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Guys,Do you think YD is currently good enough to put an ad in 'Model Railroader' magazine? Is there anything you think I should fix/improve before placing the ad? I expect that we'll get a flood of 'newbies' when I do and I just want the game to be as complete as possible first.Thanks,
KingJPW

Yard Duty, The National Freight Yard Simulation - http://groups.msn.com/YardDuty

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RE: Advertisement, DaveHonan, Mar-14-03, 07:44 AM, (1) RE: Advertisement, KingJPW, Mar-14-03, 04:28 PM, (2) RE: Advertisement, DaveHonan, Mar-14-03, 04:57 PM, (3) RE: Advertisement, KevinForsyth, Mar-14-03, 09:50 PM, (4) RE: Advertisement, KingJPW, Mar-14-03, 10:45 PM, (5) RE: Advertisement, KevinForsyth, Mar-14-03, 11:38 PM, (6) RE: Advertisement, Davecr0, Mar-15-03, 08:08 AM, (7) RE: Advertisement, KingJPW, Mar-15-03, 12:45 PM, (8) RE: Advertisement, leesome1226, Mar-15-03, 02:31 PM, (9) RE: Empty cars, DaveHonan, Mar-15-03, 08:16 PM, (10) RE: Advertisement, NSSpike, Mar-17-03, 12:51 PM, (11) RE: Advertisement, LongHoodForward, Mar-17-03, 01:36 PM, (12) RE: Advertisement, DaveHonan, Mar-17-03, 01:39 PM, (13) RE: Advertisement, NSSpike, Mar-17-03, 03:10 PM, (14) RE: Advertisement, KingJPW, Mar-17-03, 04:47 PM, (15) RE: Advertisement, NSSpike, Mar-17-03, 05:14 PM, (16)

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How about that mystery URL that's burred out at the bottom of the ad you have on the YD site? Speaking seriously, I think that the FAQs/tutorials/etc on the YD site need to be worked over before announcing to the mass public. There's a lot of editing that needs to be done, and the information there needs to be updated to reflect features of the game as it exists now. Included in this must be step-by-step directions for <i><u>every</u></i> aspect of the game; the way some things function aren't entirely intuitive (right-click-and-drag; uploading a train; creating a new train), but perform well once the technique has been learned.Other stuff:
- A note needs to added to the Yard Projects and Creating Yards pages advising that only paying members can submit maps.
- A serious effort needs to be made to contact all the players and get their info for the teams page.
- Submitted yards/junctions should not be accepted or rejected based upon one person's judgement of how interesting they are. The submitter obviously has a reason for submitting the yard; perhaps a system can be created whereby any maps that do not gain initial approval can have a summary of the map and its intended purpose posted, to be voted upon by the group of players as a whole? Majority approval allows it becomes part of the game.
- The databases in the Yahoo group need to be "officially" integrated into the YD system; there is so much there to help players, but it loses its value because new members have to sign up for the game, sign up for the forum, <i>and</i> sign up for a new yahoo group. It also certainly isn't an endorsement for the validity of the yahoo group that the guy who runs the YD show isn't a member.As far as advertising goes, consider that there are people who would love this game that don't read <i>MR</i>. We have a substantial number of professional railroaders in out midst; that alone should be a stong clue that publications such as <i>Trains</i> and <i>CTC Board</i> should also be included in the advertising program. I'd also suggest <i>Railroad Model Craftsman</i>; it has a wide distribution and often runs ads that don't appear in <i>MR</i>. It also wouldn't be a bad idea to create a "banner" ad for advertising on railroad-related websites.Comments, additions, and critcisms welcome. I'm now about late for class (shows how much I want to invest in the game!), so I'm signing off...-Dave
MP 2.6, PRR Lost Creek Branch
http://www.davehonan.gcdranet.com/

