TRS 19 - Kickstarter County 2 - Oyonix Local Ops

To begin, I spent 32 years as a Locomotive Engineer with the PC, Conrail, NS, and also operating on the CSX and Amtrak railroads as well. I purchased Trainz 2019 recently and tried my hand at the Kickstarter County 2 Local Frieght run to Oyonix. I have a few comments about the sim and real-world ops.

1. Our local freights primarily used GP-9 and GP-38s with both long and short hoods forward. We often operated the engines in both forward and reverse directions, and occasionally ran entire trains in reverse (caboose leading) which was never a major issue with us. Depending on our route for the day, occasionally we would take two locos with one on each end, or both coupled together but facing in different directions.

2. Having run the Oyonix Local twice now, I found it to be a bit confusing trying to understand the instructions as far as Loads and Unloads. The fact that they had you spotting empty cars and then wait (just a few seconds) for the cars to be loaded and then removed from the industry was a bit odd. In all my service, we might have done that 1-2 times and it was a special move. Normally, empties were spotted for loading one day and picked up as a load the next time, or just the opposite..

3. The other issue I had was at Oyonix when trying to get the train shifted for the return trip. Everything looked good until I had to make a reverse move past the signal at the entrance to the yard to get on the front of the train. No matter which track I tried to use the signal would not display anything except "STOP" and when I tried to go by it, the Sim smacked me and quit. In real life, the Train Dispatchers can give you permission to pass a STOP signal to return to your train under RESTRICTED speed. Not the case with this sim

4. The "shift sheet" called for 4 empties to be spotted at the Rosario Tspt industry and then loaded for removal. No matter where I set the train, only 3 cars would load up.

5 To close, has anyone succesfully completed the Oyonix Local with out any problems?

Thanks much,
Mike

Hello,
You you find many many (most) routes and sessions that are not prototypical. The Kickstarter route/sessions is designed to be just an introduction to the game. Routes/sessions reflect the desire of the creator. Some go for "fun" and lot's of activity, some content creators want to be prototypical. If you are looking for truly prototypical sessions I think you will be disappointed by most sessions. Those who want prototypical operation largely make their own.

As far as signals. They can be a real issue. There are many signals and styles available. Same is true for all assets. (Road crossing, etc) What you got with your game is the "base" "built in" assets (loco's, rolling stock, signals, gates, etc etc) but there are many many alternatives systems made by others.

Read the forum posts each day. You will start to learn problems, issues, etc of assets in different versions of Trainz. In other words, someone may have come up with a really nice set of signals but they may not work well with a new version of Trainz. Content creators come and go, some content is maintained and updated, some not.

Trainz is not merely a "game" or a "sim." It is a very complex "system" with "base" routes/sessions/assets and thousands and thousands of items made by content creators (the "public"). It takes a very, very, long time to learn "ABOUT" all this, let alone actually learn it all to the point of knowing most of it.

Again, read the forum posts each day (General Trainz, TRS19, Freeware, Payware, 3rd party) and you will start to learn just how "deep" this game/sim is.

Also, check out Youtube videos. Some nice Trainz Routes are shown there.

Addendum: You will find that sessions vary tremendously. No two work the same. Some may have navigation icons, some not. Some ("philskene" routes) simply have the consists in place and you are told what to do in the description. With some sessions I just can't understand what the creator intends for you to do. It's a grab bag. I have learned to go into sessions expecting problems. But these issues forced me to look at the sessions and learn how to do them. Now I'm able to "debug" them, or at least figure out what is going wrong. The more you learn, the more you do on your own. Some people have reported creating "real" "operational" railroads that run for days. Sadly, those seem to not get uploaded to the Download Station (Content Manager). The creator prefers them for personal use only and not sharing.

Lastly - Welcome. I look forward to your sharing of 32 years railroad experience. I've only been here for a year and a half and I'm trying to learn railroad ops myself, but there's a lot to learn!

I'll try to run the session you mention today, looking for problem items. I remember some loading/unloading points being "touchy" to get them to work but I don't remember specifics.