N3V Needs to Fix Their Mess

[AdvancedApproach]

it's driving me crazy how a train gets stuck even when there's a clear signal due to not being able to access an industry or trackmark. Who cares about another train ahead or behind it? Worry about that should it have a material affect on the AI drivers ability to proceed. This was NEVER an issue in previous versions of Trainz. So long as the signals were green or yellow the AI drivers would proceed. N3V clearly can't release anything without breaking something in the process.

 

[davesnow]

It has occurred to me, in my experiences driving with A.I. Train consists, that a train will sometimes not proceed, even if the light is green, if the line from the train to the next trackmark (or industry or whatever) is occupied by another train. I think that's what you're talking about. Yes, the situation needs to be addressed. If you have a route with a lot of consists this issue can definately create some bottlenecks, and exasperation.

 

[JCitron]

it's driving me crazy how a train gets stuck even when there's a clear signal due to not being able to access an industry or trackmark. Who cares about another train ahead or behind it? Worry about that should it have a material affect on the AI drivers ability to proceed. This was NEVER an issue in previous versions of Trainz. So long as the signals were green or yellow the AI drivers would proceed. N3V clearly can't release anything without breaking something in the process.

What is the distance between your signals? The AI have a set distance and if your signals are too far away, they can get stuck. There are other reasons why the AI are stopped that aren't obvious including a direction marker facing the wrong way for the siding or branch that they intend to take. To find out why the AI are sitting at a green signal, hover cursor over the signal. The signal will display a message.

The AI, however, do get stuck when things get busy. This occurs over time as the internal game threads become very busy and don't clear up. I had an extreme case of this back in TANE, and I reported this to N3V. What is interesting is initially I thought it was a signal script error because I switched signals to another kind. RRSignal instead of Jointed Rail or vice versa and the problem went away. Thinking at the time the issue was a scripting problem, I let it go because everything appeared to work, however, the problem occurred again much later after running for a long time instead of within a few minutes.

On this very large complex route, a combination of Deremmy's East Kentucky and Evansville & Western, Dave Snow's Ozark Valley, Midwest Grain from Jointed Rail, plus the add-on route Coldwater, and Jointed Rail's American Intermodal things got so bad I gave up on it and never ran it again. In TS2010 and TS12, the mega route ran fine. I'd have AI drivers, multiple of them, plying the lines for hours. When TANE came out, the route would run for about 30-minutes, before changing signals, before the AI got "dumb". They'd sit there and stare at green signals as though they were red. Inching them beyond the signals, and they'd continue on fine. Pressing Pause also worked, but that only worked once or twice. I'd end up exiting the session and reloading from the save, but that had another curve ball thrown in. The AI now were blowing through red signals, ignoring track marks, speed limits, and direction markers. Sometimes, the signals remained red while other times they remained dark. When I changed the signals out, the route ran for about an hour or two before they started kicking off, and I got to the point where I scrapped the route. TRS19 was much, much better, then TRS22 came out and we're back to the crap again as new sh*** has been added in.

 

[JackDownUnder]

There is nothing wrong with how Driver works, the issues you are having relate to your own construction problems.
I have a large route with a strong concentrated effort on a particular single and part double road branch line, it has taken me months to run multiple consists to a 1906 timetable.

 

[AdvancedApproach]

There is nothing wrong with how Driver works, the issues you are having relate to your own construction problems.
I have a large route with a strong concentrated effort on a particular single and part double road branch line, it has taken me months to run multiple consists to a 1906 timetable.

No it has nothing to do with how I constructed the route. My track markers headings are properly faced and while the route has had its problems, they've been straightened out.

What is the distance between your signals? The AI have a set distance and if your signals are too far away, they can get stuck. There are other reasons why the AI are stopped that aren't obvious including a direction marker facing the wrong way for the siding or branch that they intend to take. To find out why the AI are sitting at a green signal, hover cursor over the signal. The signal will display a message.

The AI, however, do get stuck when things get busy. This occurs over time as the internal game threads become very busy and don't clear up. I had an extreme case of this back in TANE, and I reported this to N3V. What is interesting is initially I thought it was a signal script error because I switched signals to another kind. RRSignal instead of Jointed Rail or vice versa and the problem went away. Thinking at the time the issue was a scripting problem, I let it go because everything appeared to work, however, the problem occurred again much later after running for a long time instead of within a few minutes.

