Why Is Dtg Throwing Left Rhine At Costumers?

The Alt-Bundesbahn color scheme was pretty somber, dark green, dark blue, dark red, black. Setting aside the TEE, this started to break up in the early 70s, with the colorful München and Stuttgart S-Bahnen; these led to the "Popfarben" experimentals, pale gray with various candy-color window bands. This idea would come back in the late 80s with Produktfarben, but in the interim (1974-87), DB went with something lighter, brighter and uniform, ivory over sea blue on everything.

 

Hmm, a typical german "Jein", actually there was never a 103 painted in sea blue (ok, must admit, that I've never seen a 103 in sea blue)..it was their `first class´ product back then and it got it's ´first class' markings generally, ivory and red, and actually yes, it would feel somewhat strange seeing a 103 with ocean blue colours instead of red. Even in front of an IR a 103 haven't worn a blue livery. It wouldn't feel right to see a 103 in a blue integrated livery (despite maybe a commercial livery, what surely I can't rule out), but the normal livery...no way.

 

Unfortunately both the livery and the coaches are wrong, even if the BR101 was introduced a few years before the route is set. The coaches are "IC Mod", i.e. the refurbished IC coaches which iirc were introduced 2012 or around that time. To me personally I'd still love to have the train on the route because I absolutely love Linke Rheinstrecke (my favourite route in Germany) and the IC, but I know a lot of TSW players/rail fans are much more picky about era appropriateness and would be very displeased to see the train on the route in the era it is set. The best solution would be to add a second timetable with more modern rolling stock. Yes you'd still see 90s cars and clothing, but maybe that would be more easy to stomach. Either way that is a huge amount of work, and might even conflict with unannounced plans for the route (I don't know, haven't asked and if I knew I obviously couldn't disclose) so definitely do not expect this any time soon.

Off the topic of IC but on the topic of BR110 substitutions. Would a BR145 fit on the route in the era it is set? Don't read too much into this question lol, just curious

 

Yes, the TEE/IC had always been their own thing, outside the general color scheme for the rest of the railroad. That finally ended in 1987. The 103s came from the factory in beige/crimson, and many of them kept it right up to scrapping, although many were eventually painted Orient red.

Before 1974,
Steam locos: black with red trim
103s: Beige over crimson
110s: cobalt blue, a very few in TEE colors like the 103s
All other electric locos: chrome oxide green
Diesels and shunters: crimson

TEE/IC coaches: beige over crimson
1st class express coaches: cobalt blue
Dining cars: red
n-Wagen: stainless steel
S-Bahn: light gray with orange bands, except München which had aqua bands.
All other passenger coaches: chrome oxide green

 

Just use the IC cars that come with the route, simply sub the 101 for the 103.

 

Indeed. As solicitr said, you could try having only the 101 sub for the 103 on IC services with LFR’s coaches. In that case though, you should make sure that substitution is very rare since the 101 was definitely not out in numbers yet.

Not really. The first few 145s were delivered and got their permission to run in 1998 and the only reference I could find to any being in the area at this point was 145 019 being tested for Regio use with DoStos in 1999 (1, 2). So not really appropriate. Even if we were to bend the years a bit, the 145 would certainly not have been the mainstay loco to see on all the freight. We really need a 140 for LFR instead. The 110s on all of the local services are hardly appropriate either.

 

Except, oopsie, the cab car would still be wrong for the era; those got overhauled in the 2000s as well

 

LFR is also one of, if not THE favourite route of mine. Unfortunately I am not a fan of the old metal, hence, I exclusively drive this route using mods.

Secretly I was hoping you guys would release your expert 101 with a new timetable on LFR. But I also believe that there are better routes which would have the possibility to use your DLC in a better way (ie services that need to be turned around somewhere, maybe even starting a service from cold and dark…). There are probably other issues as well with releasing a new era loco add on for a route which is shipped with exclusively old stock.

Anyway, I really do believe that this route would deserve a modern timetable. I think this would bring new life to this (in my eyes) apparently underrated DLC.

It would be interesting in general if the older era’s sell as well as predicted at some point. I remember Matt making the point in a stream some time ago that only the Germans would ask for these older years. Hence we have not seen any older stock in any other countries recently. Personally I believe a good mixture makes the difference. Like on BRO or Rosenheim Salzburg. After all, I do like the BR111 and even then KaKo. But I love the Vectron or also the Taurus (and, of course, the BR101).

 

Precisely, you can see it the other way around, if they already sell it to the original target, now it is only possible to further increase the sales by selling it to the people that was not interested initially and only is looking for bargains.

