Atomic Systems

I am wondering how people use MSTS. I download everything and make the odd consist but due to there being a lack of activities I usually just chuff or growl along for a few miles then get bored and stop. One thing Im quite enjoying at the moment is having virtual crashes. I go like hell from Manningtree until I get to the long str8 before the next station. Then I uncouple my train and run the loco/s at full throttle and they derail at the curve immediately before the station followed by their train plowing into them. Its tasteless and naughty but I like it
What do the rest of u do?

Play it? I tend to spend all my time repainting and the most I get to play it is about 100 yards up the track to makesure its working and to get a screenshot!

Why not have a go at making your own activities, they're easy enough to do

That's generally what I do these days, just put together some activities showing what I want to see (very few, if any, of my activities follow any kind of prototypical form, I just don't know much about the railways especially steam ones ). But yeah prior to figuring activities out I drove for a while, got bored and then went in for something else (eg. another game, some development on the site or whatever).

Until my PC died. *snarl*. I'm not bitter. Yeah right, like a lemon.

Matt.

Building routes for me- I really don't find RE that difficult to get along with however once I get into laying track and putting th landscape in I find I can go a little Over the top sometimes, hence Mideast, 3 times bigger than its predecessor.

Still get glitches and miss the odd thing out (as the beta team have told me so far!) but well worth it when you have the finished product.

More a modeller than a driver.

(oops, Tim came in while I was typing this, my comment was meant to go straight after Matt's)

Pretty much like me really, I got bored of the default routes/activities quite quickly, then discovered the Modern England route - trouble is that was version 3, most activities were for version 2 (paths were not compatible) and/or required stock from somewhere called trainsimfiles which had just died! So I entered the activity editor out of necessity, fixed a couple of paths for ME, then thought "this is fun" and made a couple of activities, even uploaded one to t----.s--.com. I then discovered this site and Tim's ECML, as soon as the version 3.0 was available I wrote an activity using the new bit of line, newark to grantham, and uploaded it here. I have since had fun blasting up and down that line, and am an official beta tester and activity creator for the latest incarnation, MidEast UK V1.

So, "spitfiresrbest", stop wrecking trains, download another decent route or two (or buy CDs from this site when they're available), grab all the activities you can and then make your own!

-Alan

Timcourt1 wrote:Still get glitches and miss the odd thing out (as the beta team have told me so far!)

That's what we're here for!

-Alan

It is quite easy creating activities once you get used to doing it. You don't even need to use some of the utilities in the AE to make a good activity. I usually have one activity and keep changing what I do and the traffic pattern. It doesn't have a name and I just change the paths and add different AI traffic when I wan't a change. You don't need to create a new activity each time and have to put in the time and description etc.
Once I have done a bit of route building I will usually drive through that area to see what it looks like.
I try out different driving operations on my route to simulate real situations. I quite enjoy thrashing a peak from Newton-Le-Willows to Helsby as a Manchester-Llandudno saturday train - great! Only I can do this until the route comes out!
I try to make the AI traffic quite common so because of the amount of 80s or BR blue stock around, the activities are usually from around that time although generally it doesn't really matter.
I will have 47s/45s/31s and 101 DMUs on most passenger trains on the Irish mancunian route same as the peak above. I then have things like 47s/86s on fast WCML passenger services plus MGR's fiddlers.

Just to add (cos I get excited about this!) .....What fascinates me endlessly is creating and activity with AI traffic then running it in AE, watching all the trains going about their business on the route , especially when you have the signals viewed, its quite an education.

As far as the software goes, for all its faults we are quick to criticise but when you see all this working you really cant help but marvel at what a sophisticated program this really is.

I mainly make activities which allow me to enjoy the route, and see lots of trains going by, and if they work well I upload them. Mostly prototypical stock.

Timcourt1 wrote:Just to add (cos I get excited about this!) .....What fascinates me endlessly is creating and activity with AI traffic then running it in AE, watching all the trains going about their business on the route , especially when you have the signals viewed, its quite an education.

