Sunday, November 17, 2024

Pretty Certain CFR Rule Changes

As some of you probably know, I've been tinkering and testing some changes for the next edition of Championship Formula Racing.

I'm pretty sure this is where it will land.  Specifically, I'm pretty sure about the forced passing bits.  I'm 100% certain about the other bits.

So here they are.

Tests


In an effort to simplify down to two basic tables, Start Speed now has the same odds as testing any other attribute.  A start speed failure results in a mis-shift and the loss of one wear.  Start Speed is never damaged.  I like removing the stall possibility.  Losing your turn on the start when you were trying to go 120 is bad and I think the loss of a wear and a mis-shift is penalizing enough.

I also added a mis-shift to the failure result for Top Speed and Acceleration.  I found it confusing that you would test top speed, fail and end up going faster this turn than your new, damaged top speed.  I think having a mis-shift when you fail an Acceleration or Top Speed is more logically consistent.  I think it also makes the rolls more impactful, especially at the end of the race.  It is no longer a no-brainer to test your engine as you cross the finish line.

No change to testing deceleration.  I just included the table here for completeness.

Forced Passing


This process underwent the most change.  I wanted to end up with a single table for Forced Passing. I wanted to make it a little easier for the attacker, but not too easy.  I wanted to change the interaction between the attacker and the defender.

The first change was to how "blocking" works.  Instead of the defender just declaring that they are blocking to add 2 to the attacker's die-roll, the defender now has an opportunity to spend their own skill to add to the attacker's die-roll.  Spun defenders may not.  The attacker will still have an opportunity to add their own skill after learning what the defender is doing.

The odds obviously changed as well.  On the one-hand success now occurs on any result 9 or less.  But, a success of 7 - 9 also includes a wear damage to the attacker and the attacker must now roll on the Avoid Damage table.  This could result in another wear lost and possibly a wear lost for the defender.  The attacker may apply skill to this roll as well.  The defender may not.  If the defender is called on to lose wear, it does not matter if the defender used skill to hamper the attacker ("block") or not.

In the end, Forced Passing is easier to accomplish but will likely be more costly.  

Avoid Damage

This table replaces the old Avoid Crash table but is now used both to avoid a crash as well as to avoid additional damage after a successful forced pass with contact.  

On a 10-12, the result differs based on those two situations.  If this roll resulted from avoiding a crash, the driver loses 2 wear.  If this roll came after a forced pass then the attacker loses a second wear (since the attacker lost 1 on the forced passing table) and the defender loses a wear as well.


Slips at End

There is a game that can happen in the current rules -- If two cars are lined up with the finish line in sight and both cars can go 180.  It's a dumb game.  So, If you will finish the race this turn you may not take more than 1 slip.


Zero-base Car Builds

This isn't a rule change, but I am going to rejigger the car set-up table so that there are no longer any -1 values.  All of the math will remain the same, but all of the number will be positive.


Thursday, October 10, 2024

2024 Organized Play Crowns Another Back-to-Back Champ

 Congrats to Jason Schultz.  He was in the driver's seat with only the WBC really in play and he took care of business.  Winning WBC took Jason from probably the champ to running away with it.

Jason is now the 3rd consecutive, back-to-back champion in organized play.  Fellow, back-to-backers Don Tatum and Stephen  Peeples finished 2nd and 3rd this year.  And fellow champ Michael Polcen finished 4th.


Jason and Don were the only drivers to win multiple tournaments this season.  The big difference in their scores is that Jason won two of the biggest events while one of Don's wins was a smaller event.

Thanks to all who raced this year in a OP event (111 of you) and I hope to see you all for the 2025 season -- which is already underway.

Wednesday, June 5, 2024

2024 Organized Play Update

 I've finally done some data entry for this season of Organized Play... here are the top 10 with ~2 events to go.  (Full list here.)


The top 3 is a murders row of the winners of the past 5 OP titles.  Don leads currently but he should not feel very comfortable with that lead.

The two remaining events to score are my PBeM serieses and the WBC tournament.  Both are worth big points and Jason has a commanding lead in the top tier of the PBeM.  If he does win that series it will be worth nearly 57 points and would give him just over 91 on the season.  

If we assume Jason wins P1, there will probably still be an opportunity for the top 7 drivers on this list to make up enough points at WBC to end up at the top of the heap.  Assuming a similar turn-out at WBC to last year, the top spot will be worth almost 60 points.  

Of course, WBC will be over before my PBeM so there is also the potential for someone to win WBC and do just enough in their PBeM race to pip Jason (or Don).  Keep an eye on people who could get second in the P1 PBeM series (Jeff Harrington, Gianluca Lari, maybe Tim Mossman, theoretically a couple others) and people who could win or place 2nd in the Divoll and Reilly tier... (Robert Rund, Michael Polcen, Palmiro Matteini, Brent Fitz, and others).  If they win WBC they might have a shot at the title too.