Stories 2022-09-10 Riverrun Game-play
2022-09-10T07:05:00Z Started savegame on Riverrun, all outside connections and natural resources, suitable area for building 76%, base theme: boreal.
Goal is to reach population 100k today as quick as possible while still enjoying the game.
Addons used: 81 tiles, camera position utility, cinematic camera extended v0.5.1, csl show more limits, enhanced outside connections view, extended game options, extra landscaping tools, first person camera, harmony v2.2, hide it, lifecycle rebalance revisited v1.6.4, optimize outside connections, precision engineering, random tree rotation, realistic population 2 v2.0.5, rebalanced industries, roundabout builder, TM:PE stable v11.6.6.3, transfermanager ce v1.8.10, transporttool v2.3.1, ultimate level of detail, unlimited oil and ore, unlimited soil. List updated: 2022-08-27T21:39:00Z
Riverrun name sounds bad, rivers == bad for city building, so really scared when loading this one up. Base theme is boreal which I like (except the ugly morning dew / fog crap).
Just woke up, did morning chores but didn't eat days first meal yet, I want to get next terrain started. I have FOUR terrains left in this marathon including Riverrun, so lets get to it, in this weekend we shall finish this marathon 
First look on the terrain, its okay-ish, there is enough flat land to build a city, but overall its quite bumpy terrain and yes the mentioned mandatory rivers as all authors seems to like to do, I cant figure why on earth someone would ruin a perfectly good city building terrain with excess water bodies.
First used 81 tiles addon to open up all terrain grid tiles for use. TM:PE enabled disable de-spawning, advanced vehicle AI enabled, 50% dynamic lane selection, parking AI enabled more realistic parking. Transfer manager ce, goods delivery options warehouse first, reserve trucks for local transfers 20%, improved inter-warehouse transfers, import/export disabled allow import goods, services prefer local district services, death care/garbage improved all three, general disable dummy traffic, vehicle AI enable garbage and police.
Turned roads, electric and water budget to 50%, we need to save money.
This terrain had custom hand made highway intersection, you could not do that traditional exit with dirt road on it. No big deal, now its a bit off but still works.
First save game for Riverrun_1 file name.
Here is our starting location and setup.
2022-09-10T07:17:00Z Unpaused the game, lets start this thing.
So, only four terrains to go including this one which will be done today for sure, later tonight I get to start the second one which will be then finished tomorrow and tomorrow get to start third one... oh man, this is exciting. As I'm writing this its saturday early morning and hmm its too early to tell but could this whole marathon possibly be finished by earliest of monday maybe tuesday? So cool to get this done heh. Anyways enough dreaming, get your head back to the game and finish cities! No time to waste!
2022-09-10T07:25:00Z Little Hamlet population 460.
Turned on taxes to 12% for industrial, low density residential and commercial. Purchased elementary school and landfill site.
2022-09-10T07:32:00Z Worthy Village population 900.
Again did not create districts as they have no function in my game-play style (yes transfer manager ce uses them, but in past 5+ savegames I have had no use for that). Placed fire station, police station and health clinic.
Saved game for Riverrun_2 file name.
2022-09-10T07:37:00Z Okay ran out of drinking water in real life, city is growing up nicely, now its time to start eating my days first meal. Most likely next milestone kicks in while I'm eating, so its one hand playing then heh.
2022-09-10T07:41:00Z Tiny Town population 1.4k. Before I even got done washing my hands before a meal this milestone triggered, game is FAST heh.
2022-09-10T07:49:00Z Returned budget to 100% which is the normal, glad to be over that chasing the budget phase.
2022-09-10T08:00:00Z Uuh second milestone kicks in already and I haven't finished eating yet heh. This story is now all out of whack hehe.
2022-09-10T08:06:00Z Feeding time is over, now lets start to sort out the accumulated backlog while I was away eating
Replaced placeholder dirt road arterial and collectors with proper six and four lane asphalt roads. Replaced industrial areas roads with industry road type (small for local and medium for collector). Started to use two lane asphalt roads for residential areas from now on.
Saved game for Riverrun_3 file name.
