Welcome to F1 Pools - the 2008 edition! I'm kismet, your trusty (ahem!) old (another ahem!) game host. A slacker but not a quitter, I always show up - eventually. Like a persistent cough that simply refuses to go away. Or something.
If you've been here before, you already know how everything works (I haven't changed a thing) so feel free to skip my rambling and take a look at the list of duels at the end of this post. If you're a new recruit/convert and haven't been here before, a) thank you so much for taking interest - the more participants there are, the better, and b) you probably want to read the game rules below. They're not as messy and complicated as they seem at first glance. Really, they aren't. It's just that I'm linguistically stunted and have trouble making a simple point in fewer than 1000 words. If in doubt, ask for clarification and I'll be happy to offer it.
Game rules (subject to minor changes in case I happen to think of cleverer ways of formulating things)
F1 Pools is a game that deals with team effort rather than individual drivers. The game is loosely based on soccer betting. Basically, as a game host, I pick team-vs-team duels, you predict the outcomes and post your guesses in the appropriate game thread using the familiar (?) 1X2 system where 1 = home win, X = draw and 2 = away win. The home team is the one mentioned first.
Both reliability and pace need to be considered when rating a team’s performance in relation to its duel opponent (more on that below). Every car/driver combo that either sets a time in qualifying or finishes the race counts towards a duel outcome. Note that they must actually reach the chequered flag, simply being classified isn't enough. Possible grid and/or time penalties are ignored but disqualifications stand. Failures to set a qualifying time and/or finish the race can and will be used against a team.
The basic idea is that by picking "1" you're predicting a home team sweep. Logically "2" is then an away team sweep which leaves "X" for everything else. So far so simple. It gets a bit more complicated if and when people start falling off the track, blowing up their engines and what not, so here's a summary of how various race/qualifying results translate into duel outcomes (team A vs team B) :
[COLOR=red]1 the home team gets all its cars nicely lined up ahead of their opponents on the timesheets corresponds to finishing orders AABB, AAB, AB and just A see item * below X a "draw": a mixed grid/split result/any deviation from the above (or below) i.e. finishing orders ABAB, BABA, ABBA, BAAB, ABA, BAB, ABB, BAA see item ** below 2 as in 1, but now it's the away team that does the winning[/COLOR]
* If you can’t beat them on track, you can still earn points for reliability. A finishing order ABB (team A wins on pace, B on reliability) translates into an X because this is supposed to be a team sport and there are 2 cars in a team. However, an AB finish does not warrant a punishment for unreliability because team A hasn’t done any worse than team B in that respect (A wins on pace, no one on reliability, hence the outcome is a 1).
** No unreliabilty punishments for draws. An ABA result is an X and a mission accomplished for team B in that they’ve managed to beat one of their opponents on track.
Confused? Don't be, this really isn't as complicated as it looks. The definition of a draw (X) may seem a bit artificial/strange but I needed/wanted it to be a realistic duel outcome and this was the only way I could think of to achieve that.
As for scoring, points will be awarded for every correct answer and since this is a betting-inspired game, guessing an unlikely outcome right is worth more than being right about something expected. Instead of any fancy odds-calculating, your guesses are used as an indicator of probability so that for each correct guess, your score will be 1 + the fraction of players that guessed wrong. An example: let's say 50 % of you have picked 1, 40 % X and the remaining 10 % 2. If 1 is the correct guess, the clever 50 % will score 1 + 0.5 = 1.5 points. Similarly, if X is the way to go, the score will be 1 + 0.6 =1.6 points etcetera. Points will be added up throughout the season and the person with the highest points total will be crowned the champion.
Also, just so we have some black on white on this, as the self-appointed omnipotent overlord of F1 Pools, I reserve the right to make minor tweaks here and there if the need arises (it usually doesn't). I also reserve the right to make stuff up if something totally unexpected happens but it hardly ever does.
Anyway, here are the first duels of the brand spanking new season:
[B][SIZE=3]F1 Pools 2008: Round 1 - [COLOR=blue]A u s [/COLOR][COLOR=silver]t r a [/COLOR][COLOR=red]l i a[/COLOR] [/SIZE] Qualifying duels: Race duels:[/B] [COLOR=blue]1. Ferrari - McLaren 7. Ferrari - McLaren[/COLOR] [COLOR=silver]2. BMW - Renault 8. BMW - Renault [/COLOR] [COLOR=red]3. Williams - Red Bull 9. Williams - Red Bull [/COLOR] [COLOR=blue]4. Toyota - Toro Rosso 10. Toyota - Toro Rosso[/COLOR] [COLOR=silver]5. Honda - Super Aguri 11. Honda - Super Aguri [/COLOR] [COLOR=red]6. Force India - Honda 12. Force India - Honda [/COLOR]I'm not sure what the Super Aguri situation is exactly. I guess I should find out... Proceed as if they're going to be on the grid. If they won't be after all, I'll probably end up ignoring the duel.
Deadline: Start of qualifying, but truthfully, I probably wouldn't care if you tried to sneak one past me a few minutes late.
Format for guesses: "1X2 XXX 2XX X1X" or something similarly easy and clear.
Guess away! Good luck! !
