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Messages - Lord Vetinari

1
Extension Requests / Re: Idea: double-lane road (normal street) should be wide as doubletrack railroad
Well, in rl trams that runs through a street can be stuck in traffic and must obey road rules, so making roads that looks like tracks is actually realistic, not an half functioning workaround.

I'm just speculating: if we could make a new kind of road vehicle, "streetcars", and a set of ways made of a complete set of tracks on top of the road that allows any kind of road traffic plus a complete set of tracks only that allows only streetcars (never tried it, but it's like the old bus lane addon for pak 128, I suppose...?), and make sure, if possible, that cities won't take over and replace those roads, than we could have a realistic double track tramways.
Those will be less functional than current tram tracks because of traffic, but advantages, aside from the lower cost of contruction because of the two direction on the same tile, could be that streetcars, being potentially longer than a bus, could carry more p****engers and being electric have lower running costs.
Current tram tracks could still be used for something like premetro/light rails.

2
Extension Requests / Re: P****engers and goods generation timeline
Quote from: prissi – on
At lest pak 64 addreses this by lower levels for houses compared to later years. As such the maximum number of poeple generated at a certain stop will be lower.

That worked better before engines like the locomotive Eagle were added to the pack.
Also, even pak Britain has low level buildings in 1800. However, if you connect five or six cities, you get overflowed by p****engers, at an amount that no 40km/h or less vehicle can handle. Trains are too slow and have a very small capacity, ships can carry a lot of things but are even slower than trains, cart arn't any good unless you need a really short two stop shuttle, and even so it can be tricky to manage.
The same happens with goods if the industry network is somewhat developed at the beginning (aka, if you choose a relatively high number of industry chains at map generation)

Quote from: prissi – on
But honestly: Before 1800 nearly nobody travelled further than "in-village". In many place actually leave the own village was a forbidden. At that point of time providing a simulation of transport is not realisitic at all.

Right, but I was talking exactly of 1800. It's a fascinating era, some paks have a lot of content for it.
3
Extension Requests / Re: P****engers and goods generation timeline
Your suggestion seems more realistic, which is good.
I suggested a manual timeline because I imagine that such thing will be a parameter that will be put in simuconf like station coverage or the present p****enger generation rate, and thus easier to balance according to the features of the pak and modifiable by players according to personal taste.
4
Extension Requests / P****engers and goods generation timeline
Some paks have a lot of contents for an early start (mainly pak Britain is fully playable since the first half of the 19th century, but also pak 64 has old vehicles and I suppose that also the future pak USA will have 19th century stuff). The problem is that the simulation seems to be based on more modern times. It's really hard, if not impossible, to have those old, slow and small vehicles to provide a decent service at the current p****engers and goods generation rate. Even ships, that can carry a lot of units, aren't enough to avoid overcrowding because of the low speed.

Problem is that in rl 19th century there was a lot smaller demand for transport. Experimental simulates this with travel time tolerance and comfort for p****engers, but I think that standard too needs to address the issue somehow.
I'm suggesting a timetable for the amount and speed of the generation, so that pak mantainers can set different behaviours for different ages.
5
Extension Requests / Re: No transfer at overcrowded stations.
Yes, the more I think about the automatic option, the more it seems a bad idea.

But what about the manual option? In that case there souldn't be any additional calculation time or random result, as it's all set by the player. If not at the stop, it could be done in the line schedule.
7
Extension Requests / No transfer at overcrowded stations.
I know that there's the "no route over overcrowded" option in simuconf, but I mean something a little different.

In late games, the network can be quite complex, and usually you end up with more than one transfer option for the same destination. The game chooses the first one available (which is good, it makes the things predictable), and stick to that even if it becomes overcrowded. I'm suggesting that if the first transfer option is overcrowded, the next time the route is calculated, the next option is chosen. If no other transfers are available, normal behaviour is applied.

Or, if this is too hard or requires too many computing power, an option in the station dialogue window to manually switch off the transfers at that stop (even better if you can choose which lines can't transfer there, so that you can still use, for example, buses to feed up the station/dock/airport, but you can't transfer from a train or ship to another) can work as well.
9
Simutrans Help Center / Goods loading problem
I never seriously played a goods game (usually I use goods to start my company and then go for p****engers only), now I'm giving it a try.

My problem is this: I have two large stations, let's say A and B. A serves, among other things, a grain mill and a clothes factory. B serves a bakery connected to the grain mill and a clothes shop connected to the factory. Both flour and clothes are piece goods, so they are transported by the same kind of vehicles.
I can't figure out how to transport them regularly: either flour or clothes pile up in A untill all the stock of the other good is transported to B. Adding more vehicles is not an answer, as I already have some traffic problem and also when I add too many vehicles the line starts to loose money. There's something I can do apart from destroying B and replacing it with two smaller stations?

