Transport Tycoon Forums

SlowRails

See also the development thread.

Latest released version: 0.2 beta
Latest stable verion: none

Description

SlowRails makes the following additions to OTTD r20255 or better:
- 3 new normal rail types with speed limits of 40, 80 and 160 km/h (_040, _080 and _160)
- 3 new electrified rail types with speed limits of 40, 80 and 160 km/h (E040, E080 and E160)
- option to select price model for tracks
- option to have 6 new "fake" locs to activate the new railtypes

The SlowRails addon for UKRS will make UKRS use the new railtypes introduced by SlowRails.
It also has two optional extra locs to make the slowest electrified track (40 km/h) available at an earlier time.
UKRS doesn't have enough electric locs by itself to activate all the tracks needed on time.


Uses

What good is it to have rails with speedlimits ? I'm sure if you want it, you'll have your own reasons, but I'll give you mine:

• - Making trains slow down when approaching stations or yards. I don't really like the style where fast trains go full speed into a station and then suddenly come to a full stop at the spot.

• - Slowing down high speed trains on busy track segments. A HST behind a "normal" train has the bad habbit of speeding into the slower train and dropping to a standstill when they caught up. Assuming the slower train is still capable of going about 160 km/h, the use of track with that speedlimit will make the HST use a more correct speed for the track segment.

• - The use of slowing locs and diesel locs will make more sense when they can use cheaper tracks. This requires the choice of a price model that supports it of course.

Design choices

Why the choice for those three speeds ? I figured three different speed limits were needed to allow a very fast train to slow down in a nice looking way. I figured that speed reductions of 50% each time would be acceptable. Since nutracks already used the speeds of 80 and 160 km/h (among other speed limits) I decided that those would be my choice for the faster speeds, introducing 40 km/h as the slowest speed to be used around depots and on yards. Since each track I introduced required a loc to activate, I didn't feel adding more then those three was a good idea. It's one of my goals for the future to have addons for all the popular big train sets where I hope to be able to have the six extra railtypes active using as few locs external to the set as possible.


Installing and configuring

Install SlowRails as you would install any other newGRF. If you install an addon for a trainset too, it should be
put in the list AFTER SlowRails and AFTER the trainset it's modifying. If you try to do otherwise, the addon will
disable itself.

Via 'Set parameters', you can configure three parameters for SlowRails:

1) Track price: this determines the price for laying track. These are the current models and their construction costs
OTTD default is meant for players who want to only have speed limits without other playstyle changes.
Kimby variant is meant for players who like to try a style where the choice of faster or electrification comes with a steeper price.
More variants are planned for the 1.0 release: a 'sandbox' where all rails are free is one idea. I'm also open to suggestions from the beta testers about usefull pricing models to be added.

2) Rail graphics: this determines the looks of the tracks. At the moment, the only choice is "none", which for me means that the graphics from railtype 00 are used for all new railtypes too, including taking over the effects of other newgrfs on those looks. This result is however not well defined, so I'll add some more stable options in the future. The first addition here will be the OpenGFX tracks (causing me to have to start using GPLv2), but I hope to be able to add some more options from other existing newgrfs too. That will however depend on the authors being agreeable to the idea.

3) Railtype activation: this currently has two options:
a) "by date" option introduces six locs to the game to enable the new railtypes using historically reasonable choices:

• - "Blutch" introduces the 40 km/h normal rail in 1814. I consider this train by Stephenson the best point to start because earlier "trains" either didn't use rails or were considered trams instead of trains.

• - "Rocket" introduces the 80 km/h normal rail in 1829 refering to the Rainhill trials. While the Rocket wasn't the only train to go beyond he 40 km/h limit in those trials, it was the loc that actually won.

• - "Antelope" introduces the 160 km/h normal rail in 1848. It's a matter open to discussion if that's historically correct, but it seemed the safest choice after reviewing the possible contenders.

• - For the electric trains, I've simply taken the year catenary was supposedly used for trains for the first time: 1888. I'm afraid those locs have the not so imposing names of "Catenary 1" till "Catenary 3". Maybe someone has a better suggestion ?

b) "set integration" skips introducing the locs and leaves it to a supported set to activate the railtypes. If no supported set is available, the railtypes will be unavailable too.

I'll most likely rework this 3rd setting in later version to allow players to activate or deactivate each of the 6 locs as they need them. I'm still unsure if I should go for the "invisible loc" approach (which could be used for eyecandy purposes), or continue with the idea of having some historical but mostly useless loc to activate a railtype. In the latter case, I could really use the help of a talented artist

Using SlowRails addons for supported train sets

At the moment only one train set is supported: UKRS. Putting the addon on your newGRF list (after both SlowRails and UKRS) will automatically update the locs of UKRS to have as much support for the new railtypes as possible. Due to the low amount of electric locs in UKRS, the addon offers two 'extras' whose purpose is mostly to move forward the introduction date for 40 km/h electrified track. Both the stats and the looks for those locs are temporary. I'll have to review the stats to make them fit into UKRS. The current graphics for the ES1 are actually those of the standard loc MJS250 (or at least I hope they are for you too) while those for the AL2 are taken from the standard loc SH 30.

Planned features

These features I hope to implement in future versions:

• - support for multiple track graphics (though I'm not too fond of the idea to allow different graphics based on trackspeed, I'll probably implement it if there's a strong request for it). This means I'll have to convince the various authors to allow me to include their tracks in SlowRails.

