# Trainz/containers/smoke container

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# About smokes

Smokes and vapors abound around a trainyard and amongst train traveled scenery from the gush of water out of a spigot to the acrid pine smoke plume capping that trackside ranchhouse's chimney; semi-transparent filmy thingys make for many effects that are almost magical. Anyone for smoke and mirrors to aid believability? This sort of container finds it's way into all sorts of assets. More than one earns an NN number as a suffix forming smoke0, smoke1, smoke2, ..., smokeNN as an asset needs. Smokes are also interactive and have various interfaces with software, the smoke container forms part of such linkages.

## smoke containers

A smoke container is effectively a PFX (particle effects) emitter that defines smoke and similar effects produced by assets. Smoke tags take the form smokeX where X is a number. There is no maximum number of smoke tags but they must be numbered sequentially (i.e. smoke0,smoke1,smoke2,etc). Smoke blocks have two sections: main and sequence properties. Main properties describe the attributes that stay the same for the life of the emitter. Sequence properties describe a set of one or more phases/periods in the smoke emission sequence.

## Supported Tags

Each smoke container supports the following tags. Each tag is shown here with its default value.

### Main Properties
#### accel

    Type: Decimal List
    Default: 0,0,0
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Sets the acceleration conditions for the smoke particles. First value is gravity, second is (optional) wind effect. Default is 0,0. A third (deprecated) form exists with three parameters - this uses the first two values to calculate the wind effect and the third as gravity.

#### attachment

    Type: String
    Default: ""
    Compulsory: Yes (3.4)
    Desc: The name of the attachment point at which to generate the PFX. Attachment points are specified in the mesh file during creation.

#### conesize

    Type: Decimal List
    Default: 0.2,0.2,1
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Specifies the cone in which the particles are emitted. When a particle is created it will be given an initial velocity vector with its direction being a random vector in this cone and its speed being taken from the 'velocity' tag. The cone tag is a decimal list of 1, 2 or 3 values (in meters). The first two values specify the width and depth (x and y) of the cone, and the third value specifies it's height. If the height isn't provided a value of 1 will be used, if only one value is provided it will be used for both the width and height. The default value if the tag isn't provided at all is (0.2,0.2,1.0).

#### direction

    Type: 3D Vector (x,y,z)
    Default: 0,0,1
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Sets the direction the particle emitter is facing. The direction will default to (0,0,1) if not supplied (straight up).

#### enable-steam-physics

    Type: Boolean
    Default: 0 (false)
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Enables some of the more advanced smoke/steam related particle physics (drag, spring & dampening).

#### enabled

    Type: Boolean
    Default: 1 (true)
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Sets whether the particle emitter is enabled.

#### faces

    Type: String
    Default: "camera"
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Sets the direction the particle faces. Can be one of the following values:
   * camera - The particles are drawn so that they always face the camera (Default)
   * motion - The particles are drawn so that they face the direction they are travelling.
   * down - The particles are drawn facing down.

#### file

    Type: String (filename of effect)
    Default: ""
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Specifies that the particle emitter settings should be read in from a file generated by the Twinkles PFX tool.

#### inherit-velocity

    Type: Boolean
    Default: 0
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Causes particles to inherit the velocity of the emitter, default is off.

#### loop

    Type: Decimal
    Default: -1
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Sets the time, in seconds, after which to loop the smoke sequence. Valid only for modes 'time' and 'anim2'. Can be set to -1 to imply that it loops after the length of the sequence, this is the default behaviour.

#### loopdelay

    Type: Decimal
    Default: 0
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Specifies the delay, in seconds, until the sequence loops again.

#### loop-amount

    Type: Integer
    Default: 0
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Sets the number of times the sequence should loop.

#### maxrate

    Type: Integer
    Default: 20
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Sets the maximum particle emission rate for the entire sequence.

#### maxspeedkph

    Type: Decimal
    Default: 0
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: For cone emitters, this will set the maximum speed of the particles, in km/h.

#### minrate

    Type: Integer
    Default: 0
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Sets the minimum particle emission rate for the entire sequence. Defaults to 0.

#### mode

    Type: String
    Default: "time"
    Compulsory: Yes (3.4)
    Desc: The PFX emitter mode. Smoke effects can contain a number of cycled 'phases', the mode defines how the 'start' and 'period' tags are interpreted to control the progression between each smoke phase. Mode must be one of the following values (defaults to "time" if not specified).
| Mode Value | Description |
| time | 'start' is a list of time values (in seconds) after the creation of the parent object when the next phase of the effect will start, 'period' is the duration of time the phase will remain active. |
| timeofday | 'start' is the time of day to start the next phase. The time of day is specified as a decimal from 0 to 1, where 0 is 0:00.00 AM and 1 is 12:59.59 PM. |
| anim | 'start' specifies a time in the assets animation cycle to start the next phase. 'period' is the time over which the phase is active. The time in the anim cycle is specified as a decimal between 0 and 1. 'start' + 'period' must not exceed 1. |
| anim2 | Same as 'anim' with some additional tags (interpolate, loop, loopdelay) |
| speed | 'start' is a speed, in meters per second, to start the next phase. 'period' is not used. |
| custom | UNKNOWN |
| cyldrainl | Toggled on and off by the Draincock command. The significance of "l" vs "r" is unknown. |
| cyldrainr | Toggled on and off by the Draincock command. The significance of "l" vs "r" is unknown. |
| stack | Synchronized to the drivers and is meant for a steam locomotive's smoke stack. |
| whistle | Turns on and off when the whistle is turned on and off. |
| generator | UNKNOWN |
| lowpressurevalve | Turns on when the boiler pressure exceeds the low pressure safety valve's setting (defined in enginespec). (?) |
| highpressurevalve | Turns on when the boiler pressure exceeds the high pressure safety valve's setting (defined in enginespec). (?) |
| blow0 | UNKNOWN (blowdown?) |
| blow1 | UNKNOWN (blowdown?) |
| fire-temperature | UNKNOWN |
| boiler-temperature | UNKNOWN |
    Only the 'time' and 'timeofday' modes are valid for scenery objects, other modes are intended for use with assets such as locomotives.

