Suggestion: "Blueprint" editing mode for planning changes

[Joe#]

Hi,

Here's my idea:

* A "Blueprint Editing Mode" toggle button would be added to the windows for constructing railways, monorails and roads. Or it could be added to the main buttons panel.
* Clicking this button would make all vehicles, trains and aircraft become invisible but they would continue operating without being affected by any changes made while this editing mode is toggled on.
* When this mode is then toggled off the game would make all the changes it could make without deleting things which are being used like rail lines, making the player's balance change for the implemented changes.
* The game would then wait for things being used to stop being used before modifying them and changing the player's balance. A section of track,road or station being used could become blue while the game is waiting to change it.
* While in "Blueprint Editing Mode" a player could abort all their planned changes by pressing the escape key.
* Players could be allowed to use their depots to create free track testing trains while blueprint mode is enabled, these trains would be deleted by the game when this editing mode is toggled off.
* If there are postponed changes when a player enables "Blueprint Editing Mode" having used it before, these changes could be further postponed until after this mode has been toggled off: so a player who has second thoughts could enable blueprint mode to double check changes they planned when using this mode before: cancelling them if necessary.

So a player could use this editing mode to make drastic changes to a rail network without disrupting its existing trains and any planned changes would be free until blueprint mode is toggled off.

There could also be a "Blueprint Editing Mode" window which could have these features:
* Undo and redo buttons for planned changes.
* A message saying what the cost would be for all the planned changes.

[Joe#]

I'm an experienced hobbyist programmer and would be willing to have a go at implementing this editing mode myself one day, if no one else does but I won't have time to work on this for at least a month because I have existing programming tasks I need to finish for other games.

[planetmaker]

I assume this is meant as a suggestion towards OpenTTD, thus moved to the correct forum. Please mind to post in the appropriate section in the future

[Joe#]

I assume this is meant as a suggestion towards OpenTTD, thus moved to the correct forum. Please mind to post in the appropriate section in the future

Sorry

[Redirect Left]

An interesting suggestion, although I suspect quite awkward to implement. Would be interesting though.

[TimeLapse1357]

it might be easier to implement as a "cheat" that only affects the currently loaded game.

all building, demolishing and vehicle purchases are free.
the "shift-click" cost window is displayed (and cannot be closed). it displays the accumulated costs your actions.
there should be some limit on saving the game OR a very obvious on screen indication that this "feature" is in use.

[Joe#]

Thanks for posting your implementation idea for my suggestion TimeLapse1357. I don't think implementing this editing mode as a cheat will be necessary.

I've not looked at OpenTTD's code yet but I guess implementing this editing mode wouldn't be the simplest and quickest of tasks since I think any good implementation would involve adding a second world object to a player's game state.

But I don't think a player's blueprint world would need to be shared with other players' openTTD clients so maybe no multiplayer code changes will be required. Spectators and maybe other players might want to see the blueprint world a player is viewing & editing but multiplayer code support for this optional functionality could be implemented later.

[planetmaker]

But I don't think a player's blueprint world would need to be shared with other players' openTTD clients so maybe no multiplayer code changes will be required. Spectator's and maybe others players might want to see the blueprint world a player is viewing & editing but support for this optional functionality could be implemented later.

How to treat joint planning when playing cooperatively inside one company?

[Joe#]

But I don't think a player's blueprint world would need to be shared with other players' openTTD clients so maybe no multiplayer code changes will be required. Spectator's and maybe others players might want to see the blueprint world a player is viewing & editing but support for this optional functionality could be implemented later.

How to treat joint planning when playing cooperatively inside one company?

I was wrong: a player's blueprint world would need to be shared with the other players in a multiplayer game for joint planning in cooperative games and for saving every player's blueprint world when a multiplayer game is saved.

[Joe#]

I think players would want to be able to view their opponents' blueprint worlds to see what they are planning to do and I also think players would always want to be able to see where their opponents might build new railway lines and roads so maybe new railway lines and roads being planned in a player's blueprint world should be visible in the main world. They could be visually distinguished by being transparent and players who aren't using the blueprint editing mode could be allowed to build over transparent things another player is planning to build.

[Joe#]

I want to start working on this soon if no one else is working on this.

[Eddi]

there likely is nobody working on this (yet).

[ANIKHTOS]

I want to start working on this soon if no one else is working on this.

well the blueprint can have a specific area
and when you make a blueprint you can put the land into a freeze mode? noone can use it
like for 6 months with a sign under development
you will have 6 months to develop the land or else it will be free
or you may be forced to buy all the land for the blueprint to be activated

i prefer the buy the land option
you can mark the land by clicking and drag the necessary area

so that will solve the problems with competitors
because the land will already be secured


with these we may do these
real time upgrading of network especially junctions


maybe the blueprint can have stage 1 .2.3
so we can effectively change a junction
stage 1 we by pass the circulation
stage 2 we change the junction
stage 3 we remove the things on stage 1

maybe we can implement this feature so all building is done through blueprint
and there can be a speed of construction.

some more ideas what we can do with the blueprint

[Joe#]

well the blueprint can have a specific area
and when you make a blueprint you can put the land into a freeze mode? noone can use it
like for 6 months with a sign under development
you will have 6 months to develop the land or else it will be free
or you may be forced to buy all the land for the blueprint to be activated

i prefer the buy the land option
you can mark the land by clicking and drag the necessary area

so that will solve the problems with competitors
because the land will already be secured

Your idea would solve the problem of a player building a long railway line, for example, having their intended route's land suddenly & unexpectedly affected by lots of land changes caused by another player planning these changes with the blueprint editing mode and then confirming them making this game suddenly implement them.

