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Board » General Discussion » PROPOSAL: LIMITATION on the # of DCs

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Posted by ita10267 Posts 88 Registered at 2008-12-29 10:33:09	2011-04-03 16:53:26 - PROPOSAL: LIMITATION on the # of DCs
	A lot of discussion has been done between the routers/non routers SOL competition. Weather routing is a very important part of offshore sailing as every IRL sailor knows (SOL is not a simple online game, it's the best simulation available and it's not strange that the best sailors are also good IRL). There is no crew, beside the very amateur, which enters an offshore race without the help of some software tool. IMHO SOL is a great opportunity to learn offshore strategy and the use of weather routing find its natural application in this field. Software routers are ALL the same, so it is not a matter of rich vs poor battle. SailPlanner and BWR are free and they do an excellent job. On the other hand the appearence of Brain's toolbox and AGage efforts have enabled the possiblity of navigating almost on autopilot by setting a huge number of DCs between two subsequent updates. This gives a huge advantage because it is possible to sail almost perfect routes. My proposal is as follows: 1) Limit the accuracy of CC/TWA steering by 1 degree, very few helmsmans are capable of steering this accurate (Buddy Melges? Grant Dalton?) 2) Limit the number of DCs. I haven't figured out a number yet, maybe 2 per hour would do. Maybe it is nonsense but I would like to hear your respectable opinion on the matter. My best regards Andrea (ita10267)
Posted by Tempest Posts 79 Registered at 2009-06-16 17:44:17	2011-04-03 18:38:26 - Re: PROPOSAL: LIMITATION on the # of DCs
	Andrea I think your intentions are good to try and solve an ongoing discussion about rules / fairness / routers and so on. However I think these proposals will only work in ocean races, with plenty of space around you. If you sail single handed and enjoy a good night sleep as well,as I still do, it will make it very hard to stay of the coast when sailing close to land. So i have a problem with rule one as in the current situation it gives me an opportunity to sail safe very close to land on CC's without loosing to much ground when asleep or make a DC start on CC's With the second rule I have no problems as long as there is no shoreline within a certain distance. I think you will agree that it is impossible to enforce such a rule in an archipelago races etc. with people from all over the world competing. Summarised i can even agree on both rules if start / finish positions are wel offshore and separated by a vast ocean. But i do not think this will solve the ongoing discussions. Kees(Tempest)
Posted by 76Trombones Posts 362 Registered at 2009-08-03 18:04:56	2011-04-03 23:29:52 - Re: PROPOSAL: LIMITATION on the # of DCs
	I've followed this suggestion in chat and have tried to give it a fair "thinking about" but can't support it as a method to slow the routers (which is what most of the recent rumbling is about). Many/most SOLers sail in 8hr blocks (silly work/sleep). I don't have any problem eyeballing a dozen twa DC rolling into a gybe within the window... If the swing is really fast I'm usually better off taking a hit on CC for the critical bit, but it still works out to more than the proposed allowance. I'm also quite clearly on record as pointing out that steering decimal-degree accuracy is chasing your tail anyways due to overall Wx strategy. WX interpolation also plays the routers. What the current argument _seems_ to boil down to is rewarding time at the computer vs routing. If we want to reward screen-time I'll throw in the suggestion of smart-randomising the server weather. We can use some of the grib parameters to come up with pretty reasonable "local" weather. Someone sailing with frequent check-ins could (conceivably) eke some distance out over a router sailing to the grib. On short races this should be fun and on long races it's much closer to IRL. Ok, right. It's also a major direction change for SOL... What you see on screen is now a forecast only. The SOL polar is pretty easy to follow, but we end up sailing on instruments. Yes we've penalised the routers but we also chopped the knees out from under anyone sailing SOTP on DC. Full-time boats gain. I can see maybe a couple dozen boats that would pick up rather than lose speed, and many of them are (or are sometimes) routers. Nothing that we suggest is going to flip the ranking upside-down, if that's the goal. Nothing that we suggest is going to make it possible to guess and win consistently, which seems to be what some of the fleet wants. We're sailing in a fleet of 500+ boats. Guaranteed there is someone working harder than you. Yes the boats sailing no routing are putting in more effort (if they want to) than those sailing blind routing. I can tell who is who, and take pleasure in sailing relative to the boats that I choose as competitors. I suppose the other option is to nicely ask Eddie to pull his grib service. That would temporarily drop us back to the days of super-routing, and we can probably handle that in a gentlemanly fashion. I thought it was a step forward... now I'm less certain. 76T
