Faulty DLS item that should not even be on the DLS

So, I was downloading dependencies for a route in T:ANE and I got a certain item called "<kuid:233743:100032> Concrete Truck" and I opened it for edit to see if the errors could be fixed. Well the error appears to be that the truck is almost 700k polygons (yes 673,036 polygons) with a .im filesize of 68mb. This item should not be on the DLS let alone any route.

Yep!

Despite my recent thread about poly-counts (http://forums.auran.com/trainz/showthread.php?120979), the ongoing SketchUp thread, and N3V telling us how important it is to keep poly-counts down, and including (weak) checks on the DS upon upload, we're still left guessing when adding things to our routes/sessions.

I'd say that most of my time when route building is spent on checking assets using my own mesh viewer to give poly-counts and texture weight, because you really can't tell what you're adding just by looking.

But we shouldn't have to.

As staggering as that item is, I bet it's not the highest poly-count on the DS.

Until people are educated in "The way of the Poly", we should have a poly-count column in CM, and a poly-count for individual items in Surveyor.

I can understand the buzz people get from building their own stuff, if they're new to 3D modelling, because along with Trainz, it gives them a virtual train set, and the ability to create anything bespoke they need.
Who wouldn't want that?

But when it comes to sharing it via the DS, you'd hope that they'd at least mention the poly-count in the description, for other users sake.

I downloaded a selection of things from the DS last week, and after examining them, had to delete 7 things due to poly-counts that were way over what they could have been.
One of the by a factor of 20 at least.

Maybe start a petition for a poly-count listing on the DS, a poly-count column in CM, and a poly-counter in Surveyor?
I first asked for one around 2004, so if we start now, 2026 looks good!

Brian.

Another guy has a Unimog truck (several, in fact) that weighs in at 457k polys. Also, a trumpet (yes, a foot-long musical instrument) that is 22k.

I'm also aware of another guy who has signals on the DLS that have such a high polycount, it crashes TrainzMeshViewer. The meshes alone are around 6-7mb.

Interestingly, neither the concrete truck nor the signals appear to have been made in Sketchup, although the Unimog and trumpet was.

I also noticed on a search of other assets by this author, that there are quite a number of additional items with large poly-counts on the Download Station, which might slow any game down. Can you advise what particular route we should be aware of ?


Cheers,
Roy3b3

I'm afraid to look at 233743:100008.

That and the fact that 42mb without an FCT would be a pain.
And it is a stadium, so it might not be too bad....

It does state Sketchup though, so it's probably really bad.

I'd say that most of my time when route building is spent on checking assets using my own mesh viewer to give poly-counts and texture weight, because you really can't tell what you're adding just by looking.

Click to expand...

You can do that in Content manager in TS12, highlight > Right Click > View Mesh Technical details lists:

Poly Count
Raw Texture size
Number of Meshes
Number of Textures
Number of Attchment points
Number of Animations
Number of Bones

Roy3b3 said:

I also noticed on a search of other assets by this author, that there are quite a number of additional items with large poly-counts on the Download Station, which might slow any game down. Can you advise what particular route we should be aware of ?


Cheers,
Roy3b3

Click to expand...

I sometimes just do a search of a few authors known to produce bad stuff. I'll refrain from naming them, but I'll delete their stuff outright in CMP, sight unseen. It's usually something that won't be missed anyway. As for the signals, I haven't seen them used in an available route yet.

Roy3b3 said:

Can you advise what particular route we should be aware of ?

Click to expand...

Well not really. It was internal testing of a route we will release in the future. The route creator obviously placed 3 of these trucks at an industry without knowing what their impact was.

clam1952 said:

You can do that in Content manager in TS12, highlight > Right Click > View Mesh Technical details lists:

Click to expand...

True, but once I've selected things I might want to add to my route, either from the DS or from the built-ins, I like to look at the mesh.

If an object uses more polys than I personally think they should (not being picky, I'm talking a LOT more), then if I see that they've done that because they've added some nice details in places, rather than just being sloppy, then looking at the mesh allows me to decide if it's worth the extra polys or not.

