CoriBoom (WSSNCOPFL) - Working Simulated Street Neighbor Connection Overhanging Prop Filler Lots - Beta in Progress!

[Kloudkicker 4,565]

OK. Thanks for clearing that up for me.

9 minutes ago, CorinaMarie said:

it needs to be for neutral lots

7 minutes ago, CorinaMarie said:

if one never removes the Controller and only edits it for menu location

 good points.

[CorinaMarie 29,934]

To clarify on my prior post:

They key benefit for the new method would be a single edit to the Item Order in the Controller file would move the entire set to another menu location. And, as mentioned, if one never removes said Controller file (for the disappearing menu icons trick) it would work perfectly no matter what the stats of the lots are.

[CaptCity 4,940]

^^Thanks for clarifying...

Something else I wanted to confirm...

I thought I would give my left-hand version of the game a run with some EU textures.

 

If I understood the posts in the PM topic, there will be a separate file to address the different MGB Industrial texture? I'm just checking that this is the only one that needs addressed. As a 'just in case', I was checking some previous plugins and found references to other texture changes (red brick and Moonlight's). However, they were probably some old customized things or test files. The recent NAM installations only produce the European version for MGB Industrial SAM streets - if I understand correctly? 

 

[CorinaMarie 29,934]

2 minutes ago, CaptCity said:

The recent NAM installations only produce the European version for MGB Industrial SAM streets - if I understand correctly? 

Recent and previous NAMs (afaik) only have a difference for Robin's textures. All other differences are for the roads the SAMs can connect to where part of said roads needs to be in the SAM texture for the transition.

From our own testing, the MGB Euro texture is installed when the LHD choice is made during NAM installation. Our lots should use that automatically except if you are using my preferred size textures override where the US SAM - 11 is baked in.

[CaptCity 4,940]

8 minutes ago, CorinaMarie said:

Recent and previous NAMs (afaik) only have a difference for Robin's textures. All other differences are for the roads the SAMs can connect to where part of said roads needs to be in the SAM texture for the transition.

From our own testing, the MGB Euro texture is installed when the LHD choice is made during NAM installation. Our lots should use that automatically except if you are using my preferred size textures override where the US SAM - 11 is baked in.

 

I'm officially a 'ding-dong'...    Forgot about that one. Thanks for the reminder (about the file, not that I'm a 'ding-dong' ).

After pulling it out...

 

Both the single and double tiled lots are displaying nicely.

 

[Kloudkicker 4,565]

15 minutes ago, CaptCity said:

I'm officially a 'ding-dong'... 

That's my job! I was doing that last night looking back at the past setups. Confused myself on the S3Ds.dat file,  if it was needed or not. Could not find where or why it was not used in my setup. I felt like I had to figure it out before running tests and just confused my self more than needed. I decided not to use the file. Is this correct?

[CorinaMarie 29,934]

2 minutes ago, Kloudkicker said:

I decided not to use the file. Is this correct?

How about we zip up a full v0.45 version? Then only what is in the zip is what you need to have installed. Everything else will be superfluous. (I'll leave out my preferred textures override since that's really just a me thing for use.)

[Kloudkicker 4,565]

While doing a NEW(V0.45) normal test setup plopping of all the new pieces. I took a few shots of them working perfectly. (Looks pretty too)

Rail traffic and the car/ ped. traffic works to the neighbor. You can see the hidden neighbor road connection underneath. It shows through when hovering over it.

$$$Best thing is, I found a new and favorite way of using them. This will help me a lot to hide these tricky SAMxSAM transitions pieces. I never seem to have enough room to use them where I need them to work. Now this will never be a problem for me. I don't need to worry about them converting properly to look good. And they have to look good or I will redo it all!

Check out what I mean. Here I whipped up a area to test the "Coveralls"??. I needed four places to transition to a new SAM. I believe it takes 3 tiles on each side to work. For the test I didn't care they stood out. But they would never look that way in my real cities I make.  Them it dawned on me to use the single coverall to hide them. 

