The Start Of A New Journey? Might Not...

Yes, exactly. A TSW route timetable is being run all the time:* one train driven by the player, all the others AI. Or you can get out of one train, get in another and start driving it instead. In RSN if one has the 363 installed, it's possible to do the freight makeups from both perspectives, as the 143 mainline drivers, and as the shunter, picking up wagons from "yourself-in-another-life." The more services in the timetable, the more trains are running.

*Except in scenarios; those, like in TS Classic, have bespoke AI traffic

 

And there is always the joy of "surfing the yellows" as one follows another train (especially an all-stops service)

 

I thought those AI trains were randomly spawned or pre-deployed for each service before. I wasn't thinking about that.

 

Not quite... They were implemented so that when they drew up timetables based on "London time" people in the west country wouldn't arrive five minutes after the train arrived rather than a few minutes before. More than possible to draw up a timetable which "lapsed time" but the people on board the train weren't likely to accept that they had to push their times forward a few minutes every hour

Please research the word "irony" and get back to us...

 

Or even better when they go somewhere else and you suddenly get a green light... time to settle back a bit and not have to watch every darn light! Except with freight you're just as likely to catch up to the next stopper anyway

 

There's also a huge difference between driving a train and making a tweet, as there is between making gameplay and modelling vehicles, the former anyone theoretically can do given access to the tools and a few tutorials, but modelling trains is a specialised art that takes skill - sure, with access to a modelling tool and a few tutorials you can maybe make a simple model, but you need a heck of a lot of experience and skill to a make a high quality model a vehicle of any form. And I've not even mentioned Simugraph yet which is an entirely different thing.

I'm pretty sure my metaphor is correct because I'm pretty sure they're two completely different, largely independent from each other, teams that do gameplay and modelling - unless you have evidence to the contrary.

 

Thanks I over simplified the explanation so we we wouldn't get into Noon -- Local apparent Noon, Civil twilight, Nautical twilight -- and all the other varieties and nuances of adjusting time based directly on the sidereal movement of the sun to work with our modern fast paced society -- ex naval navigator where time and celestial observations were very time sensitive to get a good fix.

Your definition is definitely clearer

 

Yes I did notice. However, I find reviews pretty much irrelevant to my choice to buy content. I find most of them either to be full of moaning or lacking any substance of any use in my decision, so no, I am not waiting for reviews to make my choice.

 

I only found out yesterday that Spain is in line with Central Europe rather than Western Europe so an hour behind GMT even though parts of it are much further west that the UK. A hangover from WWII when the Spanish sided with the Germans and decided to change their timezone to do business and show solidarity... never changed it back so their "high noon" can be as late as 3PM in some places.

 

Time zones are rarely straightforward. The US has 4 in the lower 48 which excludes Alaska and Hawaii. These zones are often adjusted around state lines, geography or economically connected areas. Quite a few states have 2 time zones and 1 or 2 choose not to observe DST. It can get quite complicated for travelers. The zones were originally set by the railroads to simplify their scheduling.

 

Adding more service doesn't make the game less fun (actually it makes it more fun due to the added variety of trains available to drive: BR101, BR425 and BR423), but it makes the game more realistic, so what's wrong with it? Is BML the worst route ever because it has 4000 services while IoW and Cane Creek are awesome because you can easily finish the timetable?

Freight trains IRL drive slower depending on consist weight, gradient and more. So most likely each freight consist has a different top speed.

The BR425 has a max speed of 140km/h (160 if under LZB)
The BR146 has a max speed of 160km/h
The BR101 has a max speed of 200km/h
The BR406 has a max speed of 300km/h

The max track speed in the LZB section is 230km/h so each train will drive at a different speed.

The S-Bahn uses a different set of track from all the other services between Köln and Düren, making a lot more stops, so all the tracks and different speeds should be satisfied on this route.

 

While that is true, in the period we are talking about, the Victorian era and the dawn of railroading, ships were still determining local noon daily; time zones hadn't yet made an appearance at sea.

 

Totally agree, especially with Steam, the reviews on there rarely relate to the actual game and most are put up within an hour of playing and then refunding, and usually by the same negative people.

Theres no way you can appreicate the full route within such a timescale, and personally I discount any review which states requested refund or similar.

 

The Köln part was previewed (pre-recorded) during Festival of Rail when that was on. The 423 (modified from Munich - Augsburg) + S12 services were originally the main remit of the the new timetable, however, Joe somehow managed to fit things like a IC layer with the 101, static stock and such in the route, plus loads of substitution. Compared to Köln's base timetable - w/o layers, it's leagues ahead.

As for Bakerloo Line, it's not much more than "the '72 stock is 50 years old this year, so we've made a fictional anniversary livery based on the original" - plus a couple of scenarios.

Similarly on Sand Patch Grade, a "preserved" SD40 (from Clinchfield) is doing a Railtour. You can drive it on the base timetable.

Whilst Bakerloo and Sand Patch primarily are just reskins + scenarios, Köln is easily the selling point. I'd recommend watching the preview back.

Many would disagree. For me personally, it's not about how many services there are to do, but how interesting they are. I'll cite Cathcart Circle; you can choose to do the Circle, or one of two branches. There are also empty runs along the branches in mornings and (maybe) evenings. Plenty to choose from. That's 200-odd services. Just with the Class 314.

As for 'there is no need for more services' - it's a simulator, it should be as realistic as possible. If there are 1,000 services, they should be there - depending on rolling stock, of course.

One of the main upsides of having a busy timetable is AI trains passing you, and that adds to the experience.

"No funny business" is completely appropriate for the context. Timetable mode is a simulation of an average day. And so it should be. If you want something "interesting" to happen, scenario mode is the place.

Two different skillsets.

