So I've tried playing the game again recently, and I'm much worse at this game than I used to be. I know its quite an old game now, but I think some of our longtime members have some experience with the game and would be able to help me out. It being so old, I cant really find many guides or helpful videos about it, so Im hoping there are still some here who would be able to help.
I'm starting to get the hang of sprint stages and cobble races, but mountain stages are still terrible. If I follow an attack with my rider, their red bar fills up almost instantly. Is there any way of avoiding this? I've tried just using the dot at 65 but the red bar fills up (albeit a bit slower), but my rider starts dropping out of the peloton (rather than moving up, and catching up to the GC favourites who have attacked up ahead). He has 78 MO, so not too bad of a rider but it seems like no matter what I do, if my rider attacks its just an instant red bar. I dont really know what I'm doing wrong.
Maybe its related to the riders morale? I know it has some affect, but I protect my leader for the entire stage, and then his 3 seconds of attacking makes him crack completely in a second despite his heart rate being below 160 for the first 180kms, which just seems a little excessive.
Also I seem to be having an issue with rider growth and experience levels. I've had multiple riders move from level 1 to level 2, but with no stat changes. This seems weird to me, because I seem to remember growing a level was how riders improve their stats, so if anyone could help explain why that isn't happening, or if I should be doing something differently I'd be grateful.
valverde321 wrote:
I'm starting to get the hang of sprint stages and cobble races, but mountain stages are still terrible. If I follow an attack with my rider, their red bar fills up almost instantly. Is there any way of avoiding this? I've tried just using the dot at 65 but the red bar fills up (albeit a bit slower), but my rider starts dropping out of the peloton (rather than moving up, and catching up to the GC favourites who have attacked up ahead). He has 78 MO, so not too bad of a rider but it seems like no matter what I do, if my rider attacks its just an instant red bar. I dont really know what I'm doing wrong.
I noticed that as in PCM 2005 in PCM 2006 the dot works better than attacks. Dot 65 it's not a sufficient effort (if you had not any attack earlier of course) - I usually use the dot between 70-80 and 80+ on the final climb (if it's not long enough). Of course the dot in PCM 2006 does not give the same advantage as in PCM 2005 (it was slightly balanced) but if your rider is strong enough and you set the right effort you will be able to stay with leaders in most cases.
And for attacks it's better to wait for flashing green bar - in this case your red bars will not fill up immediately. But I often have to count not to filling up the red bars right before the finish line. However, it would be better not to attack but use the dot on ever climb
P.S. Ah, I just remembered another trick: if you respond then for successful attack you should follow the attacking riders at some distance - not too close and not too far. In that case you could not to fill up red bars immediately and could save some blue bar. You could have some practice with that in earlier attacks of your teammates.
Edited by tomcat9 on 24-05-2021 00:40
Let's save the history of PCM together!
Just write me a PM if you have something for old PCM Editions (from 2005 to 2014) - databases, stages, shirts etc. and we'll share it.
valverde321 wrote:
I'm starting to get the hang of sprint stages and cobble races, but mountain stages are still terrible. If I follow an attack with my rider, their red bar fills up almost instantly. Is there any way of avoiding this? I've tried just using the dot at 65 but the red bar fills up (albeit a bit slower), but my rider starts dropping out of the peloton (rather than moving up, and catching up to the GC favourites who have attacked up ahead). He has 78 MO, so not too bad of a rider but it seems like no matter what I do, if my rider attacks its just an instant red bar. I dont really know what I'm doing wrong.
I noticed that as in PCM 2005 in PCM 2006 the dot works better than attacks. Dot 65 it's not a sufficient effort (if you had not any attack earlier of course) - I usually use the dot between 70-80 and 80+ on the final climb (if it's not long enough). Of course the dot in PCM 2006 does not give the same advantage as in PCM 2005 (it was slightly balanced) but if your rider is strong enough and you set the right effort you will be able to stay with leaders in most cases.
And for attacks it's better to wait for flashing green bar - in this case your red bars will not fill up immediately. But I often have to count not to filling up the red bars right before the finish line. However, it would be better not to attack but use the dot on ever climb
P.S. Ah, I just remembered another trick: if you respond then for successful attack you should follow the attacking riders at some distance - not too close and not too far. In that case you could not to fill up red bars immediately and could save some blue bar. You could have some practice with that in earlier attacks of your teammates.
Okay, thanks for the help, I'll try using the dot at a higher effort. And the tip about the flashing bar is very helpful too.
As for the experience/growth, I recall in a different save I played last spring, there was definitely rider improvements, but too much for my liking, so I edited some riders (Dekker, etc.) to be level 3 instead of level 1, and gave Cavendish better potential with an editor, but now there seems to be no growth from riders in my team and on other teams, so I'm wondering if perhaps the editor has somehow eliminated it. I seem to recall editors were a bit more unstable with PCM 2006, so could it be a bug from that?
valverde321 wrote:
As for the experience/growth, I recall in a different save I played last spring, there was definitely rider improvements, but too much for my liking, so I edited some riders (Dekker, etc.) to be level 3 instead of level 1, and gave Cavendish better potential with an editor, but now there seems to be no growth from riders in my team and on other teams, so I'm wondering if perhaps the editor has somehow eliminated it. I seem to recall editors were a bit more unstable with PCM 2006, so could it be a bug from that?
