Thanks Varisa! This, btw, means that we don't really care if some teams delete any of their members throughout the season, even if they do it one race before the last one. Since the calcualtions are done in a race by race basis, everything is cool (well, except those 1 member teams, but ok we can't have everything mid-season).

In my point of view, the only needed change for next season is to work out the minimum required members for each team (perhaps we should increase it to 3 or 4) and divide the team-total in each race by that number when the team races with less members.

I'm a bit confused. After the Team Standings re-opening, are the team-points collected in each race divided by the number of all team-racers ever raced at least one race in the season, by the number of all team-racers subscribed to this season (even if some of them never raced a single race) or by the number of team-racers participated in the specific race (that is, separately in a race by race basis)?

Last edited by migf1, Mon, 28 May 2007 18:30.

In my humble opinion, any league's point system should not worry about matters that should worry the participating teams. I mean it's not the leagues' responsibility to decide which team-members will participate in any race. If a team wants to go for the championship then this team should decide to use only its best drivers in the league. If the team is mostly interested in having fun, then it could participate with a lot of people of several skill levels. And all the intermediate cases! The drivers' selection procedure for a team should always be the team's internal decision (always IMHO).

On the other hand, the league's point system should guarantee fair treatment to any team, no matter how many and which racers of a team participate in any race. As I have already pointed out in previous posts, OLFSL so far seemed to be mostly individual oriented, but I think the time has come to consider whether it wants to be a bit more team oriented. In my eyes it's more than clear that teams are progressing in a rapid rate, providing a more than satisfactory motive for any league to want them.

Fortunately we don't have to re-invent the wheel. Real life and other team-oriented virtual leagues show some quite valid ways to calculate Team Standings. Most of them are closed leagues, meaning fixed, maximum number of teams and fixed number of racers per team, but without caring about how many drivers will drive for a given team throughout the season.

This last part, we should keep it. Obvioulsy in the Drivers Standings the less the race participations of any driver the less the driver's individual points. No need to change anything here. But teams is a different story. Anywhere you look, any team has the right to change as many drivers it wants throughout the season, without having any negative effects in the Team Standings. So this must be the right way to do it, isn't it?

Since we have an open league here, we indeed need some tweaking! Being carefull not to "punish" even more those teams who chose to use many racers (but not favoring them, either). So, 2 suggestions from me:

For both suggestions, we set a minimum number of racers per team (say 3)

a) For each race we divide the collected points of those team-members who participated in the race by their number (or by 3 if they are less than 3, our minimum requirement).

b) We only count the points of the 3 best racers of each team in each race and we ALWAYS divide their points total by 3, even if they are less than 3 (where 3 = our minimum requirement).

Last edited by migf1, Mon, 28 May 2007 12:04.

Quote from varjsa-9 :

[snip]
Our meaning was not to punish teams with a lot of members, but as I wrote to the site - to give better picture of skill-level in team.

I don't doubt the intention, varisa. The side-effects are what trouble me.

Quote :

[snip]
Meanwhile team standings will be closed.

That's a pitty
Couldn't we just switch back to the previous method of calculations? I don't really see any drawbacks to that method.

Quote :

And migf1, I'd appreciate if you could edit the first post so that it will not cause further misunderstandings about this "20% rule". Thank you.

Done

Last edited by migf1, Wed, 23 May 2007 20:26.

Quote from felplacerad :

OLFSL is open for both serious racers and racers who enter just for fun. HOWEVER, OLFSL IS a league. Signing up for any league season is a commitment. If you want to have a chance of winning the individual competetion you will have to enter every race. (Actually, your two worst results (including missed events) are excluded from the overall individual standings.)

You, as an individual may choose how serious you are about OLFSL.

And the same thing goes for teams. If you want your team to have a chance of winning the team championship, your team have to enter every race. If not all team members enter, them maybe your team simply isn't comitted enough.

