To Stop the 2011 thread getting taken over completely, here's an idea thread for 2012.
We're always looking to improve the game where possible, and so any idea is welcome to be suggested and discussed here.
Post from 2011 thread:
Smowz wrote:
Thought I would throw a few ideas for the 2012 season out there:
Reading through this thread I can see where the training ideas came from, the problem is what to spend money on instead. The only thing to spend money on was on transfers, and we saw some large transfer fees being spent.
Anyway my two ideas for money to be spent is this:
1) Contract buy outs... to appear between the contracts and the transfer season (or even within the transfer season) a kinda one or two week window in which a team can buy out another riders contract by bidding a certain amount more than the riders current contract. (I don't know twice as much)
That price would be paid to the team and that would be the riders new wage.
Perhaps put a restriction that CTour teams cannot do this to Protour teams.
2) Second idea was again a kinda between Contract renewals and transfer season. I noticed with the negotiations for riders like Ricco and Uran took a long time to be completed - this really tied those teams up away from other transfer negotiations waiting.
Anyway the idea - was to have a sort of independent agent who has a handful of selected riders - Kessler or Wegmenn for example who people bid signing on fees. All the riders have preset wages - the team with the highest bid would get to pick which individual they wanted and the next would get to pick from those left etc.
Anyway just thought I would throw these ideas out there!
rjc_43 wrote:
1) Contract buy outs was kind of in play when I joined (2009 season). It came along in the form of Contract Release Clauses.
Three riders from your team asked for CRCs and you selected a level for them. I didn't understand the process, and as a result set the CRC for one of my riders as low (there was no upper or lower limit). People could then bid on your riders with CRCs continually until they hit that limit. In which case the rider went to that team, you got the money, and lost the rider. It was a pointless and very very annoying system.
Trust me, having your best riders, or best support riders, bought off you, when you are powerless to do anything about it, is damn fucking annoying. I will not support such a venture again. In fact, if I had my team ripped to shreds by such a horrible notion, I doubt I would continue to play the Man Game. For me, seasons of effort and team building would be destroyed by new managers with the usual shed load of money just bidding on one good rider, and 19 crap ones. You will understand, come this transfer season, the difficulty of juggling contract renewels, and then a tight ass budget to buy new good riders. Don't make it harder for yourself.
2) The entire point of having people tied up on bids for riders for so long, is to allow other riders to "sneak" under the radar, so to speak. I see that what you're saying is basically like putting a new team with free agents in it, with set wages for teams to try and buy the riders. It's sort of an interesting idea, but then again, that's the whole point of teams renewing riders to sell on for money. Free agents should, in my opinion, stay free agents (with the fluctuating wages to punish stupid new teams bidding 1.5mil on one rider who SHOULD be in the Pro Tour but ends up in the Conti - Ricco, anyone?) and Contracted RIders stay as such.
Other wise you get someone being able to splash 1.5 mil of their money, but only 500,000 of their salary cap, on one awesome rider, and then being able to buy another rider with the spare salary cap. It just doesn't really work - in my opinion.
But, as usual, there are changes each season, and SN usually consults a lot of people before implementing new ideas, rules, etc, so keep firing out the ideas.
SportingNonsense wrote:
I generally agree with Rjc here
The contract release clauses - or stealing as it was called in the first transfer season I believe. I hated them, and dont miss them. So many teams got screwed over in such a way, for example personally, I lost Niemiec to Jolly_antunes on the final day of one transfer season because he had money left so put in a large bid over the steal limit, automatically getting the rider - having never previously shown interest in Niemiec. I was uanble to respond, in terms of getting a better deal, or getting a replacement, since it was simply too late.
I believe that one of the key ideas of this game is that you get a 'connection' to your team. Youve chosen your riders, you like the riders you have, you want them to do well. If you want to keep a rider, while there may be budget constraints at times, youll do your best to keep them - you dont want to have that rider taken from you, with you being helpless.
So in short, its been tried, didnt work well, and wont be returning.
rjc_43 wrote:
By the way, I didn't mean to come across as overly aggressive, but yeah, I just do happen to get rather wound up in transfer time, as SN will testify to , so anything making it worse will cause me to melt down.
Smowz wrote:
Rjc: Did not think you were aggressive at all in the response. Quite constructive in fact, it interests me that this contract buyout thing has been tried before and clearly led to a lot of problems.
It is too confrontational and of course will lead to some grey ethics like late snatches.
