baseballlover312 wrote:
I'm against lowering FA's because I really value the historical continuity of the DB highly. Then again, I've also always been against raising any FA's, but we've been doing that forever.
Was that a yes ?
Yes.
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SotD wrote:
Riders with a specific value to the game I wouldn't touch
Understandable but in that case won't fix that we got way to many 80+ sprinters, and fair enough. Not saying I am for it, just finding out what was ment by it.
Tamijo wrote:
Would just be good if we could make a choice soon (as in very soon):
A: Go back to 15
B: Stay with PCM18 (+), no changes to system, make some profile updates (natural selection)
C: Stay with PCM18 (+), make some DB/System updates (and profile updates), in that case next would be to find out what need to be changed, so that managers know what to expect.
It is an endless debate, and no matter what is decided, some will like it others will not, just as when crashes was banned.
Just can't see any reason to drag it much longer as we won't get much more evidens to what the pros and cons are.
Going with B here, my vote isn't as important as others who have been here FAR longer than me and have a much bigger conection, but it's still a vote.
I've said my opinion in the past, with some recent views I'll keep it short and direct way. Stay with PCM18, AI benefits are just too much to overlook, make adjustements to the calendar regarding HIL races/stage-races, those that are SPECIFICALLY for puncheurs like Basque Country needs serious race redesign (and as has been mentioned, irl those ARE races for climbers), Imo the MO/HIL dynamics are good, depends on how the climbs and races are raced, short climbs the effort is higher so HIL is more important (longer climbs naturally mean HIL less important), so make changes thinking of that.
Regarding sprint stages, agree make roads wider and possibly much less technical, would help. However it's not a 100% complaint to the current system, Ewan irl for example is the strongest sprinter for me and he only manages to be in the fight for the wins like half times. I've learn PCM18 with strong leadouts there's a very good chance of burning too early, so my adaptation thought is to not have a leadout next season and allow sprinter to be better position, not too exposed. As for puncheurs it's widely accepted here that value will change this next transfer season, the Puncheurs with less mountain will have less value, those with more more valued (calendar changes can balance that well).
Making changes to stats, well I have to say I dont agree with that. Although it can look like a solid solution I'm afraid it can lead to for example the teams who struck gold this season with the talents will largely benefited when this generation maxes out. Will create an unbalance in the long-term.
SotD wrote:
Riders with a specific value to the game I wouldn't touch
Understandable but in that case won't fix that we got way to many 80+ sprinters, and fair enough. Not saying I am for it, just finding out what was ment by it.
Well some 80-81 sprinters could be adjusted a bit IMO... 79 SPR and then maybe a bit up in FL or so to make them still valuable, but not a "topsprinter" as they wasn't ever intended to be.
Regarding sprint stages, agree make roads wider and possibly much less technical, would help. However it's not a 100% complaint to the current system, Ewan irl for example is the strongest sprinter for me and he only manages to be in the fight for the wins like half times. I've learn PCM18 with strong leadouts there's a very good chance of burning too early, so my adaptation thought is to not have a leadout next season and allow sprinter to be better position, not too exposed. As for puncheurs it's widely accepted here that value will change this next transfer season, the Puncheurs with less mountain will have less value, those with more more valued (calendar changes can balance that well).
Making changes to stats, well I have to say I dont agree with that. Although it can look like a solid solution I'm afraid it can lead to for example the teams who struck gold this season with the talents will largely benefited when this generation maxes out. Will create an unbalance in the long-term.
I just think the adaptation of "make your team objectively worse to cheese the AI" is not a real solution to the sprint problem. Strong teams should be favored, or the whole system of building a team breaks down.
RIP Exxon Duke, David Veilleux, Double Feature, and Monster Energy
At the moment it makes absolutely NO SENSE to bring a top tier sprinter to a GT, unless he also is a very strong puncheur who can therefor win on mutliple terrains. The very best sprinters are not, however, and thus are wasted in GT's. Maybe we could somehow differentiate to make sure the best pure sprinters have enough racedays to be used in a GT - or maybe make the cost lower for sprinters than for GC riders. If it costed 14 racedays to enter er GT it might be interesting. I mean, I have enough racedays for Coquard to make him ride every single interesting race that isn't a GT right now, but if I take out 21 racedays I will get less overall points for sure. A 2/3 kinda option might intrigue to get more sprinters into the biggest races of the world. I know some would be against it, but I would be for - even if I didn't have Coquard - simply because I feel like we don't see the best riders in the GT's which we do IRL. The same could apply for puncheurs.
I know this doesn't solve the problem and is just an extra incentive rather than a fix, but what about changing the way the Points Jersey works in GTs to the way it does in real life (i.e. more points at finishes for flat stages, then hills, then MO/TT stages) so there's more reward for a sprinter at a GT?
