New Formula Cycling is - obviously - a fictional new way of organising professional cycling. It can be seen as a new sport within the greater cycling cloud. It is a form of road racing.
In New Formula Cycling, you have the perfect mixture of the smaller peloton like in cyclo-cross and the longer, road, races like in .. road cycling. Here is how it works:
Races:
There are only handful of races on the calendar. (although every season might be different, more races might appear) This is a mixture of one-day races and stage races. The rules during the race are the same as in road cycling.
Races will never overlap and there is plenty of time between races for recuperation.
Teams:
There are a number of teams. Every team competes in every race, and every race has the same teams competing.
Every team has exactly 8 riders in its squad.
Every team has to select 5 riders for a race.
How will it work?
Races will be reported here. The reports might be very short, and might or might not include screenshots. It's a test, so much will depend on how much time & motivation I have. I hope that, as this game grows, that others can step in to help me report and run the game, like the ManGame on the site. Then again, it might not. The results will come out of 3D racing in Pro Cycling Manager 2018.
The way you play this game is quite up to you. Basically you will be in charge of one team in this game. It will be up to you to select which riders compete in which race. But even before that, it'll be essential to build a squad consisting of 8 riders, diverse enough to tackle all sorts of terrain.
On the other hand, there is room for role-playing here as well. Much like CX: A New Dawn this game will run on the imagination of you, the players. Before, in between and after races you will be making posts about what is happening. You can do this from the standpoint of the team, or an individual rider, or ...
Is this time consuming?
I think not, but it's a commitment nonetheless, also on my part. While CX: A New Dawn went far, I'm also aware that this is a long time ago and our lives are very different now. So I refrain from making bold statements. I will do my best to keep this game active (but perhaps slow), and then it's up to you to react to the game.
Basically, it's up to you. I require of you only a few things:
- making the team / riders
- Assigning 5 riders for each race
That's it so far. But of course the game gets more fun if you react and stay engaged. I once again looks at CX:AND and remember what fun times those were, when several people were active and commenting.
2019 Season
We will start the game with the 2019 Season.
For the lore of the game (fictional universe, fictional riders), I will probably change the name of most races.
Because this game will depend mostly on you, I have not yet decided which races will feature in the first season.
If you want to play, please read the following paragraphs carefully.
Sign-Up
We'll need teams to get this game started. We'll do the start-up in 3 phases, and if we can successfully manage each phase, we can start the game.
Phase 1:
In phase 1, you pick a sponsor and sign-up with 8 riders.
You don't have to set any stats yet, nor age, specialisation... This will come once the calendar is known, so you can manage your team the best way you can.
Sign-up sheet for phase 1:
Name of the Team: List of riders:
1. name (nationality)
2. name (nationality)
3. name (nationality)
4. name (nationality)
5. name (nationality)
6. name (nationality)
7. name (nationality)
8. name (nationality)
This is basically you saying you are in the game. You can still change the riders in phase 2, so this is all very informal. You can even put TBD (to be decided) for the riders. The only thing you need to be sure about is the team. Once a team is taken, others can't pick it.
The teams to pick from are the teams in the PCM official release database. Also notice (can't fix this, no download possible atm) that this is official release, meaning BMC is not licensed, just like a few other teams. Be safe, pick a sponsor which has its real name and jersey for the PCM 18 release. If you want, I can make a list which teams those are.
Additionally, you can give suggestions of which races you'd like to see in the first season of this new cycling format. It'll have to be a mixture of different terrain, but do give suggestions. This you can do in phase 1, too.
Example sheet
Spoiler
Name of the Team: Lotto Soudal List of riders:
1. Peter Johan (Belgium)
2. Gerald Barbecue (Australia)
3. ZZTop Fan (France)
4. TBD
5. TBD
6. TBD
7. TBD
8. TBD
List of teams you can choose from in following spoiler!
Spoiler
Phase 2:
In phase 2, we'll see how many players there are. Hopefully there are enough to continue. I hope for at least 8 players.
In phase 2, we'll be picking the calendar. What races do most people like? Do we find a nice balance? How many races for the first season?
Phase 3:
In phase 3, you'll be deciding the age and stats of your riders. You'll also assign the riders to the races (or at least the first race)
Extra Info-Dump, thoughts
Still thinking on how the stats will work. Probably something like this:
One rider can have 975 skill points spread out (13x75)
One rider can have 762 skill points spread out (13x74)
Two riders with 923 skill points spread out (13x72)
Probably with some extra rules (only one skill below 55 ... ...)
Between seasons, stats might change. I'm not sure how this'll work yet. Maybe riders under 25 can add some stats, riders above 30 lose some stats. Maybe I'll do this automatically, or you can choose... This will all be decided later.
Also, stats might or might not be a secret. What are your thoughts on that? Do the players send the stats to me by PM, or post them here for everyone to see? Might be fun to not know the stats of the opponents, right?
I might play myself, too, with a team.
