[mauried]

Im a bit confused here.
What is meant by a "full CTC".
In a real life rail system , a CTC system is controlled by one or more Human Dispatchers, but for
any particular track sections , there is only 1 Dispatcher at any one time.
You simply cant have an AI Dispatcher and a Human Dispatcher operating on the same route at the same time.
Who wins ?

[Csantucci]

As I have explained above, in my version the Human Dispatcher has priority (he can override the AI dispatcher, if he wants).

[RTP]

In a real CTC all the trains works as automatic "AI", and the human acts as supervisor.
But in case of any event, the human as autority to do anything.
All the signaling and securities works anyway.

Regards.

[conductorchris]

I too look forward to a full CTC as I imagine most everyone does.

So the question is: what happens in the interim? Do we wait for the long-term solution or do we adopt this enhancement (as an option in the experimental tab) even with it's issues? It seems beneficial for the future path to think through the issues and imperfections even if we do adopt it.

Christopher

[Csantucci]

Some time has passed, but this feature has remained in my mind.
In fact there are cases where it would be advisable to re-route an AI train to manage standoffs, train passings, train priorities and so on.
I had stopped development following the serious concerns expressed by Rob. Now I have tried to take into account them, and have prepared a new version, which does not disrupt the signal logic. I have disabled this new feature for timetable mode.
The concept is that switches can be thrown only if they aren't reserved (before I had overridden that check, as also Multiplayer mode does). If OR finds a manually thrown switch on the route in front of a train, it breaks down the original route and builds up a new one taking into account that thrown switch.
As a consequence of this the signal in front of the switch:
- might remain on stop, because there is still no free route
- might clear (without player intervention), because now there is a free route available
- might clear after player has set it to "System Controlled", if it had been forced to stop.
So signals must never forced to clear or approach by the player (which could have disrupted the signal logic).
Every time an AI train on a new route passes to a subsequent track section, it is checked whether the train has returned into the original path (although it is not mandatory that it returns into the original track).
As an independent feature AI trains don't disappear if they inadvertently go out of path.
I have created a demo video for this, which you can see here https://youtu.be/-f0XVg7bSgU . Sorry for my poor spoken English, I speak it rarely after retirement.

I think this feature is useful to solve problems in a simpler way than switching player train and driving the critical train out of the problem.

I have the intention to insert this feature inside next OR NewYear MG release, and later, if approved, in the official OR release.

A Trello box which can be voted has been created here https://trello.com/c...spatcher-window .

[longiron]

Very nice demo. But I have a few questions/comments. In your first video example, I hope that the AI dispatcher should resolve the conflict automatically as you manually did. Why doesn't it? And in your video, you are anticipating conflicts with sufficient room to change signals and paths to avoid deadlocks. I believe users will not anticipate those deadlocks because their attention is focused on running the train, not dispatching. So a interesting feature would be to alert the player of potential deadlock problems that using the manual dispatcher could then resolve in real time.
thanks for listening.

[Csantucci]

Hi Chris,
thanks for appreciation.
The AI dispatcher doesn't re-route AI trains if there isn't a passing path defined in the train's path definition (when the location-linked path processing option is unchecked) neither using player train path or passing path may solve the deadlock (when such option is checked). It must also be said that usually such so critical situations as those shown in the first two clips don't occur, if the activity has been built correctly (also thanks to the sophisticated deadlock logic developed by Rob). And this is what I did for the first two clips, in order to get the game entering a Mexican standoff.
Re the player needing to act fast: this is again due to how I built the activity. In general the player would find his train stuck in front of a signal at stop, so he would have no hurry in modifying the path.
Re alerting the player: that's above my skills.

[steamer_ctn]

Hi Carlo,

This sounds like a great additional feature, and I am looking forward to it.

Is it proposed to still introduce a new checkbox in the Options menu?

If so, given the issues with the expanding set of option selections, is it possible to just simply tie it to the existing "Dispatcher Window" option instead rather then adding a new one?

Thanks

[Csantucci]

Hi Peter, there won't be the checkbox.

[steamer_ctn]

Hi Carlo,

Csantucci, on 05 May 2019 - 03:36 AM, said:

there won't be the checkbox.

Thanks for the feedback.