yippee not last
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Our Client, Waylon, is a 32 year old female pilot, cowboy and dog living in Zambia. She is stubborn, caring, and introverted. More than anything, what she wants is a car that has poor lateral g’s. She also strongly wants good prestige and the newest trim year. While not as important to her, she would also appreciate high horsepower, poor fuel economy, the car being something that can be simulated directly in Automation, and good emissions.
Rules:
- Must be Fuel Injected
- Purchase Costs must be above $50,000
- Must be a cargo-dedicated body (ute or cargo van)
- 0-62 must be more than 12 seconds
- Must have ESC
So the first “double trouble” showed up, giving Waylon an extra “profession.” Also, I should note that repeats from past rounds are banned, but that doesn’t include the test round in the original post; which is why “dog” came up again.
Negative lateral G’s being a priority is interesting, 'cause that’s something last round’s winner also did poorly (well) at. Will that make it dominate again? We’ll have to find out…
2 Likes
Sounds like she just wants a Cybertruck then
4 Likes
The young cow was pissed. This was his first time at this new farm, and the grass in their field tasted terrible, worst he’d ever eaten. Then, before he could fill up (‘cause like he gotta eat anyway), the farmer’s dog comes out barkin’ & hollerin’ & herdin’ everybody over to the barn. Then just walks away, leaves 'em there, without taking any questions… and without leaving anything to eat! What’s that about, he wondered?
Well, he got his answer about an hour after being herded in, when a huge plane came over and sprayed some dust all over the field. That alone wasn’t particularly interesting, the cow was just watching it 'cause nothing else was going on, but then he noticed something incredible; that same dog was piloting the plane??
Indeed, she was. When the dog came back, she informed the cows that she’d sprayed the field in some “non-toxic, eco friendly” fertilizer and that it’d be a lot yummier tomorrow. She also apologized for not answering his questions earlier- then left before he could ask any more, leaving him to turn to his stablemates for an explanation.
Waylon had been working on the farm almost as long as it’d been a farm. From tending and herded the cattle around, to maintaining and surveying the fields the fields, she’d taken care of the more active parts of the job, while her owner managed the logistical side. In fact, today marked her 30 years anniversary being on the job! (in dog years, mind you, but still!)
The farm’s been needing a new work truck recently, something powerful and tough. And in honor of her achievements, her owner’s decided to double this as a gift to Waylon. After all, it’s thanks to Waylon that they’re one of the most successful farms in all of Zambia; she deserves something nice, modern and prestigious to celebrate with!
RULES
Waylon wanted this to double as a luxury and work vehicle- think like a Ford F350 or the like -so though she’s no car expert she chose requirements that she thought would fit both. She wanted something expensive (>$50,000) and modern (fuel injected, ESC), but not fast (>12s 0-60), and in a cargo-oriented body.
For these rules, our 17 contestants were better at meeting them, but not by much; once again, no car managed even 4/5 of the rules. The $50,000 rule was a particular obstacle, with only 2/17 entries passing. There were, however, twice as many entries (4 total) that failed all 4 rules.
At least it wasn’t all bad. One of the failed entries, the Globetrotter, may have been old and not a truck, but like most old American cars it was built like one with a ladder frame and big engine. Indeed, it was pretty comfortable and could tow fairly well; maybe that wouldn’t be too bad then.
The rest? Oh god no. Waylon wasn’t a car enthusiast but she did understand planes, and god damn Goonistan was a terrible one. Then the Sauna; why is the whole front end missing? It’s gonna get clogged with mud in a matter of seconds! And… is that just a fucking washing machine?? At this point, Waylon started begging if she could just take the Globetrotter, but it’s far too late now; she’s already invoked MLC, and it’ll go how it goes!
Now, 4 is just short of the 5 entries we need minimum to start an MLC; so all those cars got 2 bonus points (to her horror), and we opened the floodgates to the cars that passed 3 rules (which was also more than last time). Some of these were promising utility vehicles, like the Kosulya and Maxtra and Ghurruz, that she prayed would overcome the luxury car, race cars, and that RV-bus-thing.