Posted by Tempest Posts 79 Registered at 2009-06-16 17:44:17	2011-04-04 06:10:49 - Re: PROPOSAL: LIMITATION on the # of DCs
	76T , you have a point there that i overlooked. In the proposed system by andrea you will have a lot of advantage if you are at your computer. However in my opinion that was also the case in the "pre brainaid grib era". Other option might be giving WX updates at irregular times. But then again it would pay to stick to the computer. Something most of us can't. Tempest
Posted by ITA_2011 Posts 7 Registered at 2010-12-28 17:37:13	2011-04-04 08:17:02 - Re: PROPOSAL: LIMITATION on the # of DCs
	Good to hear some comments. My point is the following: - It is not possible to forbid software routing. As a developer of routing software I see all the possibilities that are opening. The worst of all is the capability of coding a fully automated pilot which can steer on bearings from WPs just as we do. Believe me, this is possible with a little effort and the latest development in available tools is pointing in that directions. At that point we will have many BOTs sailing and we'll get plenty of sleep. 76T suggestion of removing Brainaid grip is unfortunately useless. SOL wx, for most races, is derived from GFS model interpolated on a different grid. Removing the grib file will just give advantage to the number of people who can download data directly from NOAA and interpolate it on SOL grid. Moreover SOL wx is fully avaliable as xml file downloaded by the client. The best options that comes to my mind is still a limited number of DCs available. Maybe in the 10-20 range in between updates. So you can have closely spaced DCs around landmass but still is will limit the autopilot feature (at least it will make it more difficult). Finally, I really do not see why we should not limit the accuracy of steering to the first integer degree. It will not affect the possibility of going around landmass with a decent accuracy.
Posted by AGage Posts 411 Registered at 2008-12-27 10:31:57	2011-04-04 10:05:47 - Re: PROPOSAL: LIMITATION on the # of DCs
	I mainly feel the need to respond as my name was specifically mentioned. Firstly, while there IS a DC creator in the toolkit I am writing, all it does, is generate a DC over a small period of time, based on interpolaoting between 2 TWS/D values manually input and a time interval between them. It sets only CC courses, and will only maintiain either VMG or some VMC, not some arbitrary route. If it decided a limit on the number of DCs is warranted, I will of course, ensure it complies, although my own personal use in testing it during a race resulted in 12 DCs over 3 hours. A TWA course would probably have been more efficient, but the idea is to change 'effective twa' (it only generates CC DCs) when optimum VMG values change from a change in TWS. The toolkit's primary function is to help SOTP decision making and some (minimal) help in implementing s SOTP route. Aside from this feature, it is no easier to set a DC in my toolkit than in the oficial SOL client (other than some extra time formats) - there is no 'textual list' as per brainaid's toolbox - and tbh I think his is only that way for convenience, not to facilitate 100s of DCs being input with ease. And the BWR to DC tool was purely intended to a) quickly enter a few DCs in cases where we have very little time and are required to be absent from SOL for an extended period and b) to omit human error. All sorts of uses which had not even occured to me prior to posting it have been since invented/discovered, and I now very much regret posting it. But it IS only useful to BWR users, and BWR cannot produce such routes as seem indicated here for automation. Likewise I have emphasised that BWR is unique in allowing the user to enter manual routes have have the software estimate a time for them, so no optimisation is neccessary, and simply entering your planned route via BWR for DCs is again an exercise in accuracy and reducing human error - and it stil requires a few sub-legs to be changed to TWA courses - as BWR only supports integer CCs - yet another way inwhich the