Suggestions for the 2013 season

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    Topic
  • #16723
    drheaton

    It’s early, I know, but with the revival of the old suggestion thread it seems people are full of ideas on how they’d like the game to be “improved” next year!

    Obviously, this is all stuff that we’d like to see, wishful thinking really, but road.cc and Dave have always listened to what people think and have implemented good suggestions in the past (regional leagues, premium membership, the removal of the varying player values etc) so if you’ve got an idea post it below. Think of this as the place to make your request/suggestion so that Dave can see it easily. Also, tell everyone what you think works too rather than just complaining!

    Firstly off, I’d like to thank Dave for the game and strides they’ve made over the last few years to improve it into what is an excellent competition. I think that this years game is the best yet, the 4/5 split is a massive improvement over the old 1 GC, 1 AR ,1 KM, 1 PC and 5 DS split and allows for much more interesting team selections, likewise I think the constant rider values is something that should be kept next year as I haven’t missed the old system at all.

    My suggestions? Nothing major…

    1) Remove the 4/5 split altogether – I’d be happy if the current system was kept but would like to see complete flexibility, the limited budgets will restrict players from having a particularly unbalanced team and it will allow for even more creative team selections, especially where there are lots of cheap stars in a race (like this years classics). For example, pretty much all the top Vuelta teams will still have 3 of Contador, Rodriguez, Froome and Valverde so the 150 credit cap will restrict the makeup of the rest of their team. However, I guess the 4/5 split does give structure and makes the game easier to get your head around when starting out (my dad really struggled when he joined for the TdF but the 4/5 split made things easier).

    2) Expand on the premium membership with extra features such as combined purist team on the same account and stuff like that. I will probably pay for premium membership next year but I’d like to see some extra features being included for my money, not just extra races (which have been a bit shambolic this year and are very hard to follow).

    3) Teams of teams – another possible premium feature, 9 players band together into one team of players, their scores are combined in some way (straight sum of scores, average of all 9 or maybe lose the highest and lowest and sum/average what’s left) and they compete against other teams for a prize (Grand tours only maybe?). Should be fun and unpredictable, also, good for getting people to get involved on the forum.

    4) Fantasy jersey competitions – another thing to aim for when playing the grand tours, a selection of jerseys awarded to winners of particular comps:
    – a GC jersey awarded for whoever finishes 1st overall along with the bike, a black jersey possibly something road.cc themed.
    – a points jersey based on sprint stages or combined sprint points, either whichever teams gets the most intermediate sprint and flat finish line points over a race or maybe whoever scores highest just on flat stages, based on intermediate sprints would keep it interesting throughout though as you have to keep up with breaks in the mountains.
    – a mountains jersey like the points but for KoM points/mountain stages

    ideally these would be biased to make it very difficult to win them whilst still playing for overall placing, ie base it heavily on breakaway points (the KoM in particular) so that you need to pick the breaks and possibly suffer in the overall as a result, that’d make it something entirely separate to aim for like the riders aim for the KoM comp sacrificing their overall standings. Moreover, these aren’t big cost prizes and are just for fun/pride.

    5) Reduce the penalty for making additional transfers. I like the fact that there is a penalty but 20 points is very heavy, you basically need to place in the top 4 to overcome that. 10 points might bring in more tactical use of this facility and not be so penal if someone cocks up their team and needs to sort it out.

    That’s mine, just to be going on with. Also, a booby prize for whoever first mentions the ‘reset button’.

Viewing 15 replies - 151 through 165 (of 198 total)
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  • #698019
    0
    drheaton

    This is a personal thing but
    This is a personal thing but I’d like to be able to look at a race and see every riders cumulative score or even score broken down by stage (I like statistics…).

    The current system with the points on the riders page is good but it annoys me that when a rider is removed from the race they no longer appear on there. I would like to be able to go to the rider page and see the scores for everyone who had scored in the race. I’d also then like to be able to click on a rider and see their scores per stage (in a similar way to how my teams scores are shown for each stage.

    All minor personal thing but I like to be able to look at the riders after a race and see what I missed and, mainly for my purist team, see what type of riders score well throughout the whole race.

    #698017
    0
    enrique

    I know I sound petty, but my
    I know I sound petty, but my biggest issue is not being able to bank transfers… I know it’s weak, and that it’s the same for everyone, so it’s not unfair per se, but I’d just love the discretion to use the accrued transfers when I want and not lose them if I don’t use them.

    For example, I would have loved to bank the 6 transfers I had on my account after the last rest day and save them for later on in the week. Spreading them out instead of losing them would have felt like a better strategy than just letting some of them go to waste.

    I do like the idea of differnt values for different competitions, though! 🙂 Though it’ll probably be a pain for the game managers with all the different competitons we have now! 🙂

    #698015
    0
    drheaton

    londonplayer wrote:I agree

    londonplayer wrote:
    I agree with previous commenters that the game works well and if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. There is a danger that the 2013 comp. could end up so complex and detailed that it would become less fun to play.

    Couple of points though. Have always thought that picking the winner of a stage should carry more points. Trying to predict who will win a stage is bloody hard so when you do, you should be well rewarded.

    Secondly, I often wonder whether you should receive GC points for your riders. In some unpredictable stages, players go for “insurance points”. Surely you should only get points for being the jersey holder? If you’re 2nd, 3rd, or even 10th, why should you get any points?