Below I circled the 'bad' transitions. Four in total.

And a close up of them hidden with the WSSNCOPFL lots  That's a note worthy mention, YEAH. A prefect fit/cover/mask. Wait, where are they??? Magically gone LOL

[CorinaMarie 29,934]

3 hours ago, Kloudkicker said:

A prefect fit/cover/mask.

Yay! I really like this.

 

3 hours ago, Kloudkicker said:

Below I circled the 'bad' transitions.

So cropping your pic to:

^ Are these the new SAM Flex Transition Thingers? If so, because I'm still on 36, I've not seen them firsthand.

Can I assume there are only a limited few of them such that a transition from, say, Herringbone to MGB Industrial does not have a piece?

[Kloudkicker 4,565]

10 hours ago, CorinaMarie said:

Can I assume there are only a limited few of them such that a transition from, say, Herringbone to MGB Industrial does not have a piece?

Yes those are them. I am still learning them, and not sure of their limits. SAM 11 is one that gives me the most problems, and the one I use the most, ofc. 

[CaptCity 4,940]

The new SAM transition piece is a 'FLEX' piece. So far, when I've used it, all possible SAM connections have worked. Each side will change to the SAM texture that was dragged into them. I have noticed, there may be some limitation on placement - closeness to intersections,  curves, each other, etc. There is also a stability factor where plopping on streets at certain distances will produce texture differences. Some of my earlier images had the piece in use.

  Edited December 25, 2020 by CaptCity  

[Kloudkicker 4,565]

After playing around a little with the SAM Flex transition.... When first plopping the SAM's on the 'ends', this is how it looked before any further interaction from me. Four did not take at first.

 

Two of them turned when clicking on the streets with the street tool. Two did not, circled in black below. Even after flatting the ground next to the street on the right circled section. Why this one did not, I don't know. The left one is because of the curves(but I really, really want it right there!). No problem

 

Using the WSSNCOPFL lots(in red circles) to hide the bad transitions so I can move on and not worry about it.

[CaptCity 4,940]

I'm not on my game computer now, so can't check it out. The one with the curves is probably too close to the curves. The piece probably needs a 4 or 5 tile run-up. The other sections might 'fix' themselves by plopping a few tiles on the street using the street tool. I've had success doing that. I'll check it over after getting back on my game machine.

  Edited December 25, 2020 by CaptCity  

[Kloudkicker 4,565]

3 hours ago, CaptCity said:

The other sections might 'fix' themselves by plopping a few tiles on the street using the street tool.

I did try that, but one of the straight sections just would not conform to my will, with that setup. I found sometimes you have to click on street further away them then one might think is necessary. They are just a little feature I am slowly learning while adapting all the other features I'm learning as I go along, when needed or so. I'm only 6 months 'deep' into all of this, before that I never knew SC4 had mods. This is why I can't explain myself very well sometimes and and mess things up or make them more complicated then needed. It can take me forever to type up my thoughts and still not come out right. But, I'm doing pretty good, I think and learning a lot. Thanks to everyone so, Thank You Everyone

  Edited December 25, 2020 by Kloudkicker  
Spell check-strikethrough-

[Kloudkicker 4,565]

19 hours ago, Kloudkicker said:

While doing a NEW(V0.45) normal test setup

I forgot to add that the pervious test was done with a full plugin folder, and the WSSNCOPFL Down Low controller. I'm still not using RHW but now using the complete NAM controller.

I tested both the WSSNCOPFL controllers  and they worked great. I first tested by adding a "z" to the Up High file with success and then removing the 'z' so the Down Low file took over.            I like that feature a lot.  Top, bottom, or temporarily remove with no harm

[Naomi57 2,985]

I think I'll be doing the same on occasion, @Kloudkicker.

In case you haven't seen this yet, for future reference, you can also line up two SAM starter tiles in a row, to get any number of clean(ish) sudden transitions, and it all works for traffic flow, too.  eg.