I myself would buy it, but I cannot as I did it longtime ago.

 

While I know that some take extreme care of the era and even the exact year a route is set (we had a similar discussion about the BR 218 in the April Roadmap Q&A thread), one unpopular opinion to the topic here.

I personally cannot understand why this is such a big issue, that people even would be willing to have less rolling stock available, just because a livery or small detail wouldn't fit the year the route is marked as to be in.

And I can dive even a bit deeper why this is not only nit-picky but also IMHO hilarious at some specific cases.

What exactly is the exact sense and purpose of the set route year?

Scenery: Of course it has an impact on the scenery. Many things change throughout the years on locations. But this is also route specific. Some routes do not age in the same way like others and only have some minor changes in many years. However, dependent upon amount of time and even functional limitation, it is not possible to replicate every little static mesh exactly like it was in reality, not speaking about a certain year.

Rolling stock: Yes, of course it is important which rolling stock was used when. But that it all fails on something like a mismatching livery or a few minor details is rather obscure. Facing the fact that we have not hundreds of different versions of a loco done by several developers (like it for example is the case with the BR 648 in TSC - which now has 5 different versions in TSC). We only get one BR 101 and IC cab car from TSG, and this probably is the last version we get in TSW for it.

So we cannot take the privilege to say "No, this version is not fine or correct enough to fit". We just have one train as representation for the BR 101 and one for the IC cab car and coaches. If we once have the gift to have this train represented in TSW, people should realize that this will be the best version we will ever can have.

Timetable (by the serives times): I make a little guesswork to estimate that it's very hard to get a real timetable from the 90s. So, I think what developers do is using the times from a timetable today, maybe analyzing which services wasn't there or even was there in the 90s which aren't nowadays, but implementing the era-authentic rolling stock to this modern timetable. This is an estimation, because I think it's very hard to get the exact same timetable from the 90s anywhere.

Inaccuracy: If you take all of the said things together, you can see that there will always be a certain type of inaccuracy between the real world counterpart at this point of time and the TSW version of it. Demanding absolute accuracy is pointless as it's not achievable.

I can understand that if I play a game set to be in the 80s, it would be nogo to have something like smartphones in it, but the circumstance that a livery (which in case of the always red DB liveries might not be so different to each other) or different lever somewhere in the cabin is holding a developer back to implement a top level gameplay element like a layer to a route is insane IMHO, because 100% accuracy will never be able to be provided in TSW, one way or the other. And better one layer or one loco more, than one less and leaving routes even more lifeless than they are provided by DTG with an already limited timetable.

I don't think DTG would do a modern timetable for LFR on their own. Hopefully there will be one community member who creates one. Maybe he can add BR 101 and IC cab car services, once the DLC is out.

But as I said above, the will be never be 100% accuracy on TSW routes, it's technically not even possible.

In terms on the so called "retro cars" in the DLCs, I had a watch on these in Linke Rheinstrecke and Niddertalbahn (even used them on my route project) and I can assure that they are not as accurate to classify them to being 90s cars just by looking on them. The static meshes are nice and offer different colors, however the LOD is pretty basic. Another thing: 90s cars are also on the streets in the 2000s and even nowadays. It's not like we live in a world of top modern cars.

Yes, I respect that. However, at the same time you should consider how and in this case where customers can use your product. I don't know how your plans are (nor will I explicitly want to have a name here) but the more routes it layers into, the better. Especially because of - as the April roadmap already stated - this expert loco DLC will have a "higher price point" than other loco DLCs.

Other people already raised the concern whether it will sub into all services the first BR 101 DLC had, but of course the IC cab car should have services on their own, too. I personally hope that it doesn't layer into services at one DLC only.

 

Once it's released, it's in the hands of the marketing people to maximise revenue. From everything I've seen, they know what they're doing. Pricing strategy has little to do with the aspects you've highlighted.

 

Without meaning any offence, because I can tell the difference. I know what belongs on a 90s route and what doesn’t. As it’s a simulator we’re discussing, I’d prefer it simulate reality above all else.

These are the exact points I feel the complete opposite about. A mismatched livery is not a minor inaccuracy to me. For example, a 90s route full of traffic red is just not a 90s route anymore. It shatters my immersion. And non of the reds DB used are similar to me either.

Bottom line is for me (again contrasting your point of view), I’d much rather have an emptier appropriate timetable than a fictional full one. I think stuff like the 612s filling in for other DMUs on modern routes is not that bad because that is therotically possible in real life but stuff like the ICE 1 on LFR (that simply didn’t exist in that configuration) irks me to no end.

