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[nombex 26]

2 minutes ago, rsc204 said:

 

The legacy road turning lanes can be manually activated if you select the OWR tool and click once in the intersection. However, the vastly better method these days is to use the FTL and QuickTurn features of the NAM, which are compatible not only with Road and Ave, but many of the NWM networks like TLA-3/5/7 AVE-2/6 and more.

what is owr, ftl, nwm, tla3/5/7 and ave2-6?

[rsc204 21,808]

One-Way Road, Flexible Turn Lanes & Network Widening Mod. The later ones are NWM networks, which mean Turning Lane Avenue (3/5/7 lane) and 2 and 6 lane Avenues. All of this is further explained in more detail inside the NAM documentation.

[Tubthumper 499]

Is there a way to have a traffic light for a MIS1 lane intersecting a regular road?  Currently I have been widening a MIS1 into a 2Lane OWS to intersect the road so I can get a traffic light, but would like to see if possible to get a light or stop sign with just the MIS

[monkeywater 910]

Does anyone have any good links (not the sc4 devotion links 10 years old with dead images) that shows how to swap textures on a terrain or beach mod?

[rsc204 21,808]

16 hours ago, Tubthumper said:

Is there a way to have a traffic light for a MIS1

The problem with traffic lights and any kind of single direction network, is that owing to how these work internally, there is no way for them to function as intended. So no, there isn't a direct way of having such a traffic light, however that's exactly what the OWR Signalisation Project was created to solve. When using regular OWR, you 'convert' the intersection tile to the road network, so traffic lights work, it also enables turning lanes to appear as part of the junction. Check the NAM documentation for further details.

I can't say when such things may be added for RHW, at the moment this feature is limited to the base OWR network, unless I've missed an update.

[Tarkus 6,932]

17 hours ago, Tubthumper said:

Is there a way to have a traffic light for a MIS1 lane intersecting a regular road?  Currently I have been widening a MIS1 into a 2Lane OWS to intersect the road so I can get a traffic light, but would like to see if possible to get a light or stop sign with just the MIS

NAM 43 added FLEX Turn Lanes (FTL) and SITAP support to the MIS Ramps, so you can actually get turn lanes and signals on the ramps (not just the Road, as you'd get with the old OWR method).  Use one of the MIS FTL starters, and then hook it into one of the RHW ends of the RHW-2 x Road SITAP FLEX Piece--all of those components are under the RHW FLEX Turn Lanes button.

The MIS FTLs are going to be a major area of development for the next couple releases (at least), so the functionality there will continue to improve.  Here's the version with the MIS FTLs crossing the Road FTLs (back when it was still in development, and had debug info on the textures):

-Tarkus

[matias93 7,535]

22 hours ago, monkeywater said:

Does anyone have any good links (not the sc4 devotion links 10 years old with dead images) that shows how to swap textures on a terrain or beach mod?

You should check the user manual that is included with GoFSH, which is the better tool to do such a thing. In my experience, is quite easy to do, but a bit finnicky.

 

[monkeywater 910]

1 hour ago, matias93 said:

You should check the user manual that is included with GoFSH, which is the better tool to do such a thing. In my experience, is quite easy to do, but a bit finnicky.

 

Thank you!  And uh oh!  Another program to learn how to use.

[nombex 26]

17 hours ago, Tarkus said:

NAM 43 added FLEX Turn Lanes (FTL) and SITAP support to the MIS Ramps, so you can actually get turn lanes and signals on the ramps (not just the Road, as you'd get with the old OWR method).  Use one of the MIS FTL starters, and then hook it into one of the RHW ends of the RHW-2 x Road SITAP FLEX Piece--all of those components are under the RHW FLEX Turn Lanes button.

The MIS FTLs are going to be a major area of development for the next couple releases (at least), so the functionality there will continue to improve.  Here's the version with the MIS FTLs crossing the Road FTLs (back when it was still in development, and had debug info on the textures):

-Tarkus

 

i assume this isnt just for looks but actually makes changes in traffic? what are those numbers in the middle of the road?

[Lucario Boricua 7,028]

2 hours ago, nombex said:

 

i assume this isnt just for looks but actually makes changes in traffic? what are those numbers in the middle of the road?