Unfortunately I don't know about it well but I suppose we can check it comparing columns from original and modified DB corresponding to riders levels.
Let's save the history of PCM together!
Just write me a PM if you have something for old PCM Editions (from 2005 to 2014) - databases, stages, shirts etc. and we'll share it.
So I've figured out mountain, Hilly, TT and Cobble stages, but for some reason I just cant do sprint stages still. I've even had my train pull away and get a 15second gap to the peloton, and Hushovd still cant win with Dean and Renshaw as his leadout on full energy when the sprint starts.
Also, I'm trying to track down a Savegame editor. I believe FullEditor is supposed to work, but when I get to step 4 (see below), when I chose the folder in, and then go to table, my only option is "export" which if I click, leads to a netframework error.
Spoiler
In order to edit a database:
1. Place the database file in the Databases folder.
2. Open PCM2008_CDB_to_XML.exe and select the database in Database In.
3. In Folder Out, write something - e.g. "mydatabase" - and click Import.
4. After a while, the database will be imported. In Folder In, pick the folder, and you can now edit the DB by selecting the desired table in "Table".
5. When done, write something in "Database out" and hit Export.
6. This will export a database to the Databases folder. Move it to My Documents/Pro Cycling Manager ***/Database.
I would really like to try and edit some of the terrible transfers like Contador and Lovkvist moving to CT teams in with an editor if possible.
valverde321 wrote: Also, I'm trying to track down a Savegame editor. I believe FullEditor is supposed to work, but when I get to step 4 (see below), when I chose the folder in, and then go to table, my only option is "export" which if I click, leads to a netframework error.
Yes, it happens sometimes for me too. There're a box there "Local .cdb patch" - tick it if the Editor crashes.
valverde321 wrote: So I've figured out mountain, Hilly, TT and Cobble stages, but for some reason I just cant do sprint stages still. I've even had my train pull away and get a 15second gap to the peloton, and Hushovd still cant win with Dean and Renshaw as his leadout on full energy when the sprint starts.
I'm playing for some unpretentious teams with quite weak sprinters and my tactics is simple: to try to follow good ones. However I remember in PCM 2005 you could win flat stages by following the others (for example I've won quite a few stages with Moreno Di Biase (Colombia - Selle Italia, 76 SP & ACC) in this way). However I'm not tested sprinter's train yet in PCM 2006... but that's strange if you gain such a gap and can't win a stage...
Edited by tomcat9 on 28-05-2021 15:39
Let's save the history of PCM together!
Just write me a PM if you have something for old PCM Editions (from 2005 to 2014) - databases, stages, shirts etc. and we'll share it.
valverde321 wrote: Also, I'm trying to track down a Savegame editor. I believe FullEditor is supposed to work, but when I get to step 4 (see below), when I chose the folder in, and then go to table, my only option is "export" which if I click, leads to a netframework error.
Yes, it happens sometimes for me too. There're a box there "Local .cdb patch" - tick it if the Editor crashes.
valverde321 wrote: So I've figured out mountain, Hilly, TT and Cobble stages, but for some reason I just cant do sprint stages still. I've even had my train pull away and get a 15second gap to the peloton, and Hushovd still cant win with Dean and Renshaw as his leadout on full energy when the sprint starts.
.
Hmm, that doesn't work for me. Full Editor still seems to crash. Perhaps I need a certain Microsoft Net Framework? Otherwise I really have no idea's why it crashes. It cant open PCM 06 cdbs, but it opens PCM 08 and later cdbs fine.
Also, my game is now crashing in the 2nd season, on March 24. It seems to be simulating stage 5 of the Vuelta Castilla Leon, "Avila - Avila" stage. I've tried changing out the stage with a different one, with no luck, so it must be something in the cdb, however I cant edit my savegame
Hello Valverde321,
You can try edit your save with the Cyanide Editor for PCM06. I made an archive here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2NQ...sp=sharing
Note: Google Chrome thinks the program is dangerous due to .exe
valverde321 wrote:
I think the CYA Editor is the sames as the PCM2006 Editor
Oops! Definitely!
valverde321 wrote:
No matter what I change the stage to, it just shows up as a flat stage, even though its meant to be a Mountain stage (so maybe thats the issue)
I easily opened your save with my Fast Editor (Do you have this one?) and I got an idea: maybe the game crashes due to incorrect filename? (see the attachment). Check your stage file in 'CM_Stages' folder and replace underscore by hyphen if the filename there is incorrect. Because there're underscores in the names of all other stages of Vuelta aCyL. And in DB file stage 5 was named differently
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I could have sworn I posted already, but thats fixed it Thanks so much for helping look into it.
Fast Editor indeed works to open the save. (It messes up some of the symbols and things like that if I save, but I can atleast open it up, to look up stage filenames if I run into any other crashes.
Definitely!