When I view the transfer season last year there was a lot of late money floating about with middle of the road riders going for large amounts of money just because teams had money to spend. Which I suppose it what market forces are all about! But I am trying to think of other things for people to spend their hard earned money on - I agree that people that succeed in their goals should be rewarded.
A lot of the best riders currently come from teams being just disbanded. Maybe it would be best if those riders had a process whereby a team could step in and take over the contract negotiations for that particular rider. Lets for example take Ikea - Vanspreybrouk, Albert, Taaramae and Alarcon ride for them and if they disbanded then of course teams would be climbing over each other to sign them. But what about the results they gained in the previous season, they are forgotten in the melee.
How about some sort of agency to be set up whereby a select say 10 (in total) of these riders from disbanded teams could be have a sort of draft in which you get a signing fee auction for the picks.
Next idea I had which I think has been floated around before is about continental races with a small amount of teams. With the lengthy stage races like Tachira, Columbia and America this may be seen as acceptable. But it does suck to see 5 stage and some classics have so few teams in. One of the biggest problems is the lack of attacking riding and the peleton rides around in a bunch for the whole stage.
Also it seems a bit frustrating too see teams getting five or six of their squad in the top 25 - I believe there is a race towards the end of the year with just four sqauds in and that means that all but three riders will score points just for turning up!
I was thinking that a couple of U23 squads (that do not gain experience points) could be set up to increase the numbers in races past 60 (i.e. at least 8 full 7 man squads) for every race. These teams would not have great riders in and would only be formed after the transfer season for the purpose of filling space. Of course these teams could well take part in breaks and even conceivably win stages or even place riders in the top 25.
Kami wrote:
About Ricco. My actual plan was to get Van Garderen + a stage racer for my team. But during the transfer period i got ill and was away for a few days. In that time, the deal for Cataldo (which i also contacted Levi for) got sealed. At the same time Van Garderen already went up another 50k, and i don't think Wikipedia was running out of cap at that moment.
So actually one of my only choices left was Ricco, as i needed a puncheur and a climber. And seeing i was up against another new CTteam, it was my best chance to get a rider like that.
It wasn't even my plan to go over 700.000 for Ricco and wanted more or less a team with Goss, Kirchen type riders (subtop).
fenian_1234 wrote:
One thing I'd like - can't remember if I've mentioned this before - is for CT teams to pay a premium to get a big star. Let's say Vespa want to sign Cunego in the close season and Wiggle do too after being promoted. For me to win the auction, let's say I have to outbid Wiggle by 10 or 20%?
The exact amount could depend on the stat level of the affected rider.
I think these riders should be able to ride in the CT - take Di Luca as a real life recent example - but if you do end up getting them the cost should leave you with little left over to mount a rounded promotion bid.
I like the idea about minimum number of teams in a race, smowz. I've suggested before cancelling races that don't get enough subscriptions - SN didn't like that. Could be interesting to put a few teams in of free riders to make up the numbers to a minimum.
SotD wrote:
I like the CT overbidding PT teams. It would probably be realistic, but should also only be with riders on an average of above 70 or so. No need for CT teams to pay more for a talent. Often those riders are as likely to chose a smaller team than the bigger ones.
CT Races with few teams: Id rather see more teams, or less races, than inputting other teams to interfere with the races.
Every CT team gets to choose exactly where they race, and I dont like the idea of teams noone cares about interfering with the results.
Now, the idea of CT teams battling for PT teams for riders. What I dont want is to inflict large restrictions on CT teams for doing what they need to do to promote, and then have a good chance of staying up once there. A couple of ideas to throw out (Not necesarilly saying I support them, but its good to have them discussed):
- CT teams have a higher minimum bid increase for riders over a certain average
- The Salary Cap is split into 3 layers: PT > CT > New CT Teams (Maybe 3.5m, 2.5m 2m)
id be particularly interested to see any of the managers who joined this season, or even the season before, would have felt about the salary cap thing - would have it been offputting, and annoying that it could perhaps prevent you from even challenging the existing CT teams?
And at the end of the day, remember that all teams have the requirement for at least 20 riders - and PT teams do have 1 million more on their salary cap than CT teams - that is quite a gap that ought really to help in securing the better riders.
I was going to say Fenian, in regards to Cunego, should I want him on my team, I doubt you'd be able to outbid me. Plus, a rider with an average that high I really feel is wasted in the Continental Tour. Sure, he'd rule whatever races he was in (as he does in Pro Tour) but he'd get barely any race days.
