Pro cyclist mode and race day condition

[Aralunox]

Thats a topic I already opened on pcm 2023 and its hilarious that this is still ignored and not changed.

Why on earth is race day condition still absolutely broken on pro cyclist mode?

Explanation:
Lets say I play standard setting, with race day condition to -3 to +3. AI will target races, which will give them a race day bonus for objective and a bonus for preparation, resulting in a +3 bonus. As a player, you only get the objective +1, you dont get the bonus for preparation, which totally ruins the balance. So if I want to play equal to the shape of the AI, I would need to turn that feature off. And thats very sad, because I liked that feature for years before you decided to absolutely destroy it for pro cyclist mode in last years edition.

Its even worse if you have the standard random factor activated, because riders with preparation and objective bonus have only rare chances of a bad day (which is great), but as a player you have only that objective bonus resulting in too often bad days on targeted races.

It makes me really angry because I have passion for this game and i like the small changes you do, but this is such a weird and broken mechanic, that I will refund this game. It makes pro cyclist mode just way too random as a player (or more boring if I disable that feature).

I really hope you will fix this again, its just sad. Its a core mechanic, that just doesnt work right. I dont even know why you thought that it would be a good idea. The explanation kinda was, that you want pro cyclist mode to be more difficult. But this is just a random element, it has nothing to do with difficulty, it just adds frustration to a system, that was great before 2023 and 2024.

Edited and added:
Its even more hilarious, that the pro cyclist target system gives a +1 bonus to objectives (was added in a pcm 2023 patch) and not +2 (+3?, however it works) to preparations at least instead. The problem is, that you cant select objectives anymore, like the ai does (or like players can in career mode...).
But the solution cant be to get objective and preparation bonus on fitness targets, because then you would be in advantage of the ai, since every race would be an objective in the targeted period.

But that was explained already in pcm 2023, it was simply ignored for 2024. I get that you couldnt change it as fast in 2023, but Im severly disappointed, that it wasnt changed in 2024 as well.

Guess the best emergency solution could be sth like +X on preparation for targets and that both, players and ai, does not get any objective bonus at all. I guess you cant just add an objective system to pcm 2024 anymore. But again, that should have been solved already in first place...
Or maybe at least change the +1 objective to +X preparation (for standard settings, just equal the preparation level of the ai for specific settings) and make sure, you have the same bad day "protection" like you would have in career mode (or like in editions before 2023). Then I still would have an increased difficulty and the ai would have an unnecessary advantage, but it would be usable and playable again at least (it wouldnt be a good solution, but it would be at least a workaround for now).

To be honest, I have no hopes for any good fixes for this problem in 2024 and it makes me just sad. I love cycling, but its these small important details that were great and just get smashed for no reason. :(

Beside that I think the many small ui changes you did were great. And i really appreciate them. But gameplay concerns should always be the main focus.

Little disclaimer, I play on extreme, this is not a post about that the game is too hard, its about a frustrating element, that is too random. And again, I like the old race day condition system, because it adds another level of gameplay for smaller races and smaller teams and that is why I dont want to disable it. In career mode it works fine I guess.

[John Sangrós]

+1000

[Boomchickywawa]

+10000 unbelievable this hasn't been fixed

[Aralunox]

hm new beta patch stating nothing about this topic, still not happy about that.

[DON slask]

I have played some 2023 and 2024 and dont have this issue, im running with +5 and -5 in RD condition and iff i plan it inn the calender and have low tirredness and high shape off the rider i get +4 and +5 90% off the stages, maybe its ann issue on +3/-3 max RD condition?

[ricki.fid]

Originally posted by DON slask:

I have played some 2023 and 2024 and dont have this issue, im running with +5 and -5 in RD condition and iff i plan it inn the calender and have low tirredness and high shape off the rider i get +4 and +5 90% off the stages, maybe its ann issue on +3/-3 max RD condition?

Don't know mate, it might be just luck; I just rode a Tirreno-Adriatico with 98 fitness and sub20 tiredness, the race as objective, and my rdc kept floating between a -1 and +2 at best, with many days being a sad 0 rdc

[Aralunox]

Originally posted by DON slask:

I have played some 2023 and 2024 and dont have this issue, im running with +5 and -5 in RD condition and iff i plan it inn the calender and have low tirredness and high shape off the rider i get +4 and +5 90% off the stages, maybe its ann issue on +3/-3 max RD condition?

I played 2023 very much and the problem was there already known. It definitely wasnt changed at all. I mean it cant even work, like i described above. iIs technically not possible what you describe. And there are other topics as well, that undermine this clearly.

Tried it as well with UAE Tour again, no tiredness, 98 fitness, estimated RDC of 1, got everything from -2 to 2. Other guys in top shape obviously with mostly +3 on their way.

[ricki.fid]

quick upgrade; riding the Giro right now, 11 tiredness and 98 fitness, estimated rdc +1, and on the early queen stage of Gran Sasso I get -5 rdc. Needless to say, I said ♥♥♥♥ this and closed the game

[Roderik]

+10000

[DON slask]

first stage Giro, expected RDC -1
Get +2

it is not a Goal for the season.
93 inn shape
51 in tirredness;
https://gyazo.com/a0556b1db65d4432a528fa732d6257a0

stage 2
Expected RDC -1
Get +1

93 shape
51 tirredness
https://gyazo.com/3d6cda109439ee2477e15989ff17253b

might just be luck, or it might be a bug for certain countrys ect, i dont know as you say iff you have +1 you shud RARELY or NEVVER get -5

[Aralunox]

I absolutely dont think, that you understand whats going wrong. Your screenshots doesnt prove anything and dont even contribute to the topic. Read it again please. Its about how objective and preparation are calculated for the estimated bonus and how it translates into the rdc ON PEAKS AND GOALS. So whats the point of saying you had expected -1 and got +1? It doesnt matter, thats the normal rng factor you have and thats not the topic. Just take the rng out (its an option) and then you get whats going wrong (not saying, that the problem doesnt occur with rng option, just saying you see it more clear)..

Just test it out in career mode, maybe then you realise what you are writing here.

[Oggmeista]

have you noticed the devs always stay clear when an in depth explanation is required, which they can't give a satisfactory reply to. , because they already know they have never addressed it, I notice this all the time with this game series, ask serious questions of why they the devs have not addressed this or that, and you'll be answered by a wall of total silence..

[ricki.fid]

Originally posted by Oggmeista:

have you noticed the devs always stay clear when an in depth explanation is required, which they can't give a satisfactory reply to. , because they already know they have never addressed it, I notice this all the time with this game series, ask serious questions of why they the devs have not addressed this or that, and you'll be answered by a wall of total silence..

I've found online 1 reply by the devs about this fitness peak topic, saying that it was done to make the game tougher, but they would go back to fitness peak if players got too frustrated with it. One year later, almost every discussion about Pro Cyclist mode is people complaining about the new system, and they still haven't said or done anything

[Aralunox]

Another beta patch and still nothing about this. Only silence :(.

[Poggers]

Just adding to this. I have played my entire 2nd season and I kept track of how many races I did and how many negative RDC I had for those. 56 races. 55 negative RDC.

[слабое]

Does objective even matter? i didnt gain +1 to expected RDC on the day of the objective race. With low tiredness+good fitness+using mental skill if necessary you could almost always be on 0 expected RDC. So on extreme difficulty your created "next Pogi" will be worse then lowtier domestique.

Sure for some players the game will still be "easy", but how many of them are there? Is it worth to "ruin" objective and fitness peak systems, mb better to do some rebalancing.