 

Functionality of the MIS flexible turn lanes: these modify the visible traffic behavior (the automata). These add stop points (the plain MIS intersections with surface networks don't support these), which are required for traffic signals to do their cycling and for automata to stop just before the intersection; and paths matching the arrow directions (ex. you won't see through movements on the right lane since it's only for right turns). In practice, they don't provide a capacity boost, as the MIS (the single lane ramps), MIS-2 (this configuration cited) and RHW-4 (the RealHighway width with 2 lanes per direction) have the same base network capacity. Using our techniques to boost network capacity would be excessive for these, as you'd end up with the capacity of RHW-6S (RealHighway width with 3 lanes per direction).

Numbers on the road: that's a special mod developed by @Flann for internal use of the NAM team. The transportation network textures appear labeled with their instance ID numbers (the game identifies related elements or assets using instance ID numbers), serving as a reference when doing development and testing of the mod. If something goes wrong and the particular texture is identified, we can search the code and other files to fix issues more easily.

[RalleFMFreak 8]

NAM-noob here. Why can't I connect my underpassing road to the existing road? The underpass was created using two elevated diagonal rail over diagonal road pieces in the rail viaduct PP. Which pieces do I need to use to connect the roads? 

[Ulisse Wolf 4,412]

44 minutes ago, Anfield Road said:

NAM-noob here. Why can't I connect my underpassing road to the existing road? The underpass was created using two elevated diagonal rail over diagonal road pieces in the rail viaduct PP. Which pieces do I need to use to connect the roads? 

You are using the puzzle pieces. Do this procedure. Place the road first. Then place the RRW parts

[atsf189 460]

I have had several CTDs after saving a city and then going to the region view.

The city still saves and loads but will not go to the region view after a save.

Save warning is installed.

Below is the file from the .sc4 that causes the crash.

With this removed I can return to the region view however with this file removed the city is blank except for neighbor connections. 

When the crash occurred I was adding a Query sound to PLOP_5x5_One World Trade Center_2deabe44.

Could someone tell me if they see what the error is in this file?

bad file sc4.dat

Thank You

[rsc204 21,808]

2 minutes ago, atsf189 said:

Could someone tell me if they see what the error is in this file?

There wouldn't be much point, even if we could see the problem, there is no way to fix a broken save file that i am aware of. Maybe one person in the entire community would be able to diagnose the problem and he's not been very active of late. Long and short, either accept re-starting the game after you exit this city or ditch the save file, assuming that is you don't have a working backup you can restore?

3 minutes ago, atsf189 said:

When the crash occurred I was adding a Query sound to PLOP_5x5_One World Trade Center_2deabe44.

There's a modding lesson to be learnt from this, NEVER mess with stuff that's already in pre-existing regions. Additionally, test changes in special city for the purpose, so if it goes wrong, you don't loose a city you care about.

I have 2 cities with the "Save and Exit" problem from about 5/6 years ago, but I can still play and save them, so it could be worse. A third city has the same symptoms, but no matter how many times I restore a working backup, it eventually breaks again. In the latter example I clearly modded something I shouldn't have and saved thereafter, because I stopped using Save and Exit/Quit after I found out about that issue with the first 2. I'm usually careful not to save at all if messing like this with existing cities, so I must have got sloppy and paid the price.

[franyer 305]

Any batches to decontaminate the air that you recommend?... Thanks 

[SIM-ple Jack 17,444]

1 hour ago, franyer said:

Any batches to decontaminate the air that you recommend?... Thanks 

I use a cheat pack that includes a plain tile of grass that cleans even an entire large map. It also has 1 tile cheats for all civic needs and a ridiculous money park that provides trillions of dollars(I never use it). The whole pack should be in STEX/Mods, but unfortunately, I don't know the file name. It all does work for real play to, and they are easy to blend into the surroundings. Now and then, I put the real things in for realism.

[franyer 305]

@SIM-ple Jack I am very obsessed with realism, I only have the GooberGen Air Purification https://www.sc4devotion.com/csxlex/lex_filedesc.php?lotGET=1968
but I wanted to know if there are different models that also fulfill this function

[CorinaMarie 29,605]

4 hours ago, atsf189 said:

Could someone tell me if they see what the error is in this file?

I downloaded your file with the idea to at least peek inside and see if there was anything I could suggest to help prevent corrupting additional city tiles. However, I'm completely confuzzled by what it is you've created.

I do see a single Unknown entry: 49dd6f4c-49dd6f4e-00000001 which is 12 bytes long internally and @Cyclone Boom found the file you mentioned ( PLOP_5x5_One World Trade Center_2deabe44 ) is contained in The Twin Towers of the WTC.

