The rail line is long and level, with enough powered rails to keep carts at high speed. The "station" has multiple unpowered rails to stop carts.
These work when riding a single cart (stopping it on the first of two consecutive unpowered rails). However, when I have a chest-cart in front of me, both the chest cart and my minecart fly through the "station" without even slowing down.
I can see how maybe the chest-cart could be pushed through two stopping rails, but there's no way that my cart should follow it through without even slowing. Something, perhaps incomplete rendering, is preventing thorough application of rail effects.
Frame rate was 6-8 fps, and I seemed to roll through the station rather than skipping it via freeze-and-jump lag.
Regardless of what may be rendered visually, movement rules should be inviolable. When client and server get all caught up with chunk loading and graphical rendering, I should see myself stopped with a chest cart stopped in front of me.
For the curious, here's the rail pattern in the "station":
Direction of travel --->
==================DP==U=UU=DPP=DPP=========
'=' is plain rail
'D' is Detector
'P' is Powered, but only while detector fires
'U' is Unpowered (stopping rail) at all times
Edit: I've run through the station a few more times. Behavior id fairly consistent, but not completely. If the chest cart runs about 5 blocks ahead of mine, then all power/unpower effects resolve as they're supposed to (chest stops on first U, then I enter and bump it forward and bounce back against the closed one-way DP).
Problems occur if the two carts are in contact (actually overlapping slightly) when they reach the unpowered rail. It's as if my cart is able to bump itself forward – when the unpowered rail is forced to let go of the chest-cart, my cart is so close behind that I get through as well.
Comments 5
From what I'm reading about minecart & rail development for the next release (1.8), I suspect that this bug will become moot. As soon as I am able to upgrade both my client and server to v1.8, I will retest this bug and add a comment on whether or not it persists in the new version.
Is this still a concern in the current Minecraft version? If so, please update the affected versions in order to best aid Mojang ensuring bugs are still valid in the latest releases/pre-releases. If this has been done, we can reopen the issue.
Keep in mind that the "Resolved"-Status on this ticket just means "Answered", and that we are waiting for further information on whether this issue still exists or not. We will reopen it as soon as the requested information has been delivered.
Ticket resolved as incomplete, because no answer in a reasonable amount of time (1+ year), if it still happens, please update the ticket.
My problems abated when I cured my lag. If I experience rail control glitches in a more recent version, I'll submit a new bug with better analysis than this old thing written back when I was in only my 4th month of play (and had not yet started modding). Now when something surprises me, I can load Forge's version of the game into Eclipse and either insert log statements or step through the program logic in a debugger to put my finger on exactly what the error is.
Slightly off topic:
While contemplating this problem (and because I am an O-O programmer), I had a thought about rail implementation in general. Instead of having several different blocks that act as rails, some with special effects, we could have just one block type that has one item slot to contain and display (and sometimes rotate) exactly one item (a la item-frame) from select set of items allowed in rails.
The choice of item to install (if any) would then give any piece of rail the rail-effect you want in that segment of your railroad. Install a piston, and voila, that rail block acts like an ejector (unloader) rail. Install a p-plate and you get a detector rail... and you could choose any of the four p-plate types to achieve subtly different rules of detection without anyone needing to design four different detector-rail blocks. Buttons and levers could switch alignments from inside. I wonder what effect a comparator could have? Install redstone dust (or any other component/device), and you could build a redstone circuit across or along any rail line.
If we can't think of an existing item to manifest an existing rail type, then a new item could be designed to fill the role. Power rail could be effected by installing a new redstone device designed for that purpose. Inventing new rail types (like one-way boosters) would be as easy as inventing new items to bolt in, and every "rail type" would inherit all basic rail functions because it would still be a basic rail on the outside.
By separating essential rail form & function from special effects, the data field in the rail block would be liberated to express more values for orientation and connection. Four-way crossings and curving inclines could become feasible. In addition, any special effect could be installed into track with any orientation and connection(s) (e.g. power in curves and intersections).
Translating a world's rails from old to new would be a snap because there'd be a one-to-one correspondence between existing types and new combinations... at least where built on the ground. I'm not sure what to do with stacks in storage.
Sorry for rambling so while waiting for action / comment on my bug report. If there's a better place to discuss Minecraft programming without being flamed, please (gently) point me there. And if you're ever hiring, I'm currently "between contracts" 🙂