Passenger behaviour

[Incrediblejimmy]

Short question for experienced players on rates, frequencies and passenger preferences:

If I connect Station A with Station B with two identical trains in the following three methods, will there be a difference in line usage or profit:

1. One Line A <-> B with 2 Trains

2. Two Lines A <-> B with 1 Train each

3. One Line A -> B -> A -> B with 2 Trains

Its obvious in terms of the real frequencies and rates all three are in sum identical, so the question is how the game takes this into account if the lines frequencies and rates are different.

[Autocoach]

1. Is the best .
2. One line will be preferred over the other - the one that is or it thinks is quicker.
3. One of the stops will probably be preferred over the other so one of the Bs will get more passengers .

Frequency does not appear to be considered only how quick a line actually is using the same calculation as the 'rate' calculation.

[Martin]

1 is best unless you're connecting 3 cities together, then you'd use 2. Or maybe 3.. but 3 would be A>B>C>B> This train would need over capacity and would run at a cost until running full.

If you're comparing using 2 sets of A>B lines in say 4 cities, where you have 2 trains running back and forth between the 2 pairs of cities, then difference in populations, need to travel etc all matter. Using more trains, should only occur when there is a need for more movement, ie if one train carries 100 passengers and you have 200 people turning up in a year.. then use 2-3 trains on the line. Having 2 trains, won't make more passengers appear.

[Incrediblejimmy]

Originally posted by Autocoach:

1. Is the best .
2. One line will be preferred over the other - the one that is or it thinks is quicker.
3. One of the stops will probably be preferred over the other so one of the Bs will get more passengers .

Frequency does not appear to be considered only how quick a line actually is using the same calculation as the 'rate' calculation.

Thats the obvious part. The question is how much impact this has - if for example two identical lines in 2) attract half as many passengers each, it wouldn't matter

[genemead]

1 is the best.
In addition, I usually have one train arriving at one station while the other train arrives at the other station. Max,constant frequency and even loads per train.

[Incrediblejimmy]

Originally posted by Martin:

1 is best unless you're connecting 3 cities together, then you'd use 2. Or maybe 3.. but 3 would be A>B>C>B> This train would need over capacity and would run at a cost until running full.

The reason I'm asking for 3) is the possibility to connect smaller cities in the same line as bigger ones without having trains run empty. So asuming A and B are big cities that easily fill the trains at a certain frequency, but C everytime only manages to fill half a train, it would be logical to have the line go:
A -> B -> A -> B -> C

But if the game doesn't "comprehend" that as frequency X in A and B and frequency 2*X in C, it would be pointless...

[Incrediblejimmy]

Originally posted by genemead:

1 is the best.
In addition, I usually have one train arriving at one station while the other train arrives at the other station. Max,constant frequency and even loads per train.

I'm aware 1 is the best, the question was how the game mechanics interpret the gap between line freq. and de facto frequencies.

[canophone]

Originally posted by Incrediblejimmy:

Originally posted by genemead:

1 is the best.
In addition, I usually have one train arriving at one station while the other train arrives at the other station. Max,constant frequency and even loads per train.

I'm aware 1 is the best, the question was how the game mechanics interpret the gap between line freq. and de facto frequencies.

They may have that answer in June. But, 1 is best path for the origin and end point line path calculation. You can see some mission script functionality (findPath()) that calculates this way (shown in TpF1's wiki). Now, if you had 4 trains doing the double turnback loop in #3.

[fux_oki]

Originally posted by Incrediblejimmy:

Short question for experienced players on rates, frequencies and passenger preferences:

If I connect Station A with Station B with two identical trains in the following three methods, will there be a difference in line usage or profit:

1. One Line A <-> B with 2 Trains

2. Two Lines A <-> B with 1 Train each

3. One Line A -> B -> A -> B with 2 Trains

Its obvious in terms of the real frequencies and rates all three are in sum identical, so the question is how the game takes this into account if the lines frequencies and rates are different.

Sorry, but I don't understand the difference between #1 and #3... #1 starts at A, goes to B and comes back to A... and #3 starts from A goes to B, comes back... isn't it the same or am I missing something?

But as most/all said: Take #1.

But I would use it differently: 1 train with 10 wagons, instead 2 trains with each 5 wagons. So you just have to use one rail and not two and save buying and operating costs for the second engine.

Why? I couldn't notice an effect of usage with "more trains on the rail -> higher frequency". In my tests it was just: Look how much people want to get from A to B (town screen -> line usage), use a train which fulfils the rate, people will use the train because it is faster (when it is faster, than cars...), build a good public transport in your two towns and the number of usage will highly increase (wrote about this in English in another post). Yesterday I had a line usage in the town A=63 % and B=70%; from A to B it was 85 and 90 %. So just max. ~20 people used the car for commuting. (If you are german speaker: Read my guide. Today I will write more about public transport.)

[Incrediblejimmy]

Originally posted by fux_oki:

Originally posted by Incrediblejimmy:

Short question for experienced players on rates, frequencies and passenger preferences:

If I connect Station A with Station B with two identical trains in the following three methods, will there be a difference in line usage or profit:

1. One Line A <-> B with 2 Trains

2. Two Lines A <-> B with 1 Train each

3. One Line A -> B -> A -> B with 2 Trains

Its obvious in terms of the real frequencies and rates all three are in sum identical, so the question is how the game takes this into account if the lines frequencies and rates are different.

Sorry, but I don't understand the difference between #1 and #3... #1 starts at A, goes to B and comes back to A... and #3 starts from A goes to B, comes back... isn't it the same or am I missing something?

But as most/all said: Take #1.

But I would use it differently: 1 train with 10 wagons, instead 2 trains with each 5 wagons. So you just have to use one rail and not two and save buying and operating costs for the second engine.