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It would be a good thing indeed, although not something that would make me put a topsprinter into a GT. Too little points to be scored unless you clean the plate with pointsjersey almost from the start to the finish compared with what you can score elsewhere.
SotD wrote:
It would be a good thing indeed, although not something that would make me put a topsprinter into a GT. Too little points to be scored unless you clean the plate with pointsjersey almost from the start to the finish compared with what you can score elsewhere.
Which is why you're seeing Ewan staying far away from the GT's, and why i've not even sent Ricki or Kek to the Vuelta or Giro (i think Ricki might be in the Tour purely to use up RD).
The big issue for me isn't so much the points return, but that where GC riders can no longer crash out and waste RD, Sprinters can still be eliminated from the time limit and waste RD. Ewan probably could compete for a Points Jersey (with a slight tweak to the rankings, or a touch of training) but when he could be eliminated from the race on any mountain.... not worth it!!!
Even more so when i can send Ewan to every race i want without RD issues, and even throw him into some fun ones! 21 RD in Classics and Short Stage Races with almost guaranteed points, or 21 RD on a GT i might not finish... hmmm...
(btw, this is totally not an AI problem but honestly this just had to be said)
SotD wrote:
I am with you here DD - I would also vote B. I hope the sprint thing can be atleast somewhat fixed though and maybe proven well before the off season so people know what to expect - same applies for hills I guess.
For cobbles I have no clue why Maxime Daniel is performing so horrible, but I haven't really looked that much into numbers yet, so there could be an easy solution for it and maybe even a trainable solution.
I do however think we need to make it possible for riders with below 60 MO/HI to get a quick fix. Not for free of course, but we need to make it possible for riders that are completely broken get up to some standard.
It could be as simple as the current rule, but up to +5 stats pr. season instead of +2 in those segments.
This would mean I could purchase Vlatos from 52 MO to 57 in one season. If the same fee rule applies as usual that would cost: 100K + 200K + 400K + 800K + 1600K = 3,1mio, which is obviously too much, but maybe one could say:
1st training 100K
2nd-5th training x 1,5 (Cummulative)
So 100 + 150 + 225 + 338 + 507 = 1.320K
It may look like a HUGE upgrade, but really it's about getting riders up to what they could before. Several riders are hurt by a very low MO stat - this could help those become atleast somewhat usefull.
as Ive said before for low MO punchers you should be given an option to reduce HL stat and use the money that wouldve been spent to get there to upgrade mountain stat
For me I'd change the below 67 rule to be easier to work with. Instead of needing to be 10 below the riders average, just 10 below the riders best attribute. I don't think this breaks the game or DB in any way as a rider with 78+ in any other attribute simply isn't going to suddenly become drastically different because they were able to raise a different attribute up to 67.
The closest possible things to gaining too much out of this would be sprinters or cobblers adding HL stat, though again, I don't think going up to 67 is enough to warrant them suddenly becoming good on the hillier versions of the races designed for them.
Like YJ my vote wouldn't should count as much but I also like Tamijo's option B.
I am in the camp that has no problem with the sprint results particularly given the huge number of similar sprinters in many races (Holloway has done pretty consistently well which I think is because of his balanced stats).
The problem I have is how they happen, I think sprint trains are of no or negative benefit in many stages. I think that is a problem because it takes away team building which is a big part of the fun. Cleaning up the finishes will help but my pet theory I have been trying to convince Tamijo about is that shortening them would also help (in the absence of other fixes to the AI).
So Cunegoo if you are still offering to test things - I would be interested if doing a 130km flat stage vs a 180km flat stage results in more trains formed and more success for the riders with them.
I like the idea of making GTs more attractive to sprinters. As an American team with Holloway the Tour of America would be an obvious target for us but I could never justify using that many race days. Maybe you let sprinters strategically withdraw as happens in the Giro. You could designate one stage as the sprinters last day and anyone who opts for that gets a lower race day cost and drops out afterwards. Maybe only 3 riders per team can do that to avoid entire teams dropping out. Then one or two GTs could be front loaded with a bunch of flat stages to try and attract the top sprinters. Who could also then wear the leader's jersey increasing their point scoring ability.
As I see it from this tread – we got these main issues.
1/ Hilly profiles (mainly in stage races)
“Unbalanced high HI versus low MO: makes 50% of the top punchers to bad compared with 15”
2/ Too many breakaway wins on undulated flat profiles (to some extend also pure flat)
“Unbalanced DB with lower half riders to week to help catch breakaway”
3/ Top Riders (punchers / sprinter) to risky to enter in longer stage races (mainly GT) as stage hunting can only provide a certain amount of points / compared to a 21 race days cost.
