give us the power to make custom games, not just randomly generated options
well, at least at some point
How would custom games not be in the favor of the player who comes up with the stats? I mean they probably already have a rough engine in mind when setting things up.
add the basics, not % stats
like -
year built
turbo or N/A
runs on unleaded
so on
Oviously this will be in, it only takes time. Multiplayer has just been in for 1 month now and the game is not even close of being ready. Probably unneeded suggestion, but good that you are thinking about it.
Wizzy, i have been around long enough to know, what to suggest and what not to suggest and what is under discussion 
It’s not obvious that this will be in, Wizzy, so far none of you has told me how this would actually be balanced. (and/or more fun that the randomized scenarios)
sorry Killrob, but i don’t really see how randomized scenarios can be balanced, im sure you’ll figure it out, but as of now, i do believe that set input stuff from the player + randomized stats is the way to go
They’re balanced because NONE of the players have an advantage as they’re all subject to the same set of requirements that none of them had a hand in choosing. I can’t see how random sets of stats would favor a specific player, nor will they give one player more time to think up a design than all the others, the stats are equally a suprise to all players.
Also I think Killrob may have somewhat more knowledge of if it’s balanced or not considering he’s been playing, and infact balancing it for the past few weeks, I’d be reserving your judgement until it’s actually released, but best I can tell its currently both fun and fair to all players.
and please tell me, who would have advantage if the engine must be built in 1996, must be running 95RON and must be N/A?
just my 2 cents
The one who makes this stuff up does, because he knows what’s going to happen a few seconds earlier than the others. So the host can already prepare a strategy. This can make a huge difference in the game and can decide about winning or not.
Very true, and exactly what I’m concerned about.
What I could see working on the other hand would be some kind of dungeon master mode where one player designs a scenario but is not allowed to play him-/herself. That would be balanced, but also somewhat more difficult to implement.
Regarding balance, a perfect anecdotal example of how randomized scenarios are balanced is a round we played with 4 people in a truly horribly balanced random scenario:
1st: 6980 points
2nd: 6950 points
3rd: 6910 points
4th: 6840 points
Even with such a poorly generated random scenario, the game is perfectly balanced because everyone has exactly the same problem and the same circumstances for solving it.
What about, loading the game first, then as soon as everyone is loaded, make a count down timer that counts from 5 to 0 and then loads in and shows the limitations for the engine?
I don’t know what you mean by that? Under what circumstances? How does that solve the host vs. balance problem?
so everyone can think of a design, 5-10sec is quite enough for an experienced player
edit: should go into difficulity modes, like normal and expert, expert being with player chosen points
edit2: player only chooses parameters without numbers, numbers still should be random
That doesn’t get over the fact that the person who sets the scenario will also be able to set something that they KNOW they have a known solution for, I don’t understand what problem you’re trying to solve by allowing players to define limitations.
not a problem, just add variation
Not a good way to add variation in my opinion.
@Killrob, then I probably dont understand well how this imbalance occurs? I though, if the limitations for the scenario in multiplayer is given at a time when everyone is loaded, thus not seeing earlier what it is, its balanced in my opinion. I think we should work with dedicated servers for this maybe, since it is really easy to just sit their with a friend, find out an harder engine to make and how to perfectly do it and then make an online game and the host gives in these limitations, which his friend knows exactly how to build within 2 minutes. Making him always win and gain rank in the highscore chart.
This is another problem that occurs, so what I suggest is just a dedicated server where people can play on which generates limitations tested by us. So for an I6 with HP between 100 and 400, mileage between 50K and 70K RPM limit between 6500 and 7500 etc. etc.
This way you always create random matches. Players join, when all joined and loaded, count down from 5 to 0 then limitations are given to the players and they can start all at the same time with the same limits of the scenario.
To fix the dedication problem, you can release a serverpack which is installable and runs seperately from the game (kind of like Minecraft does). This way players can still host their own games that show up in the list of multiplayer games?
Sorry if the explanation is not understandable, tried my best. If anything is unclear, ask and i’ll try to clarify.
[quote]This is another problem that occurs, so what I suggest is just a dedicated server where people can play on which generates limitations tested by us. So for an I6 with HP between 100 and 400, mileage between 50K and 70K RPM limit between 6500 and 7500 etc. etc.
[/quote]
This is pretty much how it is working already. No need for “manually tested” things and a huge look-up table if we get the values to scale properly anyway.
The rest of what you were writing I don’t really understand because I don’t see what you’re trying to achieve with it, what problem do you want to solve that hasn’t been solved already or doesn’t exist in the first place?
The host having some sort of advantage, right? I didn’t see a problem at first too, but something sounded right abou everyones previous comments so I tried to understand this.
The winning chances are balanced because everything is random and no one knows anything before the other players. The current imbalance lies in the stat values and weights itself. For that, Robert already invented a dampening system, which tries to not make one stat the major one which gives you points.
Currently (if the stat threshold generation is based on some of my ideas), the tresholds are generated randomly between upper and lower borders. These borders are varying according to manufacture year and sometimes related to the generated power value. The correlation to the power value makes that you can finish all of the scenarios (at least we have not encountered a scenario yet, which has been impossible). Some scenarios are harder than others though, so the task for the beta testers is to find which combinations of stats and stat thresholds are too hard or too easy to pass. In that way, the upper and lower borders for the different stats can be tweaked and the difficulty spread can be reduced.
When the difficulty is balanced, still the possible solutions should be balanced a bit, so that there is not only one good solution to the scenario. Linear gameplay becomes boring very fast. This is where the mentioned dampening idea comes into place: If the generated stat value is very near to the lower border, you can possibly make lots of points with that stat (lots of room for improvement). Thus, the weight of the stat has to be quite low to make it less overpowered.
edit: damn, writing took too long