Route building problems.

[wreeder]

A few more questions if the people on the forum don't mind:

23) Is it possible to include a day/night cycle on a route?

You have to edit the session to change the start time, weather and fast clock settings. See the manual's tutorial on editing sessions.

24) Is it possible to change the texture of water surfaces apart from the colour? (e.g. rough water, reflective water, rippled water)

You have several choices of skies and water effects on the world panel. I know you can download new skies. I don't know if there are water surfaces on the DLS.

25) I have noticed different "widgets" below the control panel (the one where the DCC control or loco stats reside in) varying from coupler strain monitor to gradient and signal detectors. How do I add these the my route and what are the KUIDs for them if I need to download them from DLS?

See an earlier post for the kuids of two. You have to add them to the session in the edit session dialog. See the tutorial in the manual.

28) I've also noticed bridge guide rails on the Wabaldavale line and these do not seem to be part of the track but rather between the track crossing the bridge. Under what name do I have to search for to get these tracks or are they just simply narrow gauge tracks inside standard gauge tracks?

Most panels have a "Get" tool. Choose this and then click on the item on the map you want and it will become the chosen item if you are in the right type of panel. For example, to get an object you must be in the object panel, to get an track piece you must have the track panel open..etc...

I don't build maps with signals. So I can't help. Rob Crawford did some demo maps that show proper signal use for different parts of the world. Check the DLS for jrcrawford.

William

 

[mtldrm38]

Ya that happens might also try working on a route in that "session" and save route and session option this way you avoid multi sessions and
also keep a original map of the changes...........

 

[nicky9499]

Does it help if I select the route from the left side menu? There are three almost identical copies on the right menu that appear as sessions and I really don't remember starting a new session because I don't even know how to create one!

 

[mtldrm38]

The one on the left is the main map and the other 3 are just saved scenarios.....as long as you save in the main map and select save scenario along with it that list will keep growing........

 

[wreeder]

Hi Nicholas,

You're creating sessions but you don't know it. Maybe this will help. A route is a collection of track, buildings, scenery and textures. By itself the route doesn't do anything. It just exists. In fact it won't even show up in Driver. When you add rolling stock to a route Trainz creates a new session using the default parameters. When you save the route again the new session is saved with it and if you don't opt to give the session a name then Trainz uses the name of the route as the name of the session. That is why in surveyor or driver you see the name on both the left and right.

A session holds all the data that makes a route unique to a point in time. What does that mean? It is when you edit the session (you really need to do the tutorial in the manual) that you can change the time of day, the weather, the rate of the game clock and all the settings of the interactive industries and many other things. By default, if you create a new route and lay a circle of track and place a loco on the track. You save your creation and go to driver. You see the name of your route on the left and the right. You click on the right one and it opens. Your session has these defaults: 10:00am, clear weather that doesn't change, the game clock is running at a 1 to 1 ratio and you have the default driver assigned to drive your loco. If you edit your session, you can make the time be say 3:30pm and have it be raining and the clock can be set to run at 3:1 ratio. Or anything you want.

Go back into surveyor and add more locos. You can edit the session and assign drivers to those locos and issue commands to them to do while you drive one of the trains. You adjust the settings of interactive industries and that information is saved to the session as well. You can set the weather to change during the playing of the session.

Here's a way to think of it. Building a route is like building a movie set. Editing the session is like creating the script, picking the actors, adding the lights and telling the story. The same route can be used to tell hundreds of stories. Sessions are really the magic of Trainz.

William

 

[nicky9499]

That was something new for me.

To explain the rolling stock, I just randomly put a locomotive near a curve after laying it to test the gradient and radius, nothing much.

So, is there anyway to delete these unplanned scenarios?

 

[wreeder]

Sure, from the surveyor menu screen, choose the unwanted one on the right so it is highlighted and then click the delete button at the button of the screen.

 

[nicky9499]

Hey guys, I though I might share something I came across which might change the way you lay tracks forever.

Let's say u have a rough sketch of the landscape where you want the railway to go through, say a cliff beside the sea. You lay track, smooth the gradient using the spline height editor, then click on the "smooth spline height" button. Then hey presto! The ground snaps right up to the track level! No trouble at all!

Hope this helped