Trying to create autoserver for Rally

[power79]

I have ~100ms ping, while on lvp2 I have ~30.

I don't think theres anything I can do to ping. Its probably mostly about distance between Finland and Poland (or maybe router increases it?). And LVP2 is probably dedicated server machine that works more reliably than my home computer. I hope 100 isn't too bad? What I would like to know is if theres anything that I could do (game settings etc.) to make server work as constantly as possible. And if possible also during my computer/internet usage.

[Tijny]

But could you explain how that processpriority setting works? Would it do any good to set it to high(4) for my autoserver? I know that at least Mike get warps sometimes when he drives, but I don't know if thats because of my simultaneus internet surfing or something else that causes those.

I'm not really sure what process priority does, but I really don't think it would help much unless the CPU is the limiting factor. With problems like the hard disk stalling I described earlier, this setting is going to to little more than jack shit, and of course it won't speed up the network connectivity either. It won't hurt anything to set it higher though, so you can at least try it.

[power79]

Are you really going to let me have all records for Baja Poland Part I? Have some pride guys!

Only 3 days left until rally tour moves to Baja Poland Part II. Wasn't planning to continue with gravel rally but it seems that next RMPTS is delayed one week so we need to keep practicing gravel for another week.

Code: Select all

Top Rally Sessions (Baja Poland 2012 Part I)
 
 1. power79              12:45.633             
 2. Mike Nike            12:52.350       +6.717
 3. Lanz                 12:57.437      +11.804
 4. Szymek66             13:24.569      +38.936
 5. KiWi                 15:49.254    +3:03.621


Top Rally Records (Baja Poland 2012 Part I)
 
 1. power79              12:42.088             
 2. Lanz                 12:48.921       +6.833
 3. Mike Nike            12:52.350      +10.262
 4. Szymek66             13:09.758      +27.670
 5. KiWi                 15:49.254    +3:07.166
 6. CHUD                 35:50.855   +23:08.767
 
 
Top Stage Records (Baja Poland 2012 Part I)
 
Stage  1:  1.power79   2:05.686     2.Mike Nike   2:06.573 +0.887  3.Lanz       2:07.006 +1.320
Stage  2:  1.power79   3:24.653     2.Lanz        3:26.117 +1.464  3.Mike Nike  3:26.691 +2.038
Stage  3:  1.power79   4:22.913     2.Mike Nike   4:25.703 +2.790  3.Lanz       4:26.198 +3.285  
Stage  4:  1.power79   2:48.836     2.Lanz        2:49.600 +0.764  3.Mike Nike  2:53.383 +4.547 

All tracks are provided by Wokinger. You should download them if you don't have them already.

http://student.agh.edu.pl/~wokinger/rajdy/ - #1 Baja Poland + #1 Dakar (2012)

http://student.agh.edu.pl/~wokinger/sldakar2013/ #2 Dakar (2013)

http://student.agh.edu.pl/~wokinger/RMPTS/ RMPTS tracks+cars

I have all RMPTS files(+mini dakar) in SL_Rally_Tiles folder and others in their own folders (SL#1 BajaPoland,SL#1_Dakar, SL#2_Dakar(also test stages)).

[Lanz]

Are you really going to let me have all records for Baja Poland Part I? Have some pride guys!

sadly im epic busy atm! but i try to find some time next days!

[Mike Nike]

i just havent seen the server online yet, thats all.
but if these stages are those sandy ones with bumps..i might skip the try..

[power79]

I made a new rally for the server. I used Wokinger's nice SL Templates and tiles. They are my first tracks and I made them quite fast(lazy) so not the best quality but at least some new rally tracks to drive in a while. I try to make better ones when I have more time.

Download here (4 stages):
http://www.kolumbus.fi/arilai79/P79Rally.zip
Extract files to SL_Rally_Tiles folder (same as RMPTS) and they should work.

I hope there are no short cuts.

This rally is also currently on my server so you are welcome to drive some records there.

[Rendy Andrian]

I'm planning to make some rally stages. But they will be photoshopped like Wokinger's tracks. I actually had this on my mind long time ago, but had no courage to tell you guys here. (Maybe we should go out of Poland and think some rallies like... Wales GB? Tour de Corse? 1000 Lakes?)

So what things will you suggest if I am to make some rally tracks? Are user-made tracks (read: other than yours and Wokinger's) welcome on your server? Sorry if this is off topic.

