Hello!

Nice to meet you all. I pottered around these forums a few years ago whilst playing SO6 but never got very involved with discussion, despite admiring the idea of an Online League so much. Anyway, I was putting off purchasing SO7 just due to the reviews suggesting it was so much alike SO6. I bred a virtually unbeatable mare in SO6 last week and decided I wanted to be more involved in online stuff, for the sake of the conversation, challenge and learning etc. So here I am, having caved and purchased SO7!

I wanted to ask a few things. I'm going to play a standard Flat Game before I open up a League Game, just to try and wrap my head around breeding. But -

1. Is it unrealistic to think I can breed horses that will place in League races whilst only playing casually? Is it something that requires hours every day and a lot of commitment?
2. What is your biggest advice to a newbie?
3. From my recent reading, I should look largely at the Potential bar and ignore all other stats? So a sprinting horse with terrible extra speed/speed stat is still worth trialing? On that topic, in SO6 I aimed for 90%+ on potential. Is it the same goal here?
4. I understand the League mode does not allow you to make use of .ttf files and such, is that correct? So if I get a really nice filly in league mode, there's no way to duplicate her to speed up my breeding program?
5. What on earth does 'CK' stand for? I've been trying to read a lot of topics here and can't work it out.

Thanks all! I sort of suspect this could be a big flop for me haha, I think many of you have been at this for years! I just wanted to reach out anyway

Hi Lilly,

best of luck!

im not the person to ask for advice here but im sure some of the top trainers will give you some advice.

hello and welcome

1. No there is something for everyone here you will get winners if you place your
horses correctly dont throw your horses into G1s run in maidens and get a handicap
mark an work from there

2. Stick with it it will be tough at the start everyone has high expectations and think
their horses will be world beaters but usually its a rude awakening and most new comers
see their horses getting beat and give up there are so many races for everyone after the
first 2 weeks of the season

3. my advice is that yes the potential bar is important but trials in the CK
are everything go with your best in there no matter what their bars look like

4. TTF's are banned your horses will only upload to the site if league play horses

5. construction kit where you export and trial your horses set up races etc

Hope it helps dont be shy to ask more questions everyone is great on here

Hey Ryan, thanks heaps for the welcome!



Hey PJ, thanks so much for your help - and also for all of your content here that I have read and tried to absorb! I decided to throw myself into the deep end and start with League mode. Can I ask you one more question? I've been restarting my league game (with 5 seasons autorun) to try and get at least one high potential starting horse. Is it like SO6 and you will eventually get a 90% potential, or do they have to be bred on SO7? Thanks heaps.

Hey Lilly

Welcome !! Glad you caved and purchased it, I did it back in June/July after having a few years away from the game since the days of SO5.

I'm glad you have decided to go straight into the league mode, I did what you initially intended on doing as I wasn't planning on entering the league - but then I realised just how much fun it would be to get back into it. Also there is no real difference in the game modes other than by playing on league mode you can trial your horses knowing that any monsters you find will be seriously helping you start to build a league team.

Def agree with looking at Paul's content on here, lots of good advice in there. My tips would be as follows:

1) Start a combined game, not a flat or jumps. Reason why is that this has given me horses that are capable of running well over either code - so, for example, I have a league horse that is my best 8-10f filly/mare from 3-6yo but also one of my best 2m4f hurdlers. And because that distance on the flat is not my strongest, I have entered her in the jumps league. There are so many instances where one of your flat bred horses fail to fire in the CK but then when trialled over the jumps they are great - and vice versa. Leon who is the league champion has a number of flat sprinters entered for the league that were initially bred to be 2mile chasers! So try a combined game.

2) Build up your money as quick as you can - figure out some consistent game results from the first few days of racing, make a note of them, and then quit game and reload it and bet all your money on wins and forecasts/reverse fcs to build up your money. You need a lot of money so that you can start buying any top horses that come up for sale in the main sales, breeders sales, end of year sales etc.

3) As you build a stable, trial in the CK and only keep your best horses for breeding purposes - as this is what you need for the league. And when breeding, try mixing up your distances and try combining different traits from different horses you have eg. ones that have a finishing kick with other horses who have more battling qualities. You will figure these traits out by watching your races and races in your CK.

4) Let the computer breed with your horses as you improve - you will get booking requests very regularly as you improve and my advice is to let the ai breed with your horses. It makes a huge difference to the quality of the game horses as you go on and often some horses then come into the sales or breeding barn and can add quality to your lines

5) breed with top gamebred horses, particulalry the foreign ones - this is personally where I have seen the most improvement and kicked on my lines massively. Look for the stallions that hold course/race records, ones that have sired multiple g1 winners, or who have won a huge number of group 1s themselves. Some of them can be duds and produce nothing good for you but I promise you some of them will have a massive impact and transform the quality of your horses.

