Trains

[BowlerHatGuy3]

Tldr: I just saw a movie called Snowpiercer about a really big, long, frost covered train. I must now make that train.

As it is too late to add it before the game releases, please consider it for a future update/dlc.

Spoiler

Requirements for Satisfactory Train:

1. The railroad system (tracks, stations ect.) must be able to be built on a planet wide scale; I should be able to place one station on one side of a planet, place another one on the other side of the planet and be able to connect them.
2. Some progression, like having a monorail at first then moving to a hyperloop like transportation.
3. How trains trade and share resources between colonies should be automated, however the ability to control them is optional.
4. Trains should be physicalized and be loaded into the physics simulation. Kerbals should be able to walk on top of trains and craft should be able dock with them (train heists?). Also building a turn too tight should cause the train to derail.

 

[shdwlrd]

Trains have been suggested and discussed before. I think it was in one of the automation or ground vehicles threads. I think the main hang-up was how to construct the rails for it.

[BowlerHatGuy3]

8 hours ago, shdwlrd said:

Trains have been suggested and discussed before. I think it was in one of the automation or ground vehicles threads. I think the main hang-up was how to construct the rails for it.

You could just have drag-n-drop system and “draw” the rails like Jurassic World Evolution or Astroneer. 

[Ember12]

50 minutes ago, BowlerHatGuy2 said:

You could just have drag-n-drop system and “draw” the rails like Jurassic World Evolution or Astroneer. 

Having the rails line up with the incredibly detailed ground we've seen might be a bit tricky.  Plus, do you really want to drag your finger over 57 kilometers of terrain to link up two bases?  I think that's the main issue, the scale of the planets you're building on.

[shdwlrd]

1 hour ago, BowlerHatGuy2 said:

You could just have drag-n-drop system and “draw” the rails like Jurassic World Evolution or Astroneer. 

Possible. There will be people who will want to place each piece individually.

9 minutes ago, Ember12 said:

Having the rails line up with the incredibly detailed ground we've seen might be a bit tricky.  Plus, do you really want to drag your finger over 57 kilometers of terrain to link up two bases?  I think that's the main issue, the scale of the planets you're building on.

Having a raised track would alleviate the ground clearance problem. Yeah, the true scales could be daunting, but worthwhile in the long run.

[Bej Kerman]

Hyperloop is an extremely flawed system - we've used ordinary trains and subways for centuries, usually for many good reasons.

[Nazalassa]

15 hours ago, shdwlrd said:

I think the main hang-up was how to construct the rails for it.

Use Bézier curves! (or Bézier paths)
On the map view, there should be a button that allows you to create and edit Monorail Paths (or Railways if you prefer). By clicking on it, you will be able to create/edit Bézier curves / Bézier paths on the surface of the Celestial Body (like in Inkscape for example), which will, after a given time (nothing builds instantaneously), become rails, on which trains can move. Some of these points may be specified to be stations, and so a building will be built at this place.

Spoiler

 In white: the points. In blue: the handles. In grey: the final shape.

 

(Or we can specify points, and then let the game do some interpolation.)

Edited July 12, 2022 by Nazalassa
Missing bracket

[shdwlrd]

41 minutes ago, Nazalassa said:

Use Bézier curves! (or Bézier paths)
On the map view, there should be a button that allows you to create and edit Monorail Paths (or Railways if you prefer). By clicking on it, you will be able to create/edit Bézier curves / Bézier paths on the surface of the Celestial Body (like in Inkscape for example), which will, after a given time (nothing builds instantaneously), become rails, on which trains can move. Some of these points may be specified to be stations, and so a building will be built at this place.

  Reveal hidden contents

 In white: the points. In blue: the handles. In grey: the final shape.

 

(Or we can specify points, and then let the game do some interpolation.)

It's a possibility. How do you account for the detail required to setup rails on an crater filled moon? You would only be able to work on a couple KM at a time because you'll want to avoid as many elevation changes as possible.

These are some of the points I remember. I'm not against having a light/heavy rail networks in KSP2. I think trains would be perfect for medium distance locations where rovers would take too long and it's not practical for aircraft.

I'm just playing devils advocate.

Edited July 12, 2022 by shdwlrd

[Ember12]

29 minutes ago, Nazalassa said:

create and edit Monorail Paths (or Railways if you prefer)

I can't imagine there being monorails, because conventional railways have a much higher load capacity.  Monorails are used mostly in urban areas where space is a big concern, but space is not a concern for routes across uncharted wilderness.

[shdwlrd]

16 minutes ago, Ember12 said:

I can't imagine there being monorails, because conventional railways have a much higher load capacity.  Monorails are used mostly in urban areas where space is a big concern, but space is not a concern for routes across uncharted wilderness.

