Mannheim-kaiserslautern Is A Really Bad Route (for The Rolling Stock)

- Hello everyone today i make a thread because i'm not so happy of the new future route of DTG the Mannheim Kaiserslautern route a lot of problem there are on this route

First : there is, are not new rolling stock nothing is new.


Price : is really expansive for a route is short 65km nothing new,not a lot of station,nothing new,not a new train.


Wrong rolling stock will be used on this route. the TGV duplex 200 and ICE 3M will be used and BR 185.2 or 193 the freight services to France has been never exist with this series of locomotive the locomotive run between France and Germany are BR 185.0,BR 186 (MS1),BB 37000 and for the high-speed train is the TGV euroduplex or POS (depend of the season of the tgv 2N2 because to spring 2013 there was pos on this route) and ICE 3MF.



- So i make a thread to say that the next german route is disappointment for me and maybe a lot of people

 

Price does seem a little unfair considering the lack of a new locomotive.

After watching the pre release video it maybe a first time purchase for me but l will make may decision after the pre launch stream tomorrow.

Mittenwaldbahn, Manchester Airport Commuter and Cardiff Network are all definite first day purchases.

 

All the rolling stock included is featured on routes which are far better than this. The 111 will soon be in the Mittenwaldbahn route, the 425 I want to get is from Bremen-Oldenburg (which also includes other rolling stock I want) and I already have the ICE 3M and BR 185.

 

And btw, DTG could've just modified the 185.2 into a 186 (with a different cab, 4 pantographs and sound changes, it should've been relatively easy) and still given us a new locomotive, in a way

 

no it's not possible there are so many difference btw a 185.2 F140 AC 2 and a traxx MS1 or 2 different script,not the same cabin The BR 186 for the cabin is very similar to the BR 187 and some equipment is not identical between the 185.2 and 186 so even on the outside it will be necessary to model some things

 

It will be a real treat when 185.2 will only drive forward and back at 2 km/h.

And that's not even talking about whether it will be like FTF and it will be blurry

 

To be fair, the route itself looks fairly interesting, but the rolling stock situation is very disappointing. I'm fine with them nor including any new stock in routes (when applicable), but the fact that the ICE3 hasn't been modified so it can actually run to France and there's no new Doppelstock variant just seems lazy. Since there's no new rolling stock, there really is no excuse, especially at full price.

 

We are in Tsw 5 and we dont have a single german Stadler train. Not a Flirt or Kiss made it into this 6 year old franchise.
I have a feeling we wont see anything from them in the near future too.
At this point i would even be extremely happy to get it at least as a loco dlc.
If Dtg has licensing issues for companys that use Stadler trains, then just take the one driving around Münster from DB Regio. I dont care how but the lack of this train company and especially the Emus from them is just a joke at this point.
Yes Matt was so kind to answer that Dtg is not avoiding Stadler, but please make it at least once. I just guess most of the german content focused here think the same, sorry if thats not the case.

Edit: This post was motivated by the nonexistant Süwex Flirt 3 on Pfälzische

 

This is so interesting.

Known Issues
Work continues on this timetable following issues that were not known until later in development, beyond the point of 'certification' whereby the release date is fixed. There are therefore some known issues that players may notice on release.
These are:

• Off-world PIS destinations may not display correctly.
• Some additional AI services for the BR 425, ICE 3M and BR 642 (from Maintalbahn) have not yet been implemented at Mannheim, Neustadt and Kaiserslautern.
• Playable and AI layers for the BR 628 from Niddertalbahn have not yet been implemented.

The 628 will run from various places like Kaiserslautern, Neustadt and Schifferstadt, all converging at Ludwigshafen Hbf before heading off out of the map in the direction of BASF. They run towards the BASF station in the early morning and away in the evening but this station will not form part of the in-game route.
We will look to address these issues in a post-release patch, and our teams will communicate a date once this has been confirmed.

 

So they want to release the route not only with no new rolling stock but quite a few missing features.

