New Compact Coaster Challenge

[Thergothon]

In light of the closing of snipers points based system due to problems that unfortunately couldnt be worked around, I propose a much simpler challenge.

1. The coaster must be within 10x10 and may be of any type.

2. No brakes, either to accelerate or decelerate the train. Powered launches are acceptable. [EDIT] Launched lift hills are also disallowed.

3. One circuit only.

4. The highest excitement rating wins.

[EDIT] 5. The station must be on the ground level.

[EDIT] 6. No low friction.


S.

[rizzla]

Ok, Thergothon, those rules sound pretty good. I hope a few people will participate, otherwise I'll have to win this one (again... ;))

Let's start off with a non-entry, which would be disqualified anyway cause it uses brakes. Trying out coasters I have not worked with before, I decided to give the Flying Coaster a try - and was heavily disappointed. So as a little game inside this competition thread: Guess the excitement of the follwing coaster. A 10x10 Flying Coaster, and it's not like I didn't try my best on this one - 1000 meters long, 1:29 ride time (no lift hill), 40 seconds air time, 13 drops including 6 inversions, tweaked with brakes for the best possible ratings (they weren't that different without, actually). Here it is, go take a look:

http://www.sininen.de/useless1.jpg

Taken a look? Ok, now take a guess at the ratings. You've maybe seen my other coasters, I'd have to have a bad day designing one that isn't rated 7+ in excitement. But this one... :rolleyes: Ok, here are the stats:

http://www.sininen.de/useless2.jpg

Disappointed? I certainly was! Hope you're not feeling I hijacked this thread. So, onto business - I'll be most interested to see what people come up with. Knowing from my towering coasters like the Skyscraper and the LIM 63 I'd guess that bigger ain't always better - inversions are cool, but 63 of them get repetitive! :) So after this competition we'll hopefully know even better what makes a coaster really exciting!

I hope that some people who have not tried a 10x10 before will join in - check out the previous 10x10 competition and the compact coasters thread over at the Exchange, quite a few are downloadable and should give you some ideas.

[rizzla]

Two questions about the rules:

1. Is Low Friction allowed? (I wouldn't have asked if not just now a train of mine stopped at the top of a loop :noob: )

2. Ratings taken in the Coaster Builder? Coasters in Sandbox mode that are opened gain quite a bit in excitement (+0.2, +0.3 -ish).

[Thergothon]

Im not sure on low friction, Im leaning towards no as it seems to give a fairly impressive boost to excitement ratings on some coasters, particularly the wooden ones.

Ratings should definately be shown in the coaster builder for the reasons you mentioned.

Oh and the station has to be on ground level.



Are those rules fair enough?

S.

[Thergothon]

And I am pretty surprised by those ratings on the flying coaster. The only explaination that I can think of is that the average speed is very low.

S.

[rizzla]

Originally posted by Thergothon
Im not sure on low friction, Im leaning towards no as it seems to give a fairly impressive boost to excitement ratings on some coasters, particularly the wooden ones.

Are those rules fair enough?

Is that a No then? :) I saved the coaster in question at that point, so it doesn't matter. I think a No is fine myself.

(BTW: Working completely without brakes is tough...)

As for the Flying Coaster - just check out the prebuilt coasters, their ratings also suck. And with higher speed (without brakes) the ratings were something like 4.0/4.5/4.5, so only the intensity increased, but not the excitement. Maybe we should one day have a competition "first gut to take the Flying Coaster's excitement past 5! :D

[rizzla]

Ok, to kick off this competition properly I present my first attempt. It's a Floorless Coaster and I got it to work nicely even without brakes. Already in a slightly shorter version it was close to breaking the 8.00 in excitement, I just added a bit more to make it happen.

http://www.sininen.de/floorless1.jpg

Perfecting coasters for this competition probably means hitting the height limit - a bit of a shame costwise, and it adds only little to the excitement, but I don't mind, I've built a few skyscrapers already!