Simply put: IMO, a point system should not favor individuals nor teams who doesn't take part.

Regarding the teams, is for example McLaren serious and commited to F1? Because last year they used 3 drivers, with De La Rosa replacing Montoya for a few races. With OLFSL's recent changes McLaren would have been "penalized" in the Constructors Standings, just because they used 3 drivers. Or do you know any real-life league, "penalizing" teams in the Team Standings for using many drivers?

Dont get me wrong, I'm not implying that OLFS and F1 is the same thing nor that OLFSL is the same with WTCC for example. But the point is that when you advertise an open league to everyone, experienced or not, it doesn't make sense to hurt teams that collectively and organized bring to the league racers of both categories.

Actually is a matter of compromizes for both parts (since we are talking about an open league to anyone). Closed leagues (like the F1 example above) simplify many things in that aspect.

For example there could be a requirement of a minimum AND maximum number of members that each team may has in OLFSL. If we want our league more "closed" then we can use tighter limits for the number of team-members and/or add the requirement that these members must be the same throughout the season. If we want our league more "open" then we use broader limits in the number of team-members and we don't care which of them participate in each race, as long as there are always between X to Y team-members present in each race.
Something like that allso helps teams to organize their internal procedure of selecting which of their members will represent the team in which league.

A "commited team" is a different term than a "commited individual". The more the teams' members (which is a good thing for LFS, to have organized schemes bringing newcomers to the sim) the biggest the difference between the terms

And of course ususally there's no logic in changing rules mid-season.

Last edited by migf1, Wed, 23 May 2007 20:25.

Quote from Tukko :

Nope. From OLFSL rules:

"You can skip/miss 20% of the events per season. For example if there’s 10 events in total, you can miss 2. Points (even zero points) will then be removed from your total points. However, DNSH points can not be removed."

So you don't have to race in 80 % of all events, it just means that your 2 worst results will not count in final standings.

Thanks for clarifying that one Tukko (I had indeed misinterpreted that part of the Individual Standings).

Russ, hopefully the OLFSL team will reconsider the point system for the next season, making it a bit more fair for both team and individual entries.

For this season, I have to agree with the other guys who want the Team Standings back to the previous way of calclulation. Not only because it dramatically changed the given data mid-season, but also because I really think it was more fair and logical.

[edited]

And I'm pretty sure there are other issues that need to be discussed for the next season, but not now.

Last edited by migf1, Wed, 23 May 2007 20:19.

Hi everybody,

I was wondering if the current OLFSL point system is individual oriented or team oriented? Actually I was wondering if it is oriented at all to any direction, because I think there are some pretty big logical loopholes.

[edited]Since the latest changes, the Team Standings are calculated based on the total number of a team's racers throughout the season (the sum of their individual points are divided by the total number of the team racers ever participated in any race throughout the season).

At a first glance this seems to have been introduced in order to... punish "Did Not Show" cases. But it also introduces unwanted side-effects.

For example, what if just before the last race of the season a team "decides" to delete from its member list those racers who hurt the team's points, keeping only those members who run consistently throughout the season. This would automatically push the team towards the top of the Team Standings table.

Another example, imagine a team with 2 devoted racers who run consistently every race of the season. But let's say one time, one of them gets sick. With the current point system the only option for that team is to run with just one racer, instead of using a substitute racer for their second car. Because if they use a substitute racer for that one race, then at the end of the season their Team Points will be really screwed up (the amount of their points will be divided by 3 racers, instead of 2 racers) and this really sucks since the 3d racer's points will be 0 for all races except one. [edited]

[edited]

Another problem arises when a racer changes teams.

Actually the philosophy behind any point system on any league gets down to really one basic question: who we want and who we don't want to our league (to be more polished, who we'd like to attract and who we don't).

The OLFSL has built the reputation of an open league to anyone, experienced or not. Obviously in the beginning it was individual oriented, but as time passes more and more organized teams seem to get developed around LFS. At the same time OLFSL also evolves and attracts more and more racers every new season.

