Roads vs Rail

[KingHalford]

What are the benefits of using Sealed Roads and Truck Stations over rail?

I know you can get more LIP using both in tandem, although I've yet to find a situation where I need more than the basic few levels of Rail, and I guess I'd need to crunch some numbers to see if using them together like that would be more or less efficient than just sticking to one and upgrading the respective Truck/Rail station.

[Vic]

Rail is more expensive to construct.

I guess the best way to combine them is to use rail for your core infrastructure, where you actually need capacity to transport big stocks. A few lines connecting your Cities would be my advice.

And then using Truck Stations to make the connections with individual Assets and to the different frontline.

Best wishes,
Vic

[willgamer]

I thought I heard streamers saying that rail is cheaper than sealed roads??

Also, is there any benefit to moving truck units down sealed roads, as opposed to dirt??

[balto]

If you only have a road network, and you build a Rail Station - is there any benefit to your Roads? Or is the Rail Station useless until you put Rails down?

Similarly, if you have rails coming out of your city, does the Truck Hub in the city now useless -- or it can it also use the Rails?

Thanks

[KingHalford]

One issue I have is that currently (at least in my press-build) Rail costs 40IP base-cost, whilst Sealed Road is 60IP. And the relative difference in LIP between the two hugely favours rail so I can see people gaming that system and not bothering with roads once they've hit the point they can build rail networks.

I personally stopped building roads once I realised that rail is so much more efficient and cheaper, at least when it comes to supplying a front. I still use road to reach the Assets as Vic suggested.

@balto the truck networks can't use rail no. The truck stations in the city aren't useless, they just stick to roads you build.

[Vic]

I'll probably will still be doing some finetuning.

The design idea is as follows:

DIRT ROAD = Best choice for the large amount of small branches on your 'logistical tree'... best when pressed for resources

RAIL = Best choice for pushing lots of items between Cities and SHQs

SEALED ROAD = For purposes in between as well as best speed for movement of Mot/Mech Troops

I am also thinking an advantage of roads (over rail) should be in mountains. Rail has more need to have straight tracks making laying it in mountains much more expensive.

Best wishes,
Vic

[KingHalford]

ORIGINAL: Vic

I'll probably will still be doing some finetuning.

The design idea is as follows:

DIRT ROAD = Best choice for the large amount of small branches on your 'logistical tree'... best when pressed for resources

RAIL = Best choice for pushing lots of items between Cities and SHQs

SEALED ROAD = For purposes in between as well as best speed for movement of Mot/Mech Troops

I am also thinking an advantage of roads (over rail) should be in mountains. Rail has more need to have straight tracks making laying it in mountains much more expensive.

Best wishes,
Vic

That might do it! I actually forgot that infantry/motorised move faster on roads than rail.

I also think that Rail transport is much more difficult to administrate and coordinate. Perhaps an increasing penalty to it's efficiency the more track you have, much like you currently get with Bureaucratic Points, to represent the difficulty in organising all those trains, and tied to the amount of Cities you have. That might encourage the player to just use rail where it's really needed, especially if it only kicks in with excessive amounts of rail?

[DasTactic]

In that case I think there is a bit of a bug in the Construct Road dialog as it lists rail as only costing 40IP yet it seems the cheapest I can get is 80IP.

[balto]

eXplorminate

Hi. to expand on this --

(1) if I have a Road from SHQ for 10 hexes, then 5 hexes of Rail, then another 15 hexes of Road (35 total hex distance) Do Logistics and units travel at the regular Road speed for the first 10 hexes, then speed up for the next 5 Rail hexes, then finally slow down to the road speed the final 20 road hexes? Or is there an incompatibility between roads and rail that would make this 35 mixed type length of travel not work?

(2) Can you build Rail without a Rail Station?

(3) If you have a Rail Station with no Rail, just Roads, does it help the Roads?

(4) If the answer to (3) is "NO" and that the Rail Station does NOT benefit the Roads, how would my example in (1) work? The Truck Depot uses the Log costs for the first 10 hexes, then after the 5 hexes of Rail use the Train Station Log points, then the Truck Depot Log costs pick up again in hexes 16-35? See what I mean, something is kind of wonky.., I think.