Can you imagine typical twin track train for heavy rail on a low g world? You'll want something that can hold the train on the rails. Maybe something like a heavy version of a roller coaster track?

Edited July 12, 2022 by shdwlrd
Typo

[Bej Kerman]

3 hours ago, shdwlrd said:

It's a possibility. How do you account for the detail required to setup rails on an crater filled moon? You would only be able to work on a couple KM at a time because you'll want to avoid as many elevation changes as possible.

These are some of the points I remember. I'm not against having a light/heavy rail networks in KSP2. I think trains would be perfect for medium distance locations where rovers would take too long and it's not practical for aircraft.

I'm just playing devils advocate.

Why not just autogenerate it?

[BowlerHatGuy3]

10 hours ago, shdwlrd said:

There will be people who will want to place each piece individually.

There is a difference between a masochist and a psychopath.

3 hours ago, shdwlrd said:

How do you account for the detail required to setup rails on an crater filled moon?

It depends on how you build it. If you use a top down system like JWE to place the tracks I don’t think it would be much of a problem. If you have to set up each piece individually than there’s no point in making the train.

32 minutes ago, Bej Kerman said:

Why not just autogenerate it?

That would take the fun out of it. IMO everything “manmade” in Kerbal should be created by the player. Whether it be a rocket, plane, boat, submarine, colony, space station or railway. Plus, as long as you can zoom out enough the construction should take no more than a few hours (around as long as it takes to make a semi-complicated craft.)

Edited July 13, 2022 by BowlerHatGuy3
Spelling mistake

[shdwlrd]

44 minutes ago, Bej Kerman said:

Why not just autogenerate it?

Are you asking about the whole length of rail or each track section?

24 minutes ago, BowlerHatGuy2 said:

It depends on how you build it. If you use a top down system like JWE to place the tracks I don’t think it would be much of a problem. If you have to set up each piece individually than there’s no point in making the train.

I was thinking about it for a few minutes. Building the line seems to be good candidate to abuse the BAE. You will still have to bring resources to the area you want to build. There will be stock procedural parts. You can have some options for the type of rail you want to use. You can stretch and bend them to your hearts content to fit what you're trying to do. The real questions are the rails actual physics objects? Do they need special rules regarding physics range and colliders?  Will you be able to use player made cars on them? Or will the whole system be abstracted away like the interplanetary transfer system is suspected to be?

[BowlerHatGuy3]

3 minutes ago, shdwlrd said:

I was thinking about it for a few minutes. Building the line seems to be good candidate to abuse the BAE. You will still have to bring resources to the area you want to build. There will be stock procedural parts. You can have some options for the type of rail you want to use. You can stretch and bend them to your hearts content to fit what you're trying to do. The real questions are the rails actual physics objects? Do they need special rules regarding physics range and colliders?  Will you be able to use player made cars on them? Or will the whole system be abstracted away like the interplanetary transfer system is suspected to be?

The tracks should be physical objects. They can stretch, bend, and be destroyed just like the colonies. This means you can drive rovers, land planes and crash into them. The system should be “on rails” until you get close to a moving train, just like orbiting craft.

[shdwlrd]

47 minutes ago, BowlerHatGuy2 said:

The tracks should be physical objects. They can stretch, bend, and be destroyed just like the colonies. This means you can drive rovers, land planes and crash into them. The system should be “on rails” until you get close to a moving train, just like orbiting craft.

I can see some potential problems with the rails being physics objects with colliders. None of which can't be easily solved. (Hopefully anyways.)

They can't be directly on the planet colliders. I can see sections going boom when the physics is loading. (I don't believe that bug will be completely solved by the devs.) So, the rails will have to be raised on pillars. (Similar to the colony buildings. Don't need to be too high, maybe 1m off the ground.)

People will want to build their own engines and cars for them. So, the rails will have to be designed to accept the stock wheels. Or have wheel carriages (boogies?) designed for each type of rail and only that wheel carriage can be used with that rail. (Probably be easier to use all around with this option.) There will need to be a way to get said engines and cars onto the rails.

There will need to be hinges and decouplers for multi-car trains. (Let's face it, a single car isn't going to be good enough for a large operation.)

There will more than likely be more design problems that I'm not thinking of at the moment.

[BowlerHatGuy3]

59 minutes ago, shdwlrd said:

I can see some potential problems with the rails being physics objects with colliders. None of which can't be easily solved. (Hopefully anyways.)

They can't be directly on the planet colliders. I can see sections going boom when the physics is loading. (I don't believe that bug will be completely solved by the devs.) So, the rails will have to be raised on pillars. (Similar to the colony buildings. Don't need to be too high, maybe 1m off the ground.)