9-POINT CATEGORY
We’ll start with the 9-Point this time. Waylon asked for low lateral G’s because there are a lot of rough and dirty/muddy trails around the farm, and she wanted something with tough utility/offroad tires, not sports tires that’d pop easy out here. The Pingu Commander, unfortunately, only has low grip because it’s a bus.
At least unlike last round it wasn’t completely dominant. All the actual utility vehicles did get decent scores as intended. And thanks to the hyper-grippy Barrijat Supremacy serving as an outlier on the top end, most cars scores got pushed higher anyway. So at least its lead is far from secure.
5-POINT CATEGORIES
First, Waylon had awarded 5 points to the top-half most prestigious cars (rounded up, since there’s an odd number). The commander did once again dominate here (along with the Apoapsis Triton), but at least it’s wide lead lead didn’t matter, as the pass-fail scoring method made sure the DMCW Ghurruz and Maxtra Deliver trucks scored the same.
There was also a lot of overlap there with the award for the top 5 newest cars; The Triton, Deliver, Commander, and Barrijat all came out with perfect scores in both 5-point categories. Rocinante, in fact, was the only 21st-century car that didn’t also succeed in prestige (because it doesn’t run).
So this leaves the Commander still in the lead, but only by 2 points over its emerging rival, the far-more desirable Maxtra Deliver. Any one of these next 3-pointers could be enough to flip it…
3-POINT CATEGORIES
Waylon values power over economy, bringing 2 rankings for the highest horsepower and worst economy. The former was a slaughter by the commander, with its 835 horsepower being leagues ahead of just about anyone else in the competition. It did well in fuel economy too, but at least the Washing Machine and Rocinante leveraged their ability as inanimate objects to be even worse.
Fortunately She also included a rule that it had to be an actual car, as can be simulated by Automation, precisely to prevent something like a 6-wheel bus from getting the win and giving an advantage to the Deliver. This leaves everything up to a responsible top-half ranking for emissions.
But just as it acted against the Commander in the prestige round, the top-half scoring acted in its favor here, as though its (surprisingly high) WES-9 emissions were worse than the Deliver’s WES-11, it still landed in the top half and got the full 3 points.
Results
In retrospect, Waylon knew she shouldn’t be surprised. She had asked for a large, modern, powerful and prestigious truck. And well, uh… that’s what this was.
It is a truck, just one that isn’t set up to carry anything and can’t really handle a dirt road. One whose “prestige” comes in the form of the computer games inside, not from the vehicle itself, and whose power comes from a wonky turbo-tune that no one in the country probably knows how to service. And it’s not like she can sell it y’know; the tuner-gaming-RV market in Zambia ain’t exactly booming.
So this left her with 2 options; abandon it in her field- which is what she did for a couple months -or scrap it off. And that’s what she ultimately did… in part, anyway. She scrapped the engine, and instead had it replaced with some old semi-truck engine. She got her own rims for it, installed her own loading out the back. and cleaned out the interior- minus the fridge, which she found might be useful for specialty deliveries.
Finally, after short of 2 years and a lot of work like that, she had rebuilt the commander’s frame into a somewhat-functioning heavy hauler, that was actually able to meet the more utilitarian needs she’d set out for; and she was able to use the money it made to get a separate, more fun personal car.
So what’s this mean for MLC20?
According to the original rules, the winner of MLC20 is first car to win at least twice, and have the most wins. That last part is important, because they also state that at least 5 rounds are guarenteed to run.
So with 2 wins, the Pingu Commander is on deck to be MLC20’s winner as soon as 3 more rounds have been run. But in those rounds, if another car can manage to also win twice, then the tie will deprive the Commander of its lead, and require us to keep running rounds until the tie is broken.
