FIRS Industry Replacement Set - Development

[andythenorth]

How much control does ttd give you when coding the industry graphics?

Lots

Is it possible to to create more than two or three industry graphics which produce the same cargoes and have the same name, but look different in game (e.g. underground or open pit graphics, but otherwise being identical industries)?

Yes, apart from the work, the main concern would be confusing players with industries that look different (bearing in mind that there'll be 50 or so industries in game, and that there are already plans to change them over time).

The sand quarry will be less dominated by the flooded extraction pit once I've added processing and stockpile tiles. Incidentally one of the reasons I chose the flooded pit was speed of drawing: easier to make water look good than draw rock faces and roadways across 12 or 16 tiles (drawing the banks for the pit took two hours).

[planetmaker]

I'm not saying you should do this (you already have plenty on your plate), but I am tempted to have an attempt at creating a subset for FIRS...

Given the current authors attitude and policy as I interpret it, they might be happy, if you want to contribute and add drawings of your own - provided they fit into the style of FIRS

Just saying, I hope you don't mind, andythenorth, FooBar, George

[Coxx]

The sand quarry will be less dominated by the flooded extraction pit once I've added processing and stockpile tiles. Incidentally one of the reasons I chose the flooded pit was speed of drawing: easier to make water look good than draw rock faces and roadways across 12 or 16 tiles (drawing the banks for the pit took two hours).

The sand querry is allready looking quite good. Actually I have never seen a sand quarry without water (but I´m no expert, of course), allthrough a irregular shaped lake would look better. I guess there will be some variations of the layout, just like the other industries.
I think the pit should appear only near (not so far from) water.

Definitly a site demanding some serious machinery. I wonder if there is a real dregging machine drawn yet on your HD.

[Zephyris]

Given the current authors attitude and policy as I interpret it, they might be happy, if you want to contribute and add drawings of your own

Any drawing contributions would be very warmly welcomed (at least according to me)!

[andythenorth]

Following a discussion on PM with FooBar (who is actually coding the cargos), we've switched some of the cargo bits around one more time. This is based on a few tests FooBar made.

So concluding:
Food -> 0B
Regearing -> 1E
Reserved 1 -> 1D
Reserved 2 -> 1F
Milk -> 0C
Scrap Metal -> 10
Survey supplies -> 16

Updated here: http://tt-foundry.com/sets/FIRS/schema/cargos

Given the current authors attitude and policy as I interpret it, they might be happy, if you want to contribute and add drawings of your own

Any drawing contributions would be very warmly welcomed (at least according to me)!

Agreed. Either post sprites directly in the thread (don't worry about finishing them completely before posting, it's useful to see work-in-progress), or PM me to discuss in advance We are already using sprites from ISR, and mph's chimneys have been very useful. Specifically things I am *not* drawing at the moment are:
- snow sprites (for arctic landscape)
- construction states
- animated features, such as the crane on the quarry (these are painful to do due to drawing & painful coding!)

Definitly a site demanding some serious machinery. I wonder if there is a real dregging machine drawn yet on your HD.

Not yet. Got bulldozers, dump trucks and front end loaders though: http://www.tt-foundry.com/

[FooBar]

Cargo icons. All 32 of them.

And with that comes a question: What's the best solution, using ActionA to replace TTD cargo icons as much as possible, or can I just 1/2/3 all icons leaving the icons in trg1r.grf the way they are?

[George]

Cargo icons. All 32 of them.
And with that comes a question: What's the best solution, using ActionA to replace TTD cargo icons as much as possible, or can I just 1/2/3 all icons leaving the icons in trg1r.grf the way they are?

Use actions 1/2/3. Second looks better

[FooBar]

Thanks George, will do.

[George]

So concluding:
Food -> 0B
Regearing -> 1E
Reserved 1 -> 1D
Reserved 2 -> 1F
Milk -> 0C
Scrap Metal -> 10
Survey supplies -> 16

I'd suggest
Milk -> 16
Survey supplies -> 0C

But I can't understand why to move reserved to 1D and 1F. I see no profit for this.

[FooBar]

Any particular reason for that?

Don't get me wrong, I don't mind swapping those, but there should be a reason for doing so...

[George]

Any particular reason for that?
Don't get me wrong, I don't mind swapping those, but there should be a reason for doing so...

Initially IDs were divided between vectors (by Michael Blunck). While drawing the schema, I try to keep IDs inside their chains. So ID 16 with milk stays inside agricultural chain, while with ID 0C swaps with wood one.
This allows to split the FIRS into chains files easier (like ECS vectors are done). I remember, that the current FIRS plan has only 1 GRF, but my tests show, that for 256x256 map (with large amount of water) 4 vectors is really much, and 7 vectors is the overkill (it is hard to place 37 industry types, imagine the problem for 64!). So, I would like to keep the FIRS with possibility to be split into chains in the future (when your tests would show the similar results for 256x256 maps). Technically, as much as possible. This is why I give my suggestions to select IDs that way.

