Hey guys and gals, just bumping the thread ready for the July challenges. Haven’t checked DTG Live yet to see if the new objectives have been posted, so if anyone spots them before I do feel free to add below. Let’s get stuck in!
They are as follows Drive 400 miles Collect 15 collectables Drive 10 jobs at over 80mph Complete 5 scenarios
Thank you kind sir. At least they dropped the conductor mode this month. Moderately challenging then, I’ve already got a scenario underway on my newly purchased Bernina Line, though that won’t do much for the distance and certainly not the 80 MPH! ECML and the zoomie here I come!
Which of course is the hook to get you to buy a route not in your collection! Luckily I have never bothered with collectibles until I started doing the masteries so still a fair number left.
You can't escape them that easily though, as conductor mode services are the first part of Manchester Airport's mastery.
Only one way to find out… Though I’m waiting for the impartial initial user feedback before dropping my £20 (Steam) on this.
For the collectables, just create a new throwaway profile and go to Sileby on MML (or just collect them right away if you haven't bothered with them before). There are 12 there in one small station. Hop to the next and get another three. Done in a few minutes. https://tswmania.com/guides/midland-main-line/115
It's growing on me and the route (what we got of it) is actually very good, certainly Rivet's best. If only it had gone the whole distance. Still, not much chance of the 80 MPH mastery down ther. However, I have discovered some 20 minute ish runs in the SHG timetable for Edinburgh to Glasgow with the Azuma to and from Polmont, so that will make it easy to achieve that part of the challenge without tying up too much time.
As regards the scenarios, well I’m guessing the old free play jobs on SoS, Sherman etc. will serve again, just walk across to the marker, save then reload and repeat four times. For collectibles probably easiest just to spawn into random stations and do them rather than keep jumping on and off trains. I don’t know whether Alex watches this thread but if you do mate, bearing in mind the last few route releases have been pretty much low speed commuter runs (CCN, MIA etc.) you might want to rethink the high speed objective strategy if the intention is to encourage possible DLC purchases. How about an objective where you complete 25 timetable runs not exceeding 50 MPH? That brings all our low speed bus stop routes out to play!
A little (cheat) tip on the side: If you don't feel like playing long scenarios in the current summer heat to unlock the July badge, simply switch to the Holiday Express DLC and complete five 5-minute scenarios, for example, delivering presents to the Christmas tree. If that's still too long for you, save shortly before the scenario ends and then just click "Continue Game." The rest is just a matter of logging miles, preferably on a high-speed train...
Oh the distance challenge is never usually a problem and I like to mix and match my runs to get it done, some express and some commuter.
or even better if you own rhein ruhr osten and the G6 just play the freeroam scenario bc that only takes 7 seconds to finish
I keep forgetting that my PS5 sub account links to Mastery on my PC main account. So Sherman Hill Sandbox Switching, save at the marker, load and repeat four times to finish. Oh and for anyone with WCML South who wants to get the 80 MPH thing out of the way before going back to more interesting stuff, the 377 runs from Watford to Wembley and vv take about 15 minutes and easy to get over 80 MPH.
Nothing much to worry about there, I don't think. I'll play as normal, and see where I am in the middle of the month.
I found several services on Rhein Ruhr Osten, 6/7 minutes each with the BR 422, where you can easily reach 128kmh. RB48 Wuppertal Oberbarmen - Wuppertal Hbf (and vice versa)
I have a feeling the “Sandbox Switching” etc exploit for scenarios might have been nerfed. On checking my progress, I noticed the save/reload completions of the scenario had not been counted like they were before. I did the scenario again this morning from scratch and the number of scenarios done incremented by one. I loaded a save I made and the total did not increase. I then quickly played the scenario from scratch and this time that didn’t add to the total either. Do seems there is now a cooldown period (24 hours?) before you can redo a scenario. I know some might argue, why bother with the Mastery when you have to resort to shortcuts to get some of the objectives done. However, the flip side of that is unlike Timetables there are only a finite number of scenarios across the routes you can run. Some of those are long and tedious and may not contribute much to the other Monthly objectives. So while taking a shortcut may seem like cheating, it’s simply clearing a path to the more fun tasks. Sorry for ping, DTG Alex but can you confirm if the way Mastery tracks scenarios has been, ahem, adjusted to prevent spamming to get done quickly?
Doesn't seem to be the case. I tried it and it still works (with the G6 shunting scenario on RRO). So could just be that old glitch where your counter is stuck and needs to be reset.
You were right. The scenarios have now updated, just took over 24 hours! That just leaves the 80 MPH+ runs and distance to polish off. Easy peezy!