Beyond that, I don't even see anything that your 49dd6f4c-49dd6f4e-00000001 is intended to override.

[Cyclone Boom 16,875]

@atsf189

Just to add...

Re-reading your post and it occurred to me you might be referring to an entry in the city save file (.sc4) itself. Sure enough, I peeked in one of mine and that entry (Type = 49dd6f4c, Group = 49dd6f4e) is there at 12 bytes long. Of course, we still don't know what it means, but at least it makes more sense what your attachment is.

Was it through trial and error how you determined it was this exact entry causing the trouble?

 

Something interesting is when opening the file entry in the hex editor (from Reader):

 

These selected 3 bytes change between saved files it seems.

Looking inside a handful of tiles and these are all different, with the other bytes identical. So the mystery is what this is all about, and there's no info in the Savegame article about this. Perhaps these bytes are a reference to some other data, and when they don't match with something else it's what caused the crash. Possible thoughts might be this is the city date and time info, or maybe an identifier which makes each city tile unique as an individual instance.

I did test to confirm when deleting this entry, a test tile is entirely blank and is reset when attempting to load it. Also the tile subsequently gets moved into the region Downloads folder, which shows how it becomes orphaned with not belonging to any region. Whatever this entry is for, it sure seems important.

[atsf189 460]

Yes I just kept pulling files out to see what file was causing this. I also put the same file from my backup that works into this file to see if would let me save and not crash. It would load and you could play but still crashed when exiting to the region. The majority of the files that I removed would get rewritten when I saved again.

It is this file that when missing and opening the mayor window it will act like you are starting a new city. There are several other files that have the same instance number as this one.

I do not know what it all means but this may be the way to recover at corrupt city file.

[Cyclone Boom 16,875]

35 minutes ago, atsf189 said:

It is this file that when missing and opening the mayor window it will act like you are starting a new city.

This fits with our findings also.

From testing when deleting the file entry, it seems as if the tile appears to load. However it actually de-associates the tile from the region, and makes it not possible to load at all. Even the terrain doesn't show any differently than a blank new tile. So when seeing the neighbour connections, this was because the bordering tiles were recognised. The actual city though wasn't loaded, as it becomes the same as if one deleted the city from the region view and then entered it.

That shows that the entry is critically important for some purpose, and quite possibly as a way to identify the instance of what it is.

[atsf189 460]

I tried putting the 3 bytes from the good back up file into bad file and it loaded a blank city.

Not being a programmer would this be because the checksum was off, if so how would I fix the checksum?

Is the checksum for each individual file or the complete save file?

So much for a quick question. I guess this should have been a new topic somewhere.

If it needs to be moved I do not mind moving the post.

Rob

[CorinaMarie 29,605]

9 minutes ago, atsf189 said:

I tried putting the 3 bytes from the good back up file into bad file and it loaded a blank city.

After CB found where this particular entry was (in a save file), I tested too and altering those 3 bytes does bork the city tile and causes it to disappear.

 

10 minutes ago, atsf189 said:

Not being a programmer would this be because the checksum was off, if so how would I fix the checksum?

While I can't say for certain, I don't suspect this particular case is a checksum issue, but more likely the data in this entry needs to match up with some other entry and when they don't the game considers the entire save file is borked.

 

12 minutes ago, atsf189 said:

Is the checksum for each individual file or the complete save file?

I'm almost certain (based on comments @smf_16 has made before) that the checksum is per entry. Their code for it is here, but I've no clue how to actually use it.

[gbdias 6]

When constructing a monorail/el rail type system, is it better to build stations on spurs or on the mainline (I'd imagine there would be more stops, thus slower)? What's the best way to end a monorail line (I was imagining some kind of loop)?

[CorinaMarie 29,605]

I've only tossed in a monorail now and then just for testing, but I did find with subways it was much better to offset the stations by a minimum of two cells to prevent all the traffic going thru them and counting towards their congestion. I presume it would be the same for monorail and el rail.

For regular rail I do like ending in a loop unless the end is a neighbor connection.

(I could post pics of both things I've mentioned, but since they are only similar concepts and not the same transportation type, I'll skip them unless you'd like for me to dig them up.)

