Hi together! I am coming from MSTS/Open Rails world and I am a little bit disappointed because in RW we have the same situation with the AI traffic. So we have generally no traffic in the routes, only very few purchasable Scenario packs (I want to play at first with Austrian routes, I don't know what is the situation with USA or UK Routes). So I think about how we can create acceptable oncoming traffic without big effort to be able to drive a train with optional departure time what I want to. I have seen lots of tutorial videos about creating Scenarios and it seems to be very long time to go through the railway line map, add stops and departure times for every single AI departures. Do I see right we have no possibility to save a service with the path and stops and add it to traffic with a periodic depart? I think if we have a clock-face schedule on the line with the same type of vehicle and stops, I could only give the starting time of the first service, the period time (e.g. 15 or 30 minutes) and a number of departs. If somebody knows the TSRE5 Activity Traffic editor for Open Rails, it is possible there. (For example: I give the first departure at 5:00 am, after that I add 10 services with 60 minutes periods, so I have immediately departs with 6:00 am, 7:00 am.... until 3:00 pm). Before you ask: No, I don't have to add every departure time of different stations because I see it is possible to give standoff time (e.g. 30 seconds) instead of exact clock-time. So I have to add only the start time from the start point of the given service. With this method I could save very big effort because I don't have to create the whole timetable of every single service. i It would be only some mouse click to have whole-day AI traffic. And before starting the play, only I have to set the "Player Service" marker to the train, what I want to drive. Is it a good idea? But if I have to add stops and departure times for every single AI services again and again, it is unpossible, it would take some months long to create whole traffic of a line. In this case I would give up and only play on empty route. What I can make is only to place some static trains on different stations to have some life on the route. But it is not so enjoyable as the oncoming traffic. Thank you for your response and I hope you know what I mean. Maybe 100% right you can understand only if you know Open Rails TSRE5 Activity Traffic editor.
TSC has no timetable mode. The closest you can get there is QuickDrive which randomly spawns AI services.
Thank you for your answer! I don't think about Timetable mode, it is also long time (some months) in Open Rails to type in the arrival and departure times for every stops of every single AI trains on a line with heavy traffic. It is not so good looking solution I know, but I have created the whole-day traffic of the lines simply in the Activity Editor. Only one Path for a kind of train (personal, fast train, Intercity...etc.), one Service with the stops and it knows the stand-off time itself, I don't have to type the single departures for every stops. After that I give it to the Traffic periodically. It is a little bit "low-cost" solution, Timetable looks like better, but it works also and it is fast. It takes 2-3 hours long to create the whole traffic of a line, after that I can play unlimited with well oncoming traffic, I don't have to create different scenarios before every single game. I thought about such kind of solution with RW Scenario, but I think it is not possible so simply, because we don't have such kind of summary windows, clone possibility for the AI trains and I have to start creating and add stops for every single AI service again and again. Do I know right? But the Quick Drive with random AI traffic seems to be good idea. I would play at first with Austrian and German suburban railway lines where we have lots of trains with the same vehicle, so it is no problem to have only random departures, the real life timetable is not in my head. Sorry for my stupid questions, still I have to train myself about Quick Drive mode, but how does the random AI traffic look like? What kind of data I have to add? Start point, end point, stops, departure and arrival times? What we can save from these efforts? Can I automate or clone the adding of services anyway? So what is the difference compared to the normal Scenario? Thank you!
