Octopus Overlords

Test run is in the books. I hope everyone enjoyed the game. Now comes the fun part: modifications for the future races.

Obviously, pulling up one short of a turn can be catastrophic. Luckily, there are tire selections available:

Hard Tires:
If it's raining, you move an additional three spaces (mandatory) if any of your move is a turn.

Soft Tires:
It it's not raining, you can move one additional space (optional) on all moves. If you overshoot a turn, it's 2 WP per space. You must pit to change tires after the lap, or lose the bonus.

If it's raining, you get the same mandatory 3 spaces through turns as hard tires.

Rain Tires:
If it's not raining, overshooting a turn is 2 WP per space.

If it's raining, you move an additional space (mandatory) if any of your move is a turn.

Obviously, the soft tire extension comes with the price.

Each track comes with a weather grid that determines the weather on race day. For Singapore:

1-8 Rainy
9-14 Changeable
15-20 Sunny



Also, we need to discuss starting grids for races. With a reset for a league, I have been considering for the first race to have each half of the grid contain one racer from each team to even out any team advantage. For subsequent races, reverse individual points standings. Which also leads to the question of how to handle DNFs. Do we want to induce some sort of DNF penalty for Race 2 and/or subsequent races?

We've discussed some of this before, but I wanted to get a thread going separate from the race threads themselves so we could keep a central location for discussion and modifications.

Definitely in favor of the rain and tire rules.

I like the idea of splitting the teams up. By reverse individual point standings, are you thinking of having the worst finishers start closer to the front of the pack, to give them a head start? Or am I missing something in what you are saying?

For Race 1, Work it so that there's one team represented in the front half and one in the back. Say Team Red gets 1st and 5th, White gets 2nd and 6th, Yellow gets 3rd and 7th, and Blue gets 4th and 8th. Put the top driver from each team in the back segment, bottom driver in the front.

Dead last in the points standings will get pole position for Race 2-?. So whomever is in 8th (or last if we can fill Team Green) after completing 1, they get pole for the next race and we go Last-first on each starting grid based on comprehensive point total from all previous races.

Isgrimnur wrote:For Race 1, Work it so that there's one team represented in the front half and one in the back. Say Team Red gets 1st and 5th, White gets 2nd and 6th, Yellow gets 3rd and 7th, and Blue gets 4th and 8th. Put the top driver from each team in the back segment, bottom driver in the front.

Below is a more equitable distribution and I would say roll and let teams pick which slot pair they want or base it on the reverse of the results of this race. Red picks first, then white, yellow, blue.
1/8
2/7
3/6
4/5

I also am a fan of trying out weather. I'd also like to see some consequences to devastating your car for the win. Something liek if you are below X non-tire WPs remaining, your WP total is reduced by 1 of your choice for the next race. The mechanics just couldn't get it back to top form. "There's not enough time, captain!" or say you get X repair points between races to fix your car, with the ability to go slightly beyond the max if you keep it clean.

Just some thoughts to keep it interesting and make those games more risky.

I like the idea of different tires. I'm not sure I like how the weather tires are designed, though. They're contingent on a single weather roll before the game takes place. So if Player A chooses advantageous tires for dry weather, and Player B chooses advantageous tires for wet weather, one's going to get an advantage over the other based on one roll, possibly for the entire game. Seems like giving a player a bonus from the start based on a coin flip.

I like the 1st / 8th, 2nd / 7th team positioning.

In terms of tinkering with the game, I do wonder whether there ought to be something to cope with the disaster of coming up one short of a turn. I'd think there should be something like nitro, like maybe you could put WP when designing your car into it, and it'd be like brakes except that it would allow you to move bonus spaces.

You'll know the starting weather before putting tires on the car. The only time you'll have to worry is if it starts as changeable, as it might start raining.

Isgrimnur wrote:You'll know the starting weather before putting tires on the car. The only time you'll have to worry is if it starts as changeable, as it might start raining.

Oh, ok. Never mind on that then.

El Guapo wrote:In terms of tinkering with the game, I do wonder whether there ought to be something to cope with the disaster of coming up one short of a turn. I'd think there should be something like nitro, like maybe you could put WP when designing your car into it, and it'd be like brakes except that it would allow you to move bonus spaces.

The Road Race variant has a nitro mechanic where you can add your gear to your roll once per lap. ie in 4th gear you get +4, in 1st gear you get +1.

I'll certainly leave that up for consideration if a majority want it as a once per race item. I can see it being a helpful thing, but also a bit of an unbalancer, especially late in the race.

On a dry track, though, the soft tires give you that one additional space going into a turn. Obviously, that means squat if it starts raining...

