Train Fever

[Purno]

Ok, I don't get this. I made a railway line connecting 4 towns on one route. Stations are placed close to the towns. All towns have at least 1 bus/tram route that connects the whole town to the station. Yet, there are no passengers using my railway line. And yes, I checked, they are not cargo stations. What am I doing wrong?

[SkeedR]

What's the frequency of the trains? What's the frequency of the bus/trams?
I've found it works best to have 2 or more bus/tram lines in each town and have 15mins or less interval on the trains.

[Purno]

The frequency of the train (I had only 1) was probably quite bad. Sold the train to prevent massive loss. So, you're saying I should add multiple trains on that line, which is a huge investment? What frequency should I be aiming for?

[SkeedR]

I read somewhere that under 20mins is required for any usage at all. Get it under 20 and it'll start making money and then you can increase capacity from then.

[romazoon]

in my experience, over 10 min frequency(with one train) i usually don t see many people using the line.

the reason is that people will not try to go where it takes more than 20 minutes to travel to (from home to their destination). Imagine if frequency is 10 minutes and the train trip is for exemple 5 minutes, making allready 15minutes waisted, there would be only people able to reach station in less than 5 minutes that would potentially take your train. And beware that, people wants to travel to a building in an other town, and are not stoping at the train station, that s also additionnal time you have to take care of. In my exemple, that means there is only people that can reach in 2,5 minutes the station that will use it (they will use the 2,5 min left to reach their destination once in the other town).

Now that s why frequency is so important. Only a new model of vehicle allow to really reduce the travelling time(or better made lines), but just by multiplicating trains, it s easy to reduce the frequency and this way making much more people potentially taking the train. in my exemple, a second train would make frequency being reduced to 5 min, giving 5 more minutes for people to reach the station, or to reach their destination in another town.

So adding trains, definitly add passenger potentially using your lines, and then make grows towns wich add again some more passenger.

Edit : Purno, with 4 town connected on one line and with one train at the date you are playing it s normal(i mean normal in this game) that nobody uses your trains, the frequency + traveling time is simply too long. with slow train i advice you to do a line A to B, then another B to C, then C to D.... needing at least 3 trains. good luck and hf

[Purno]

Edit : Purno, with 4 town connected on one line and with one train at the date you are playing it s normal(i mean normal in this game) that nobody uses your trains, the frequency + traveling time is simply too long. with slow train i advice you to do a line A to B, then another B to C, then C to D.... needing at least 3 trains. good luck and hf

So a realistic setup won't work and the game encourages a silly A-B, B-C, C-D method? That's a huge dissapointment. Then what's the use of lines?

-

Also, see screenshot. What am I doing wrong? There's obviously enough railways available for these trains to pass each other.

[romazoon]

well the realistic setup could work, but as explained you ll need really many trains = lots of money to buy the trains and to run them until they turn a profit (a couple year usually). and even with plenty of trains if the frequency+traveling time+loading/unloading time is over 20 from A to D, nobody will stay in train the full route. The other problem you ll face is the separation of trains will take probably a huge amount of time.... yes game still have some quite major flows on that side IMHO.

Now for your problem on last screen, it s look likes they try to go where each other are standing..., try clicking the signal from main track, to make them one way only signal, making sure that this situation canno t reproduce anymore. For now, i think you should send one of them in the depot, let the other one goes, and relaunch the train in depot. but before relaunching that trains, make sure the signals are fixed (and that the line path is using the tracks you are expecting). note that signals are path signals and work very similarly to the Path signal from OTTD. And i can t really tell from here, but are the signals on right side of the tracks (on the double track side, not the station's one) ?

[SkeedR]

Edit : Purno, with 4 town connected on one line and with one train at the date you are playing it s normal(i mean normal in this game) that nobody uses your trains, the frequency + traveling time is simply too long. with slow train i advice you to do a line A to B, then another B to C, then C to D.... needing at least 3 trains. good luck and hf

So a realistic setup won't work and the game encourages a silly A-B, B-C, C-D method? That's a huge dissapointment. Then what's the use of lines?

-

Also, see screenshot. What am I doing wrong? There's obviously enough railways available for these trains to pass each other.

Realistic as in, A->B->C->D and then back again? It works for me, makes tonnes of money.
As for your stuck trains, it looks like one of the signals is the wrong way...

[Purno]

Well, all things considered, the "easy" difficulty is definitely not easy. I hope they'll address that issue.

