Depends on your group
- Our take
- Opinion is split but mostly positive for repeat players. A BGG first-impressions review (Aug 2026) calls it effectively one extra auxiliary action (branchlets) that gives delivery and scoring options, says it fixes the old problem of one player grabbing every end-game station token, and says the reviewer now mixes the pieces into the base box and will not play without it; the BGG rating is 8.6 from about 1.1K ratings. A r/boardgames thread on teaching the 2nd edition finds some saying include it for experienced players (one says it fixes the game with much less chance of being unable to deliver), while others call it extra and fiddly, say it complicates a complex game and adds balance issues at higher levels, or prefer the Argentina or New Zealand standalones. A Reddit best-iteration thread has votes for 2e plus Rails (one group plays it every time) but also a player who found the branchlet mini-game stale quickly. The 2019 BGG thread on the 1st-edition version argues builder strategy becomes too strong, which many replies dispute; those concerns are about the first printing and may not match the 2nd edition rework. Net: good for people who already like the base game, not for a first teach.
- What you need first
- Just the base game