Brazil Revisited (1.3 Final Release)

[RulerofRails]

Good news. The latest file is working correctly. Sea is fine. I have all cargoes displayed.

It's one thing to turn the 1.06 industries on with the check marks in the Industry(Overall) page. But there is more to do before you will see those cargoes on your trains. Here's a snap of the industry list. You will notice the 1.06 industries display with grey text with a (0) following.

This means that they aren't being used in any of the city/region recipes. (Regions are the countryside, cities are obvious ). You need to go and manually add them. Recipes are setup by means of sliders. This give a "percentage" or in simple terms the likelihood that one industry will appear compared to the others.

There is a great deal of balance possible with recipe setup. For example, it's generally bad practice to add one industry to the majority of cities/regions. To add the 1.06 cargoes, I would pick the best region for each resource. A couple cities for each industry (like Furnace). I'm not an expert with the balance and this is probably a large part of why I've never finished making any map I started.

Here I am adding the Quarry to the region "Sudeste"

Extras: What I was trying to say is that I fixed the rivers (flow and junctions). Actually I just noticed that I missed one: Rio Sao Francisco.

I didn't smooth any terrain to facilitate neat rail building. I was just suggesting it as something for "polish". It's not a necessity.

I already changed the haulage report to display in the ledger. When looking at an event, there is a strip of radio buttons in the top right corner. The lowest one is "Status". All that was needed was to tick that and format a little. (Use Ctrl+Enter for line breaks.)

[Firefly 2-2-2]

Hi there RoR!

Good to see you here. Your testing is proving very valuable.

I actually changed the river flow to be more consistent. Rivers were flowing from sea to land, which is wrong. Now they're flowing from source to sea, as expected.

Thanks for reminding me about sliders. I'm gonna do some balance work on the extra resources before I release this, but I noticed that actually Troops, Ammo and Weapons are already balanced. If you start by 1880, for instance, you'll notice a lot of barracks on the map.

Also, good job with the ledger stuff. Can you upload this file? I'll do the changes using it as a source, and also for final testing. Name it "beta 4" or whatever, we're gonna release it as 1.5 final.

[RulerofRails]

Good to see your here. Your testing is proving very valuable.

I hope that I can help you learn/experiment with the editor more and avoid some of the frustration. Some actions in the editor are definitely a bit quirky/buggy as you will discover soon enough.

Also, good job with the ledger stuff. Can you upload this file? I'll do the changes using it as a source, and also for final testing. Name it "beta 4" or whatever, we're gonna release it as 1.5 final.

I made the change to the ledger with my first upload. You have it already in your version.

I must apologize. I was causing my own issues with the "green sea." Because I wanted to keep the old version, I renamed it to version "1.02." And there's the problem: a "." is as Gumboots said: a special character. Sorry for that.

[Firefly 2-2-2]

OMG no problem. Yeah as a computer nerd of some sorts, I always instinctively avoid any exotic or unusual thing when naming any files of mine. This includes my Word documents and whatnot. Turns out this ingrained habit kinda helps a lot

I made the change to the ledger with my first upload. You have it already in your version.

Didn't notice it.

So yeah, maybe - could you do me a favour? Could you help placing the extra resources? Namely Rock and dyes. I await your input on this regard. Did you notice the rivers are flowing correctly now? Oh and also port it to 1.05. If you can't, please at least try porting it to 1.05, if necessary without the extra resources. Thanks!

[Firefly 2-2-2]

Brazil beta 4 released (waiting for people to test!)

