Affordable Class 150/2 For Ts20xx

Discussion in 'Loco Suggestions & Proposals' started by Class43Harrison, Sep 3, 2020.

  1. Class43Harrison

    Class43Harrison Member

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    The Thomson 150/2 was withdrawn a while back from steam, and the Armstrong Powerhouse Arriva Class 150/2 was pulled earlier this year. I think we need a 150/2 that comes with 3 or 4 liveries that is decently affordable and reasonably priced for other members of the community that maybe cannot afford to pay the £19.99 price tag from Armstrong Powerhouse. I mean, don't get me wrong, it is stunning quality from AP. I would love to get it, but the price is a bit steep for me and I am sure for many others too. I am nearly 15 and I don't want to pay nearly £20 for one type of DMU. I know it has 21 liveries and cracking sounds and graphics too, but, I would rather pay £20 for a selection of things like locos, coaches and multiple units from the steam store or other websites and get a variety of things to drive.
     
    Last edited: Sep 3, 2020
  2. ARuscoe

    ARuscoe Well-Known Member

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    I did work out how much my collection was worth last year... it was somewhere near £700 spent on £1300 nominal value.
    Not a cheap hobby...
     
  3. Cat

    Cat Well-Known Member

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    OP, perhaps you missed the AP sale last Bank Holiday weekend where some items were reduced by 40%. Not sure if the 150 was reduced but it is worth checking 3rd party sites on a regular basis, they often have flash sales.

    I remember being nearly 15 and really, really wanting a loco for my 00 model layout but could not afford it. :( But I did get it as a present the next Christmas.:)
     
  4. tsted.designs

    tsted.designs Member

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    You pay for quality. If you pay much cheaper prices you should expect less features and worse final quality. I feel Armstrong Powerhouse's prices can be justified as most of their packs have additional features that other developers might not add or even think of. This is also very unnecessary duplication when there is a perfectly good quality model available to purchase. If you really want a particular add-on, you could save up for it, much like other things in life. Or wait for a sale that would have a decent discount.
     
  5. Class43Harrison

    Class43Harrison Member

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    Cool. Thank you. That's good you got the 00 model you wanted.
     
  6. Class43Harrison

    Class43Harrison Member

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    Ok. Thank you. I understand what you are saying. I just think though if there was a 150/2 with not as good quality as AP, it would be good for starter Train Sim players and instead of them forking out to begin with, they may have a budget and say that budget was around £20, they could get some locos / route DLCs to start them off with and then work there way up to buying AP quality. I understand what you mean. Thank you. :D
     
  7. Class43Harrison

    Class43Harrison Member

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    No. I saw the AP Sale and got The 321 pack, the 319 Volume 2, the 142 pacer, mk 2a - c coach pack, the Mk2 DBSO, the Class 90 Fteightliner pack, The MTU Class 43, Mk3 HST enhancement pack and the Valenta Class 43, Mk3 HST enhancement pack. Cheers anyway. :D
     
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  8. Class43Harrison

    Class43Harrison Member

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    Gee whizz! I had model 00 gauge railways once, a few years ago now. Very expensive though. Enjoyable though, don't get me wrong. :D I put the Hornby Santa's Express round my bedroom Christmas tree every year. I got it about 5 years ago when I liked model railways. I still like them, but I live the real thing. 4ft 8" 1/2 gauge. :D
     
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  9. dunkrez

    dunkrez Well-Known Member

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    That's a great little collection, they are all awesome packs. Looks like you're in for a busy weekend!
     
  10. Cat

    Cat Well-Known Member

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    I broke a two year, self imposed ban on buying any dlc because I'm saving for a new pc.
    Couldn't resist the AP Mk1 pack on offer and they are fantastic. Only thing is they kill my fps, I add that that is the fault of my pc and not the product. :(
     
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  11. dunkrez

    dunkrez Well-Known Member

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    It's easy to cave in to the temptation of more trains.
     
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  12. Class43Harrison

    Class43Harrison Member

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    Yup. I am. Thank you! :D
     
  13. Doomotron

    Doomotron Well-Known Member

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    I thought that the original Class 150 was fine, and if AP hadn't bought the model it would still be available.
     
