I have in the meantime also thought some more about how transfers will work this year, this is how it will likely work:

We won't go back to a round based system, but stay with a continuous one like last year. Basically you can make offers to free agents at any time.
What then happens will change a little bit:
- Riders will have a minimum that they are going to accept at a specific point in time (which is not equal to the min wage in the db). That minimum will drop over the course of transfers until it reaches the min wage. That means the first signings are all going to be rather expensive. If you want to make a bargain that only will happen after a few days. (You can make the offer at the beginning already, though)
- Riders will publish what the top offer they got so far and state at what point they will sign for that. This point in time depends one their decreasing minimum but will be at least one day after they received the offer (so no instant signing)
- If a rider has received acceptable offers three days in a row he will instantly sign for the highest offer.
- Bids can be made by additionally giving a maximum of how far the bid can be increased. Should another manager also bid on a rider with less than that max, the counting leading bid is the bid of the other manager + x

Generally these rules should avoid that managers miss out completely on their targets and can readjust if they didn't get their first choices. Also bidding wars that are dragged out for a long while are avoided.

Transfers between teams will probably not be restricted. Only thing I'm thinking about is whether riders signed from FA should be allowed to be transferred. It is rather counter-intuitive to sign a rider just to sell him, but on the other hand contracted riders also just got their new contract...

Please let me know what you think about all of this!

Riders will publish what the top offer they got so far and state at what point they will sign for that. -> this will lead to bidding war no?

I am very much against selling newly acquired riders, this has been rather woeful in the past with major shenanigans happening from all sorts of managers (Overbidding on talents just to sell them for huge profit, overbidding on top riders to sell them to stay in budget...)

I quite liked the anonymous bidding system that we have had but I understand that especially for new manager it is not good. I myself have missed out on countless of my targets over the past 6 seasons & it is always weird when guys like Froome or Tony Martin are without contract after many days.

I think the system seems a bit overly complex though but why not give it a try. We have had worse transfer seasons here, another one barely will kill this game.

To be honest, I don't quite get it. Could you make a couple of examples? With leading bids and all that?

100% agreed with this, mainly for the points which I have put in bold. This seems like an improvement on the previous system and may take a while to get used to, but I like what the new system is aiming to do.



This was the only part I didn't understand. Two examples below;

Scenario 1
Rider X says that he will sign for 1000 on day 1. If nobody bids that amount, he will sign for 800 on day 3.
Does this mean that if he has bids over 800 on day 1 that he will accept the highest offer on day 3?
Or is it day 5, since he wasn't accepting offers between 800-999 until day 3?

Scenario 2
Team A places a bid on rider Y of 550, but is prepared to pay up to 800.
Team B places a bid of 620, with no maximum stated.
Team C places a bid of 590, with a maximum of 700.

Does team A have the leading bid (700 + x) or is it team B (620)?

Yeah that was maybe not worded well.
Scenario 1: He will sign on day 3. As soon as he gets that bid it will be made public that he got a bid of 800 and will accept it on day 3.
Scenario 2: The leading bid in that case would be 700 + x from Team A

@krisa: This could lead to bidding wars but with also a maximum given with a bid the hope is to not have many of them.

@Shonak: The bidding is still be anonymous. Riders will publish their leading offers but not who made them.

@Ripley: I'll come up with an example later

That already cleared up a lot, though more examples might still help.

Okay so we start with day 0 in transfers, which where no FA can be signed yet, but the first offers can be sent in. Usually after each day there will be an update and during it offers can be made.
For the example we have Teams A & B and Free Agents 1, 2, 3, 4. Free Agents 1, 2, 3 & 4 all have fixed values which they want at least to sign at day x. To make it easier they'll be the same for this example:

day 1: 1000
day 2: 900
day 3: 800
...

This means if a team wants to sign any of these riders after the first day they need to bid at least 1000.

For day 0 offers the teams send in these bids, optionally they include a maximum to which the bid can rise if two teams bid on a rider:
Team A:
- FA 1: 1000,
- FA 2: 950 (maximum 1000)

Team B:
- FA 4: 900

Following these first bids we get an transfer update (after day 0 -> day 1 begins). No rider signs at this point but each free agent gives an update on what offers he received:

	status	leading bid	sign
FA 1	unsigned	1000	day 1
FA 2	unsigned	950	day 2
FA 3	unsigned	-	-
FA 4	unsigned	900	day 2

On day 1 teams send these offers:
Team A:
FA 3: 620

Team B:
FA 2: 970,
FA 3: 600

After day 1 FA 1 signs with Team A for 1000 and we get the following update:

	status	leading bid	sign
FA 1	signed (A)	-	-
FA 2	unsigned	980	day 2
FA 3	unsigned	620	day 5
FA 4	unsigned	900	day 2

980 here is basically 970 + x.