Of course, it’s perfectly alright for us to agree to disagree. I just thought it’d be good to have both sides in the discussion.

 

That's it right there. Not everything needs to be 100% accurate, but it does need to be explainable within the confines of reality. "This one branch line has a different class of DMU on it" isn't a major change to German railway history as a whole, while "DB repaints most of its rolling stock several years earlier" is.

 

The problem with that is that the IC1s don't use the LRS today, they run on the SFS Köln-Frankfurt.

 

They do not. The high-speed line is only used by ICE3, Velaro D, and ICE4.

 

Yes, but that's my point. TSW will never simulate reality accurately to 100%. Look at the house assets that repeat on and on along the tracks. Also the Rechte Rheinstrecke is missing in the scenery. Is this a realistic and accurate simulation of the route? No, and this massively breaks my immersion on the route, but I don't complain about that fault and rather say thanks to what we got the DLC from DTG at all, rather than not having it.

If I go ahead by this thinking, that the era needs to fit between all components in the game (the rolling stock, the liveries, the scenery), I could even say that any plan (either by the community or DTG itself) to create a modern timetable on the route is absolutely useless as there is a mismatch between the era the scenery is set to be in and the era the modern timetable should set to be in. In other words, the route is burnt only for the year or years it is marked to be in.

In the end, we just have one product DTG is releasing to us, one route with just one timetable. They are not going to release LFR twice in a modern setting. It's take it or leave it.

However, this thinking eliminates the chance that the route could offer much more rolling stock and services and therefore decreases the value of the DLC IMHO.

And just going by the statement of cwf.green that the expert BR 101 will probably not layer into the route and therefore is no other reason provided why they would discount the DLC so drastically, the answer to my initial question "Why is DTG throwing Left Rhine At Costumers?" seems to be that it simply didn't sell well.

But if it didn't sell well, I would rather think about why it didn't sell well and how could we improve the product's quality instead. I don't think that eliminating the chance that the BR 101 could layer into it (just because of some mismatch of livery or whatelse detail) would really be good for the Linke Rheinstrecke, which indeed could provide a better value to it.

Another thing for the on-going livery topic to add is that we complain about something here, the developer should provide us correctly. It's actually a shame that we need to debate here and even start a fight about it.

If I were the person in charge at either DTG or TSG, I would say that they should provide at least a certain variety of liveries with the loco, so that this loco can be used in each and every possible timetable/era/route it fits into. Doing so, would raise the value for both, the loco DLC itself but also the route DLCs is layers into.

However, DTG or TSG seems to not think economically in this regard. And well, it shows off. Not without a reason they almost giving away LFR now.

In regard to the upcoming loco DLCs by TSG, I personally see it critical if:

A. the BR 218 would only be delivered in one livery and sub/layer to MTB and HBL only, although it could be used at so many other routes if it had the correct livery (as I proofed above even here in said Linke Rheinstrecke and in the April roadmap Q&A thread on Niddertalbahn), and

B. The expert BR 101 would only layer into two or even 1 single DLC, facing the fact that it will have a "higher price point" as stated in the April Roadmap article. Why paying an elevated price if one can't use the loco enough for timetable services on routes?

In the end, it's not a good business practice to go the easy way out, might this count for DTG or TSG. Let's see how the BR 218, the expert BR 101 and even the whole TSW franchise with the mindset of "the less we can do, the better" is paying off at the end.

It's also worth to point out that this whole problem here (livery and era debate between customers) is just created by DTG. If a historic route DLC would come with a modern timetable as well, we would have absolutely no problem here. Maybe this also is the reason why LFR did not sell as other DLCs, because it's missing a modern timetable.

 

Im sure there were good reasons but that doesn’t make the problem go away. I like the idea of a Right Bank Route (which would got through Rudesheim, a town I loved when I visited a few years ago). Perhaps then, the scenery on the other bank can be added for Gen 9 consoles and PC (assuming the rendering problem was Gen 8 based). Also, a busier river would be nice. I know it is a train simulator but decent scenery adds to the realism.

 

it talks about that in the roadmap: "The TSG team are currently exploring the options of where the Expert 101 will work in timetable mode, and we will share more details of this in upcoming roadmap and news articles."

 

I must admit that this is my favourite route in TSW by far. I’ve driven roundabout 19.000 km on this track until now and it is still fun. It’s far from perfect, the empty Rhine without any ships is some kind of strange and some missing signals and wrong placed magnets are very annoying for those who drive using PZB.

