Creation Sharing New Timetable For Dresden - Riesa

This looks amazing!
Will any of the ICE1s/3s be present in the completed timetable? I don't know what runs there irl.

 

The Dresden–Riesa (–Leipzig–Erfurt–Frankfurt–Wiesbaden) ICEs are ICE-T sets in real life. I'll use the Kassel-Würzburg 403 (rather than the Köln-Aachen 406 that DTG used) for those. There's also one train each way to/from Offenburg via Riesa, Leipzig, Magdeburg, Hannover, Dortmund, Köln, Koblenz, Mannheim, Stuttgart and Karlsruhe (check out that route on a map!) per day. That one is an ICE1! So yes, both types of ICE will have drivable services, and both will be visible as AI trains to/from Berlin too.

There will also be one drivable Vectron passenger service to Riesa and back, the Praha hl.n. <> Zürich HB EuroNight.

 

Awesome, are the ICE1 runs at night?
Can't wait to try the Vectron doing passenger services.

 

Dresden 05:23 - Riesa 05:56, and Riesa 18:02 - Dresden 18:37.

The Vectron runs are Riesa 06:31 - Dresden 07:05, and Dresden 21:10 - Riesa 21:45.

Not the middle of the day, but you should get some nice lighting in TOD4, depending on the season.

 

Awesome, can't wait! The more ICE1 the better lol.
Thinking I might try messing around with timetables on some smaller/quieter routes.

 

amazing work!!

 

It's a lot of fun honestly! I'm really enjoying the deep look into railway operations I'm getting, and it's a cool problem solving exercise too. And there's so much potential for additional gameplay in some of the older routes... For example, I'd love to see a whole bunch of different "gala" timetables for East Somerset! Some photo freights and shunting demonstrations maybe... Either way, I'm happy to help anyone who's working on timetables too, as I've got a good amount of experience at this point.

 

Quick update: I've made some tweaks to how trains behave at the different junctions at Coswig. These have brought down the number of instructions that trains are late for to about 250. Progress!

 

I thought after this I was finished for the day, but I did want to spend a few minutes walking around at Coswig in the game and admiring my work. While doing that, I noticed another strange interaction between trains which luckily, I could fix very quickly. I also realised that all the Elbe-Elster-Network trains had their PIS information set up wrong: they all showed up on the PIS boards as "RE 50 Weißig", which, um. Yeah. That's awkward. I decided to put on a podcast and redo the PIS setup on those trains. I then let it resimulate while making and eating dinner, and we're now down to just 150 late instructions started or completed late. As far as PIS goes, I'll let this screenshot speak for itself:

An RE 15 service from Hoyerswerda arriving at Dresden Hbf. The driver will have to change ends quickly, as this Talent II unit's next service, an RB 31 to Elsterwerda-Biehla, is due to start in just a few minutes.

 

Do you have any idea why the platform number isn't being displayed on the platform PIS? This is currently an issue at certain stations on the route (mainly the ones around Dresden HBF) and it's quite weird.

Also, this timetable is looking better and better every time you update us about it, and I am so excited to get my hands on it

 

I didn't feel like further timing troubleshooting today, and given that the next new trains I want to put in are the Desiros I'll have more than enough time to finish that anyway. What I did today was make sure that the formations for the regional trains all do what they're supposed to do. This mainly meant change the substitution settings -- I do want to be able to drive S-Bahn trains with either a 143 or 146, but I don't want a 112 to show up, and I really don't want to find a 110 on the end of my train when driving a cab car service...

Turns out this was very easy to achieve because the Rail Vehicle Definition files for the DRA 146 and 143 include a "Bahnbetriebswerk Dresden" Geographic Region. However, for some unfathomable reason the formations from the original timetable aren't using that, instead letting any loco with the "DB Regio" Geographic Region sub in... and they don't even check if the loco has the "ZWS" tech that it needs to talk to the cab car.

So yeah, two minute job tbh. Just replace "DB Regio" with "Bahnbetriebswerk Dresden" and add the ZWS requirement just in case. Here's the RE 50 dosto formation as an example, with just a tiny little half-percent chance you'll find a 143 on your train...