But either way, we shouldn't have to leave Surveyor to do it.

Did ya' ever notice that even Rockafellla' was cheap with candles..................
They burn at both ends ya' know!

RRSignal said:

Another guy has a Unimog truck (several, in fact) that weighs in at 457k polys. Also, a trumpet (yes, a foot-long musical instrument) that is 22k.

I'm also aware of another guy who has signals on the DLS that have such a high polycount, it crashes TrainzMeshViewer. The meshes alone are around 6-7mb.

Interestingly, neither the concrete truck nor the signals appear to have been made in Sketchup, although the Unimog and trumpet was.

Click to expand...

Yes, there are some quite 'senior' creators who should know better.

Regarding the "technical details" in TS10 and TS12, the problem with them is that they total everything in the asset folder. That includes every LOD and every seasonal variant (and ironically look worse as more LOD's are added). In the game, these variants only appear one at a time, so the overall totals don't reflect the real situation. To me, a "per mesh" poly- and materials count would be better metrics of performance impact.

Hearing about this 700,000-poly concrete truck being allowed just makes me spit chips as I sit here trying to bring the poly count of my objects down, typically from just 3000 to less than 500 in order to avoid a smack on the backside from T:ANE's error checker...

this asset certainly gets an error in TANE citing some problem with a memory block which is why I looked at it to begin with - I had been using the route in TS12 for a few days not even knowing that there were multiple near-700k-polygon items on the route near a large train yard! I should be able to fill the entire yard with traincars after removing those from the scene!

Maybe a sticky thread could be started where people could list the high poly assets. More could be added as they are found.
I never download anything with Sketchup shown.
Cheers,
Mike

yes, that is probably true for a route creator who is going to make sure that their routes do not contain these types of assets but for someone like myself - I dont make routes so I got this item simply by telling CM to grab the deps for the route off the DLS. I did not screen 1000s of items for potential problems.

We need Smileyman's Asset Poly Counter!

If this tool was in action, the asset would have been glowing a crimson read!

This reminds me of the 256K poly feet I dealt with on an injection molding machine model many years ago I won't go into details as I've recounted this story a few times now as it pertained to this situation before..

And we wonder why we have stutters and crashes...

John

norfolksouthern37 said:

this asset certainly gets an error in TANE citing some problem with a memory block which is why I looked at it to begin with - I had been using the route in TS12 for a few days not even knowing that there were multiple near-700k-polygon items on the route near a large train yard! I should be able to fill the entire yard with traincars after removing those from the scene!

Click to expand...

I didn't see this thread before posting this in the current SketchUp thread. The error shown in T:ANE was a new one for me but I guess something topped out a memory limit. AssetX will show the asset and its stats but it take a while to do it.

I'm now convinced we need a "large" asset warning. Large poly counts are not the only problem: multiple and large (2048*2048) textures can slow things down.

I just downloaded a collection of freeware from Jointed Rail. Specifically their ACF Covered Hoppers. After installing I promptly deleted them all. The smallest one was 32mb in size. The largest was 132mb. For ONE car?
If your concerned on poly counts, Id look at their equipment.

I'd love to see a poly-count option added to CM.


Bill

Switchbuilder1949 said:

I just downloaded a collection of freeware from Jointed Rail. Specifically their ACF Covered Hoppers. After installing I promptly deleted them all. The smallest one was 32mb in size. The largest was 132mb. For ONE car?
If your concerned on poly counts, Id look at their equipment.

Click to expand...

This is mostly irrelevant and I would suggest learning what a "poly count" is. JR items may be at the higher end of number of triangles but it is more because they are custom detailed items. Traincars rarely get to be 20k polygons and locomotives I have let go to around 80k polygons max at their highest LoD level and at most 1k polygons at their lowest. You may have had a big download because of the number of textures included - for instance, the "ONE" hopper car has I think 6 skins that come with it and they are applied at random to the car. Some JR ACF hoppers are already built-in to Trainz, btw.

From what I've learned from being a Trainz Content Creator, never have a model that is too high in poly count.