  14. Class43Harrison

    Class43Harrison Member

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    I know. It looked fine. It looks great now, but it's just too expensive for me and I'm sure many others. Thank you :) stay safe
     
  15. Cyclone

    Cyclone Well-Known Member

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    The big problem I have with AP is not necessarily a problem with AP themselves, but a problem with how it is used. In various scenarios, you find that five to ten different very expensive AP products are required, some costing $40 Canadian apiece (for reference, a route costs no more than $46, most in the $43.49 range). Then you don't even get any playable scenarios out of the box because you need half the library to run them. You got an issue with buying ten different AP products to run a scenario somewhere? That's your problem,. go edit it yourself. They are not very welcoming to all users of the product, and frankly, that's the problem.

    Let me be clear. I have no problem with people using the locos. I would love to drive the train around, and have others like the one I'm driving show up on the route. But for everything else, just use free skins for the models from Steam because that's what most newer users are going to get first. Only use the one Armstrong pack. Maybe some coaches, that might be acceptable (though Searchlight Simulations has a lot of free quality rolling stock, just use that instead for freight cases). But the reason is just what is discussed in this thread: it's too expensive to buy all that stuff to play an ever growing collection of scenarios dependent on the alternate versions, and I don't care what any terms of service say in regards to editing. If I can't play it, I'm editing it. End of discussion. Though more than likely, I'm just not going to waste my time downloading it.

    So again, I have the Arriva 150/2. I can sub that in everywhere. But we do need a 150/2 back on Steam. The Oovee model needs to come back even if it's just included for free with the 150/1 or another product. Just because Armstrong has their own model is no excuse for removing that from sale; if it was, the 170, 156, and 158 would be long gone from Steam, and the 320 would not exist in Suburban Glasgow (I learned later that Armstrong did that exact train through a route learning video). People still use it in the Workshop to this day, just like Marias Pass and Stevens Pass and all the BNSF items, and there is the ever-growing alienation of newer players - especially younger players like the OP here - that needs to be corrected. And Canadians REALLY get shafted with the GP9 pack and an SD70 pack. CN locos that Canadian players cannot even acquire. Like, come on now. I suggest to throw all the old Railworks models for free into other packs and increase value, and going back to those CN models, replace the BNSF with static stock like has been done on South Wales Coastal recently and make it internationally available even if a deal with BNSF for Canadian use in particular is pending (and if it does happen, Canadian buyers can have BNSF editions added to the DLC for free), or create a cheaper international pack without those BNSF models so people can still acquire them (BNSF can be another separate package should they later become internationally available again). Heck, merge the GP9 and SD70 into one international pack to maintain the price point. DTG has shown they can do stock models now with the 175. It's not a bad idea, especially if the scenarios don't use the older model. At least they are there for Workshop use. And the 150/2 is needed.

    This leads to another concern on SWC, but that will be a separate thread.
     
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  16. Doomotron

    Doomotron Well-Known Member

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    The AP model IS the Oovee model. They bought the model, as I said earlier, and AP removed it immediately from the store to release their own, improved version.
     
  17. Cyclone

    Cyclone Well-Known Member

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    You don't follow. Yes, they bought the Oovee model and removed the model so no one was able to acquire it. Therein lies the issue. Unless that model is actually part of the pack, it disenfranchises incoming newer, and sometimes younger, players who never got to grab the original model to use in Workshop scenarios. That is a lot of editing they will have to do in those Workshop scenarios because the game is designed expecting them to accept their fate.

    Luckily for me, I can sub the Arriva model as I got that in April. Anyone coming now does not have a reasonable substitute, will go to AP and think hmm, 150/2, that should work...then find nothing in the Workshop works and their model is useless there. That isn't right. Someone should not have to spend - and this is not an exagerration - $40 in Canadian pricing on a locomotive that they then have to spend time editing into scenarios. At least put the original model in the pack, even if you don't plan to feature it in scenarios. Other DTG packs do this with older models; heck, the CN models with Ohio Steel 2 and Fort Kent. Granted, perhaps the developers of those routes actually made the CN models as well. The old Canadian National pack had scenarios for Castle Rock that can no longer be acquired with the loss of that pack, but at least the models got put SOMEWHERE.
     
