Double stacks around the loop

[markhyams]

I just download Run 8 last night and am having a blast. The best thing about this sim is that it just WORKS! No tweaking or fiddling required. Very prototypical from the get-go. After 11 years of frustration with MSTS and other sims, I'm excited to get into this one, especially the multiplayer aspect. If you haven't considered downloading, go for it! It's only $40 for an entirely new sim with a top-notch route. We've paid that much in the past for just ONE MSTS route. We've paid $20 for just a handful of engines. $40 is a steal! This comes with over fifty different pre-made, realistic trains. You can randomly assign a load to the entire train, so every time you run it the train-handling will be different. Superelevation and easements are spot-on. The cab view is what we've always wanted: full-3D cab, variable zoom. Signals can be seen from far away. I could go on and on.

Mark

[flarrfan2]

I just download Run 8 last night and am having a blast. I could go on and on.

Mark

This might not be the best place to do that, Mark.

Have you tried MP yet? Despite the naysayers, most every session I've been in has been great. And even the ones that were less than that, I was at least partly to blame. Have there been a few trolls and non-serious gamers? Yes. Has Run8 Studios dealt with it? Yes, in the new update.

[markhyams]

Haven't tried MP yet. I'm waiting for my registration to go through on the Run8America website. I'm just getting the hang of the train handling now. Fun stuff!

[flarrfan2]

Mark, I am doing the same (working on train-handling), except that I have run in about a half dozen MP sessions and hosted and DS'ed three of my own. It's a real blast in session when that train you're meeting is being run by an actual person who dims the light and toots for you, instead of just some AI that may or may not be following a faulty script with signals that don't work. I probably like DS'ing better than running. I really found the absence of typical interaction with crews a very limiting fault in Train Dispatcher.

So why am I working on train-handling? Well, I embarrassed myself pretty good in my last session, missing a sig indication, running a stop and causing a head-on. Combination dispatcher error and crew failure to heed signal, I assumed I was getting turned out to the north track at Bena, misread the approach signal, found the switch routing me right into the head end of a waiting EB. Plus before that happened I overran a red siding sig by about 30 feet trying to squeeze a mile long train into a mile long siding. So the rest of the week I am running up and down the hill, practicing stopping and starting. Plan to do the same in the up direction as well, saving my train at each siding so I could spawn it in a MP and give the DS more options. So far, I have fit my mile long train into Walong, which is course is Way-Short. Later on, I'll get to the equally short Caliente siding, where I overran the signal. Then I will re-enact the issue I had at Bena and see just what the signal I missed was showing, to confirm what I'm 99% sure of, that in the effort to control my train going downgrade toward Bena for turnout speed, I simply looked at the sig and saw what I wanted to see and not what it was actually indicating.

[flarrfan2]

Haven't tried MP yet. I'm waiting for my registration to go through on the Run8America website. I'm just getting the hang of the train handling now. Fun stuff!

So go on a MP session in foamer mode. Watch the "scanner" text to find out where the trains are, teleport there by mousing on a control point switch on the F3 CTC board, click the mousewheel and teleport yourself around the Mojave Sub to find the trains. Great way to see how MP works before jumping in to run a train. I can PM you here with details on my next hosting session, possibly this weekend.