Legal Cheating!! Doug you are singing a very different tune to when I queried James' GN winner being eligible last season. Back then you said "I think it's fair that last years winner get automatic entry."

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Yes i will stand by my comment - but i thought in good faith that he would have started it in a few chase races. From memory it wasn't until or around the time i did the preview show (for the GN) with Martin that i discovered he'd ran it in hurdle races only.

That is why along with these changes proposed - one of them is that there should be X amount of GN lead up races - like a Moores Millions type of thing - where designated GN horses need to run in them, over the chase, to gain entry by just completing the course and to recieve a handicap rating. They also should compete in let's say 3 of these races. If need be - that rating for the GN can be a seperate rating for the GN only that Gray can jot down on paper at home until the big race.
If last years winner falls in each qualifying start - it still retains entry where as if my horse falls at every attempt it doesn't run.

The only real change to novice/open is that we're not even touching 4yo juves or 5yo novices - just raising open grade horses to 6yo to make a clear distinction between open and novice. That's it. If an open race says that juveniles and novices are eligible - then they are and it isn't a problem.

This is about making a clear definition by the use of age as to what is an open grade horse.
It's main purpose is to make the Hunt more user friendly and easier to fathom for new players wanting to join.
To quote John Morgan If John still has no idea then what chance does an American or a South African or an Australian have of understand what this pea soup is all about?

The other changes - which are just as important.

A new way to qualify for the GN and to get a fairer spread of weight ratings for the big race. And close the loop hole that a returning winner can exploit by running in hurdles only to avoid or minimise any rating penalty.

Lifting the minimum age for the GN.

Relaxing the 3 furlong rule for horses that their best average distance is over 3 miles and making it easier for long distance horses to gain a start in shorter or longer races.

We can back and forth but I think we just need a poll on ages for novices and open races.

At least then it'll be clear what the majority want to do.

I'd set it up but I'm just walking out the door for work

I posted in the vote but the distance rules work fine and are the best solution for the issues we had before they were implemented. It is a fantasy game so all will not mirror reality exactly.

I can't implement many rule changes so bare this in mind. Although things like age restrictions on races are in the schedule so that is done by whoever does the schedule so that would be easy. And I could add a cap for novice horse age for example

Novices were implemented as before it was just chaos when all horses could enter all races. Remember a lot of rules may look strange but they solved some issues we were having. If we can enhance these rules great. A lot of people in the league have not been around since SO2 etc and the rules have come into play to try resolve problems created by errant trainers, who unfortunately will always be there

I am going to start by saying sorry to those I am likely about to offend, but I have decided I cannot go quietly into the night on this...................

Lets do the easy bit first.



Totally agree, and indeed I think I suggested this, off the back of my original post about rating consistency for National horses. Which of course is not consistency, but that the present system allows either deliberate or inadvertant mechanisms to ensure a horse is rated lower than its true ability, would not go sofar as to call this legal cheating, but I have never met a gamer who would not buck the odds in his favour where the system allows it. 'Coffee du London' rated less than several maiden winners and low rated handicap winners being a prime example (no offense implied Paul). And I reiterate this is not a pop at handicapping but a consequence of race entry. Rules proposal to address this a) 3x 4m races to be run in the same season as the National being entered (just requires work on this schedule to add the races and maybe a entry condition from Leon on the national or race runner work to filter). b) at least one of these races must be completed (with the pull curse anymore than this would be potentially unfair). c) Address the hurdle point in a known and public rule, if you race a national horse in a hurdle then that horse is banned from that seasons National, the community will police this well I am sure, rather than again expect work in the TOM, not fool proof but clear and I think 99.9% of people will honour it if made public.

Thats my suggestion, please feel free to challenge or point out anything that is clearly going to an issue and I am being blinkered. The outcome should go into a poll?



