Add rails, bogies and switches

3

Deon Beauchamp ●

I would like to move unpowered ships into hangar bays for storage and have launch tubes for quick acceleration.

I have asked for magwheels or moving pavement.

I take it that the bogies would work without gravity.

If a sensor or camera could follow a coloured or a hidden path line would that help?

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1

Martin Rudat ●

I'm not sure that dedicated rail blocks are strictly necessary; you can easily build a (straight) monorail, and with a line of hinges, you could make a switch reasonably straightforwardly. However, having dedicated blocks for building curved rail (which doesn't need physics simulation) and something optimised for acting as a switch would be awesome.

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2

MadGosu ●

You could use a bunch of subgrids to do that, but i'm envisioning being able to build a large rail line (10s-100s of km) that is relatively performant. The rail blocks could use a placement system like in the mod equinox made for ME: https://youtu.be/hWRu3CUxbzA.

In order to not make the block count of such a rail system really high and to keep it below physical shape limit, there could be two sets of rail block sizes, 100m and 250m.

Additional thoughts: the bogies could be about 5m in length, i'm not sure if it's technically possible but if each bogie was 1 subgrid, each carriage wouldnt need more than 1 grid and 2 subgrids. So for example a 5 carriage train would be 19 grids/subgrids, 15 for the carriages and bogies, 4 for the connection points between the carriages. Which isn't great for performance, but miles better than what it would take to make it from scratch with wheels in SE1.

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2

Sich ●

We need rail in game, and we need to be able to have "station", and program train to go to 1 station, full load cargo, and then come back...

It's close to impossible with "custom" rail atm...

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2

MadGosu ●

Agree! I think it would add a whole other level of gameplay. With how beautiful the planets are going to be, I would love to sit in a train and take in the view while going through a mountain range or rolling hills and forests.

While they wouldn't provide any functionality in terms of transporting stuff that can't be done already with aircraft/rovers, it would be really cool to build a station and have automated trains delivering cargo/water etc to your base. There's also the uses I touched on in the original post, as well as possibly elevators(?)

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1

Amanda ●

I think with the tiny blocks this would be easily do-able once wheels are in.

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2

Deon Beauchamp ●

I know this may sound silly, but is it possible to have voxel based track? This would eliminate the need for long grids and operate with the curvature of planets. There still would be a need for grid based track for things like bridges, stations and voxel track repair. In space could the track be based on an energy beam with beam gates at regular intervals to adjust direction?

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1

Sich ●

At least I hope that with SE2 we will be able to do voxel road...

atm air carrier use too much energy, and on the ground it's hard to do it on long distance because you can't really change the terrain.

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1

Tobias Traut ●

Rails for a Spacelift etc would be great too.

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2

Eli B ●

A rail block with variants and end blocks that can serve as connectors along with a rail slider/connecting block that can slide along the rail and be powered by the rail would be AMAZING!!! KEEN PLEASE!! This could work to create elevators, cargo lifts, trains, weapons mounted on a rail, welders mounted on a rail. The possibilities are endless!! So much more depth and creativity could be added to the game!

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5

William ●

Imagine the speed with which you could launch fighters from deep inside your ship if you could attach them to rails, guiding their direction. The possibilities with rails are endless

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3

Valourant ●

I'm 100% for rail blocks. I would also like to add they could simultaneously be used to create elevators in ships, especially if they are maglev designed rather than physical rails that require interlocking or something.

You put rails on either side of a wall, and have an elevator block that interacts with them. Now through the power of magnetics and power supplied to the ship the elevator you built can go up and down a shaft. Maybe even left and right with more complex designs where it stops on certain floors and then goes right.

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1

Balmung ●

Yeah, good use for rails. Rails anyway can used for a lot of stuff. In SE1 in the first years there was a hidden rail block

in the game that players used for small ships inside a hangar bay for jump starts like you can see it in some space movies or on aircraft carriers.

And since the Havok physic engine looks much more stable today as it was on early SE1 days, rails should work much better now, at least straight rails.

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3

warlord ●

i too would find rails very useful for a lot of things in this game, from simple elevators to full train networks. and i also believe that having a rail system could take a lot of physics calculations load off of the game

but i am also going to assume that this game is voxel based and that might make spline based tracks such as that found in satisfactory a difficult thing to implement in all the ways we might want to use them. i did see the video of the medieval train, but would that also work on a moving ship?

but since this is voxel based, it might be a bit more practical to take the roller coaster tycoon approach where you have a bunch of track shapes. straight, bend up and down, twist left and right, and several radius choices of curved track.

it would also probably be wise to have the carts or bogeys act as a merge block that can be turned off to detach whatever is built on them. so if i were to have a storage container loaded, i could attach it to the cart, take it to its destination and detach it for processing, rinse and repeat.

these could be self driven with a cockpit, moved with a press of a button, or programmed with a schedule.

i also believe these should come in 3 sizes. full 2.5 for large scale rail lines, a mid size for interiors like elevators and conveyance, and .25 so even the smallest of vehicles could have some creative designs.

