I would say to everyone, just stop worrying about it now. All the laundry has been aired and the judging is done and isn’t going to change.
Let’s just get on with the next joc challenge as all this tension is helping no one.
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Yes you did disclose that realism would be taken into consideration. The original is on par with other challenges I’ve seen.
I didn’t think having rear double wishbones are equivalent to these meme-ing entries you describe but that’s just an opinion.
I can’t speak for the others in this case, but if I knew that you were going to change core elements of the engineering, I would have done the engineering differently. I think that’s reasonable that people would not use double wishbones if you said you’re going to replace it out right. The same goes for the gearing if there was a disclaimer or notice like “If anyone goes beyond 4 im going to remove them”.
At this point I’m confused and that brings me to question to why allow double wishbones and not ban them outright if you are going to just change them into semi trailing arms? that goes the same for limiting gear numbers. You don’t want them in the challenge why leave the option for them? Or you do want them in the challenge just to severely punish people who do? That doesnt make sense…
I doubt its from malicious intent but doing something to the effect of ‘here’s an option but if you pick it you will be severely punished’ I don’t see the need to open the option if realistic vehicles are your goal for this challenge. Nor do I see the need to have an option that seeming only used to punish entrants.
I am fully aware and do expect penalties from using double wishbones. Though I expect the standard subjective number tinkering in the spreadsheet. You must see that changing such things affects more than just that particular thing. You did not just take away the suspension and gear you took away its optimization and selected ratios. You made choices for the entrant. If I knew you were going to make choices for me I’d reconsider joining this challenge. like I said its useless to allow it at first then change it completely. That’s where this challenge overstepped and differ from the rest.
I’d think changing entrants engineering without their knowledge is something you should disclose as a host. Its apparent now and no use saying it again, yeah that was not something that should’ve been done though nothing anywhere says you couldn’t.
In regards to other challenges, they all vary in realism according to hosts. You can’t just go “Look at other challenges” when the problem is with this challenge. Your realism discretion was to change entrants engineering without their chance of optimization post change nor their knowledge previously. I highly doubt the challenges you mentioned will do the same.
This is way more predictable than the out of left field alteration, I doubt anyone who joined thought that their entries would be changed that way that much.
Wait what?? you can’t be serious… Won’t people question why some of the judged stats are different from their original submission? you can’t hide changing their engineering… even in the spreadsheet. And the thought of hiding the fact that you changed the entrants cars… wow… all I could say is you did not judge MY car.
Tell me you did not change my car’s suspension and gearing. Hell, nevermind that. Even you admitted to doing that.
Well it did and it’s only one twist.
You’ve explained my rankings case well and I accept that. It just changed to others got screwed not only me.
Im at the opinion of “dont want it there? Ban it then(?)” Hell funnily enough I’d be content and and went oh well if my entry was outright binned!
Telling me you’re going to change the engineering at a whim… no that won’t make me care more, I’d stay away from a challenge where I have no control over my car’s final stats as is.
I agree with this. I rested my rankings case earlier and didn’t ask rankings to be changed. I hope this serves more as a reflection than anything else.
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im not gonna say too terribly much here because im quite tired and dont want to start any more fires than are already burning but i am personally rather baffled by the thought of… editing entries for judging.
if rear dws are rare/unrealistic? add a cost penalty like some challenges do. or ding for realism in your judging. deem it expensive and complex to service, or unreliable somehow, or something. dont like… change it? because now youre not judging the entry are you, no, thats some abstraction. the ranking isnt valid anymore. thats a could-be, not an as-is.
if i hand you a cardboard box with packing tape on it for you to put things in and you replace the packing tape with masking tape because you don’t think packing tape is necessary, and suddenly the box isn’t as good as i thought it was when i gave it to you, and it isn’t as good as someone else’s box… then what in the everlovin hell are ya doin with my box?
that might be a terrible analogy. moving does things to a mans brain. you can probably tell by my disregard for punctuation.
id say thats my two cents but in this economy i want my two dollars
…for closing arguments sake im claiming this is all as rhetorical food for thought.
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On the one hand, you’re saying you agree with the comment that we should just move on. On the other hand, you’re the one who re-opened this whole mess after I tried to leave it at a gracious “let’s just move on point.” And in the same post, you are continuing to take every single thing I say and interpret it in the worst way possible, and to suggest that I am arguing things that I don’t think any fair-minded reading would suggest that I’m arguing. No, I am not denying that I created a cloned version of each finalist and modified the engineering of those cloned versions to calculate realism penalties for the finalists. No, I am not suggesting I should have lied about or tried to hide the scoring. My point was that I could have stopped my judging efforts at the point of saying, “Eh, this doesn’t seem very realistic, so I’m going to bump it down a few spots,” written it up that way, and everyone would have been happy. As a first-time host, I tried to go the extra mile to make sure that realism penalties bore a rational relation to the actual effect that any unrealistic engineering choices had on the car. And everybody hated it. Heck, people who didn’t even make the finals (and thus never had a cloned version of their car created) and didn’t even participate in this challenge have jumped in to criticize my judging.
