OpenTTD's default signaling system is mediocre. "Path signals" which are "recommended" and the only signal system not locked behind a settings change, will get you into trouble more often than not. You can only put a path signal somewhere where "it is safe for an arbitrary train to park here", which is a problem more often than not. If you are used to block signalling, as used in real trains, path signals will repeatedly surprise you in unfortunate ways. You have to basically deprogram everything you learned about signalling and even build rather different track layouts to use them. Add to that, platforms are not integrated into path signals in any useful way, so a train will sometimes refuse to advance to it's destination platform if it is a "Drive through" capable station if it cannot reserve a path well past it's desired endpoint.
IMO block signals are much simpler to understand for simple use cases, even if it is hard to make complicated railways with them. I think for normal people picking up OpenTTD, they would be a better choice.
Path signals are closer to how a modern signaling system operates. They absolutely can allocate multiple paths through the same block as long as the position of switches guarantees no conflicts.
mrguyorama|1 year ago
IMO block signals are much simpler to understand for simple use cases, even if it is hard to make complicated railways with them. I think for normal people picking up OpenTTD, they would be a better choice.
TylerE|1 year ago
loa_in_|1 year ago