But over the last few month DTG did a lot to lower the quality of this route adding more and more bugs which hadn’t been there at the release, like the broken PZB of the BR 103, which by the way also effects using this loco on other tracks like BRO or Salzburg-Rosenheim. The headlights of the AI‘s cab car are off at night, only the light cone is visible which is very confusing when passing one of these Karlsruher Kopfs. The headlights of the 110.3 and the cab car are much too bright after one update (and those of the 103 are slightly too dim) and so on.

I think that this add on doesn’t sell well, so they try to push the numbers by giving a lot of discount. Maybe the players are not interested in old driving stock, maybe it’s the lack of different locos and coaches, I don’t know. From my point of few it is very, very sad that DTG ignores the major bugs and seems to have no interest of fixing them. Which means that there is currently a BR 103 on sale which is not impossible but hard to use with PZB enabled. And this is not good in terms of reputation of the BR 103. I personally really like the 103, it drives and break’s very well (after some post release brake fixes) and I really love the in-cab sound as well because it’s a very loud loco in real life due to the its fan noise. So everyone who bought it on sale made a good choice in my opinion, but has to live with the bugs which I guess sadly will never be fixed.

 

It's a train simulator, not a scenery simulator - so I expect a higher degree of detail and accuracy from the train than I do from the scenery.

It's not - any additional timetables are optional. You can play them if you want to, and you know what you're getting into. They don't degrade the default experience.

I mean, lots of people have offered other possible explanations. We don't know how well it sold.

It has been said quite a few times, starting before the route even released, that the 101 as we have it is in fact appropriate for Linke Rheinstrecke, just its coaches aren't. But of course the route already comes with correct coaches, so that's not a problem at all.

Pretty much all loco DLCs in the past (except for, if I remember correctly, the Acela and Vectron) only came with one new layer. So I'm in fact quite pleasantly surprised that we can use the 218 on two routes out of the box. For the expert 101, the loco itself isn't the problem since that will presumably just substitute for the original 101. Adding cab cars to formations and turning them around shouldn't break any old timetables, so hopefully TSG will do that on a few more routes. Of course we haven't seen any indication of what they are or aren't planning to do, so I'm not stressing about that for a train that's three to six months away right now.

I mean, if you really had to do that to make a vintage route sell, why not simply make a modern route in the first place?

 

I'm not only argueing about the BR 101. What about adding the IC cab car into these services as they drive there today? The n-Wagen coming within the DLC are not made for a Bpmmbdzf cab car.

Yes, but in the past we also had less routes from DTG or third-party. If a route is available and a loco fits to more or less to the timetable, some players could expect it to sub/layer into. I mean yes, we can be thankful for having the loco DLC and the layers it comes with at all, however more layers/subs to routes means better usability and therefore increases the value of both, the route it could layer into, as well as the loco DLC. It's a win-win situation for both TSG and DTG. That's why I can't understand the decision for any other reason than the developers saying that they couldn't do it because either a technical limitation which prevents it or simply not having enough time. But in case of the time aspect, they still have a bit of time. For the BR 218 less, but for the BR 101 and IC cab car this shouldn't be a problem with its 4 or 6 months up to release.

Yes, I guess this is something DTG thinks about now with the knowledge gained from sales of LFR and considers it for future routes well. Maybe it's as sad but true that we will never have another historic german route in the future.

 

Well, they shouldn't do that, the cab cars had barely started to exist at the time the route is set in.

Again, we have no idea how LFR sold.

 

Agreed; besides, if the cab car from TSG is a Bpmmbdzf, it would be very anachronistic in 1997; the rebuild from Bpmbdzf 296s to Bpmmbzdf 286s took place, with the rest of the IC coach upgrades, in 2012-13. (The "mm" indicates a refurb)

 

While we're discussing LFR- the instrument lights in the 103 don't seem to work! I've turned on the lighting master switch, which gives me headlights and the tap-changer lighting, but the gauges remain dark- useless at night. Am I missing something?

EDIT: Yes I was missing something. The instrument lights breaker on the back wall defaults, weirdly, to "off". Close it and you're good.

 

Okay, it seems that the era does not really work with it. Sad for poor LFR.

I found a modern rolling stock mod where BR 101 and IC coaches are used. You can find it on trainsimcommunity.com here. I hope the creator replaces these with the expert BR 101 and IC cab car once its out. However, console users can't use it.

 

Does this work for you using TSW4? It did not in the beginning of it and I would be really delighted if it would

EDIT: I am using this mod, however, it only subs in the 101, does not change anything else...
Linke Rheinstrecke Timetable: BR 101 Substitution - Train Sim Community

EDIT #2: While we are at it. I am also unsing this mod. It brings some colour to the route. The IC services in question then remain with the 103, if you use both theses mods:
Linke Rheinstrecke Timetable: IR & SBB EC Coaches + Virtual Destinations - Train Sim Community

 

I didn't use it, just found it. Also not quite sure if it would work with TSW4.

