Please can we have some proper drivers!

As amusing as it is for Sebastian to be giving the ladies driving lessons something I would really like to see in TS2019 are some proper steam era driver figures. In TS2012 we at least had Charlie and Geoff who were proper steam engine drivers like my grandad and looked like they knew what they were doing on the footplate.



And as for the scruffy types in hi-vis, none of them look like anybody responsible enough to be driving an engine. Yes I know the TS2019 figures are more aimed at modern era railways, but not everyone models and operates modern era routes. A good proportion of us are steam enthusiasts and have no interest at all in the modern scene.
Before anybody tells me, - yes I know I can solve the problem by placing figures on the footplate using attachment points in the config file and making sure there aren't any spare ones left over for the TS2019 driver figures to claim, but not everyone feels confident enough to start editing their engines config files.

I don't know if you're a modeller, but are any of the drivers suitable for re-skinning? If so, you would not need to create any mesh, simply change the texture image to make a modern person look like a steam era person. Perhaps.

Drivers with a trainzbuild of 4.6 (?) use the mesh, assigned in their config.txt, in driver. Drivers with a lower trainzbuild get their mesh replaced with one of the new ones.

Peter

I've reskinned model figures before, but with these being N3V's own built-in figures wouldn't they be locked down so they can't be edited.

p-dehnert said:

Drivers with a trainzbuild of 4.6 (?) use the mesh, assigned in their config.txt, in driver. Drivers with a lower trainzbuild get their mesh replaced with one of the new ones.

Peter

Click to expand...

Which is why the legacy driver figures I use in TS2019 are cloned under my own Kuid number or else have their mesh and textures included in the locomotive's file folder to stop that happening.
I'm clever enough to be able change driver figures in the config file and edit attachment points if I have to, but not everyone is able to do that.

Hi
Using Makehuman and Blender to make a new model quickly is also possible.

Antony92160 said:

Hi
Using Makehuman and Blender to make a new model quickly is also possible.

Click to expand...

But the poly counts are rather high which makes them less suitable for Trainz.


Cheerio John

That would be my concern too John. There's some stunning photo realistic figures on the DLS, but most of them take a big bite out of available computer resources and make frame rates drop like a stone.

MakeHuman has lower poly figures included as an option. I've used them and they are in the 1500-2000 tri range so far. Don't know what the going poly rate is these days for figures, however. They're nekkid to begin with, so they have to be manipulated some to get a presentable appearance of clothing/hair etc without using the included high poly clothing.

My expectations were really low when I first looked at MH as a way to make figures for trainz, but it turns out it has the capability to go either way in terms of detail and isn't particularly hard to interface with Blender. Not being any sort of animation guru, there are some complex series of steps to go through to pose them and export correctly, but once that is figured out, it's not really time consuming.

crazytrain said:

MakeHuman has lower poly figures included as an option. I've used them and they are in the 1500-2000 tri range so far. Don't know what the going poly rate is these days for figures, however. They're nekkid to begin with, so they have to be manipulated some to get a presentable appearance of clothing/hair etc without using the included high poly clothing.

My expectations were really low when I first looked at MH as a way to make figures for trainz, but it turns out it has the capability to go either way in terms of detail and isn't particularly hard to interface with Blender. Not being any sort of animation guru, there are some complex series of steps to go through to pose them and export correctly, but once that is figured out, it's not really time consuming.

Click to expand...

Bobsander's people are under a 1,000 polys and I have seen other reasonable ones in the 300 poly range.

Cheerio John

You can always delete, or disable, those drivers from the CM, or delete them from the config file, or swap them out with another driver.

I agree, that Hillary Clinton in her pants suit dress clothes, looks very inappropriately weird, and totally silly, just standing there, supervising the fireman, on an open air steam locomotive footplate.

DriverCharacter Therese <kuid2:523:19723463:1>

Unmodified (trainz-build < 4.6) in TRS19 -- mesh is automatically replaced by TRS19 mesh


After modifying (trainz-build = 4.6) -- the original mesh is displayed in TRS19


Other drivers, which could be modified, behave in the same way (tested with Alistair sitting, Willy the Gimp ...).

Peter

Peter, what do you think was the intention of automatically over-riding drivers from legacy versions with N3V-made TRS2019 drivers? I don’t know much about this, but it seems like quite a heavy-handed thing to do.

You're going to have to tell me where you got that delightful engine from Peter. As you might have guessed I have a bit of thing for 19th century engines.

I have no problems myself with changing footplate crew figures or even retexturing them. John Whelan mentioned Bob Sanders figures, - the tramway engines on my own Norfolk route are nearly all crewed by Bob's figures, - so it's no big problem for me to put any model figure I like on the footplate. My point was is that it would be really nice if N3V gave us a better choice when it came to driver figures so we wouldn't have to mess around like this. Not everyone is a capable Trainz modder like most of us on the forum are and someone coming to Trainz for the first time is going to be very disappointed over the odd folk who end up on their engines' footplates.

Search for Saxonia, author Niezbo. There are some traincars, to go with the engine.

There would be some better choices, if they didn't replace the original mesh by the TRS19 ones. Select all drivers in content manager, and select List dependencies, to see all the original meshes used by the drivers.

Peter

Thanks very much Peter, - I now have a copy of Saxonia to add to my collection of early 19th century locomotives.