[rsc204 21,808]

On 25/02/2022 at 6:58 AM, gbdias said:

is it better to build stations on spurs or on the mainline

If you have the NAM and are using the stations from the base game/NAM, the capacities have been upgraded such that if the station is congested, then so is the line which the station is on. As such there isn't a compelling argument to put stations on spurs, unless you really want to do so, it's not exactly common for such systems to work this way in the real world.

Because Monorail is an elevated and standalone network, ending lines by just a dead end doesn't look all that ideal visually, in the real world that would happen at a terminus station. Some do exist for monorail, but they are not particularly common, I think Moonlight made one in the style of the BTM mod, a reskin of the Monorail network, it'll work without the reskin though.

El-Rail fares much better however, whilst again it's an elevated network, because it can transition cleanly into GLR and Subway, you can make much more realistic solutions. For example, it can just end in a tunnel (subway), where you could have a loop, but it's not functionally necessary to do that. GLR has a couple of tram-loops where trams can turn around and head back the way they came, but actually those aren't always necessary. It's quite common in Frankfurt's tram system for terminus stations to just end and go back the way they came, with the driver switching to the other end of the tram to do so. Such a solution would be vastly cheaper where a dedicated turn-around wasn't explicitly required.

Overall, it all comes down to what you want/like to build, there are usually solutions for every problem, but a lot of which one you choose is simply personal preference.

[gbdias 6]

17 hours ago, rsc204 said:

Because Monorail is an elevated and standalone network, ending lines by just a dead end doesn't look all that ideal visually, in the real world that would happen at a terminus station. Some do exist for monorail, but they are not particularly common, I think Moonlight made one in the style of the BTM mod, a reskin of the Monorail network, it's work without the reskin though.

Any idea where I could find this station? While I'm using NAM 43, I copied the specific BTM mod contents from the last NAM version that had it, and am running it with the latest NAM with no problems. Never did like the normal monorail look.

[rsc204 21,808]

So the one I was thinking of is Sakuragicho El-Rail station, which turns out was not BTM but El-Rail:

It could be easily modded for monorail use instead of El-Rail, although it's not ideal visually, but elevated terminus stations are in short supply so no sense being too picky here. Other options include the HSR Terminus by IllTonkso and I think some of the stations released by Mattb325 may also fit the bill here, but that's really all I can think of.

As for where to get this Japanese station, the best I can do is say it was from TKK, perhaps one of our more knowledgeable members in the realm of Jap content can help decipher that, sadly this isn't the best organised part of my collection. @Tyberius06 / @art128, are either of you able to help?

If all else fails, I'll see about uploading it here, since it's a unique station.

[Tyberius06 12,189]

6 hours ago, gbdias said:

Any idea where I could find this station? While I'm using NAM 43, I copied the specific BTM mod contents from the last NAM version that had it, and am running it with the latest NAM with no problems. Never did like the normal monorail look.

45 minutes ago, rsc204 said:

So the one I was thinking of is Sakuragicho El-Rail station, which turns out was not BTM but El-Rail:

It could be easily modded for monorail use instead of El-Rail, although it's not ideal visually, but elevated terminus stations are in short supply so no sense being too picky here. Other options include the HSR Terminus by IllTonkso and I think some of the stations released by Mattb325 may also fit the bill here, but that's really all I can think of.

As for where to get this Japanese station, the best I can do is say it was from TKK, perhaps one of our more knowledgeable members in the realm of Jap content can help decipher that, sadly this isn't the best organised collection. @Tyberius06 / @art128, are either of you able to help?

If all else fails, I'll see about uploading it here, since it's a unique station.

That station on the image is @APTX's TKK Sakuragicho El-Rail station which can be found in APTX's collection on the following link: http://hide-inoki.com/bbs/archives/sc4_0886.html. (second post on that site and altogether the 4th download link on the site - second in the second post: TKKSakuragicho.zip). Bear in mind however that those lots, specially the stations are really old and transit capacities and switches are not reflecting to current days NAM standards on that area. On the second page (same site), there is one more El-Rail terminus which serves two DTR lines http://hide-inoki.com/bbs/archives/sc4_0886_2.html. I also made relots of these stations a few years ago (with my usual dependency tsunami on them), though they never got released, still planned.  
There is a chance however that they will be rehosted in some form in the future on either or both exchanges in an updated form. 

- Tyberius

[rsc204 21,808]

Thanks for the information, indeed the capacities and switches might not be ideal, but if the plan is to re-make them for Monorail, that's very easily fixed I suspect, so I'll see if I can find some time to provide a re-lot of those over the weekend, so much going on right now.