4/ Sprinter result a bit random in all mass sprint (not sure how bad this is if profiles was 3-4 wide with no sharp turns in the last 5-10 km, will depend on the profile what is possible but the earlier the better)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
This might be a solution without changing the current DB.
NEW TRAINING RULE:
(this is an additional rule/option does not replace Rider Average Exemption
LOW STATUS TRAINING
(only fully developed riders as usual)
The maximum a stat can be raised to using this method is 73.
This can only be used on Flat-Mountain-Res
A stat can only be raised by 5 points/year
Cost:
73 600,000
72 500,000
71 400,000
70 350,000
69 300,000
68 250,000
67 200,000
66 150,000
≤65 100,000
(no extra cost for 2 update ect.)
This could help unbalanced MO/HI
This could make a more valid peloton (breakaway hunting)
This could help sprinter survive the 21 day in GT
Maybe this could make better trains (not so sure about that)
Comments: I understand why we had the “fear” of lifting the lower skill too much in PCM15, as there was this fear of status inflation, but in PCM18 the engine works best without too many 50-60 flat/mountain riders and if it is limited to 73 will never become top riders unless you put another 7+ millions on top something that will never happen.
Long race exception (8 race days or more):
Rider with 50 or less PT race days (no matter if actually in PT) with both MO and TT below 78 uses only half the race days.
NB: not sure if this one will be possible to handle as admin if not then must look for another similar rule.
Edited by Tamijo on 23-04-2020 07:12
Still need to read this fully but some things I have picked up now and find pretty interesting and likely to come into the MG for next season:
1) Point Rankings in GT more towards sprinters, e.g. 40 points flat stage, 25 hill, 15 mountain or something. Just numbers yet, need to calculate those properly with some former GTs as example, so that it would still be a nice fight obviously.
2) Low Status Training: In especially the mountain stat here is important using PCM18, so making it easier/cheaper to get riders from 50-65 to up this a bit and maybe even going a bit higher until 72/73 with cheaper prices could work well with the PCM18 AI using this stat different.
Example could be Juul-Jensen with 70 I think, who is not longer strong enough. Though need to have a proper look here until what stat it really makes sense. Surely for those 60`s, e.g. Vlatos, who is struggling too much.
Other things, likely to be made:
3) TTs suffer once they are hilly as they are automatically counted as mountain TT basically.
So when wanting to have a mountain TT, easy.
When wanting a flat TT, easy, just go pan flat.
When attempting to make hilly, likely the PCM18 AI works best with some kind of _________/ stage only, which does look weird on real life hill TT view but should lead to flat TT riders suffering and the climb itself not hard enough for mountain riders.
Thing is, it needs to be tested how e.g. a pure puncheur like Ponzi does against a combo puncheur TT rider such as Coppel, Boom, Reus etc and vs. a mountain TT rider such as Keizer.
So testing needed here, but likely the design of TTs need to be changed anyway in the way, they are supposed to come.
4) Hill Stages will look different in stage races probably. e.g. Pais Vasco (in MG a pure puncheur race) or Beijing (pure puncheur race with big climbs). Both are in PCM18 more climber races, so they likely need stage design changes. Same for couple other races.
The classics show, that PCM18 can handle puncheur only hill races well. So just stage design issue.
5) Sprinters. The main issue AI wise.
Basically testing needed here with level 3 and better level 4 roads and close to 0 stuff on final 10km such as corners, roundabouts etc. Hopefully this can already cut lots of issues.
5-6) Basically an issue combining with the sprinter issue. The breakaways are caught too late. AND while this is indeed not a great point, it is WAY better than PCM15, where basically on every sprint stage as a reporter I frustrated as the gap was down to 1-2min with 40km to go and still the same gap with 10km to go and then most often not getting a catch.
In PCM18 the catch at least is made pretty often, so that sprinters take the win. Just failing the organization unfortunately and hurting teams with leadouts.
That said, hopefully those long flat, wide roads will already fix this in parts. Other than that I also doubt that the stat matrix play a role here. This also happens in regular DBs imo and is more a general PCM issue, not only in PCM18.
Breaks simply don`t lose enough energy late in the stage, while still being able to improve their powermeter by quite a lot going as fast as the peloton with fresh rides.
One issue also the late attacks by the break. The attacker is suddenly going 10 km/h faster than the others, and so also gains this advantage on the peloton, where the pace is staying same. Also not just in PCM18 but already worse in PCM15.
NEW TRAINING RULE:
(this is an additional rule/option does not replace Rider Average Exemption
LOW STATUS TRAINING
(only fully developed riders as usual)
The maximum a stat can be raised to using this method is 73.