The limitations of this adjacent SAM starter tile technique are:

1. The ground must be completely flat for the two street tiles where SAM starters are laid.
2. The two starter tiles can only be straight.

This technique would work for the straight transition on the right.

4 hours ago, Kloudkicker said:

Using the WSSNCOPFL lots(in red circles) to hide the bad transitions so I can move on and not worry about it.

For the curvy transition on the left, WSSNCOPFL is the only way!

[Kloudkicker 4,565]

13 minutes ago, Naomi57 said:

you can also line up two SAM starter tiles in a row, to get any number of clean(ish) sudden transitions, and it all works for traffic flow, too.

Sweet, that's some good intel. The parking lots can drive me mad when they "take over" a whole stretch of street. One bad plop or demolish the wrong title and they instantly grow like weeds. This will help me out a lot. Thank you

[Kloudkicker 4,565]

I just found out what those rail fence pieces are, Caribou Railway Fence. The ones I couldn't remember from post #97. Made by caribou and uploaded by SM2 through @STEX Custodian. Since everyone was asking about them, now you can stop bugging me.

Spoiler

No one asked me, it just bugged me I had forgot and could not find at the time. LMAO

 

[Kloudkicker 4,565]

  On 12/5/2020 at 9:58 PM, CorinaMarie said:

A random thing: We've set it so that each lot can be renamed individually. That's done by clicking with the Query Tool on the invisible part of the plopped lot and then renaming it in the popup window. Ofc, there's prolly no reason at all to do this, but since we could allow it, we did. 

**Copied from the PM**

I forgot about this. I'll have to try and use it to help remind me what is on the neighbor side. When I am building I could label it and when I am growing the city I can use it for reference. So the titles blend together in region view.

[Kloudkicker 4,565]

Had a thought    But really just looking for input. Is it possible to make these kind of lots, not sure of the term, all in one to where you tab thru them? Two menu items, one for single lot overlay and one for the double lot overlay? Just wondering that's all.

[CaptCity 4,940]

This slipped my mind also. Likewise, I was thinking I would label them to tell the neighboring city the connection was being made with.

 

Or maybe give a name to some of those customized lots I made before.

 

  Edited December 28, 2020 by CaptCity  

[CorinaMarie 29,934]

1 hour ago, Kloudkicker said:

But really just looking for input. Is it possible to make these kind of lots, not sure of the term, all in one to where you tab thru them?

It's prolly technically possible just like the SAM Starter pieces, but completely beyond my ability to create.

 

2 hours ago, Kloudkicker said:

I'll have to try and use it to help remind me what is on the neighbor side.

1 hour ago, CaptCity said:

Likewise, I was thinking I would label them to tell the neighboring city the connection was being made with.

That's a cool use for the naming ability. Ofc, clicking the connection arrow also tells what the neighbor tile is.

It's just a little feature we knew how to toss in so we did.

 

[rsc204 21,869]

1 hour ago, CorinaMarie said:

2 hours ago, Kloudkicker said:

But really just looking for input. Is it possible to make these kind of lots, not sure of the term, all in one to where you tab thru them?

It's prolly technically possible just like the SAM Starter pieces, but completely beyond my ability to create.

Tab-Rings require RUL0 code, which must be in the NAM or otherwise will conflict with the NAM, in that latter case it means anyone using your code, could not also use NAM. But the RUL code is designed to switch between transport objects, not lots and whilst I believe some testing was done in this regard, it's ultimately either not possible or very flawed. Frankly if you were going to the effort of all that RUL0 code creation, you'd be better off just making these functional SAM NC's, like the sets for RHW/NWM that exist now.

On 25/12/2020 at 7:07 PM, Kloudkicker said:

Yes those are them. I am still learning them, and not sure of their limits. SAM 11 is one that gives me the most problems, and the one I use the most, ofc. 

