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21
Pak128.Britain-Ex / Steam trams
Last post by MCollett -
In the real world, electric trams were strongly preferred to steam trams from quite early on.  By the 1890s, any newly-built tram systems would almost certainly have been electric, and existing steam systems were being converted to electric.  But in pak128.Britain Exp. as it currently stands, steam trams are strongly competitive with electric, at least until 1899 and arguably right up until they become unavailable in 1902.  

So I wondered, where is the error?  Should steam trams be more expensive to run? Are they too powerful (the tractive effort does look rather high)? Or should electrification be cheaper?

Answer: none of the above.  In the current pak, steam trams have a maximum speed of 40 km/hr.  It seems that they were in fact legally required to be governed to a much lower speed, although there is some disagreement about what that speed was (it may have varied with time or even with place). Wikipedia says 12km/hr,  this picture caption says 8mph (13km/hr) and The Encyclopaedia of Plymouth History says 10mph (16km/hr).

Of course, that raises a different question.  If steam trams are so slow, why bother with them instead of horses?  And the answer to that, which opens a completely different can of worms, is that horses were in fact (a) even slower (perhaps only 5mph), and (b) significantly more expensive to run; neither of which are true in the pak at present.

Best wishes,
Matthew
22
Simutrans-Extended gameplay discussion / [New release] Simutrans-Experimental 11.2
Last post by jamespetts -
A new version of Simutrans-Experimental is available to-day: Simutrans 112.3 Experimental 11.2. See here for more information on how to download, install and set up the latest version. For those already familiar with the installation and setup, here are some quick links:

Edit: Updated the list to include a link to Mac OS X binaries.

Note that the Windows binaries contain the Windows version of the no-graphics server, Makeobj and Nettool, and the Linux server binary contains the Linux version of Nettool.

This is a minor bug fixing release, and now includes the Windows command line server version, which now works. The last major release was Simutrans-Experimental 11.0, which contained significant enhancements over the previous version.


A full list of changes follows.

Changes since 11.1

  • FIX: Compile error for command line server.
  • REVERT: "FIX: endless waiting before long block signals direct in front of stations": this was not the correct fix and caused convoys to skip stations after a long block signal.
  • FIX: Bridges of any length could be built over deep water.
  • CHANGE: Players can now set whether access is given to the public player (albeit in most cases the public player overrides the lack of access, but is mainly relevant to whether city cars may use player roads). This access is now given by default.
  • CHANGE: The public player can now connect power lines to any other player's power lines.
  • FIX: Do not set reverse waypoint data for aircraft.
  • FIX: Possible crashes with aircraft with faulty routes on occasions
  • FIX: P****engers, mail and goods would walk/be hand-hauled to their ultimate destination if any intermediate stop was in walking distance of their ultimate destination, even if a further transport link would get them there more quickly.
  • FIX: Aircraft would sometimes get stuck when flying over taxiways
Feedback and testing

Thanks also to all those who have tested Simutrans-Experimental and provided useful feedback: it is very much appreciated. Any feedback from this version would, as ever, also be very much appreciated, including (1) the new features introduced in 11.0 (see here); (2) online play (see here for a list of Simutrans-Experimental servers); (3) general bug reports; (4) information as to how well-balanced that the game is; (5) any difference in approach/strategy needed for Simutrans-Experimental as over Simutrans-Standard; and (6) any other useful feedback.

I should also be grateful for feedback on how the performance of this version compares to recent previous versions (10.27 and earlier).

I shall bid people good playing, and look forward to any feedback!

Note

This topic is locked, as it is intended to serve as an announcement. To report a bug or otherwise give feedback, please start a new thread for each bug/topic. To ask a question about how to obtain Simutrans-Experimental, use this thread.
23
Simutrans-Extended development / Steel Mill orders huge amounts of coal
Last post by Jando -
Sorry, another thing I noticed on my current map. No idea whether bug or strange feature - and please tell me if I should stop to report these little things. I don't want to annoy you guys with strange features you probably know much better than I do.

Anyway, the steel mill has now ordered enough coal to cover it's demand for the next 4 years or so, clogging up the harbour to constant overcrowded status. Monthly demand: 160 tons, amount of coal shipped to the harbour: 7082 tons. Screenshot here: http://i.imgur.com/kJ1b97b.jpg

I have no idea whether the clerks at that steel mill ever stop, but I've noticed other industries stopping to accept deliveries much earlier.

24
Pak128 Add-ons and Graphics / Monorail Cleanup
Last post by Djohaal -
A minor project I started.
I find the monorail sprites in simutrans a bit too cluttered so I edited them to remove the diagonal struts (a bit unreallistic, but yeah) on the track segment sections, and fixed transparent pixel strips in the support struts which caused the game's downsampler to get fudgy at some spots. So far here's the result: