This wait is actually getting unbelievable now - this is not me having a go at anyone by the way, im sure there isnt anybody to blame.

The problem is all we are hearing is 'soon' , 'schedules will be uploaded soon' , but soon seems to be forever atm and then after that there still needs to be the staffing sorted out and the 'upload window' which will be a couple of weeks. At the moment i think its looking odds on the league wont start until august - originally it was meant to be at the beginning of may!!

The league schedules are now perfect in my opinion i.e. 12 week long with ideal numbers and balance of races. There should, in my opinion, be THREE SEASONS per year. 3 seasons with a 5 week break in between each one = pretty much one year.

I would hate to guess how many hours 'league focussed' trainers put into the game - i have put hundreds in to my current game and im way off the pace so i know scatters and thunderspark must have dedicated loads of time. hemz has spent alot of time on his game i know for sure, and i know that others at my level such as scotty and nick have also spent a hell of a lot of hours getting competitive horses. The problem i have is that for SO4 the 'return on investment' has been ridiculously poor. All of those hours play for one full season and one which was cut short after a few weeks. For the amount of game time we all put in we should be having 3 seasons a year for sure. I am no longer playing so4 - if the league starts then great, i will make do with what i have. but there is no way i will continue to spend hour after hour to gain half a length on my horses when the league is so inconsistent.

For SO5 we need to see three seasons a year which are ran under set rules, staff roles, and schedules. I think this may require having someone create a competley new website for the league and out of my love for the game I would happily put forward 50-100quid to this. The league needs to change asap

sorry for long post!!!

Rich will it HAPPEN ?

I'm with you on this Ryan, god knows how many hundreds of hours i have spent trying to improve.
My problem is I go away next monday for 2 weeks, then I'm back for 2 then I'm on my stag do for 5 days, then get married 2 weeks after and i'm away for another 3..............I dont think there's any point in me playing anymore as I'm surely odds on to be away at the most importatnt times!!!

have a great time scotty and congrats bud

u probs wont miss owt scotty - if you were to be away id happily enter your horses into races on your behalf???!!!

it needs to be addressed though - all of us putting in hours and hours of gameplay and weve had one and a half seasons in a year and a half??!! im sorry but thats fuckin wrong on too many levels!!! i wont play for the league until i know its sorted and we are guaranteed season after season!!

until then ill play ipad version for fun

I totally agree Ryan and I'll keep this short.

If the league is again delayed till August then I'm pulling out of the league.

That's just way to long to wait for this thing to get going. By August, that would make it 3 months and that's a lot of time wasted.

that was just a guess thunder - sort of a worst case scenario that may come true

when may was announced i said to hemz that it would be june/july because i knew things like this would happen - the problems with TOM, and only dave who is too busy nowadays knowing how to sort things, means that the current situation is always gunna happen!!!

on the whole the league ,since i found out about SO during the current installment (SO4), has been a failure. 1 n a half seasons in all that time is poor.

hence why i propose to put together some kind of donation to get a programmer to make us a new league website so that leagues can be ran continuously with a set break in between seasons. thats how it should be now but unfortunatley it isnt

I can understand peoples frustration, am one of them.

In my opinion Rich should have had this sorted way before May, things should have started to get fixed early April in time for the league to start.

Am guessing it out of rich's hands tbh. He could have gone about it way earlier and then we may have started in may or the beginning of June.

This is what am hoping is going happen once TOM is sorted. That the following season can be set up straight away, if that is possible.

I've sent rich an email saying i maybe able to help out, or should i say my girlfriend possible can. He's waiting on DD replying, not sure when that will be.

even if this league does start, as hemz says, the question is how long will the break be before the next one!!

the league needs to be continous. 12 week season, 5 week break, 12 week season etc. this would see improved horses but also more horses return at an older age which is rare in current league.

my main issue which i cant stress enough is how many hours we have all put , in comparison to how many league seasons wev played.

hemz - 100s and 100s of hours, thunder scatters, scotty, nick, myself, mike westwood, del, padraig, hooley - so many of us. so 1000s of hours breeding and trialling for nothing!!!

it needs to change before so5 is out or i wont be buying the game. i know we cud have a perfect league built by then

I propose that if the league has not been sorted by the 1st July (meaning schedules are not uploaded and horses ready to be nominated) then the NHC league should be run manually by myself.

i have devised a method of doing this fairly and efficiently. it may not be ideal but at least it would mean getting the league season underway. obviously all nhc trainers would have to be on board.

for trainers like thunder, i know u r a flat trainer and i would love to do both but obviously the work to do the league manually would be too much to do both

Seriously how long those it take to upload a schedule and do some SQL code? SQL isn't rocket science. I'm waiting nearly 5 months to play in the league and I'm pissed off.

I've got no idea how long it takes, the fact is it clearly takes some time otherwise we'd be done already. I had not factored in this delay into my calculations, maybe I should have done but the time difference makes communication tough.

It's not my place to explain the reasons behind the delay although if I did it would make some people feel pretty bad over the stance they have taken. I understand the frustrations but complaining about it doesn't make it any faster or any easier.

Yes, we could start the league on a manual basis and handle it with spreadsheets and the like and given the spirit within the community I've no doubts that it could work. However TOM is a useful utility, it is a utility that we should use as it's simplicity and GUI encourages new players to join. A schedule change and rule change makes a big impact to the coding and it should be done properly.

SO5 is a long way off, there is plenty more thread in SO4 yet. Personally I haven't been playing it as much as I have for ages.

rich im not frustrated with dodgydave or think its his fault this isnt being resolved. I know he has personal issues and other things keeping him busy and so4 should not be on his mind right now. But its not good that the league all hinges on one person being around to make the website function!

Rich, sorry but still no start date?? Start the league with spreadsheets and use TOM for the following season. I am also willing to help with spreadsheets etc.

OR I am willing to invest in paying Dogydave. Actually should have done it a lot sooner, sorry Dogydave you have put a lot of effort in this mate.

Once all the new schedules and rules are in place, will it be easier to set TOM up for another season straight away without Dodgydave?

The gap from last season has be way to long. I really like ryan idea of only having 4/5 weeks break after a season as ended.

Yes you will not find many new horses which could better than your previous ones, but you will see a lot of returning horses season after season.

Which is a good thing imo.

Another question rich, why don't we have presidents back for each leagues?

This worked so well in previous seasons, one person should not have control on how the leagues should be run and the decisions been made.