This makes @Ringu’s Commander the one in everyone’s sights, the one to beat as other cars thrive to try and become its rival. Sure, the chances of a car winning twice back-to-back are slim- but if it happened once, it can happen again!
Pings for every participant:
@Edsel @Knugcab @HelloHi @mart1n2005 @06DPA @Ringu @Chief @oldmanbuick @hjuugoo @moroza
Updated Spreadsheet
See you in round 3!
6 Likes
can we enter at any time? and can we enter more cars between rounds?
Unfortunately, the submission period was long closed. This is, after all, really set up as one large challenge; which car can play the randomizer to win the most often?
I’m open to alternate suggestions, but I’m inclined to stick to the 17 we already have.
This is just about the nicest thing anybody has ever said about this car.
Too bad things went downhill from here, but thanks for another fun round!
3 Likes
Our Client, Abel, is a -3 month old male stormchaser and activist living in Ireland. He is open-minded, cheerful, and dull. More than anything, what he wants is a car that has high sportiness. He also strongly wants the best safety and low horsepower. While not as important to him, he would also appreciate the best fuel economy, the best emissions, the largest possible size, and that it be one of Edsel’s top 5 aesthetic designs.
Rules:
- Must have 3-5 seats
- Must be a vehicle which can be simulated in automation
- Must have displacement from 660cc to 2500cc (Double Trouble!)
- Must have a Monocoque chassis
- Must be a 3-box car body (sedan or coupe)
- Must have no aero fixtures
Somehow, despite a double-trouble in the rules and the brief being for a -3 month old stormchaser, I think this is the most coherent brief we’ve had so far!
Although I’m not sure how I’m supposed to write a negative-3 month old character. Part of the point of MLC20 for me is to get practice writing, and challenge myself with strange prompts, so I guess I’m succeeding on that front at least.
4 Likes
Make it Wizard of Oz style. While chasing a particularly fierce storm, he was caught in the storm and somehow sent back in time to three months before he was born, thus making him negative three months old.
Also, I feel like my 90s Globetrotter just might have something of a shot with these rules. Fingers crossed!
3 Likes
That’s actually not to bad an idea. Better than anything I had.
I’ll incorporate it into my brainstorming, thank you.
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Everyone found it quite silly that Abel liked to chase dangerous tornadoes. The short-of-20 college student from the small town of Loughrea was always in good spirits, got good marks in class, and usually behaved very cautiously. And besides, the lad lived in Ireland. There isn’t really anything to chase in Ireland; if he wants tornadoes, why doesn’t he hop on over to The States where they get 'em by the dozen?
Now any storm nerd will tell you, tornadoes can and do happen anywhere in the world- including in Ireland, which gets ~10 a year. It’s just that most of the time, these already-rare events are too ephemeral and weak for anyone to notice. The one 20 years ago was neither, however; it was just strong and well-timed enough to be the reason he grew up without a father. And sure, Abel wouldn’t be born for another 2 months, so he never actually knew his father. But he still held a fascination with the weather that had so greatly altered his life, and with the man he might have met.
And that’s where we find Abel today. He’d been chasing long enough to know that this storm had more potential than usual; but the sight of an actual funnel had still caught him off-guard, leaving him awestruck until just a bit too late. By the time the thought of “shelter” crossed his mind, the storm had already sent a large branch into the side of his grey 1.4L Corolla, sending the car (with him inside it) tumbling across the Roscommon countryside in a sensory overload of violent chaos…
By a stroke of the lord, he found himself crawling out of his Corolla largely unharmed. He could even recognize where he was, just north of Castlerea. But something was off here; and he didn’t just mean that the tornado had littered a bunch of debris around and totaled his Corolla. Actually, he was pretty certain that instead of a field, there was a housing development last time he was here…
He checked his phone, and to his surprise, it was reading a date about 20 years ago! And confirming that, the nice farmer that offered him a lift into town, was driving a “brand new” 20-odd year old Transit. And that’s when he put it together; the tornado he got struck by was really similar to another that hit Castlerea 20 years ago; the new tornado must’ve transported him back to the time of the last one!