Team B sends an offer of 800 for FA3

After day 2 FA 2 signs for 980 with Team A and FA 4 signs for 900 for Team B:

	status	leading bid	sign
FA 1	signed (A)	-	-
FA 2	signed (A)	-	-
FA 3	unsigned	800	day 3
FA 4	signed (B)	-	-

Only FA 3 remains unsigned. Team A sends an offer of 820, we get this update after day 3:

	status	leading bid	sign
FA 1	signed (A)	-	-
FA 2	signed (A)	-	-
FA 3	unsigned	820	day 4
FA 4	signed (B)	-	-

Team B sends an offer of 850 including a maximum of 950

Update after day 4:

	status	leading bid	sign
FA 1	signed (A)	-	-
FA 2	signed (A)	-	-
FA 3	unsigned	850	day 5
FA 4	signed (B)	-	-

Team A sends an offer of 900

After day 5, Free Agent 3 was already 3 times one day away from signing a contract so he will now immediately sign for Team B for 900 + x (due to the maximum). Additionally I here think that if a leading bid with a maximum covers any new bid the rider should also be signed immediately. Finally we get:

	status	leading bid	sign
FA 1	signed (A)	-	-
FA 2	signed (A)	-	-
FA 3	signed (B)	-	-
FA 4	signed (B)	-	-

This should cover everything and I hope it gets clearer now. Let me know what you think!

I either need more clarification or few more reads
Maybe just few more reads.


Shouldn't this be other way around? Made me confused.

Yes, fixed thanks

Think it's not as complicated as it first appeared, happy to give it a try but then again, my bidding will be pretty small anyway.

What are expectations of the riders in relation to their min wage, between +50 to 100%?

is the maximum editable if noticing it being exceeded?

If I understand it correactly, it will be harder to quickly secure a minimum wage rider while others are fighting for the big names?

Not 975? +10 increments across the board?


For 900 or for 910? 900 because he was the first to offer the sum or 910 (or 905) to go above the 2nd best offer?

Also, will the decline down to the min wage be in the same time span for all riders? Will the amount accepted on day 1 be the same %-wise above min wage for all riders?

Not sure yet thought about 2xmin wage at the start and then -100 in each iteration, so weaker riders accept for min wage quicker. Not sure yet, though.



You can always send a new bid



Maybe 975. I just did 10 for this example but I am not sure about it yet. Maybe it will be different depending on how high the bid is.

910 in this example. Or do you think 900 would be better?

For the last question see the answer to Shonak's question

Second Ollfardh on this, while this potentially sorts out the big names, it is penalizing managers for finding useful riders at min wage who the others might not have spotted. It is not fair if I make a bid which would've otherwise gone through but now gives other managers a chance to review the leading bid at least for one day.

If there is only one bid on a rider, it should still directly be accepted, irrespective of the day in which it is made. What's the point of scouring the DB otherwise. Just wait for others to do the research and then pounce for whoever has enough budget.

Good to see a few more examples. As I've said before, I do like the new system and think it is worth trying. It seems a lot fairer but I am a bit concerned about teams going over their budget with multiple "maximum" bids.


No, a wage of 910 (or 900 + x) makes a lot more sense in this example.


This is a good point, I think there should be a min wage limit (perhaps 300 and below) where riders will accept offers on day 1 if there is only one bid. That could also solve Ollfardh's issue I think.

Think thats a solid suggestion from OZ. Lower tier riders will be happy that they get a contract. Perhaps it is not a hard cut but more granular. E.g Below 72 0%, below 73 10% etc.

I dont remember last year's system well but I think riders didn't sign on the first day either and instead waited for a few? Only difference was that the leading bid was not published. The main issue of Abhi sounds less the waiting and more that the bid is published.

Whilst that sounds ok, please keep in mind that in MG every bid is public! Why is it ok for you in MG and not in ICL @Abhi, Ollfardh? I dont see an issue with publishing the bids if it finally avoids one of the major transfer issues: narrowly missing your targets. In return, it also helps those active mamagers to find good first leads as they can see which riders have not been bid on yet. So ppl who scour the DB regularly can gain an advantage still, just not so much on the first day when bids flock in.

What's with the (or 900 +x)? The rider's been signed, we must have a definite wage. As for 900 or 910: Had Team B sent a bid of 850 and max 900 (rather than 950) and then Team A counters with 900, I guess B should get the rider because he offered 900 first. In which case it should also be 900 with a 950 max.

Unlikely to happen at such a high wage, but could happen with low wage riders. Being first with 100, max 120 should beat a later 120. That'd be a small bonus for spotting a rider first.

As for "insta-sign" as well as -100 per iteration... ideally, I'd like to sign my captains first and then see how much I have left over for the rest. Can I still afford better and/or younger domestiques or do I have to pick a lot of old min wage riders? At first I thought that the new system would help me with that. ("That means the first signings are all going to be rather expensive." )

So I'll propose a radical idea, taking the 300 OZ mentioned: How about two rounds of transfers, first for riders with a min wage of 300+ and only when it's finished (no new bids for... 3 days) another one for the rest (including those unsigned above 300), including "insta-signing" with one bid?

It should also protect somewhat from the going over budget with several max bids, like OZ I do worry about that a bit.

Because in the MG, the bidding is in real time and one can quickly move on to other targets or transfers if the rider they are interested in gets out of budget, rather than waiting 24-72 hours just to see if someone is out of my budget, by which time I might lose out on some of my other options as well.