It turns out that I’m just a guy who likes cars and video games and who isn’t an expert on early 1960’s compacts. I was doing my research along with everyone else, so I honestly didn’t know at the start of the challenge that double wishbones or 5-gear transmissions were essentially unheard of at the time. That’s why I didn’t ban them upfront. I wasn’t trying to hide the ball. I was just doing my best to try to run an efficient challenge, not fully knowing what I was getting myself into.
If I entered a challenge and my car was altered by the host and never judged as is, I would be upset. But every car made its initial preliminary scoring and finalist qualification based entirely on the stats as produced by the game in the as-submitted version of the car. Funnily enough, I’ve also received criticism for not considering design/realism as part of these considerations. So, it seems that I’m damned if I do, damned if I don’t.
At the end of the day, any judging for design or realism is going to be considering something that is more than, less than, or modified from the game-generated stats. What’s the difference between (1) taking the in-game generated stats and then applying some sort of additional “realism score” or “realism penalty” picked out of thin air and (2) using the in-game engine to calculate a realism modifier? Both are effectively creating modified statistics for your entry. I could have sworn that an earlier version of your post proposed adding a cost penalty or a reliability penalty for double wishbones. Well, if I did that, then, again, I would be judging something that is not your as-is submitted entry, but rather some modified version of your entry. And applying a cost penalty could easily result in a car having to be binned for exceeding the cost limit. Given the fact that you are this upset over the exact way that I derived a realism scoring modifier for your car that made the finals, I seriously doubt you would have been content if I had simply binned your entry based on some never-announced rule about double wishbones.
I was trying very hard to do right by everyone with this scoring. It obviously backfired. Next time I host (if I ever get that chance, and honestly at this point I’m not sure I’ll take any future hosting opportunities I might get), I will simply announce “Ten points for Gryffindor!” when doing design/realism scoring, and then apparently everyone will be able to sleep at night knowing that they have absolutely no idea how that score was arrived at, other than that I liked or didn’t like something.
So if you want to believe that I somehow screwed everyone over by applying a consistent ruleset that applied milder and better-explained realism penalties than I could have to a limited set of 7 entrants who made the finals, go ahead. I’m done with this challenge. I will not be replying any further. So feel free to go ahead and get the last word.
Thanks to everyone who participated, I’m sorry I let you all down, and good luck to moroza and/or ananas with the next round.
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Everyone please just stop.
It’s going in circles now.
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Sorry for being late to the party. I had things to do that are more important. I am genuinely sorry to the others that feel disturbed by my late questioning and arguments even if I hoped everyone else could have ignored it. This will also be my final reply here.
Yeah I agreed after my case was settled. Quote:
Then instead of a “sorry you feel that way, I’m still learning” you came back with a huge reply comparing this challenge to others and stating:
So I replied with my opinion on how I considered a fair approach.
Perhaps that’s how it came out no matter the intention. Tone is hard to convey through text but take it as you will.
Wow, see this is the answer I was looking for when I said:
Because I was trying to understand where you come from in terms of approaching the matter. That could’ve ended my questioning.
You’re right they are both modified statistics, though I’d like to agree to disagree. At the very least the entrants have control over the in-game generated stats. Though the same results could easily be accomplished I feel that part is crucial for the entrants.
I still think you should continue hosting if real life circumstances are not an issue. You demonstrated great writing, organizing, and hosting in general up till that part. Even with the amount of ‘heat’ I or others have given you, I don’t think anyone would disagree that right up till that part you did fantastic work especially as a first time host. My point was never to put you down or discourage you from ever hosting again if it seems that way to you.
P.S:
I really should’ve said this earlier and it was in the bottom of my notes for quite a while, 1962-68 Alfa Romeo 2600 Berlina had a 5 speed manual couple sources claiming its a ZF S5-18 but all agreeing it was 5 speed. Its a family saloon for the mid size E segment. For those looking for an earlier justification the 1957-62 Giulietta Sprint Speciale 2+2 Coupe came with a 5 speed too.
Sorry again if this post disturbs you.
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I understand your frustration, but to avoid long winded arguments that some people might find tiresome a good idea can be to take such discussions with the host via DM. I don’t think anyone is upset with you being dissatisfied with how your entry was handled, it’s just that an argument between two people that goes on for a long time isn’t really of interest to the rest of the community and should maybe be handled over DMs because of that.
