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KX Challenge

You are here: Home > Forum > Simulations > Released > King's Cross > KX Challenge

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KX Challenge 06/01/2014 at 15:56 #53620
GW43125
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Hi all,
Hope this is the correct category,
Thought that since it is a new year, I would propose a challenge, so here goes:
I think we should have a competition over the next year, and see who can score the most on KX 4 day TT.
Feel free to disagree if you wish, but I believe we need a Slight element of challenge.
Starting afresh now (Or since wednesday 1st), post your scores here.
Good luck and Happy Signalling!

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KX Challenge 06/01/2014 at 19:40 #53626
CTCThiago
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232 posts
" said:
Hi all,
Hope this is the correct category,
Thought that since it is a new year, I would propose a challenge, so here goes:
I think we should have a competition over the next year, and see who can score the most on KX 4 day TT.
Feel free to disagree if you wish, but I believe we need a Slight element of challenge.
Starting afresh now (Or since wednesday 1st), post your scores here.
Good luck and Happy Signalling!
Hello,

My opinion:

1st: We need to fix the 4 day TT, and put more information on it, as the this TT came with very basic informations.
2nd: King's Cross PSB is Operated by 2 signallers at Off peaks times and 3 signallers at Peak times. (Need to confirm this)
3rd: We may form groups for healthy competition and develop some rules too.
4th: We need to start to do Timetables including all locations.
e.g: 2P00: London King's Cross to Peterborough. Make a Timetable for Kings cross and peterborough sims.
5th: More Important: I said this before and i'll say again, please read the manual of the simulator, study the simulator, before trying to open a challenge to SimSig community, I've been playing King's Cross since 2010, but only register at SimSig website in 2011, and join multiplayers sessions in 2012, so, I've seen many SimSig players operate panels that he/she have no idea of the area covered. We need to discuss about this first, before open a challenge.

This is my opinion and i'm open to discuss this subject.
Cheers
Thiago.

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KX Challenge 07/01/2014 at 10:57 #53641
kbarber
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1743 posts
" said:
" said:
Hi all,
Hope this is the correct category,
Thought that since it is a new year, I would propose a challenge, so here goes:
I think we should have a competition over the next year, and see who can score the most on KX 4 day TT.
Feel free to disagree if you wish, but I believe we need a Slight element of challenge.
Starting afresh now (Or since wednesday 1st), post your scores here.
Good luck and Happy Signalling!
Hello,

<snip>
2nd: King's Cross PSB is Operated by 2 signallers at Off peaks times and 3 signallers at Peak times. (Need to confirm this)
<snip>
Cheers
Thiago.

Point of information... unless my memory is much mistaken, the real-life Kings Cross has five panels each of which would be worked by one signalman. The physical layout would make it difficult for one person to work more than one panel, unless traffic were extremely quiet; moreover, my understanding is that the intensity of the work is such that signalmen were not required to work a full eight hour shift on a panel. (What I heard in the early 1990s was that, rather than three 8-hour shifts, the box was covered by four 6-hour shifts. As the signalmen were paid for 8 hours at the then grade F - the highest grade - this introduced a de facto grade G. If anything, the workload has increased since then.) Admittedly, Biggleswade is actually part of Kings Cross (but has been transferred to Peterborough by Simsig for technical reasons that, I believe, no longer pertain) but the workload there is relatively small so the difference can be discounted for manning calculations.

Hope this is useful for setting things up.

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KX Challenge 07/01/2014 at 11:31 #53642
LucasLCC
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Just curious. Is this individual submission, or as part of a group?
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KX Challenge 07/01/2014 at 11:45 #53644
mfcooper
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If you want to look at a score, and you want to pick a "winner", then I suspect this is an individual challenge.

You'd also need to make sure every challenger had the same set of start-up options, including delay/failure settings. However, each user will have different incidents, and someone could be very lucky with how few problems they get, whereas someone else could have many major and chaotic incidents. Picking the first type of user as the "winner" may be considered unfair.