People will want to build their own engines and cars for them. So, the rails will have to be designed to accept the stock wheels. Or have wheel carriages (boogies?) designed for each type of rail and only that wheel carriage can be used with that rail. (Probably be easier to use all around with this option.) There will need to be a way to get said engines and cars onto the rails.

There will need to be hinges and decouplers for multi-car trains. (Let's face it, a single car isn't going to be good enough for a large operation.)

There will more than likely be more design problems that I'm not thinking of at the moment.

I agree with the rails being raised off the ground; that’s where the monorail idea came from.

I think it would be best if you designed a car on a “platform” that’s essentially a metal plate with wheels/monorail thingymabobs. You could then add an engine, cockpit, passenger compartments and utility devices along the cars. Engines and cars should be able to be individually saved so you wouldn’t have to build a new train from scratch, but saving an entire line of cars should also be an option.

Hinges are an obvious element and should just be on the platforms by default. You should be able to decouple and connect cars at will, like a docking port. 

I think it would be cool if you could have different engines that pull your cars at different speeds. You could have a workhorse engine that’s relatively slow but cheap and reliable, and another high speed one that’s more expensive and difficult to design, but is much more effective in the long run.

[Ember12]

10 hours ago, BowlerHatGuy2 said:

I think it would be cool if you could have different engines that pull your cars at different speeds. You could have a workhorse engine that’s relatively slow but cheap and reliable, and another high speed one that’s more expensive and difficult to design, but is much more effective in the long run.

Assuming that trains are being used as supply missions, the speed of the trains doesn't matter so much.  If you send a train every 2 hours, they will arrive every 2 hours, whether they go 10 miles an hour or 100.  

[shdwlrd]

17 hours ago, BowlerHatGuy2 said:

I think it would be best if you designed a car on a “platform” that’s essentially a metal plate with wheels/monorail thingymabobs. You could then add an engine, cockpit, passenger compartments and utility devices along the cars. Engines and cars should be able to be individually saved so you wouldn’t have to build a new train from scratch, but saving an entire line of cars should also be an option

That would make things easier, but people will complain that you're limiting them. The best option is have the construction stay in the SPH like a rover or plane. Make the wheel carriages an assembly and able to be positioned anywhere you would like. They should have some way to line them up. When launching, there should be a building or rail length for the craft to spawn at.

18 hours ago, BowlerHatGuy2 said:

Hinges are an obvious element and should just be on the platforms by default. You should be able to decouple and connect cars at will, like a docking port

Hinges and decouplers are tricky in Unity. They don't like connecting to other hinges or decouplers without a rigid body part between them. You can try to abuse the colliders, but I can see that flaking out. You can also try using a flexible connection with a decoupler, but it will behave weird. (Rubber banding with heavy masses.) I have no real good solution for this one.

18 hours ago, BowlerHatGuy2 said:

I think it would be cool if you could have different engines that pull your cars at different speeds. You could have a workhorse engine that’s relatively slow but cheap and reliable, and another high speed one that’s more expensive and difficult to design, but is much more effective in the long run

Again, you'll be limiting people's creativity. The amount of torque the wheels provide should be based on how much power can be generated and part settings, much like the KSP1 wheels and robotic parts.

[BowlerHatGuy3]

1 hour ago, shdwlrd said:

That would make things easier, but people will complain that you're limiting them. The best option is have the construction stay in the SPH like a rover or plane. Make the wheel carriages an assembly and able to be positioned anywhere you would like. They should have some way to line them up. When launching, there should be a building or rail length for the craft to spawn at.

Sounds good on paper but it’s very easy to misalign things in Kerbal, and it’s unknown if that’s going to be fixed in the second game. All it takes is a millimeter and the train would go kablooy. Plus, there is no reason that I could think of where you would need to rotate a car sideways. I think it’s best to have the assembly in a line. There would be some basic settings like car length and height. You could the add, subtract, copy, paste and load cars. There could also be a “frame” mode so that it’s easier to make your cars look more aesthetically pleasing. You could then make an engine car with generators, batterys, turbines, cockpits and what have you to pull the cars along. There should be a maximum weight for the cars, as being able to make moving skyscrapers is kind of dumb.

 

1 hour ago, shdwlrd said:

Again, you'll be limiting people's creativity. The amount of torque the wheels provide should be based on how much power can be generated and part settings, much like the KSP1 wheels and robotic parts.

What I meant was that there be two types of engines your engines would fall into. So like if you put a lot of power generators you could go fast but would waste fuel faster. Sorry if that came of as two actual locomotives you would have to choose from.

[intelliCom]

On 7/13/2022 at 1:20 AM, Ember12 said:

Having the rails line up with the incredibly detailed ground we've seen might be a bit tricky. 

It can easily be elevated procedurally, then elevated at certain points by the player's choice.

