VOR '17-'18 - THE GAME

[Tunnel Rat]

I’ve bitten the bullet and bought all the bells and whistles. I’ll have to see if the increase in enjoyment is equivalent to a bottle and a half of rough red!

 

[Rainbow Spirit]

OK - here's an interesting point raised on facebook just now... With the 4kt minimum wind speed, has anyone considered taking the Leg 2 direct route risking the Gulf of Guinea pirates?

I did a rough calculation on the distances, and taking the 'short' route it is about 5,500nm, and that includes the upwind tacks. Taking the traditional route is about 7,400nm, so the 'long' route is about 33% longer than the short route. Me thinks that the long route is much faster if you get the right winds. I remember back in 2008/9 taking an abbreviated 'long' route, the headwinds killed me.

 

[Your Mom]

so I screwed up. I used the credits to add light air sails, and heavy air sails. Once I realized I wanted the full kit, I bought the full kit. However, it kept my credits I paid to buy the first two sails. Any thoughts on how to go about trying to get those back?

If you submit a help request, they might refund the credits.  I'm not sure.

 

[Your Mom]

Hi SA'ers,

As I'm new at this VR stuff, i did join leg1 a day late... i'm after some hints on how to setup & and then ignore for the start of the 2nd VOR leg.

Does anyone know if it is possible to use the programme cards to set a route before the actual start of the race 1400UTC = 0100 Mon 6th AEDT, and the yacht will start automagically??

Yeah, i'm going to have to make a few guesstimates ... but thank zezo for the win(d)

Reason being i'll now be on a yacht half way between Melbourne & Sydney (delivery for it's S2H preparation) with likely no iNet access for a day or two when the race starts. We leave 1700AEDT Fri 3rd (0600 UTC), there may be occasional  spotty mobile coverage up the east coast, i don't know never bothered trying before. &  it's too rude to ask to use the satalite data for this! 

Cheers

.kea

If you buy a Nav Pack or two (or three), you'll get enough programmation cards to schedule a couple maneuvers.  But I think it won't work until you're within 24 hours of your scheduled maneuver.

Also, my recommendation when offline for a start is to start with a straight line, not TWA.  The TWA seems to align itself to the winds at the current time instead of the winds of the scheduled start.  But - When you schedule your first post-start maneuver, you can schedule it as TWA.

 

[frostbit]

will be starting leg 2 as Spadadua. Does anyone know whether or not the upgraded winches make any difference at all? if so, under what circumstances? % impact on a leg like this one? 

 

[Your Mom]

will be starting leg 2 as Spadadua. Does anyone know whether or not the upgraded winches make any difference at all? if so, under what circumstances? % impact on a leg like this one? 

The game has a 50% speed penalty for tacks, gybes, and sailchanges.

In theory, pro winches cut that penalty from 5 minutes of 50% speed to 75 seconds, or something like that.

The Zezo forums have some rumors about it possibly not working.  (Also about the foils only working on port tack).  I think the rumors were true when they started.  I don't know if the problems have been corrected or not.

So...  if you want to be at the front of the pack, you'll usually need pro winches and polish...  but if you aren't planning to be in the top 2% anyway, then having the right sails and right strategy will be far more important than winches or polish.

There are cases where you can skip things and still be at the front...  In the Zanzib races a while ago, there was an upwind light wind race where I skipped the foils and heavy sails, and I wound up being fine.  Never needed them, but the C0 was still important.  In Mini Leg 2 right now, I'm going without C0 or heavy sails...  significant risk.  C0 would have come in handy yesterday.  But I've made other mistakes in that race that are hurting me more than the absence of a C0, so it works out to be a worthwhile savings decision anyway.

VOR Leg 2...  will probably require every sail.

 

[Hitchhiker]

I did a rough calculation on the distances, and taking the 'short' route it is about 5,500nm, and that includes the upwind tacks. Taking the traditional route is about 7,400nm, so the 'long' route is about 33% longer than the short route. Me thinks that the long route is much faster if you get the right winds. I remember back in 2008/9 taking an abbreviated 'long' route, the headwinds killed me.

Routing today shows 2.5 days faster for the west route vs the east!

 

[Your Mom]

Routing today shows 2.5 days faster for the west route vs the east!

 My rough guess at the impact of the 4-kt minimum windspeed is...

- West will still be best, because of the downwind angle in the South Atlantic, though, not because of a better route through the doldrums.

- The best path won't be as far West as it would be in reality.  (Unless we're required to go around Fernando de Noronha...  I haven't checked...  Are we?).  Likely someone will find a nice path down the middle and then get further West after crossing the equator.

- The doldrums won't be anywhere near as challenging as usual.  Just find your line, jam through, and remember your sailchanges.  But...  since the winds evolve constantly instead of once every 6 or 12 hours, there will be times when hand-steering through wildly shifting light winds could be important.

- Leaders will get way ahead of the real boats, because the real boats don't have any minimum windspeeds.