On 25/12/2020 at 8:15 PM, CaptCity said:

The new SAM transition piece is a 'FLEX' piece. So far, when I've used it, all possible SAM connections have worked. Each side will change to the SAM texture that was dragged into them. I have noticed, there may be some limitation on placement - closeness to intersections,  curves, each other, etc. There is also a stability factor where plopping on streets at certain distances will produce texture differences. Some of my earlier images had the piece in use.

On 25/12/2020 at 9:22 PM, CaptCity said:

I'm not on my game computer now, so can't check it out. The one with the curves is probably too close to the curves. The piece probably needs a 4 or 5 tile run-up. The other sections might 'fix' themselves by plopping a few tiles on the street using the street tool. I've had success doing that. I'll check it over after getting back on my game machine.

RUL Code (which is used for override networks like SAM), is based on the "next" or "connecting" tile for it's functionality. So if you programmed these SAM transitions to work based on whichever SAM Ortho Street is either side, it will not work if the pieces either side are anything but a generic Ortho section. They also may not work when next to SAM starters, I seem to remember that pieces uses a unique ID. So yes, in short having a curve or T-Intersection touching the transition is going to screw things up. Of course we can write code such that no matter what SAM piece touches the transition, it will override, but this is vastly more work and hugely balloons the code. I'd be surprised if this piece supported more than the basic Straight.

That said, I too have been having major problems with some combinations simply not overriding properly or the transition texture being wrongly overridden, I'm guessing there are some bugs. Again, SAM11 seems to be quite bad compared to the others.

[CorinaMarie 29,934]

6 hours ago, rsc204 said:

Frankly if you were going to the effort of all that RUL0 code creation, you'd be better off just making these functional SAM NC's, like the sets for RHW/NWM that exist now.

Thanks for clarifying and no, I won't be going to all that effort as the current set fills the need quite nicely IMO.

[CaptCity 4,940]

9 hours ago, CorinaMarie said:

That's a cool use for the naming ability. Ofc, clicking the connection arrow also tells what the neighbor tile is.

It's just a little feature we knew how to toss in so we did.

 

Yes, but the text on the connection arrow pop-up is so 'tiny', and these 'old' eyes have a hard time with it sometimes.     The lot pop-up is nice and big. It's just an aesthetics thing with me... 

More aesthetic usages...

Depending on if you're coming or going...

Similar to this, but as a 'pop-up'.

 

  Edited December 28, 2020 by CaptCity  

[CorinaMarie 29,934]

2 minutes ago, CaptCity said:

The lot pop-up is nice and big.

Ah! That's a good thing then. So yes, we planned if for exactly that right from the start.

[Kloudkicker 4,565]

9 minutes ago, CaptCity said:

Yes, but the text on the connection arrow pop-up is so 'tiny', and these 'old' eyes have a hard time with it sometimes.     The lot pop-up is nice and big. It's just an aesthetics thing with me... 

More aesthetic usages...

Depending on if you're coming or going...

Similar to this, but as a 'pop-up'.

 

I'm having a hard time fitting my monitor under my microscope. Could you please make the pics larger please. LOL, I wanted to make fun of the last ones like this but decided not too. And soon after they up sized themselves magically. .... I see the 3rd pic. 

[CaptCity 4,940]

5 minutes ago, Kloudkicker said:

I'm having a hard time fitting my monitor under my microscope. Could you please make the pics larger please. LOL, I wanted to make fun of the last ones like this but decided not too. And soon after they up sized themselves magically. ... I see the 3rd pic. 

Yes, I was just trying to save space, but now I realize I am contributing to my own problem... 

They're bigger, now.

[Kloudkicker 4,565]

[CorinaMarie 29,934]

6 minutes ago, CaptCity said:

Yes, I was just trying to save space, but now I realize I am contributing to my own problem... 

They're bigger, now.

Much better visually.

Ofc, in JPG format we could see bigger pics and reduce loading time.