- Polished ALL in-game message boxes and newspaper headlines with better translations.
- Polished events with better translations, including all Medal events.
- Made territory names more English-like.
- Changed loco engine availability to America and World for balance purposes.
- Smoothed terrain around main city centres, for easier station placement.
- Fixed problem with rivers flowing backwards. Also changed their flow from source to sea, more realistically.
- Deleted "Brasilia" and "Goiania" from the map: these two cities didn't exist until 1960 and the 1930's, respectively (I always felt an itch connecting my railway to Brasilia so early in history, don't ask me, I just did). Replaced them with three other significant cities in the Goyaz-BR region during the time period - namely, "Goyaz", which gave the state its original name, Vila Boa, the ancient state capital and Bonfim. Source: Official Brazilian Government Map, 1892 - https://www.loc.gov/resource/g5400.ct000636/ (named as "Carta da Republica dos Estados Unidos do Brazil").
- Also added city "S. Luiz de Caceres" next to "Cuiaba" in Mato Grosso state, and "Porto Imperial" next to Palmas (all according to historical charts).
- You can now start as early as 1840, though original start date of 1880 is recommended for some later events (namely, Coffee Crisis in 1929) to fire properly.
- Changed most city styles to Clapboard, except for those in Southern Brazil which retain "Tudor" style.
- Fixed bug with "No Asignado" AI players for 1.06. AIP now should have proper historical characters.
- Made AI track building more aggressive.
- Added more cargoes: Ceramics, Rock, Machinery, Troops, etc... The bright player will know how to make their production lines a cash cow.
- Re-balanced map and region economy in order to handle the new resources, and also new 20th century industries and resources.
- Changed Coffee/Cotton/Sugar goods for win status from message box to player's ledger.

NOTE - THIS MAP REQUIRES 1.06.

SPECIAL THANKS to RulerofRails for Map Editor help and testing

EDIT - Some people will actually notice factories "way off" the main city centres. This is WAD, many factories and centres of production IRL are located far off their consumer markets. Should add yet another dimension to logistics, which is the main point of railroads in the first place.

@RulerofRails, all I need is that you might be able to port it to 1.05. Thanks! I'm already done balancing resources.

Testing is done. Should be OK. Waiting for a few people to download and test, then will rename and re-release as final.

---

Edit by Hawk: Removed attached file

[Firefly 2-2-2]

There seems to be a bug with the Machinery Shop. It doesn't pump out machinery, neither does it demand anything. Can somebody verify how can we fix this? Thanks.

[Gumboots]

What year are you testing it in? It requires oil, which doesn't become available until 1860-ish.

(Yes, this is a bug in 1.06)

[Firefly 2-2-2]

1840. Anyway... So... Ignore the comment above. Let's just keep things as they are, *BUT* it would be nice if we could, say, make its cargo routines like tool & die. As such, early on it will take just iron, then iron & oil, then steel & oil and so on.

[Firefly 2-2-2]

So, all in all, what do our players think about this general optimization of the Brazil map? Everybody please comment.

[Gumboots]

I haven't had a chance to look at the map yet. I've been busy with other things.

Someone did make a "debugged" machine shop that had the start date changed to match the start date of oil, which is really the way it should have been coded from the start. There's little point in making it effectively duplicate the tool and die. TBH, a problem with the 1.06 industries is that in general they aren't well integrated into the game. The same largely applies to the 1.06 locos. 1.06 has some good ideas in it, but they would benefit from more balancing.

[Firefly 2-2-2]

Ok, I mean, no problem. I'm also short on time lately. The important part is to one day, perhaps, test and comment. I like it when people appreciate my work .

[Gumboots]

Yes, we all like it when people tell us we're wonderful. I find doing it myself saves a lot of time. That way you don't have to wait for everyone else to behave themselves.

Anyway, I downloaded your beta 4 and cannot extract it. I tried it with WinRAR and 7zip, and neither will recognise it as a valid archive. I suggest rezipping it, using .zip as the archive format and on default compression settings. That is probably going to be more reliable, and also has the benefit that it's a format that is handled by a wider variety of apps.

[RulerofRails]

@RulerofRails, all I need is that you might be able to port it to 1.05. Thanks! I'm already done balancing resources.

You just went to the trouble of adding the 1.06 cargoes. If I put it back to 1.05, they will disappear. When I suggested making it a 1.05 version you weren't using any of the features at that time, now you are, so I would stay with 1.06. I can still do it if you want.

A note on 1.06:
1.06 added ship-at-a-loss. This makes it easier than normal to make haulage targets whenever you use custom consists. Cheating is easier too, but from the start RT3 relies on people's honesty as haulage count cheating is possible in 99% of maps. People who are going to cheat will probably do it anyway even in 1.05.