    Last edited: Dec 3, 2020
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  18. ARuscoe

    ARuscoe Well-Known Member

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    TStools (formerly RWTools) allows you to sub out every matching car type on a scenario or even route, so subbing them out takes a few minutes (mostly waiting for the serz program to unpack, sub and repack the .bin files to .xml and back)

    The tools are out there if people know where to look
     
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  19. Cyclone

    Cyclone Well-Known Member

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    This is the second time today I've heard of the Serz program. What is this?

    And yes, knowing where to look for alternate stuff helps (I just found old CN skins for a default model, and even a couple of BNSF skins, but I fear they might be for a different train model than used in some scenarios), but the point is it's extra work I need to do and DTG doesn't add a protocol to the program to automatically search for and replace with other content in the game. If a new core is ever created, this would be ideal. It can even say hey, you don't have this 150, we found these models, would you like to use this 150 instead? This would be a great way to sub out all the Armstrong trains, which are third-party and used in extremely large numbers in some scenarios, by replacing with versions that they already own. (Of course, we'll ignore that they might already own some of these if getting third-party scenarios in the first place, but the idea would be driving with the single train that you already own that might itself be such a model.)
     
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  20. ARuscoe

    ARuscoe Well-Known Member

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    Just about all of the config files for each asset, consist, route etc is in the form of an XML file (a database of locations, positions, what gets used, where it starts, ends etc)
    Serz is the program DTG have that packs these XML files into BIN files, but they also give you the serz program (they kind of had to to get their program to work) so if you know where it is, how to use it you can dig around in a few settings and do things that are otherwise impossible, because there are more settings available in the XML than there are in the TSx program

    I don't know too many companies that make it easier for you to use other people's stuff... Importing, yes... outbound? No
    TStools does what you're suggesting anyway, or you can use the editor (how to videos on youtube)
     
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  21. Cyclone

    Cyclone Well-Known Member

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    So here's a good question, then. Just yesterday I noticed on my first playing of Cajon Pass some extremely unusual lag. It was actually worse than that of Suburban Glasgow, a brand new route a month ago. I asked another user who told me the issue is the US Loco & Asset Pack; namely, since those assets were originally used with the route, the game splitting them rendered them to be a different AP file than Cajon Pass itself. As a result, the US assets are being dug out of the route on a regular basis. Yesterday I went from Barstow to Victorville with little more than minor annoyances in lags longer than those experienced on Suburban Glasgow. Today, I reached San Bernardino. As I was about to enter the yard to park my charge, the game froze. Completely. Note I have Windows 10 64-bit, a 1060 NVIDIA graphics card, 1 TB SSD hard drive, and 24 gigs of RAM. The screen was completely frozen. I hit Alt-TAB a couple times to make sure the computer hadn't frozen. After some panic and while in my second Alt-TAB, the game suddenly unfroze. I theorize that the assets in the San Bernardino yard were being loaded, meaning this is a very likely thing that could happen every time I go to San Bernardino. Can I unpack all of the assets and thus speed up the game? Or is there a different cause of this?

    It's worth noting I dropped to Medium quality for the second run today, and I had no issues at all on the third run leaving San Bernardino for Victorville and Oro Grande's tasks. Given how clean that run was, I might leave it there.
     
  22. ARuscoe

    ARuscoe Well-Known Member

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    Without knowing what your computer was doing at the time (and I mean the 60 things other than TSx as well as TSx itself), I don't know
    There are all sorts of reasons why computers lag, but unpacking isn't normally one of them, that's more likely to happen at scenario load (i haven't watched the files and folders to verify but given the preload in the scenarios has all of the required asset packs listed I would theorise that they all get unpacked at scenario load, hence it taking so long sometimes when you have a lot of requirements and not when there are fewer

    People are always looking for a golden bullet on why games run so badly on PC, and without literally stripping back every background process and optimising for TSx there's little way of knowing
     
  23. Class43Harrison

    Class43Harrison Member

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    Fully agreed thanks for the detailed reply :) stay safe
     

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