Post by alfikhoazka on Oct 29, 2020 1:36:18 GMT 2
Grand Prix World Official Hints & Tips Version 1.0
July 2000
© Edward Grabowski Communications Ltd., 2000
Welcome to the first set of Hints & Tips for Grand Prix World!
This document is to help you get the most out of playing Grand Prix World and contains a wealth of information not included in the game's manual.
Although the game's interface is simple to use, Grand Prix World is a large and complex game, and it may not always be obvious just what is going on in the game, and what you need to do, to succeed. These Hints & Tips will give you all the information you need to help you form your own effective strategy.
However, there is no single correct way to play the game. What you should do in a turn really depends on which team you are controlling, which resources are available to you, and what your current situation is. You will often have to prioritise actions to respond to events that are outside your control. However, these Hints can tell you how best to maximise the value and return of the resources you do have.
In addition, the Hints & Tips include special tips for High Teams and Low Teams. So, if you're playing with one of the more wealthy teams (such as McLaren or Ferrari), you'll want to look at the tips for High Teams; but if you're running one of the less wealthy teams (such as Minardi or Tyrrell), you should pay attention to tips for Low Teams. If your team is in the middle of the field, you should follow the general guidelines until you find the right balance and can progress. Extra cool tips for everyone are shown as Ace Tips.
These Hints are written under the assumption that you are already familiar with the game, and have read through the game manual.
As you know, Grand Prix World is broken up into the following modules:
Main Menu
Team
Engineering
Commercial
Racing
The FIA
Game Options
The Version 1.0 Hints & Tips includes information on the Main Menu and Team modules only. Other modules will be discussed in later Versions of the Hints.
Contents
1. General Comments
2. Main Menu
2a. Cash
2b. Bonus Player Points
2c. 1998 Cash Differences
3. Team: Profile
3a. Cash Balance
3b. State Icons
4. Team: News
5. Team: Mail
6. Team: Finance
7. Team: Staff
7a. The Four Departments
7b. Staff & Chief Effects
7c. Star Staff
7d. Recruiting Staff
7e. The Head-Hunter
7f. Department Size Limits
7g. Staff Resignations
7h. Firing Staff
7i. Department Costs
7j. Hiring Chiefs
7k. Computer Teams & Chiefs
7l. Driver Loyalties
7m. Unfriendly Chiefs
7n. Hiring Drivers
7o. Computer Teams & Drivers
7p. Paying Drivers
7q. Retiring Drivers
7r. Chief & Driver Bonuses
7s. Driver Ratings & Morale
7t. Morale Changes
8. Team: Rating
9. Help - I'm Playing As Minardi!
10. More Grand Prix World
1. General Comments
In the world of Formula One, nothing is certain. The best plans can go wrong, the most reliable car can breakdown, sure-fire deals can fall through, the best driver can spin off a perfectly clear track, and long term technical suppliers may decide to pull out of Formula One.
This uncertainty and unpredictability forms a major element in the design of GPW.
The AI in most areas of the game is complex to a fairly high resolution, and the game includes many elements of constrained randomisation - i.e., variability that is not totally random, but falls within certain limits or trends. This means that nothing is fixed in the game, but that the game will follow overall patterns. A wealthy team with a great car, a great driver, and great engineering may not win every race; in fact they may be unlucky enough to have a terrible season. However, on balance the probability is that a wealthy team will do better over time than all the others. Likewise, a poorly funded team may occasionally do better than expected, but will generally perform badly.
GPW also takes a long term view of Formula One. The history or Formula One is a history of surprises. Top drivers unexpectedly join struggling teams, long term engine deals are terminated, new sponsors enter the sport and more. This "what if?" factor features heavily in GPW. During the QA of GPW, testers complained that two particular events were unrealistic, but before the game shipped those very same events happened in the real world of Formula One!
These elements of probability and uncertainty pose unique problems for players of GPW. Most strategy games tend to be deterministic. If something happens one way in a game, it will pretty much happen the same way every time. Or if a piece of information in a game says X, it will always say X. None of these assumptions is true in GPW.
