Hi, new player here. Have played the game for about 40 hours now (flats only) and am loving it. I am confused with some of the terms and mechanics used; maybe because I am not familiar with horse racing, I'm just into management games.

1) Based on the posts on the forums, the potential stat seems to be the most important one. But what does it do actually? Is there any relation between the potential stat and the speed/stamina/break stat?

2) How does the training impact your horses? Do they improve during the season or is there some sort of weighting system that distributes points offseason?

3) I'm assuming that the secondary stats are independent of the potential stat. So do they improve/deteriorate at all or are they set in stone?

4) Will my 3y filly suffer potential stat growth if she is in the barn at the end of the season?

5) There is the stat 'distance adaptability'. Is this adaptability from the indicator assigned at birth or the ability to switch between race distances effectively?

6) The only time I reduce the distance of the race the horse runs in is if the stamina is too low or if I notice the horse is faded/weakened for few races. But should I do the opposite as well? Should I race horses with higher stamina in longer races than the birth indicator?

7) Is the stamina only the capacity of the horse to race or does it have any advantage in the shorter races? eg: Horse A: Stamina 10, Horse B: Stamina 50, Horse C: Stamina 100 in a 5f race and all other attributes are equal. Will Horse B and C have an advantage over Horse A (maybe race at a higher speed for longer or a longer cruising burst?)? Does stamina become redundant after some point like, in this case, will there be any difference between B and C given that it is only a 5f race?

Should I stick with only the one prefered length for a horse or should I also race my horses for with a few furlong ranges? For example, sometimes I see 1m races where my 1m1f horse has a far superior rating than the ones competing. Should I allow the horse to compete?

9) When does the finish application come into play? Is it the percentage of track left or just x amount of distance?

10) What does each of the pacifier do? The tooltip suggests checking the instructions, but the instruction manual only says "Some horses may benefit from
these items depending on their profile and parameters. ". What are the profile and parameter I need to take into consideration? The head lad suggests that I use a pacifier. But no reason is given or any indication as to which pacifier to use.

11) Where is the ability to make notes on AI owned horses? The instruction manual points to a section that does not exist in the manual. I'd like to note the sires that have had good foals with my dams.

12) When do you send a horse to the field? I send older horses for a week or two after each race.

13) How do you plan the season? At the moment I just look for a race when the horses are ready. But surely there must be a better way to plan things.

14) In the training data, it says the estimated training potential for the agility and starting attribute. Is this actually the potential they can reach or their current ability estimates?

15) Is there any skin where I can see all the attributes and skills of a horse on one page.

Thanks for the time

I'll try to answer some of your questions.

1. There are two parts to the potential bar. The light green part of the bar shows you how good a horse could eventually be (absolute potential), and the dark green bar how good it is at the current time (realised potential). I find that to win a Group race a horse needs about 80% realised potential. The red speed\stamina bars are not related to potential.

2. I use the simple training module, so the AI takes care of training. There is one thing I would point out and that is the realised potential does go up with races upto a max of 5 times a season.

3. Apart from potential and crusing burst most of the other green bars are fixed at birth. The red bars do sometimes move with a horses age. After about 7yo a horses potential will start to deteriate.

4. As long as a horse is given approx 5 races a season, it can be in the barn the rest of the time.

5. This is a very minor stat and it has very little effect on how a horse performs. Most horses run best at one main distance and about one or two furlongs either side of the preferred distance. You can give the jockey race instruction which helps the horse race over different distances. e.g. If it is a short distance tell the jockey to "Go Early".

6/7. The birth indicator is wonky. I only enter horses into races based on their stamina bar. The higher the bar, the longer the distance.

8. Some horses can compete over multiple distances but I stick to races one furlong either side of their best distance indicated by the stamina bar.

9. Don't know an exact distance for this.

10. Trial and error to chose a pacifier.

11. Never used notes so don't know.

12. I never send horses to the field. Some trainers do.

13. I use my own schedules, they are laid out to suit my horses needs, otherwise just look at the yearly diary and maunually note which races to look for.

14. Don't think these estimated bars have any effect at all.

1. Potential is the measure of well your horse will do over their lifetime. Only horses with high potential will be able to race in the higher classes or Group races. Potential changes with time. You should race a 2yo at least a few times to maximise their potential gain. Mostly after that it will change when the season starts. The parent's stats are what decide speed/stamina/break.

2. When you say training, are you refering to the special training options? Like agility during blue time or speed/stamina emphasis? There's not a lot of info on that but people tend to set those while their horses are recovering and the change can take a lot of time to occur. Some horses may not respond to training at all.

3. All stats are decided by the parent's stats. It's a random value between the stat that's on the lowest parent and the stat that's on the better parent. As someone said, most of them don't change.