Certification be damned! If it's not ready, then push it back. Particularly as they are charging £30 for a short route with no new rolling stock. Or drop the price to reflect the situation.

Seems to be a complete breakdown of commercial management and discipline in the DTG TSW department, currently.

 

Watch them never fix that.

As for the route itself, I can't remember the name of it even though the thread title has the route's name in it. It's probably the most 'nothing sandwich' German route in TSW for a long time.

 

I would see it that way too.

 

This does annoy me. Yes, the usual TSW 185.2 can absolutely be seen here, but a 185.0 or 186 would be much more appropriate and alleviate the lack of new rolling stock for the route. Truly a missed opportunity.

To be fair, while the route isn’t necessarily well known, Mannheim absolutely is. It is one of the larger freight hubs in Germany and very well known. Another reason why the lack of a more appropriate freight loco is disappointing.


Apart from that, the list of known issues does not fill me with confidence. If something as fundamental and straightforward as off-world destinations doesn’t work, then what else is broken? I’m still looking forward to the route as it’s somewhat local to me, but I’m undecided if it’ll be worth full price for me.

 

I second that 100% - looking forward to the route!

To be honest, I'm not 100% informed but maybe one of you might know: What's about the 218 on that route? Since there seems to be a 612 layer, why not more Diesel action?

 

The route looks nice, I've been looking at where it runs and from a scenic point of view it looks interesting.

I like the 111 so don't mind that being featured and having a longer run on the 425 which doesn't seem to have much of a run in other routes.

However it is disappointing to read that there are inaccuracies in the realism of some of the stock used. Will we be able to stop the the Vectron appearing without removing the complete layer for example.

I don't mind them reusing stock, especially if it's correct but for full price it would be good to see something new even if it's an existing loco modified.

Also looking at a modern timetable for this route there do not appear to be any self contained services, that might be different with this timetable of course.

It seems there is still not a satisfactory solution for those of us who don't want to see a Vectron, or a BR110 or a class 40 appear where they wouldn't be seen, and those who aren't bothered by it. It seems "gameplay" usurps realism. Either point of view is fine but it seems pretty much the only way to remove unrealistic layers or substitutions, is to use a sledgehammer to crack a nut.

I'm very much undecided about this new route at the moment. I'll see what I think after the stream.

 

I think the route looks interesting, but yeah the lack of any new traction is holding it back, especially considering its price. And personally I think it would be overshadowed by the upcoming Austrian DLC, so I'm sitting this one out for the time being. Hope the performance is up to scratch this time.

 

Yeah right.... in the same vein that WCMLs still remains unfinished months after release, with numerous timetable layers omitted and currently not on the cards to be added due to "other more serious ongoing gameplay issues"... DTG want to take our money and deliver half baked DLC time and time again and then slowly sweep it under the carpet and move onto the next project.

 

Is it really? Well, a couple of years back, someone wrote a suggestion in the suggestion-thread...does it really mention, that this route never has seen any of this rolling stock...by the way, the cab ride video linked in this thread, shows quite a lot of the mentioned rolling stock...and well, yes, within the first five minutes, you'll see a BR 193...and yes, for DB he clearly proposed F140 AC2, while the F140 AC(1) is mentioned for SBB Cargo...but wasn't there some quarrel between SBB and DTG? And for the TGV (as it's AI only) does the TGV in the video really look that different to the TGV in game?

 

tbh I know DTG can fix stuff but from the recent things I've seen that can take up to 3 days or 3 months. the broken freight marker on FTF still exists for example

 

You seem to forget that this route is not set present day. What did they say? 2010 again or something like that? The Vectron was first built 2010. In 2011 Railpool ordered 6 locos and in 2013 other freight companies started ordering them. Vectron was basicly not preset around that time. You started seeing them used more commenly around 2015 and now they are everywhere.

conclusion: everything set before 2015 that has Vectrons coming towards you every 5 minutes is not realistic. 15 years ago freight was dominated by BR 140, 151, 152, 185, 186 and maybe some Taurus. Only two of those in game though.
Furthermore you would see some "excotic" candidates on freight like for example BR 218 (and all it´s offshots like 216, 225 etc.), Ludmilla, Class 66 (with German cab) or BR 139.