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Assuming 1970, +5 body techpool, and only SUV, I count at least five body groups that would be viable: “1975 SUV”, “Predator 1970 SUV”, “1960 SUV”, “1957 SUV”, “Predator 1955 SUV”.
For trucks, including semi-cab-over but not car-based utes, I count six: “1975 Pickup”, “Predator 1970 Pickup”, “1970 Pickup”, two different “1960 Pickup” (one that looks like a Jeep, the other like a Corvair Greenbriar), and the “1957 Pickup” could still be dressed up for the 70s.
And a ton of car-based ones. I’d argue that the 1977 DCMW Hiluq is proof that those can be turned into respectable trucks.
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Our opinions differ there a bit I guess, yet I share some of them with you, so here’s an explanation what I am thinking…
1975, Predator 1970 bodies: Yes, works for something more like a Land Rover pickup or a Jeep CJ8. Not as good for something like the “traditional” american pickup.
1960 SUV/Pickup: May be based on a Scout (I think), but yeah, fair point, it could be made into something like the more traditional pickups, I had missed the 3 metre wheelbase one, that could be something to work on, there was just a smaller one before it which was too short.
1957 Pickup: IMO it looks too old (could maybe be used with extensive work but hard to get it to look right).
1955 Predator: See 1970 one.
Cabover/semi cabovers: Fair, if you want to make one, but they were rather dead in the US by the 70s.
Car based bodies: Can be made into believable minitrucks (I have done that myself) or something like a Ranchero/Camino.
My main gripe is that when I am thinking about a 70s US pickup, something like this is what I am sure most buyers would have gone for:
And my opinion stays that we don’t have a lot of good bodies for something similar.
Not saying that the round would be impossible to pull off, but it would end up a bit weird compared to how it most likely would have looked IRL. On the other hand, if you don’t care about that I guess that it’s no problem running it, but then you have to be a bit open minded that you might get some oddball entries, not expecting a C10 and then be disappointed in getting lots of stuff that is far from that. 
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Yes, for that style GM and Dodge, we don’t have good bodies for those at all. Ford are a bit better.
Anyway, it won’t be JOC6A again. We’ll be looking for Jeeps, Scouts, Land Cruisers, maybe 4-door Hilux or Vanagon Syncro, with a side of AMC Eagle.
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The Fords of the 70s looks a bit more old fashioned than Chevy and Dodge yes, maybe the 1957 body could work if choosing more of that route but it would require skills in that case.
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True, but what I meant was the “OBS” Ford from 1980, well represented by the 1978 bodies, which I will make a point to be available via either starting year or techpool.
I know you conceived of this series with the idea that each Journey would occupy one continuous thread. Besides some tedious cluttter polluting the way in this instance (merits of the contents aside, they should’ve been hidden in details), digging through several hundred posts to find the newest is annoying. And in JOC3C, we got one entry for JOC3A. Yes, the new one can be linked from the first post, and yes, closer attention would’ve prevented the OXXRON situation (but then we wouldn’t’ve had the Firebreather…), but this seems against the grain of established competiton practice, counterintuitive for many, and for little gain. What if we include an ample summary of the first two stages of Earl’s Journey in a new thread for the third?
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That is actually not a bad idea.
The thing is, back in the days (before you joined) it was not unusual for continous challenges to run in one single thread. I think CSR ran that way for the first 60-odd rounds, AGC did it until rather recently and I think CSC too. Yes, it was really a format that had its drawbacks, hence why it was abandoned.
On the other hand, people tend to be lazy. They won’t scroll through old threads, not that they always will scroll through the most recent either but there’s at least more of a chance. If we lose the overall concept of the character, JOC will be rather pointless. If the character says in round 1 that “I hate convertibles” and in round 3 it is suddenly “woho build me a convertible” it will be a kind of tragicomical situation, but that’s where it will end up if we don’t do attempts to keep the story consistent.
So, yeah. I am not opposed to a change of format for JOC, BUT…and there’s very much of a but here. Then I really want to see, not a summary of the last round, but of ALL previous rounds of the actual JOC at every new thread start. And one that gives a good overall brief. Not “haha red car won”.
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That’s what I meant. Such a summary would be a lot more effective than simply glomming on to the same thread.
However, people mature and develop, sometimes becoming radically different in some ways, especially during as tumultuous a time as the late 1960s…
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Yes, I know that was what you meant, but it is only good for as long as people can actually follow it.
Maybe include links back to the previous JOC posts, to make it easy to reference them (regardless of what thread you’re in)?
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