" said:
... (What I heard in the early 1990s was that, rather than three 8-hour shifts, the box was covered by four 6-hour shifts.
They were working three 8-hour shifts in 2001 when I was there (for a week of work experience). I was under the impression that NR signallers only officially work 8-hour (3 turns per day) or 12-hour (2 turns per day) shifts across the country. (NB: Not taking into account boxes that close regularly, eg: overnight)

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KX Challenge 07/01/2014 at 18:11 #53646
CTCThiago
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232 posts
" said:
If you want to look at a score, and you want to pick a "winner", then I suspect this is an individual challenge.

You'd also need to make sure every challenger had the same set of start-up options, including delay/failure settings. However, each user will have different incidents, and someone could be very lucky with how few problems they get, whereas someone else could have many major and chaotic incidents. Picking the first type of user as the "winner" may be considered unfair.
Agreed Matthew, In this case, the competition will be unfair, and we need to set standards of delays, track, signal, points failures aswell, so many things to discuss before taking into this challenge.

Thiago.

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KX Challenge 08/01/2014 at 01:06 #53657
dwelham313
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139 posts
The timetable information has been added to the wiki page for users to copy and paste into the F4 timetable options 'general' tab if they so wish.

Perhaps the best way to go about the challenge and keep it as fair as possible would be to turn failures and delays off but run the game with one of the scenarios active, such as the new southgate incident. That way a high scorer won't be affected by a badly timed/located failure.

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KX Challenge 10/01/2014 at 19:42 #53767
Finger
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220 posts
" said:
You'd also need to make sure every challenger had the same set of start-up options, including delay/failure settings. However, each user will have different incidents, and someone could be very lucky with how few problems they get, whereas someone else could have many major and chaotic incidents. Picking the first type of user as the "winner" may be considered unfair.

Exactly, but if you think that

" said:
we should have a competition ... I believe we need a Slight element of challenge.

why not have a real competition? Two teams, two identical MP sessions running head-to-head, one winner. What do you think?

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KX Challenge 10/01/2014 at 20:02 #53770
fsxfaulder
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77 posts
" said:

why not have a real competition? Two teams, two identical MP sessions running head-to-head, one winner. What do you think?
If there are enough people online I think that has great potential...

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KX Challenge 10/01/2014 at 22:38 #53771
Lardybiker
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If I am not mistaken, two teams playing simultaneously on the same sim(s) was done at a meet. I don't recall which but it wasn't that long ago.

The problem you still have even doing that is as Matt has already pointed out....you'd have to get the two sims or sets of sims to have identical failures so you compare like with like. Otherwise, you simply can't say if one team was better than another as getting the best score isn't an indication of a better performance.

Putting it another way, imagine you are the owner of a racing team and you want to analyze the performance of two drivers with a view to employing them.....you'd want the best one right? So which one would you pick if you had a single test at Silverstone but one driver drives round in a Porsche 911 while the other drives round in a Ford Focus? How would you know which driver is best? You can't choose on pure speed because you'd expect the Porsche driver to be faster but it's not the cars you are evaluating....it's the drivers.

Now, you could put them in the same car and compare lap times and that would be a fair assessment. In SimSig terms, that means running the same TT which runs identical trains in exactly the same conditions. If you have failures or delays on, the randomness will mean you won't get a fair comparison on a one-off attempt.

Perhaps a better option would be to run a series of challenges with the using the same people in the same teams each time and making the assumption that over time, the failures would even themselves out. The results of all the challenges be added together in some way to find a winner.

I'm even tempted to say (and I suspect I'll get some derision from some quarters or even suggesting it....) devs/testers vs everyone else.....I'll get my coat shall I?