Thanks in advance.

[Mike Nike]

@power

unfortunately i didnt check the tracks in editor before driving on the server and i made some solid laps yet..


track1, 1 cut with 1 alternative (1-2 sec maybe) and 1 major cut (drive into finish from other side, maybe few seconds) which cuts a part where are 2 cuts as well)

also i saw you made just 3 checklines (start, middle, end, so kinda like 1 checkline).
note, for a possible future feature of tsliders you might like to have many checklines to store section/sector times.

track 2, 1 maybe-cut early, maybe 1 cut later, but likely not; upper part huge cut (few seconds), upper left part little cut (1sec +-)
sigh..

track 3, 1 cut at a big stone (max 1 sec)

track 4, a line with 6 cuts, usually big stones..a few very thin ones, but last cut saves a lot of seconds driving through 2 trees to grass..

so a tip: you dont need to put a looooot of trees to build a wall around the track.
you basicly sometimes just need 2-4 trees to set 1-3 checklines in some curves. that might save actually some time when making tracks..

[power79]

Thanks Mike. I uploaded fixed tracks. I think I found at least most of the cuts you mentioned. If theres still bad cuts left then I think I just take them down and we drive with Wokinger's quality tracks until I have time to make better ones. In the editor those holes between rocks seemed so much smaller than when I watched your replays lol.

@power
unfortunately i didnt check the tracks in editor before driving on the server and i made some solid laps yet..

That was a good thing that you drove legit times. Now I don't need to delete your times from database.

also i saw you made just 3 checklines (start, middle, end, so kinda like 1 checkline).
note, for a possible future feature of tsliders you might like to have many checklines to store section/sector times.

so a tip: you dont need to put a looooot of trees to build a wall around the track.
you basicly sometimes just need 2-4 trees to set 1-3 checklines in some curves. that might save actually some time when making tracks..

Yeah, maybe better to use checklines. I just thought that its would be easier to miss some cuts when using checklines and empty grass just looks so lame. And also how you change order of checklines if you want to afterwards place checkline between two? Or how you delete checkline thats not the last one added? And actually that is problematic with tiles too that you can't replace tiles you have added earlier, only the last ones. Or did I miss something in the editor?

I'm planning to make some rally stages. But they will be photoshopped like Wokinger's tracks. I actually had this on my mind long time ago, but had no courage to tell you guys here. (Maybe we should go out of Poland and think some rallies like... Wales GB? Tour de Corse? 1000 Lakes?)

So what things will you suggest if I am to make some rally tracks? Are user-made tracks (read: other than yours and Wokinger's) welcome on your server?

Absolutely. More tracks/rallies the better. Wokinger has actually been quite lazy on this front lately so it would be good to get some fresh tracks.
Just try to make them so that they are drivable with those cars that are on the server.

[Wokinger]

Thanks Mike. I uploaded fixed tracks. I think I found at least most of the cuts you mentioned. If theres still bad cuts left then I think I just take them down and we drive with Wokinger's quality tracks until I have time to make better ones. In the editor those holes between rocks seemed so much smaller than when I watched your replays lol.

Take a look at my tracks in editor. If you put more ckeckpoints you won't care about cuts Of course there is limit of 100 checkpoints, but in stages like that it's absolutely enough.

I'm planning to make some rally stages. But they will be photoshopped like Wokinger's tracks. I actually had this on my mind long time ago, but had no courage to tell you guys here. (Maybe we should go out of Poland and think some rallies like... Wales GB? Tour de Corse? 1000 Lakes?)

So what things will you suggest if I am to make some rally tracks? Are user-made tracks (read: other than yours and Wokinger's) welcome on your server?

Absolutely. More tracks/rallies the better. Wokinger has actually been quite lazy on this front lately so it would be good to get some fresh tracks.
Just try to make them so that they are drivable with those cars that are on the server.

Yep, I'm so lazy

It would be great to see new stages made by other! We started rally project on f1sl, because there was most of interested people. But as I said before, World Rally Championship, like F1 League, where competitors are making tracks by their own would be awesome!

Photoshopped or not, it doesn't matter. I prefer photoshopped, but I made many basic tiles for editor for people, who has no idea, how to make them in photoshop.