One thing I did find out, though this might vary with coaster types, is that overbanking curves usually is even counterproductive (if it doesn't get excessive). I started as always with just about all curves overbanked then changed them all to normal curves and found the excitement increased (of course, intensity and nausea rise, too, but apart from being irrelevant for this competition check my stats, they are still fine). What I also clearly noticed is that the train loses more speed if you don't overbank curves - it's an obvious point, but especially for this competition (no brakes) quite useful. After un-banking my curves the train couldn't make the 2nd loop anymore, changing the last two curves beforehand back did the trick.

Not overbanking curves also gives more options when confined to such a small space. The next coaster I'll design with that in mind...

[Screemer89]

['Oh and the station has to be on ground level.']


I was wondering if it would be ok to have the station raised a couple of blocks off the ground. (just enough for the track to run under the station.)

[Milkdud]

Wow Rizzla, what a coaster! :D I'm not sure if I can, but will try to beat it :D

[Milkdud]

Ok this doesn't beat Rizzla's but it's one of my first attempts at a 10x10 so I wanted to share it :D
http://www.alienhax.us/uploads/rct3_1.jpg

EDIT: Hmm, here's another one that still doesn't beat Rizz but is fun as hell to ride imo :D So here's a screenie and the download:
http://www.alienhax.us/uploads/rct3_2.jpg
http://www.alienhax.us/uploads/[LIMLaunched]Mayhem.trk

[rizzla]

Cool coasters, Milkdud. The Giga generally is a very good choice, cause it is easy to take the excitement above 7 and keep intensity and nausea down - but that isn't required for this competition and maybe it's lacking inversion track pieces to raise the excitement higher. Your LIM also looks cool, but I think that coaster type is simply not the one which offers the best excitement ratings...

BTW I often build coasters of your size and see how they perfom and then build another "floor" or two on top.

[Milkdud]

Thanks Rizzla :D Yeah the LIMs do always have bad ratings...but thier pretty darn fun :D. Also, it's true what you say about the giga, thier always the easiest coasters to get high exictement and low intensity/nausea. I see using gigas for contests as cheating because thier so easy to get good stats. So to me, I just cheated by using that giga....but it didn't beat yours so I only posted it to show off...:p I haven't been able to make any more attempts at beating your floorless today because I'm working on a new park which I'm going to use to make a video of for Bitter Jeweler's contest. Can't wait to start working on a new 10x10 coaster soon though :D. No way I'm going to let you beat us all with your very first entry!! ;)

[Black Vivi]

i got 7.83 earlier with a giga coaster, thought it would be easier to use a giga coaster, but it was actually quite hard
ill probly try again later with something else

[Screemer89]

My 1st try is using a Twister with launch lift. Excitement 7.44. will have to play around with it to see if can get better rating.

[link not working]

[Screemer89]

Remade my Twister and got a 8.14 excitement.

http://img140.exs.cx/img140/8954/10x10try2infothumb7id.jpg
(updated link)

btw, I really like the coasters Milkdud and Rizza, very nice.

[Milkdud]

An error has occurred.

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Try using Imageshack.us to upload images please...

[Screemer89]

Ok, am trying to get my entry up using Imageshack now. hope I did this right.

http://img140.exs.cx/img140/8954/10x10try2infothumb7id.jpg

[Thergothon]

Sorry I havent responded earlier, Ive had some problems with my ISP and havent been able to get on the internet. All is solved now.

As for the questions....

No low friction. It makes the challenge that much more challenging.

Station definately on ground level. That also reinforces the challenge and prevents any sort of "well if that entry is one unit above ground, why cant mine be two?" mentalities.



As for me, I'm finding the lack of brakes and boosts to be a very limiting factor when designing the coasters, but I'm enjoying the challenge.

Here is my MultiD (surprise, surprise), 8.30....

http://free.hostdepartment.com/a/atragicopus/ecc01.jpg

[BRTeller]

Ok im in this contest im going to post my coaster asap.:D

[Screemer89]

I agree, it is challanging not using any brakes.


Well, had to try again. I did manage to get an 8.73 but may try again. I am wanting to break a 9.


With supports showing
http://img203.exs.cx/img203/5675/wyvern12pg.jpg


without supports showing
http://img218.exs.cx/img218/1371/shot0005thumb3qb.jpg

[crowscall]

Here's my entry. I can't think of a way to take down the intensity rating, which kinda sucks.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v98/the_gr8_brandino/coolwoody.jpg

[rizzla]

Screemer89, excellent coasters, really impressive. However, how does the Wyvern work? Can you power launch it all the way up??? I just don't get it, or is there something I missed?

