Hey I've noticed that in some scenario's on the LIRR there are a couple dozen Amfleet cars at Sunnyside railyard, this looks great and all but when you drive a timetable route Sunnyside is barren wasteland instead of the busy yard as it supposed to be. Does anybody know how if Dovetail is working on improving that
Yeah, these really do spruce up the route don't they? For those unaware, these cars are basically just 'dummies' that have no interior modeling and aren't functional at all, but they sure do look alright from a distance. The reason they're there is simple: to populate an otherwise empty yard without having the performance impact of a fully modeled and functioning train. So far I've only seen these being used on very few select routes, and even then they're only used in scenario mode. These 'dummy' trains can only be used in scenarios since they're curated and scripted and you can simply drop in various props without having to worry much. But if you plop one of these dummy trains into service mode...well...how would that work? Would it be a part of the base layer/package? Maybe it can be offered as a sort of DLC pack? The biggest issue that's been brought up was that if you fill up a yard with these trains, then the yard basically becomes unaccessible to the player. Remember, those dummy trains can't be moved at all (I believe they just function as scenery props). This hinders the possibility for future expansion DLC's and locos. ...Has there actually been a case where this happened? I dunno. But the premise is that it *could* happen. Imagine a switcher loco that can't access half of the tracks in the yard because they're permanently obstructed. That wouldn't be too useful, would it? On another thread somewhat related to this topic, I believe Adam, one of the developers in charge of the Preserved Collection, hinted that they were open to feedback from the community as to whether or not we'll see more of these train/props scattered around yards. I don't believe anything further has been said about this, but there has been a considerable demand for it, so who knows
Perhaps they could be locked to prohibit access (after all, you’re an LIRR operator, not Amtrak ). Also keep the interior/windows dark to get around modeling the interior. I don’t know if just doing that will allow them to be and still access the yard without performance issues. The ones in the scenario are likely missing many finer exterior details that you would normally see if up close.
I've seen various example of this technique being used since the MSTS days and it's odd it's not so widespread on TSW. About blocking the yards... how would those dummy trains be different to any other prop, like a house or a fence, there is a pole in the middle of the track on RSN so it's not a problem to place props on the track... why should it be a problem to remove it in an update if those yards will need to become functional?
Like I've mentioned, those M7's are only there in scenario mode, but not on the full 24/7 service mode. Those simplified cars weren't used at all outside of scenarios. The yards at Sunnyside and Jamaica are always empty in service mode (there's one Belmont service that's sometimes stabled past the eastern end of Jamaica, but I don't think that service has ever seen any changes). That part was just speculation, I'm not exactly sure how those dummy cars are placed, I just figured that they were like scenery props. The problem with this (if true) is that this means they are 100% static and cannot be moved around at all, unlike a normal functioning car. Once they're there, then they're staying there. Sure, I believe they totally should be able to be removed in a update shall it come to that, but since these trains would be part of the scenery itself, it makes it unlikely we'll see their removal. It's rare when they do move around scenery objects. Perhaps the better solution would be to only allow them to obstruct just a few tracks, rather than an entire yard. Theres a bunch of different angles this can be tackled from