[balto]

I think I just had an epiphany. If the Rail and Road are not compatible (and they really should not be), then that would show the advantage of Sealed Road in that Sealed roads are compatible with Dirt Roads. Rail would only be beneficial if you are 100% dedicated to building Rail the entire path!! Wow, did I just have a smart moment here??? I think I did, happens rarely. Let me know.

[KingHalford]

ORIGINAL: balto

I think I just had an epiphany. If the Rail and Road are not compatible (and they really should not be), then that would show the advantage of Sealed Road in that Sealed roads are compatible with Dirt Roads. Rail would only be beneficial if you are 100% dedicated to building Rail the entire path!! Wow, did I just have a smart moment here??? I think I did, happens rarely. Let me know.

They're not compatible no, you can't connect road to rail like that.

[KingHalford]

ORIGINAL: DasTactic

In that case I think there is a bit of a bug in the Construct Road dialog as it lists rail as only costing 40IP yet it seems the cheapest I can get is 80IP.

Cheapest I'm getting for building rail into Plains Rocky is 48IP, I think 40IP is the base cost and I'm assuming it's modified by terrain type as stated in the manual. The manual I have also says that 40IP is the correct cost for Rail, with Sealed Roads at 60IP.

[willgamer]

Would it be correct that troops cannot draw supply from a rail line, just the rail stations?

However, for a road or sealed road supply can be drawn from any of its hexes?

[DasTactic]

ORIGINAL: willgamer

Would it be correct that troops cannot draw supply from a rail line, just the rail stations?

However, for a road or sealed road supply can be drawn from any of its hexes?

No. Troops can get supply from anywhere along the rail line. My preference would be that rail is basically just a conduit to move large amounts of goods to where the trucks are waiting.

[willgamer]

ORIGINAL: DasTactic

ORIGINAL: willgamer

Would it be correct that troops cannot draw supply from a rail line, just the rail stations?

However, for a road or sealed road supply can be drawn from any of its hexes?

No. Troops can get supply from anywhere along the rail line. My preference would be that rail is basically just a conduit to move large amounts of goods to where the trucks are waiting.

Seems weird... if rail acts just like a big road, then why would rail stations be needed at all?

[DasTactic]

You still need one rail station to push the supplies out along a track (like you need a truck station to push supplied out along roads).

[willgamer]

ORIGINAL: DasTactic

You still need one rail station to push the supplies out along a track (like you need a truck station to push supplied out along roads).

Wonder if that's working as intended, since Vic stated above that the purpose of rail was to get the supplies from the SHQ to the cities. [&:]

[KingHalford]

ORIGINAL: willgamer

ORIGINAL: DasTactic

You still need one rail station to push the supplies out along a track (like you need a truck station to push supplied out along roads).

Wonder if that's working as intended, since Vic stated above that the purpose of rail was to get the supplies from the SHQ to the cities. [&:]

It's working as intended as far as I can tell.

The Rail/Truck stations generate LIP points, which are then pushed along their respective routes, but trucks can't use rail and Trains can't use roads. Each type of route causes a loss of LIP owing to distance travelled.

Rail was used like this to supply armies in WW2: Gary Grigsby's War in the East has this concept in, although you're only repairing/converting railroads there, not building new ones. However, the trains there run to supply troops wherever the tracks reach, with organic supply lines picking up from those railhead points. It's essentially the same system here.

I'm going to have a bit of a play with road/rail lines, and try to use them as Vic has suggested here, to see if I can see the benefits to using Sealed Roads (presumably the main one is the bonus to motorised unit movement)

[DasTactic]

I did a lot of experimenting yesterday with the rail and road numbers and at this stage I really can't see a viable reason to use sealed roads. The only time I find I really need rapid movement is near the front and for much of the time at the front you are digging in. Also, with the recruitment cost of trucks I prefer just getting another batch of grunts instead. Maybe if you had a front line >15 and <=25 hexes away from your truck station you could seal the road to get 100% supply there with a supply base along the road. But then you could just build a truck station at hex 15 along a dirt road as well.

Also, it would be rare to know in advance when you would need a sealed road over a dirt road so you are going to tend to build the dirt road first. I'm not sure if there are savings with sealing a dirt road.

[devoncop]

If there was a weather mechanic or swamp/mud areas (there may be....I don't have the beta) then a sealed road could have huge advantages over a dirt road..dirt roads could have their movement costs doubled in such areas for example...