    I agree that the game should probably remain pretty stable, most of my suggestions were around ‘adding features’ to the premium side of things to make it a more attractive proposition, stuff that would be fun and not overly complex for the regulars (as premium users are unlikely to be the newbies) while adding something to an already great game.

    I disagree on GC, Sprint of KoM jersey standings, I think that they work well as they are, there needs to be a reward for being high up in the GC or other standings and I think the current standings are fairly well balanced against the other points available.

    For example, Rodriguez today is guaranteed 17 points (probably) but only because he’s so high up in all three competitions, that doesn’t mean I won’t pick Degenkolb, Davis or Bennati though as they’ve all got the potential to outscore him. He’s safe points but not enough to compete for the stage win.

    #698013
    0
    londonplayer

    I agree with previous
    I agree with previous commenters that the game works well and if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. There is a danger that the 2013 comp. could end up so complex and detailed that it would become less fun to play.

    Couple of points though. Have always thought that picking the winner of a stage should carry more points. Trying to predict who will win a stage is bloody hard so when you do, you should be well rewarded.

    Secondly, I often wonder whether you should receive GC points for your riders. In some unpredictable stages, players go for “insurance points”. Surely you should only get points for being the jersey holder? If you’re 2nd, 3rd, or even 10th, why should you get any points?

    #698011
    0
    drheaton

    Yeah, it’d be a ‘no change’
    Yeah, it’d be a ‘no change’ change with everyone for the most part just getting 18 points more per stage. The only change would be that you’d be penalised a tiny amount (2 points in the scheme of things isn’t much) if you either lost a rider in a crash (which is kinda unfair) or chose to leave an abandoned rider in your team like I did with Bouhanni for a few stages.

    Also, it’d work against purist players as if you are unlucky enough to lose a couple of riders mid-race you’re not going to be able to swap them and would be stuck with non-scoring riders.

    #698009
    0
    londonplayer

    Can’t remember whether it was
    Can’t remember whether it was the Halfords game or RCUK but…. one of those comp.’s gave you points for a rider completing a stage.

    Just checked – in the Halfords game, you got 2 points for every rider that completed a stage.

    I guess it would sort of make sense in the Purist league. But, in the ordinary game with transfers, it would surely just make everyone’s scores higher with little effect on the result overall?

    #698007
    0
    STEVESPRO 79

    Raleigh wrote:I like the

    Raleigh wrote:
    I like the points for starting and finishing a stage.

    I mean, that’s a pretty big effort isn’t it?


    Please tell me that this is tongue in cheek humour or are you on drugs…..If its not humour or drugs then please explain in detail how this would improve the game… :/

    #698005
    0
    Raleigh

    I like the points for
    I like the points for starting and finishing a stage.

    I mean, that’s a pretty big effort isn’t it?

    #698003
    0
    ray silvester

    If you put
    If you put Greipel,Sagan,Cavendish,Goss,Farrar etc into the Vuelta then Degenkolb’s price is correct.

    #698001
    0
    dave atkinson

    degenkolb has been dominant
    degenkolb has been dominant but there’s not necessarily the history there to suggest that would be the case: half of all his points all year have been in the vuelta.

    you’ll still need your nous to pick the people who you think will do well in a certain race. the parameters might be a bit different. past form is not always an indicator of future success…

    #697999
    0
    drheaton

    I admit, I do like that there
    I admit, I do like that there are weird values throughout the season. It means that you need to have the knowledge to pick those riders.

    My dad started playing during the TdF, for the Vuelta he had no idea who Bouhanni was and didn’t pick him as a sprinter as he was DS and not down as a PC rider. I knew who he was and obviously had him right at the start.

    The weird values are part of what makes the game harder to read unless you have some knowledge I guess, for example people who didn’t know much about cycling might have picked Cobo as defending champion and as an expensive GC rider (assuming cost = likihood of success) whereas those of us who’ve been with the comp all year know he’s not worth the price (and wouldn’t be worth any price at the minute).

    Also, part of what makes the game fun is trying to identify the cheap DSs who can go on and get a boat load of points. If we’d gone into the Vuelta and riders like Bouhanni and Viviani had cost 30 credits because they were going to be protected sprinters, and Degenkolb 40 as he was clearly going to be dominant, everyone would have had much similar teams restricted to a few good sprinters then random DSs likely to acheive nothing (as the prices of the ones likely acheive something would have increased…).

    #697997
    0
    ray silvester

    I like it…..we won’t have
    I like it…..we won’t have the anomalies of Cobo still so expensive this late in the season and Bouhanni still so cheap for example.

    #697995
    0
    dave atkinson

    Like i said, it’s a work in
    Like i said, it’s a work in progress 🙂

    #697993
    0
    drheaton

    I assume pricing will be
    I assume pricing will be based more on past form in the upcoming event rather than past form overall? So for the uphill finishing classics where Cavendish is poo he’s likely to be cheap whereas someone like Gasparatto may be more expensive?

    Would that also mean that riders not racing in the upcoming event would have no value set and therefore be unavailable for selection?

    #697991
    0
    dave atkinson

    Quote:Interesting on how your

    Interesting on how your doing that then regarding the new system. Does that mean its going to be very complicated, and also values may change based on there likely standing in the race?

    it won’t be based on a rider’s likely standing but on their past form. it’s a work in progress :B

Viewing 15 replies - 151 through 165 (of 198 total)
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