Why? I couldn't notice an effect of usage with "more trains on the rail -> higher frequency". In my tests it was just: Look how much people want to get from A to B (town screen -> line usage), use a train which fulfils the rate, people will use the train because it is faster (when it is faster, than cars...), build a good public transport in your two towns and the number of usage will highly increase (wrote about this in English in another post). Yesterday I had a line usage in the town A=63 % and B=70%; from A to B it was 85 and 90 %. So just max. ~20 people used the car for commuting. (If you are german speaker: Read my guide. Today I will write more about public transport.)

If you do a line that goes abab instead of ab, the frequency in the line manager will be double and the rate half of the ab-line - question was if that effects passenger usage or just the displayed stats in the line manager.

Line usage doesn't go down with higher frequencies? I could swear 5min works a lot better than 15...but maybe my TPF1-experience mixes into that...

[fux_oki]

Originally posted by Incrediblejimmy:

Line usage doesn't go down with higher frequencies? I could swear 5min works a lot better than 15...but maybe my TPF1-experience mixes into that...

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1066780/discussions/0/2262439317605510707/#c2262439317609442036
Here I wrote, that I used 35 horses in total (7 for each line) and it doesn't changed anything as compared to 1 horse per line. It was still at ~ 50 %.
When you use high frequency, let's say 1 min for one rail connection (rate of 100), but town A and B just swap 50 people each year, you have a oversupply -> line will make loses, because you use more than you need.
Edit: In one test I used the red Swiss train from the campaign to connect two towns. Had a usage of ~ 85 to 90 %. Would I use a second train, it wouldn't change anything, because ~10 cars drove from town B to A and why? Because I had at the corners of town A some industrie/shopping that wasn't covered with public transport. So my Opinion: A good public transport and fast vehicles for connection are the keys to "success".

Hm... #1 goes A-B, than again A-B, ... as normal. #3 is doing the same, but you justed added AB again... there shouldn't be any difference (otherweise it's not logical - for me). I think it's just a failure with the display stats.

Test it, with method #1 and #3 and see if you can recognize any big changes.

[canophone]

Originally posted by Incrediblejimmy:

Originally posted by fux_oki:

Sorry, but I don't understand the difference between #1 and #3... #1 starts at A, goes to B and comes back to A... and #3 starts from A goes to B, comes back... isn't it the same or am I missing something?

But as most/all said: Take #1.

But I would use it differently: 1 train with 10 wagons, instead 2 trains with each 5 wagons. So you just have to use one rail and not two and save buying and operating costs for the second engine.

Why? I couldn't notice an effect of usage with "more trains on the rail -> higher frequency". In my tests it was just: Look how much people want to get from A to B (town screen -> line usage), use a train which fulfils the rate, people will use the train because it is faster (when it is faster, than cars...), build a good public transport in your two towns and the number of usage will highly increase (wrote about this in English in another post). Yesterday I had a line usage in the town A=63 % and B=70%; from A to B it was 85 and 90 %. So just max. ~20 people used the car for commuting. (If you are german speaker: Read my guide. Today I will write more about public transport.)

If you do a line that goes abab instead of ab, the frequency in the line manager will be double and the rate half of the ab-line - question was if that effects passenger usage or just the displayed stats in the line manager.

Line usage doesn't go down with higher frequencies? I could swear 5min works a lot better than 15...but maybe my TPF1-experience mixes into that...

This is the LUA functionality for find path:
http://transportfever.com/wiki/script-doc/modules/game.interface.html#findPath.

The algorithm tries to find the best path between points A and B. Sometimes there can be multiple equivalent paths (as we've observed before they updated the line paths less and let us assign terminals). It's not going to see #3 as the best path, because it's not as quick as #1, especially with only half the train service on the line for #3 versus 2 on #1, despite being the same number of trains on the line (one with a double turnback loop operation). The game hasn't been made smart enough to check for the next best vehicle.

[Incrediblejimmy]

Originally posted by canophone:

Originally posted by Incrediblejimmy:

If you do a line that goes abab instead of ab, the frequency in the line manager will be double and the rate half of the ab-line - question was if that effects passenger usage or just the displayed stats in the line manager.

Line usage doesn't go down with higher frequencies? I could swear 5min works a lot better than 15...but maybe my TPF1-experience mixes into that...

This is the LUA functionality for find path:
http://transportfever.com/wiki/script-doc/modules/game.interface.html#findPath.

The algorithm tries to find the best path between points A and B. Sometimes there can be multiple equivalent paths (as we've observed before they updated the line paths less and let us assign terminals). It's not going to see #3 as the best path, because it's not as quick as #1, especially with only half the train service on the line for #3 versus 2 on #1, despite being the same number of trains on the line (one with a double turnback loop operation). The game hasn't been made smart enough to check for the next best vehicle.

I'm sry, I don't understand code...so thanks for explaining. How does it calculate a car in comparison to a train line / how do wating times or frequencies go into that opposed to travel duration?

[Autocoach]

To answer the question , I don't believe that waiting times or frequencies are considered much if at all - it is all down to travel time .

That said I'm also not sure that a comparison between road and rail is helpful as unless your rail is very slow or there is a long bus journey to get to the station .

The real bonus both in passengers travelling a long way and the growth of towns is to get far away destinations possible within the max time each passenger is prepared to travel for.

[canophone]

I'd have to see their internal code to see how they prioritize modes...

But I can see something like this:

1) findLine path exists with plane preference.
2) findLine path exists with train preference.
3) findLine path exists with tram preference.
4) findLine path exists with bus preference.
5) findLine path exists with boat preference.
6) if none of the above exists, findLine with car preference, unless walking distance.

*preferences would likely be based on proximity to major stations or stops.