On 7/13/2022 at 1:20 AM, Ember12 said:

Plus, do you really want to drag your finger over 57 kilometers of terrain to link up two bases?  I think that's the main issue, the scale of the planets you're building on.

Again, this is where procedural generation comes in handy. Have a map view allowing you to see the entire planet in an equirectangular format, then click and drag directly between two locations. If they're closer together, just zoom in. Rails will take some time to generate due to having to check all the terrain from point A to point B, but it shouldn't take too long with some approximation. Since the rails are above ground anyway, rails going under terrain should be unlikely.

[shdwlrd]

16 hours ago, BowlerHatGuy2 said:

Sounds good on paper but it’s very easy to misalign things in Kerbal, and it’s unknown if that’s going to be fixed in the second game. All it takes is a millimeter and the train would go kablooy

Yes and no. Placement accuracy really depends on how the models are made and what specifically you're trying to do. In this case, nodes are your friend. Surface attachment wouldn't be recommended.

In real life rail networks, the tolerances aren't that tight. The interface between the wheels and rails are fairly loose to give the cars the freedom to move around on the rails. (The reason you can see trains going down poorly maintained tracks without much issues.) This applies to all types of rails, standard rails, mono rails, maglev, roller coaster.

17 hours ago, BowlerHatGuy2 said:

I think it’s best to have the assembly in a line. There would be some basic settings like car length and height. You could the add, subtract, copy, paste and load cars. There could also be a “frame” mode so that it’s easier to make your cars look more aesthetically pleasing. You could then make an engine car with generators, batterys, turbines, cockpits and what have you to pull the cars along

This where I disagree. I'm not thinking of a full fledged train recreation of what you would see in RL. I'm thinking of giving the players enough to make a usable train in KSP. So that is the tracks, wheel assemblies, someplace to spawn the engine/cars, something to allow the loading and unloading of cars, and someway to build the tracks. Everything else would be the standard stock lineup of parts to actually build the engine and cars.

[Nazalassa]

Maybe a Trains folder for each save, with the possibility of adding a vessel built by the player to the list of available cars. In the parts, there should be a (procedural) chassis, and some wheels for the trains. Then the player can build whatever train they want.

[shdwlrd]

14 hours ago, intelliCom said:

It can easily be elevated procedurally, then elevated at certain points by the player's choice.

Again, this is where procedural generation comes in handy. Have a map view allowing you to see the entire planet in an equirectangular format, then click and drag directly between two locations. If they're closer together, just zoom in. Rails will take some time to generate due to having to check all the terrain from point A to point B, but it shouldn't take too long with some approximation. Since the rails are above ground anyway, rails going under terrain should be unlikely.

Your suggestion would make running the lines quicker and easier. That style is more akin to running networks in a city builder. That is not the brick by brick building feel that KSP has.

If the rails were procedurally generated between two points, that could be easier. Then you think about creating curves between the two points, that can get messy. (Thinking about shifting around the networks in Cities Skylines or InfraSpace and how much of a pita it can be to get a clean, smooth curve.)

[intelliCom]

1 hour ago, shdwlrd said:

Your suggestion would make running the lines quicker and easier. That style is more akin to running networks in a city builder. That is not the brick by brick building feel that KSP has.

If the rails were procedurally generated between two points, that could be easier. Then you think about creating curves between the two points, that can get messy. (Thinking about shifting around the networks in Cities Skylines or InfraSpace and how much of a pita it can be to get a clean, smooth curve.)

It may not be like KSP's "Brick by Brick" feel, but if we're talking planetary scales, something like that wouldn't matter. When I said "elevated by the player's choice", I should've said that chunks of rail can be modified individually beyond just elevation, allowing the player to do what they want at any point on the track, still fulfilling that "brick by brick" feel you mentioned for rails.

Edited July 15, 2022 by intelliCom

[shdwlrd]

19 hours ago, intelliCom said:

It may not be like KSP's "Brick by Brick" feel, but if we're talking planetary scales, something like that wouldn't matter. When I said "elevated by the player's choice", I should've said that chunks of rail can be modified individually beyond just elevation, allowing the player to do what they want at any point on the track, still fulfilling that "brick by brick" feel you mentioned for rails.

I've been trying to think of an counter argument for this. But in all reality, I can't figure out a good logical counter. Let me explain.

Drawing your train line is the quickest way to create one. But there are examples of single players taking on huge tasks themselves and completing them. (Too many examples seen within Minecraft, Satisfactory, Space Engineers to count.) So both schools of thought hold true and is dependent on the individual player's own goals. 

Without KSP2 in our hands and knowing what the capabilities of the game are, there's no real way forward on that front. Most would be guessing and assumptions. I don't really want to do that.

So at this point in time, we'll have to agree to disagree.