Jump to content

Leaderboard

Popular Content

Showing content with the highest reputation on 07/01/2018 in Posts

  1. I've figured the scenario out in the meantime via extensive trial and error, beat it few times, even attained a gold medal eventually and... wow. One of the better maps I've ever played or recall seeing. The sheer nostalgia factor for me (I'm a huge fan of "The Postman" by David Brin and this scenario fits right in) made it a great experience and then there is the whole logistical puzzle to figure out. I absolutely love how everything in the scenario connects together, rathen than having some obscure resources. Well, aside maybe canned coffee, but compared with other maps, this is a golden standard of connection between resources and goods. However, there are still issues that I was unable to figure out for high efficiency, instead simply removing non-essential trains once I've got all the rails I need laid down, because even with three lines going, it's a mess. And a LOT depends on early RNG, since not having Chemicals in Salem/Eugene/preferably both or having Coal scattered around can make things absurdly complicated. I also end up restarting few times when I realised there are no Dairy Processor around, or having a single Milk producer in the Valley. Anyway, stuff I still have and can't figure out Any dam that isn't Detroit one (the north-most) is a complete pain in the ass to connect with rest of the rail and a sink for rail cells, while you might end up with any of those dams getting destroyed right after being connected. Not a single line created by connecting any of those southern dams has any practical applications, unless I'm missing something. At least Detroit Dam is on the shortest and most effective route to Madras, but other three are painfully hard to connect Connecting to the Grant's Pass military depot has absolutely no way of avoiding high grades, unless openly cheating (by stocking up high amount of spare rails and then lowering the terrain by building at angles, demolish the rail and build new line in the now "flat" terrain. The fact you need to haul Oil from Salem to... Roseburg and then to Grant's Pass only works in three stages, otherwise the line(s) between Eugene/Veneta to Roseburg gets blocked in no time, even if nothing else goes there. If for whatever reason Chemicals don't spawn in Salem/Eugene, the scenario is close to impossible to win. If there is no Workshop turning Steel into Goods, things get wonky ealy on, since connecting to... Siletz? The place with Ammo factory. Anyway, Steel deliveries provide a lot of rail cells, so without a quick dump of entire Steel production from Corvallis, there is lotta steel that does nothing and railway to ammo factory might take even 3 years to finish. I was absolutely unable to get Alluminium production going in effective way. I know you can suffice on Steel, but this undermines the whole effort to get Alluminium at all, as hauling it half over the map back and forth (and only two places can have mills) doesn't exactly work. Am I missing something, or this was intended? Connecting to... Grand Ronde (the port you need to connect) serves nothing. The terrain makes any hauls going there impractical and wasteful, but at least it's self-contained area, so a tiny passenger train going there can pay for the tracks. Things that I never had issues with or figured out: Money is barely an issue, since a huge amount of resources and finished goods are going to be hauled. Passenger trains can be managed almost entirely as "side" or during "empty" return hauls. It's absolutely normal to generate 10 million of industrial profit/year if all the farms and processors in the rail system are owned by player, closely followed by coal. Milk is the key. If Halsey, Tangent or Albany don't have Dairy Processor, just restart the map. Milk not only can carry on thanks to rail cells it grants (probably the easiest of all "farming" goods), but the food provided from it can then be quickly shipped to Salem and traded for Iron. Flooding Salem with Food is great, since it goes through customs to get Iron. Having a ready pile of Iron for pick-up speed things up significantly Bend to Madras is a nice money maker passenger route, because it doesn't interact with rest of the rail and provides substantial income. "Efficiency" locos are better, solely because they have higher reliability and better grade performance. No point bothering with Lumber, while Paper is only worth to get the Mail production bonus. Same with Concrete - once the dam is fixed, no point clogging the system with Gravel and Concrete shipments. Profit is meaningless, but the slow down on the rail system is painful. If there is no place to connect at least 2 Coal mines with single station, restart. If said Coal isn't in easily accessable spot, restart. Coal is one of few choke points of the whole system, not having it makes a difference between winning or failing. Once electricity is back, there is no point to keep using steam engines outside mountain hauls. The sheer reliability and speed of GG1, along with compact size (so less things on the track) makes up for everything else. I'll have to try that. Usually I connect via Detroit Dam and then next to Mt. Jefferson, over the top of the Lake Chinook's Dam. When I have spare cells, I demolish the most graded element and rebuild it, dropping the grades to a passable 4-4.5%
    1 point
