Convoy: train support testversion

[fanioz]

Congratulations..
Test it ..

egh... What is minimum version required ?

[GeekToo]

I'm not quite sure, I guess you're safe when you can run the bus version of Convoy. I don't think I've used any of the newest functions.

[davidx123]

Wow!really nice AI!he even uses that new signals!
i don't even use pre-signals!
but sometimes,he stuck,when there isn't any free path for a train.also with some new grf,like dutch trainset,and DBset he has the to long train graphic error.but he very good ai when using the proper trains!
8\10!

[GeekToo]

Wow!really nice AI!he even uses that new signals!
i don't even use pre-signals!
.but he very good ai when using the proper trains!

Thanks for the nice words

but sometimes,he stuck,when there isn't any free path for a train.also with some new grf,like dutch trainset,and DBset he has the to long train graphic error

I've never tested it with any newgrf, but thanks for the feedback. I took a little look at it, and it seems that some newgrfs make carriages or engines longer or shorter, so they don't fit anymore in the station's platform.
I think I've solved it now, will be present in the next update.

[davidx123]

one thing that i really love in that ai,that even if you reload him,he will still remake his old services
( if he had a a service from town a to b,and i reloaded him,he will start from a to b!).
any way,if you reduce the number of the trains to 2,it will be much better,since it will not stuck any more.
maybe also shorten wagons,according to city size.

[Mr. Wednesday]

I introduced TConvoy into a relatively mature game (me and four NoCab 1.17). The first route it tried flamed out after the stations were built. I've attached a save game and a screenshot (including the end of the outputs in the AI debug window). Please let me know if there's any more information I can provide.

I let the game run for a little while longer after I saved it before taking the screenshot, because I wanted to see what the AI would do next.

This game is r16371, the nightly from a few days ago. (The most recent nightly does not load the AIs cleanly.)

Edit to add: TConvoy wound up going bankrupt, though they weren't alone in that regard: one of the NoCab's did too.

[GeekToo]

Mr Wednesday, thanks a lot for your report.

I think you've found three problems at once: 2 for TConvoy and 1 for NoCab, well done!

1. You used hilly terrain, that contains several areas of water and already build upon with several roads and tracks.
Both factors complicate things for the pathfinder. I limited the number of iterations the pathfinder can spend to find one connection, to prevent the situation that it spends decades of pathfinding before finding a route, if ever. But under more difficult situations I think I have to raise the number of iterations.
2. You use a setting or newgrf that cause trains to be a lot more expensive than usual (Do you happen to know which newgrf does that?).
In combination with point 1, this can get TConvoy into trouble: it already spent money to build some stations that weren't connected in the end, and when finally a connection is made, it does not have enough money to buy a train anymore. I think I will consider to build only one track to start with one train, and only double the tracks when enough money is available.
3. When loading your savegame, NoCab's are immediately stopped, because in the latest nightlies, the devs have limited the time the AI can spend in the constructor or Load function, to prevent the game lagging at startup. I'll put a note in NoCab's thread about this.

Anyway, thanks for testing, I'm glad I did not see any real AI crash. Going bankrupt is part of the game, it just needs to learn to play a bit better. But an AI crash is clearly a programming error, and that's worse in my opinion.
Well, you've given me some homework, next version will be better, thanks to you, though I won't promise when that version will be posted.

[Mr. Wednesday]

I'm a little surprised that the settings or newgrfs would increase the train prices substantially. The only newgrfs that I'm running that should touch the trains are Pikka's industries and the old wagons/new cargoes (so that I can transport the new cargoes from the new industries using existing wagons). I wouldn't have thought, though, that either would alter train costs significantly.

I don't remember making any economy-related changes to the settings or difficulty.

[roberto_rrocha]

Hi GeekToo,

Great AI ...

I think you could put a longer Sleep value (like 100 or 200, I don't know exactly ) on main thread of AI in order to avoid slow down the game when several TConvoy AI were started.

Another thing is, if I change the terrain(ex: remove slope) just before the AI build the track, the track can be built in wrong way and so the route won't be Ok. In this case it's necessary make some track review.

I think it could build less switch points too... sometimes the switch points looks crazy.

I agree with davidx123 about create only 2 trains for each route.

As posted before there are some problems with insufficient cash

Regards.

[fanioz]

Hi GeekToo,
Here is the crash I 've got several days ago. I've scrolled panel up, but I can't see where is the exactly error exception. I hope it is still clear for you to know where.