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Dave, Points taken, however:1) Participating in a Team is an option since many members may not care, and nothing would be worse than adding people who don't intend to participate as a Team member.2) "Majority approval allows it becomes part of the game..."
Sounds like 'democracy'. I'll have no part in that! If you could only see some of the crap that was submitted. lol!3) I was a member before the Yahoo group got deleted. If I 'assume' control of the Yahoo database, things would become less democratic. I like the idea of other people starting there own YD sites. Less work for me.4) I'll consider more magazines later, because I don't want to get overwhelmed.Jim

Yard Duty, The National Freight Yard Simulation - http://groups.msn.com/YardDuty

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Jim-2) Can you also create guidelines for mapmakers to polish maps before submitting? It seems to me that would greatly decrease the time between submission and approval.3) I guess you missed Paul's post:
http://www.train-sim.com/dcforum/DCForumID14/237.html
Is it too much to ask for a link to the Yahoo group be posted beneath the "Forum" link on the YD site? Maybe title it "Yard Duty Databases" to differentiate from this and provide a clear meaning to what seems to be its primary purpose. It'd also make it much easier for newbies to find if they don't check all the old posts here.4) I'd strongly suggest that, at minimum, you include Trains in the initial push; there's an audience there that you won't get in MR that will be just as strongly interested in the game. Same publisher, too.I'd be willing to help out with editing the website.-Dave
MP 2.6, PRR Lost Creek Branch
http://www.davehonan.gcdranet.com/

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Jim,I'm sure you hadn't intended to turn this particular thread into a call for suggestions/improvements. That said, here's a thought: if the system file could contain data on unloader spurs as well as loaders, then as soon as you unload a car it could gain a new destination at a place that can load it. That way every car, empty or full, will always show where it needs to go next. This would especially help the newbies.My vote, not that I have one, is for your continuing hegemony as the King of YD. I'm just enjoying a chance to contribute. By the way, for the next couple of weeks I am available to help with an instruction manual update if needed. Let me know.Kevin

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Kevin S. Forsyth
kevin@forsyth.net http://kevin.forsyth.net
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I know what you mean, but there are several reasons to avoid this:a) It's not prototypical. It would be silly to set the destination of an empty car to California when it just got unloaded in Maine. Railroads typically don't send individual empty car's across the country just to be loaded.b) What would I do with the car's history. Would I immediately delete it? Would the car get a new originator assigned. I just don't see how this would work. Emails happen when a car is unloaded, but nothing meaningfull happens when loading, thus there is no reason to load a car at a specific place. Just load it anywhere.Anyway, maybe it would be best if I made it so that when are car is unloaded, it changes to having NO destination. The problem is that people think that in YD individual empty cars have destinations but the really don't. It is your job to load them somewhere so that they once again have a destination. Let me think about it...Thoughts and comments welcome.
Jim

Yard Duty, The National Freight Yard Simulation - http://groups.msn.com/YardDuty

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You know, I should have given it more thought, because I agree with that argument. Never mind. I like that idea of no destination, though.

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Kevin S. Forsyth
kevin@forsyth.net http://kevin.forsyth.net
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I like the idea of no destination. It does get a bit confusing as it stands now. I tend to change them anyway to a yard which needs them.

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I finished coding the 'no destination' feature last night and I like it much better. Basically, when unloaded the cars appear black with a white line in the state or yard color filter. One gets the sense that the unloaded empties have no purpose (and are just in the way) until someone gives them a destination to be loaded. Much better.KingJPW

Yard Duty, The National Freight Yard Simulation - http://groups.msn.com/YardDuty

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I think that routing mtys to a location is part of the fun, I find myself looking at other maps and figuring out what type of loaders they have and then sending the mty's that I have sitting around to that certain yard.As far as the Advertisement, I think it is a great idea although I know they can get a bit pricy. I think that YD has all the features that it needs to make it currently. I would have to agree with Dave that you should also put an Ad in Trains as well as MR because with Trains becoming more industry oriented lately there seems to be quite a division in who reads what while a few years ago they used go hand in hand. You might also considering posting it on a few Yahoo groups, mainly the OPS sig group which is where all Model RR operation discussion happens, it is quite a large and intruging group.Good luck,Chris Lee
Train Artisan

