I've found that even though the 465 is limited to 75mph I'm still arriving at stations a minute or 2 early. I did a run from Faversham to cannon St and at a couple of stations I was waiting for several minutes? To achieve gold is far to easy.
As far as I can tell you don't have to be on time to get gold, you only have to not brake the speed limit.
To be more clear, I don't think you get points for being on time... or have I just missed that. Even when late I have not struggled for points to get gold.
I thought it was a mixture of both? Anyhow I've broken the speed limit a couple of times. On one run I hit a 20 zone at 40 and still achieved gold.
It's the waiting at stations is the main problem. I've been on a lot of services on sehs in rl and I've never seen trains wait in stations for several minutes. Normally its a minute at the most.
A timetable that a driver can easily keep to, that should please the unions. Driving trains isn’t a race. It should be easy to keep to time. On the subject of scoring… In reality, players should be getting gold on every run unless they make lots of errors or break the speed limit often. Being slightly late or sneaking just over the speed limit occasionally shouldn’t be punished harshly in the game. Sometimes gold can be too easy because it lets you get away with too much but it should be the norm if you drive correctly. Drivers don’t always drive at the speed limit. They are aware of what time they are due at stations and drive accordingly, and they also drive with safety, passenger comfort and economical use of energy as considerations. If there is a downhill section for example a driver can use that to accelerate the train and not add power to get to line speed as quickly as possible and then end up using the brake to avoid overspeeding, because driving that way wastes energy.
I'm not racing honest. I noticed in rl when a 465 is subbing a 375 service to victoria they push the 465's beyond 75mph a lot. That's why I thought it was a bit easy on tsw especially keeping it at 75.
And keeping passenger comfort in mind. Speed reductions in brake step 1 and stopping at stations brake step 1 and still arriving too early. I know the 465 has better acceleration but the 375 runs arnt as easy and they can run at the line speed.
If, as is I believe to be the case, Joe took the timetable from the RL 2019 working timetable, then the schedule should be easily makeable- they aren't set up like a game to make every run and every stop a challenge for the driver! A certain amount of slack is built in, because delays can happen, or the weather can turn bad, or simply because they don't want their drivers retiring at age 40 with chronic ulcers.
Every schedule will have a certain amount of recovery time in it or even pathing time if booked to catch up another service. This was (is) an issue on BML where the timetable is missing trains that IRL you would be catching and getting checked down. I would much rather have Joe's accurate timings than the unachievable AI propagated ones. Also consider the possibility the 465 in game is way overpowered. It certainly seems that way when I've driven it. Try just using up to Notch 3 rather than 4.
Well, the 465 was specifically designed to have very snappy acceleration, at the cost of a limited top speed.
And braking for the frequent stopping and starting on the commuter routes. It kinda drives like a lu train. Still I think OldVern is right it does seem a bit faster than it should be. The new time table is good, the old one had the arrival times set as the departure times. Taking into account the better acceleration it still shouldn't be a lot faster than a 375. Like I said the drivers have to push them past their top speed in rl to keep to the schedule.