tool does not offer advantage, not to mention the tool rounds all DCs to whole minutes. Which points out another problem with just entering a huge string of DCs directly from a router - only CC courses, and i seriously doubt a router can route so fine as to negate this aspect. Also, to address to issue of router-users and SOL time. From approximately 500Nm behind, until the time I passed dunbur in Leg 5, right up until my planned finish, I was spending atleast 5+ hours a day on the race (which many can atest to from the chat ) - probably about 40 minutes of which was taken up using a router - approx 10 minutes per wx update. Granted this reduced when I realised I would finish 2nd at best. There are many levels of router use, and using one does not at all mean that other time (often significant amounts of) is not dedicated to the race. Often I did not even sail the 'router-suggested' route. I am guessing my result in that race has only served to fan the flames this issue. Personally, if there is growing disparity betwen those who do and don't use routers, the only solution I see is to introduce 2 'divisions' similar to other platforms, when registering for a race you declare in which you intend to race, and it is on honour that this choice is adhered to. Aaron I help develop the client interface for the best online ocean racing sim there is... __/)/)_/)__
Posted by AGage Posts 411 Registered at 2008-12-27 10:31:57	2011-04-04 10:11:14 - Re: PROPOSAL: LIMITATION on the # of DCs
	Andrea do you propose to limit ALL sterring to integer degrees or only for DCs? As I pointed out, my BWR to DC tool does just this... manual modification is required to do otherwise, even to set a TWA DC. I help develop the client interface for the best online ocean racing sim there is... __/)/)_/)__
Posted by ITA_2011 Posts 7 Registered at 2010-12-28 17:37:13	2011-04-04 10:11:35 - Re: PROPOSAL: LIMITATION on the # of DCs
	Sorry Aaron, I cited your tools just because they extend weather routing capabilities. It was not intended to diminish your efforts which I really appreciate because they resemble, in a cleaner way, many things that are on my TODO list But again I wish that we do all the efforts to make everyone feel that SOL is fair to everyone. If this means two classes.... PS: all the steering should be limited by the integer degree, CC/TWA DC or not. --- Last Edited by ITA_2011 at 2011-04-04 10:12:44 ---
Posted by NOR_Jawik Posts 70 Registered at 2008-08-31 20:55:18	2011-04-04 11:36:56 - Re: PROPOSAL: LIMITATION on the # of DCs
	ITA_2011 said @ 2011-04-04 10:11:35: But again I wish that we do all the efforts to make everyone feel that SOL is fair to everyone. If this means two classes.... I have been programming since the beginning of 1969 and regard this as a good tool that we use in real life on board. Being able to test out the programs here at SOL is fabulous. The problem that we have experienced since Braineid started this has created frustration among the sailors. So it's probably time to split up into classes. But what about the day we feel that everyone in a class represents a dot with no difference. This day will come as we add up to apply exactly the same programs. WX will create difference. Possibly. But is this the way to go ...
Posted by RainbowChaser Posts 2656 Registered at 2009-06-14 09:44:50	2011-04-04 12:34:31 - Re: PROPOSAL: LIMITATION on the # of DCs
	I am and probably always will be a SOTP SOLer.. I like imagining that I can "read" the weather and I like not spending very long considering my course (too much knitting, cooking, walking Mr K, napping and SOL Admin means there is little time for SOLing as such!). That there are SOLers who use routing software, SOLers who can write amazing programs to interact with SOL, is all wonderful news to me. Not because I will use the software but because it shows that SOL truly is a real-life simulator (as far as it goes) and can be taken seriously. In real life sail racing there are boats loaded to the gills with gadgets competing with boats skippered by people with super experience/local knowledge. SOL has this wide variation in skippers but, unlike real life, the gadgets are freely available to all who wish to put in the time to check them out and understand how they work, so to my mind, for anyone wishing to improve their results, they simply need to knuckle down and "get with the program(s)" ... literally!!! The advances in technology simply means that SOL has a super future.. absorbing and utilising latest navigation techniques. RainbowChaser (as herself not SOLgoddess)! --- Last Edited by RainbowChaser at 2011-04-04 12:35:15 ---

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