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PCM.daily Tips & Tricks Section
So You Want To Start A Story?
By: Cycleman123 | Average Rating: 4.50 | Game version: PCM13
Before You Start
Your Rider/Team
Before you start, at the very least, you want to have your team or rider ready. This means adding necessary riders to the database and creating your custom team. Also try to do your sponsor objectives, season planning, rider objectives etc. etc. before you begin, so you can start off strong.
Racing
It's good to have a few races already raced before you even start the thread. I was almost up to the Giro before I started my story, and this allowed me to start reporting quickly and not have to worry about getting content. Starting quickly will also get the readers sucked in, as they want a story that updates regularly. Then, once they're sucked in, you can afford to report less often . Just saying - no reference to my story, just busy at the moment .
Backstory
It's good to have some sort of a backstory to your rider or team. In terms of rider, if you have created a new youngster, you could talk about his career as an amateur. I sort of did this in my story too, but not so well. In a team story, a good thing to talk about would be how you got the job as manager, or in the case of a custom team - talk about the formation of the team. Think about Nordic Cycling by Atlantius.
Something else to consider could be to start off with (preferrably cycling related ) news items - possibly about stars being injured or caught for doping. For example Roule Brittania by TheManxMissile.
The Report
Notes
You want to have some sort of notes on the stage. Usually things like the breakaway and other important events. You'll find that flat stages require MUCH less notes and thus final text than mountain stages. Think Team Carrefour by tpinot. Some people choose to write their reports while racing, and although it might work for them, I wouldn't advise it.
Screenshots
Taking a screenshot is easy. First press " to get ride of rider circles, then CTRL+U to get rid of the information on the screen and then finally press CTRL+T to take the picture. To get the best camera angle, hold the mousewheel and then move your mouse around. PCM saves screenshots in [Your PCM Folder] ---> Users ---> [Your PCM username ---> Screenshots as .PNGs, but you want to convert them to .JPG/.JPEG to avoid lagging out the webpage on your story. This is preferrably done using a bulk image converter. Then upload the screens to an image sharing website, I'd recommend photbucket. Click the picture in your library, copy the link that says "URL" and paste it into your report. It may look long, but trust me - it works .
Layout
The look of your story is important to attract readers, and is something I have had trouble with. Some stories to take inspiration from (not to copy ) are Australia's NRS by Tsmoha, The Several David Veilleux stories by Valverde321 and Matthias Frank by Cunego59.
I hope that this guide has helped you . Also, please tell me if I have missed something .
#3 us the img button. Underneath the text box are loads of buttons, and one of them looks like a photo ( well three, but only one is centered). Paste the image url, highlight it and click the image button.
Or suse the site search function, as this has been asked and answered in several places
. Just saying - no reference to my story, just busy at the moment 
.
. Also, please tell me if I have missed something 