On this very large complex route, a combination of Deremmy's East Kentucky and Evansville & Western, Dave Snow's Ozark Valley, Midwest Grain from Jointed Rail, plus the add-on route Coldwater, and Jointed Rail's American Intermodal things got so bad I gave up on it and never ran it again. In TS2010 and TS12, the mega route ran fine. I'd have AI drivers, multiple of them, plying the lines for hours. When TANE came out, the route would run for about 30-minutes, before changing signals, before the AI got "dumb". They'd sit there and stare at green signals as though they were red. Inching them beyond the signals, and they'd continue on fine. Pressing Pause also worked, but that only worked once or twice. I'd end up exiting the session and reloading from the save, but that had another curve ball thrown in. The AI now were blowing through red signals, ignoring track marks, speed limits, and direction markers. Sometimes, the signals remained red while other times they remained dark. When I changed the signals out, the route ran for about an hour or two before they started kicking off, and I got to the point where I scrapped the route. TRS19 was much, much better, then TRS22 came out and we're back to the crap again as new sh*** has been added in.

I place my signals at intervals of four baseboards due to me running shorter and faster trains. I use direction markers at the end of my routes on the mainline to prevent AI drivers going the wrong way when there's no crossover to get them back on the right track. That obviously rules out confusing them with branch lines because I don't have any on my routes. I've hovered over the signals and all I got was a message saying 'clear' and nothing else. I try to keep no more than eight trains on my route at a time so it can't be that busy.

 

[JackDownUnder]

I stopped using direction markers early on in my routes, no need for them.
Unless you are an exception to the majority of Trainz users, one is always able to make construction errors.

 

[billm001]

What is the distance between your signals? The AI have a set distance and if your signals are too far away, they can get stuck. There are other reasons why the AI are stopped that aren't obvious including a direction marker facing the wrong way for the siding or branch that they intend to take. To find out why the AI are sitting at a green signal, hover cursor over the signal. The signal will display a message.

The AI, however, do get stuck when things get busy. This occurs over time as the internal game threads become very busy and don't clear up. I had an extreme case of this back in TANE, and I reported this to N3V. What is interesting is initially I thought it was a signal script error because I switched signals to another kind. RRSignal instead of Jointed Rail or vice versa and the problem went away. Thinking at the time the issue was a scripting problem, I let it go because everything appeared to work, however, the problem occurred again much later after running for a long time instead of within a few minutes.

On this very large complex route, a combination of Deremmy's East Kentucky and Evansville & Western, Dave Snow's Ozark Valley, Midwest Grain from Jointed Rail, plus the add-on route Coldwater, and Jointed Rail's American Intermodal things got so bad I gave up on it and never ran it again. In TS2010 and TS12, the mega route ran fine. I'd have AI drivers, multiple of them, plying the lines for hours. When TANE came out, the route would run for about 30-minutes, before changing signals, before the AI got "dumb". They'd sit there and stare at green signals as though they were red. Inching them beyond the signals, and they'd continue on fine. Pressing Pause also worked, but that only worked once or twice. I'd end up exiting the session and reloading from the save, but that had another curve ball thrown in. The AI now were blowing through red signals, ignoring track marks, speed limits, and direction markers. Sometimes, the signals remained red while other times they remained dark. When I changed the signals out, the route ran for about an hour or two before they started kicking off, and I got to the point where I scrapped the route. TRS19 was much, much better, then TRS22 came out and we're back to the crap again as new sh*** has been added in.

I agree.... it seems like the longer the session goes on, the dumber the AI gets when it comes to following basic rules, scripts, etc.

 

[davesnow]

One thing to note. . . . If trains get backed up for a long time, sometimes a few of them will just stop altogether, and you need to go in and tick "Continue Schedule." This little issue can really cause frustrations if you run a lot of A.I. consists as I do. I do have some consists that have been running the same routes (schedules) for years and they never cause any problems at all. They just keep doing their thing, obeying signals and instructions to the "T."

 

[JCitron]

One thing to note. . . . If trains get backed up for a long time, sometimes a few of them will just stop altogether, and you need to go in and tick "Continue Schedule." This little issue can really cause frustrations if you run a lot of A.I. consists as I do. I do have some consists that have been running the same routes (schedules) for years and they never cause any problems at all. They just keep doing their thing, obeying signals and instructions to the "T."

It must be the newbies then that are causing the problems.

 

[JCitron]

No it has nothing to do with how I constructed the route. My track markers headings are properly faced and while the route has had its problems, they've been straightened out.

I place my signals at intervals of four baseboards due to me running shorter and faster trains. I use direction markers at the end of my routes on the mainline to prevent AI drivers going the wrong way when there's no crossover to get them back on the right track. That obviously rules out confusing them with branch lines because I don't have any on my routes. I've hovered over the signals and all I got was a message saying 'clear' and nothing else. I try to keep no more than eight trains on my route at a time so it can't be that busy.

Try an in between track mark. I've noticed since the most recent release that the AI don't look ahead as far as they used to. This may be due to the new code for TLR or it's possibly a bug. I put in a Drive via, not a Navigate via track marks at some locations and that seems to have fixed the problem on my large route.

