East Coastway

Discussion in 'Suggestions' started by sophieclarke1983, Feb 28, 2020.

  1. sophieclarke1983

    sophieclarke1983 Well-Known Member

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    I’ve got a good idea how about expanding east coastway as there is a whole cache of destinations in the Mitrac destination controller some nor even that far from Brighton that would enhance the offering and give multiple routes out of Brighton as seems pointless to me having all those destinations if you cannot even serve a few of them over and above Seaford lewes snd Eastbourne
     
  2. Tonto62

    Tonto62 Well-Known Member

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    They don't / can't / won't, do extensions.
     
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  3. chieflongshin

    chieflongshin Well-Known Member

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    I was disappointed with this add on. Just didn’t captivate at all.
     
  4. Factor41

    Factor41 Well-Known Member

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    The can't seems wrong to me. I think the issue would be that if a timetabled route was amended to extend past the point where it ends in the game, there would be an issue with registering the completions of the service - some people would have done the shorter version, new players would need to do the long, and given how flaky the the setup is at the moment, something would definitely go awry. However, I think they could expand the timetables for new routes without changing the existing ones; if they added a new branch and loco to LIRR, for example, and added in new timetabled services to those destinations which didn't affect any of the existing times or services, that should be simpler to do without it cocking everything up. I don't have ECW to know where that would be possible, but surely there are options.
     
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  5. Tonto62

    Tonto62 Well-Known Member

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    I know very little about the actual process of building a simulation and when I first started on this tsw journey I thought the obvious way to build new content was to use what you already had and add to it. For example, the Trans Pennine has loads of options for add on routes, some of which are already started in the present dlc. When I mentioned this on a Facebook group I got pretty well shot down in flames. I was told that each route is a fixed entity which cannot be added to. To do so would mean building the whole thing again with the extra bits included. For this reason, I've pretty much given up hoping for anything interesting happening with the routes I already own. I suppose the business model they're following is to build more and more new routes to appeal to as broad an audience as possible. Their original customers either embrace this or get left behind and at the moment I'm on the platform watching the train leave. I haven't bought anything since the class 31 last November since none of it appeals to me and when East Coastway is voted the best dlc on a Facebook group I realise I'm out of step with the majority. This "hobby" is the most passive activity I've ever been involved with. We have no control over the routes we buy, we can't alter anything, we can't decide to run something different, we can't run a special to that industrial siding near Eaglescliffe. We just have to wait and hope that something that interests us is offered but whatever it is, it won't join up with what we've already got, which is a shame.
     
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  6. Factor41

    Factor41 Well-Known Member

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    I think that maybe that's people who used to build from existing content on TS getting salty that they can't use 'cooked' assets in UE4-based TSW (if an editor were to ever appear). Since DTG have all of the original 'raw' files, there's doesn't seem to be any logic to the suggestion that they couldn't add in a new branch to an existing line then re-package up the whole thing again. The existing tracks, stations and start point references would all be the same, and new services could have new end points. I suspect the real issue is that an update to an existing DLC would make it harder to charge for it.
     
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  7. Tonto62

    Tonto62 Well-Known Member

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    Perhaps their assumption is that people won't spend money on an extended route as most of what they'd be buying they would already have paid for. Leeds to York is about 24 miles, the standard price of £25 would be a bit excessive for most people but if it was tacked onto the existing Trans Pennine route I'm sure it would sell very well and it would be building a network instead of the fragmented approach we have at present. Let's face it, on current evidence, they're never going to build a long route so extensions are the only way it can happen.
     
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  8. Trim

    Trim Active Member

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    My guess - and it is a guess - would be that Manchester to York would be a completely separate route from Manchester to Leeds because it would need its own timetable. The same would be true of any other geographical extension to an existing route.

    Notice how existing add-ons do literally just add things on to the base route; the basic timetable does not change to accommodate anything extra from the add-on, and any changes that are needed have to be built in to the vanilla route. You can see this from looking at the ordinary Northern Transpennine timetable (without BR Heavy Freight installed) where the 16:04 Manchester - Leeds DMU gets 10 minutes to get from Huddersfield to Deighton instead of the usual 4, for no apparent reason. When you install BR Heavy Freight, you can see why it gets this extra time, because heavy oil train 6E67 overtakes the DMU in Huddersfield and then runs in front of it. This is a piece of ridiculous pathing, but that is by the by.

    I'd love to see Healey Mills added to NTP, and for Manchester Exchange and the eastern end of Leeds to be driveable so we could have loco releases and ECS movements at the beginning and end of the day, but these would have to be a general update to the NTP route. I don't see how they could be a separate, charged-for DLC.
     
    Last edited: Mar 4, 2020
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  9. Tonto62

    Tonto62 Well-Known Member

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    Well, from travelling on these trains in the 1970s, the Manchester to Leeds trains actually started in Liverpool and carried on through Leeds to York and on to Newcastle so they would use the same timetable, just extended to York.
     
  10. Trim

    Trim Active Member

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    That's the problem. If there were no through trains, I expect a geographical route extension would be possible as all the trains on the extension route would be in addition to those on the original route. However, I don't think there is any way a Manchester - Leeds train in NTP can be turned into a Manchester - York train in a Leeds - York extension DLC. If you want a Leeds - York DLC then it would either have to be standalone and terminate in Leeds, or else it would need a duplicate copy of NTP added to it to turn it into a Manchester - York route which would sit in your list of routes alongside NTP. The same thing goes for extensions to East Coastway, of course.
     
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