Since we are on topic, industry chains are popping out way too fast for my tastes. I remember that there is a parameter in simuconf that changes that, but I can't find it.
Also, if I set it now, will it affect my current game? Is there a way to turn off the industry growth at all?
10
Pak128.Britain Bug Reports / [v294 - Simutrans Standard] Fishports grow away from water
As the title says, a new fishport chain just popped in the middle of the land, several tiles away from the nearest water tile.
All older fishports (I started this game a long time ago, with other version of the pak) are onj the coastlines, in the right place, so I suppose that the issue is related to the latest version.
11
Extension Requests / Re: Click'n'drag for raise/lower land tools
Quote from: prissi – on
The bulldozer/raise/lower tool works like that since several versions ...

I think that Isaac ment a selection-like movement. I.e. click, drag and the entire rectangle defined by that movement gets terraformed. Last version I tried was r3453 and terraforming didn't work that way.

I support this, I too like to edit my map extensively before starting to play.
12
Simutrans Help Center / Re: Why do so many people want to go to Milton Keynes?
I've seen that there are other destinations from Preston Stop. Are all served by the same line? As far as I know, in Simutrans people will wait for a bus, train or whatever at the stops for their entire life. Call them faithfull customers ;D
So, even if the number of p****engers generated to Milton Keyins is very small, it's possible that they are piling up because there is no room on your vehicles.

If there are stops between Preston Stop and Milton Keynes Parish Hall stops: vehicles always pick up the p****engers for the next stop first, then, if there is other room, the ones for the second stop, then the third, and so on. If the line is very long or if the vehicles have small capacity, it's entirely possible that the p****engers for the last stops are never picked up, so they start to pile up and the stop gets overcrowded.

If MK Parish Hall is the next stop but Preston is not the first stop in the line, it's possible that the vehicle gets full in the previous stops, so there is no room to pick up other p****engers at Preston, so they start to pile up and the station, again, gets overcrowded.

Try to follow closely one of your vehicles in the line for some time.
If one of those is your case, just add another parallel express route with fewer stops .
It seems that you are playing with pak Britain: if you are still in XIXth century, your only street vehicls are horse coaches, which in my experience are all too small to efficently serve a multiple stop line. they can be enough for a two stop shuttle, but not more. Trams are a little bit better, but not much. Before XXth century, IMHO, trains are the only viable option for a smoothly working (and profitable) p****engers network, even if they are expansive. If you'd like to, you can actually run trains on tram tracks.
13
Simutrans Help Center / Re: Building tunnels
If you use CTRL+click, you also need at least a single empty tile underground in front of the entrance the entrance, otherwise you still get that message.
14
Pak128.Britain Bug Reports / Re: [r 3453] Small graphic glitch
No, but I missed a couple of game and pak nightlies.

I thought this was a game bug because I tested on this version of the game a couple of old pak.Britain release (which enver had this problem before), and I experienced this glitch with all of them.
16
Simutrans Help Center / Re: Cities
If you mean automatically during the map creation, you can't, as far as I know. You can however plop new cities with the player's money during the normal gameplay, so you can start a new game without cities (just change the "number of cities" value to 0 in the map creation window) and plop them manually.

The button used to plop new cities is in the special contruction tool menu.
17
Extension Requests / Re: upgrade stations ? more !
Quote from: Lmallet – on
I had the same thought, but then again the upgrade button could check every station tile and determine which ones are up to date and which ones needs to be updated.  The upgrade button would then upgrade all out of date tiles in the station.  There could also be a field somewhere in the box indicating how much the upgrade would cost, but I am wondering if all this additional checking would add a lot to the Simutrans "load".  (I guess the button should be called "modernize", as upgrade is not quite the right term).

Other option I was thinking, was since you have to pay maintenance on the station, simply consider modernization as part of standard maintenance.  Then again I am sure someone is going to ask "well what if I don't want to modernize my station".  You just can't win.  :)

I'd say that the CTL+click option is better, if I understood well your proposal. What will happen with your system when there are two possible updated versions available at the same time?
20
Extension Requests / Re: Rail depots with built in choose signal
Quote from: prissi – on
Ich cannot starte a train if there is not enough free space of track to be resevered. I think you want to start many trains even if they cannot leave teh depot currently.


Do you meen free space with or without the platform? Maybe that's the problem.

This is my usual layout:

Station -> couple of tiles of switch area, depending on the size of the station -> depot.
Where there is enough room, I add a couple of tiles of track between the depot and the switch area, so that I can put a choose signal on it (in this case, the station became so big that I had no more space for that). In the first part of my games it works.
21
Extension Requests / Re: Rail depots with built in choose signal
The last version I've played is r3317, but I've seen this on other nightlies too. Not a fresh game, though, I loaded a savegame.

I honestly don't remember what was the behaviour of the last stable, it's been a while since I played it.
22
Extension Requests / Rail depots with built in choose signal
It seems that currently you can't start a train from the depot if the platform it's scheduled to stop at is used by another train, even if there is a choose signal between the depot and the station and there are other empty platforms. Or, at least, this is my experience in my games; in later stages of the games, when there are more lines and more trains per line, this behaviour can be a problem when you try to add new trains or replace old ones.