 

[Rainbow Spirit]

All this talk about cards, winches, polish?? etc doesn't endear me to sail any part of the VOR this time. Why do they stuff about with the game so much? Anyone else remember the Mars bars that you had to feed your crew some time ago?! Crazy.

 

[frostbit]

The game has a 50% speed penalty for tacks, gybes, and sailchanges.

In theory, pro winches cut that penalty from 5 minutes of 50% speed to 75 seconds, or something like that.

The Zezo forums have some rumors about it possibly not working.  (Also about the foils only working on port tack).  I think the rumors were true when they started.  I don't know if the problems have been corrected or not.

So...  if you want to be at the front of the pack, you'll usually need pro winches and polish...  but if you aren't planning to be in the top 2% anyway, then having the right sails and right strategy will be far more important than winches or polish.

There are cases where you can skip things and still be at the front...  In the Zanzib races a while ago, there was an upwind light wind race where I skipped the foils and heavy sails, and I wound up being fine.  Never needed them, but the C0 was still important.  In Mini Leg 2 right now, I'm going without C0 or heavy sails...  significant risk.  C0 would have come in handy yesterday.  But I've made other mistakes in that race that are hurting me more than the absence of a C0, so it works out to be a worthwhile savings decision anyway.

VOR Leg 2...  will probably require every sail.

Thank you!

 

[Sailing My Cubicle]

All this talk about cards, winches, polish?? etc doesn't endear me to sail any part of the VOR this time. Why do they stuff about with the game so much? Anyone else remember the Mars bars that you had to feed your crew some time ago?! Crazy.

YES- the damn candy bars!  I remember that.

 

[Sailing My Cubicle]

SMC, I am feeling your pain..when you convert 15 euros into American money, it is like $18. Is $1/day for a 2.5 week leg worth it???...maybe.

So, if I check my boat 6 or 7 times per day, that is $0.15/adjustment. Not so bad when you think about it, but, meh...

We'll have to see..I may just spin around into a beautiful oblivion in this edition of the VORG by about Leg 3 if I come up with something better to do. I have one of those old Atari style joysticks that plugs into my TV that has a half dozen 80's arcade games on it that my sister bought me as a nostalgia gift a few years ago..I bet she paid $10 for it..it has PacMan, Super PacMan, Pole Position, Galaga, DigDug, Space Invaders and a few others on it and I can play that stupid thing for hours!

See...that's my point.  You spend the same amount on a different game and you get play it until it breaks. VORG - $18 gets you 2.5 weeks of fun.  And then you need to pony up again for the next leg.  Hmmm, I'll keep thinking on it.

 

[Rainbow Spirit]

At the end of the 'candy bar' VORG, I thought my crew would need a virtual dentist!

 

[Marty6]

Noticed some changes in the new version of the App (as also predicted on zezo forum):

- weather forecast for 24h free now, only longer need cards

- programmation (course/TWA change) now starts with 2 cards for the first step

According to a post on zezo forum the programmation/waypoint are supposed to change to flat cost (2 cards each step) instead of the previously increasing cost (1 card, 2 cards, 3 cards, ... per step). The first waypoint is still one card, so i don't know if they only implemented he change only for programmation and not waypoints. Anyhow the "improvement" is ridiculous. Instead of moving the cost to 1 card/step they go 2 cards/step and still charge for the first step which actually does anything. Only second and further steps achieve course changes.

 

[Mudsailor]

So the count down on auto sail cards start immediately............even if the race hasn't started yet....

 

[BlueMountainsYC]

I'll give it a go again. shockwave11 reporting for duty for leg 2

 

[Your Mom]

So the count down on auto sail cards start immediately............even if the race hasn't started yet....

If you can be online, the first few hours should involve one or two sailchanges (depending on whether you start under LG before going to C0 vs. just starting under C0).  Once you get to HG, you'll be using it for a while, I think.  If you can be online, best to do the sailchanges manually.  I've experienced cases where the sailchange card does excessive changes (ie, as the wind increases and goes aft, it could go LG-C0-LG-C0-HG-C0-HG).  That would be extreme.  Worst I've actually seen (I think) was 3 sailchanges when only 1 was necessary, but you'll see the point...

 

[Breitling]

"Due to a great amount of players, some functionalities have been temporarily deactivated. Thanks for your comprenhension"

Virtual Regatta at its best !!

 

[joeboy]

This is kind of turning into a farce.  The only thing it has going for it at this point is the continuous weather, but everything else is getting dumber and more awful.  Is anyone playing the V L M game DavidNumber1 mentioned? Any thoughts on that one?

Try Virtual Loup de Mer, great site. v-l-m.org. 5 minute cranks for long races, weather updates every 6 hours, you can program an autopilot. It works really well, completely free, no gimmicks.

You can use external routing software. qtVLM is fantastic, started off intended for VLM, but now some Mini sailors are using it, and plenty of other people.

There is a learning curve but once you get used to it is really good. Try the permanent record races for practice, PSDP and the three 3 Megs races.

 

[frostbit]

Had a brief moment of glory out in first in first 30 min when boats were separated by inches. Spadadua,  now resporting in 120s