Train Jump 180*

[Rafit]

Trains shouldn't jump at the station by 180*. The locomotive should disconnect itself from the train and drive the second track to the other side of the train or another locomotive should connect to train from other side. Jumping 180 * is not realistic.

[Viss Valdyr]

Originally posted by Rafit:

Trains shouldn't jump at the station by 180*. The locomotive should disconnect itself from the train and drive the second track to the other side of the train or another locomotive should connect to train from other side. Jumping 180 * is not realistic.

A person needing nearly one year to go to work and back is also not realistic. The game is about practicallibility, not "realism".

[Rafit]

Time also goes too fast. You can barely build 2-3 lines, and then just 100 years pass.
The time should go 100x slower, you are currently playing a few hours and you have 2500 year ...

[Oakshield]

Originally posted by Rafit:

Time also goes too fast. You can barely build 2-3 lines, and then just 100 years pass.
The time should go 100x slower, you are currently playing a few hours and you have 2500 year ...

Well, yeah, if you play in 4x speed, that happens.
Try to play at 1x speed instead; pause when setting up and building your lines and buying your vehiles and before you know it, one year may take you one hour.

As for "realism", trains shouldn't be as high as houses, places with just 112 citizens aren't cities but villages, the 100 cars from 1917 shouldn't be operating in 1987 etc.

The game isn't about realism, it's about having fun. And since the latter is more important to most game dev's, expect about every game having flaws because at some point realism has to be sacrified to make sure the fun part still exists.

If you really want realism combined with fun, I suggest you take a look at the train sims instead. Although in those you most likely drive them back and forth and don't have much influence at how the line runs.

Thorin :)

[genemead]

You don't want trains to "instantly reverse" at a station? Build a loop w/waypoint(s).
In the meantime, I want a playable game. If I want a "realistic" game, I go play Trainz.

[pkk]

I agree that trains should not just jump around.
This would provide for more interesting gameplay, as there would be an advantage to using trains that can run both ways.
Even for normal trains, there would be an incentive to use engines that can run at nearly the smae speed both ways (such as the VIc) over other engines. Engines that can run fast forward only would then benefit from having a turntable at the terminus.

Getting away from instant train reversal could make gameplay more interesting.

[canophone]

In the last patch of Transport Fever, the developers made it possible so you don't have to see vehicles turn around! I don't see this as an essential request, especially that trains do often reverse, sometimes to go in a loop to change direction from a terminal station that you can only enter from one end. The game just cuts that out as a requirement for lines.

[Steve]

The turning around at stations is also a pet peeve of mine, I'd prefer to see the locomotives being uncoupled. However, the game needs to be playable, so it could go both ways. The game could get some more complexity and push-pull trains and trainsets will have an extra advantage. Or you need to micromanage too much at the end of every trainline.

[MarkyT]

Originally posted by SteveMaxx:

The turning around at stations is also a pet peeve of mine, I'd prefer to see the locomotives being uncoupled. However, the game needs to be playable, so it could go both ways. The game could get some more complexity and push-pull trains and trainsets will have an extra advantage. Or you need to micromanage too much at the end of every trainline.

For non multi-unit and driving trailer trains, instead of the traditional magic switcheroo I suggest the locomotive changes ends, with varying time delays, leaving the wagons in the same place and orientation. In real life there are two ways a train reverses at a terminus. Either the original loco 'runs around' the rolling stock on a parallel track and couples up at the other end, or a fresh loco couples up on the other end and the train leaves the old loco behind at the buffer stop. The original loco then follows the train out of the station to wait in a siding for the next train, visiting a turntable or wye track to turn around if appropriate. The timing of these operations differ. A run round can take longer than a substitution, but for the latter you need an extra loco available at that terminus and turning introduces further time into that operation. At a big city terminus you might wish to employ substitution to minimise platform occupancy, while at the other more rural end of a line you might use a slower run round. These methods could be options for the player at a terminus. Substitution would be more expensive as it requires an extra locomotive. Not one extra for every train but one (or sometimes more) for the whole line at that terminus depending on the cycle time of the loco turn-round, Substitution would always be quicker for the train though than run-round, which would be slower but cheaper. You wouldn't actually need to provide all the extra parallel tracks, wyes, turntables etc for this, but at least the operational sim would be more realistic in terms of timing and trains would not be magically flipping any more. With the sim allowing time for all these prototypical shunting moves to take place, it leaves the possibility open to actually add in the extra facilities and animations in the future.