[power79]

Take a look at my tracks in editor. If you put more ckeckpoints you won't care about cuts Of course there is limit of 100 checkpoints, but in stages like that it's absolutely enough.

Yes I need to make my next tracks more professionally. These were more like practice. But I think you can miss some cuts even with checkpoints and like I say its difficult if you have to place them in correct order and you notice that you want to add new checkpoint between two old ones.

Photoshopped or not, it doesn't matter. I prefer photoshopped, but I made many basic tiles for editor for people, who has no idea, how to make them in photoshop.

I Don't have photoshop (isn't it quite expensive?). Can you make tracks/tiles with GIMP as easilly?


And Rendy, remember to use Wokinger's starting system with your tracks if you want to get them to my server.

[Wokinger]

Photoshopped or not, it doesn't matter. I prefer photoshopped, but I made many basic tiles for editor for people, who has no idea, how to make them in photoshop.

I Don't have photoshop (isn't it quite expensive?). Can you make tracks/tiles with GIMP as easilly?

[/quote]

I said photoshop, but I'm using gimp Both programs are similar.

[Mike Nike]

@power
well, you can delete checklines and tiles (which arent the last) in the notepad, but i doubt that will help enough.
i dont know if there is a working alternative track "pre"-editor out there at the moment. "pre"-editor i call it because i doubt any alternative could easily generate the hash values for the track.
dunno in how far ande is planning to update trackeditor featues, but as soon as i know if not so soon or maybe earlier, i might as well add it to my todolist.

[power79]

I made a test with gimp but I didn't get the track tile to show in editor. I did set everything right because it worked when I used another tracks(same size) image , but not with my images.

I used correct RGB values for grass(background) and tarmac(track layer) for pattern file (I actually used same image as pattern and tile because im just testing this.)

Maybe I saved the PNG file wrong? I used gimp's File->Export function but I don't know if I had all the right boxes checked (Save Background Color, Save Gamma..etc.).

Any ideas?

[Wokinger]

I made a test with gimp but I didn't get the track tile to show in editor. I did set everything right because it worked when I used another tracks(same size) image , but not with my images.

I used correct RGB values for grass(background) and tarmac(track layer) for pattern file (I actually used same image as pattern and tile because im just testing this.)

Maybe I saved the PNG file wrong? I used gimp's File->Export function but I don't know if I had all the right boxes checked (Save Background Color, Save Gamma..etc.).

Any ideas?

pat file should be indexed.

[power79]

Thanks. Only problem is now that terrains are wrong. I made background with grass in gimp but its just black(null) on terrain view and tarmac is kind of green(grass?) and really slow when driving. Maybe I should do only the track with gimp and build background with editor?

edit: I mean colors are correct on my PNG files but editor gets terrains wrong.

[Wokinger]

Thanks. Only problem is now that terrains are wrong. I made background with grass in gimp but its just black(null) on terrain view and tarmac is kind of green(grass?) and really slow when driving. Maybe I should do only the track with gimp and build background with editor?

edit: I mean colors are correct on my PNG files but editor gets terrains wrong.

Check it: http://docs.gimp.org/en/gimp-indexed-pa ... ialog.html

and if u are using slRallyTerrain.ter, make sure that indexes are the same in your pat file and terrain ter file.

Null 0
Grass 1
Tarmac 2
Sand 3
Gravel 4
Water 5
etc.

[power79]

Thanks for help. Now I think I got it.

[Rendy Andrian]

The first rally of mine will take place in New Zealand. It's known for its green environment and loose gravel. I could start with Indonesia actually, but I think I'll pass that...

I've worked the layouts for the first two stages, but the only thing is the loose gravel terrain. I'm stuck between using TS's rocky terrain and a custom loose gravel terrain. Which one you'd prefer? Don't worry, start lines are Wokinger-style thanks to my calculation in layouts!

[power79]

The first rally of mine will take place in New Zealand. It's known for its green environment and loose gravel. I could start with Indonesia actually, but I think I'll pass that...

I've worked the layouts for the first two stages, but the only thing is the loose gravel terrain. I'm stuck between using TS's rocky terrain and a custom loose gravel terrain. Which one you'd prefer? Don't worry, start lines are Wokinger-style thanks to my calculation in layouts!

I think its totally trackmaker's decision. So just use which ever feels right.

[power79]

Im still little puzzled with this trackmaking so if someone could help.