The key lesson, then, is to always focus on the big picture and to occasionally take risks.
One final comment is that all data in GPW is as accurate as possible, and that intensive research went into the game. The development team drew on contacts in Formula One teams, agencies, autosport magazines, and freelance Formula One journalists. The team also had a wealth of data from their previous Grand Prix Manager products. It is almost impossible to obtain 100% accuracy on personal data such as Driver Salaries, but the team is satisfied that this game is as true a picture of Formula One as you're ever likely to get.
2. Main Menu
The only thing to consider in the Main Menu area is which team you choose to play with.
2a. Cash
• There are no difficulty levels in GPW. The AI for computer teams and race performance is fixed. Difficulty is reflected by the amount of cash you start the game with. It is much harder to be successful when running teams with low cash. However, some people will find the game too easy if they choose one of the wealthy teams.
2b. Bonus Player Points
• Another thing to consider when choosing your team is its 1997 Championship position. Your ultimate goal is to take the top slot in the GPW Hall of Fame. You won't be able to do this without scoring bonus Player Points, and how many bonus points you get is based on which team you are playing as, and how well you do from season to season. So in choosing a team, you might want to think about picking one that will help you climb the Hall of Fame more quickly.
This is how bonus points work:
• At the end of each season you may receive bonus Player Points that will help you get on the Hall of Fame. The total bonus is found by adding three possible bonus scores. The first bonus is found by comparing your Constructor Championship position at the end of the current season to your team's position at the end of the previous season. If your position this year is the same as, or better than, your position last year, you score bonus Player Points as shown in this table:
Last This Year's Final Constructor Position
Year's 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Unclassified
1 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
3 300,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
4 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
5 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
6 600,000 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0
7 700,000 600,000 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0
8 800,000 700,000 600,000 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0
9 900,000 800,000 700,000 600,000 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0
10 1,000,000 900,000 800,000 700,000 600,000 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0 0
11 1,100,000 1,000,000 900,000 800,000 700,000 600,000 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0
Unclassified 1,200,000 1,100,000 1,000,000 900,000 800,000 700,000 600,000 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000
• The second bonus element depends on which team you are playing and your Constructor Championship position at the end of the current season. Team related bonus points are shown on this table:
Team This Year's Final Constructor Position
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Unclassified
Arrows 800,000 400,000 400,000 200,000 200,000 200,000 100,000 100,000 0 0 0 0
Benetton 200,000 200,000 200,000 200,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Ferrari 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Jordan 800,000 400,000 400,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
McLaren 400,000 400,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Minardi 6,400,000 3,200,000 1,600,000 800,000 400,000 200,000 200,000 200,000 200,000 100,000 100,000 0
Prost 400,000 400,000 200,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Sauber 400,000 400,000 200,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Stewart 1,600,000 800,000 400,000 200,000 200,000 100,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0
Tyrrell 3,200,000 1,600,000 800,000 400,000 200,000 200,000 200,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0
Williams 200,000 100,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
• Finally, if your team wins the Driver Championship you get a special additional bonus of 500,000, and if your team wins the Constructor Championship you get another bonus of 1,000,000.
So in the unlikely event that you take Minardi from Unclassified in one year, to win both the Constructor and Driver Championships in the following year, you would score a maximum 9,100,000 for the season.
The third bonus element is not awarded to computer teams, so you may find that when you play some seasons you are voted Manager of the Year even though you didn't get Voted Manager of the Month very often during the season.
2c. 1998 Cash Differences
• Another thing to look out for when choosing a team is the difference between your 1998 Budget and your 1998 Estimated Revenue.
For example, if you look at Williams on the Team Select screen, you will see a 1998 Budget of $80,000,000. But if you then choose Williams and take a look at the 1998 Estimated Revenue (Team: Finance - Summary Tab), you will see a figure in the region of $75,000,000.
This shortfall is because you are expected to generate the difference in Licensing revenue. All teams have this drop in cash, to varying degrees.