  2. "Not so bad" scenarios not included on the Platinum CD, but which might be good candidates for an additional CD. This list is made mainly for those "players" that have not been in the game all that long and may not be that familiar with the huge library of scenarios we have available. None of my own notes on these scenarios are included. This is strictly a playlist selected from some 483 maps listed in my files.. As a group, these scenarios all have objectives except DragonIsle, which is included for the beautiful rendering of a dragon. They are not markedly better or worse, easier or harder, than the player scenarios on the Platinum CD. Nor are they any more or less devoid of errors in key events. In particular, some have to be played just because they are interesting, others are easily fixable by the player if desired. Some of the scenarios may not be immediately available, some may be on the list by accident and there are certainly scenarios missing from the list. In any case, I guess they can be found in The Terminal Map section or at Hawk & Badger . Afghanistan TSC Ben Sauer AsiaAmtrak TSC Benjamin Sauer North AmerColorz! RT2 Bill Ingram ImaginaryTasmania TSC Cam Hills AustraliaClosa 1950-1985 RT2 Darrell ImaginaryCanadian Pacific TSC David Gross North AmerPacific Northwest TSC David Masters North AmerEsquimalt & Nanaimo RT2 E. Collins North AmerAlt Baden RT2 Erwin Hiesl EuropeApple War Ooze TSC Gwizz ImaginarySeattle Street Railway TSC Gwizz North AmerScorpion Mountain TSC Hawk(dawg) ImaginaryUS History TSC Jeffry Fisher North AmerBritannia RT2 J Sylvest and GS Bales ImaginaryCanada Bound RT2 Joe Fitzpatrick North AmerKootenay to Coast TSC Joe Fitzpatrick & SM North AmerKVR251 TSC John Schwarz North AmerYosemite Valley Railroad TSC John Schwarz and Paul Bamberg North Amer20th Century Limited TSC Lars Maischak North Amer20th Century Unlimited TSC Lars Maischak North AmerBroadway Limited TSC Lars Maischak North AmerCoastline TSC Lars Maischak ImaginaryGreat Passenger Trains 3-pak TSC Lars Maischak North AmerReich Chancellor TSC Lars Maischak EuropeMason County RT2 Mike Gasaway ImaginaryCascadia TSC N. S. Bennett North AmerCascadia-sm TSC N. S. Bennett North AmerOregon and Empire TSC N. S. Bennett North AmerRenewed Zealand TSC N. S. Bennett AustraliaThat Toddlin' Town TSC N. S. Bennett North AmerMorocco TSC Paul Bamberg AfricaNew England TSC Paul Bamberg North AmerMorocco (SM version) TSC Paul Bamberg AfricaBound for South Australia, v2 TSC Peter Bennet AustraliaPilbara Iron, ver 2 TSC Peter Bennet AustraliaWesternport v2 TSC Peter Bennet AustraliaVancouver Island TSC Profish North AmerCuba (2000) RT2 Ras North AmerBen Franklin's Kite TSC Sirian ImaginaryBristol Cars RT2 Steve Banks EuropeIsrael 1952 TSC Steve Banks AsiaItaly and the Alps TSC Steve Banks EuropeManchester Sheffield TSC Steve Banks EuropePoland 1945 TSC Steve Banks EuropeThe Philippines TSC Steve Banks AsiaWoodstock RT2 Steve Banks EuropeAlaska TSC Steve Lorenz North AmerAlaska RT2 Steve Lorenz North AmerAmerican Flyer (SM fix) TSC Steve Lorenz North AmerChina TSC TSC Steve Lorenz AsiaGreat Northern TSC Steve Lorenz North AmerHawaii RT2 Steve Lorenz North AmerRail Baron V2.0 TSC Steve Lorenz North AmerHeartland Heaven TSC Steve Martineau North AmerHeartland, USA Auto Industry TSC Steve Martineau North AmerPine Valley TSC Szabla North AmerOntario Northland TSC Ted Kocyla North AmerBulvanian Petroleoum TSC Toni Ronkko ImaginaryDragonIsle RT2 Unknown Imaginary
    1 point
  3. FROM DIFFICULT TO INSANE Among other things, delivery schedules for Albany and Grant's Pass must be completed. It was Nick's original intention to include Warm Springs as a 3rd depot. But that would have made the scenario insanely difficult. Nevertheless, some months ago I attempted to do just that and have enclosed the resulting scenario in the attached zip file along with a short technical note. I never played very far into this one so it is not fully tested. As I recall it just seemed like such a daunting task at the time. Nevertheless, here it is. Note that I never intended to distribute this so it may have some odd things in it, for example, 2 or 3 variables strung into the same variable in the status report either as xxx,yyy xxy,yzz (can't get rid of the comma). I just looked and saw that I disabled gold so I may not have even expanded it to include the additional connection, so you'll have to keep track of your own results. The event will trigger a report but with no gold effect. The gold effect in the gold trigger has been removed. It was quite likely just as it says in the dialogue, so you could continue playing. I have no reason to believe the trigger is incorrect, but however the silver, etc effects have not been altered so they might still trigger even for a gold win. A player may want add back the gold effect or remove the other medal events, but its not really necessary to do so [Ed.] Hoping this gives you a good challenge, outofmage & MaglevForever, and that you will report your views/results and upload your post-gold game if you get one. Note that I didn't state when I got gold in the above narrative, it seemed better not to at the time for various reasons. And I don't remember any more. I can tell you though, that it would have been a no-tricks honest play because I always disclose anything like that and anyhow wanted an honest play so I could write the review. But then (lack of) trickery is oft in the eye of the beholder. Good Railroading Cascadia-NSB.zip
    1 point
×
×
  • Create New...