A problem with you idea of allowing players to reserve blueprint land for free for 6 months is that some players would misuse this ability to interfere with their competitors' ability to construct things. And there would have to be a limit to how much land a player could reserve for free because if there was no limit a greifer could spoil a game by simply reserving all/most of a world's land. Also games would start with players having to race to reserve the best land for free. This would spoil OpenTTD's gameplay imo.

So I personally think that my idea for how this editing mode should work should be used: players would each have a blueprint copy of the shared world which they can edit for free before confirming that they want to pay to have their changes made in the shared world, when changed tiles have no vehicles on them.

A player planning to change land with or without the blueprint editing mode could ensure other players don't change it, in the existing way of buying it and they could easily buy multiple land tiles by dragging a selection box. The blueprint editing mode's window could have a "buy all affected land tiles" button.

I have these ideas for solving the problem I described in this post's first paragraph:
* Players could be required to buy land tiles before the blueprint editing mode would allow these tiles to be changed with the landscaping tools.
* Players could be allowed to build railway lines, roads & canals anywhere for free in their blueprint world and before these things are implemented in the shared world they could appear in it as transparent things or the squares beneath them could be blue. Planning to build one of these things on a land tile shouldn't, imo, prevent other players from being able to change/build on it, if they tell the game they want to change it before a player using the BEM to plan changes to it, confirms they want to change it.

[ANIKHTOS]

free reservation was an idea
and i said i prefer the buy land option

also if we make all constructions made in the blueprint first
and then build at a slow rate lets say a track per toc of game time
that will take off the edge of ai to build faster that us

this way we will no longer have an instant very long route made that makes lots of money
but instead we will have to build a short route and then expand the railroad out
as it happened in reality lol yes i said it in reality

given blueprints phases
we could change a junction in real time without stopping the traffic

with the blueprint idea we can implement the copy paste option in creating the railroad layout
which will no longer be cheating

so the blueprint can tell
the cost of the construction and the time needing to do it

also if there is some landscaping the blueprint must expand to cover all land affective of the landscaping

[ANIKHTOS]

free reservation was an idea
and i said i prefer the buy land option

also if we make all constructions made in the blueprint first
and then build at a slow rate lets say a track per toc of game time
that will take off the edge of ai to build faster that us

this way we will no longer have an instant very long route made that makes lots of money
but instead we will have to build a short route and then expand the railroad out
as it happened in reality lol yes i said it in reality

given blueprints phases
we could change a junction in real time without stopping the traffic

with the blueprint idea we can implement the copy paste option in creating the railroad layout
which will no longer be cheating

so the blueprint can tell
the cost of the construction and the time needing to do it

also if there is some landscaping the blueprint must expand to cover all land affective of the landscaping

[Zuu]

CluelessPlus has a slow build mode that build tile by tile including a delay between each tile, and for bridges/tunnels add an extra delay before/after. Try it if you want slow AI building, but then don't complain that the AI is a too weak competitor because it's planning of paths is often slower than human.

[ANIKHTOS]

CluelessPlus has a slow build mode that build tile by tile including a delay between each tile, and for bridges/tunnels add an extra delay before/after. Try it if you want slow AI building, but then don't complain that the AI is a too weak competitor because it's planning of paths is often slower than human.

i do not want to built piece by piece
i want to plan a construction press go ahead construct it
and the game construct it slowly

there is a big difference in what i say and what you say

even the buy land that is limited to 1 tile is one reason to stop playing the game
trying to secure land for future things like airport upgrade or teraforming it takes for ever.

[Zuu]

I understand your general idea is towards human players, but I was referring to this part of what you wrote: (underline added by me)

also if we make all constructions made in the blueprint first
and then build at a slow rate lets say a track per toc of game time
that will take off the edge of ai to build faster that us

Edit: AIs do in general spend a lot of time planning ahead and then construct it. Effectively using in-memory blue prints. You may think they build instant, but behind the scene it spends often many in-game months planning what to build.

[ANIKHTOS]

I understand your general idea is towards human players, but I was referring to this part of what you wrote: (underline added by me)

also if we make all constructions made in the blueprint first
and then build at a slow rate lets say a track per toc of game time
that will take off the edge of ai to build faster that us

Edit: AIs do in general spend a lot of time planning ahead and then construct it. Effectively using in-memory blue prints. You may think they build instant, but behind the scene it spends often many in-game months planning what to build.

the problem with humans is we can nt plan as the ai

when i want to connect 2 industries in map my eyes may say it is a straight line but i can be wrong 5 6 tiles in the end
because we can not follow a straight line without visual aid humans do no planning as he ai

we start building and we correct as we move
i would not mine to spent months planning as the ai but i can not

i start building a line hopping it was the best option
which most of the times is not usual problem line hit the second industry instead of passing next to it