3. Team: Profile
This screen is your "home" and gives you a snapshot of all the most important information. The two most important items to look for here are your Cash Balance (also shown in a window in the top right hand corner of every screen), and any State Icons against your Chiefs or Drivers.
3a. Cash Balance
• Cash is the single most important resource in GPW. If you don't have enough cash, you will not be able to do all the things you need to do, to be competitive. More importantly, if you run out of cash, you lose the game. So it's important that you keep an eye on your cash levels at all times.
• It may be useful to know that you lose the game only if you end two successive game turns in debt. If you end one turn in debt, you are charged a fee by "the bank" and are warned about going in debt again. If you end the next turn in debt, you lose. However, if cash is really tight, with clever play you can aim to go in debt every alternate turn and that way can cling on and stay in the game.
• Some cash costs are charged immediately, and some are charged at the end of each turn. Ongoing costs, such as Staff costs, Factory project costs, Hospitality are billed at the end of the turn. Costs due to immediate actions (building items in Engineering: Construction, the cost of Test Days etc.) are deducted immediately. So you need to be careful that you leave yourself enough cash to meet all end-of-turn costs.
• You also need to make sure that you can pay out bonuses in the event that you win a race, or win a Championship. All your Drivers and Chiefs receive bonuses should you win races or championships. On occasion, these bonuses can be huge, and may bankrupt you if you can not cover them. If you think there is a danger of bonuses putting you in debt, you should raise some cash to cover the danger period - either by selling Shares or by taking out a Loan.
High Teams - should spend as much cash as possible provided there is no risk of going into debt. You get no prizes for having a huge Balance, so spend, spend, spend! The game is designed so that top teams will spend larger and larger sums for smaller and smaller benefits. At the top end of Formula One, it is the minute speed advantages that can win Championships.
Low Teams - save, save, save! Do not spend money unless it is absolutely necessary. You simply do not have enough money to do everything you need to do, so don't even try. You should relax your financial controls only when you have done deals that will guarantee more sponsorship income and when you are in good regular profit. However, good Sponsor deals may be one or two years into the future, so you may have to be prudent for quite a while.
3b. State Icons
• Occasionally you will see a State Icon appear alongside the name of one or more of your Chiefs or Drivers. These icons are important and warn you of a problem. The icons are explained in the manual, but just to recap:
Red Diagonal Cross - Chief or driver is Unhappy
Red Lightning Bolt - Driver is Angry
Red Square Cross - Driver is Injured
Gold Diagonal Cross - Driver is banned from the next race
Red Exclamation Mark - the position is vacant and you need to recruit a replacement
• All these icons mean you have a serious problem. Most of the problems are self-explanatory, but you may not know that being Unhappy (Red Diagonal Cross) means your Driver or Chief has a Morale rating of 1. We'll discuss Morale in more detail later on in this document, but it's worth knowing that the Chief's Morale is the same as the Morale for that Chief's department. So if your Technical Director has a Morale score of 1, the Engineering department will also have a score of 1. For purposes of Morale, a Chief and his or her department are one and the same.
• It is important to keep an eye on Driver injuries, because you must have two Drivers at the start of each race. If you do not have two healthy drivers, you will have to recruit one before going to the next race. You can start a new season with no Chiefs (discussed later) and no Drivers, but you are obliged to recruit two Drivers before the first race of the new season.
4. Team: News
The News section in GPW serves three main functions. News stories respond to your actions and performance, they inform you of other things that have happened in the world of Formula One, and most importantly some news stories tip you off about something that has happened or is about to happen. It is important that you always pay careful attention to the News.
5. Team: Mail
Mail is similar to News but differs in two significant respects. Some Mail messages provide a tutorial function, basically saying, "You should be doing this." Other messages flag problems or are a reaction to you not taking an expected action. For example, you may have staff available who are doing nothing. Or you may have designed a new car component, but not actually constructed it. So most Mails are either status reports or gentle nudges that you need to do something.
• In the top left of each message is an icon. This icon is a tilted but otherwise identical version of the icon button for the game module where the message was sent from. So messages related to sponsor deals will show the sub-menu icon from Commercial: Deals. This is to help you find where you need to go, to deal with issues raised in Mail.