This one suits me also, for the following reasons:

1 - It is not out of step with the real world entry system, I personally voted 6yo for this, but if 7yo come in thats good too.
2 - It is not out of step with the way the game plays, 6yo+ is from my expereince, the ideal point to start a National horse where the breeding is high quality. And this is worth expanding on. When you start out with 4m horses, they are really bad, they have potential in the 40% mark, speed and crusing too, in fact all the stats are dreadful, but in game at 8yo these horses can be highly competative, and without trying to be offensive likely why many of the lower tier trainers run older horses. Now my reality and I expect John's, Paul's, Jim's, Leon's, Gray's and likely also David's, Darren's and soon I expect Moleits - take that and uber breed it so the potential is 90% to 95% at around 5/6yo, speed 80%-90% and crusing say 60% (which is about where my National line is) and they are highly competative at 6yo, actually they are decent at 5yo but they jump like poo. I also now have a horse who matures for a good two of three years, they improve to 8yo+ just as the 40% version does, 'Snails Trail' my proposed national entry at 7yo, remains top of my trial sheets at 8yo, 9yo and 10yo, it is just a shame there will not be enough leagues left to race him for four seasons.

And before I hear the suggestion, that this is just a Flat breeding horse and I am far too impatient to play the game properly, Martin, which is why they are good at 5yo. That is as offensive as it is rubbish, you cannot breed national horses from flat horse, in fact for the most part, 2m hurdles aside you can never really breed a really decent jump horse from of any kind of a Flat horse directly. This is also not just a 'Racing' game, it is also a 'Breeding & 'Training' game, I like those more than watching races and riding horses, so yes I move faster, not impatience, just method or manner of play.

It takes a jump horse and a lot in mix and matching, with the National probably 100+ seasons of slow methodical improvement. Flat horses, even the 2.4m stayers do not make 4m chasers, and if you find one that does in a UK or Ireland jump/combined schedule then your not looking at a Flat horse. You yourself Doug have seen this, your Flat game does not create them. And I personally have I figure 300-500 seasons of total game playing expereince in all game countries to back that up.

My method, take that 4m+ 40% chaser with all those ugly looking bars, wants to be a Stallion. Breed it with every decent 2.4m chaser you have, create a load of average looking 3m horses, make a breed stock of these, bred more create more, keep cross pollenating with the 2.4m chasers, keep improving the 3m stock, start breeding the 4m stallion with the 3m stock, getting average and ugly looking 3.4m horses, start to use these as stock, start to cross this back to the 2.4m chasers, get better 3m stock from this, breed that back to the 4m stallion, get better 3.4m stock, rinse and repeat and repeat and repeat, when the 4m is breeding with the better 3.4m stock you start to get the odd 4m horse, but mostly 3.4m. I figure circa 90 seasons at this for me personally and this is my second attempt at a National line, which has also created a very nice Gold Cup range. All the following league horses this season are from exactly this sort of breeding method. Gathering Pace, Eight the King, Snails Pace, Snail Trail. I will concede though Martin, if you go back say another 100-150 seasons in the lineage, those 2.4m chasers would have come from 2.4m hurdlers, and those more than likely came from Flat horses mixed with jumpers.

This is already in a poll so does not need much more discussion, I just wanted to dismiss the suggestion this is short cut flat breeding.



I also agree with this in principal, however with the way the game/league is, and the gulf between National horses running 3m races and actual 3m horses, likely 20l+, make this too low and you have just created a 'legal cheating' method to drop the rating of your National Horse. I have voted 3.4m and I shall concede this one Martin, this is entirely self serving, though I think you put it as 'only interested in maintaining their win percentages', sodding top tier bunch of gits (OK that was adlib), or words to that effect. I prefer to think it is more based on my reality in game, which differs considerably to yours I would expect, and as I have just painstakingly explained my national breeding is loitering around the 3.4m range, who with the right training and lineage can sometimes be pursuaded to stay to 4.2m. So 3.4m is exactly the point where my horses are broadly competative at both distances, they cannnot really hide, they will always face an even hand from the handicapper (and as I have shown in quasi ranty posts, I as a competative gamer, found I'd sometimes rather they did not) take Eight the King - 3.4m -3.6m horse, 10L winner in a maiden at 3.2m, does not compete with my 3.2m horses at trial, and it ticks me off he has landed at 150 off the bat as I know yes it will make wins harder for him to come by, I said it, I apologies, I am a very bad sport............. competative is a very key word as it motivates everything I do in the league, including my 5yo chasers who we shall get too when I have recharged my coffee, if I write too much this morning you will all stop reading and go do something more interesting anyway........................................

Takes a deep breath...........



Firstly, this is not a change, it is a proposal for change, and thus far supported it would seem by Doug, Martin and Darren. I maybe stretching my interpretation here but I read Josh, John, Jim, Paul, Gray and perhaps Leon against, some of whom are more verhment than others. But this one does fundamentally need a poll.