The RE 50 Dostos will now (almost) always be a 146 (but you can always choose the 143 in the menu), the AI Dosto regionals will always be a 143, the 2x Dosto S-Bahn trains will mostly (but not entirely) be 143s and the 4x Dosto S-Bahn trains will mostly (but not entirely) be 146s. The one thing I couldn't work out yet was if it's possible to make 112s show up on the Elbe-Elster Dosto trains without also inviting in 146s and other locos that don't belong on these. For now I've made them 143 only, but it's on my list to look at again. If I can't make it happen they'll stay 143 only rather than 112 only. That's because these have a bunch of dependencies with other Elbe-Elster trains and I don't want to make loads of Talent II services unavailable for players who don't own Hamburg-Lübeck. Also, the 143 is just a better loco in TSW tbh.

If anyone else who's worked with substitution so far has any ideas: is it even possible to have the 112 (and nothing else!) substitute for the 143?

 

Just want to mention keep in mind the 112 dosen't run freight

 

Someone at DTG made the great choice to give the 112 the "DB Cargo" Geographic Region as well as DB Regio. That means there's nothing I can do to prevent it from showing up unless I turn off substitution for freight locos altogether, which I'm obviously not going to do. Either DTG or a modder will need to change the Rail Vehicle Definition on the 112 to stop it from showing up on freight.

 

Maybe you can try working with the extension lengths? I don't know if you encountered the mechanic yet but you need to set an extension length (might be named slightly different) for the formation in the timetable when you want longer rail vehicles to subsitute (for example a 146 to substitute a 143). If you leave that at 0.0, 112s should substitute while 146s don't. This might not be a perfect situation for all future locos but it should work for your case with 143 <=> 112 for now.

Another option would be to mod the RVDs of the locos you need to include some new tags. But this isn't the most sufficient options as we would run in conflicts very soon when every modder starts to make RVD mods for their own substitution needs.

 

Good call, I'll try that!

 

Looks damn good, is there any planned release date?
And I'm curious, does it include repaints? Like the trilex, or Ceske Drahy. I'm currently trying, to learn, to create pakked repaints based on the original content, but only changing the texture.

 

No, I've not put myself on a schedule. It'll come out when a) the Editor supports cooking and packaging and b) I'm happy with it.

It doesn't. I don't use personally use repaints, and I want to keep the timetable package as small and clean as possible so anyone can choose what parts of the game they do and don't want to mod for themselves. That said, I don't want to make using repaints within my timetable harder than necessary for people who do want them either, so if anything comes up closer to or after release, I'll be happy to look into that.

 

Progress is slow right now because there's simply not a lot to do until I get my hands on the Desiro Classic next week. I have made all the trains in the timetable be on time by now. I've also started hanging out at Dresden Hbf whenever I get the opportunity and writing down the formations of passing freight trains to get a feeling for what types of trains I should use in my timetable. I'm also keeping an eye on the passenger trains of course.

Here's my to do list for until the release of Maintalbahn:

• Fix a problem where the RE15/RE18 trains arrive at Coswig a full two minutes early from Dresden because it turns out I didn't notice the test train I copied the times from hit a red signal at Coswig (oops)
• Correct the paths taken by RE3/RB30/S3 AI trains to match reality
  
• Redo the train lengths and formation assignments I've been planning for the Trilex trains to be more realistic and more fun to play
• Some more testing on my regional train formations to make sure the substitutions work properly

I'm confident I'll have all of that done in time to start adding Desiro trains next week. These are going to have a lot of coupling/uncoupling and general shunting moves at Dresden Hbf, so they'll actually add quite a bit of gameplay even though they leave the map at Dresden-Neustadt!

I'm really looking forward to having these trains in game. There are up to five of them per direction per hour, they'll really make the main line through Dresden busy, as it should be.

 

This timetable is likely to be the only reason for me picking up the new route. I love Dresden - Riesa, and anything to improve that I'll pick up.

 

Better get it in a sale then. It's a day 1 purchase for me. I'm really looking forward to making those DRA Desiro services (there are going to be more than 25 shunting moves at Dresden Hbf, including lots of coupling and uncoupling units) and I'm looking forward to playing Maintalbahn itself too, as I like single-track diesel routes a lot.