[FooBar]

Well, in that case we might want to redo most of the ID scheme altogether. Seperated by 'chain', it's quite a mess:

Untitled-1.png (3.85 KiB) Viewed 2873 times

I think you're right about small maps. I don't think we want seperate files, but we might want to introduce a parameter or something to reduce the number of industries; some kind of light version...

[DaleStan]

How much control does ttd give you when coding the industry graphics?

Lots

Oy. Read the question. TTD gives you (close enough to) no control when coding industry graphics.

TTDPatch and OpenTTD provide non-trivial quantities of control, but TTD does not.

[George]

How much control does ttd give you when coding the industry graphics?

Lots

Oy. Read the question. TTD gives you (close enough to) no control when coding industry graphics.
TTDPatch and OpenTTD provide non-trivial quantities of control, but TTD does not.

Dale! I see you! What about NFO renum??? (Yes, I mean extended byte for vehicle ID for action 3 and others )

[George]

Well, in that case we might want to redo most of the ID scheme altogether. Seperated by 'chain', it's quite a mess:
I think you're right about small maps. I don't think we want seperate files, but we might want to introduce a parameter or something to reduce the number of industries; some kind of light version...

This order is seen both in cargo payment graph and refit vehicle list. If we'd decide to ignore these cases, then let us keep to MBs proposal as much as possible. If we decide to reorder IDs for these lists, then we need to change the list completely. Let me remind, that MBs list was build according to default cargoes list in temperate and has deep roots in TTD I think such a question should be asked to players, but we need to keep in mind, that most of users are familiar with this order since TTD and also by ECS and PBI. I suppose that users would prefer to keep the list as is

[FooBar]

I see...
How is the order in the list below? Is it good in terms of user-friendlyness? I tried to group cargos from the same chain as much as possible, while keeping original cargos in the original position. The exiting new things like * Supplies are at the end.

Passengers
Coal
Mail
Oil
Livestock
Goods
Grain / Sugar Cane
Wood
Iron Ore
Steel
Waste
Food
Fruit and Vegetables
Fish
Cotton
Wool
Milk
Sand / Water
Gravel
Lumber
Bauxite
Aluminium
Scrap Metal
Chemicals
Fuel Oil
Packaging
Parts
Engineering Supplies
Farm Supplies
Survey Supplies

[George]

I see...
How is the order in the list below? Is it good in terms of user-friendlyness? I tried to group cargos from the same chain as much as possible, while keeping original cargos in the original position. The exiting new things like * Supplies are at the end.

I do not think it is a good idea. Many users play with ECS, and it would be better to have similar cargoes on the same positions for them, Imho. So I suggest to return to the initial IDs list provided, with the only exception for ID 1E, placing it on ID 10 for gearing.

[George]

BTW, FooBar, do you use translation table for your code? You can define cargoes in one order, then define translation table with the other order and use translation tabe for industries. Unless you use the GRF in the regular game, changing cargoes IDs is not a pain, because your industry code is not changed.
You can look at ECS town vector for example.

[andythenorth]

my tests show, that for 256x256 map (with large amount of water) 4 vectors is really much, and 7 vectors is the overkill (it is hard to place 37 industry types, imagine the problem for 64!).

Thanks for the advice. I see the problem. However FIRS won't split by chain. The industrial economy would be incomplete, and I would consider that fundamentally broken, therefore it's not what I want to do.

FIRS is intended to provide interesting gameplay over a long game. If it requires larger maps I'm happy with that. We are designing a large number of physically big industries. Given the topological constraints that will impose (can't build on steep hills), and the requirements for some industries to be in town or near water, it follows logically that a certain size of map may be required (x things can't fit into a space that holds <x things).

I appreciate that there is a long-standing ethos that OpenTTD can be played on small maps to serve players who prefer that, or use devices that can't handle large maps. FIRS does nothing to damage that ethos, but may not be available to those players. There are already good alternative industry solutions for such players (default, ECS by George, PBI).

As FooBar suggested, a light version is worth considering. I've examined which industries could be removed, and it still leaves a very large number of industries. A light version imposes more work without solving the underlying problem, so I'm excluding it from our plans.


Any decision to change the plans above would rest with the core FIRS developers - me, FooBar and Zephyris.

cheers,

Andy

[andythenorth]

This site is *awesome* for industry photos:
http://www.derelictplaces.co.uk/main/fo ... y.php?f=64

I've been relying on Flickr and Google Images, but often not very useful.

Dare I say, Microsoft's birds-eye view on http://maps.live.com is also useful for big industry sites - the photos are at an angle and better than Google Earth / Maps which are completely top down.

cheers,

Andy