PS. The rar file extracted ok with 7-zip for me, but also recommend .zip file which is the de-facto "default" for this site.

[Firefly 2-2-2]

@Ruler of Rails, I honestly don't see how somebody would play 1.05 over 1.06. I mean, shipping at a loss using Custom Consists is exactly what saved my butt in this scenario last time, since even by increasing base demand at Rio de Janeiro and Santos my last 7 Cotton boxcars just before victory right before the end of the scenario were shipped at a loss.

If this was 1.05, I wouldn't have gotten the Gold just for that, but would you think that if a true Railroad Tycoon had - * say* - a government mandated quota to fulfill he wouldn't just dump the goods within the selected sites if he could?

No problem, then. Now I would like to see this scenario among the downloadables in Hawk's Railroad site. I believe this scenario certainly warrants it.

[Firefly 2-2-2]

BRAZIL THE UPDATE (VERSION 1.3 FINAL RELEASE)

The purpose of this scenario is to make much needed tweaks and polish to this otherwise very well done game map. It was designed using 1.06, and makes use of all the new features of the patch. If you're a fan of this map, we recommend you check out and stick with this update.

- Polished ALL in-game message boxes and newspaper headlines with better translations.
- Polished events with better translations, including all Medal events.
- Made territory names more English-like.
- Changed loco engine availability to America and World for balance purposes.
- Smoothed terrain around main city centres, for easier station placement.
- Fixed problem with rivers flowing backwards. Also changed their flow from source to sea, more realistically.
- Deleted "Brasilia" and "Goiania" from the map: these two cities didn't exist until 1960 and the 1930's, respectively (I always felt an itch connecting my railway to Brasilia so early in history, don't ask me, I just did). Replaced them with three other significant cities in the Goyaz-BR region during the time period - namely, "Goyaz", which gave the state its original name, Vila Boa, the ancient state capital and Bonfim. Source: Official Brazilian Government Map, 1892 - https://www.loc.gov/resource/g5400.ct000636/ (named as "Carta da Republica dos Estados Unidos do Brazil").
- Also added city "S. Luiz de Caceres" next to "Cuiaba" in Mato Grosso state, and "Porto Imperial" next to Palmas (all according to historical charts).
- You can now start as early as 1840, though original start date of 1880 is recommended for some later events (namely, Coffee Crisis in 1929) to fire properly.
- Changed most city styles to Clapboard, except for those in Southern Brazil which retain "Tudor" style.
- Fixed bug with "No Asignado" AI players for 1.06. AIP now should have proper historical characters.
- Made AI track building more aggressive.
- Added more cargoes: Ceramics, Rock, Machinery, Troops, etc... The bright player will know how to make their production lines a cash cow.
- Re-balanced map and region economy in order to handle the new resources, and also new 20th century industries and resources.
- Changed Coffee/Cotton/Sugar goods for win status from message box to player's ledger.

NOTE - Some people will actually notice factories "way off" the main city centres. This is WAD, many factories and centres of production IRL are located far off their consumer markets.
Should add yet another dimension to logistics, which is the main point of railroads in the first place.

NOTE - THIS MAP REQUIRES 1.06. For more information, don't hesitate to visit us and post your own queries: http://hawkdawg.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=87&t=4195.

SPECIAL THANKS to RulerofRails for Map Editor help and testing

NOTE: The only difference between this and beta 4 is that I made some further tweaks to economic balance and also corrected a typo in the ledger.

4shared link: https://www.4shared.com/s/fv_uWFRTRda

[Firefly 2-2-2]

Anyway, I downloaded your beta 4 and cannot extract it. I tried it with WinRAR and 7zip, and neither will recognise it as a valid archive. I suggest rezipping it, using .zip as the archive format and on default compression settings. That is probably going to be more reliable, and also has the benefit that it's a format that is handled by a wider variety of apps.

Hi there, try again please with WinRar.

[Gumboots]

Hi there. It still doesn't work. Please use zip like everyone else. Kthnx.