The time travel he could accept pretty easily. The thing is, though, that Castlerea twister was important in being one of two noteworthy tornadoes that year; the other, a month or so later in Loughrea, was the one that took his Dad! Why, if he could hurry, he might be Abel to save his father!
Now knowing what he had to do, he quickly put together a plan to save his father. First, he ran right on over to the Castlerea Library, and borrowed a phone to call The Loughrea Town Council’s receptionist’s desk. With fortune, there was a meeting of council members today, and he managed to secure a slot to present to them in about 3 hours from now.
He then hurried on the library computers to put together a powerpoint concerning proposals he wished to make, regarding improvements to weather warning and response services, as well as for education efforts on severe weather safety, and why he felt that these measures would be very effective in keeping Loughrea citizens safe, and reasonable enough in cost and effort despite the low regional risk of storms, and thus the Loughrea council should implement them as quickly as they would be able.
With his last-minute presentation saved to his phone, and just over an hour left to get from Castlerea to Loughrea- which was doable but was gonna be tight -Abel has turned to us in desperate need of a car ASAP. One that’s right quick, that can get him to Loughrea in time to present his live-saving powerpoint! But he also dunna wanna set the wrong impression by arriving in a clunker or a sports car, so he’d prefer something big and presentable, but also practical and understated.
RULES
Being a very practical and pragmatic man, Abel wanted the car to be a normal, 3-to-5-seat monocoque sedan (or coupe), with an average-sized engine and no spoilers or the like. He did get pretty overly-specific with his ruleset though, so even though each individual rule was pretty easy to meet, there was no car that quite met all 6 of them.
Fortunately, we do have a small but strong lineup of 5 cars that met 5 out of 6 rules. The Triton and Globetrotter sedan were fine other than their too-large engines. Setting aside its D-Pillar, the Deliver is a swell candidate. The Sausalito would’ve passed easy if not for the extra rule banning aero. And, although I erroneously counted it as passing fullu at first, the Kommodore has one seat too few to make it.
(Also, an honorable mention to the DCMW Ghurruz, which would have failed every rule… if not for, again, that extra rule on aero.)
Since 5 is the minimum to start a round, this lineup is good to go. All of these cars are monocoques, and passed the realism check of being Automation cars. The few rule violations they have are pretty minor anyway, and in a rarity for MLC20, all seem to vaguely fit the brief. Looks like this round’s gonna go surprisingly normally…
NOTICE
…yet looks can be deceiving.
So, 5 of the 7 scoring categories in this round are for “Best In” a given category- safety, fuel economy, emissions, size, and my subjective aesthetic ranking. A “Best In” category means Pass/Fail scoring for the top 5 cars in that round.
There are 5 cars in this round.
This means that no matter how good or bad a they do in those categories, all cars will get full marks in each of those categories. Ergo, all the scoring categories are worthless. Except for two: the 9-point ranking for sportiness, and the 5-point reverse ranking for horsepower.
For Abel, this makes sense; sure, he values the environment, safety, a stable ride, etc.- but with so few options and all of them good enough, it’s best that he focus on what matters most. For our reviews though, it is a bit of an anticlimax, so I’ll still go over the rest for your entertainment.
NON-SCORING CATEGORIES
We start with the 5-point safety category, which is understandably dominated by the Apoapsis Triton; being a giant luxobarge, it trounces even its more modern competitors. Meanwhile, our older 2 fall behind, especially the Kommodore who’s a whole 16 points below the similarly-aged and still poorly-scoring Globetrotter.
Moving onto 3 point categories, the Sausalito manages to just barely outdo the Deliver in Fuel economy, while the V8 Globetrotter and Triton lag behind. The Triton does not lag, however, in emissions, getting a healthy WES 11 just like the 2020 pair, while our classics from Baz and Flint sit at WES 3 and 2, respectively. Size is another clean sweep for the luxobarge, being just as far ahead from the otherwise-uniform pack as the compact Kommodore was behind.