I think that it would be better if trains can choose an empty platform right from inside the depot, or, if this is a problem, if at least they can leave the depot as long as the track untill the next signal is empty, no matter what's the state of their scheduled platforms.
23
Simutrans Gaming Discussion / Re: Poll: Public Service...trick or treat?
I use it a lot: to edit maps (like adding or reshaping hills or mountains, rivers, connect water body which are close to each other, etc.), plan the road grid of cities (which I feel that can be very broken if left entirely to the engine) and manually place industries, as in my games it always seems that there are too many producers and not enough consumers. I don't think that this is cheating; actually I'd like to have more powerfull editing and terraforming tools.

Never used it to build tracks or stations.
28
Pak128.Britain Bug Reports / Problem with may 10 (v 280) nightly
It seems that I can't run it. I mean, I can load the pak at the startup, but the game crashes as soon as I try to load an old game or start a new one with the error:

Quote

****ertion Fail!

Program: ...\simutrans\sim-winsdl.exe
File: simfab.cc
Line: 220

Expression: plan

Currently I have installed Simutrans r3233, sdl version, but the same error happens with r3192 sdl (which I used without problems untill a couple of days ago with pak Britain 1.07) and all GDI versions.

I also tried a fresh install of the game, but nothing changed.
All other paksets (well, at least pak 64, 128 and 128.Japan) work fine.

I still think that it can be a problem on my end, but I can't figure out what it may be...
31
Pak128.Britain Bug Reports / Strange graphic glitch


There's this white box around the top of the shops and offices building that grows from 1880. It's there on every single building of that kind that popped on the map.
The strange thing is that it appeared only after I loaded the savegame. The building popped yesterday night and it looked perfectly fine.

I'm sure that the white box is connected with that particular building, as it desappeared when I destroyed it.
33
Simutrans Monthly Screenshot Contest Archive / Re: SMSC May Edition: downtown


Pak 64.
City of Hillborough (the game chose the name).
City Size: 43.111
Downtown with central railway station and tram tracks.
Although I layed down manually the dual carriages roads, the city itself developed to the present stage naturally during gameplay, without cheats.
The city has a total of 10 tram lines (although two of them are clockwise and counterclockwise services of a circle line, so you mey count them as a single line) and three subways (not showed in the image, of course), all of them crossing at Central Station.
Other three neighbouring cities joined the metropolitan area, all served by trams and subways.

PS sorry for those two income signs. Anyone knows how to disable them? It's a very busy station, it's hard to have a perfectly clear shot.
34
Extension Requests / Buildings under bridges and viaducts
I'm not asking to be able to drag bridges over existing buildings, quite the contrary.
I build a viaduct over empty land, a couple of years p****, a nearby city grows or a new industry chain starts, and I end up with skyscrapers or chimneys popping through my elevated ways. Is it possible to limit the size of the buildings that can grow under a bridge or a viaduct?
I know it's not a crucial issue, just wanted to point it out.
35
Pak128.Britain / Re: Realism VS gameplay: a couple of balance issues
Quote from: jamespetts – on
Turning finally to Lord Vetinari's points: I am not sure what is meant by Simutrans being programmed for a linear increase of vehicle capacity and capability. For a long time, Simutrans-Standard has used speedbonus.tab instead of the average of current vehicles to determine the speed bonus, so the increase can be as linear or non-linear as one likes.

You're right, I didn't explain myself, sorry. I ment that, in my experience, the gameplay is smoother if each vehicle generation is somehow faster, powerfull and can carry a little bit more p****engers than the previous ones, while I feel that there are some big gaps in the early years of Pak Britain.
Another small example, this time is the opposite of the previous one: in 1847 Jenny Lind becomes available and suddently I can run 8 tiles trains at full speed without any problem, when all the previous engines could pull only a 3 tiles train at full speed and the Patentee alone could manage to pull a 4 tiles train whith a bearable speed penalty.
From Jenny Lind onward, there will be no problems at running full length trains (24 cars in the consist is the maximum limits) until 1870.

Again, I understand that those gaps are historical facts, I'm just looking at the gameplay side of the question.

Quote from: jamespetts – on
Whilst it is true that it can be harder to squeeze in infrastructure to densely populated areas in Simutrans than in reality, I think that, in the context of the issue raised about vehicle lengths and capacities, the issue is somewhat marginal: the game would not be realistic if one didn't have to lengthen one's platforms at some point in the 19th century (and would be impossible to balance if it required having the same platform length from start to end).

Sorry, that's not what I ment. The game doesn't know that it's 19th century (or, better said, it works exactly the same way in 19th and in 21st century).
As soon as I expand the network and/or connected cities grow, there will be "natural" reasons to update the infrastructures, way before the end of the 19th century, as the amount of p****engers will rise, thus requiring trains with more cars. This is perfectly fine, it's fair game challenge. I'm saying that is not good gameplay to force the player to expand the stations just to have the same amount of cars that carries the exact same amount of p****engers as before (especially given that, in game terms, the size of the station is related to the catchment area and doesn't just affect the amount of cars that can load and unload there).