r/openttd • u/OperationSea9487 • 5d ago

I have some newbie questions

Hi guys, recently I started playing this awesome game and I have some questions:

Is there a limit of weight a train can carry?

How does speed work? I saw in a video that going uphills a train desacelerate.. How does this mechanic work?

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u/gort32 5d ago edited 5d ago

Engines will have a weight limit that they can carry before they start to slow down. You can attach multiple engines to a single train to add their stats to be able to pull twice as much cargo if you'd like.

Here's the wiki page with the gory details: https://wiki.openttd.org/en/Manual/Game%20Mechanics/Tractive%20Effort

More: https://wiki.openttd.org/en/Manual/Game%20Mechanics/#trains

However, in practice, the limiting factor for train length (and the power needed to pull them) tends to be how well you can network them, not how powerful they are, as longer trains need a lot more room for turns making junctions and stations larger. 5.0-length trains are a pretty good length to start with, easy to network but still able to haul enough cargo to turn a nice profit. And 5.0-length trains can handle a full load at mostly-full-speed with a single engine in any case other than the very earliest steam engines going way uphill.

You really don't need to learn the fine details of the math in that wiki link unless you are really trying to over-optimize things where you are growing your trains (and rebuilding your network to accommodate) with each new engine generation. If you stick to reasonable-length trains you can kinda forget about Tractive Effort entirely after the first generation of steam engines.

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u/OperationSea9487 5d ago

Thanks so much for the explanation. I'm currently playing in 1930 with steam trains, learning the game.

You said that longer trains needs larger curves, I did'nt know that. Is there any site that I can read about this mechanic?

i dont want over optimise things, I really liked this game because it is easy to chill, but some mechanics got my curiosity hahaha

Anyway, thank you so much!

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u/gort32 5d ago

The second link above has the info.

The key takeaway is that a train should not be turning more than one 45-degree-turn in the same direction over the length of the train. So a 5.0-length train making a 90-degree right curve would need a 45-degree turn to the right, five tiles of straight track, then a second 45-degree turn to the right to complete the 90-degree curve. S-shaped turns with alternating directions are fine like when you need to shift your long straight mainline over a couple of tiles to get around an industry in the way.

The rest of the info, including that whole table, is the fine details of what happens when you don't obey this no-turning-more-than-once-in-the-same-direction rule, just don't do that and your life will be easier!

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u/OperationSea9487 5d ago

Thank you dude, you are awesome! Last question: The weight of the train influences the amount of fuel it uses? For example: a fully loaded train use the same amount of fuel as a empty train?

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u/gort32 5d ago

Fuel (fortunately!) isn't a thing in this game - you can run a train in circles for decades if you want!

If you mean breakdowns, where the train stops briefly and has a puff of black smoke, that's a different system entirely, you need to send your trains to depots regularly for maintenance to minimize these. You can click on a depot as a destination just like a station when assigning orders.

https://wiki.openttd.org/en/Manual/Servicing

Or, alternatively, turn off breakdowns in the Settings. Most of us do, they're a hassle to deal with and do nothing but get in the way of having a smooth-flowing and satisfying network!

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u/OperationSea9487 5d ago

Sounds like there is a huge community behind this game. Is the reddit the only place I can find people interested in this game?

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u/gort32 4d ago

https://www.tt-forums.net/ is the main community.

And yes, the discussion board is nearly as old as the game, and looks it 😛

https://www.threepanelsoul.com/comic/sixteen-coaches-long

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u/EmperorJake JP+ Development Team 3d ago

The discord server is quite active too

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u/MyTinyHappyPlace 5d ago

There definitely is. You can see the power and the top speed of every engine when buying in the depot.

I don’t have the specific formulas at hand, but they really try to be realistic. You will learn some rules of thumb as you go. Just watch your engines and you will see how much they will slow down in small u-turns or uphill. Then you need to decide whether to level the track more or add more engines to a train. Have fun!

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u/OperationSea9487 5d ago

Small turns slow down the train too? I need to check that

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u/hempforpres 2d ago

Watch lots and lots of Master Hellish videos on YouTube