Road map for the Fantasy League
Even though we're barely half way through the first season, it's time to start thinking ahead so I have time to add new stuff for next season. There's a lot we can do with the League and I think after 4 weeks I have a much better idea of what people are interested in along with what I'm capable of on a weekly basis. Your feedback is appreciated.
None of these are for-sure yet, just gotta say, they're all in my head so I'm relying on you guys to tell me what sounds interesting to you. I'm also throwing some ideas of what could be eliminated from the game.
Possibilities for Season Two
Player teams
Basic feature that would let players join together in a team with collective points. There would still be individual points and rankings, but this way friends or clubs could all race as one versus other teams/clubs.
No more bonus points
I've realized that the bonus point scoring is kind of wonky. Not only does it require math, since the rating system keeps cars close in competition, the bonus points don't vary much.
Changes in classes
I don't know what this means yet, but with the International Class problem, something needs to change to avoid it. Maybe it's just picking different classes? Or maybe getting rid of the all together and just have a smaller garage?
Match-up voting for points
Voting for winners will be added to the game next week, but at this point they're just for fun. If people enjoy the voting, why not make it matter? Logged in players can vote and then if their vote ends up correct they'll get points for being correct. I think this works out a little better than rating bonus points, and it's more fun.
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There will be more, I'm sure, those are just the ones that have been on my mind lately.
There is also a redesign of the RDR blog coming this summer, so that will probably change some things too. It will feature the Fantasy League more in efforts to tie things together and get more players.
Thanks for any feedback!
Discussion
Racing Divisions
I'm trying to think of a way to get around worrying about running out of cars. If the classes don't change, then I'm wondering if having divisions within the league make sense. Each division would have a max number of players, say 20, and they would race each other within the division...and cars would have to be unique per player (single owner rule) only within the division.
Lets say there are two divisions, the Red and the Blue, the Audi R8 would be owned by one person in each division in the International league. This would allow the re-use of cars within a class without having to worry about the same car racing itself (which isn't possible). But the Blue and Red league players wouldn't race against each other...until the end of the season.
I'm taking a page out of the NFL handbook...there are divisions of players/teams, they all race each other and at the end of the season the best of each division race against each other.
The only hiccup with this is that the number of players can change at any time, so divisions would have to be created on the fly. It might start with a Red and Blue division, but if people keep joining, a Green division may have to be created half way through the season...which doesn't sound right. How do I overcome this?
Maybe it's a closed racing season? There's a window when people can sign-up before the start and once the season has started, too bad, no more players can join...? I guess there's a point when a noob joins too late that they'll never catch up in points. So maybe closing new sign-ups after the first week or something.
And all this gets me thinking about...
Spectator Play
So lets say we go with division play and have an active player sign-up deadline. The number of divisions are determined by the number of players signed up. Fine.
The deadline has come and no more new *active* players can join...but then there could be spectator players. My thought here is that spectators could choose cars they want to watch. These cars are NOT raced for real. But they spectators get points when the cars in their garage win. They would have their own leaderboard and point system.
The real races would be determined by the cars selected by the *active* players. Then spectators basically make their bets on which cars they think will win. They still have a garage, it just doesn't effect real races. This way it gets them involved with the game but doesn't tax the limited pool of cars.
I think this puts an interesting spin creating almost two games in one. The regular players become like players on the field while everyone else is just watching in the stand cheering for their favorites. Kinda becomes a fantasy game within a fantasy game...? Woah.
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That was a lot, I know, but needed to dump all that out of my head before I forgot.
Please let me know what you think about any of these ideas.
After finally seeing the light, I'm thinking next season will be changed to work like a more normal fantasy sports setup, which means basically all the stuff I outlined under the Spectator Play.
Instead of the cars in players' garages telling me which cars will be in each week's race, I'll be creating races and then players will just pick/vote on cars that will win and get points accordingly. This lets me control car population and also may allow for more races per week.
I'm thinking there may still be classes but they will all work under the same practice. So there may still be an International class that pulls cars from only that pool.
I think this is what I had intended all along, but I spent too much time overthinking the game and ended up with what we have now. It's fun and all but has become a worry to manage already with less than 50 players. I think this better Fantasy model should allow more players and hopefully more fun.
Another suggestion...
Player-to-player trading
I see this as a possible direct player-to-player trade system that would bypass releasing cars into the wild. I think releasing cars into The Lot at large keeps things open for all players, so that option won't go away, but if you make a deal with another player for a specific car, I see no reason why this shouldn't be made easier.
Thanks, Bryan, for the suggestion!