• - having different depots for the various speeds: this will allow you some choice of depot style while waiting for OTTD to offer it an easier way. Again, this means I'll have to convince some authors.

• - support for different tunnel graphics for the various speeds: I'm not sure it's even possible, but worst case it should be possible to at least chance the graphics for all of them together.

• - metro tracks: those are currently under development as part of nutracks and are for me the most appealing part of that newGRF missing in SlowRails. Who knows, maybe they'll allow me to add that part to SlowRails too. This is however not very high on my current wishlist.

Feedback

As this is my very first newGRF, I'm probably doing all kinds of things the wrong way. Feel free to (gently) point out my mistakes so I can improve. Any requests for additional features are welcome too, but some things I can already exclude:
- third rail or narrow gauge: I'd like to refer you to nutracks if you're interested in those kind of tracks.
- catenary of different, incompatible kinds. While I agree this is actually realistic, it makes things too much a mess for me.
- extra locs for train sets other then those needed to support SlowRails: the locs I'm adding are only there because they're currently needed. When one of the devs decides to implement railtype activation by date without the need of a loc, all the locs will be gone from SlowRails.
- bridges: I'm afraid the looks of bridges are better left to a bridge set

Kimby wrote: The SlowRails addon for UKRS will make UKRS use the new railtypes introduced by SlowRails.

This is actually a very nice idea. I'd propose to move it into the core newgrf and automatically use it when UKRS is present.

Kimby wrote:I'll most likely rework this 3rd setting in later version to allow players to activate or deactivate each of the 6 locs as they need them. I'm still unsure if I should go for the "invisible loc" approach (which could be used for eyecandy purposes), or continue with the idea of having some historical but mostly useless loc to activate a railtype. In the latter case, I could really use the help of a talented artist

I'd not go for invisible as the engines will be available in the purchase lists, too. Having there more than one invisible one is... anything but ideal. Historic engines is a good choice. Enabling them via add-on to existing train sets as you do for UKRS already is the best solution.

Kimby wrote:

• - support for multiple track graphics (though I'm not too fond of the idea to allow different graphics based on trackspeed, I'll probably implement it if there's a strong request for it). This means I'll have to convince the various authors to allow me to include their tracks in SlowRails.

Shameless plug: SwedishRails (nightly versions) already incorporates support for your railtypes. So it can be used as means to provide alternative graphics to these track types via newgrf parameter.

• - support for different tunnel graphics for the various speeds: I'm not sure it's even possible, but worst case it should be possible to at least chance the graphics for all of them together.

That is possible.

planetmaker wrote:

Kimby wrote: The SlowRails addon for UKRS will make UKRS use the new railtypes introduced by SlowRails.

This is actually a very nice idea. I'd propose to move it into the core newgrf and automatically use it when UKRS is present.

To be honest: I originally did put it in the core newgrf and automatically used it as you're proposing here. But that was when I was under the wrong impression about how newgrf overrides worked. As it is, the part that's put in a separate newgrf now is only usefull for those using the train set supported by it, so it actually makes sense to me to not load it for everyone else too.

planetmaker wrote:I'd not go for invisible as the engines will be available in the purchase lists, too. Having there more than one invisible one is... anything but ideal. Historic engines is a good choice. Enabling them via add-on to existing train sets as you do for UKRS already is the best solution.

I wasn't overly fond of the invisible engine thing myself, so I guess I'll go for the historical approach. I believe Raven created a "Rocket" in the past, so I guess can start by begging him to be allowed to use it here. That leaves only 5 other locs

planetmaker wrote:Shameless plug: SwedishRails (nightly versions) already incorporates support for your railtypes. So it can be used as means to provide alternative graphics to these track types via newgrf parameter.

I guess I really should check out SwedishRails then

planetmaker wrote:

kimby wrote:

• - support for different tunnel graphics for the various speeds: I'm not sure it's even possible, but worst case it should be possible to at least change the graphics for all of them together.

That is possible.

Nice More potential power for SlowRails

Love it! can't wait to try it out!

The UKRS2 Addon features two early electrics, the EF1 (1914 I believe) and EE1 (1920s). That should solve your introduction date issue. The EF1 was pretty much the first successful electric mainline engine in Britain. (Although your idea to add the ES1 and the later AL2 is certainly welcome. The more the merrier!). I'd also like to see the EM1 and EM2, but that's a different request for a different thread.

I think I redrew my EM1 and EM2 to current UKRS loading gauge..

Kimby wrote:Uses

What good is it to have rails with speed limits ? I'm sure if you want it, you'll have your own reasons, but I'll give you mine:

• - Making trains slow down when approaching stations or yards. I don't really like the style where fast trains go full speed into a station and then suddenly come to a full stop at the spot.

• - Slowing down high speed trains on busy track segments. A HST behind a "normal" train has the bad habit of speeding into the slower train and dropping to a standstill when they caught up. Assuming the slower train is still capable of going about 160 km/h, the use of track with that speed limit will make the HST use a more correct speed for the track segment.

• - The use of slowing locs and diesel locs will make more sense when they can use cheaper tracks. This requires the choice of a price model that supports it of course.

I would like to say my opinion.
1st. Yes I thing this is a good idea to slow down train manually before they enter the station or when they go behind a slower train, but I think this should be done by a program and not by graphic set.

2nd. If the intention of this set is to control train speed, then maglev and monorail trains need it even more. So maglev and monorail extensions are welcome

3rd. Is this not the same as nutrack set (despite price factor) ??? Are you not reinventing the wheel ?