[edited]As long as a team can guarantee (let's say) 3 to 5 racers in any race, this should satisfy any open league's need for participations, without examining which racers of the particular team participate in every race. [edited]

If you think a bit more the recent change in the way the Team Standings are calculated, you'd see that what it really does is to punish teams with a lot of members, such as GVR, SC, FFRT and 1st Racing. But these teams guarantee a noticable minimum of participations in every race (and of course it's never wise to dramatically change a rule mid-season).

As far as I am concerned, I strongly beleive that the OLFSL point system shoud be re-orginized being more team-oriented, because organized teams is the healthy future of any sim-league (or any sim in general). This doesn't mean that individual entries should be discouraged, on the contrary.

So for a start, my suggestion would be to switch back to the previous way of calculating Team Standins, by dividing the sum of points by the number of only those team-racers who actually paricipated each race individually.

I would be happy to hear other people's opinion on this matter. The more the better!

Thanks for listening and sorry for the long post.

Last edited by migf1, Wed, 23 May 2007 20:15.

I wrote it in the chatter-box as soon as the race was over (watched it on OLFSLtv) and I write it here too...

Total RESPECT for Mooney!!!!
(in most people's hands, the XFR is slower than the UFR on that track)

Last edited by migf1, Mon, 26 Mar 2007 08:45.

Louder skid volume is a bless, since it is a must in order to achieve fast laptimes. Listening to the tyres is critical in knowing when you exceed their grip limit. Thanks for that!

Personally I don't see why the driver should be punished. He didn't do anything wrong. Actually I don't think anyone should be penaltized at all. However I do think this is a good opportunity to clear up the rules' flexibility issue from now on.

PS. SOul, thanks for answering.

Last edited by migf1, Wed, 14 Mar 2007 08:37.

Quote from S0ul :

Oh noes. We had this discussion before and a certain somebody flamed the hell outta me the last time....well, that certain somebody isnt around anymore,still it is already decided, we shouldnt argue about that,the last time was stupis enough

Since I started visiting regularly this forum only recently, could you please point me to the old conversation?

Contrary to most people, I liked that combo. It was small and fast, ideal for some real close racing. The only "problem" was that it required experienced racers in order to avoid big crashes. Racers capable of judging where they could and where they could not fire a passing move.

There were two places were an overtaking manouvre could be fired, with big chances to be succesfull:

1) In the first corner, where if you had succesfully slipstreamed your opponent (in the straight) then u could stay in his inside (right side) and outbreak him in the turn in point of the right-hand half of the corner. Then you should keep a tight line for the upcoming left-hand half of the corner, thus diminishing any of his hopes to re-pass you at the exit of the turn.

2) In the last corner, where things were much more simpler, because all you had to do was to take his inside (left side). No need to outbreak him here. You just bardge him just a little bit to the outside, so you can point your apex from a realative open line, so you can go early on the accelarator and pass from the apex fast and tight. You have already ruined both his breaking and accelarating, so he can't re-pass you at the exit (depending on the line you keep and your acceleration start point it's possible for him to slipstream you to the straight following the corner, but if you do it right -and you are bit lucky- he doesn't even have the chance to try that).

In my point of view, any other attempt to pass someone elswhere in the track was way too risky (especially at the chicane) and most probabaly that's the major factor for the chaos I read about in some pools (haven't checked them myself).

Although the pass in K1 is a rather trivial technique in both real and sim racing, it requires some racing experience not only from the attacker but from the defender too. The latter should have the experience to judge when to lift his foot off the gas during the outbreaking procedure, and realize that there's nothing more he can do to save his position. If he pushes it, then 99% the result will be a crash, because the attacker has already blocked the line for the second half of the turn.

Sorry for the long post, I just had nothing better to do at this particular moment <img>

Last edited by migf1, Mon, 12 Mar 2007 10:42.