I am in the verhemently against camp, and this is simply the aspect about 6yo being the min age for Open chasers, and for the following reasons:

1 - It does not reflect real world reality where races such as the Gold Cup etc are open for 5yo horses. And where Novice does not denote age directly but maturity or competence or even experience. Rookie for our American friends, many of whom have bags of raw talent, but are prone to the odd mistake, so they go in with the others prone to make the odd mistake, where they can do less damage.

2 - It does not reflect game reality, where at 6yo, for many trainers most 2m breeding lines are getting worse and the 2.4m-3m lines are at best staying the same, rare is the horse that keeps improving at 6yo for these distances. I am sorry this is so, I really would rather the best in game jump horses you can breed are at 6yo, 7yo or even 8yo or 9yo, but for 2m and 2.4m chasers that is simply not the reality in game. In my reality of the game, which I utterly accept may not be your reality of the game Martin, you can get there at 5yo and most of them do and these are better than the older versions of the same, heck some of them are pretty tidy at 4yo, but again jump like poo. They have one year of being excellent, maybe two if they are really special. And at the sake of sounding like a broken record, no they are not Flat horses, they may have come from flat horses a very very very very long time ago, but now they are jumps horse with lineage that is jump horses, and by the way, they do not make very good Flat horses either. I frequently try and sprinkle 'Flat bars' into my jumps horses (all of whom look considerably worse on paper than my flat lot on everything from Potential Extra Speed and yes that old devil Cruising Burst) and 95% of the time they suck as jumpers particularly chasers, you have to breed them through generations and generations and eventually you can get the bars to stick on what is basically a jumps horse, but it take a long time and a whole lot of patience. My current saves are split specifically so I do not dilute the two codes, My jumps save is on 82 seasons, 95% of the breeding stock is from this game, my Flat save is on 86 seasons, same rule with the stock. That dilution includes considerations such as ground preferences, nature etc and the extra bars that jumps horses need and flat horses simply do not, they are both combined UK games simply as I like to start training them as 1yo, and I race them all, from 2yo - 4yo on the Flat, usually up to 5yo on the Jumps. And I have tried again and again and again to change it, to get that magic game horse jumping legend, but they are all shite, even the actual jumps legends don't get close to the reality of my breeding. I will concede probabaly 30% of those seasons have been breeding only, where the outcomes just recycle the breeding stock, or add depth so not all those seasons included races.

Make this a rule and:

1 - The Queen Mother winner, a 6yo will be a worse horse than the one that wins the Arkle, indeed probably 60% of the Arkle field, extend to all open G1-3 2m chases and all open G1-3 2.4m chases.
2 - Very few, if any Champion Chaser winners will return, and I thought people had generally concluded this was a good thing.

So as a UK NH jump racing fan, flat I find rather dull and somewhat tedious, I have no conceptual issue with the suggestion, I do have an issue with it not being aligned to the game experience for a large number of the community, yes those nasty top tier chaps again, so anyone really who puts in the effort. Revisit this maybe for SO7 if Mark changes the way the game plays and what it allows you to do with breeding, but it has no place in the way SO6 works now, if your prepared to push it too its limits.

And for the record Martin, and in direct response to the rather veiled 'I have to remind myself that not everyone follows racing' comments which I find very condesending. I have followed UK jump racing personally for about 20+ years, I go to Cheltenham pretty much every year and have done so for at least the same period, in additon to Sandown, Kempton and Aintree, since my father got me interested in it. Both my brothers are mad about it, one is a utter racing stato, one owned stakes in some pretty bad jumps horses. But this is not a competition about who knows the most about racing history, this is a game, played on top of a game, it is Fantasy and should remain so.



And in the context of that very same game, messing with the jumps game to make it easier for none UK/Ire, and arguably none NH jumps racing fans is as as offensive to me as say we should change that pointless collection of Australian mud races back to the low rated handicaps they should be, would I expect be to you. And truth be told I actually think they are an excellent addition to the Flat schedule which also in many respects mark the simply massive contribution you Doug have made to the league, when you got rather upset last year about their representation. I am asking for the same in many respects, just for my NH races.