[rashaverak]

crashed when no vehicles to transport passengers available (1920 year)

[Wold]

I didn't get a crash, but I got a little bit of malfunctions :

Unnamed, 10th Nov 1962.png (97.98 KiB) Viewed 922 times

Here, the Yellow has built a route, but couldn't double the track, so there is a single line for 50 tiles or so. That caused a lot of jams and didn't result in serious income

Unnamed, 10th Nov 1962#2.png (51.78 KiB) Viewed 921 times

Now a second thing - the Red has build a route with a single line ( connected both cities ) yet it didn't build a train to service them. And in addition there are no signals on yellow's track so the train reserves a lot of space ( don't know if this is intentional )

Shordington Transport, 23rd Nov 1969.png (98.01 KiB) Viewed 916 times

There are no mail wagons even though both station accept it.

[Wold]

And the last thing:

Shordington Transport, 5th Jan 1970.png (96.02 KiB) Viewed 920 times

These are the 2nd and 3th largest cities and for 10 years neither of the companies have built a route. ( they have connected 7-8 times smaller towns )

And something else - I don't understand the choice of engines - the ai prefers to build expensive yet unreliable locos. For short distance route you can build Manley-Morel ( or something equivalent or even just slowly moving trains ) so you can have more passengers on the track resulting in greater income.

[GeekToo]

Thanks a lot guys, for posting your reports, it's really appreciated. Some of the bugs are known problems, others aren't. For AI devs (well, at least for me), bug reports are really motivating, cause it means people are interested, and it offers a chance to improve things. And that does feel a lot better than having your efforts ignored.

I am already busy with improving TConvoy, though some of the issues are difficult to solve, next version will be better, thanks to you.

[Yexo]

For AI devs (well, at least for me), bug reports are really motivating, cause it means people are interested, and it offers a chance to improve things. And that does feel a lot better than having your efforts ignored.

I second that

[Wold]

Dundingworth Falls Transport, 5th Apr 1967.png (66.2 KiB) Viewed 913 times

It was supposed to reuse it's tracks, wasn't it?

Dundingworth Falls Transport, 11th Aug 1966.png (75.69 KiB) Viewed 911 times

Speaks for itself ( keep up the work though )

Dundingworth Falls Transport, 28th Nov 1960.png (93.99 KiB) Viewed 913 times

A slight bug

[Paltala]

possibly found a bug with the pre-train test version

convoymishap.png (400.75 KiB) Viewed 923 times

as you can see, convoy constantly builds terminus bus stations and then proceeds to build far too many buses for the network which results in 1 station with high ratings but huge queues of buses while the other 8 stations in the network have ratings of under 20% and very very very rare service

[Menno]

Hi, I don't know if you're still updating on the vehicles part of Convoy, I've used Convoy v11 in a game with other AIs (see other topics)

I tried a game with Convoy v11 among other AI's.
Compared to the other AI's, Convoy performed extremely well, maxxing out in all graphs until the vehicle limit was reached (in under 10 years in the 1980s). One annoyance: clogged roads. One funny thing: within on continuous game Convoy is not aware of crashing road vehicles, does not attempt to replace them, and is also not aware of the 'vehicle gap' caused by many, many railroad crossing crashed (thanks Choochoo!), although it could use it to build new vehicles or even new routes. When I saved the game and reloaded it however, Convoy immediately detected the 'gap' and filled it with vehicles.
Congratulations on this competetive AI, which make me tremble when I see the head of P. McIntosh and the text "Convoy starts construction near Brundale!"
See attached save game.
OpenTTD 0.7.3
NewGRFs: OpenGFX, better vehicles names, Av8 1.501

(I will post comparable posts in the other AI's topics)

EDIT: PS I'm looking forward to try TConvoy!

[planetmaker]

Seems I forgot report back here on my AI testgame results. Congratulations, you (or Convoy v11) won! and it reached the vehicle limit in less than 10 years.

Having a 2nd look at the game I observed by chance a funny thing Convoy did do: clear a piece of water, build a bus station which then was - of course - flooded immediately:

[Wolf01]

I'm sorry to dig it up, but I have problems playing with this nice AI when using articulated road vehicles

In the pic attached you can see 2 Convoy AIs in action after about 100 years of gameplay

I hope it will be possible to fix this problem