Travelling in the same direction as the player train on a two track line you would not have much AI traffic behind you. In front you could have another train that you are following. I was playing a Quick Drive on the York - Peterborough route. At different places on the opposite line a train was placed and as you got within 2 km that train would start to move. These AI trains only have a limited distance to run as you don't want them to catch up with the train in front of them so they are removed via a Portal when the reach it. There are usually a number of portals on routes and you could add more. I think Kim Olesen would be able to give you some more tips as his knowledge is greater than mine
I forgot to say, I want to have traffic only on the other track what comes in front of me. So on the track what I drive I would be the only one train. To have traffic on the same track what I drive it would lead to very lots of troubles, I did not make it in Open Rails also. Because of that I would have generally two prepared and stored traffic. One if I would like to drive in the direction for even number trains and another one what is for odd number trains. Only I would load the corresponding before the game depending on the train direction what I drive. Or do you say still the AI trains can disturb and catch up each other even if there is no player train on their route? So is it not possible to have long running AI trains at all, only they can ride in small sections between two portals? I don't want to believe it. In this case if there is a very well prepared Scenario, still you can see the removing Train if you have a small delay or longer stand-off in any stop and you don't hold the prepared timetable.
What would the point be for having the AI trains run a long way? Imagine you are on a train journey are other trains pass you in the opposite direction - Unless it is a slow section of line or you are in a station then you see the other trains for less than a minute. If you ran all the trains you passed to the end of the line you would run out of space for them at the terminus of the route. Scenario - you drive for 90 mins to the last station. At 20 mins to the end an AI train passes you - if it has to run until the other end of the line it has 70 mins to run even though you have reached the end after 20 mins.
I don't necessarily want to have long AI train runs. Only I want to be able to play in an optional time (when I have free time) with real traffic without long Scenario editing before the game. Just sit down e.g. at 4 pm and drive a train what departs at 4:15 pm. But not on an empty route. If I want to have oncoming AI trains only in the time when I meet them face to face, I need to edit their path, stops and timetable during long time. And what is if I have a delay? Than they disappear before I meet them. In this case I can not play only edit and edit. It is the problem with all train simulator games that you have to decide if you play or edit. TSW is still better because you have immediately more hundred trains on the route what you can drive. Almost all departs in the timetable of a line. That is why I have the idea to make a master Scenario with whole-day traffic what I only have to load before I play. But if it is too big overload (RAM, CPU...etc.) for the game to have lots of trains in the traffic at the same time, than I have to forget it. In Open Rails the AI train disappers at the end of the line automatically. So I don't have soo many trains on the route at the same time what overloads the computer. But I don't know how the RW works.
You can run AI trains for as long as you want for sure. BUT it comes as a cost in TSC. The dispatcher code is a bit fragile, so you don’t want it to handle too many trains at once. The solution to this in QD is to run trains that come against you from a spawnpoint to a portal about 5 km further. There is a mod to tsc so you can set in portals in the scenario editor. If you do as i say, you will have the appearance of the route being as busy as you want. Generally you should not worry about trains crashing into eachother as long as you don’t spawn them in the same block, which you seriously don’t want to do, since you will get an OOM error. However, if you give AI trains a choice of routing, like just spawning them all and pointing them towards the end of the line, you are very lucky if the scenario don’t crash. Don’t ever give the dispatcher choices. Here is the mod. https://www.dropbox.com/s/idxj7wloaxr5k00/Portal_in_Szenarios.rwp?dl=0
I have read elsewhere that in TSC it is no longer possible to "spawn" AI from portals, this feature was "no longer supported" many years ago but could still be done until a recent update. Those in existing scenarios still work, but apparently you can't create new ones now. Spawning them in the same block section has a collision risk of course but does not cause OOM errors per se; however too much AI traffic might, consumption of memory is very much dependent on the type of locomotive and number of wagons. And, unless changes have been made with recent improvements, no memory is returned for re-use when a train disappears into a portal. John
It is no problem for me if my train has no official timetable in the game. I am not interested for loc. driver performance evaluation and other messages in the end of the game. I can get a real timetable as a basis and I drive after that, I stop on the stations. Only I like to drive a real train what goes at the same time in the real life. But if I would not drive exactly at the same time, also in this case the 5-10 Scenarios what can be purchased for the routes are very few and they don't cover all types of the services what run on the route. So yo can not get off the necessity for editing if you don't want to play only with some pieces of Scenarios forever. Only I want to know how we can add satisfying AI traffic into the game but as I see it can not be simple. Previously all people blessed RW and swored MSTS/OR but I don't exactly know why RW is better? Creating of a traffic seems to be more complicated. This is proved as we have no huge amount of available Scenarios for the routes. Generally I believed only I have to buy the game, routes, vehicles and I can enjoy the game, really a simulator and no empty routes, no sitting in front of the display and edit, edit, brainstorm. Probably best solution if I create a QD with passenger stops in RW Enhancer and after that I place some static consists to the stations. It is simple and gives some railway feeling. If I have to play with different portals, spawn points...etc. than it can hold during some months long and still I did not drive and enjoyed the game a minute long. Or as you say trains have no timetable here, is it enough to place AI trains on a different point with defined frequency and do they drive automatically until the end point with short stops on the stations? Or do they only pass the stations without stop? And should I repeat this procedure between more portals?