1) I would like to make 2000x2000 tracks without car getting small. I just want bigger track area and cars and tiles to keep their size which they have with smaller tracks. How this scaling stuff works? Increasing zoom over 1.0 doesn't have any effect for me when driving, why is that?

Size td 6 1280 800

Whats that "td 6" means? I haven't seen it explained anywhere.

2) If you have your own .til and .ter files and you include that .ter file in your .til file, can you then include tiles2.til in your .ter file to get default tiles included or how that include business works? I was in impression that there can only be one include line per file, but can you chain them like that?

3) Another thing is levels with tiles(SubTerrains). Could I make a (driveable)hill to my track that rises from level 0 to level 6 or is that stuff just for jumps and bridges? How big jumps can you make then? I tried to read terrains.ter but I didn't quite figure out the elevation stuff and cars going between levels. I mean is it possible to make elevation from levels 0 to 1 and then another one from 1 to 2 behind it and so on?

Thank you.

[Rendy Andrian]

1) I would like to make 2000x2000 tracks without car getting small. I just want bigger track area and cars and tiles to keep their size which they have with smaller tracks. How this scaling stuff works? Increasing zoom over 1.0 doesn't have any effect for me when driving, why is that?

Size td 6 1280 800

Whats that "td 6" means? I haven't seen it explained anywhere.

Maybe decrease the car's scaling? Don't know, couldn't answer. If you want to make a track, make sure there's plenty of room for minimum a width of two 36x36 scaled 2.0 cars for racing, or an aforementioned car's width if you are to make rally tracks.

2) If you have your own .til and .ter files and you include that .ter file in your .til file, can you then include tiles2.til in your .ter file to get default tiles included or how that include business works? I was in impression that there can only be one include line per file, but can you chain them like that?

You can. I remember doing this thing on my tracks. You can put normal tiles when you create your own tiles file. This way, you don't need to copypaste tiledefinitions each time you saved a track using custom tiles.

3) Another thing is levels with tiles(SubTerrains). Could I make a (driveable)hill to my track that rises from level 0 to level 6 or is that stuff just for jumps and bridges? How big jumps can you make then? I tried to read terrains.ter but I didn't quite figure out the elevation stuff and cars going between levels. I mean is it possible to make elevation from levels 0 to 1 and then another one from 1 to 2 behind it and so on?

Thank you.

I don't know. I can't answer it, though if I have to, I'd like to say it's possible, but you should go through a series of complex editings. I won't recommend it since they are usually made for jump terrains.

[power79]

Thanks for answering Rendy!

Maybe decrease the car's scaling? Don't know, couldn't answer. If you want to make a track, make sure there's plenty of room for minimum a width of two 36x36 scaled 2.0 cars for racing, or an aforementioned car's width if you are to make rally tracks.

Well for now I am using Wokinger's tiles/terrains so I guess they'll work fine. I am just wondering because every other size from 500px to 1500 px (RMPTS tracks) car+tile sizes are ok with 1.0 Zoom but when I make 2000x2000 track then suddenly car and tile size gets miniscule and even increasing Zoom has no effect.

You can. I remember doing this thing on my tracks. You can put normal tiles when you create your own tiles file. This way, you don't need to copypaste tiledefinitions each time you saved a track using custom tiles.

Yes I noticed this already. Helps a bit.

I don't know. I can't answer it, though if I have to, I'd like to say it's possible, but you should go through a series of complex editings. I won't recommend it since they are usually made for jump terrains.

Well I tried and it seemed to work but the jump wasn't any bigger from level 4 than it was from level 1. But I guess its possible to do some other crazy stuff with those levels. Uphills and downhills could be maybe possible with gravity? I should just learn to paint so I could get some more tiles. There are not that many made for rally tracks. Wokinger's terrain images are ok but I could use some bigger or with more variation patterns/textures when I make tracks with GIMP. Tried with some photographic ones but they are maybe too much.

[power79]

hmmm.. Do you think this gravel looks nice to drive? Im not that sure, maybe better to just keep it simple - Wokinger style - and not try anything fancy.


Another thing is drawing these tracks. Is it better too have smooth straights and corners or would it be interesting to have rough sides, specially on gravel. I mean I can make the shape just with pen/brush or smoother version with path tool.

At least Mike could give his opinion now that hes most active driver on server after Lanz has been absent for some reason.

[Wokinger]

IMO, it's too dark.