 

Performance optimization doesn't work on FTF, texture blurring runs at full speed regardless of HD or 4K, etc. ..... and if DTG has found the ceiling that TSW can handle, there's no point in creating traffic-heavy routes like this, the result is dismal

 

I don't have a problem with them releasing the route. It's not even that expensive by game standards (although 20% less would make more sense) It's that it violates their own principles that new routes need to bring something "new" to the game. Doesn't have to be a loco or rolling stock (since much of Germany is to be fair pretty well covered and railways use the same stock in many places) It can be unique landmarks, unique operations, new animations, a new feature, fan demand, connects to another route, etc.
None of that seems to apply here. So while it's fine if you live there and it's local to you.... what does it give "new" for the majority of TSW fans who can't see anything in it that isn't already covered in a half dozen other routes?
I can see sales being mediocre at best for this reason. How many people just look and ask "Why do I want this route? It's just like the others I already have."

 

(C) OpenStreetMap contributors



The f'd up multilevel triangular flyover junction 60s car centred urban planning nightmare extravaganza that is Ludwigshafen Hbf certainly qualifies as a landmark in my opinion.

 

isn't the same variant TGV pos and 2N2 are second and last gen of tgv duplex built btw 2004-2007 for the TGV POS and 2010-2013 for the 2N2 (3UA) and tgv duplex 200 is the first gen of tgv duplex and there are so many difference btw the tgvs duplex variant

 

lt is very disappointing that DTG keep releasing products that are not completely finished. Seems a popular occurrence these days!

I am disappointed with the last TSW5 update, l ran it, it started downloading then paused. I then restarted it and it wouldn’t start. The realised that I had somehow lost all my content so l had to install the game and my content again. I am half way through as l type. It would be nice if DTG would release their products as the finished article. Is that too much to ask?

 

Schlossberg-Tunnel with Castle Frankenstein

 

Mannheim castle is right next to the station throat in, well, Mannheim.

 

The issue isn't the route itself, but rather what it brings to the table. There's nothing with this route that hasn't been provided by other German routes. The trains are all reused - DTG say that two of them have been upgraded, but I assume those upgrades are barely noticeable. And, of course, the return of the Doppelstock with its eternally terrible running sounds. The wagons are nothing new either. The route is just a normal German regional route, with S-Bahn, regional, ICE and freight services... Which is pretty much the same as most of the other German routes. The IC services are provided with the old BR101 for some reason. Even if the bugs announced in the article weren't there, the route wouldn't be remarkable and I'd still rather play Riesa to Dresden.

 

Meh.
Be honest.
Would you buy the route just because of that?

 

I'm sorry Mannheim Castle isn't up to your high standards.

Please give me an example of any landmark, which, just by itself, would be a reason to buy a TSW route in which you're otherwise not interested at all.

I cannot think of one, so maybe that's not a reasonable expectation to have...?

 

Perhaps Festung Marienberg in Wuerz-no nevermind they screwed that up big time. Oops.

 

There seem to be some of the standard problems like light bleeding in tunnels and the many copypasted old building models that just feel wrong - especially in conjunction with the quite realistic looking green soundbarriers, seeing those and the old buildings behind them feels jarring to me.

What annoys me the most however for some reason is seeing really nicely modelled stations with these horrible ancient pseudo-billboards in them, like the ones that just say "Gasthäuser" or "Finanzielle Dienstleistungen". It's TSW 5 now and we still get these in a new route - a route that seems ok and has some nice scenery but could be much better.

For now I'll probably spend my bucks on Mittenwaldbahn and wait for a sale for this.

 

From watching bits of the preview stream and reading details so far I'm kind of tempted to try it but only once the promised patches come out. It's too annoying to pay full price when there are some significant known issues. Getting the TGV to finally work on different voltages will be a treat though when that patch releases.