Thergothon, your MultiD is quite amazing, too. Great layout and as always you show that it's not necessary to build a huge coaster costing $ 50,000+.

I still have not yet built a single MultiD and will definitely give it a go for this competition. But I promise I decided that before seeing your coaster and rating, I just haven't found any time for RTC3 lately.

[Screemer89]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by rizzla
[B]Screemer89, excellent coasters, really impressive. However, how does the Wyvern work? Can you power launch it all the way up??? I just don't get it, or is there something I missed?



I did power launch it out of the station but it limits it to about 27 mph. I then used launch lift hills to get it the rest of the way to the top.

If I can ever get access to ride exchange I will upload it. I dont have a site to post it on myself....

[Thergothon]

As much as your twister coaster impresses me ( :up: ), I should have been more clear with the no brakes or boosts rule and stated that launched lift hills are also disallowed (being a boost)as they give twister coasters a massive advantage that no other coaster can match.

Sorry.

[Milkdud]

Thergothon, that multiD is awesome! Did you also fix all the angles? Or left them all the same?

Edit: Here's a corkscrew I just finished. Now this is what I call compact! :D
http://img159.exs.cx/img159/3176/shot00048kt.jpg
Too bad the stats are't good enough =/

I also found out something pretty niffty. When this coaster was running with the regular corkscrew car, the exictement was only 7.03. Then when I changed it to the shuttle cars, the ecitement went up .40 points!

[Thergothon]

Milkdud thats one impressive coaster, too bad about the stats, which really, considering the size of the thing, are pretty impressive. Rizzla also had some luck with fiddling around with coaster train types and length in the first compact coaster thread.

My MultiD has all the angles fixed, though I'm starting to get tired of them as they are a bit restricted in special track pieces you get and when the train isnt hanging from the track you have to be going backwards. The other thing that irritates me is trying to get twists looking right as the angles usually make me feel ill.

[Milkdud]

Thank you Thergothon :)

Well, I don't see many Inverteds around the compact threads so I decided to make one :D These baby has 11 inversion!
Featuring a Batwing :D Also has 2 corkscrews, a diving loops, 2 half barrel roll to half corkscrew (w/e that element is called :p) and 1 half barrel roll to half loop (whatever that's called too :p)
http://img144.exs.cx/img144/1083/shot00064yi.jpg

[Screemer89]

Nice coasters MilkDud

well, since launch lift hills are out have tried several different types of coasters (including an inverted coaster) and cant get em to break an 8 on excitement. must say it is a difficult task.

[Screemer89]

Well, here is my latest try. I used the Inverted Wild Mouse.
'Mutant Mouse' got an excitement of 8.57

http://img216.exs.cx/img216/5503/mutantmousethumb3ie.jpg (http://www.imageshack.us)

[Thergothon]

:eek: :up:

[Milkdud]

Nice coaster Screamer! Gonna be hard to beat :p

[Milkdud]

Grr, I thought this one would for sure best screamers score, but I guess I was wrong :( It's still worth a look (has 15 inversions!)
http://img204.exs.cx/img204/9973/shot00029jy.jpg

[edit] Woot! Just got an 8.70 excitement giga :D
http://img77.exs.cx/img77/8498/shot00022ux.jpg

[rizzla]

@Screemer89 (I): The launched lift hill, of course. I had feared Thergothon wouldn't like it but nonetheless, I am most impressed with that coaster.

@Screemer89 (II): Inverted Wild Mouse? Way to go, just shows that all coaster types need to be considered. Well done, great ratings!

@Milkdud (I): Wow! What a rating! And even intensity and nausea quite low. One of the keys to the Giga coaster I'm pretty sure is speed - or long, steep, twisting drops, to be exact. But I simply love that "flat top" (spiraling up and then dropping down from what I can tell), that looks real cool.

@Milkdud (II): Btw, pretty wicked other coaster you have on offer, the ratings just don't reflect the amazing layout.