Good read, with some very interesting and informative posts! But at the end it all comes down to one thing guys, fun!

IMHO there's no need to struggle to find or prove which sim is more or less realistic, simply because most of us have no clue what the point of reference is. It gets even funnier if you consider that if, say, we ask M.Schumacher and Kimi to give us feedback on the behavior of an F1 car, the same F1 car, most probably they'll tell us different stories. That's because they have different point of views, different driving styles, different line of experience, etc, etc.

So, what really matters (at least to me) is what sim I have the most fun with. And guess what, I have fun with more than one sim <img>

I've been racing sims since the days of Geoff Cramond's GP2 and I honestly beleive that this quest for the more realistic sim is good mostly for makrketing purposes, but it has no answer. It lyes in the category of those "to be or not to be?" or "who's created first, the hen or the egg?" type of questions! <img>

Something that feels totally realistic to me, who have only driven road cars, most probably feels like total crap to a dedicated racing driver (who btw rarely drives road cars). Totally different points of reference! And things get much more confusing with sims like LFS and rF that include many different types of vehicles (I own them both)!

If I may comment on some semi-objective things about the two sims, I would say that LFS is better in physics, ffb and online, while rF is better in graphics, sound and (of course) modding.

Compared to rF, the two things that really bother me in LFS is the lack of real tracks (I don't really care about real cars... I've explained above why ) and the generally slower feeling of speed. All in all, I think rF is much more immersive than LFS, but I am mostly racing LFS (now, how contradictive is that? <img>).

Last edited by migf1, Fri, 16 Feb 2007 19:12. Reason : typos

Many thanks for the rapid answer!

Could some kind soul explain how are the NS calculated? What do the numbers in parenthesis represent?

Thanks in advance

Got it! Try 128, give it some time and tell us if it's better

Hi Bob, had you manually set the FFstep setting to 256 in the cfg file in older versions, because I'm pretty sure the default value was 128 until U32.

If I'm not mistaken, the FFstep line in the cfg file defines the rate at which the game feeds the steering wheel with force-feedback data. Until U32, the step was 128 and it changed to 256 in newer versions of LFS (most probably in order to cope with those 900 degrees wheels, like the DFP and the G25).

If I understand it correctly, that settings is something like -say- the ffb resolution and the value 256 is supposed to give a richer ffb feeling. But most probably it also has to by supported by the wheel drivers, and in older wheels that may not even be an option.

In my case (I own the very first ffb wheel Logitech ever made, the Wingman Formula Force, which is not even supported in the 4.60 drivers... i use the 4.30) I just switched the FFstep back to 128 in the cfg file and everything came back to normal

I hope it works for you too!

That's good news, thanks!

Hi guys, I just wanted to point out that there seems to be a problem with the hotlapping database at the moment. In particualr the first 4 entries seem quite improper to my eyes <img>

After skinning the AMG FXR DTM 2006 , I decided also to skin the AMG XRR DTM 2006 (both fictional skins). Here's the result (that one was a bit harder, and a bit less attractiveI think)

Recomended name: XRR_amgDTM.JPG so u don;t have to upload it to LFSW (it's alredy there. The 3 first attachmenets are hi-res previews (2048x2048) and the fourth one is the actual skin in noraml res (1024x1024).

Enjoy!

Quote from Stew2000 :

It's really good even for 1024.

Thanks Stew

I just finished the AMG XRR DTM too. I'll post it shortly on the apropriate topic.

Ok, after living for a while in the WIP topic, my AMG FXR DTM 2006 is now finished and goes public. Recomended name: FXR_amgDTM.JPG, so u don't have to upload it to LFSW.. it's already there

The first 3 attachments are previews (in 2048x2048) and the last one is the actual skin (in 1024x1024).

Enjoy!

Quote from Stew2000 :

If you paint the mirrors red, then it can be Car #2. then you can do team racing with them