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1

MadGosu ●

but i am also going to assume that this game is voxel based and that might make spline based tracks such as that found in satisfactory a difficult thing to implement in all the ways we might want to use them. i did see the video of the medieval train, but would that also work on a moving ship?

If it uses a system like the one by equinox, there could a rail planner block that you could only place on voxels, as well as a set of 'predefined' rail blocks (straight, curved, incline/decline, maybe L-bend too) that could be placed on a grid as well as voxels.

Some additional thoughts (sorry for rambling):

Rather than my previous suggestion that of a 100m and 250m rail, the rail planner could use a minimum and maximum distance and angle like shown in the video. I think ballpark numbers that are reasonable would be 50m min distance and 250m max distance, as for angle i'm not sure.

On a 120km diameter planet which is the default for SE earthlike, the circumference is ~377km, this means if someone used the min distance rail of 50m to encircle the planet it would be ~7540 blocks. Bit of an extreme scenario and most players probably wouldn't build a rail line so large if it was implemented this way, but I think is a good way of limiting block count getting out of control.

The predefined set of rail blocks that could be placed on a grid as well as voxels would be a lot smaller, maybe in 5m or 10m increments. For most uses on a planet, you'll have long sections of mostly straight rail that the the rail planner will suit, and could use the predefined set of blocks for fine adjustments near stations etc. The predefined blocks could then be used for all the uses mentioned on this thread, elevators, fighter launch mechanism, welder arm, cargo lift etc, on static and mobile grids.

it would also probably be wise to have the carts or bogeys act as a merge block that can be turned off to detach whatever is built on them. so if i were to have a storage container loaded, i could attach it to the cart, take it to its destination and detach it for processing, rinse and repeat.

Maybe, but I was thinking that the bogeys could be like a subgrid that you place a grid on (or vice versa), like a wheel is to the suspension, so you would have the merge block on the grid.

Yeah those would all be neat ways of driving them. Further hypothesizing, if a logic block was added to the game that you could automate it with rather than having to script it that would be nice.

but i am also going to assume that this game is voxel based and that might make spline based tracks such as that found in satisfactory a difficult thing to implement in all the ways we might want to use them. i did see the video of the medieval train, but would that also work on a moving ship?

If it uses a system like the one by equinox, there could a rail planner block that you could only place on voxels, as well as a set of 'predefined' rail blocks (straight, curved, incline/decline, maybe L-bend too) that could be placed on a grid as well as voxels.

Some additional thoughts (sorry for rambling):

Rather than my previous suggestion that of a 100m and 250m rail, the rail planner could use a minimum and maximum distance and angle like shown in the video. I think ballpark numbers that are reasonable would be 50m min distance and 250m max distance, as for angle i'm not sure.

On a 120km diameter planet which is the default for SE earthlike, the circumference is ~377km, this means if someone used the min distance rail of 50m to encircle the planet it would be ~7540 blocks. Bit of an extreme scenario and most players probably wouldn't build a rail line so large if it was implemented this way, but I think is a good way of limiting block count getting out of control.

The predefined set of rail blocks that could be placed on a grid as well as voxels would be a lot smaller, maybe in 5m or 10m increments. For most uses on a planet, you'll have long sections of mostly straight rail that the the rail planner will suit, and could use the predefined set of blocks for fine adjustments near stations etc. The predefined blocks could then be used for all the uses mentioned on this thread, elevators, fighter launch mechanism, welder arm, cargo lift etc, on static and mobile grids.

it would also probably be wise to have the carts or bogeys act as a merge block that can be turned off to detach whatever is built on them. so if i were to have a storage container loaded, i could attach it to the cart, take it to its destination and detach it for processing, rinse and repeat.

Maybe, but I was thinking that the bogeys could be like a subgrid that you place a grid on (or vice versa), like a wheel is to the suspension, so you would have the merge block on the grid.

Yeah those would all be neat ways of driving them. Further hypothesizing, if a logic block was added to the game that you could automate it with rather than having to script it that would be nice.

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3

Dirk ●

Honestly I feel like a Drone that flies from one place to the next will be 100x more efficient. That said, I'm a recovering rail head and recreating the Train Job on SE2 would be a ton of fun. Something like needing to fly in and lift cargo off of a moving train without crashing it...

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1

MadGosu ●

Maybe I played too much OpenTTD, I think that subtly influenced my decision to make this suggestion xD

But yeah you're right, it would mostly be for the cool factor. But there are also a bunch of other uses other than trains that this would open up.

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1

Balmung ●

Efficiency vs more fun. There are always different kind of players and that is good, everyone should be possible to have such fun stuff in the game and some sort of trains we already have seen in SE1 with normal wheels, but true rail systems would be better. You can use rails for so much stuff, also elevators and jump start systems in larger ships for small fighters.

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2

MadGosu ●

Not only more fun but performance too. There will always be the option to build these kinds of things from scratch but giving the option for more a performant way of doing it would open it up for much more imo

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4

Sich ●

Drone is to move small amounts of resources quickly.

Train is to move massive amounts of resources on a bigger distance and for "long term" like a mining station.

It's about being efficient for energy usage. A drone will use a lot of energy to move a significant amount of ore on a big distance.

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Add rails, bogies and switches

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