Railworks America

A short while ago, reading a thread about whether portals can spawn trains in RW3 and noting several replies that either denied or at least discouraged such a possibility, I decided to create a brief scenario proving that spawning is indeed possible. Having achieved that, I could not let well enough alone and began to create an enhanced version of the same scenario. Portal_Test_02 should be available in the Downloads section very soon. There are still only two trains spawning from a single portal, but I've piled in a considerable amount of AI traffic and several portal exits (anyone can do that; I know).

Let me note that this was not an easy or fast process. Trains that are to spawn from portals during a scenario have to be very carefully planned, timed, and placed into the portal that will spawn them in the correct order (last out, first in). Fortunately, their start times and their instructions can be edited without removing them from the portal: a convenience that wasn't available when I first experimented with spawning, before RSC gave us the Timetable Editor. I won't bother you with a list of the corrections I had to make in order to coordinate all of the AI in this scenario, but do keep in mind that a great deal of patience is required.

Am I done? Of course not! Next, I want to find out how many trains a portal can spawn if a portal can spawn trains (which it can, despite RSC's warnings not to try this in the first place).

Please give this scenario a whirl and let me know whether it loads and runs correctly on your RW3 installation.

Thank you Tom, much appreciated

The correct order to place into the portal, whether 1st is Train A, 2nd B, 3rd C and 4th D is: D, C, B and A?

Cheers,
Doc.

Will do if I can grab a minute! thanks for the continued exploration.

Have you found any situation which consistently does not work yet?

Machinist wrote:The correct order to place into the portal, whether 1st is Train A, 2nd B, 3rd C and 4th D is: D, C, B and A?

Correct.

Machinist wrote:Thank you Tom, much appreciated

The correct order to place into the portal, whether 1st is Train A, 2nd B, 3rd C and 4th D is: D, C, B and A?

Cheers,
Doc.

Reply from the real Tom Pallen (Old Prof): yes, assuming that by "1st is Train A" you mean that A will be the first train to emerge from the portal ... it's like the Bible, isn't it? The last shall be first and the first shall be last. This becomes very tricky when the scenario writer starts by putting, let's say two AI trains into the portal and then deciding to add a third that will be spawned later than those first two. In a case such as this, the only solution is to unload all trains from the portal (and if they're long, finding a place to put them can be difficult) and then begin "packing" the portal again.

As I said at first, this process isn't eaasy ... but it can be rewarding.

Kali wrote:Will do if I can grab a minute! thanks for the continued exploration.

Have you found any situation which consistently does not work yet?

No, I can't think of one; but do keep in mind that thus far I have not gone beyond two trains to be spawned from the same portal. I must give that a try.

Perhaps worth saving everything as a consist first - if you lose a train then you only lose the timetable, you don't have to rebuild the entire thing...

Kali wrote:Perhaps worth saving everything as a consist first - if you lose a train then you only lose the timetable, you don't have to rebuild the entire thing...

You're absolutely correct and I generally do just that when writing scenarios that include long consists. However, it's important to remember, too, that when a saved consist is used again the vehicle identification numbers will not be the same as the originals.

In these scenarios, which are essentially demonstrations, I'm using a small number of very short consists that really aren't worth saving.

Good tip, though: and they're always worth reiterating.

Regards,

Tom Pallen

At this point, I have to ask a rather embarrassing question: on the Castle Rock Railroad, should trains drive forward on the left- or righthand track?

Old Prof wrote:At this point, I have to ask a rather embarrassing question: on the Castle Rock Railroad, should trains drive forward on the left- or righthand track?

Don't mind! Usually (traffic dependent) an US railroad operates in right hand forward, this is why the engineer sits at the right hand of cab, and also signals are placed to the right side of track. Anyway, IIRC, Castle Rock is a fictional route, so let your imagination drive you. That's always up to the fictional Dispatcher!

BTW, a very hard traffic to scenario writers is at Monumentum. Whether you place an inbound AI Train at the western track (forgot if is 1 or 2) it messes the outbound traffic from Monumentum. There is a Portal at the top of hill (forgot the name as well), you should put in good use your portal spawning testing assigning AI trains moving toward Monumentum, at the same time the Player moves outbound toward Castle Rock at the eastern track (that crossover under the bridge is the messing thingy, usualy the inbound AI gets priority over the flyout blocking outbound trains).

Cheers,
Doc.

I may have discovered the spawning limit of a portal. The one I've been experimenting with is Monument Portal, which is a single portal that covers two tracks. In my latest experiment, I created three AI trains named PS_01, PS_02, and PS_03, respectively, each consisting of a diesel engine and five freight cars. The instructions for PS_01 took it to Monument Yard Track 01, where it dropped off its cars before heading on the the next available portal, located at Glen Park, which it entered. The other trains followed suit at 10 minute intervals, each dropping its cars on the Monument Yard track corresponding to its number and exiting through Glen Park Portal. I added a player engine off on a siding, which had a destination but was not intended to move; it just served as a viewpoint. The scenario completed successfully.

After reopening the scenario for editing, I placed the three AI trains into the portal in the correct order: PS_03, PS_02, and PS_01, and then saved the scenario and clicked the play arrow. Bam! The scenario failed to load due to "marker not found" errors that involved all of the cars in PS_02 and two of the cars from PS_01.



I reopened the scenario for editing and double-clicked the portal. The three trains were listed there in this order: PS_03, PS_01, PS_02!



I've removed the trains from the portal and put them back in the correct order several times, but the same shuffling of my intended order occurs each time. The conclusion that a single portal can hold no more than 2 AI trains seems inevitable at this point, but I will continue to experiment.

Regards,

Thanks for your good work Tom. Working portals would be a big help to scenario creators.

harryadkins wrote:Thanks for your good work Tom. Working portals would be a big help to scenario creators.

Appreciate the gratitude, Harry, but I'm not making them work, just trying to figure out how they work. I'm rather unsure right now whether to continue with these experiments or wait until the September release of RW 2013. The release announcements don't mention portals, but they may be affected anyway.

Regards,

Tom - I'm wondering is the InitialSave files that cause some user loading problems might also be causing havoc with your edits. Once the file is altered and saved, and there's an InitialSave file to be found in the Scenario folder, delete and see if that solves the issue.

I don't think there are any changes in portals for 2013.