 

Constant problems with missing trolleys, or missing tension wires at the transverse supporting gates, a problem in at least one of the tunnels, a strangely lit place......the textures of some objects are quite distracting......especially the church by the tunnel under Frankenstein Castle, it looks like a cartoon. And what surprised me, practically no traffic, so that they would take measures to be sure .... and on the contrary BR628 in action

Overall embarrassing feelings

 

Well, well! Another half baked route. Will be waiting for the patch for this before I pull the trigger. It’s such a shame as many elements of the routes such as station modelling look pretty good.

 

Frankfurt is waiting for repairs practically until now and nothing is optimal

 

Felt weird seeing a timetable with a BR 406 running from France to Germany, with said BR406 not actually equipped with french in cab signalling. Feels like the route is a quick cash grab.

 

You didn't answer my question... would you buy the route because of that one landmark?
I'll answer your question if you answer mine.

 

Obviously not. Like I said, there is no landmark in the world whose inclusion in a TSW route I am not otherwise interested in would make me buy that route.

I never claimed that "you can see a castle for about 30 seconds" was a good reason to buy this route though. I posted the castle, as an example of a landmark, in response to you saying that there were, among other things, no recognizable landmarks on this route. You moved the goalposts afterwards.

 

Time, Dovetail Games? Is it really that time again.

It really is saddening to see DTG use the TGV once again as glorified filler, applying zero change or usability for it. At this point it's becoming so frustrating that I'm currently trying to figure out how to make a TGV 2n2 mod for the community. So at least this train won't go to waste.

This route isn't too bad for what it is, I like the scenery and certainly like the location. But for the price they're asking, it's going to be a big fat no. We're now in the 5th iteration of this simulator, we should NOT be still releasing routes with zero new rolling stock especially when there are still tons upon tons of trains to choose from.
There are also tons upon tons of trains they could rework and bring up to professional standards.
But no, we get none of that while pulling out the same pricetag for a route that does.
For it being on sale or a permanent drop in price, it would be worth it as new piece of map you could drive your favorite train on. Outside of that, it's a pass.

 

No, YOU are moving the goalposts because you are assuming that because something exists it's a significant landmark to players around the world interested in TSW. You are posting a strawman argument that minimizes what I said and trying to pretend that I said ANY locations at all. It's pedantic and you know you're being dishonest because you admit you yourself don't think they're significant enough to purchase the route yourself... and you have some knowledge of what is local which is more than 99% of players will have.

So if the people best positioned to appreciate the landmarks don't think they are significant enough to buy... that proves my actual point.

It's not enough to build a route around. It's a bad choice. Which violates DTG's own guidelines on what makes a "good" route.

Are there routes with decent landmarks? Yes there are. The Fife bridge for example is truly iconic and many UK players especially bought the Fife Circle route then posted glowing pictures of that landmark. It was a big selling point.

Cajon Pass itself as is an iconic railroading location that is known world wide.

Same with Horseshoe Curve.

Or the West Somerset Railway.

Others offered just beautiful scenery like the Alpine routes or Cane Creek that hadn't been seen yet.

Some focused on lesser used mission types like the high variety of shunting on Oakville.

Others offered a different gaming experience or function like coal hopper loading on Clinchwood or Sand Patch.

And still others were bundled to show off specitic locos or rolling stock like the High Speed routes.

This route.... has nothing truly new.

It's just lame.

DTG is free to make bad routes that don't sell well, but given that they judge mostly based on sales then it will be a failure by their own standards.

 

I don’t know how much was covered on the stream, but the Q&A thread just locked by Jan with barely any of the more searching questions answered. PR Truespeak at its finest.

 

It is worth noting that the ICE 3MFs barely run into France anymore to my knowledge, and only six of them were modified to do so anyway. A BR407 may have made more sense. The TGV Duplex also doesn't have German signalling and, I think, is the wrong version anyway. I don't know exactly when the route is set but a POS would have been the correct version until a few years ago when 2N2s replaced them.