6) Stick with the guidance on here, trust in the process, and be patient - if you follow the likes of Paul, Hemz, Leon, and even some of this advice above, you will quickly improve your stable. I started playing in July, some 50-60 seasons+ behind the other top trainers, and I had a couple of winners in the league trials - so you can make progress quickly and get involved in the league. Plus, there plenty of lower level races in the league to cater for all trainers, not just the G1 winning trainers!

Good luck and if you want any more advice, people are super helpful on here!

Hello and welcome to the nut house.

1- no that is not unrealistic, the way the league mode has been restructured on so7 makes it tailored made for casual play.

2 - enjoy playing the game, play multiple formats, trial and trial and trial again.

3 - potential is called out as a important factor in league mode games as the rest of the stats are hidden, in this mode it is the only real indicator you have visually. In a standard game add speed and cruising burst.

4 - nope no transfer between game and no recreation, when they die they die.

5 - construction kit, bottom right hand corner of the landing page and where you trial or race your exported horses against each other.

Josh

I would add, don’t start a normal game if your thinking to play the league as an end goal, if your familiar with so6 then you will find it is about the same but with a slightly worse UI. It will not clue you in for league mode which has its own set of challenges. I would also make a target to get something out for the upload window of this league, after week 5 before week 6 and dip your toe. Keep your expectations in the handicaps but you never know, it only takes one horse to make magic happen and these can land in the game early.

And finally be prepared to start new games over and over until you get a starting package you can work with.

Hello an welcome. I'd agree with all said here, and possibly add one thing I think is vitally important now. Watch as many races as possible. You really need this now to work out all the hidden stats. It will give you a good indication of cruising burst etc, all those little hidden stats you used to be able to see. Then you can breed speedy horses with each other to maximise that stat, but also start adding in the other traits you can visually see other horses have. It's a great way to keep advancing your breeding lines, takes time to get them in, but it does work so just stick with it. Read some of the race comments too, like travelled well etc

Some great advice here, thanks so much! I'll be sure to keep all of this in mind, it's been a big help.



I'm glad I decided to jump straight into league then! Thanks heaps for your input, it's been great.



Thanks Kniesh! Do you have a rough guide on what the stats will look like? Battling Qualities would look like a horse pulling ahead in a head to head... I have a rough idea of what the rest might look like but would love some confirmation if possible.

I've restarted the game about 30 times now I think... maybe more, I wasn't counting. I haven't seen much worth working with. This is my best so far:

Hey, also. I'm a bit worried something has gone wrong amidst my StartIt installation, it wouldn't load in League mode so I assumed the two weren't compatible. Anyway I've just been loading games in as pure Vanilla SO7. However, I can only see two Racecourses on my map? Is that normal?

Could be a 90% 3yo maybe a little more, that’s not a bad place to start from, I have 90% horses in my league team and expect I am not alone. 100% is obviously the holy grail but I expect a fair number have not yet found it.

Hi Lilly.

It takes a little time to develop league horses and don't think because you have an awesome in game horse that it will translate into a good league horse. It can happen but not very often. Trialing after each season once you've exported them is key.

Most of us I'm sure export our horses around August time which gives them 3+ or more runs. Can be slightly different for 2yo and NH horses.

The more you watch races the more you will understand the horses running styles and traits. But this takes time and make sure you have notes at the side of your horses so you know once they enter the breeding barn you have a good idea on what there running style is like for pairings.

Also make your stallions available for AI breeding with other mares. This will keep the pool of horses, especially CK horse form circulating for generations to come. You'll be pleasantly surprised later in the game on how these improve your lines with breeding from you stallions which have matched AI mares.

If you want to be apart of both codes I'd advise using a combined schedule like mentioned above and you have the best of both horse types for each discipline come league time.

Battling qualities is a tough one as it tends not to pass on too much in breeding. But look for comments like 'headed but battled back' or really close finishes where they're battling for a while in a finish.

Thanks for the insight guys! I'm going to roll with the game that colt is in I suppose. Sounds like an okay starting point The only advice I'm not taking is the combined schedule, I don't have much interest in jumps, at least at the moment. Hopefully I don't come to regret that.



Thanks Hemz for that rundown, very helpful. I'll take that info on board.

Can I ask somebody - is the StartIt mod compatible with League mode? I've just reinstalled the whole game as I believe I didn't install the mod correctly and it messed with my schedules and courses. If it's not compatible I won't bother re-installing StartIt.

Don't know about startit because I don't use it but I will just say seriously consider the jump side. It is more forgiving than the flat. With fallers and such you can win a bigger race slightly more easily. It is much harder to land a G race on flat.

I have been playing about 6 seasons and best I have managed on flat is one G3. But on jumps I get at least one G1 every season.

That is in the league by the way