Lastly for my subjective ranking, I rewarded Maxtra with 2nd best for MLC overall, as I’d felt it a well-proportioned and handsome bit of industrial design that I could imagine existing in the real world. The Globetrotter and Sausalito’s scores were above-average, good but not the best, while the Triton fell below the median, and the Kommodore neared the bottom of the pack for being a 5-fixture wonder. I’ve provided more in-depth explinations for each car on the Spreadsheet. Not that I needed an explination, of course. It’s a subjective ranking, I literally give whatever the fuck I want.
5-POINT CATEGORY
Now to the scores that matter. It’s a battle for the least horsepower today; a reflection of Abel’s frugal mindset, and desire not to give a poor first impression in front of the Loughrea Town Council.
And this battle is dominated by the Baz Kommodore; with the humble 60’s compact needing only 55hp to get around, a whole hundred below even the 2nd-best Maxtra Deliver. Meanwhile, the Apoapsis Triton crashes and burns in a massive 375hp fireball, its V8 giving a similar 130hp gap to the second-worst Alira Sausalito- which is itself no lawnmower, mind you.
9-POINT CATEGORY
Finally, the tippy-top category that matters most. On a good day, the drive Abel’s planning is almost an hour and a half, and he was cutting it close even before all this MLC presentation nonsense.
Unsurprisingly, our slowest contender is the Maxtra van; 3.7 is pretty low for a modern monocoque car, even if it’s a van. Meanwhile, our elders did surprisingly well, scoring in the double digits and within a tenth of each other. We don’t see real speed, however, until we get to the Autobahn-ready Apoapsis and let it’s V8 properly show off for once; though even it is a cruiser, not a racer.
No, the real champion in sportiness is none other than the Alira Sausalito. with the second-best sportiness in all of MLC, this nimble, AWD hot sedan easily carves its way to the lead with grippy tires and good suspension, without relying too hard on power- though to be clear, it won sportiness by such a high margin that it could’ve gotten a 0 in the last category and still beat the Kommodore. So I guess only one score really mattered after all.
Results
For once in MLC20, our client was quite happy with his result. A competent, modern 4 door sedan, the color and styling was a bit flashy for his tastes, but not so much so that he’d look conspicuous arriving in the town. And all that modern tech made it not just fast, but easy to drive fast, which was great to have given his short notice.
With the main roads fortunately not having changed much in the past 20 years, Abel’s familiarity with the geography let him open up a bit, making up enough time on the backroads that he was able to take his time parking at the Council Building.
Despite being a new face, the Council pretty quickly identified Abel as a Loughrea local. and while they weren’t fully able to understand the urgency of his proposed adjustments to weather warning and response protocols, as well as his call for education efforts on severe weather safety, his arguments were well reasoned enough that they agreed to consider the matter further.
One month later, he sat parked in the Alira in front of his parent’s old home, watching as the television news warned them just a little earlier about the impending storm, giving them just enough time to make it to the bathroom for shelter- which they now knew to do thanks to public service announcements. He smiled knowing that, all in all, it seemed they’d both just barely be ok.
Of course, he knew sitting here put him in the tornado’s path too. He’d been doing his own research in the past month, and believed he’d figured out how to replicate what happened in Castlerea. The conditions were right, his equipment was set up, and he just needed one more prayer before the winds really picked up…
Our man crawled out of the wrecked Alira with the largest smile ya ever seen, as he looked 'round the young housing development he’d plopped in the middle of. Knowing he was only a few streets from his family home, he walked on over and rang his door, excited to finally meet his father for onc- who’s this answering the door?
