A portal related rule?

[butter]

I am looking for a rule to simplify things within the portals.

My current situation is I have a portal to portal route, with about 60 track marks for each train to keep it on the correct track, and get it to the proper portal. One train setup currently takes around 45 minutes to get configured, and there's about 15 trains at each portal.

I'm currently looking for a rule that allows you to put trains in like the normal portal, and you can just select a predefined route...

Thanks

 

[boyerm25]

You could use a command library... take a look at some of the PO&N sessions in TS2010.

 

[sniper297]

Phil uses some kind of central portal control, I went a simpler way with schedule library.

1. Edit session rules, edit driver commands, check "copy commands from" on.
2. Click add, select schedule library.
3. Edit schedule library, create a schedule and give it a name.
4. Add drive via (or navigate via) instructions to schedule.
5. Select the house icon, then the question mark, click on a portal. Set the portal to produce new trains every X minutes (whatever spawn frequency you want).
6. Add train and driver. Select driver, Copy Commands From, Insert, Schedule Library.

You can make a bunch of different patterns if you want, and every new train you add to the portal you can repeat the Select driver, Copy Commands From, Insert, Schedule Library instead of doing 60 instructions over and over again.

 

[butter]

This sounds exactly like what im looking for minus a new rule. I will try this after work. As for now,
Thank you!

 

[butter]

I am stuck with number 4, I don't really know where to go from there...

 

[sniper297]

Don't understand the question - in the original post, you had ONE train starting from the portal with the 60 trackmarks? Just do all that in a schedule library, then instead of giving each train 60 trackmark instructions, give them all one instruction to Copy Commands From, Insert, Schedule Library Eastbound (or whatever you named the schedule).

 

[philskene]

"DriveToTrackmarkList" is what you be wanting

Hi butter --

I use central Portal Control because it can be configured to emit a train immediately a session starts. The main drawback, however, and one that I think you might encounter with your route, is that there is a limit (99) on the number of consists that can be on a route. This includes the player trains and the loose consists spotted on the route. Once 99 is reached the portal will not produce any more trains until one has been consumed by a portal. I bumped into this once before on PO&N and it took a while to figure out why.

There is a rule that you might find very useful - "DriveToTrackmarkList". There are at least two versions of this. I have not had any success getting the one that comes built-in with TS12 to work correctly. Use the one from the Download Station - kuid2:61392:1050:3.

You do need to name the trackmarks correctly for this rule to work. They must be named like
x(1) though to x(9), where x = a common designation.

So on the TS12 version of IndustRail, for example, I've named the northbound trackmarks:
nb a(1) through to nb a(9)
nb b(1) through to nb b(9)
nb c(1) through to nb c(9)
and so on.

I did experiment with numbers greater than 9 in the brackets, but the rule didn't read the sequence correctly. It thought 10 came after 1 and 20 after 2. Maybe I should have used (01) to (99)?

If you do want to see how it can be set-up to work, see the session "KrashnburneRRCo TS12 v2 Session 1". Go into Edit Session Rules and edit Central Portal Control to see the configuration.

Tell us if this helps or if you need more assistance. And tell us if you can do better than (1) to (9).

Phil

 

[butter]

Okay I don't feel I did a very good job with my explaining.
I have a 2 track main. A portal that outputs Eastbounds. (P-C1) and a portal that outputs westbounds (P-A2)
The eastbound line is 1.01 - 1.60 each variable 1.XX is a trackmark. The amount of TM's is because of the length of the route.
The Via options are only for trackmarks. My only options with those are to TMs with that I might as well manually enter all 60.

 

[philskene]

" ... I might as well manually enter all 60."

Sure you can. But I've been there and done that for a large number of trackmarks. It's damn tedious and prone to errors.

Naming the trackmarks "EB 1(1)" though EB 1(9)", then "EB 2(1)" ... gives you six entries to make in the configuration instead of 60. It's a start. And as I say it may be possible to go greater than (9) if (01) instead of (1) works.

 

[sniper297]

I've done it with 60, it's tedious but using the schedule library I only have to do it once for each pattern, then I use that session as a template for future sessions. Let's walk thru this, Copy Commands From is off by default, but it is built in so all you have to do is turn it on.