6. Team: Finance
There is not much for you to do in Finance, but the information shown here is extremely important.
• The Estimated Revenue figure on the Summary tab shows how much money you can expect to make this year. Unless your Sponsor deals are all on Fixed terms, the actual amount you receive may be more or less than the Estimate, depending on how happy you keep your sponsors during the season.
• Use of the Income and Expenditure tabs is pretty straightforward - you use these to see where most of your money is coming from, and where most of it is being spent. You can use this information to predict whether or not you will have enough cash to last the whole season. Both sets of figures will tend to be constant from turn to turn, but Income will peak if you sell shares or take out a loan, and Expenditure will peak if you make an Investment.
• You should also be aware that your Expenditure will peak at different times during the season. For example, Transport costs will be much higher for races not based in Europe. Additionally, building new cars for the next season is very expensive, so there's no point relaxing on a $100,000 profit per turn, when building cars is going to cost you half a million per car. With enough experience you will begin to predict and head-off cash flow problems.
7. Team: Staff
Next to Cash, Staff is the most important resource in the game. Ultimately, you use Cash to hire Staff, and you use Staff to carry out all the work you need to do, to be successful. A major factor in running a good team is having the right Staff. So you need to know (a) how Staff actually work, and (b) how to get the best Staff and how to succeed in negotiations with Chiefs and Drivers.
7a. The Four Departments
• In GPW there are four main departments: Commercial, Design, Engineering, and Mechanics. Drivers form a unique mini-department of their own, but we shall forget Drivers for the moment.
• Each department has two elements: Staff and the Chief. Information on each department tab is a combination of Staff and Chief data.
Low Teams - while all departments are equally important to a degree, departments can be prioritised thus: Commercial, Engineering, Mechanics, Design. Without a strong Commercial department, you will find it hard to sign all the deals you need to ensure future growth. Without Engineering staff, you will find it hard to build all the Spares needed for car Maintenance and Repairs, and for important Technology projects. Without a good number of Mechanics you will find it hard to maintain and repair your cars, and pit stops may go wrong. Without a strong Design department, design projects will take longer to complete and may not be completed to a satisfactory level. For you, the number one priority is survival which basically means keeping your cars on the road, and planning for the future. If you are unable to field two cars at a Grand Prix, you will lose the game.
7b. Staff & Chief Effects
• The effect of Staff and Chiefs is to give you Time Units (TU) that are spent in carrying out all the different jobs you do throughout the game. In addition to providing a much higher TU value than normal Staff, Chiefs also have special effects in different areas of the game. These special effects are described in the Hints for other modules of the game.
• The basic TU values of Staff are:
Trainee 20
Average 40
Good 60
Very Good 80
Excellent 100
And the basic TU values for Chiefs are:
Ability 1 250
Ability 2 500
Ability 3 750
Ability 4 1000
Ability 5 1250
So if you have an Ability 5 Technical Director and four Trainee Engineers, your Engineering department will have 1330 TU to spend per turn.
When you hire staff, you need to find the right balance between cost and TU, to make sure you are getting the most value for your money.
• You will often find that your TU score varies from turn to turn. Although exact figures are not shown in the game, this works as follows:
MORALE
------------
First of all your TU scores for each department will vary according to each department's current Morale rating:
Morale 5 Add 20% to TU
Morale 4 Add 10% to TU
Morale 3 Add 0 to TU
Morale 2 Subtract 20% from TU
Morale 1 Subtract 40% from TU
So a team with 480 TU in a department, at different Morale levels would actually be able to spend these points:
Morale 5 576
Morale 4 528
Morale 3 480
Morale 2 384
Morale 1 288
Low Teams - Morale will be a big problem for you in the first couple of seasons. As your team fails to perform, department Morale will fall, meaning that your low TU scoring staff will be worth even less. For this reason, you should not allocate staff to any job unless it is absolutely essential. You should be doing the bare minimum to ensure your cars can attend each race, and that you have good finance in place for future seasons.