In TS we do have a TGV Duplex with German signalling and an ICE 3M with TVM, but really annoyingly the BR407 in TS has no TVM functionality, which would have made it absolutely perfect to be a de facto Class 374. The former two are both included in Strasbourg - Karlsruhe, a route in TS that does what this TSW route is trying to do, but much better.

If DTG had developed an ICE 3 Neo or a 3MF, with a POS or 2N2, and with all relevant trains having both French and German signalling systems, that would have given this route a unique selling point. It would fix the issue I mentioned earlier, which is that this route adds nothing new to TSW.

 

I didn't say "the landmarks on Mannheim - Kaiserslautern aren't significant enough". I said "I don't base my decision whether or not to purchase a route on whether or not it has landmarks I previously knew".

Now, I appreciate that when you said "unique landmarks" in your original post, you may well have meant "unique landmarks well-known and iconic enough to influence a purchasing decision". However, you did not write "unique landmarks well-known and iconic enough to influence a purchasing decision", you wrote "unique landmarks".

So while it is indeed possible that I'm here just to annoy random strangers on the internet on purpose by pretending to like a Train Sim World addon that I don't actually think is that good, maybe consider the alternative: that I took your post at face value and answered it in good faith.

Now, to get back to the actual point, I genuinely do not care one bit whether or not a route is famous, has landmarks on it, or if I've heard about it previously. As far as I'm concerned, the next addon can be the Nowhere & East Armpit Railroad as long as it has gameplay I enjoy. If anything, a cool route I previously had never heard of is better than a cool route I knew before, because that's an opportunity to learn about a cool route.

I mean, yeah, obviously there are. There's just absolutely no correlation at all between how iconic/well-known a route is and how much I personally enjoy it, so I don't care. I'm not saying you can't or shouldn't, just that I don't.

 

I watched most of the stream last night. They answered a lot of questions, I don’t know if they were the ones on the Q and A thread.

What was very apparent from the stream and they weren’t trying to hide it, is that it’s not finished. A lot more was mentioned that needed to be looked at then was mentioned in the known issues.

Given the current state of TSW5, I have absolutely no confidence that these things will be addressed.

I’m still waiting for fixes for WCML South. I’m finding the incorrect AWS warnings intensely annoying (Though someone on discord helpfully suggested it was easy to solve by turning of AWS! - They’re not wrong but I like to drive with it on).

I’ve given DTG the benefit of the doubt too many times and I think I’m done now. I really love the German Routes but this one just isn’t ready.

 

That's great you claim not to.... but my whole point was that DTG's process for route suggestions and choices specifically states that's a major criteria. Not that you personally care. I'm holding DTG to DTG's standards.
Not just the landmarks either, but rather it doesn't hit ANY of their supposed requirements for a new route.

For those who aren't clear on what I"m talking about, this Harry reiterated it last year with the July 2024 Roadmap (but it was a thing before that)

L - Licensing
Licensing covers our legal obligations and is a good starting point to answer questions such as whether we have licenses or agreements in place to ensure we can represent the route appropriately with the trains that are seen on the route in the real world, for the time period proposed? Do we need to consider additional licenses to bring in to develop the route? This then informs our Licensing and Contracts Team on where they need to focus their resources.

A - Anticipation
Anticipation is about how we expect the players to perceive the route, and the included content. This probably is the most subjective area of the evaluation as we’re essentially evaluating how well players will receive the route in its proposed form. We look closely at reviews and comments from similar routes we released previously, as well as any community thoughts and concerns raised on proposals from suggestions. We need to answer if players will find the content boring, or just a duplication of a previously released route? If there is strong support for a route, where is it in the hierarchy?

M - Mix
Mix looks at the gameplay element in greater detail. Is there enough gameplay provided in the route to keep players occupied and engaged? Does the value of the included content and gameplay align with the intended pricing? Does the gameplay volume align with previously released content? Are there any unique elements in the gameplay that we can leverage to improve the gameplay offering (new industry elements or interactive components that can enhance the experience)?