 

"Working" on the timetable by spawning loads of 628s in Free Roam Mode, driving them back and forth between the platforms and sidings at Dresden Hbf and doing some coupling and uncoupling in the platforms.

As ever, Free Roam is super helpful to see what the dispatcher does in different conditions, and seeing the sidings so full of trains is getting me properly excited to implement all these moves in the timetable next week!

 

This looks like a superb addition to the game, great work!

 

Really looking forward to the many services with coupling involved. I guess this means that there will be some services where you start off as a single unit, couple and then resume the service with multiple units?

 

Not quite. These are trains that terminate on the lower level of Dresden Hbf and then have an a unit added or removed for the return service. But that has the benefit that you should be able to drive the inbound service, walk over to the other unit, drive the shunting move to couple it, do some trainspotting for a few minutes until departure time, then drive the return service. All that within, say, 40 Minutes since these trains do leave the map at Dresden-Neustadt.

(I'm sure I'll find a spare formation during the off-peak that could do an ECS run to Riesa on its way to maintenance...)

 

Sounds awesome. Really thankful for your work, hopefully we'll get it soon when the 642 is released and they'll finally enable the editor to cook and package things...

 

You can cook and package at the moment. Just need to use a community workaround.
I've been doing it all week to try my timetable in game.

 

Is there a reasonable simple explanation of how that works anywhere now? Last time I looked they were still in the process of figuring out how to do it and I couldn't understand the first thing about what was going on.

 

I followed this video, and downloaded the stuff in the links. It works for me.

 

What's left for you to do after the Desiro services are added?

 

Cheers, I'll take a look!

Here's where I'm at right now:

S-Bahn
[X] S1
[X] S1 rush-hour services
[X] S2
[X] RE 50

Elbe-Elster-Netz
[X] RE15/RE18/RB31 (one big chunk, as the trains switch lines in Dresden Hbf)

Diesel Trains Towards Dresden-Klotzsche (Playable between Dresden Hbf and Dresden-Neustadt)
[_] S8
[_] Trilex

AI only regional trains
[_] RB 33 (at Dresden-Neustadt)
[X] S3, RB 30, RE 3 (at Dresden Hbf)
[X] RB 45 (at Riesa)

Other
[_] Long Distance Trains towards Berlin (Playable between Dresden Hbf and Dresden-Neustadt)
[_] Long Distance Trains Dresden-Riesa
[_] Freight Trains
[_] Local Freight (at Coswig and Nünchritz Chemical Works)
[_] Railtours and Easter Eggs

The Desiros are going to be the final regional services that go in. Once I have them done, I'll add long-distance trains, then redo all the ECS moves, as only then I'll really know where and when they can fit in. And then it's on to freight trains!

 

Good look with freight trains, they've been causing me a lot of grief in my TVL one lol. Though to be fair it's a more freight heavy route.

 

I'm wondering what will be in here? 101 with freight? Loose ICE 1 powercar? who knows...

 

Well, TVL has some major origin/destination points for freight trains on it, right? DRA is simpler in the sense that most freight trains are really just passing through on their journey between points off the map. Then again, there are a lot of different portals and routes between them (most of which the original timetable just doesn't use)... Freight is also the most research-heavy part for me, as it'll take actual days of standing at Dresden Hbf with a pen and paper to figure out a realistic mix of different formations. I've also got some ambitions to create meaningfully different experiences depending on which loco(s) you have. For example, one train I saw recently was a 155 with 33 Tadgs grain hoppers.


For reference, here's what noir 's freight calculator spreadsheet has to say about that thing. I desperately want to have this train in my timetable, and I'm certainly not going to have a Traxx sub in on that thing.

 

Spoilers!

 

Yeah TVL has quite a few end/start points, and a big yard for drop offs/pickups. There is a steelworks, an ore terminal, a port and a cement works.

 

That'll do it, yeah. Sounds like it'll be challenging to create, but a lot of fun to drive too!

 

There is a lot of shunting involved lol, so if people like that, there will be a lot of services for it.

With the current steam sale, what German routes/content am I going to need to get the full experience out of this timetable?

