PC Class 20 Tutorial Insufficient

Discussion in 'Troubleshooting' started by LastTrainToClarksville, Jun 24, 2020.

  1. LastTrainToClarksville

    LastTrainToClarksville Well-Known Member

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    Since engine DLC manuals are no longer being supplied and tutorials cover only a limited range of operations, we're left guessing about even the most basic techniques.
    For example, there's nothing anywhere, including Carson Young's document, about changing cabs in a two-engine lash-up. The first available timetable session for this engine involves front coupling a pair of engines to a rack of wagons and then driving those wagons to a destination. To me, driving in reverse all that way makes no sense, so I've guessed at shutting down the cab of the initially driven engine and starting up the other engine, but I cannot seem to shut down the train brake in the first engine before moving to the second.

    Leaving us without manuals and with incomplete tutorials is just plain disgraceful, in my unhumble opinion.
     
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  2. Anthony Pecoraro

    Anthony Pecoraro Well-Known Member

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    Lift the brake pin.
     
  3. LastTrainToClarksville

    LastTrainToClarksville Well-Known Member

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    Sorry, Anthony, but that's no help unless you "show me" (I am from Missouri) where the brake pin is located. It isn't noted in Cameron Young's guide.
     
  4. Tonto62

    Tonto62 Well-Known Member

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    To put the train brake in shutdown, push the brake lever into emergency, then push it again until it goes into shutdown.
     
  5. Anthony Pecoraro

    Anthony Pecoraro Well-Known Member

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    You have to either wait for the brake pin to go up or manually lift it first.
     
  6. Gae14

    Gae14 Active Member

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  7. Anthony Pecoraro

    Anthony Pecoraro Well-Known Member

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  8. Plastic Pal

    Plastic Pal Well-Known Member

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    Oh My Gosh....! This is a very negative thread about the Class 20. You seem to be implying that the package on offer is somehow less than perfect...!

    Look, just because TSW's senior producer did the voice for the Class 20 tutorials, and very clearly guides you to refer to the manual.... um, ............that's no reason to be displeased about the lack of a manual. I thought the optimism expressed in that moment was quite charming.

    Personally, I love being left guessing. Why would you want to know what you are supposed to do? It's not real life, you know. It's not as if some factory in real life is not going to get their steel if you can't start the engine. It's just a game! Crikey - you take things so seriously...!

    One of the best things about the Class 20 is that they rushed it out to us ASAP, without completing any real content for the wagons. Thankfully, key features like the refuelling cap can't be used (unless on WSR, maybe), and the friendly tease is that one of the scenarios starts you off right next to the refulleing rig....! Maybe they decided to scrap the function after they had the problem with the Class 33.... you know, the bug that suddenly appeared when they released OSD.... and the ethanol filling process wrecked the Class 33 refuelling function.......

    Less is more, as they say.
     
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  9. LastTrainToClarksville

    LastTrainToClarksville Well-Known Member

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    I tried that multiple times with both the mouse and the keyboard, but the lever won't move past emergency.
     
  10. TrainSim_Fan

    TrainSim_Fan Well-Known Member

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    PlasticPal I agree with most things you said in that comment. :)
     
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  11. LastTrainToClarksville

    LastTrainToClarksville Well-Known Member

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    Close, but no cigar: 20200625143012_1.jpg

    And, a tip of the hat to Anthony: eventually, the pin does pop up by itself.
    So, with that problem solved, I switched to the forward engine and reached Eaglescliff Platform 1 with no further difficulties. However, after a second or two another instruction appeared, telling me to exit the cab, which I did. The 2D map showed a destination marker alongside the train's last car, but when I got there the marker was no where to be found in the "3D" world: just one of those book-topped obelisks that serve as a gateway to another activity. My only guess is that whoever hastily assembled this session thought that the engines were still at the rear of the wagons. Good grief!

    Ah, well, another RRS adventure. And, yes, I still like TSW: warts and all.
     
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  12. Tonto62

    Tonto62 Well-Known Member

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    Just trying to help. We don't have a mouse on the PlayStation so I just told you what works every time for me using the controller. Anyway, glad you figured it out in the end.
     
  13. TrainSim_Fan

    TrainSim_Fan Well-Known Member

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    So, I've tried this on my PC to no-avail but................for some reason it works on my Xbox, so it seems to be connected to the PC and Playstation.
     
  14. Anthony Pecoraro

    Anthony Pecoraro Well-Known Member

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    You can also click the pin and lift it yourself.
     
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  15. LastTrainToClarksville

    LastTrainToClarksville Well-Known Member

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    All these things that DTG doesn't bother to tell us because, evidently, they no longer think that user manuals are worth the trouble despite the fact that many of us value them.
    [Who am I kidding? Helpful details like these probably wouldn't appear in a manual anyway.]
     
