Railway Empire - Quick Guide - The Rule of 50 or How Many Trains Should I Run on a Line?

In this quick guide, we cover the rule of 50 which is a useful calculation for determining how many trains to run on a freight line and the rule of 15 which is used for passenger and mail lines.

[@john0constantine]

Don't take this the wrong way, but this is probably the most complicated explanation of cross-multiplication I've ever come across.

[@Adekyn100]

Sorry it didn't click for you.

[@bobbis.172]

I'm glad you're still playing this game and sharing new videos, tips and tricks with us! I always come back to your videos when i pick the game back up, they're a great resource. Thank you!

[@Adekyn100]

Glad you like them!

[@Bla_Razor]

Love those guide/back-to-basics videos - always something so take away from them, even for a guy like me with maybe 300+ hours in this game... Had the passenger stuff figured out, but never used the travel time in calculations for # of freight trains to keep a town/industry fed. Just eyeballed it up to now, lol...

[@Adekyn100]

Glad you like them.

[@TythosEternal]

supply = demand for a single train, supply is: L [cars/train] * 7 [days/week] / r_d [days/train] for multiple trains, equating supply and demand: n_t [trains] * L [cars/train] * 7 [days/week] / r_d [days/train] = n_d[cars/week] solve for n_t trains to equal demand n_d: n_t [trains] = r_d [days/train] * n_d [cars/week] / (7 [days/week] * L [cars/train]) r_d (route duration) is available directly within "manage train" UI * some margin may be needed when running into crowded switches/stations, which effectively introduces an r_d penalty (but will be eventually reflected in "manage train" UI) * this does not account for warehousing efficiencies (which make up for r_d penalties) but supply and demand rates must be matched for steady-state regardless * you can adjust for refrigerators, etc., by reducing L accordingly EXCEL EXAMPLE: variable meaning value units L length of train cars 8 cars/train r_d route duration of a single train (round trip) 31 days/train constant days in a week 7 days/week d demand 8 cars/week n_t number of trains to satisfy demand 4.428571429 trains ...where "value" for n_t is "=C3*C5/C4/C2"

[@Chneemann]

I played this game for many hours. But there are a lot of things I ignored until now. I didn't know the rule of 50 and I never looked at the days. Also I didn't know the Flow good chart or the possibility of automatic placed signals. So thank you very much!

[@Adekyn100]

My pleasure.

[@ThatsMrAwesomesauce]

Thank you for being clear and concise! Much better video than most others I tried to watch!

[@Adekyn100]

My pleasure.

[@Aspenstorpemusic]

I dont even play Railway empire but KZbin wanted me to see this *edit* I did play it once when I had to hole up at my friends house until my radiator was fixed(Arkansa's been cold for a change).

[@Adekyn100]

Even KZbin gets it right once in a while.

[@Galucia]

I am new to the game and this was very helpful. I will be going back to watch many more videos of yours

[@Adekyn100]

Glad it was helpful!

[@brenthinshaw8391]

Oddball suggestion here but I'd like to see you try your hand at running through something like Railroad Tycoon 3, I just reinstalled it from Steam and had forgot how easy it is to sink hours into the game lol

[@slayrey1]

I’m happy you’re still at it mate.

[@Adekyn100]

I drift in and out depending on my mood.

[@Xaveth]

Took me a little while to understand, but I got it. Thank you!

[@Adekyn100]

Glad it helped!

[@ksbrugh9886]

You ready for railway empire 2. Personally I can't wait

[@Adekyn100]

It should be good.

[@Wizard__J]

I was looking up vids for the game, came across this. WHAT lol. If they demand 3.6 per week, your train can carry 8, that means a train delivery will last 14+ days (they’d consume 7.2 for 14 days), so *where the hell* are you getting “every 49ish(50) days to bring a train in?”

[@Adekyn100]

The 50 days is for a demand of 1. You scale up from there.

[@robserviss5419]

Great stuff as always. Does it matter how many passengers are "wanting" to travel to help determine number of passenger/mail trains?

[@Adekyn100]

The calculation is to ensure that you get nearly 100% coverage; in other words, that you carry every available passenger and piece of mail on trains that are as close to full as possible. If you had a case where there were many passengers and/or many pieces of mail wanting to go from one city to another you would add trains as necessary to accommodate all the volume. However, if you get trains loading every two weeks you will generally "get" everyone.

[@marcin5446]

Which railroad sim do you like the most? Thx for great guides, keep up the good work! :)

[@Adekyn100]

My pleasure. Glad you enjoy the videos. My favorites, although I don't think of them as railroad sims as much as tycoon games, are Railway Empire and Railroad Corporation. I thoroughly enjoy both.

[@chavkata]

Sorry for reviving 3 month old comment, you should try Workers & Resources: Soviet Republic. Trains are a lot of fun there, also you can get rail laying carts to expand your network. If you do not mind all the additional hassle of managing cities etc. It is a lot of fun for trains.

[@marcin5446]

@@chavkata Thanks. I'll check it out :)

[@cinncinnatti]

ADEKYN : please come back soon !!!!

[@hyperspacejester7377]

Just a comment for your analytics ✌️ 😎

[@Adekyn100]

Thanks. Just a reply for the same reason.