EDIT: That's not to say I disagree with the rider in the conti tour - as with Ricco, I don't think he should be really, but I'm not going to suggest putting a rule in to enforce that. Managers are 100% free to build their teams the way they want to. Just be prepared for heated crying/anger should you buy someone I want Just part of the game.
Plus, as I'm showing, you can get promoted fairly easily without a massively big star. Just a wide range of good quality riders. Who took me 2 seasons to build up. Patience is better than a short term quick expensive buy, in my opinion anyway.
And, I doubt I'll have actual space for Cunego - for those that are interested in my cap - once all my loaned riders come back (nigh on maxed) and most of my chosen riders are maxed (like Ponzi, Diggle, M.Rowe, etc).
Edited by rjc_43 on 28-11-2010 12:09
About CT teams overbidding PT teams, avg of 70 is too low I think. I think 76/77 is a better limit. I just arranged the DB by avg now, and at 77 we got riders like Serpa, Hagen, Samuel Sanchez, Henao Montoya, Kirchen, Ginnani etc
At 76 we got riders like Løvkvist, Davis, Breschel, Goss, Cornu, Di Luca, Evans, Vanspeybruck, Van Garderen etc
At 75 we got riders like Van den broeck, Greipel, Monfort, Marquez, Albert, Ratiy etc
Just to get a perspective on things. I think that the 75 avg riders are not too unlikely to find in Pro-CT squads, I also belive that makeing it too expensive for CT squads to get a "star" would make it less interesting for some. As an example I bet Kami is really looking forward to see Ricco race and is more active around the times he's racing.
BUT a small "fine", let's say 10% higher wage (than the bid they got him with, for example winning the rider at 800k will give the rider 880k in wage, 20% would then give 20%)
Could also be a system where the higher avg the more extra. over 76 = 10%, over 78=20%, over 80=33%.
In the CT today then Ricco would get about 1,1 millions, Pozzatto 720k, Steegmans 1 mill.
Gusev would be 850k, Ignatiev 720k, Schumacher 660k, etc
And riders like Cobo 400k, Vaitkus 220k, Ginnani 600k, Serpa 880k etc
Sounds good to be honest. Don't know exactly how to do it, but I do like the sound of it.
Also I'm seeing the CT as a developping tour. Right now talents with low XP will increase faster in the CT. I really love that aspect, but if we also include the fact that riders above 75 avr would be too expensive to get, then the teams would battle for talents instead. That way the CT would help making riders better, faster for the seasons to come. I like that a lot!
And of course the CT teams are still getting a shot at sealing top riders. They just have to make a priority as to which one or two top guns they want.
SN: I would not have been offput by having a lower salary. I think you could make it seem more realistic also by calling the "old" teams for Pro-Continental and the new teams continental.
It would also give a bonus to those staying in the game, afterall poeple have been playing for years now.
I like the idea, but would prefer the gap to be smaller, maybe only 2.25mil for new teams, and 2.5mil for old teams, 3.5mil for PT. Just enough to give the old teams a bit more of a gap enough to build a good team with higher wages.
Also a thing I've been thinking about, even though it would be unfair, but some kind of bonus for having riders from the nationality of the team. Maybe a small reduction in wage or something. Ofc this would be more effective for spanish/italian/whatever teams, but at the same time it would be an incentive to play more realistic. I really like what Deadpool (signing all Israelis) did, OlegTinkov (Russian team) or Mb_ with a pure spanish team (examples of the top of my head)
Agree with you rjc, but I think it's the new managers who seem to make the insane deals with buying top riders. I think they would still be doing that even with a smaller budget. Perhaps they would think it over one more time if they are to pay 33% on top of the Pro Tour teams...
I was also very interested in keeping my team swiss in the beginning, but it made people who had seemingly decent swiss riders claiming shitloads of money for them...
I had:
Steve Morabito (Still does)
Johan Tschopp
Olivier Zaugg
Those were the only riders I could get my hands on.
Riders such as Fabian Cancellara, Michael Albasini, Aurelien Clerc, Gregory Rast, David Vitoria, Marcel Wyss, Hubert Schwab, Martin Elmiger and Michael Schär was impossible to get my hands on.
Otherwise you can be sure that I would have had my spine with those riders, and then perhaps Sammy Sanchez and Alberto Contador as stars to make a good result, but it was simply not possible to get a good PT result when trying to make my team swiss..
OK I could've had 6-7 swiss riders instead of some of my fillups, but that doesn't make any sense either imo.
This was already discussed in the transfer thread i think. The thing is with nationalities. I chose my sponsors before the transfer season. I would have gone for an American-Italian team. Every single Italian i bit on, got over bidden by another manager (who at one point even had more than 20 active bids).
