hopefully, these notes will be useful for the balancing project.
I will only mention the relevant specs to keep clutter to a minimum.
using default game settings
starting credits: 250,000c
passenger factor: 20
bits per month: default, 19 I think?
timeline: on
Starting off in 1750...Hackney carriage (cost: 25c, maint: 0.14c, cap: 5, speed 10km/h, comfort: 30): In a word:
UselessThe stage coach, while costing more initially, is better rounded and the cost over time easily makes up for the cost difference. Not to mention that the initial starting money is more than enough to cover the initial cost.
Stage coach carriage (cost: 62c, maint: 0.06c, cap: 4+4, speed 18km/h, comfort 58): Nothing better, until omnibus comes around in 1828. Basically, the goal of the early game is to generate as much revenue as possible, so the aim is to connect up all the city halls on the map and some attractions if they aren't too far off course.
Which engine/horse should you use?
Single horse (cost: 125c, maint: 0.13c, speed: 18km/h, power: 10kW/1kN)
vs.
Double horse (cost: 250c, maint: 0.26c, speed: 18km/h, power: 20kW/2kN)
Double all the way. There's just no point in using Single, unless, for some reason you want to use the Hackney carriage.
Double + Double for hilly terrain, as the double and single both drop down to 4km/h when climbing hills.
Q: Why not Single + Double?
A: Not enough power when going up hill, and defaults to 4km/h, so it's a waste of money.
In 1830, the first usable passenger trains appear.
Q: Why not earlier?
A: LMR 3rd class carriage is not exactly fast, nor is it comfortable, and they're available from 1828, which means you're likely to just upgrade them in 1830, no need to rush.
Train combinations that work well: LMR Planet x2 + 7x LMR 4 wheel carriage and LMR Patentee x2 + 7x 4 wheel carriage. Both are 3 tiles long and hold (18+9) x7 passengers.
Q: Why double headers (2 locomotives in one train)?
A: Currently, in experimental 9.2, double headers are less lossy in power, so a single engine might only be capable of 80% of its full potential, but a double header will be capable of 95%. This means that a single double header convoy will be better than two single engine trains, especially so when the locomotives are underpowered.
TrainsLMR Planet (intro: 1830, cost: 11880c, maint: 6.40c, power: 25kW/4kN, speed: 45km/h, weight: 4+1t )
LMR Patentee(intro: 1833, cost: 18144c, maint: 7.70c, power: 40kW/5kN, speed: 55km/h, weight 8+1t)
LMR 4 wheel carriage 1st class (cost: 360c, maint: 0.09c, cap: 18+9, speed: 55km/h)
road horse carriagesHorse Omnibus (intro 1828, cost: 25c, maint: 0.05c, cap: 10, comfort: 37): slight dip in comfort, but 2 more passengers, and no overcrowded capacity. overcrowding reduces comfort, and that's a guarantee with the stage coach, so a good trade off. Don't replace this with the knifeboard for longer distances, where your rail network is incomplete.
Knifeboard horse omnibus (intro: 1845, cost: 42c, maint: 0.07, cap: 30+2, comfort: 20): major dip in comfort, best used for local, as in, within city or to neighbouring city and leave the longer distances to the Omnibus.
As usual, use double + double horse for hilly terrain.
Starting off with the double LMR Planet and eventually moving up to the double LMR Patentee, these two will be the mainstay of all passenger locomotive operations until the LBSCR Jenny Lind comes around. At this point in the game, the horse carriage operations should have generated more than 5,000,000 credits, depending on how large your network is, and
ALL of it is needed to build up your rail network. I had about 7,000,000 credits at this point. Perhaps the most costly part of the network are the trains themselves, as the higher speed allows more passengers to travel further, which means more are generated.
One major problem with your newfound higher passenger generation, is meeting capacity demands. This problem will be visible in two places. One is your wallet, where you must increase the amount of your expensive train convoys, and the second is between horse carriage and train transitions. Up until 1845, the Omnibus horse carriage is the only horse carriage you need to be using. Now, the Omnibus is not exactly a high capacity road vehicle, and this is where the transition problem crops up. The trains are high capacity, but the horse carriages are not, meaning that your trains will completely overwhelm the horse carriages, leading to unhappy passengers :(, as they get tired of waiting and expire. In 1845, the Knifeboard horse carriage comes around, and it has three times the capacity of the omnibus, and it's more than enough to meet the demands of the trains. To work around this problem, it's best to demolish city buildings and roads to ensure the train station catchment area sits on the town hall, which is by far the largest passenger generator and destination in this era.
