National Monopoly challenge 2

[PouncingAnt]

Current Winner: Elvish Magi of "Gundinghead Transport" in the year 1991
Runners up: Dopefish_lives of "Dopefish Transport" in the year 1996

Following on from this challenge, I am launching a second challenge. It is a small step up from the previous one. I've marked the main changes in bold.

This time things get a bit more interesting. You've been tasked with building up the transport network of a small sub-arctic country, rich with resources. With your skill help the country flourish into an economic power!

Conditions
[*]The world population must exceed 20000 (this should be child's play)[/b]
[*]You must achieve a company rating of at least 975[/b]
[*]Please do not change any settings that will effect gameplay
[*]Please destroy any unused stations and any unused station tiles
[*]Road vehicles less than 2 years old do not count toward vehicle number (otherwise you could just buy 120 road vehicles to fulfil the vehicles condition)
[*]Cargo from a specific industry must be picked up from a single station, and if delivered to another industry it must also be dropped off at 1 station[/b]

Considerations
[*]Your freight trains will be much heavier than usual (x10), so be careful of hills.
[*]Expanding towns is going to be crucial, do it as quick and as early as you can.
[*]You may turn off breakdowns!
[*]To clarify on the last condition, you may not use more than 1 station to pick up a certain cargo from a specific industry (different cargo types are OK [i.e. you may have a station for grain and a seperate one for livestock]). Additionally, unless delivering a cargo to a town, you must drop all of a specific cargo at a single station (ie. all grain travelling to a food processing plant must arrive at a single station, livestock may arrive at a seperate station).*
[*]Those towns wont grow without a supply of food each month!
[*]I borked up the settings by accident, you can change the station spread to whatever you feel is appropriate

I'm afraid that since this game is very reliant on how the map is laid out, that you must use the provided map.

I've lowered the rating required to win slightly. Hopefully that will reduce some of the triviality what needs to be done to win..

Good luck everyone!

*my apologies to Elvish Mage . He came up with a really good tactic against my previous challenge, possibly making it too easy.

[Dopefish_lives]

can you also post an openttd cfg file with the requirements for this challenge? hope im not asking for too much.

[PouncingAnt]

I could do, but the main reason its a challenge is that all the towns are above the snow level

also, I'll update the first post but: I accidently left the max. station spread at 4. You can increase this as much as you like (but dont touch any other settings )

[Elvish Magi]

No apologies needed.... It's just time to think of a new tactic, which is always more fun

Anyway, for the sake of clarity:

I presume the aim is once again to meet the specified conditions in as short a time frame as possible?

Under the "single station" rule, what if you are using multiple transport modes (eg a train and boat)? It's not very often a solution like that is the most efficient but I have seen it in the past.

Also, on occasions the geographic surrounds of an industry do not support a single larger station - would it be permissible to use separate stations should that be the case?

[PouncingAnt]

I presume the aim is once again to meet the specified conditions in as short a time frame as possible?

Under the "single station" rule, what if you are using multiple transport modes (eg a train and boat)? It's not very often a solution like that is the most efficient but I have seen it in the past.

Also, on occasions the geographic surrounds of an industry do not support a single larger station - would it be permissible to use separate stations should that be the case?

Yes, the person completing the challenge in the earliest game year is the "king of the hill" as it were

as far as I know, if you ajoin, for eg. a rail station to a bus station, despite the name remaining the same, you are credited with 2 stations. (ie. if you have a bus station, lorry station, rail station and dock all as part of one station, you'll be credited with 4 stations under the rating scheme.) so you shouldn't need to worry about that.

Hmm.. I'm willing to allow multiple stations due to the geographic situation, since that is only realistic. But you must REALLY be unable to do anything else about it. for instance if a transmitter is causing problems (sea/lakes do not count, you can fill them in )... I doubt you'll need to worry too much about this point either

[Elvish Magi]

as far as I know, if you ajoin, for eg. a rail station to a bus station, despite the name remaining the same, you are credited with 2 stations. (ie. if you have a bus station, lorry station, rail station and dock all as part of one station, you'll be credited with 4 stations under the rating scheme.)