Edit: WinRAR is a proprietary application that is not free. Not everyone has it anyway, and not everyone has extra apps like 7zip or whatever. Even for those who have 7zip, like me, it still doesn't seem to work with your .rar archives.

If you use basic .zip, without getting carried away with non-default compression options, then any mug on the internet will be able to extract it. This is good, yes?

At the moment I don't know why my WinRAR and 7zip installations are not happy with your files, and frankly I'm not inclined to spend time trying to figure it out. It would be much more efficient use of everyone's time if you just used a basic format that is likely to work for anyone.

[low_grade]

I'm just 15 years in, but I have tons of issues. So many scarce resources, overabundance of industries, most supply chains unrealistic. So I ignore all industry aside from Hotels and go all rail, hoping for express, and yes indeed, pax and mail are about 2/3 of my revenue. So many rewards for expansion, the "train keeps-a-rollin'." Now I'm rolling in the dough, and finally I have resources and connections and can invest in industry, and now it's ridiculously easy. Like I fall asleep trying to pay attention. At least disable issuing stocks. Or make a PNW goal.

Interesting terrain, I've enjoyed figuring out routes, many quite circuitous. The haulage warehouses should probably have stronger demand, even so, and then increased goals. Too many duplicate industries spawning near each other across the map. And generally just odd that what is ostensibly a connection/hauling goals map comes down mainly to the predictable early express revenue.

So, for just polishing up a fun map with challenging terrain, good job. For actually balancing the game to make it a strategic challenge of some sort, we're not there yet.

[Firefly 2-2-2]

Edit: WinRAR is a proprietary application that is not free. Not everyone has it anyway, and not everyone has extra apps like 7zip or whatever. Even for those who have 7zip, like me, it still doesn't seem to work with your .rar archives.

If you use basic .zip, without getting carried away with non-default compression options, then any mug on the internet will be able to extract it. This is good, yes?

No problem, Gumboots, I understand your point of view. I'm making it a zip file as you wish. Even though WinRar is not free, you can still download it and all you'll get when using it is an annoying message box. That's it. .

I'm just 15 years in, but I have tons of issues. So many scarce resources, overabundance of industries, most supply chains unrealistic.

I never had that problem . FYI, it's best to start either with Textile or Lumber, but Express is also quite good as an early source of revenue.

In this case you have to locate some two or three cotton farms bunched up together, preferably near a river, and build your own textile mill near that river. It'll be able to swiftly acquire the cotton, and also ship the Clothing to nearby green gradient areas without issue. Generally, you can start doing this in a place like Campinas, or near President Prudent, in the southeast, or near Paulo Affonso, in the northeast, which generally has cotton farms in most scenarios.

Interesting terrain, I've enjoyed figuring out routes, many quite circuitous. The haulage warehouses should probably have stronger demand, even so, and then increased goals. Too many duplicate industries spawning near each other across the map.

I've made the industry base figures a bit higher, having realism in mind. Realistically, base industry like Lumber or Steel Mills is always more abundant, and required to build something up in the production chain. It means you're going to face more competition, as expected: in my last test run, rival steel mills got much of the Iron and the Coal my own Steel Mill was supposed to acquire.

So, for just polishing up a fun map with challenging terrain, good job. For actually balancing the game to make it a strategic challenge of some sort, we're not there yet.

Perhaps you're right. But that wasn't my intent - perhaps we can start making a more challenging, alternative approach in the future. But Brazil wasn't meant to be, and really isn't one of the top 10 hardest scenarios on Hawk & Badger.

[Firefly 2-2-2]

Hi, there, Gumboots. Here's the .zip file. But still, I'm gonna stick with .rar since it's so much better than .zip .

I dunno how, but nowadays most people use .rar too or at least know what it is. Even 7zip can compress and open to .rar. If you can't get 7zip to open it, all you need is to go to Properties or select system app defaults in your Control Panel. This should do it.

... But since 7zip is freeware and doesn't have that annoying message box telling me to buy it, I'm gonna stick with it from now on.