STARS
----------
The effect of normal Staff becoming Stars is that Star Staff yield additional TU. The amount of additional TU is generated according to this formula:
(Ability Level x N of Stars) x (2 + Half N of Stars)
Example: I have 8 Star Trainee level staff, so:
(20 x 8) x (2+4) = 960
So that's 960 TU compared to 160 TU for standard Trainees.
EFFORT
------------
On each department screen, you will see an Effort %. This is a measure of the difference between your base TU and actual TU.
Example:
Before taking Morale and Stars into account, a department has a base Time Unit score of 2230 points. After taking Morale and Stars into account, the actual Time Unit score is 1976. As 1976 is roughly 88% of 2230, Effort is shown as 88%.
Remember, that each department has its own Morale and Effort scores.
7c. Star Staff
• Star Staff are workers who become highly motivated at no extra cost to you. Gaining Stars is a great way to improve the performance of your departments without incurring any extra expense.
• The appearance of Stars is determined by the game's AI. Because of this, you can never be sure that a Star will appear in your team. However, you can provide the conditions that will improve the chance of Stars appearing.
• Staff like their departments to grow or remain the same size, and they are made unhappy by redundancies. So on any turn you fire Staff from a department, there is no chance that a Star will appear in that department. The longer you leave a department alone, the more chance there is that Stars will appear. Also Stars will be more likely to appear in lower Ability levels of Staff, such as Trainee and Average. Department Morale also influences when or if Stars may appear, with low Morale (1 or 2) reducing the likelihood of a Star appearing.
• Stars are not permanent. Each time you fire Staff from a department, or each time Staff resign from a department, there is a reasonably high chance that Stars in the same department will revert to normal status.
• The final thing you need to know about Stars is that each department can have only one Star for every ten staff. So, a fully staffed department with 100 people can have 10 Stars, and a department with 27 people, can have a maximum of 2 Stars. So you might want to ensure that your departments are always staffed up to the next nearest level of 10. If your department size falls below these limits, you may find that you also lose Star staff status.
7d. Recruiting Staff
• The cost of Staff is fixed, so when recruiting new staff you need to consider only three things:
Can you afford the new Staff?
Are you getting the best Staff for your money?
Are the Staff available for hire in the first place?
• A highly staffed department with all the best Staff will cost you millions of dollars per year, but will give you the power to achieve almost anything in the game. Many teams won't have this luxury and must use and recruit staff strategically.
• When recruiting new Staff, keep an eye on the Annual Total Salary window in the bottom right of the Hire & Fire screen. As you add or remove Staff you will see the NEW salary figure change. Compare this figure against the CURRENT salary figure to see just how much less or extra cash will be needed as a result of the proposed Staff hiring and firing. If you don't like what you see, simply cancel the hire and fire changes you've made. Remember, the salary bill shown here is an annual figure. You pay only 1/16th of this figure after each turn.
• In the rush to build a good department, it is easy to get carried away and recruit way too many staff. If you find that your current balance is getting low, look at the Staff costs on the Expenditure tab in Team: Finance. This figure shows the cost of all four departments, and may occasionally surprise you by how high it is.
High Teams - When you have completed most of your key tasks for the year, don't be afraid of firing Staff to cut costs for the rest of the season.
Low Teams - Don't get carried away with hiring every new available Staff member - it will bankrupt you!
• Now that you have staff TU and Star data, you yourself can decide whether or not you are employing the right people compared to their costs. However, before you rush ahead and hire one Excellent Staff in place of four Trainees, you should read the Resignations section below.
• The final consideration in hiring Staff is their availability. If you have played the game more than once, you will see that there is some variation in the amount Staff and the ability levels of Staff you start the game with. This variation serves to make each game different, and adds a touch of realism. However, if you are unhappy with the Staff spread, you can simply scrap the game and start a new one. Once a game has begun, you have to keep a sharp eye on Staff availability.
