Some suggestions for next release

[AvG]

Running EXP11.22:

- Removal of functionality of the Windows-Close-button. (Only the close-button, the other 2 buttons are needed)


- Different placing of sub-windows. Proposal: Minimap left (as is); Line Management in the middle and more width; listing windows to the right. Minimap should stay UNcovered.
  More length for the edit-window of line-management.


- If feasable some multiplier in the existing mail-generation (10 or 25). The waiting for the major-release will be more acceptable.


- Building a scenario:
  Placing and building  a big city is a disaster. For a +100K city you have to left-click some 2000 times. I can imagine it is quite simple to extend the .exe with a right-click of 5K or 10K inhabitants.


  Building a town near a canal/river gives automatic placement of bridges. These bridges however are NOT connected. If you know it you can correct it easily, but I think it is not meant this way.


AvG

[jamespetts]

Running EXP11.22:

- Removal of functionality of the Windows-Close-button. (Only the close-button, the other 2 buttons are needed)

I am not sure what you mean by this - can you elaborate? Are you referring to the game window itself, or the windows, such as the minimap, line management window, etc. that appear in the game? And why would it be a good thing to remove the button that enables them to be closed?

- Different placing of sub-windows. Proposal: Minimap left (as is); Line Management in the middle and more width; listing windows to the right. Minimap should stay UNcovered.

Do you mean the default placement here? They can, of course, be moved. These things are unchanged from Standard - perhaps you could post an extension request there?

More length for the edit-window of line-management.

Again, this is unchanged from Standard; but is there an Experimental specific reason why this should be enlarged?

- If feasable some multiplier in the existing mail-generation (10 or 25). The waiting for the major-release will be more acceptable.

The next major release will have fully customisable mail generation levels, although a realistic level is of mail generation is actually very low.

- Building a scenario:
  Placing and building  a big city is a disaster. For a +100K city you have to left-click some 2000 times. I can imagine it is quite simple to extend the .exe with a right-click of 5K or 10K inhabitants.

Are you referring to placing city buildings manually (this is potentially problematic, as they do not generate passengers or have any function if placed outside the city borders, which borders are themselves determined by the existing buildings) or the increase city population by X size functionality? If the latter, then this, again, is unchanged from Standard, and, in view in particular of the long list of things specific to Experimental that I need to do in future, it might be better to suggest this as an extension request to Standard.

Building a town near a canal/river gives automatic placement of bridges. These bridges however are NOT connected. If you know it you can correct it easily, but I think it is not meant this way.

I do not think that this is specific to Experimental; I think (although I have not confirmed) that this is a bug inherited from Standard that has since been fixed in Standard and incorporated into the code for the next major release.

[Combuijs]

For building a large city you modify the menu yourself:

toolbar[12][0]=general_tool[10],25,,+100

The  +100 is the increase if you click on the button. You can easily change that to +1000, + 10000 etc.. You can also add another button as I have done in my own pak:

toolbar[12][0]=general_tool[10],25,,+100
toolbar[12][1]=general_tool[10],134,,+1000

In your pak the toolbar may have another number, just look for general_tool[10]. As you can see I've given the button another icon, but you could use the same one, if you don't get confused yourself...

[AvG]

Combuijs,
Thanks for your answer.
Now you mention that toolbar-possibility I recall very vaguely I could do something like that in the past.
I can't recall however to get into that menu.
Is there a link to this somewhere?
AvG

After a good night sleep I found the toolbar-issue.
Changed it and did some trials.
Results:
- Not possible to do this in a running scenario.
- Using a high value of f.i. 5000 in the up-situation does not result in 5000/click. It varies between 50 and 3000. (What I have seen)

End conclusion: Will you it in my next scenario.

[AvG]

James,
Thanks again for answering.

I realize that all the suggestions I mentioned are also "Standard"-issues. Except the mail-problem.


I know you are working on a new pax/mail generation system. But that takes time.


In the present 11.xx situation there is a severe problem of far to few mail-generation. What I mean by that multiplier is that I can IMAGINE a piece of the .exe-code where it is easy to add a multiplier
in such a way that you get 10 or 25 times the amount of mail.
Of course this is only meant as a temp-measure to increase playability.
AvG

[jamespetts]

Ahh, much of the work on developing Simutrans is about balancing limited programming and pakset creation resources: my current strategy is to focus heavily on the next version, on which I am currently performing extensive testing of the new passenger generation system.