As far as the software goes, for all its faults we are quick to criticise but when you see all this working you really cant help but marvel at what a sophisticated program this really is.

I must agree. It is great watching what the AI trains do both in the AE and in the sim. When driving it is very interesting to see what AI train get held up behind slow moving trains infront and how close they come to stopping! Then how far away the slow train infront gets when the fast AI train behind stops at a station.
Also at junctions its facinating to see which trains will be given the road first and whether any of them overtake as they have different speeds. Also I love it when there are two lines which parrallel each other and then split away and you can see a train still racing you in the distance even though you are not there to see it and you can just make out its route. I like planning lots of AI traffic at different speeds like slow freights and fast passengers and see if the passengers get held up. I'm interested in the signalling in MSTS whether it is colour light's or semaphores. I like to see lots of AI traffic at different speeds interacting with each other and the signalling working its magic.

I play dangerously on MSTS especially on explorer route for marias pass and the NEC the maris pass can handle some speed went round some 25mph curve at 105 mph and only lost the rear most 4 wagons out of 50. and on the NEC i set explorer route as an end to end but theres a tricky dispatcher that throws a switch and i ended up doing 115mph with 2 dash 9s and 50 oil tanks through a bridge pillar and a car park

Much like Alan, I started out in "explore route" and when blasting up and down the S&C became boring tackled a few activities. Once you have the hang of the activity editor it takes very little time to put together or modify an activity to feature your latest download.

I do not really use "explore route" except for the occasional bit of "playing silly bu**ers" and testing.
Once you get used to driving in the activities just chundering along the line without purpose seems a bit pointless. I do wish though that I was a liitle more motivated towards packaging my better activities for upload.......................................Then I too could have an inbox full of "I downloaded your activity and it dont work" type e.mails.

I would love to tackle the route editor but with no off system backup at present I just refuse to put myself through the inevitable trauma of seeing months work lost forever (at least, that's my excuse).
Regards,
Dave.

Beta testing activities on Ohio Rail.Finding the rogue AI that headons you just as you were doing so well.Running same activity,at different speeds,to cater for all levels of player skill.Fine at 48mph,rubbish at 40 etc.
Can be tedious at times,but great when it all comes together.Zanesville here I come!

Crashing trains is sick.
I only do it to check what i can put new downloaded stock through.
Did however have to severely reprimand myself for running the new 321 out of kings cross, on a test to see what forces did what, decided to try a fast line to slow line switch, and where, numpty that I am, did I derail but Potter f*ing Bar.
Felt very guilty.
I set up my own activities using a combination of timetables, real and fictional stock and others.
My latest is a local run from Hitchin to Kings Cross using a 321. Other stock is 319's and Voyager (under the might have beein guise of Virgin East Coast) and other 321 and 322 stock, will add 317's tomorrow.
these provide the best framerates whilst using a realistic busy traffic pattern
I even vary stock so 319's run into Moorgate, FGE 321's run to Cambridge, NSE on london suburbans... i'm currently adding Hartford loop arrivals/ departures at Finsbury Park and Stevenage respenctively.
I also tinker in the RE, mostly adding platforms and resignalling Goingnorths ECML. I even put in Doncaster in vaguely the right place, only to find I put it band on the marker he'd put in the RE saying "doncaster station. I'm currently resignalling the area and re-doing the track layout for the XC south Yorkshire lines etc.
Might attempt to do my own extention to Wakefield/leeds...wait and see.
Anyhow, its for my own personal use.
Anyhow, 317 downloaded, so off I trot.

I tried to resignal the Nene Valley section of the East Coast Route and to add passing loops but because the track wouldnt stay on the terrain and the signals wouldnt work prototypically I got p*ssed off and gave up in disgust. I am in the process of signalling and developing the Hiatsu line to use Kevin's Narrow Gauge stock as I love to see a Fairlie working hard on the gradients.
I wish there was a way of just starting in MSTS and the simulator actually simulating rather than waiting till each user has performed several arduous tasks just to see a little train pass his as he uses it. Another thing that puts me off activities is that you cant change points when you use them making any deviations from the route u chose impossible.