[General Tso]

You make some good points MarkyT.

Since there is going to be modular train stations in TF2. Maybe they could include the option to have a engine house at either end of the station. If both engine houses exist then the player has the option to enable "real reversing". Where the engine at one end moves into the engine house nearest to it. And another engine of the same kind reverses out of the other engine house and connects to the other end of the train.

That way wagons do not reverse and the engines only reverse inside engine houses.

[genemead]

Which involves the expense of larger stations, micro-managing manually switching engines, the expense of dual engines, the addition of the ability to couple/uncouple cars, etc. just because some people don't like trains "magically" flipping (which is quite a simple solution for going the other direction).

Why don't we like loops? There's a simple way: 2 platforms at each station, dual tracks between stations. Go A1 to B1, loop around to B2 then go the other way to A2 and loop back to A1 again. One track for one direction, the other track for the other direction. You could use just 1 platform and 1 track at/between stations, but then you couldn't use multiple units (depending on the number of signals).

[MarkyT]

Originally posted by genemead:

Which involves the expense of larger stations, micro-managing manually switching engines, the expense of dual engines, the addition of the ability to couple/uncouple cars, etc. just because some people don't like trains "magically" flipping (which is quite a simple solution for going the other direction).

Ah, don't we like loops?

Loops are not realistic in most circumstances, especially when fitting passenger stations into urban areas and can be tricky and expensive to implement in hilly areas. Once multiple unit or push pull trains are available with cab control at either end the problem goes away but in the mean time a more realistic simulation is really required and it should reflect the disadvantages and other characteristics of the older haulage methods like the time to run round and the fact that not all steam engines turned round when reversing if they were designed to be able to go backwards at a reasonable speed. Rather than having to create lots of extra facilities, I was thinking about a simple check option in line orders wherever a reversal is detected for non multiple unit trains. It would be default set to 'run-round' or could alternatively be 'relief' for substitution, each of which would have their own time delays which would in turn could be varied according to whether the loco was to be turned or not. For run-round the loco would disappear from the leading end of the train and after a delay would reappear at the other end of the string of wagons. The delay might be longer if turning is required for the engine to perform at best forward speed but that might be overridden to save time say for a short shunt back into a yard. For relief the engine on the rear end would appear magically before the front engine disappears. The time delay for relief would be less than for run-round but might be varied similarly according to whether turning takes place. This idea needn't affect gameplay at all except perhaps to more realistically extend the default minimum turn-round time with a locomotive run-round manoeuvre.

[genemead]

Originally posted by MarkyT:

The delay might be longer if turning is required for the engine to perform at best forward speed but that might be overridden to save time say for a short shunt back into a yard. For relief the engine on the rear end would appear magically before the front engine disappears. The time delay for relief would be less than for run-round but might be varied similarly according to whether turning takes place. This idea needn't affect gameplay at all except perhaps to more realistically extend the default minimum turn-round time with a locomotive run-round manoeuvre.

Huh? What's the difference between this and the train magically flipping around? I'll take flipping any day over that micro-management.

TPF is NOT a sim! It's not realistic. "Flipping" is the least of your problems. IF the developers add "no flipping" I hope it's an option that I can turn off.

[canophone]

This whole time delay already exists. Just add a station that has the "full load" order and set the wait time.

[MarkyT]

Originally posted by canophone:

This whole time delay already exists. Just add a station that has the "full load" order and set the wait time.

And that full load order restarts the wait timer every time a new passenger arrives so its useless for setting any defined wait time for synchronisation. I'd like some better control over that wait time regardless of minimum turn-round time. It needn't be a great deal of micromanaged required at all as it could just default to one type of operation and the turn-round time penalties applied automatically. When you upgrade the line to multiple unit operation later the minimum turn-round would be automatically readjusted with a significant reduction. Graphically I think the engine disappearing from one end and of the train and reappearing at the other would look much better than the whole train flipping, as at least the start and end conditions would be far more realistic. Flipping could be reapplied globally of course if a player so desired, but if you're using old steam trains with run round it should automatically affect the time it takes to turn round nonetheless or the cost of switching between multiple locomotives.

[canophone]

No, you can add a station that's opposite to the wagons' type, and it's guaranteed to wait the set time >99.999% of the time. Especially if you also have unload only at its previous stop.