That's interesting, I've never examined it that closely. I did notice in the last game that there was a discrepancy between the number of stations reported on the performance history screen and the list of stations - the performance history was showing a few more for some reason, so I made sure I had enough on both reports to satisfy the 80 station requirement! I did have a few adjoining stations earlier on in the game, so maybe that's where the discrepancy crept in. I suppose if I had the patience I'd count the stations to see which is correct, but I don't

[PouncingAnt]

I think I first learned that by looking at the tool tips for the detailed performance rating (right mouse button over stations EDIT: that is to say stations in the rating window )

[Dopefish_lives]

i started to play the game and all I have to say is that it's great. pretty challenging.

[PouncingAnt]

I finally got round to beating my own challenge.

Bawood Transport, 14th Dec 2006.sav

(92.96 KiB) Downloaded 320 times

I'm pleased to have beaten my personal record with this! It was frustrating though, I achieved 975 rating a few years beforehand, but my vehicles were mostly renewed that year!

[Elvish Magi]

Well, I've beaten 2006 by finishing in 2000, but I made loads of mistakes on the way so the field is open for someone to trounce that!

Nat Mop 2, 20th Mar 2000.sav

(93.55 KiB) Downloaded 308 times

Curiously, I think this is actually slightly easier than your first challenge but other people may well find different. That didn't make it any less enjoyable though

[PouncingAnt]

Indeed I found it a bit easier too. But then again, it's also a competition as well as a challenge, so it gets harder to win as more people play the next person will have to get 975 rating before 2000, for instance.

I have quite an interesting challenge in mind now, I'm just adapting it for playability. To that ends, I'm wondering what a good year to finish the game by is. Do you prefer a challenge that will take you 100 years to beat, or 50 years etc.?

I'd like to hear from everyone!

And good luck beating 2000!

[Elvish Magi]

I very rarely play a game as far as 2050, because long before that you tend to have completed pretty much everything that you can complete on a map and it just gets boring. That said, if a challenge had a reason for lasting 100 years then that might be different, so in true decisive fashion the answer to your question is...

It depends!

[PouncingAnt]

Haha! You're right. Well, I've thought of a number of things to do in the next challenge, so it should hopefully be enough to keep one going for 100 years. We'll see.

[Dopefish_lives]

dudes wait for me!

[PouncingAnt]

Hehe, sorry Dopefish, I guess I've had a lot of spare time lately.
Don't worry I wont be releasing the next challenge for a little while yet. Its a bit more complicated and needs balancing.
Also, this challenge will always be open, and I will accept people's submissions for as long as I have the free time to process them.

Anyways, how are things going with the challenge, Dopefish?

[Dopefish_lives]

theyre going quite well, but i dont really think i might be able to do a rating of over 975. i connected all the raw material producing industries. i only have to deliver some goods and paper. right now im in 1965

[Elvish Magi]

If your rating was any where near 975 by 1965 I would be shocked... not to mention rather impressed!

I just checked a save file from my game and in 1966 my rating was all of 278. It soon rises though

[Dopefish_lives]

its 429 in 1965. in 1970 for me its almost the same.

[Elvish Magi]

Ok, I couldn't resist setting a better mark for this

975 rating achieved in 1991, using 0.6.0 Beta 4 -

Nat Mop Take 2, 26th Aug 1991.sav

(94.69 KiB) Downloaded 322 times

That mark could definitely still be beaten, as one of the two starting farms decided to shut down in 1951 leaving me very short of food to grow the towns with. Hence why the final pop is only just over the required 20k!

Btw, my rating was around 470 in 1986 so as you can see it can be increased quite rapidly under the right conditions.

[Dopefish_lives]

during the game did you happen to have a recession? i did have one in the 1st of august 1984