Last edited: 10/01/2014 at 22:42 by Lardybiker
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KX Challenge 10/01/2014 at 22:59 #53774
John
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" said:
The problem you still have even doing that is as Matt has already pointed out....you'd have to get the two sims or sets of sims to have identical failures so you compare like with like. Otherwise, you simply can't say if one team was better than another as getting the best score isn't an indication of a better performance.
Probably be best to turn failures/late running off altogether and have an identical custom failure/scenario instead.


" said:

I'm even tempted to say (and I suspect I'll get some derision from some quarters or even suggesting it....) devs/testers vs everyone else.....I'll get my coat shall I?
Leave your coat on, Lardy, I think it's a fun idea. :cheer:

I'm free all day Sunday and Monday?

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KX Challenge 10/01/2014 at 23:20 #53775
JamesN
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" said:
I'm even tempted to say (and I suspect I'll get some derision from some quarters or even suggesting it....) devs/testers vs everyone else.....I'll get my coat shall I?
I'm up for that!

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KX Challenge 10/01/2014 at 23:54 #53777
Lardybiker
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For better of for worse...mark me up for the devs team....
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KX Challenge 11/01/2014 at 00:00 #53778
JamesN
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" said:
For better of for worse...mark me up for the devs team....
Your our team captain! (Your silly idea )

Last edited: 11/01/2014 at 00:00 by JamesN
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KX Challenge 11/01/2014 at 18:14 #53788
CTCThiago
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Who is going to host? And how can we get the guaranteed of alterations to failures in the mid of the simulation? We need to define a person to host for both teams.

Thiago.

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KX Challenge 11/01/2014 at 18:30 #53789
LucasLCC
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You could make it so that the host fails certain sections manually, and can edit the minutes late on the timetable if need be.
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KX Challenge 11/01/2014 at 18:30 #53790
tjfrancis
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devs/testers vs everyone else it a good idea Lardybiker but what about if a team need a break will the other team have to have a break as well
I am dyslexic so please consider this when reading my posts
Last edited: 11/01/2014 at 18:30 by tjfrancis
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KX Challenge 11/01/2014 at 18:54 #53791
John
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884 posts
" said:
... how can we get the guaranteed of alterations to failures in the mid of the simulation?
In the interest of fairness it's probably easiest to switch off failures/late running and just give both teams an identical line blockage.

Editing the timetable (stepping-up, fast running, turning short of destination etc) would be banned.


" said:
... what about if a team need a break will the other team have to have a break as well?
As there would be no interaction between teams it would make no difference.

Last edited: 11/01/2014 at 18:54 by John
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KX Challenge 11/01/2014 at 19:00 #53792
tjfrancis
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well if they no interaction between teams that will be fine then
I am dyslexic so please consider this when reading my posts
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KX Challenge 11/01/2014 at 19:27 #53793
mfcooper
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You could even try to find enough "Pro's" to have real signallers vs devs/testers vs "normal" users
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KX Challenge 11/01/2014 at 19:33 #53794
memorialstingray
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I'm game
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KX Challenge 11/01/2014 at 21:33 #53795
Guts
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I think that the hosters, should be the moderators and impartial.
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KX Challenge 11/01/2014 at 21:34 #53796
CTCThiago
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" said:
I think that the hosters, should be the moderators and impartial.
Agreed Guts.

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KX Challenge 12/01/2014 at 08:42 #53797
GW43125
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We could have failures set to zero (developer mode) and we use F11 to create the same troubles on both sims.

I also think that devs vs others would be a little unfair, as the devs would have a clear advantage.
We should appoint someone to choose teams (E.G: Me, as I started this) and make sure the teams have an equal number of devs/testers/pros/others.
It only seems fair.

Last edited: 12/01/2014 at 09:18 by GW43125
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KX Challenge 12/01/2014 at 12:28 #53805
John
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" said:
I also think that devs vs others would be a little unfair, as the devs would have a clear advantage.
:huh:

I'm not sure I understand your logic there.

Even if it were true, Isn't that the whole point?

Last edited: 12/01/2014 at 12:34 by John
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