[@kitchentroll5868]

I had arrived at a similar rule of thumb for freight (without a catchy name, just a pile of math), but, not knowing the 14 day limit, passenger service has always been a chore for me. But, now, armed with your "Rule of 15" for station to station passenger service, I may start loving the Lady. Also, I hope the "Rule of 15" applies to mail, 'cause man-oh-man some of these freeplay maps can have some breathtaking early goals for mail. The Japan DLC is my current mountain of woe, some of those cities seem to have been placed specifically to make it cost as much as possible to connect to the next city. Pesky developers....

[@Adekyn100]

The catchy name is all that really matters.

[@fsconsultantcy2559]

Hi ,just doing northern europe, FYI the passengers to gotberg are hard now but possible, gold tick unlikely but still will get president

[@Adekyn100]

I suspect any passenger count goal will be messed up. It is very disappointing that the developers have introduced a serious defect into the game and have not bothered to fix it.

[@Marcus-fr7sj]

Great video u should do dlc tier list from best to worst in ur opinion

[@Adekyn100]

Glad you like the video. I like all the DLC so it would be a very short video.

[@stephendemeritt1058]

Q1: on timing of PAC trains, does the "time hack" start when the train is bought, or when it LEAVES the station ? Q2: Distance between cities DOES have an effect on how many PAX trains *can* run ; but how many *should* be run on a line, say Melbourne > Sydney, or Melbourne > Bendigo, assuming you want to max out the number of trains from both ends ?? I'm doing the Australian scenerios as Doc .

[@Adekyn100]

The time for the route is an estimation of the time it takes to complete one round trip. It has nothing to do with when the the train was bought. How many PAX should you run is a function of your goal and the business of the stations. Run what the calculation tells you up to the point where the station is getting saturated. One of the reasons I sometimes prefer regular stations over auto-signal stations is that I can dedicate a platform on each end and see the true utilization of that line. That way I can max out trains on that line up to platform capacity.

[@john0constantine]

When talking about the city demand, you have weeks and months confused. The demand in the city screen is given per month. Look at the tooltip. That can trip you up, because the game gives you travel time in weeks.

[@Adekyn100]

The demand in the city screen is per week. As you say, look at the tooltip, as the video does here - kzbin.info/www/bejne/navWn3agj8hjq6c. This is discussing a 20 year game. For a 100 year game, the time frames are different. The demand is per month and the travel time is in weeks. That may be the source of your confusion.

[@john0constantine]

@@Adekyn100 Oh you're right, my bad. Yeah, I only did 100 year games

[@fsconsultantcy2559]

Hello ,can you ask Kalypso to unlock all characters for all scenarios ,this would extend the life of the game having done all with each character that's possible, hope to see you back with the lady in the summiteer

[@Adekyn100]

Kalypso doesn't pay any attention to me.

[@kleinerprinz99]

Thanks for the guide! @Adekyn: Quick question about something else: Did you find a solution for the passenger count bug? Because now several scenarioes are impossible to get gold tick for passenger transport :( I hope the devs fix it soon.

[@Adekyn100]

My pleasure. There is no solution with the production version of the game. The game has a serious flaw and I cannot believe the developers have not put out a fix. There is one thing you can do. Go into Steam and change the game to run beta - legacy build. That code appears to count passengers correctly.

[@hyperspacejester7377]

Ever had a problem with rural businesses not producing? Had a large station at the fisheries west of Warnambool on the down under map and a single train was sitting there "loading" for months! Close proximity, so it wasn't just slow loading times and even upgrading the business twice had no effect!? Any ideas?

[@Adekyn100]

Did you check on demand? Are you certain that the destination of the train required the goods at that time?

[@hyperspacejester7377]

@@Adekyn100 Ahhh, that was likely the problem.. I had a few trains running to a warehouse, so the demand was definitely there for some of them, but I also had some running directly into towns. Can't verify now because I've restarted with a different approach but I'll remember to keep an eye on that in the future. Thanks for the reply 👍

[@michaelcooper3803]

hi thank you love your guides! Should I run separate freight and passenger/mail trains between cities or is automatic plus passenger/mail just fine? Also should I run trains between each city directly or bunny hop between cities? Like Toledo-Chicago and Chicago-Rock City is fine or should I run also Toledo-Rock City?

[@Adekyn100]

Dedicated passenger/mail lines are nice when you can do them. Automated works just fine when you can't. In general, just run your passenger/mail lines from Toledo- Chicago and a second one from Chicago-Rock City. Passengers in Toledo wanting to go to Rock City will take the train to Chicago, then take the train to Rock City. (I think you meant Rock Island).

[@michaelcooper3803]

@@Adekyn100 thank you! I like having dedicated express trains between everywhere with bypasses but i know its not efficient haha

[@colindouglas7769]

Hi Adekyn! I don't know if it has crossed your mind whether livestock is slaughtered on the farm before transport to the city or transported to the city in a live state and slaughtered at the meat processing plant. This would determine whether you could get 8 cars of cattle on each train or 7 cars of cattle plus a refrigerator car, which would affect the number of trains you need to deploy on a line to satisfy the demand. Any thoughts about this?