It specifies that you're able to change tires between qualifying, which we're not doing, and the race, but I don't see any reason not to allow a tire type change when you pit, especially if it starts raining mid-lap. I can easily see having rain tires stored in the truck if the weather report is iffy for race day. Also, I can see a 1-2 turn delay from the change in weather as the water accumulates on the track.

Isgrimnur wrote: It specifies that you're able to change tires between qualifying, which we're not doing, and the race, but I don't see any reason not to allow a tire type change when you pit, especially if it starts raining mid-lap. I can easily see having rain tires stored in the truck if the weather report is iffy for race day. Also, I can see a 1-2 turn delay from the change in weather as the water accumulates on the track.

Tire changes in the pits are called out as allowed in the weather rules. Under pit stops at the bottom of page 11: "the driver may change the type of tire whenever he changes tires"

Thanks for directing me to it. Seemed kinda odd that it wasn't in the rules where I was looking. Not the best organized rulebook.

Nice! Just wanted to respond. I thoroughly loved your post. Keep up the great work on...

I'll bet Isgrimnur is flattered.

Rain and tire rules make about as much sense as the "one person revving their engine up causes everyone else's engines to blow out" rule, but if it gives me a chance to go faster, I'll take it.

For weather, do you get to decide your car build after finding out the weather, or just the tire choice?

I'm not sure I'm a big fan of any sort of long-term penalty for beating your car up too hard. If they can put it back together after you used it to decorate the wall, your mechanics should be able to fix a few dings and loose belts, and slap on some new brake pads. Also, I'd like to see fewer 'extra' mechanics introduced at one time rather than a giant bowl of "new game mechanics surprise!"

Weather reports will be in place before you put the car together. In most cases, the weather will be static for the whole race. Looking through the tracks, changeable weather is at most a 30% chance. on the initial roll.

Given modern racing, there's no fixing "your" car, as every car is different. Cars that win at races are taken apart for inspection, and some of them are shipped off to museums for display.

Looks like we've beaten the discussion to death.

I think everyone is on board with the tire and weather rules.

I think the 1st/8th; 2nd/7th start seeding has promise, and we can randomize the teams to allow for selection.

The only thing left (I believe) is to get a vote on the inclusion of the nitro as a one-shot, +1 space per gear option.

Then, I can select a track. I'm leaning toward the Hockenheimring track and shooting for an October 1st start so we can be done by Thanksgiving.

I'm down with it.

Damn I knew there was something productive I could have been doing on my vacation. Poopsicle. On the plus side, it's trivial to switch the map out on the site. I really wanted to add more functionality, but there's no time, cap'n!

No worries. If we can keep the league going, this will be the only race before the new year. Plenty of time for whatever improvements you're looking at.

Sounds good. I'd favor including the nitro rules, I think.

Thumbs up for nitro. I like having a little extra control over my car.

I would be a dissenter on the nitro rules. Would rather just work with tire choices.

Counting coop's introduction as a positive vote, that puts the nitro vote at 3-1 currently.

Nitro sounds interesting. I say we include it.

Nitro sounds interesting. I say we include it.

As I'm the mod and will defer, that's a majority of the remaining seven votes for the nitro.

Philistines.

Isgrimnur wrote:As I'm the mod and will defer, that's a majority of the remaining seven votes for the nitro.

Eight, since bb voted twice.

No ballot stuffing will be permitted.

Without a Voter ID law, you are powerless to prevent it!

Looks like coop's been hard at work for the new map. If we get confirmations from LM and Tommy, we should be good to go. Also, feel free to beat the bushes for new players, as we've still got the Green Machines sitting idle.

I'm probably a bad choice right now. I don't seem to be daily checker of OO right now and I can't speak for when my habits will change.

El Guapo wrote:

Isgrimnur wrote:As I'm the mod and will defer, that's a majority of the remaining seven votes for the nitro.

Eight, since bb voted twice.

I don't know what you guys are talking about. But the nitros sound like a cool idea. I'm for it.

Isgrimnur wrote:Looks like coop's been hard at work for the new map. If we get confirmations from LM and Tommy, we should be good to go. Also, feel free to beat the bushes for new players, as we've still got the Green Machines sitting idle.

I'm going to pass. I love Formula D on the tabletop, but don't think forum gaming is my thing. Hentzau knows, but I don't know if he's had a chance to drum up a new partner yet or not.

Worse comes to worse, he and I can consolidate.

Hentzau, pick a team color for us.

Will be shooting for a 10/1 start.

White again, please. Less confusing.

Sure thing. I'll take Tommy's slot so that you keep the same number as well.