And I do mean this final point with absolute sincerity, both Martin and Doug, I hold you both in the highest regard and have a massive amount of respect for the way your contributions have directly uplifted this whole experience, just as those from Leon and Gray and all those behind the scenes have. I simply do not think this is a good thing for the game, my reality of it and what others can acheive within it.

Josh

this discussion has rumbled on for 8 pages now its time to stop theres currently 2 polls running the outcome of which will not suit everyone.I decided 3 seasons ago never to get involved in a heated argument again as it was detrimental to both myself and the party i was involved with as you gain nothing by taking your ball home with you,the only person who ends up getting hurt is yourself as you play this game cos you love it .So come on lets all play nice John get your horses back in but dont have too many winners please and keep it constructive without the hissy fits as ive had my fair share of them and it benefits no one.

Steve dali lama jalupen rann

NOW PLAY NICE

Thing we do for the love of the game, eh, well said. Had my say the polls can do the rest.

Well next time I will get my partner who is a lawyer to proof read what I publish. Having left school at 15 after failing you'll have to excuse my lack of technicality!

If you reread what I have posted - I suggested that with the qualifying for the GN through (potential) 'official' qualification races that maybe Gray can keep a separate record of handicap ratings from those races to be used for the GN - all other races that yours, mine, ours run in are subject to normal ratings/handicapping so it allows any trainer - if they wish to compete in any other races (hurdles for example) that they will not be penalised for it as their rating for the GN will be determined from the qualifying races.
This obviously has a lot more debating as to how it may or can work but in the interests of your example Josh where your horse bolted in at what you believed would be an unsuitable short distance - it would or may be protected in the GN by the ratings your horse would occur qualifying in races that may arguable be around the 4 mile mark and hopefully would be kinder in ratings than bolting in, in a 3m2f G1 (or whatever the race was)
This obviously opens up a hat full of further questions - should all designated GN hopefully have their own maiden races before and after the window? (for example)
As I said - much more debating to be had on this issue but it is indeed a serious issue we need to discuss and nut out before the next season.

You will also have to excuse my diction as I have consumed quite a bit of average Aussie red and will chip away at replying.

I voted 6yo as I am concerned about filling a field of 40 for the GN.

Also can anyone confirm if James Shea's GN winning horse was game or home bred.

Wobbling around a bit here Josh, with your examples of breeding long distance chasers and their peaking age being older the further they get/go - how did a 5yo win the GN in the League?
Personally as a small town, small business sihthouse rat Arthur Daly type business man - the more I think about this the more my bs bristles start twitching!

PJ himself said that to breed a GN winner you need a game bred GN winner to start with - it can't be done from two home bred horses. It needs a cross pollination.

Personally I'm not fussed with you lot! It's not about you or any of the top 5 or so trainers - regardless of any or no change - you lot will still win all the Graded races and all the big Handicap races - I realised a long time ago that Graded and Group winning trainers are the ones that smash their time breeding horses through either customised schedules or what ever means possible. Casual trainers have no chance of competing at the top - I and I suspect many (the majority) of trainers have worked this out - in fact if I can snatch a Listed race, I will hit my shop with a bottle of booze - a tube of the best lube I sell and smash a toy within an inch of it's silicon life!
That's how elated I would be!

The PROPOSED changes are to make it all user friendly and easier to navigate to the NOVICE trainer. Why you lot of top tier trainers are getting paranoid that you'll be penalised by this has me beat!

[quote="jalupen"]this discussion has rumbled on for 8 pages now its time to stop theres currently 2 polls running the outcome of which will not suit everyone.I decided 3 seasons ago never to get involved in a heated argument again as it was detrimental to both myself and the party i was involved with as you gain nothing by taking your ball home with you,the only person who ends up getting hurt is yourself as you play this game cos you love it .So come on lets all play nice John get your horses back in but dont have too many winners please and keep it constructive without the hissy fits as ive had my fair share of them and it benefits no one.

Steve dali lama jalupen rann

Bang on Stephen same reason as you why i dont come on here ... arguments and yes ive had a few
i have always said what a great league .. so helpful and made good friends on here
am i voting ? nope not interested ... i love watching live show and live stream and the races
yes it not real only a game and if anyone leaves the league because of this ... be very sad
every helps each other .. i made many friends on here
Stephen your message is the best of the 8 pages lol
John run My Princess Jane in the king george
happy new year lol
Del

I'm bored - I'm going to play Battlefield 1!