Post by kronzky on Jul 28, 2013 17:32:10 GMT -5
While the July race isn't technically over yet, it might still be a good time to reflect on this month's race already, considering the changes we implemented this time.
Turnout was promising, and hopefully the word will spread even further with future races. And, with next month's race happening in Orbx territory, this might attract some further participants.
As far as the changes are concerned — quite ironically, the month we introduce an option to repeat a crashed flight, is also the first month where we didn't have a single crash! Looks like we're getting better!
But I guess it still came in handy for accidental altitude violations, so we'll keep it for now, and see how it goes.
The scoring via relative performance ratios might be a bit more complicated to calculate, but, looking at the results this month, I think it was the right decision, and while it may still need some minor tweaks (for crashes & violations) overall it seems to be fairer.
The new weather handling, unfortunately, didn't work out long-term, as Microsoft did find their reset button after all, and the easy way of getting static weather was removed through that. We will still try to equalize the weather in the future, and will use the free GetWeather application in August.
Regarding the course — even though I created it myself, I wasn't 100% happy with it. Some of the (over-water) stretches were perhaps a bit boring. But, OTOH, some may find them a welcome break, and it may also be a unique challenge in itself, if you have a fairly uneventful stretch first (where you nearly fall asleep), and then, at the end, have to be wide awake for some challenging off-airport landing. So, I don't know about that one.
Also (and I'm probably the biggest culprit here) I think legs that allow you to fly a nearly straight line should probably be avoided (either via altitude restrictions or different route selections). Bush flying is about twisty-turny routes, low altitudes, narrow passages, and dirt landings. So I will definitely keep that in mind for future course creations.
So... these were my thoughts... Rather subjective in some regards I assume, so it would be good if we could get some feedback from other racers, regarding the rules, as well as the course layout.
See you (hopefully) all in British Columbia next month, for August's race!
Turnout was promising, and hopefully the word will spread even further with future races. And, with next month's race happening in Orbx territory, this might attract some further participants.
As far as the changes are concerned — quite ironically, the month we introduce an option to repeat a crashed flight, is also the first month where we didn't have a single crash! Looks like we're getting better!
But I guess it still came in handy for accidental altitude violations, so we'll keep it for now, and see how it goes.
The scoring via relative performance ratios might be a bit more complicated to calculate, but, looking at the results this month, I think it was the right decision, and while it may still need some minor tweaks (for crashes & violations) overall it seems to be fairer.
The new weather handling, unfortunately, didn't work out long-term, as Microsoft did find their reset button after all, and the easy way of getting static weather was removed through that. We will still try to equalize the weather in the future, and will use the free GetWeather application in August.
Regarding the course — even though I created it myself, I wasn't 100% happy with it. Some of the (over-water) stretches were perhaps a bit boring. But, OTOH, some may find them a welcome break, and it may also be a unique challenge in itself, if you have a fairly uneventful stretch first (where you nearly fall asleep), and then, at the end, have to be wide awake for some challenging off-airport landing. So, I don't know about that one.
Also (and I'm probably the biggest culprit here) I think legs that allow you to fly a nearly straight line should probably be avoided (either via altitude restrictions or different route selections). Bush flying is about twisty-turny routes, low altitudes, narrow passages, and dirt landings. So I will definitely keep that in mind for future course creations.
So... these were my thoughts... Rather subjective in some regards I assume, so it would be good if we could get some feedback from other racers, regarding the rules, as well as the course layout.
See you (hopefully) all in British Columbia next month, for August's race!