Not true - there's about 25,000 scenarios available on the Workshop. Of course it seems difficult at the beginning. If you don't care about scoring and stuff, then creating a QuickDrive template is the way to go. Then you can choose whatever starting time and season/weather you like.
Spawning trains in the same block does often cause OOM (error in dispatcher module) error. But then, what do i know, i only build what is probably the most advanced quick drives in the world……
Yes, they took the code out of the editor because a) it was never an officially documented feature and b) I think DTG know better how risky and problematic that piece of code was.
When you run a quick drive it is up to you at what time the Scenario starts. Example you wish to drive the 10.30 from A to B - Start the Quick Drive at 10.20 - its up to you when you start to drive. You can then stop at the stations you want - if the train is supposed to stop for 2 mins or 5 mins you can do that. Other AI trains will go past in the opposite direction When you reach the the location you wish to drive to it will tell you the scenario is complete.
Thank you for your support and sorry for my incomprehension. Since that I have read there are really AI trains in QD mode itself, it depends from the route. I hope the serious purchasable routes have this feature. At first I want to play with suburban lines around Vienna and Munich (RSSLO and RWA routes), I think they should have this feature. I have to ask or search for it in their forums. And if I know right, for this feature you should have the defined vehicles also what are in the AI consists. Sorry, I was afraid here I have to deeply edit traffic similar as in MSTS/OR. If this feature really works well still I know why people like RW.
RSSLO has AI traffic in their QD. As for the RWA stuff, you have to either purchase a lot of their rolling stock dlc or modify other ai preloads to get any ai traffic.
Sorry Kim, it would have been better if I had said "should not" rather than "does not" as there are so many permutations of settings and computer configurations that it sometimes seems rare for any player to get the same behaviour of the game as another. Best regards, John
Here's my process: I select a Quickdrive scenario, ideally one of Kim's Real Drive for enhanced immersion. I then use ThirdRails to choose a real-live service schedule and follow that timetable with the ThirdRails HUD overlay in TSC. Optionally, you can drive the chosen real live service in real time, simultaneously with the actual service or drive it any time you like. This approach eliminates the need to create a scenario, allows flexibility in choosing the time and weather settings, and includes the bonus of a multiplay style on the radar and spoken announcements.
Ai traffic in QD scenarios needs a certain amount of care. Certainly multiple trains can be spawned in a single block but the problem arises as when one is a certain distance past the first train that ( unless it has been portalled to non-exitance ) train will simply stop. If the second train in the same block is not seperated, at that point by a signal, it cannot be stopped from causing a "potential" crash and the sim then CTD's. In some cases the sim will CTD when two trains set off in the same block - especially if later their routes diverge. I have learnt the hard way to only allow one train per block and to track very carefully their fate once I have passed them. Often this means adding additional portals in the scenario into which the trains fall in succession as I pass them so as to remove conflict possiblilties. Its a bit unpredicatable and a black art.
One of the scenarios for ECML-S had two trains on the Royston line near Hitchen. Both were separated by at least one signal block but the second train would set of first and crash in to the stationary train. It was an AP Scenario and when I asked Richard said it was because the track was different he could not provide support.