Edit session rules, then edit the Driver Command rule in that.

Find Copy Commands From, check it on, then click the check button (the X is cancel) to exit.

Click the Add button in the session rules window, scroll down and find Schedule Library to add that.

Then click the Edit button to edit the schedule library you just added. Click Add Schedule inside that, give the new library a name. You can add multiple schedule libraries to the same one.

Edit your new schedule library to add all the instructions for that one traffic pattern and save it.

Click the house icon, select the question mark button, then click on the portal to bring up this window. Check produce new trains, type in a different number if you don't want the default 15 minutes, then add consist.

Each new consist you add has to have a driver, so add a driver, and instead of giving him those 60 instructions, just give him Copy Commands From and select which library you want him to copy from.

Rather than fool around with CPC and Emit Train Now stuff, I place "starter" trains on the route and give them "wait for" (2 minutes, 5 minutes, whatever) followed by the Copy Commands From instruction from whatever library I want them to use.

When the wait time is up (or when a new train comes completely out of the portal) he copies from the library, and all those instructions show up in his window.

 

[philskene]

OK - just ran a test with the "DriveToTrackmarkList" rule.

If the trackmarks are named 1(01) through to 1(99) an AI train will run through the trackmarks in the correct sequence - that is 01, 02, 03, ... 10, 11, ... 20, 21, ... 99.

So, butter, you now have two solutions.

 

[sniper297]

Confusing again, do the trackmarks need to be named 1(01) to 1(99) or 01, 02, 03 etc. then 10, 11, 12 etc. up to 99?

 

[philskene]

Jim --

It's absolutely essential you use correct notation for the trackmarks.

Designator - bracket - sequential number starting at 01 - bracket.
​

For example:
In the first set of trackmarks, the first trackmark is

Northbound (01)
​

The second trackmark is

Northbound (02)
​

The last trackkmark is

Northbound (xx) where xx less than or equal to 99
​

Second set could be:

Westbound (01)
Westbound (02)
​

etc

Again, see the Krashnburne session to see it in operation.

Phil

 

[netting2010]

Hi butter

Looks like you've been given the details but I definitely recommend selecting the copy command as being the best option as it saves a mountain of time. Make sure you have all markers named correctly and in sequence or you will have some congestion issues as the session gets busy. May I suggest (and I am no expert at this) you set up a short line with Portal to Portal and then set up a schedule as a trial to make sure its what you want. Then you can attack the main set up.

Hope this is of help.

 

[butter]

I'd like to apologize to both of you for putting so much effort into explaining this, but I would like to thank you as well.
I wasn't overly functioning well mentally when trying todo this last night, the thought "What the Hell is the House Button" Occurred many times.. And I feel like an Idiot for not putting two and two together:hehe:
I'm going to get snipers set up for now, and hopefully this can serve as a good tutorials.
Many Thanks guys!

 

[sniper297]

What the hell is the house button?

Hee-hee, I don't know what else to call it, the process is definitely NOT intuitive - select a static scenery menu to add AI traffic trains to a portal?! Technically the portal IS a static scenery object, but when creating sessions it don't seem like it should be. Adding a load to a car you use the rolling stock (wheel) icon to pull out that menu, select the question mark button and click on the car, that's obvious. But when configuring an industry (or an industry track!) to load and unload cars in the game, you use that same house icon to pull out the static scenery object menu.

Couple other items; when I first started doing this I made a few "throwaway" routes first, short and simple with half a dozen trackmarks to figure out the process.

http://trains.0catch.com/tutorial.html

That's the bible I go by, altho (1) the info about AI trains having a preference for which direction the track was layed is wrong, (2) I use AI Routing Direction Marker,<kuid:30501:1013> to make the AI trains stay off the wrong direction tracks, and (3) I found that "drive to" or "drive via" works better than navigate, with the navigate via trackmark they tend to take the scenic route looking for shortcuts.

 

[netting2010]

Don't worry too much about the "house" issue. I call 'em "seniors moments"!!!

Shane G

 

[Dap]

Check out pguy's QuickPortalManagerV2 or V3. This will give you complete control. He has an extensive manual. Check out his website. pguy's website

David