Again, nobody makes you do it, just ignore them. I also would imagine that Posters & Trains are done by two seperate teams.

Gameplay is just services and scenarios in this game.

The new pack fits into the gameplay expansion category. It adds something new to do.

You.

Yes, it is. For starters, DTG releases have - for the most part - been good over the last year. And frankly, the UK and Germany doesn't have any real competition (Germany has Zuzi, but I'd consider that more a technical thing than a sim-cade which TSW is, I'd say Run8 has America (freight) covered.

DTG's quality is inconsistent, yes, however again, most of the DLCs in the last year have been good:

• BR Class 465 (Loco) - One of the best to date.
• DLGW (Timetable Pack) - Meh.
Clinchfield RR (Route) - Of a good quality overall.
• DB BR 101 (Loco) - One of the best, again.
• Hamburg - Lubeck (Route) - Mixed, wouldn't say bad, in my opinion.
• Cathcart Circle (Route) - one of the best in terms of detail and accuracy, the 314 is perfect (I can say that very safely)
• Boston Sprinter (Route) - Mediocre.
• Dresden - Riesa (Route) - very well made with great locos, some issues with crashes.
• London - Brighton (Route) - Plagued by Issues. I believe fixes are in the works though.
• BR Class 313 (Loco) - not the greatest.
• Sherman Hill (Route) - well made, some FPS issues.
• Tharandter Rampe (Route) - again, well made, the 612 is supposed to be quite good as well.

As for "the gameplay is boring", that's your opinion, however I hardly imagine that train driving is as thrilling as a BR or something.

I don't get what you're meaning by Services/Route info, as for Halting Stations and Mileposts, I presume that's an American thing.

As for Scenarios, the player is able to get up and walk around. Same button as always

 

Hopefully you don't mind if I very strongly disagree with that, HHL is terrible.

Agree with everything else though, I really don't understand OP's hostility towards this (relatively) simple and small expansion pack, particularly because it actually adds everything that makes the game fun for him... (more trains travelling at different speeds and using different tracks - more variety more fun).

I would expect there would be more criticism in the form of "I only want BKL/SPG/SKA" but as it hasn't come up yet.

 

I think disagreement is the core of these forums. Although often it goes too far, it's fine. I do agree, though, the hostility to the pack seems unjustified, to say the least, and I'd probably wait to see the previews before making a judgement.

 

For me, the best thing they could add to Bakerloo is mainline AI trains.

Even if just Class 66 freights and 08 shunting moves at Willesden.

The mainline running is such a major part of the route its hard to imagine why they chose to model it without a solution available.

If they made 350s and/or 390s as exterior only models, they could also use them at Glasgow Central too.

 

350s would require a reskin + a new license (TPE - in fact it would be FTPE in the era), and in Cathcart's era it was still VTWC. However, a 377 could also be an option for the WCML AI, even if it's just a modified 387, so it has the pantograph on the top. Could probably also change a 377/387 into a 378 if they wanted.

But I'm dreaming

 

DTG aren't going to make or remodel a loco just to serve as AI. The best they could do would be to have 3rd-rail 377s running rather absurdly through Harrow & Wealdstone- or, as you say, Sheds moving freight. The WCML is after all Britain's heaviest freight line.

 

I played RRO today and had a lovely service run where s8 to Hagen ran parallel to another service for a few miles. Was great to see

 

Actually - around that time chronometers were coming into use on ships which were synched to GMT - this allowed the determination of Longitude - Local Apparent Noon observations allowed Latitude.

In Deal, UK on the waterfront - they have the Clock Signal that they dropped a ball and fired a cannon so ships could set their chronometers all based on a signal from Greenwich, this started about 1852. GWR used portable chronometers synched to GMT around 1840 But we are far afield from the original topic - Interesting discussion - but if we want to continue - we should start a thread in the off topic section

Best

 

What makes TSW 2 compelling for me is the dynamic dispatcher combined with the ability to drive in a complex and well designed timetable.

Applying the timetable advances of DRA and BML to a really interesting prior release like SKA makes this pack an instant buy for me.

 

Agreed. Seeing more traffic, more movement, more life in general on the routes is what sells it for me. When you are the only moving thing for miles until you arrive at the station it just disengages me. The things I love are the irregular things you see, the dioramas, not just workers sitting on a bag of cement though.

 

Unfortunately DTG haven't spoken about this in some time, but I agree that something like dioramas with varying interaction would make the game much more lively, especially if they can introduce some minor works with temporary speed restrictions... That place where you normally drop down to 80 suddenly becomes a 40 for that week and there's some orange shirts and a digger next to the track. That sort of thing
Of course the flexibility in the timetable would have to allow for such engineering works to be possible, but this is the case on a fair few timetables anyway

 

There is missing an option for me to vote, unless watching multiple gameplay videos without review/comments voiced over (or muted when watching with replay speed over 4x) can count as "wait for reviews". But then it would also need to be multiple choices poll anyway, as if I like what I see, I just add it to wishlist and wait for a sale. In most cases, even for the routes or locos I wanted the most, I haven't bought them until they were discounted at least 40% off, or at least 60% when it wasn't something particularly high on my wishlist. This will mean I'll probably buy it around a year or 2 years after the release, assuming I added it to my wishlist after seeing preview & launch streams.

 

Just say you wont buy it, this rant was very unnecessary

 

Meh the 313 is a tad underrated in a way because door sounds were a serious pitfall of the 313 but hey at least it was actually good

Have to say its perfect, but apart from the bugs

 

I like the 313. Not sure what everyone is complaining about. A nice change of pace from the too-easy-to-drive 377.

 

I do enjoy the BML myself, however the Bugs + Whatever Reigate is supposed to be are holding it back imo. Shame, it has the potential to be the flagship of TSW...