4. What do you mean by "in the barn"? Is that the breeding barn? Horse's stats will still change during the change of seasons, no matter where they are.

4. Answered.

5. This is probably going to apply to your other questions as well. The distance of races that will suit a horse is decided by their stamina. I recommend going to the Game Mods section of the forum and grabbing SiriusChill's increment bar mod so you can judge the numbers better but basically:
10% = 5/6f
20% = 7f
30% = 1m
40-50% = these horses aren't as easy to judge 1m1f-1m3f
60% = 1m4f
70% = 1m6f+

7. Your example would be very bad for Horse C. See above for recomendations of distance. Basically, short races are really fast and long races are slower. So typically, you'll see low stamina horses with really high speeds and then high stamina horses with more medium speed that will still do well. Even if the speed stat is equal in a sprinter and a stayer, the sprinter will run much faster than stayers. You might get a comment like "the distance was too short" or "horse was outpaced". The other way sprinters and stayers differ in how you want their stats is Extra Speed Burst vs Cruising Burst. For a sprinter, Cruising Burst doesn't have to be really high but it's very important for a stayer because they go from a slow speed at the start of the race and get slowly faster over the race without actually putting on their final burst of speed. Sprinters have to go fast throughout the whole race.

8. Answered.

9. Finish application is how much effort a horse will put into the end of the race (when they make a move, which depends on running style). Low finish application horses might be described as "weakened when beaten" or "faded". This is a good stat to have but not vital. Battling Qualities, another stat that sounds like it's for the home stretch, is whether the horse will give up if they're head to head with another horse. This stat maxes out at about 85% and it's very rare to get a horse with more than 10%ish, so don't stress about this one.

10. Yeah, no one really knows the answer to that (I've been through 30 pages of the forums). Try each one and see if the jockey and formcard stop saying "horse didn't settle". There may also be a note in the Head Lad comments that says the horse would benefit from a pacifier.

11. You can't make notes on horses used for breeding.

12. Horses only need to be sent to the field when they've had enough racing for the season or when they're recovering from an injury. Unless they have a low confidence stat, in which case they need a break in the paddock (some people say about a month) or they'll perform badly in their next races. The Constitution and Juvenile Constitution are what tells you how much racing a horse can take, not their age. Old horses can sometimes race more than younger horses. Your Head Lad lets you know when the horse has had too much racing, or you can see the red constitution bar has gone to a low level. If Juvenile Constitution is low, you may only get one or two races out of a horse at 2 and 3 but then they'll be much better as a 4yo.

13. I only plan the season for my feature race horses. I use a combination of the pre-entry in the Diary and also a spreadsheet that I have open to keep track of things.

14. Agility and starting are the current level. These can be affected by the special training modes but as above, it doesn't always change things.

15. When you are viewing a horse's summary, in the lower left hand corner of the stat box there's a blue square button. If you click this it will bring up a screen with both the first and secondary stats all on one page. This screen is only available at higher resolutions though, not 720p.

My big tips are read the form book and the jockey feedback. Check out the times of races - next to the winning time at the top of the form card is a number in brackets like this [-0.1]. If that number is a minus, the time of the race was faster than the average for the race. Be careful judging the stats of 2yos because they change multiple times during the season. I've had one change as many as four times and then change again when they turned 3yo. Sell 2yos, not yearlings but look at the yearling stats, because they're the best estimate of what the 3yo stats will be. I'm sure you'll end up with lots of breeding questions as well, so read through the forums for lots of tips, there's so much amazing advice given by the long time players. There's a wealth of information about how to really bring out the best in your breeding barn.

CB maxes out at 85% but Battling goes to 100%...not sure which you meant in this sentence

Might have got them mixed up, for sure! So yeah, CB maxes at 85% so don't stress if it doesn't go over that and don't stress if Battling Qualities are low because it seems to be that horses with over 10% are really rare.

Pacifier - which pacifier is responded to is hereditary. If neither parent used one, just guess. But if a parent used one, and responded, it will always be that one.

"Not Settling" message seems to be triggered by multiple reasons, including pacifier but not limited to it, like needing gelding. I think I've seen it when the horse dislikes the going or is running green (and over fresh), and I also think I see it more often when a horse is entered well over class. So for this message, try things other than pacifier, esp. if neither parent needed one. It feels like a general purpose "horse was unhappy" message.

Thanks guys. The answers were really helpful

The "Not Settling" statement appears to be caused by a variety of factors, including but not limited to pacifier use and the need for gelding. I believe I have witnessed it when a horse dislikes the going or is running green (and over fresh) doodle cricket and I believe I have also witnessed it more frequently when a horse is entered way over class. Therefore, for this message, explore alternatives to pacifiers, especially if neither parent required one.

There are some questions that make me quite curious drift boss the answers here are also quite interesting