In GPM 1 and GPM 2 players could hire as many staff as they liked, whenever they liked. This was unrealistic. In real life recruitment is constrained by the job market. And job markets tend to follow seasonal trends. Also it is harder to find skilled Staff in some career disciplines than in others. Finally, successful teams are more likely to attract new recruits. All these factors are taken into account in GPW.
• One interface feature added too late to include in the manual is that if Staff of a certain Ability level are available for hire, you will see a small red cross against that Ability level on your department screens. So you can see whether or not there is anyone you want to hire without having to click further to get into the Hire & Fire screens.
• How easy it is to recruit Staff for each department is generally governed by seasonal variation, with each "season" being four turns long:
Department Race Number
Race 1-4 Race 5-8 Race 9-12 Race 13-16
Designers High Very High Very Low Low
Engineers Very Low Low Very High High
Commercial Very High High Low Very Low
Mechanics Low Very Low High Very High
So you should find it easier to recruit designers in turns 5, 6, 7 and 8. However, these are only general trends, and Staff may become available in all departments throughout the year. You should also know that availability varies for each individual department, so while there may be no new Commercial Staff for hire, there may be a whole lot of Engineers ready for you to recruit.
• In terms of actual Staff available, you will find that lower quality staff are more readily available than high quality staff.
• Also, the number of staff available for hire will vary based on your current Constructor Championship position. So if your position improves during a season, even if only for a couple of races, you should be able to hire more, better staff for that period.
High Teams - You have enough money to hire anybody and everybody. As soon as the game begins, hire all available Staff until you have no more room in your Factory (if you can afford it, you should start to build a Level 5 Factory as soon as possible, so that you can increase your Staff to maximum levels). When you have a full factory, start an upward cascade of Staff replacement. For example, if you have 3 Excellent and 5 Trainees and you see 2 Excellent for hire, fire 2 Trainees and hire the 2 Excellent. If you follow this rolling process for long enough, you will have a factory full of Excellent staff. This cascade process also means that you maintain maximum TU at all times based on the Staff currently available.
Low Teams - Because cash is initially so low and the best Staff are rarely available, it is best to expand slowly in a reverse of the cascade process described above. Fill up your Trainee level, then your Average level and so on - this process will also encourage the appearance of Stars. Only when you cut new deals that bring you more cash should you consider hiring a lot of good Staff. However, if your Morale hits rock bottom, you may have no choice but to hire expensive new Staff just to get basic jobs done on time. If this happens to you, you will have to consider selling Shares or taking out a Loan to raise the cash.
7e. The Head-Hunter
• Using the Head-Hunter is a luxury for teams with cash to burn. If you want to see if you can find more Staff to hire, just hit the Head-Hunter button. Using the Head-Hunter costs you money whether Staff are found or not. If Staff are found, and you hire them, the Head-Hunter will cost you even more money. So only use the Head-Hunter if you can afford to, and if you are in a rush to find new Staff. Many times, the Head-Hunter will just rip you off!
7f. Department Size Limits
• Eventually, if everything's going well, you will run out of workspace and will not be able to hire more Staff until you have increased the size of your Factory. Any Factory construction work will not be ready until the start of next season, so if you do have this problem you should still try to improve the TU level of your Staff using the cascade recruitment process described earlier - you may be limited to 30 Staff, but better to have 30 Excellent Staff than 30 Trainees.
• Factory size limits Staff and Department sizes as follows:
Factory Size Staff Limit Department Limit
1 160 40
2 200 50
3 240 60
4 320 80
5 400 100
So if you have a Level 1 Factory, you can have a maximum of 160 Staff, with a maximum of 40 Staff in each of the four departments. However, the Staff in each department can be of any Ability type.
A summary of this information is shown in the bottom left of the Hire & Fire Staff screens.
• When looking at your Department or Hire & Fire screens, you should be careful to note that your total number of Staff is the total number of normal Staff plus the total number of Star Staff. It is easy to forget to include Stars in Staff calculations when looking at the Total row at the foot of these Staff tables.