In the next version, the train to road problem should be fixed, so you might not need to demolish city buildings to ensure your train station catchment area is sitting on the town hall for prior to 1845.
At 1847, the best engine for this era, LBSCR Jenny Lind is introduced.
Before looking at the Jenny Lind, let's look at the other locomotives that are available, and look at why they might not get any use.
LMR Lion (intro: 1837, cost: 7000c, maint: 2.46c, power: 125kW/26kN, speed 35km/h): more of a freight engine, and the top speed is not exactly good.
SDR Derwent (intro: 1845, cost: 13200, maint: 3.30c, power 50kW/9kN, speed 40km/h): decent power and greatly reduced maintenance costs compared to the LMR Patentee and Planet. Unfortunately, the Patentee and planet are not exactly bleeding money, so there's no need to save money by switching out to this well rounded locomotive. To nail the coffin, the LBSCR Jenny Lind costs less initially, has higher power, speed and tractive effort, at not a lot more maintenance.
LBSCR Jenny Lind (intro 1847, cost: 12480c, maint: 3.96c, power: 200kW/21kN, speed: 70km/h): Replaces all LMR Patentee and Planet trains. This locomotive is very well rounded and the only reason you wouldn't use it, is because it becomes obsolete.
LNWR 4 wheel carriage (intro 1847, cost: 360c, maint: 0.07c, cap: 24+12, speed: 100km/h, comfort: 37): Only passenger rail carriage for quite some time.
LNWR 4 wheel carriage brake (same as above, except cap: 8+4): This is a mail carriage, but needed to complete the convoy.
Convoy consist: LBSCR Jenny Lind + 9x pax LNWR carriage + LNWR mail brake, 4 tiles long.
This is where a lot of money can be earned as well as recuperated and it's basically a great time to expand as much as possible. You can enter 1847 with less than 1,000,000 credits, but walk out of it with more than 10,000,000 credits and earn more than 2,000,000 credits yearly.
Q: Why is money "recuperated"?
A: Do you remember how the Planet and Patentee convoys were double headers? Basically, since the expensive locomotives are now halved, you actually earn money for each Patentee and Planet convoy that is replaced with an Jenny Lind convoy.
There's not much else to say, except the speed bonus, and general excellence of the Jenny Lind is second to none for a long time.
Along the
rail road to 1860Not much more development for a while. Diesel and Steam road vehicles are still a while off, and there's not much in the way of new stuff that is available. Probably worth building new cities and connecting them to your network to increase revenue even further. We might as well look at why the Jenny Lind is the best locomotive for this era again, by looking at what else becomes available after the Jenny Lind.
LNWR Bloomer (intro 1851, cost: 20748c, maint: 9.90c, power: 200kW/17kN, speed: 85km/h): Even faster than the Jenny Lind, but at the cost of, well, cost. It doesn't have enough power to actually reach 85km/h unless used as a double header, and has very similar performance to the Jenny Lind, but at more than twice the maintenance and nearly twice the cost for just a single engine, there's simply no use for this locomotive.
SDR 1001 (intro 1852, cost: 14784, maint: 6.60c, power: 250kW/36kN, speed: 50km/h): This is more of a freight engine, with high tractive effort to power and lower top speed, but consider the fact that it only has 50kW more power, meaning its haulage capability isn't that much greater than the Jenny Lind. Going by power to maintenance ratio alone, for the SDR 1001 it is 250/6.6 = 38kW/1c, while for the Jenny Lind it is 200/3.96 = 50kW/1c. So you're paying more for a freight service that is slower.
LNWR DX Goods (intro 1858 Aug., cost: 7912c, maint: 4.62c, power: 400kW/48kN, speed: 60km/h): This locomotive is actually a pretty good all rounder. There's no point replacing the Jenny Lind with this locomotive, but it does take place of the Jenny Lind, which retires in June 1858. There's a slight availability gap between the two, but this locomotive does an excellent job of filling in for the Jenny Lind. Of particular note is how it absolutely demolishes the SDR 1001 in every single aspect.