  16. Plastic Pal

    Plastic Pal Well-Known Member

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    The problem with manuals was created when someone created the OSD manual, which described a network of represented railway that was double what was really on offer.

    So... with any new manual, there is a risk that it will detail the original specification for a product, and not the cut down rushed-out final version. Maybe the Class 20 had a scenario which involved refuelling (but now sliced down...?). Maybe there were x20 services with the PGAs planned, but they all got axed. Maybe all of this was written-up in a draft manual.... along with a load of other features like slow-speed control for the coal loader/unloader.... but they are all now incorrect. So... no manual.

    It is possible that there isn't anybody in DTG that understands what the Class 20 DLC actually contains, definitively, after having been salami sliced down at release.... so nobody can actually approve a manual, because nobody can tell whether it is accurate or not, without doing some testing. And you wouldn't want to do something really rash, like testing, or any sort of Quality Control or QA.... Uuuughhhh. Not QA.... euch... no thank you....(!).... it almost makes the skin crawl just thinking about it..... ;-O.
     
    Last edited: Jun 27, 2020
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  17. Ian Hudson

    Ian Hudson New Member

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    Having spent a reasonable amount of time without fully understanding the simulations, I am astounded that a basic requirement of any piece software is a user manual, cannot be found I've spent an inordinate amount of time trying to find how to drive different types of locos, how t apply brakes whilst still being able to look at the track ahead etc. This software, who's graphics are absolutely superb is badly let down by the lack of information about the simulation.
     
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  18. SaddingtonPlush

    SaddingtonPlush Member

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    I agree that "looking down" to handle brake levers is unsettling - I don't look at my feet to hit the brakes when I drive my car either ;)
    Just for reference of those coming across this thread in future - these keys for PC seem to always work for me:
    Locomotive brake decrease [
    Locomotive brake increase ]
    Automatic brake decrease ;
    Automatic brake increase '
    Dynamic brake decrease ,
    Dynamic breake increase .
     
  19. Rudolf

    Rudolf Well-Known Member

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    Other UK engines have the same brake pin. It is not documented at all and though some scenarios require you to turn brakes off, it is nowhere explained how to do this. I learned it by asking here at the forum.
     
  20. Plastic Pal

    Plastic Pal Well-Known Member

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    I agree, the lack of manuals is shocking. I wonder if TSW2 will come with a manual, or any documentation at all.....?

    Trying to look at it from DTG's perspective though - it could be very difficult and time-consuming for them to write manuals. To write a manual, you would have to understand the specification of the simulated route/loco, and you would need to check and test to see if the route/loco DLC works as it was designed to do, and that all of the features, including for example, how big the map is, are actually included by the developer, before the DLC is put on sale. No single person in DTG would be able to know all of that and write an accurate manual that fits and makes sense - it's just not humanly possible.

    Can you imagine the number of minutes it would take to go through every loco/route feature and check to see if it was actually implemented and working....!? It would be a nightmare.....! It could take almost an hour to check that something like the Class 20 works. And testing things takes away time that could be spent on making other DLCs that don't work properly, are poorly described and badly supported with documentation.

    All you really need to know about any loco/route is to be assured that it is iconic and looks so real that you could almost touch it. That should be enough. Why would you need anything more than that? Just give DTG your cash and stop complaining. ;-)
     
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  21. Paulo_1997

    Paulo_1997 Active Member

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    The amount of sarcasm in this post is so damn high, even Neil Armstrong couldn't touch it...
     
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  22. lDanny Holand

    lDanny Holand Active Member

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    There is no manual for the 20
     
  23. Plastic Pal

    Plastic Pal Well-Known Member

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    I think that it is part of the natural evolution with TSW to have no manual for the Class 20..... but also tease everyone by saying that there is one in the introductory scenario......! At least the guys at DTG have a sense of humour.....!

    The people complaining about a lack of manual for the Class 20 now will eventually stop complaining about the Class 20, so why bother to write one now......? What would be the point, other than to provide good product support and vaguely decent customer service....? Both of these things are probably much over-rated concepts...... and aren't really needed if you only want to sell a very small quanity of incomplete goods and if you are prepared to trash your own reputation as a developer by demonstrating incompetence at a level where it is incapable of writing a manual for its own products....

    The lack of manual for the Class 20 will become an "iconic complaint from a bygone era". And all of today's worries about the Cklass 20 will be forgotten when new future DLCs also come out without any kind of user support or documentation.
     
  24. LastTrainToClarksville

    LastTrainToClarksville Well-Known Member

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    We know that -- its absence is the subject of this thread!
     
  25. Deimenried

    Deimenried Member

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    I agree there needs to be a little more instruction on some of the finer points, but if you can drive one BR diesel-electric from that era, you should have enough knowledge to operate any of them competently.
     

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