The thing is there are many factors and situations that can cause this issue ranging from human error, yes YOU can make errors even if YOU don't admit to it, to program errors and the randomness built into the logic. All it takes is for some event to occur, a switch lever thrown incorrectly, or a driver sitting too long at a station, to throw everything off the tracks figuratively speaking. This means, and here comes the caveat of caveats, what may work for me may not work at for you, or may work one day but not another.

 

[AdvancedApproach]

Try an in between track mark. I've noticed since the most recent release that the AI don't look ahead as far as they used to. This may be due to the new code for TLR or it's possibly a bug. I put in a Drive via, not a Navigate via track marks at some locations and that seems to have fixed the problem on my large route.

The thing is there are many factors and situations that can cause this issue ranging from human error, yes YOU can make errors even if YOU don't admit to it, to program errors and the randomness built into the logic. All it takes is for some event to occur, a switch lever thrown incorrectly, or a driver sitting too long at a station, to throw everything off the tracks figuratively speaking. This means, and here comes the caveat of caveats, what may work for me may not work at for you, or may work one day but not another.

I always make sure the switches are aligned to its proper position before dispatching a train. Once I did cause a derailment using the autodrive through command, not ensuring switches were properly aligned and trains didn't cross paths at a time which would cause conflicts to arise.

 

[TRS17985]

Hi all,

I countered this problem by using the autodrive pas signal command to cover trackstretches with no junctions. It keeps speed and signal status in consideration but is not hindered by in front trains.

 

[AdvancedApproach]

Hi all,

I countered this problem by using the autodrive pas signal command to cover trackstretches with no junctions. It keeps speed and signal status in consideration but is not hindered by in front trains.

We shouldn't have to do all of that. Trains at the front don't have those issues.

 

[skittlekicks]

I agree.... it seems like the longer the session goes on, the dumber the AI gets when it comes to following basic rules, scripts, etc.

Just like the AI obsession going on now in the real world. Except people are the ones getting dumber.

 

[skittlekicks]

The real issue is that AI in every single game is trash. I've yet to play one game in my 47 years of gaming where AI does what I want it to do. AI is only as smart as the person that codes the script in the first place. I used to space my signals every 4 to 7 miles unless there was a junction or some other oddity. Now I usually go a mile to a mile and a half for signal spacing. So when I send an AI driver to point X or Y, it just works. One way markers are useless because a lot of folks use multiple mainline tracks, and only in a rare location are they useful. Priority is something I tried and it works fine, but it isn't perfect. KISS is a thing for a reason (and I'm not referencing the band).

In the 80s we had "One to Grow On" and "The More You Know" during Saturday morning shows and cartoons. Sound advice.

 

[JackDownUnder]

It has taken me about a week to resolve an issue with moving loco to opposite end of a consist.
Eventually after lots of effort resolved the issue with addition of two TM's at appropriate locations.
All junctions set themselves however, loco had five junctions in close proximity after uncouple and four proceeding to the coupling.

 

[skittlekicks]

It has taken me about a week to resolve an issue with moving loco to opposite end of a consist.
Eventually after lots of effort resolved the issue with addition of two TM's at appropriate locations.
All junctions set themselves however, loco had five junctions in close proximity after uncouple and four proceeding to the coupling.

Do you have a dedicated runaround track for that location? Might make it a bit easier to go from the head N to the tail N of a consist.

 

[davesnow]

Lol! I haven't tried a Runaround since TRS06! The A.I.'s in my route aren't trash. Normally they all behave as ordered. Oh I'll get one once in a while that missed a trackmark or decided to just stop until good ol' Dave Snow ticks the "Continue Schedule" button. Stuff happens and if you want to play Trainz you'll just have to buck up and get ready for an issue once in a while.

 

[passanger]

The real issue is that AI in every single game is trash. I've yet to play one game in my 47 years of gaming where AI does what I want it to do. AI is only as smart as the person that codes the script in the first place. I used to space my signals every 4 to 7 miles unless there was a junction or some other oddity. Now I usually go a mile to a mile and a half for signal spacing. So when I send an AI driver to point X or Y, it just works. One way markers are useless because a lot of folks use multiple mainline tracks, and only in a rare location are they useful. Priority is something I tried and it works fine, but it isn't perfect. KISS is a thing for a reason (and I'm not referencing the band).

In the 80s we had "One to Grow On" and "The More You Know" during Saturday morning shows and cartoons. Sound advice.

The point is the issue was introduced in some of TRS22 updates. In the same time, in TRS19 AI trains do what they were ordered to do.

 

[JCitron]

The point is the issue was introduced in some of TRS22 updates. In the same time, in TRS19 AI trains do what they were ordered to do.

Yup. Worked fine in TRS19, after they broke things in TANE, and now they've broken it again with the new features being bolted on top of everything else.