 

Big shunting fan here, love to see it.

Layers I'm planning as of right now, off the top of my head:

• The Vectron will add extra freight trains using the Eanos wagons, and sub into other freight trains of course
• If you have Hauptstrecke Rhein-Ruhr and the 101 you'll get playable InterCity trains. If you also have the Vectron, you'll get playable and AI EuroCities. If you have Hamburg-Lübeck too, you'll get two (mostly AI) Flixtrains as well. Also, the 112 from Hamburg-Lübeck will replace the 143 on the Elbe-Elster dosto formations.
• Niddertalbahn will add railtours
  
• Linke Rheinstrecke will add railtours and extra freight services using the Shimmns-U wagons
  
• Maintalbahn will add the 642 and extra freight trains using the Roos-t
• Kassel-Würzburg will add player and AI services using the ICE 1 and ICE 3, extra freight services using the Kijls wagons, and give you the DB 185 to sub into other freight trains
  
• Bremen-Oldenburg will add extra freight services using the PRESS 155 and the Tadgs grain wagons
• The Easter Eggs are mostly included in those layers, but the New Journeys 423 and the 204 will each add two or three new services as well.
• And as always with German routes, pretty much any freight loco will sub in on lots of the freight services, like the Railpool 185 from Tharandter Rampe, the Dispolok Taurus, etc.

 

Awesome already have most of those!

 

Thanks for all your work done already and you re continuous updates! Can‘t wait to try this out!

 

Ist es dann auch möglich, die RE50 Dienste mit dem ET442 aus Köln-Aachen zu fahren? Bzw. wäre es umsetzbar?

 

No, the Köln-Aachen Talent II can't substitute for the Dresden-Riesa one as it's got a different number of coaches.

 

You can definitely cook it manually, but that kinda sucks, here is a tutorial, that I have spent some days on, to understand:
I wouldn't use it anymore, and just wait for some cooking option to be released.

 

Hello everyone,

It's good to take a bit of a break sometimes. Today, in anticipation of getting the Desiro later, I opened my timetable for the first time in about a week or so to take stock of what I had achieved so far, and to prepare for adding Desiro services. Having been away from the project for a bit, I was eager to get going again, but I also was looking at everything from a bit of a different perspective to the one I had when I was buried deep in timetable work a few weeks ago.

This meant that was both a bit less happy with the many compromises I've been making in the weeks before, and less afraid of re-doing things that had room for improvement. I came to a decision quite quickly: I am going to start from scratch and re-do everything.

The thing is that making a timetable is a very iterative process. This means that a small change made early in the development process -- say, shifting the S1 timings by 5 minutes because the AI is a little slow -- can snowball into many more required changes on completely different parts of the timetable. And since this whole thing was 90% "learning by doing" for me, I now know about tools and settings I didn't have available to me. In fact, I am now able to make S1 match the real-world timings! I copied out one service into a new timetable file and tried it out today. It's more realistic, and, more importantly, more challenging and fun to drive. However, I can't make this change to the timetable I already have: I'd have to adjust every single arrival and departure time manually, and also every single other regional train in the timetable would literally explode because I've had to adjust them to match the tweaked S-Bahn times.

Doing everything again is genuinely going to be much quicker and easier than trying to improve what's already there. I'm a lot better at making timetables now than I was when I started, and I'll be able to keep using all my research, so the second time will be a lot faster than the first. I'm also confident that it'll be a lot better.

Don't worry, it's going to be worth it.

 

Learnt the same thing on my TVL timetable lol. I've had to spend the last 2 days refactoring my passenger services because of one stupid, tiny thing I didn't do at the start.
The next one I do shouldn't even take half the time this one has.

 

You wanna have that, when it's done? Its gonna be the trilex repaint

 

I'll be happy to make this thing sub in for the Westfrankenbahn one on the Trilex layer for people who have it installed. How exactly do repaints work from the perspective of the game? Does the repainted version have its own RVD?

 

Yeah it's basically a duplicate of the rvd, having a child blueprint of the RVV

 

I could also do some Ceske Drahy Repaints

 

In that case if you give it a "Trilex" Geographic Region, I can set that up for substitution super easily. Nice!