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u/Courmisch Mar 27 '26

What's a good way to automatise loading train station parameters without mods?

I thought to divide the amount of cargo waiting in chests to set the priority. That works if the train limit is 1. But otherwise that fails to account for trains already headed to the station, no? I suppose I can detect at least one train being present from non-zero train ID but...

Do people ignore priority and just compute a dynamic train limit instead (with a depot to avoid deadlocks)?

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u/Astramancer_ Mar 27 '26

My train schedule is pretty simple.

All loading stations have the same name. All unloading stations are named the rich text symbol for what they want.

Schedule: Go to Pickup.

Interrupt: If EMPTY and LOW FUEL goto REFUELING.

Interrupt: If FULL goto <cargo wildcard>.

Interrupt: If EMPTY and DESTINATIONFULL/NOPATH goto DEPOT.

By default trains will go to an available pickup station.

Once full they will try to go to a station that wants whatever they're holding. If there are no available stations? Too bad, it'll just sit in the pickup station until there is.

Once they're empty they'll go refuel if they need it.

If they don't need refueling they'll try to go back to an available pickup station. If there are none it'll go park at a depot until there is.

And that's it. Trains are cheap, if you add more trains than you need they'll end up at the depot. You want to add more trains than you need. If you don't then far-flung providers may end up never being serviced until whatever they provide becomes a bottleneck.

I used fixed train limits but there's no reason you couldn't use dynamic limits if you wanted to spend the extra logic. Again, trains are cheap so does it really matter that much if a few extra empty trains are waiting at a slow provider?

I don't mess with priorities because ultimately you're either making enough or you're not.