[@Adekyn100]

You get the refrigerator car bonus when transporting cattle directly to a city.

[@norm51963]

I'll try it on my next game.

[@Adekyn100]

Let us know how it works for you.

[@penknight8532]

Good Stuff but we all know that all you have to do with this game is run more trains :)

[@joseivandiazhinojosa9569]

Hey Adekyn. Nice to see you playing Railway empire. Dude can you explain how the dates for the objectives work? For example, there's an objective that must be completed in 1870...I succeded completing it in 1868...but then the game just gave me a green mark. How is this possible?

[@Adekyn100]

To get a gold tick you must complete the task in half the allotted time, calculated from the time when you first see the task. For example, a starting task in January, 1850 that targets 1851, must be done by December, 1850 to get gold. In a scenario when new tasks appear you calculate from the date the new task first appears. Example: you just complete a set of tasks and a new set of tasks appear. The current date in July 1, 1852. The first task has a target of 1855. For a green tick you have 42 months to complete the task. For a gold tick, you must complete the task in 21 months; by end of March, 1854.

[@joseivandiazhinojosa9569]

@@Adekyn100 God! Haha how the hell do you know that Adekyn!? Thank you soooo much!!!

[@EmreErdogan]

Not particularly related to this episode, but can anyone tell me how do you put multiple signs at a track with one click? Seems like you divide the tracks automatically with one click.

[@Adekyn100]

Control + Shift + Left Click

[@EmreErdogan]

@@Adekyn100 thanks my bad, you explained it in your back to basics.

[@lionseries7585]

hello brother how are you ? bro i have a issue in game railway empire .... the issue is that ... i bought a rural wood industry and i upgrade it at level 5 and only 5 trains is going on there and all are on waiting ... mean my trains said please wait for loading ... 🤷🏻‍♂️ whats the issue can you please solve it ? or explain me ...

[@Adekyn100]

I suspect there is no demand. Make sure the line is connected to a consumer of the wood, either to a warehouse that has wood turned on or directly to a city.

[@lionseries7585]

@@Adekyn100 okay thank you let me try to warehouse

[@tlichten]

Adekyn... I'm sorry, but I am lost on your Freight math (3:15). If Toledo needs 7 cattle every two weeks, you need a train pulling in every 14 days with 7 cars of cattle. I don't understand where "7x7=49" comes in. Your DURATION showed at 34 days, but I have no idea what a DURATION is. Does this represent the number of days a round-trip takes?

[@Adekyn100]

Duration is the time in days it takes a train to complete one full route (e.g. from cattle station to delivery in town back to cattle station). I'm not sure where you got the idea that Toledo needs 7 cattle every two weeks. A demand of one per week is met by having a train with 7 boxcars pull into town every 7 weeks. That's the source of the rule of 50: 7 weeks x 7 boxcars per train rounded up or 7 weeks x 8 boxcars per train rounded down. So if the demand for a raw material in the town is one per week a route time of around 50 will work. If the demand is two per week and the same 50 day duration, then two trains are needed. So the number of trains needed equals the duration / 50 rounded up.

[@PapierToaletowy866]

​@@Adekyn100 I don't understand it either. Weekly demand in Toledo is 3.6 cattle every week, so around 7 in two weeks. So demand is 1 train per 2 weeks, (2 trains per month). If the duration is 34 days, we need around 2.5 trains per month. I don't understand why you need only one train per 50 days.

[@jimskam]

Adekyn, did you ever do a guide for The Dallas Challenge?

[@Adekyn100]

I haven't covered any of the challenges. Maybe some day.

[@jimskam]

@@Adekyn100 if you want to do it as a team, I will gladly host it. We can Twitch and KZbin stream it. I'll play and you yell in the background "No, don't do it that way, you idiot!". I ask because Dallas is definitely a challenge. Some of the scores leave me wondering

[@lateralus6512]

Hi Adekyn, are you going to give Sweet Transit a go?

[@Adekyn100]

I'm taking a look at it right now. It's sort of a prettier Mashinky with some city building borrowed from Anno. Will decide about releasing videos later after I get a better handle on the game.

[@camdenbarker388]

You haven’t posted on a while are you good?

[@Adekyn100]

Hi Camden. I'm doing great. Hope you are too. Thanks for asking. I don't make videos for a living, I do it for pleasure. Sometimes I'm in the mood to post and sometimes I'm not. Right now I'm not. I have many other interests that keep me occupied. That could change at any time and then I will post more videos.

[@camdenbarker388]

@@Adekyn100 Okay, haha good too hear. I know what you mean I get burnt out too!

[@princecampbell5788]

Honestly, I found that very confusing 😢

[@Adekyn100]

Not my finest work. Divide the estimated route time by 50, round up, run that many trains to meet a demand of 1 per week. Extrapolate from there.

[@thekingofthezombies4059]

I can’t understand this explanation can you

[@thekingofthezombies4059]

Simplfay to me ?

[@Adekyn100]

Freight: divide number of days the route takes by 50 and round up. Passengers: divide number of days the route takes by 15 and round up, limiting to 6.