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Jim-One point for clarification: Although no destination is now default, will users be able to assign a destination to an empty car? That would help greatly when routing the cars through multiple classification yards (say, Selkirk-DeButts-Barstow).-Dave
MP 2.6, PRR Lost Creek Branch
http://www.davehonan.gcdranet.com/

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Have you considered working on the hump? When I was yardmastering DeButts I had problems in gettting the cars to roll in all of the tracks. At DeButts the cars are stopped by retarders at the northend of the class yard so you can fill any given track up with cars, which I wasn t able to do in the game. I think if the hump operation can be improved some, it would be awesome, and it would make classifying cars easier, which is the prototypical function of a hump yard, easy classification.

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DeButts seems to be working ok for me...I run the hump at 6 mph to get the maximum roll out of the cars. The more cars you cut off at a time the farther they roll...if you have 20 cars goin the same destination and cut those 20 off...they will roll all the way through the bowl, out the other side, and all the way to Indiana! Now that I'm back online...I can get these 1400 cars out of this yard!!Corey
"LongHoodForward"

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I've been meaning to bring this up for a while, but never think of it because I'm not actively using a hump yard.From observing the way the cars move, it seems to me that you use some physics equations to govern rolling stock movement. Is there a way you could program the game to increase a car's inertia from the point when it's uncoupled by a "hump" track to when it stops? This ideally wouldn't affect the speed at which it leaves the hump (as doing such would make lining routes more difficult), but would allow it to roll for a longer distance.Alternately, maybe an "anti-retarder" track piece could be created that would give a boost of speed to any car passing over it; these would be added to the entrances of all class tracks. If it causes the occasional car to zip out the other end, that's a prorotypical occurance (albeit uncommon, except at NS' first attempt to reopen Enola).-Dave
MP 2.6, PRR Lost Creek Branch
http://www.davehonan.gcdranet.com/

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LAST EDITED ON Mar-17-03 AT 03:20 PM (EDT)

Ideally the cars should roll until one of two things happen. 1) the cars couple into another car and stop or 2) the cars are stopped by the retarder at the northend (in the case of DeButts) of the class yard.What I would suggest instead of a "anti-retarder" track piece is a retarder track piece that would stop the cars from running out of the track. I don t know how difficult it would be to program, but instead of having the cars programmed to roll a certain distance and stop on their on, program them when free rolling between the hump track piece and the retarder track piece not to stop until contacting the retarder track piece, of course the player could still intervene at anytime and stop the cars or speed them up if they wished. The retarder track piece would not restrict the players movement in & out of the track, it would just prevent the cars from free rolling out of the track. The yardmaster would then have the whole class yard available without fear of sending a car to a track and having it stop on his end of the yard, but instead it would roll until contacting another car or the new retarder section, which is prototypical. In real life cars are not sent over the hump at DeButts in more than 5 car cuts per yard bullentin. I just don t think you should have to send big cuts of cars over the hump to have a chance of getting them in the clear, thats not prototypical, and it would be dangerous in the real world .Furthermore we are not just talking about DeButts here, but all of our present and future hump yards. It would be nice on that Model Railroader ad to have- Game features: Fully Functional Prototypical Humps available.Just a thought.

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Guys, I did some work on the hump feature last night, basically making the cars roll further and also made it harder for colliding cars to keep moving (which was annoying me when classifiying)Anyway, I think the idea of a retarder track as described by NSSpick at the end of the yard is a good idea. Let me see what I can do... Not that it matters, but are these retarders prototypical or just something necessary for Yard Duty?Jim

Yard Duty, The National Freight Yard Simulation - http://groups.msn.com/YardDuty

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Thanks Jim for working on the hump, and being interested in improving it. The retarders are prototypical and are in use at DeButts Yard. These mini retarders are controlled by the retarder operator who also controls the group and master retarders which slows down the cars before they enter the class tracks, the mini retarders at the northend bring the car to a complete stop and hold it in place while other cars couple into it. I think this will be a great improvement for the game.

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