Hawk & Badger Railroad Forum

This is a thread where I will show off progress on my Island of Sodor route for Railroad Tycoon 3.
But first, I'm going to need your guy's help. Your assistance will be appreciated.

Sincerely,
Nicholas Webster

Whaddaya need? Post your questions and check back soon and often to see the responses.

Well, what I needed were some map making tips and a special heightmap used for the island's shape. I was also planning on making some engines/rolling stock for the map and I need help here for this.

There are some threads on here that discuss mapmaking and creating height maps. First thing you are going to want to do is get a greyscale image of the map you want. Even if it is just an outline, it can get you going on starting the map from the map maker. Let's start there first. You can post attachments to messages, just zip any files.

http://hawkdawg.com/cgi-bin/dwnlds/download.pl?file=390

Rolling stock is a bit trickier though. Do you want to make all new locomotives or just skins?

Based on what I perceive that you are trying to do, my recommendation is that you consider Trainmaster for this project. It will be much easier for you to create a custom pack for your map, than to try to insert your stuff into RT3 1.05 or 1.06.

nedfumpkin wrote:There are some threads on here that discuss mapmaking and creating height maps. First thing you are going to want to do is get a greyscale image of the map you want. Even if it is just an outline, it can get you going on starting the map from the map maker. Let's start there first. You can post attachments to messages, just zip any files.

http://hawkdawg.com/cgi-bin/dwnlds/download.pl?file=390

Rolling stock is a bit trickier though. Do you want to make all new locomotives or just skins?

Based on what I perceive that you are trying to do, my recommendation is that you consider Trainmaster for this project. It will be much easier for you to create a custom pack for your map, than to try to insert your stuff into RT3 1.05 or 1.06.

Ok I'll consider doing this for the map. Thank you.

I want to make all-new locomotives/rolling stock for my map because there is only a few engines that are suitable for a stand-in of the Sudrian engines. I plan to make them look as close to their prototypes as I can becuase I like to picture Sodor as a real place.

My post from last night got deleted. No worries..

Here is the map that I am working on. As soon as I am finished removing all the towns and text, I will convert it to greyscale with the ocean being red, the rivers black, and lighter grey as the altitudes rise. Then I can generate a map in RT3.

Download the Trainmaster Rollingstock Developer's kit to get all the stuff you need to make your engines and other cars.

http://hawkdawg.com/cgi-bin/counter/dow ... l?file=141

nedfumpkin wrote:My post from last night got deleted. No worries..

Here is the map that I am working on. As soon as I am finished removing all the towns and text, I will convert it to greyscale with the ocean being red, the rivers black, and lighter grey as the altitudes rise. Then I can generate a map in RT3.

Download the Trainmaster Rollingstock Developer's kit to get all the stuff you need to make your engines and other cars.

http://hawkdawg.com/cgi-bin/counter/dow ... l?file=141

Ok very good. Thank you very much for your support with the project.

But I must ask, what is Trainmaster?

nedfumpkin wrote:My post from last night got deleted. No worries..

That's because there was a major server problem yesterday and they didn't catch it until today. They ended up having to rebuild the server and had to resort to a back up from Sunday night.

Sorry about that.

nictrain123 wrote: But I must ask, what is Trainmaster?

Whot! (see, I said that with a British accent)

Trainsmaster is a mega mod for RT3. I has a larger and more complex supply chain, and more and better of everything. It is an expert version of RT3, and has a lot going for it in the way of possibility in the editor. TM, as we call it, also is designed to allow for quick and easy customization of rolling stock.

It incorporates, as much as possible, the best parts of RT2, RT3 1.05 and RT3 1.06.

You can download it here. http://hawkdawg.com/rrt/rrt3/TM/

Read about it here: viewforum.php?f=69


...Hawk, I pretty much figured that's what happened....btw Hawkdawg.com still comes up with an error message. Direct link to the forums is fine...redundant since I am posting. :)

nedfumpkin wrote: ...Hawk, I pretty much figured that's what happened....btw Hawkdawg.com still comes up with an error message. Direct link to the forums is fine...redundant since I am posting. :)

Probably just need to clear your browser cache. The site itself is working fine for me, and I have Firefox set up to clear cache on closing.

See this post for more information on what happened.

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=3059

Very well then! I've decided I'm going to do engines in packs for the Sodor Project. The first ones I'll do are Thomas, Edward, Gordon, 98462, 87546 and Eagle. If anyone can help me find blueprints of the LB&SCR E2, Furness K2, Gresley A1, LNER B12 and a L&YR Hughes Class 27 engines this would be greatly appreciated!

Creating new engines is very difficult and time consuming. It took me two weeks just to move 2 wheels on the dorchester!

Best to find locomotives in the game that roughly approximate what you are looking for and skin then as you would like.

nic...Are you still interested on pursuing this map?

Ha, this is great! I'd love to help you with this project, especially in building the custom trains. The simplicity of the T&F characters would be a great place for me to practice engine modding, and there's plenty of British engines already in the game that we can choose from. However, Thomas, Percy, and any other tank engines may be difficult, considering the only tank engines in the game are the fairlie, shay, and camelback. PM me if I can help, and good luck!

I sort of put this project aside since I never got a response, but if you are interested then for sure we can do something.

Only problem is that I am making this in Trainmaster, so you'll have to get familiar with it.

Alright, cool. I'm working on getting Trainmaster. Now, I've always questioned one thing: How steep is Gordon's Hill?

Alright, I'm working on steps forward for this. First of all, I'm looking at all the existing British/European steamers in the game including the Coast To Coast pack. There are 8 that I think we could use in this project to make the main characters. I'm not quite certain which engines will be used for all of them, but Gordon, Henry, Spencer, and Emily all have very good starting engines that can be only lightly modded and skinned to look like their characters. Then I looked at the list of engines in the 1.06 expansion pack and noticed some new locomotives that can't be downloaded as a mod. If I could get pictures of these, (remember I'm currently on 1.0.0) then I can evaluate further. Thank you!

Edit: Are we making this as a scenario or just as a map? A scenario may be difficult since the real Sodor Railway had only one exxample of most locos.

You'll likely want to upgrade to 1.05 (and then follow the thread on making multiple installs of RT3 and have a 1.06 and TM version installed) From there, since Ned said he'd help if this was a TM map, you'll want to see what steam engines are currently available in TM.

In my opinion, I'd focus first on the map/scenario, and then after you have a workable scenario come back and focus on new skins for some of the locomotives. Unless of course you mainly just want new skins for existing locomotives rather than a map.

Alright, sir, you've finally convinced me to follow the instructions on the "multiple Installs" thread closer than I've ever followed anything. And I've put together Fine Scale Miniature kits before! Now let's get to it!

Indeed I am making this a TM map. The idea behind it was to use Sodor as a concept based on Thomas, but to have a real scenario with goals etc. The Thomas skins could be made available in a custom pak so that player have the option of using them or not.

But before all that, it will help to actually play some TM to get a better understanding of its supply chain, and other features.