LNWR Problem (intro 1859, cost: 19008c, maint: 11.22c, power: 300kW/22kN, speed: 100km/h): First true express locomotive. A bit costly, but if given the same 10x 4 wheel carriages as the Jenny Lind, can still hit 85km/h. Is it a good express locomotive? probably not for this era, since it's only a 15km/h boost in top speed, for a single, but at nearly three times the maintenance cost. Still needs to be a double header if 100km/h is to be achieved and can be up to 8 tiles long. A 30km/h boost in speed is interesting, but requires station expansion.
When I play, I plan ahead and make the station hubs that I know will become busy with a maximum of 8 tiles in mind. This seems length seems to be a sweet spot for express service trains, while slightly slower services work quite well with both 8 and 6 tile lengths and local commuter service seems to have a sweet spot of 3 tiles. For freight services, the convoy length can be anywhere from 3 to 16 tiles long.
Slightly beyond 1860, or a future prediction, since I haven't played beyond 1860, yet.
More express use locomotives crop up, but how good are they?
When looking at the newer express locomotives, the LNWR Problem actually looks like a good deal.
Midland 156 (intro 1866, cost: 17430, maint: 13.20c, power: 500kW/31kN, speed: 115km/h)
GNR Stirling Single (intro 1870, cost: 32736, maint: 21.12c, power: 550kW/32kN, speed: 125km/h)
Taking a look at the specs, and new carriages that are available, we see that...
LNWR Problem double header + 21 LNWR 4 wheel carriages: (maint: 23.91c, 100km/h, passengers: 480+240)
Midland 156 double header + 11 MR 4 wheel carriages: (maint: 28.49c, 115km/h, passengers: 300+150)
GNR Stirling single double header + 9 GNR 4 wheel carriages: (maint: 44.22c, 125km/h, passengers: 240+120)
Considering all of that, the LNWR problem double header is the most flexible and has the potential to earn the most revenue, but the midland 156 should prove to be better for a pure express service, because of an issue with service frequency. GNR stirling single double header just looks like a poor investment, due to its lower capacity, higher maintenance and just slightly faster top speed. The LNWR problem express is worth a try at the very least.
Other thoughtsRail Bridges: Brick viaducts all the way. There's simply no point in paying for the cheaper, but higher maintenance cost bridges on routes that you know will become permanent. That said, if the route will be temporary, like a factory line, then it
might be worth building the cheaper bridge. I say
might, because you never know if this line will become part of a greater network, or simply become obsolete when the factory shuts down. It's a bit hard to guess such things. However, considering how much revenue there is in passenger transport, does bridge cost for a factory line really matter? part of a good thing with large networks is their ability to spread out costs, so one or two expensive bridges shouldn't hurt, even if they end up being temporary lines.
Q: 115km/h or 200km/h brick viaducts?
A: You're paying an arm and a leg for the brick viaducts, so you might as well pay your kidney as well
Actually, as was previously written, the train costs the most when first building up, so there's really no need to cut costs by using cheaper to build bridges. One further comment, the 200km/h bridges and elevated ways seem out of place, along with the 175km/h tunnel. Shouldn't the +175km/h parts start cropping up later when trains can actually run at more than 125km/h?
Road Bridges: Masonry stone bridge (cobble) is all that is needed for a while.
Boats: Unfortunately, I haven't been able to use boats at all, as the railway and road bridges were affordable with the amount of credits available. Perhaps they could be used on a map with more isolated islands, instead of just wide rivers.
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Update: Up to 1868
Turns out the express trains do generate a ton of money, despite their maintenance and costs.
Yearly revenue has grown exponentially with their use and allowed long distances to be linked up.
Both LNWR Problem and MR 156 double headers are very good.
Both have the same capacity at the same tile length, 480+240, but the MR coaches have better comfort and the MR156 has slightly better top speed at the same length.
The LNWR DX goods proves to be highly useful in replacing overcrowded lines that run LBSCR Jenny Lind. Quite useful any configuration of 4, 6 and 8 tiles.
I didn't spot it at first, but the GWR Class 517 becomes available at the end of 1868. Quite a good multi role engine with 295kW/56kN and 80km/h top speed, very cheap to boot.