2022-09-10T08:09:00Z (updated timestamp now after a meal heh) Boom Town population 2.6k.
Cemetery and bus depot became available in this milestone, cemetery is essential for life heh. Ore industry specialization available.
So did all the above stuff since eating days first meal, finished off by placing cemetery, bus deport and creating residential to industrial and two residential collector bus lines. Uah that was a lot to do. Now we get to continue again.
Oh and then banned all private cars from industrial area using TM:PE. Also added pedestrian walking paths between industrial and residential area.
2022-09-10T08:49:00Z Current progress.
This base terrain feels like there is too many highways in close proximity, traditional "pixel porno" effect terrain developer has created by mistake.
2022-09-10T09:04:00Z Busy Town population 5.5k.
Fire helicopter depot became available in this milestone, this is must have to any large city, when you have traffic jams and fires, helicopters are a life savers. Two lane road with trees, this is my go-to local road, starting using it now and when time comes, will upgrade existing dirt roads with this one. Oil industry specialization available.
Saved game for Riverrun_4 file name which is the last of the four rotating file names.
Usually I place education buildings ie schools evenly according to city building placement and once previous ones get full, without much paying attention to the info view education tab generic numbers. Well in this savegame I want to focus on the info view education tab numbers, kind of to see if there is any truth to it that education buildings are global, it doesn't matter where in the terrain / city they are, students will travel there.
Oh and also of course I arrange public transport to schools, mainly buses.
2022-09-10T09:22:00Z Saved game and exited to main menu, I want to check if I have "Watch It!" addon installed, it would be helpful on this beginning building phase.
I had it installed, activated it from content manager and setup it, then restarted game and loaded savegame up.
Watch It! is pretty useful to have all the icons on the right side of the screen at the same time, this is very important when you are creating new road grids in 2D top down mode and cant see whats going on with your city, so now you can, even alarms like fire pops up in the warning panel.
Watch It! is actually great!
Wonder why I didn't start to use this before, I did check it out on some test savegame but guess it was only a small city test and did not have enough data to show, so I thought that blah this aint so useful just dumb icons clogging up the side screen. But yeah, this is actually useful in the situation I explained above. I would say it is essential.
2022-09-10T09:42:00Z Now I get to actually ENJOY my city instead of looking at it from satellite view from space
I love to go boots on the ground all over the city, browsing, seeing how things run etc. But you cannot do that because without Watch It! addon you cannot see if all the shit is burning or breaking down someway elsewhere. This definitely makes my game-play much more enjoyable, I always hated that 2D top-down or well in slight angle satellite view, you don't get to know your city like that, it truly is like spying from another country through satellite camera.
2022-09-10T09:51:00Z Actually this is kind of a shame that I discovered how useful Watch It! addon is at this point in the terrain savegame marathon, we only have three more terrains after this, so the usage for Watch It! will be quite limited considering I've already played over a MONTH straight 17hrs a day. But oh well as they say, better late than never I guess
Will be so enjoyable to do this and the last three terrains now, plus of course all future game-plays.
Well this is interesting, our landfill site became full, this has not happened in a long long time because I always get incinerator plants before that, hmm odd.
Only two hundred more people to the next milestone, I'm going for it without purchasing recycling center for no reason...
2022-09-10T09:59:00Z Big Town population 8k.
High density zones, metro, incineration plant, intercity bus, university and large warehouse are now available.
2022-09-10T10:18:00Z Small City population 11k.
This milestone gives us cargo train terminal, train station (passengers!) and two good policies. Activated small business enthusiast and big business benefactor policies.
Here is overview of a new cloverleaf intersection I created, feels kind of silly to be so close for the original terrains intersection, but railroads dictate where I need to build my second industrial area.
Created passenger train station and cargo train terminal. Also did huge expansion over the highway, including industrial area which is near the cargo train terminal. Only question now is, will this cargo train terminal send semi-trucks deliveries to the original industrial area which might cause bad traffic issues. We'll see.
Walk the electric. So here I wanted to place fire station (the big building with 25 fire trucks) in middle of this new industrial commercial area, so I walked the electric from the cargo train terminal and initial industrial buildings using other service buildings which are also good to have in this area so far away from our main city.
