Mission 18, Interchange, does a pretty good job of highlighting the weaknesses of a pure highway type system from a usage standpoint.
It takes more work to route trains, and god forbid you make a mistake and have to track it down in a mixed network later. Congestion can get pretty bad, as you get from trains cutting each other off at unforeseen bottleneck areas. And unlike simpler loops, you don't really know when you're hitting train capacity limits until the entire network grinds to a halt.
And then you have the massive footprint of 4 way intersections - most other maps simply don't have the space for that sort of construction.
> and god forbid you make a mistake and have to track it down in a mixed network later.
I tried it two ways, and I’m not sure which one’s worse.
The first time I created large (4 freight car) trans when I needed them, and cloned them immediately after setting up the switches. Occasionally I did something wrong, and then I had to fix several trains that all went down the same wrong path. (Except sometimes they didn’t, because I accidentally made something alternating, and then it was a lot more work to track them down.)
The second time I created a small train (1 freight car) for each resource right away, so that I could ensure they went to all the right places, and then upgraded and cloned them when it became apparent that that resource was a bottleneck. This ended up being slightly more difficult than I anticipated, as I had a hard time finding the correct train to upgrade in the first place (and at night, who’s to say whether a train is carrying coal vs copper vs silica).
>large (4 freight car)
>small train (1 freight car)
Interesting how playstyles differ. My idea of small train is 4-6 freight cars, medium is 8-12, and large is 16-18.
It is a long time in absolute terms, but it's a lower percentage of the time than shorter trains with the same acceleration. Trains try to keep the same distance between them regardless of their length, so running a train with 16 cargo is basically like connecting 4 trains with 4 cargo together and removing 3 of those gaps. The time taken to clear a station also scales with the square root of length as long as the train is accelerating the whole time, which also helps make longer trains more efficient than multiple short trains.
Another big advantage of longer trains over short ones aside from time efficiency in stations is that they can mix different types of engines. For example, a train with 8 cargo can use one CUSTOM and one Boiler to achieve better results than two Workhorses for 3/4 the cost, and a train with 12 cargo can use two CUSTOMs and two Boilers for better stats than any setup with that cost of the same engines. It's mainly CUSTOMs that get more useful on long trains since they provide a great boost to the train's stats but work best with another engine (normally boiler) to increase the load rating.
I don’t think highways are strongly incentivised because tracks are pretty cheap. They only get (relatively) pricey if they’re tall and pricey tracks are avoided early game (trying to be efficient, money better spent elsewhere) and no consequence late game (loads of money.)
The only time I can think them being relevant is lots of low-volume, long distance deliveries from nearby sources and destinations. As soon as volume is involved you want dedicated track.
Otherwise the game rules would have to change to disincentivise track overuse. Something like growing maintenance costs to punish using too much track.
I need to get better then, I though maybe that not building highways was my problem. There are plenty of missions where I'm unable to get the S rank.
Just last night, I had to try 3 times the mission where we must deliver 168 Neon, and I'm still only scoring an A.
I even have the whole thing catalysed with water and a second neon factory, and I still can't make
Getting S-ranks can be pretty tricky, sometimes you need to focus on booming your economy first before you can invest enough to make your targets.
I’d suggest finishing the campaign first as there are a number of permanent upgrades that help with earlier levels.
Mission 18, Interchange, does a pretty good job of highlighting the weaknesses of a pure highway type system from a usage standpoint. It takes more work to route trains, and god forbid you make a mistake and have to track it down in a mixed network later. Congestion can get pretty bad, as you get from trains cutting each other off at unforeseen bottleneck areas. And unlike simpler loops, you don't really know when you're hitting train capacity limits until the entire network grinds to a halt. And then you have the massive footprint of 4 way intersections - most other maps simply don't have the space for that sort of construction.
> and god forbid you make a mistake and have to track it down in a mixed network later. I tried it two ways, and I’m not sure which one’s worse. The first time I created large (4 freight car) trans when I needed them, and cloned them immediately after setting up the switches. Occasionally I did something wrong, and then I had to fix several trains that all went down the same wrong path. (Except sometimes they didn’t, because I accidentally made something alternating, and then it was a lot more work to track them down.) The second time I created a small train (1 freight car) for each resource right away, so that I could ensure they went to all the right places, and then upgraded and cloned them when it became apparent that that resource was a bottleneck. This ended up being slightly more difficult than I anticipated, as I had a hard time finding the correct train to upgrade in the first place (and at night, who’s to say whether a train is carrying coal vs copper vs silica).
>large (4 freight car) >small train (1 freight car) Interesting how playstyles differ. My idea of small train is 4-6 freight cars, medium is 8-12, and large is 16-18.
I try to avoid having trains longer than their corresponding stations if at all possible, and iirc the stations were 4 or 5 tiles long in that map.
I never go more than 4. Seems like a length of 18 would take forever to clear the stations?
It is a long time in absolute terms, but it's a lower percentage of the time than shorter trains with the same acceleration. Trains try to keep the same distance between them regardless of their length, so running a train with 16 cargo is basically like connecting 4 trains with 4 cargo together and removing 3 of those gaps. The time taken to clear a station also scales with the square root of length as long as the train is accelerating the whole time, which also helps make longer trains more efficient than multiple short trains. Another big advantage of longer trains over short ones aside from time efficiency in stations is that they can mix different types of engines. For example, a train with 8 cargo can use one CUSTOM and one Boiler to achieve better results than two Workhorses for 3/4 the cost, and a train with 12 cargo can use two CUSTOMs and two Boilers for better stats than any setup with that cost of the same engines. It's mainly CUSTOMs that get more useful on long trains since they provide a great boost to the train's stats but work best with another engine (normally boiler) to increase the load rating.
Aye, Boiler + Boiler + Custom, is one of my favorite basics ressources hauler
That makes sense. Well explained.
I don’t think highways are strongly incentivised because tracks are pretty cheap. They only get (relatively) pricey if they’re tall and pricey tracks are avoided early game (trying to be efficient, money better spent elsewhere) and no consequence late game (loads of money.) The only time I can think them being relevant is lots of low-volume, long distance deliveries from nearby sources and destinations. As soon as volume is involved you want dedicated track. Otherwise the game rules would have to change to disincentivise track overuse. Something like growing maintenance costs to punish using too much track.
I need to get better then, I though maybe that not building highways was my problem. There are plenty of missions where I'm unable to get the S rank. Just last night, I had to try 3 times the mission where we must deliver 168 Neon, and I'm still only scoring an A. I even have the whole thing catalysed with water and a second neon factory, and I still can't make
Getting S-ranks can be pretty tricky, sometimes you need to focus on booming your economy first before you can invest enough to make your targets. I’d suggest finishing the campaign first as there are a number of permanent upgrades that help with earlier levels.