#### texture

    Type: KUID
    Default: <kuid:-1:6329>
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Sets the kuid of the texture to use for the particles, defaults to KUID<-1:6329> (Steam).

### Sequence Properties

Per-phase tags are specified as value lists. If a list is added it should specify a value for each phase.

#### color

    Type: Color List (RGBA, 0 to 255)
    Default: 1,1,1,1
    Compulsory: Yes (3.4)
    Desc: Specifies the initial color of the PFX texture for each phase. Color will default to white (255,255,255,255). From build 2.9, failing to include a color tag will create a validation warning.

#### dampening

    Type: Decimal List
    Default: 0.02
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: The spring damping constant for particles created in this phase. The spring damping constant affects the 'stability' of the link between individual particles (see 'spring'). Requires the 'enable-steam-physics' tag. Defaults to 0.02.

#### drag

    Type: Decimal List
    Default: 0.36
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: The drag constant for the particle created in this phase. This specifes the resistance against the particles ability to move freely through the air. If not specified the drag constant will default to 0.36, increasing the value will cause particles to be more strongly affected by wind. Requires the 'enable-steam-physics' tag.

#### endcolor

    Type: Color List (RGBA, 0 to 255)
    Default: 255,255,255,255
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Specifies the ending color of the PFX texture for each phase. Color will default to white (255,255,255,255).

#### lifetime

    Type: Float list
    Default: 3
    Compulsory: Yes (3.4)
    Desc: Specifies the time, in seconds, that the particles exist for in this phase (defaults to 2).

#### mass

    Type: Decimal List
    Default: 1
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: The initial mass, in kilograms, of the particles created in this phase..

#### mass-scale

    Type: Decimal List
    Default: 0.5
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: The percentage of mass lost over the particles life time for this phase. This allows particles to become lighter as they dissipate into the air. The value is specified as a percentage where 1 is 100% and will default to 0.5 (50%).

#### maxsize

    Type: Decimal List
    Default: 3
    Compulsory: Yes (3.4)
    Desc: Specifies the ending size of the particles created in this phase (scaling value where 1 is 100%).

#### minsize

    Type: Decimal List
    Default: 0
    Compulsory: Yes (3.4)
    Desc: Specifies the starting size of the particles created in this phase (scaling value where 1 is 100%, default is 0).

#### period

    Type: Decimal List
    Default: -1
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Specifies the duration of this phase, 'period' behaves differently depending on 'mode' and is not always used (see mode for details). Period can be set to -1 to imply that the phase is active until the next phase begins, this is the default behaviour. (Note: only mode "time" valid?)

#### physics-delay

    Type: Decimal List
    Default: 0
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Delay, in seconds, before particles are affected by world physics.

#### rate

    Type: Integer List
    Default: 4
    Compulsory: Yes (3.4)
    Desc: Specifies the rate of particle emission in each phase. For most modes this is set to the number of particles to emit per second, for 'anim' and 'anim2' however this is the number of particles to emit over the animation period. The default rate is 4. See also 'minrate' and 'maxrate'.

#### spring

    Type: Decimal List
    Default: 0.17
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: The spring constant for particles created in this phase. The spring constant specifies how the strong the link is between individual particles. By default the spring constant is 0.17 if not specified, increasing the value will cause the particles to be more rigidly linked to each others movement. Requires the 'enable-steam-physics' tag.

#### start

    Type: Decimal List
    Default: 0
    Compulsory: No
    Desc: Specifies when to start this phase, 'start' behaves differently depending on 'mode' (see mode for details). Start will default to 0.

#### velocity

    Type: Decimal List
    Default: 1
    Compulsory: Yes (3.4)
    Desc: Specifies the initial speed of the emitted particles for this phase. Speed is specified in meters per second, the default value is 1m/s.

## Example Config.txt

Sample config.txt file for a scenery asset that produces smoke:

### Example Steam Loco

A config.txt file for a simple steam engine with four smoke emitters:
* Dark smoke from the main chimney stack that is dependent on the trains velocity (a.smoke, Y axis pointing up),
* A constant steam trail from a small safety pipe on top (a.steam.safety, Y axis pointing up),
* 2 steam trails on each side of the train that alternately expel steam keyed to the animation of the trains wheels (a.steam.l, a.steam.r, Y axis pointing outwards).