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| Control 12/11/2010 at 14:18 #2001 | |
kbarber
1712 posts |
How about a basic "Control" function (as in Control Office, "The Brains", according to your age/area of interest)? What I have in mind is a menu option that could be activated in case of (e. g.) a points failure. At its most basic it would allow trains of certain classes to be stopped from entering the sim - as if Control, having been told of the failure, were recessing them. The sting in the tail being that trains thus held back would be remembered and released (at suitable intervals - there aren't that many loops on modern main lines!) to enter the sim very late. (On a Kurt timetable that would also mean outgoing trains waiting loco or somesuch. If anyone cared to use the feature by which the sim can know what's in any siding - with depots populated with locos at the start of a game - it might also lead to outgoing trains waiting loco at some stage.) Ideally the operator would be able to choose what classes to hold back. A trivial enhancement would be to program the running time to the nearest refuge point, so that incoming trains that had notionally passed that location would still enter in spite of the block. Less trivially, routes/destinations might be programmed so stops would have to be requested on a "per route" as well as "per class" basis. Final far-from-trivial enhancement: where there are offstage diversionary routes, the stopped trains might enter somewhere else (eg on Westbury, if a stop on freights were requested for a points failure at - say - Pewsey, they might start entering (very) late at Wooton Bassett). Of course that would probably end up being very complicated for some sims, but they could be left with just the basic "stop" function until someone has the time & inclination to do more. Oh, and what about some of drivers delayed by such events calling in and asking to be looped because their day has ended, with Control providing a new driver on request (and after a suitable interval)? (A bit like train being delayed by food trolley etc, but always somewhere it can be recessed, with the complication that it needs to stop at a signal & phone call made, which doesn't happen at the moment, with a further phone call when the new driver is ready.) Log in to reply |
| Control 12/11/2010 at 14:18 #12435 | |
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kbarber
1712 posts |
How about a basic "Control" function (as in Control Office, "The Brains", according to your age/area of interest)? What I have in mind is a menu option that could be activated in case of (e. g.) a points failure. At its most basic it would allow trains of certain classes to be stopped from entering the sim - as if Control, having been told of the failure, were recessing them. The sting in the tail being that trains thus held back would be remembered and released (at suitable intervals - there aren't that many loops on modern main lines!) to enter the sim very late. (On a Kurt timetable that would also mean outgoing trains waiting loco or somesuch. If anyone cared to use the feature by which the sim can know what's in any siding - with depots populated with locos at the start of a game - it might also lead to outgoing trains waiting loco at some stage.) Ideally the operator would be able to choose what classes to hold back. A trivial enhancement would be to program the running time to the nearest refuge point, so that incoming trains that had notionally passed that location would still enter in spite of the block. Less trivially, routes/destinations might be programmed so stops would have to be requested on a "per route" as well as "per class" basis. Final far-from-trivial enhancement: where there are offstage diversionary routes, the stopped trains might enter somewhere else (eg on Westbury, if a stop on freights were requested for a points failure at - say - Pewsey, they might start entering (very) late at Wooton Bassett). Of course that would probably end up being very complicated for some sims, but they could be left with just the basic "stop" function until someone has the time & inclination to do more. Oh, and what about some of drivers delayed by such events calling in and asking to be looped because their day has ended, with Control providing a new driver on request (and after a suitable interval)? (A bit like train being delayed by food trolley etc, but always somewhere it can be recessed, with the complication that it needs to stop at a signal & phone call made, which doesn't happen at the moment, with a further phone call when the new driver is ready.) Log in to reply |
| Control 12/11/2010 at 15:50 #12437 | |
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ralphjwchadkirk
275 posts |
Control are more likely be ringing constantly and asking you to turn trains round, take different routes, run fast, issue SSO's etc.
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| Control 14/11/2010 at 13:46 #12487 | |
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kbarber
1712 posts |
Well that might itself add to the "interest". So it would need some settings (rather like the failure settings already have) to keep Control under control. Boom boom! Log in to reply |
| Control 15/11/2010 at 19:42 #12516 | |
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ralphjwchadkirk
275 posts |
Yes, I think it would be a great addition to the simulator. It would be nice if you could turn control off in real life though! Log in to reply |
| Control 15/11/2010 at 20:10 #12517 | |
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Zoe
251 posts |
In a multiplayer game, there's nothing to stop someone acting as a controller. Where several sims can be chained together they can make decisions on diversions, turning short and so on.
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| Control 16/11/2010 at 09:19 #12524 | |
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kbarber
1712 posts |
Zoe said:In a multiplayer game, there's nothing to stop someone acting as a controller. Where several sims can be chained together they can make decisions on diversions, turning short and so on. Certainly would work for multiplayer but not for single player. It occurs that if you're going to do this for multiplayer you also need an enhanced F2/4 timetable control function; it would still need the facility to stop certain trains entering the sim but to remember that they were going to so they entered late when any blockage had been cleared. Log in to reply |
| Control 24/11/2010 at 23:22 #12631 | |
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Stephen Fulcher
2028 posts |
In multiplayer the host often acts as Controller, especially so when all panels are taken by other players. I think we could be in danger of over-complicating the game here, especially for players who may not be as railway-orientated as some of us are, and I also expect the code changes needed for such alterations would be substantial. Log in to reply |
| Control 29/11/2010 at 10:14 #12704 | |
ajax103
1106 posts |
kbarber said:Oh, and what about some of drivers delayed by such events calling in and asking to be looped because their day has ended, with Control providing a new driver on request (and after a suitable interval)? (A bit like train being delayed by food trolley etc, but always somewhere it can be recessed, with the complication that it needs to stop at a signal & phone call made, which doesn't happen at the moment, with a further phone call when the new driver is ready.)I would welcome that as it would be possible and act as a challenge to users, we already have the ability to have track circuit failures and signals not working and other random problems so should be able to get a phone call from a driver for example saying they're at Welwyn Garden City on the Up Fast not with a train fault and having us to divert the Up Fasts though Platform 2 on the Up Slow around the failed train. Log in to reply |