This can only be used on Flat-Mountain-Res
A stat can only be raised by 5 points/year
Cost:
73 600,000
72 500,000
71 400,000
70 350,000
69 300,000
68 250,000
67 200,000
66 150,000
≤65 100,000
(no extra cost for 2 update ect.)
This could help unbalanced MO/HI
This could make a more valid peloton (breakaway hunting)
This could help sprinter survive the 21 day in GT
Maybe this could make better trains (not so sure about that)
Comments: I understand why we had the “fear” of lifting the lower skill too much in PCM15, as there was this fear of status inflation, but in PCM18 the engine works best without too many 50-60 flat/mountain riders and if it is limited to 73 will never become top riders unless you put another 7+ millions on top something that will never happen.
I think this needs some rethinking, because as I see it, this will benefit the top tier riders more than others. I haven't looked into ages, but your suggestion opens up to these:
Edvald Boasson Hagen 70 > 72 MO
Sam Bewley 69 > 72 MO
Angel Madrazo 68 > 71 FL
Michael van Stayen 64 > 71 FL
Justo Tenorio 68 > 70 FL
Arnaud Demare 67 > 70 MO
Bryan Coquard 58 > 70 MO
The less strong riders are, the worse because of the +10 stat rule. For example, can Viennet "only" become 65 MO because of his OVL. A rider like Jaroslaw Marycz can only become 63 MO etc.
So while I agree with your thoughts this need to be recalculated to ensure the strongest riders won't benefit from it. That is probably why 67 was the top end before while 73 to me seems too high. I have riders with 73 MO that works brilliantly as breakaway riders - so to enhance riders with a very high OVL to take advantage of their substats like that isn't good imo.
Another thing if we are making a list of stuff to fix for next season, is changing cobbles from having every section being 5 star. This is making for brutal stages where selection is frequently happening in the first half of the race and the race just essentially comes down to who has the best cobbles stat with good form.
Having just done Kigali... it was brutal, we were down to 20ish riders very fast, and then only 8 or 9 for a long portion of the stage. Ideally the main field should still stay mostly together until the last 3rd of the race at least.
SotD wrote:
I am with you here DD - I would also vote B. I hope the sprint thing can be atleast somewhat fixed though and maybe proven well before the off season so people know what to expect - same applies for hills I guess.
For cobbles I have no clue why Maxime Daniel is performing so horrible, but I haven't really looked that much into numbers yet, so there could be an easy solution for it and maybe even a trainable solution.
I do however think we need to make it possible for riders with below 60 MO/HI to get a quick fix. Not for free of course, but we need to make it possible for riders that are completely broken get up to some standard.
It could be as simple as the current rule, but up to +5 stats pr. season instead of +2 in those segments.
This would mean I could purchase Vlatos from 52 MO to 57 in one season. If the same fee rule applies as usual that would cost: 100K + 200K + 400K + 800K + 1600K = 3,1mio, which is obviously too much, but maybe one could say:
1st training 100K
2nd-5th training x 1,5 (Cummulative)
So 100 + 150 + 225 + 338 + 507 = 1.320K
It may look like a HUGE upgrade, but really it's about getting riders up to what they could before. Several riders are hurt by a very low MO stat - this could help those become atleast somewhat usefull.
as Ive said before for low MO punchers you should be given an option to reduce HL stat and use the money that wouldve been spent to get there to upgrade mountain stat
That's actually an interesting idea. Might be an easy and fair way to fix certain puncheurs without giving them stats for free.
5) Sprinters. The main issue AI wise.
Basically testing needed here with level 3 and better level 4 roads and close to 0 stuff on final 10km such as corners, roundabouts etc. Hopefully this can already cut lots of issues.
Already did change some of those stages so can do test, strangely enough most results are "fine" already this year but would be interesting to see if removing those late curves (3-4 wide) in lets say barbedos will result in more top 3 riders:
Coquard - Swift - Degenkolb
making more solid top 5 results every day.
If you want can do a series of 3D test - (10?) and see what we get?
Kentaurus wrote:
Another thing if we are making a list of stuff to fix for next season, is changing cobbles from having every section being 5 star. This is making for brutal stages where selection is frequently happening in the first half of the race and the race just essentially comes down to who has the best cobbles stat with good form.
Having just done Kigali... it was brutal, we were down to 20ish riders very fast, and then only 8 or 9 for a long portion of the stage. Ideally the main field should still stay mostly together until the last 3rd of the race at least.
Will be done surely. A bit more variety as cobble stars indeed work now better, so no need to make it 5 stars only.
![imgur.com/KlJUqDx.jpg[/img[img]]https://imgur.com/yUygrQ.jpg](https://imgur.com/KlJUqDx.jpg[/img[img]]https://imgur.com/yUygrQ.jpg)
