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Rather than run a survey, we wanted to start a discussion thread to hear all about your "gameplay" preferences in Trainz. By gameplay, we mean interacting with a train, or multiple trains in Driver.
Some things to discuss include:
- Is there a particular built-in session that you like? (and what makes this one special?)
- Is there a session on the DLS that you enjoy?
- If you create your own sessions, what is a typical set-up? (e.g. do you use navigation points?)
- Do you only ever drive a single train or do you like to jump from one to another?
- Do you use CMTM (Car Movement and Traffic Management System) ? Or perhaps model railroad card systems?
- Are there certain rules that you use when making your own gameplay?
- How do you use commodities in your sessions?
- Do you only use Quickdrive? (and why?)
- How much AI traffic do you like in your sessions?
- Have you tried multiplayer? (What did you like/dislike?)
- Anything else you'd like to throw in to the discussion.
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1 - Being mostly interested in passengers operations with a lot of AI trains following some defined timetables, and as from my knowledge there are no builtin routes and sessions matching this criteria, I currently don't use builtin routes and sessions, but my own routes and sessions with a lot of passengers AI traffic regulated using EITs, MCM and STT.
2 - Same answer as 1. I did not find on DLS any routes and sessions implementing heavy AI passengers traffic using ITs or EITs ...
3 - For my own session, I use the default rules with Quick Custom Hud replacing the default hud, and with EIT manager, Mission Code Manage and Stops and TimeTables Manager to easily schedule the operations
4 - I use only AI train, but I switch from one train to another during the session to have different views of the current AI passengers traffic
5 - Being more interested in passenger traffic than in goods traffic, I don't use CMTM ...
6 - should not be a surprise, I use in my own session a subset of all my own developed rules, available on DLS
7 - I don't use commodities, except passenger loading and unloading at stations
8 - There are two things designated as Quickdrive in Trainz : QuickDrive as a method of switching easily from surveyor to driver without returning to the main menu, and the QuickDrive rule to easily set at run time some environment parameters. I use both; First one to test under driver some modifications done to the session under surveyor. And second for the quick drive rule, mainly to change at run time the set of available driver commands or to add more drivers, which can only be done at run time using the quick drive run interface. Being able to change some parameters at run time, without the need to return back to surveyor, is important for me.
9 - how many AI trains. usually between 10 to 40.
10 - Never tested multiplayer and not really interested in such feature.
Running only AI trains, I am of course interested in AI enhancements. And as a scripter, I would be much interested if a new AI was written, with a default behaviour, but with with scripts calls to open the AI function so that by script you can adapt the AI to your need.
I think that one of the current AI problem is that it has no options. It try to take the shortest way (even if it will go through sidings) and you currently cannot change this behavior. On my last car, I have a GPS that will propose a default route but also 2 alternate routes, and will take care of my preference (quickest route, shortest route, with or without motorways, ...). I dream of a new Trainz, where you can specify for tracks if it is a main express track, a secondary commuters track, a siding track, ... and where you could request for a train an AI DriveToDestination giving a preference on the type of track to follow ... And if you add the opportunity to have like for ITs some AI listeners rule, called to confirm or change the default choices, you could have both a robust default AI but also a very versatile one that can be improved using some listeners rules.
The versatility of what you can do using scripts in Trainz is one of the great advantage of Trainz that other simulators don't have. And you can have a robust default behavior that meets the needs of most trainzers, and also still offer the opportunity to add some listeners rules able to tailor the behavior to specific needs for some other trainzers.
Only my opinion.
Regards.
Pierre.