Races will be with a control team, not interfering. Or I just pick a team, put everyone on automatic and difficulty on normal.
Probably no money-aspect to the game.
There will be an overall competition, though. Top 10 in every race scores points (stage races work a bit different, with points for stages, jerseys and overall GC)
There will be a WC, but this will be like a regular one-day race, in team format. So no countries. Just a single race at the end of the season, not for points in the competition but for that jersey, to be worn the next season.
We start only with one season, with limited races. This is an experiment. I have a job, most of you have a job, we all lead busy lives. Let's see how we can make this work, if we can make it work. CX:AND was a blast, I hope for something similar. Let's just keep it fun, for the players and for me. If it doesn't work out, I hope everyone can accept that, too. But hopefully we can give it a shot and see what a "test"season brings.
Shoot me your questions or interest/sign-up sheets below. Edited by Ian Butler on 29-09-2019 16:23
24/02/21 - kandesbunzler said “I don't drink famous people."
15/08/22 - SotD said "Your [jandal's] humour is overrated"
11/06/24 - knockout said "Winning is fine I guess. Truth be told this felt completely unimportant." [ICL] Santos-Euskadi | [PT] Xero Racing
Another thought is to start with an experimental pre-season race, or 2. Before commiting to an entire season, get a few races under the belt?
Additional thoughts:
Make the calendar a bit more mixed:
- 2 different competitions (like World Cup & Superprestige in CX)
- Some Classics/Monuments (2-3 races that return every season, more prestige, but not counting for the overall classificaiton)
- WC
TheManxMissile wrote:
Yes you'll need to put up a list of teams in PCM18, some of us don't have the game.
True
I'll do that later today.
On the other hand, shouldn't be too difficult to change a shirt. Because I do have the correct shirts, just can't get the database working right. But I can change the "COM" shirt to the BMC shirt, probably.
These are the teams you can choose from. (a few U23 teams are listed, though, these might not be possible, we'll see if someone picks them or not)
btw TMM, female cyclists are allowed.
No Aliens, Cyborgs, Vampires or Wizards, though. (no, I don't put them in the same category. And yes, that statement might seem dubious)
SSJ2Luigi wrote:
Name of the Team: Astana Pro Team
List of riders:
1. Henrik-Eggerts Hyllestad
2. Lukasz Niehüser
3. Lazer Milosevic
4. Pavel Dionisiev
5. Denis Kasymov
6. Márton Farkas
7. Nils-Sverre Storøygard
8. Luigi Cabras
There is also the reporting format to be figured out. Some possibilities:
- 3D racing, reporting the highlights of the race (perhaps some screenshots)
- 3D racing, keep results but game host "inventing" how the race went
- 3D racing, some hybrid of the two above.
- Simulation (don't know if simulation in PCM18 is any good though), keep results and invent how the race went
- 3D/Sim keep result, no comments or highlights at all, only result (most risky, though, when people start RP-ing and contradicting each other how it went down...)
For me Ian it's about what works best for you, I'd prefer the first three depending on what style you want. Don't like simulation. Looking forward to this a lot
Name of the Team: Groupama - FDJ
List of Riders:
1. TBD
2. TBD
3. TBD
4. TBD
5. TBD
6. TBD
7. TBD
8. TBD
24/02/21 - kandesbunzler said “I don't drink famous people."
15/08/22 - SotD said "Your [jandal's] humour is overrated"
11/06/24 - knockout said "Winning is fine I guess. Truth be told this felt completely unimportant." [ICL] Santos-Euskadi | [PT] Xero Racing
Just yesterday I was (literally) dusting of my Wilier road bike with the intention of getting back in the saddle (again). So that provides some inspiration to select the Wilier Triestina - Selle Italia outfit if that is acceptable.
Name of the Team: Wilier Triestina - Selle Italia List of riders:
1. Marko Balaban
2. Rocco Torres
3. Sean Chisholm
4. Pierino Baffi
5. Matteo Mancini
6. Tiberio Mancini
7. Dario Russo
8. Ernesto Rossi
Name of the Team:Verandas Willems-Crelan List of riders:
1. Fabian Gilbert
2. Philippe Cancellara
3. Wout van Boonen
4. Tom van Aert
5. Marko Petacchi
6. Alex Cavendish
7. Alberto Valverde
8. Alejandro Contador
I wish to see the following races on the calendar:
Strade Bianchi, Paris-Nice, Tirreno-Adriatico, Milano-Sanremo, Paris-Roubaix, De Ronde van Vlaanderen, Liege-Bastogne-Liege, Gent-Wevelgem, Itzulia Basque Country, Eneco Tour, Lombardia, Paris-Tours.
Luis Leon Sanchez wrote:
Scorchio, the original post was from 2019 and only popped up again due to a spam post. I doubt it will be continuing.
Thanks for pointing that out mate, I completely failed to pay attention to the posting date. Shame, as could have been very interesting. As you highlight a spam post reivigorated this, and now I have got the bandwagon rolling again .