Okay so this layout is really scary and exciting at the same time, dunno why heh. I am terrorized by the fear of traffic jams. Obviously "don't zone too much industry and commercial" to avoid traffic jams, sure, but heh well yeah.
2022-09-10T11:21:00Z Big City population 18k.
Crematorium, large water tower and advanced inland water treatment plant are now available.
2022-09-10T11:29:00Z Grand City population 22k.
2022-09-10T11:59:00Z Capital City population 36k.
Passenger and cargo harbor is now available, passenger is a must have for incoming citizens.
2022-09-10T12:26:00Z Colossal City population 48k.
This milestone gives nuclear power plant and cargo hub (ship + train terminal).
So far going good, industrial area traffic is under control. Demand for residential is zero and industrial sky high, but hmm darned I'm scared of zoning more industrial as it might unleash the underworld demon that we know as Cities Skylines traffic 
Its kind of funny that I'm such a pussy with traffic jams when current traffic flow is NINETY (90) percent!
2022-09-10T12:53:00Z Saved game and will let it run in 3x time acceleration speed while I'll eat some lunch, I'm starvin' ...
2022-09-10T13:14:00Z Feeding time is over, back to growing some population.
2022-09-10T14:07:00Z Got caught trying to improve public transport, forget that nonsense and get back on growing population right now! Heheh!
2022-09-10T14:21:00Z Currently our outside connections imports are 1893 and exports 13. Very nicely balanced goods production vs commercial zones consumption.
2022-09-10T14:24:00Z Metropolis population 70k.
Hmm but now few of the high density commercial zone buildings flash "not enough goods to sell" icon. It was time to expand generic industry area.
Having generic industry produce goods so exports are 1 or very low is kind of bad, it is a fantasy to precisely even out production and consomption, you should always have a little bit more production than commercial zone consumption that you don't run out of goods to sell. If you have 100-300 outside connections goods exports, its NOTHING. Don't worry about it, it wont cause any traffic jams for you. Keep it healthy, have a little bit goods exports always, if you drop to very low or even 1 (lowest), add more industry or reduce commercial areas. Just remember there is a very very long lag time when you do changes, also the numbers fluctuate a little bit, so don't be freaked out if suddenly your exports dip down to below 100, they might come up soon again.
2022-09-10T15:19:00Z Uh oh we finally broke the road system, we got ourselves a good old traffic jam 
Sigh. Guess the reason is that we have two separate industrial / commercial areas so they are sending delivery vehicles criss-cross which is obviosly no good. And the original industrial area has no train, in this second one we have now TWO.
Now I'll just sit and watch if it clears itself...
2022-09-10T15:32:00Z Megalopolis population 90k.
Milestones are all done, now ten thousand more folks to move / born into our city and we are there...
... if we only survive this traffic jam
2022-09-10T15:40:00Z Yup PMC Train Terminal 1 is exporting goods to the first industrial site, across city. This is no good. You just cannot have two different industrial and commercial areas in one city, traffic will flow between them. Or yeah maybe you can arrange some traffic which is outside the city like some sick highway where you definitely will not get traffic jams. And train connections of course.
Hmm actually, let me create quick train terminal to the original industrial area...
Now lets see if that eases off any traffic. Of course as Cities Skylines is not a reactive but preventive game, its too little too late, the traffic jam has to clear on its own somehow this terminal will not cure it. I mean the actually current gridlock, in the long run hopefully these two industrial areas would send cargo through train instead of vehicles. Hopefully.
Cargo train terminal number three is working just fine. Keep the goods rolling.
What traffic issue, we have no traffic issue, maybe its your issue???
2022-09-10T16:04:00Z Boom! We have reached our goal, 100k population! Yeah buddy! 
And what a mess we leave behind with this city, oh my, I feel sorry for myself for the next time I'll load this up as I have my hands full sorting out all the traffic mess caused by excessive industry and commercial buildings
2022-09-10T16:05:00Z Saved game and shutdown Cities Skylines, we are done here.