P - Prominence
Prominence looks at the global commercial appeal of the route – are the locations represented known globally or is the route known only to locals? Are there prominent landmarks which are required to properly represent the route? Do the included locos have appropriate appeal to the players? Is there any prominence to the locos (are they famous)? Routes that have greater global appeal and have strong landmark features, with trains that are likely to engage the players are more likely to move forward to approval.

O – Opportunity
Opportunity is the first of our new categories we’ve added to this definition, and it looks at the potential to alter the design of a proposed add-on to increase the appeal for players. This could be including a famous location, landmark, train, service or coach name. It could also look at the chances to create additional related add-ons, seasonal spin-offs or layers that may link to the route and the content included.

I – Intelligence
Intelligence refers to aligning a release with real world events that may elevate the add-on if completed by a specific milestone, such as birthdays and festivals, or released at a certain time of year. These can help support the add-on success by giving our Community, Marketing and PR teams areas to highlight, such as historic events or locations.

L – Limitation
The final area, Limitation, is our last check to understand if we need to consider anything that would work against us for creating a specific add-on. Outside of licensing issues with operators, we also need to consider legal constraints such as a copyright landmark where there may be a fee. We would also use this step as a chance to ensure there is sufficient relevant content to make the add-on feel alive, and if the scope of the project is something we’re able to support to give the best version of the add-on to players.
So that’s the full process as we have it now, I hope this insight helps you understand where your suggestions come into the picture and explain the challenges our teams face before picking the perfect route. Keep giving us your community suggestions for new add-ons, and make sure to submit these ideas to our Suggestion Forums.


Licensing- Well they got one thing going for them.
Anticipation- Zero anticipation for this route. It wasn't requested and most people had to be told what it was.
Mix of gaming- Nothing unique. Nothing that hasn't been done before (and better given the more variety on other routes)
Prominence- No special landmarks or anything recognizable outside of a few locals. No new locos or rolling stock. No new global appeal, just the same mostly German players that have other similar routes.
Opportunity- Not much to add to the route later (additional loco DC, extension, landmarks, services. It's pretty much you get what you get.
Intelligence- Doesn't link to anything special like an anniversary or real world events at all.
Limitation- I guess it may have been "easy to make" so sure, we'll give them there were "few limitations" since it's the same thing as a bunch of other routes. "Lack of challenges" isn't really a great selling point though.

So it failed at least 5 of the 7 standards of LAMPOIL, and that's only because it's just like a bunch of other routes...which makes the 5 other failures even more glaring.

Yet THIS route made it over other routes that would have been far more popular and were specifically requested repeatedly by the fans.

That is the issue, and the question I'd love to see addressed by DTG.
What made this route so important to them that they would violate their own standards to do it over others that would be more interesting to players and sell better?
I could even understand if it was brought to TSW by a third party and they just signed off on it. Then it's just making money on someone else's work so.. why not?
But putting company resources into making it seems odd given that it doesn't meet their own criteria.

 

I am beginning to wonder if that might be the case. Maybe not Rivet as Germany generally outside their comfort zone, but a hitherto unrevealed third party or maybe someone who "git gud" with the editor (perhaps not that "gud") and opted to publish through DTG but anonymously. Just a conspiracy theory I know but otherwise how do you explain the rather obscure route choice, the obvious deficiencies compared to previous DTG German in house offerings and the lack of new rolling stock.

 

Alternatively, it could've been an idea from long ago they just dug up to maybe make something In the meantime that didn't require too much effort. Like a route idea meant for TSW4 or even older.

It's somewhat like when I find an old draft or something last minute, and use that just because it's convenient.

 

Forth Bridge maybe

 

In terms of justifying 'the rather obscure route choice' I think the logical answer is quite simply the rather obscure forum you're expressing your opinion on.

It might not be all that popular here, but it may have gained traction with some of the vast majority who play TSW but don't go on the official forum.