For Americans i would have to battle with Wikipedia, which was impossible, and would become even more impossible with those new wage measurements.
With the wage increases by 10, 20, 33% you would completely cripple CT teams which would result in them promoting and immediately demoting again. So bassicly, lowering the lvl op CT drastically.
Actually, it's pretty simple, the one who offers the most money, get's the rider.
However, the change between wage for new/old CTteams sounds good.
Having teams live up to their nationalities is something I really like - I do it as much as I can with both teams.
For Veusvio, Luxembourg is certainly a challenge. Ive got 6 in total - but even here, I got priced out of Didier this season, Ive been priced out of Kirchen in past seasons, Andy Schlecks not going anywhere, and I chose to sell Drucker to what at the time was a CT team, so he could actually get some results. So the Lux riders are generally there as 50k domestiques, beyond Schlecky and the promising Gastauer.
And of course 100% Me are very nationality driven. 18 Brits, 6 Irishmen, then 1 Aussie and 1 Kiwi which is realistic if you look at the real life British CT teams ... oh and 2 Liechtenstein guys just .. because.
But its hard to sort of get that into the game as a method of incentive for focusing on nationality - beyond asking me to add a few riders for a certain nation, as I did for Deadpool, for example. Some countries do of course have more and better talent to choose from, and like SotD said, it can often become harder to get riders of your teams nationality than a similar rider from a different country.
I was actually puzzling about with my CT team, where I was trying different nationalities. I decided to try and form a baltikum team, which I really saw potential in, but I decided to go away from that again, as I wouldn't be able to buy the riders... But the team would've been very cool:
Rein Taaramae
Tanel Kangert
Rene Mandri
Gatis Smukulis
Aleksei Saramotins
Ignatas Konovalovas
Ramunas Navardauskas
Drasutis Stundzia
Tomas Vaitkus
Dainius Kairelis
I really wanted that team, but what if I couldn't get Taaramae? What if I couldn't get Vaiktus?
Fact 1: Only 3 riders in the entire CT would be affected by the 33% (7th place, 13th and 15th)
Fact 2: 7 riders would be affected by the 20%, UBS would take the heaviest hit with 2 riders there (getting 190k extra wage), 5 others team affected (Cilit Bang = 142k more , Youtube~160k more, Wiggle=122k more, Pendeltons=110k more, IKEA=96k more). Not really a crippling effect?
Fact 3: That means the main effect with be the 10% effect, and considering that if your entire team would consist of riders at 76 and 77 that would give you (given you use your entire budget now) a whooping 250k hit... Or in avg 12,5k extra per rider (20 riders at 2,5 mill = 125k per rider), not that much?
I can do some quick maths for the hit it would be on each team:
Might be a few mistakes, but not really crippling imo. For the ones with over 150k: Bacardi (Goss + 1 helper away = same as now and 20 riders), Cilit Bang (Coenen + 3 other helpers = same, 20 riders), Mercedes (under the limit anyway I think, since they went over orginally and lost riders), UBS (Perez Sanchez and they are under), Vespa (The ones with most problems if this is done. Switch out one of the stars, something I think he's talked about already), Wiggle (Would have to change a bit around, but Bertognalli would take care of most of it)
Dont underestimate how damaging that would be - the CT teams already have a much lower salary cap than PT teams that disadvantages them from going for the big riders; plus the fact that they dont really get a lot of race days anyway.
You say its not crippling, and list a few teams that would lose key riders because of it.
and about nationality, I tried aswell, did some mistakes (atleast 1 Norwegian free agent I shoul've signed) and some riders I couldn't get (outbid on Hushovd, no chanse on Hagen, UBS wanting to keep Kristoff etc). Also when it came to danes most of the good ones end in B&O and most good swedes were taken (had to overpay Kessiakoff).
But I plan to change the nationality of the team next season as I see a nation with great potential in the free agents market (specially with semi-talents that will become good helpers).
There shouldn't be any sort of nationality bonus, why? Like it has been said there is a huge difference from each country I mean anyone would prefer to make a team based on Spanish riders than some from lets say...Rumanian
Kudus to those who are having a huge base of riders from the same country but that's just as much up to each manager to see how they would like the play this game.
I would also like to see a small gap between new continental teams and teams that have been around for at least one season a minimum. Then the continental division would get some more depth, since newcomers will have a season to establish themselves and as a bonus would they in the next season get more money to play with and the title as a pro continental team.
, so anything making it worse will cause me to melt down.