These are very good recommendations. Not quite sure if it any of those will help to bring services of the IC cab car to the DLC though.

 

The aspects I've highlighted and you quoted from my previous post are in relation to other products of them. Comparing these with the aspects of other DLCs, it seems unreasonable why DTG is discounting Left Rhine in the way they do at the current moment in time.

If they would know what they're doing, they wouldn't use a pricing strategy to sell a route for 10% of the price it had 11 months before, which is not only unfair to the costumers who bought it for this price but also the developers creating it.

Marketing also seems to not exist after a route has been released, just like big improvements. Not to even mention that some bugs never get fixed.

 

That's an excellent mod (with no observed bugs). It's true the coach interiors remain DB, there was no way to redo them, and in reality the IRs were refurbed m-Wagen not Eurofimas, but it certainly adds both variety and some accuracy to the route.

 

Yes, it should; it was made this year (2024) so it ought to.

 

I think what you mean is the second one, the BR 101 substitution mod, which was created this year.

But I proposed the Modern Stock mod first, where they replied to whether it works. This mod was created for TSW3 orginally and still is marked to be TSW3 compatible only.

I think the main difference between them two just focusing on the BR 101 and nothing else, is that the Modern Stock mod also replaces the IC coaches, while the BR 101 substitution mod does not.

 

Yes, it has not been updated since it was first posted in March 2023, so I would say it's a no-go for TSW4

 

Which is really a shame, for me it was one of the best mods ever…

 

Since you don't know the the routes production cost, you've no reasonable basis for claiming unfairness to the developers. You're making assumptions.

 

And again you do not know how it sold so far.

 

Yes, I don't know the route production cost and payment conditions, but I also don't think that this route was done in 2 weeks with almost no reasonable amount of work done with it and therefore a reasonable work/cost/payment balance to sell it for a low level price tag as you're saying might assume now.

Yes, I don't know how the paying modell is behind the curtains, nor that it would be important to me since DTG isn't offer me a job as a route creator (unfortunately not). Could be that they pay a monthly income regardless of the sales, however all what I meant was that if there is any kind of drawing a conclusion to amount of work done/payment to developers to income by sales, then yes I seem it to be unfair to sell it for such a price tag.

And as we're on to the topic of assumptions about the costs of LFR already, here's another one of mine. One assumption you only can understand if you know the context very well, but I give it a try for the ones who're interested about my two cents.

As I'm building a route in Rhineland-Palatinate (which is the german state in which LFR is in), I know very well that the obtainment of the Lidar data is pretty problematic for this specific state of Germany until yet. It hopefully will change from June 9th onwards in Germany due to a law change, but until yet problematic. Why? Well, there is no LIDAR data for free and openly available in the resolution you preferably need to have to make a route. Rhineland-Palatinate currently offers only a DEM of 25 meter resolution for free. But the best is 1 or 5 Meter resolution, which RLP only offeres for fees (which aren't that low) until now.

Now what has this all to do with this topic?

Matt once said that for most german route projects, they could use the free and open available LIDAR data except for one case, which he didn't specified where it was. My assumption now is that DTG even paid more for this route (thus production costs were higher for this topic at least) than all others routes in Germany (if not all routes done so far).

It's highly speculatory, yes, however as me as someone who dived into a similar case this is my assumption.

And since when exactly are assumptions forbidden in this Forum?

And again, you can't proof nor show me evidence about the opposite that it sold well.

 

I mean it's an... assumption.

 

Well, for example, take a look at TSW Tracker. Right now, placed at 69, which, ok, isn't that good. Just a little spot check, but taking the tendency, it was sold more often right now then...ECML, Antelope, Niddertalbahn, NEC NYT, Glossop, Midland Main, Edinburgh Glasgow, Peak Forest, Holiday Express, Maintalbahn, Blackpool, Bernina, Salzburg Rosenheim, Suffragette, Semmering, Fife Circle...

 

I picked this up in the humble bundle sale, having had no prior interest but after seeing this thread. I haven’t had much time with it yet, but I LOVE the loud, clunking, mechanical sound and feel of the locos; and the cab car is a very unusual way of controlling the loco. Very interesting!

the only let down, for me, is that DTG’s more vintage trains often seem to lack polish and detail in the texturing compared to more modern locos. There’s a kind of… lower quality flatness to a lot of surfaces.