Dead end track

[wallyweb]

Some tracks stop at dead ends. Sometimes they are just a stack of ties but other times (in terminal stations) they are quite elaborate with shock absorbing bumpers and all.
This would be similar to the dead end in one of the road sets.
If it can't be included as a track build option, perhaps it could be done up as a single tile platform. This should be possible with the new option to build stations by the tile.
Perhaps it could be combined with a signal permanently set to stop.
Any takers?

[GoneWacko]

What would the use of this be?

Don't think there is really a need for this.

[DeletedUser21]

doesn't it add a bit of realism to the game to include fixstops?

[Louie Armstrong]

yeah it does add realism, i think its quite a cool idea myself. Although it would more than likey need to be done as a station, and the only problem i can see is this would make the total station count add up pretty quick.

[The Irish]

I think it has be suggested many times before. Somehow, the problem was always that the train wouldnt be able to stop and therefore would drive right to the end of the track.

[jfs]

Using the extra landscape array also used for new station graphics and other stuff (iirc), it should be posible to just mark those pieces of track to have alternate graphics.
Then, if I'm not badly mistaken, one could hook into the train movement code in the patch and disallow any kind of train to move on track marked that way. Actually, it might even be a step on the way to extra track systems, but the problem in implementing those are in the train data structures afaik, which can't be extended any further.
(But then, I'm probably badly out of touch with patch development )

[DaleStan]

What would happen if we flipped the station, so building an X-direction drew Y-direction tracks, and vice versa? Now, the train can't get to the square in question *at* *all*. Is this an improvement?

[The Irish]

Sorry, didn't cop that.
Can you explain that again, in a different way?

I had the idea to make it some kind of signal that is always red. But that isn't possible either, as those can not be built inside stations.

[hovering teacup]

maybe a too simplitic idea but: you can draw station tile with a bumper that debords its own tile. the bumper must be fore-piece if the end is at the south side, back-piece if it's at the north side. this should work except when there's a building in the next tile.

[Rob]

If you use a wrong tracktype for it (but draw is as if it is the right tracktype), you can even build it inside a station and trains can't use that piece of track.
You only have to be aware of this while up- or downgrading your tracks.

[DaleStan]

What would happen if we flipped the station, so building an X-direction drew Y-direction tracks, and vice versa? Now, the train can't get to the square in question *at* *all*. Is this an improvement?

Sorry, didn't cop that.
Can you explain that again, in a different way?

You build a station where, internally, the track goes this way: /, but all the graphics show \ track, and vice versa.

[wallyweb]

Lots of great thinking here since I launched this thread.
Maybe the solution is the simplest one possible, using existing behaviour.
As things are now, if a track ends, the train stops there, reverses itself, and goes back the way it came.
This situation is usually encountered with a terminal station, unless you like to build track that goes nowhere.
So, that last tile in a terminal station just needs a little eye candy tacked on to the end of it.
With the new station graphics allowing for single tile add ons as well as tile replacement, this should be easily implemented.
The challenge is to the artist and it is this ... the engine will advance right to the end of the track, right at the edge of the tile, so it will seem to penetrate any structure drawn there. Is there a way to draw the bumper, a forced perspective perhaps, so as to give the illusion that the engine does not penetrate it?