This wasn’t his father, it was some random chap he’d never met before. Odd, he’d got the right house number. And even if it wasn’t knew all his neighbors on a first-name basis anyway. Abel tried asking this man who they was, but couldna understand him; he just kept speaking increasingly-angry gibberish until slamming the door on him. After checking his phone, he confirmed that yes he had the date right… wait, why is his phone in Chinese?
After an hour investigating his phone history, Abel was finally able to piece together what had happened; apparently, sometime just after his birth, his father got a job opportunity that’d had the family moving to Taiwan, and living there ever since. This meant- among a host of other things -that he grew up with English as a second language, and never got enough exposure to rural Irish accents to be able to understand them.
Well… okay… so, how’s he supposed to get home?
And so a competitor has risen up to challenge the Commander’s lead; the Sausalito only needs to take 1 of the next 2 rounds to tie the Commander, prevent it from auto-winning after Round 5, and put the Sausalito itself in contention for victory.
Or… maybe there’s still a chance for someone else to step up. Like, what about the Apoapsis Triton, that’s finished podium in every round so far, but never quite won? Or perhaps it’s time for the Cago Estate’s redemption, after having the lowest point total of any car- or for Goonistan Airlines’, who’s come in last place for every round it’s entered?
For now, congradulations to @HelloHi for their Sausalito’s first win. And or the rest of us, stay tuned for next round to see if we can repeat it!
Pings for every participant:
@Edsel @Knugcab @HelloHi @mart1n2005 @06DPA @Ringu @Chief @oldmanbuick @hjuugoo @moroza
Updated Spreadsheet
See you in Round 4!
8 Likes
Very clever story! I especially liked the twist at the end–some nice butterfly effect there.
Also, the Globetrotters continue their streak of failure. Hey, at least they’re consistent, right?
3 Likes
And DCMW continues its streak of utter irrelevance. Oh well. I enjoyed reading this all the same. The previous couple of rounds were just surreal and random; I appreciated that this one, while still fantastical, was coherent.
3 Likes
Yeah, I was hoping premises would oscillate between more/less surreal. Glad that part of the challenge is working well.
Also I’ll say, the DMCWs are very interesting cars to have onboard. I do hope that’ll get a better chance to show through in the writeups before long.
Our Client, Matías, is a 92 year old nonbinary chauffeur and accountant living in The Vale of Arryn (from Game of Thrones, 2011). They are chaotic, petty, and annoying. More than anything, what they want is a car that has the best possible braking distance. They also strongly want high top speed and a high seat count. While not as important to them, they would also appreciate a high 0-62mph (0-100kmh), good drivability, low top speed, and good safety.
Rules:
- Must run 92 RON Ethanol
- Must not contain any reference to the sport of bowling
- Must be roadworthy fixture-wise (lights, wipers, plate, etc)
- Must have at least 300mm of clearance
- Must pass WES 11
“I want to challenge myself” I said…“I want surrealness to oscillate” I said…
Well, we can see here some of the holdovers from the older MLCs here. Such as the inclusion of a fictional medieval fantasy setting, for the intended comedy of both a) having cars in a setting which doesn’t usually have them, and b) me having to write for a setting from a franchise I’ve never seen. (I had also hoped that participants would suggest fictional places of their own, but no one ended up doing that)
At least the challenge itself seems interesting. In all past MLCs, whoever won the 9-point category won the round. But now, since it’s a best-of (top 5) round, there’ll be multiple “winners” with full points, forcing the decision onto the smaller categories. That part I’m looking forward to.
3 Likes
Oh, great. A senile geezer basically asking for a Durango hellcat. What could go wrong? 
4 Likes
Except also at the same time wanting something slow, just a bit less than wanting something fast. This brief was almost starting to sound a bit coherent (a lead-footed chauffeur wanting lots of seats for passengers) until I started reading those secondary priorities.
1 Like
To be fair, since the top speed scores perfectly invert each other, you could just interpret top speed as a mere 2 point category. “He prefers high top speed, but has stronger bias towards acceleration or braking.”