prairie4566 wrote:Be sure to switch "snap to terrain" off almost all the time when laying track. You only need it in very special situation, when you try to join track arriving at different grades (and even then, there are other methods).
I have this activated all the time I confess
The point is, it does not hurt most of the time. But there are a few minor issues which may or may not spoil it in some situations, and you hardly remember that this might be the cause:
RW organises track in "ribbons". Each ribbon can have more than one track section. The difference does not matter for you most of the time, except for the discussion here.
With "snap to terrain", every stretch of track is its own ribbon, and the end point is aligned with the terrain. This means that minor deviations in terrain height lead to minor differences in grades. This may bite you when you try to place a crossover between two tracks which are nearly, but not totally, at the same height with the same grade.
The second consequence is that you cannot have straight frogs with "snap to terrain". With straight frogs, the curve ends before the frog is reached and it is followed by a straight piece of track. If both pieces are part of the same ribbon, the switch renders fine. Otherwise, it does not.
Ribbon ends also retain their elevation independently. I.e., if you want to lay a stretch of track and raise one end to give the desired grade, you need to have it in one ribbon (I believe).
Crossovers of close track can show "welded flangeways". This is because the whole crossover (2 curves plus 1 straight in between) are a single ribbon. Splitting it in the middle and welding it again makes that 2 ribbons and the issue is gone.
In earlier versions, cars would vanish at the ribbon ends, but that has been fixed a while ago.
I do find the snap-to-terrain feature useful for guiding a joining track to another on a grade. I make an extra wide embankment (snap terrain to track) next the target track, then have the joining one approach there, with some ribbon breaks so it really follows the terrain there. Afterwards, the extra embankment is removed. But I am not exactly a skilled route builder.
One hint I forgot: At times, some track pieces may disappear when you join track using the snap-to-track option and then remove the stubs to have a curve instead of the switch. Exit the route (saving the changes in the process) and reload it. The missing track will reappear. If you would continue, you would get more and more confused, and RW, too, I guess. Otherwise, this is a harmless issue.
Finally, I must say that the join tool is simply overrated by some. Generally, when you wish to join track, you use snap-to-track option to lay a curve to a straight, or to another curve of bigger radius. I used the join tool to get parallel track, using precisely made pieces of curved track, but since they made the offset tool work with track, the whole piecing-together exercise (and the clever Excel sheets I made for that purpose) are second choice in the shade of the offset tool.
Not really helpful advice I know, but at-leats you know it's not just you in that postion!