[romazoon]

well i also make plenty of money with those ABCDCBA lines, but only once i have with relatively fast trains and lots of them and relatively big towns. i think Purno hitted that problem before he had the first fast steam loc...i guess with the 100km/h it works well already, but with 50km/h, like i said it is just too hard to get them spaced evenly, and to have enough passenger to carry.

and yes easy is not that easy, especially in 1850...but don t dare trying the hard mode then ! haha, the only difference is a decreased revenue for same trips...hard is really really hard, i played a 150 years hard game and sometimes ended up bankrupt, after 150 years of goddamn service with profit !

[Purno]

well i also make plenty of money with those ABCDCBA lines, but only once i have with relatively fast trains and lots of them and relatively big towns. i think Purno hitted that problem before he had the first fast steam loc...i guess with the 100km/h it works well already, but with 50km/h, like i said it is just too hard to get them spaced evenly, and to have enough passenger to carry.

Sounds like a major flaw of the game, considering you're forced to start in 1850.

and yes easy is not that easy, especially in 1850...

Sounds like another major flaw of the game. Shouldn't "easy" be, you know, easy? If I can't make profit, how should someone who hasn't got Transport Tycoon experience, make profit?

[SkeedR]

I've not yet bankrupted myself on easy. Current game I had 30m capital to spend at one point... Perhaps I could make it in the transport business after all?

[Purno]

Oh I'm sure a skilled player will have no problem at all. But IMO the "easy" difficulty should aim for the unskilled player. (Or the player that just wants to have some fun, rather than a challenge). A sandbox mode would be nice too.

[LocoMH]

It's more of a balancing issue I think. When I started connecting cities with buses, I made incredible profit. Having gained some money I could build nice railways.

[Purno]

I'm really struggling to make any kind of profitable railways. And even busroutes in towns give me losses. The only thing that works is a short-distance freight route with trucks.

Definitaly not the reason to play Train Fever. I want to see my lovely trains running at lovely tracks I built. This game really needs an "easy" mode that's actually easy. Or a sandbox mode. Either way, I don't really mind how they call it, but the game seriously needs an easier game mode.

Currently I simply can't enjoy the game.

[Chrill]

Definitaly not the reason to play Train Fever. I want to see my lovely trains running at lovely tracks I built. This game really needs an "easy" mode that's actually easy. Or a sandbox mode. Either way, I don't really mind how they call it, but the game seriously needs an easier game mode.

I recall Cities in Motion suffering much the same issue. This was corrected in time with an easier setting.

[Robbedem]

@Purno,

I think you lose money on the bus/tram routes because the stops are too close to eachother (at least they were to close in the first screenshot). If you put too many stops, the bus/tram will be stopping so often, it reduces the average speed a lot, which in turn makes walking just as quick.

F.e.: a 20km/h tram/bus that stops every 200m for 10 seconds, will doing only be doing 15km/h on average (even less, because it needs to accelerate and decelerate).

[LocoMH]

If you just want to build nice railroads without caring about money:
Save the game, go into the vehicles' folder, open a vehicle that's currently available, change its prize to 0, load the game, buy the vehicle, save the game, change the prize to a high number of your choice, load the game, sell the vehicle...you've got some serious money! I guess it's cheating, I did it in one game to build whatever I wanted.

[Purno]

@Purno,

I think you lose money on the bus/tram routes because the stops are too close to eachother (at least they were to close in the first screenshot). If you put too many stops, the bus/tram will be stopping so often, it reduces the average speed a lot, which in turn makes walking just as quick.

Well, considering stations have no displayed catchment area, I can only guess how close the bus/tram stops have to be to each other. Another flaw of the game...

I'll try creating longer distances, but ATM I kinda gave up on Train Fever
[/quote]

If you just want to build nice railroads without caring about money:
Save the game, go into the vehicles' folder, open a vehicle that's currently available, change its prize to 0, load the game, buy the vehicle, save the game, change the prize to a high number of your choice, load the game, sell the vehicle...you've got some serious money! I guess it's cheating, I did it in one game to build whatever I wanted.

Thanks, but that workaround takes a bit too much effort. Especially since my vehicles keep on loosing money. Purchase costs aren't the issue. Running cost are a problem along with the low supply of cargo/freight. The economic model of the game is, IMO, screwed up. Which is a shame, because the game looks very much fun, if it'd just be a little easier.

[uzurpator]

Purno: Go to vehicles folder, open the 'trains' and 'wagons' folders.

There are files there, afair with *.mdl extension.

Open them in notepad, search for

Code: Select all

Runningcost="xxxxxx"

where Xes are a number.

Change this to whatever value you wish. I reduced train running cost by a factor of 10. Now the game plays like early versions of TTD but with lots of cool features.