7g. Staff Resignations
• Staff may decide to leave your company. You have no direct control over this, but you can help prevent it. Whether or not Staff resign is based on the current Morale of your departments. Staff in a department with Morale 1 are far more likely to quit than Staff in a department with a higher Morale score. The number of Staff who quit per turn is also likely to increase if department Morale is low. On a really bad turn you may lose up to 3 Staff.
• Trainees rarely, if ever, resign. Staff resignations are more likely to occur at higher Staff Ability levels. So if your Morale is low, hiring Excellent Staff may be a waste of effort. If you have fired someone to help pay for the Excellent Staff, you'll have an even bigger problem because (a) you will have spent redundancy money, and (b) you'll have no TU left for either the fired Staff or the newly resigned Staff.
Low Teams - Resignations can be good if you are looking to gradually raise the quality of your Staff. If you fire lower quality Staff to pay for higher quality Staff, you will have to pay redundancy fees. However, if you wait for Staff to resign, you can replace them at no cost. You don't pay any redundancy fees to Staff who resign, yet you get to save on their salary cost.
7h. Firing Staff
• Firing Staff in GPW is easy, right? You just hit that little - button and watch the Staff numbers go down. Easy!
Wrong!
• Each time you fire a member of Staff you have to pay an immediate Redundancy fee that is equal to roughly half a year's salary. So if someone is costing you $160,000 per year, his cost to you is $10,000 per race. But if you fire him, it immediately costs you $80,000. So Low Teams might panic when they see their annual salary bill and decide to fire Staff to bring the wage bill down, without realising that they are incurring a massive one-off immediate cost that could push them into debt. When you fire staff, keep an eye on the Redundancy costs shown near the centre of the Hire & Fire table.
• There is a chance that a fired member of Staff will successfully sue you for Unfair Dismissal - you have absolutely no control over this risk. If this happens, you will have to pay an additional cost between 1.5 and 3 times that person's annual salary.
• Firing people will also often result in the reversion of Star Staff to normal Status.
• Finally, firing Staff can seriously reduce a department's Morale, no matter what else is going on in the game.
So you have to think really hard before you decide to get rid of people.
High Teams - You're so rich that you don't care who sues you, or who costs you what. If you wanted a friend, you'd buy a dog! Just fire the deadwood, and bring in the experts who will make your team a winning organisation year after year after year. Even if Morale takes a dip, you will be hiring better staff, cutting cool deals, and winning races, so Morale will soon go right back up.
Low Teams - This is a people business. You are nothing without your staff. Fire even a single person at your peril!
7i. Department Cost
• One final thing to keep an eye on is the total cost of each department. This cost is the annual salary total of all your Staff plus the salary of your Chief. This figure is shown in the Cost window in the top left of your Department tabs. Also remember that Chief bonuses will not be shown here, as bonuses are not fixed costs. So if your current salary bill is near breakeven point, be careful not to win any races until you have enough funds to cover bonus pay-outs!
7j. Hiring Chiefs
• Some general points about Chiefs and Chief contracts:
Duration of Chief Contracts is measured in whole seasons. Where a Chief is recruited mid-season in the current year, the Chief's contract will run to the end of the next season. A Chief who is ready to start NOW has a small white + symbol in the Seasons field of your Job Offer. So a Chief offered a deal of 2+ will work 2 whole seasons plus the rest of the current season.
Chiefs never resign from teams or leave Formula One.
Each Chief may be approached only once per turn, but may be approached any number of turns until the Chief is hired by you or a rival team.
You can approach a Chief only if he or she is not already under contract for next year.
Chiefs will some times approach you for work. This is flagged in the form of Mail - so keep a look out for these messages.
Deal terms will change in the player’s favour, the longer a Chief has to wait before getting an offer.
You can not poach Chiefs under contract to another team.
• Hiring Chiefs is slightly tricky in that you can make only one approach to a Chief per turn. In addition, Chiefs often change their mind about the kind of deal they are looking for. Also Chiefs start the season looking for the best deal possible. But the longer a Chief goes through a season without being signed up, the more likely he or she will be to settle for a less favourable deal - they'd rather have a poor deal than no job.
• It is in your interest to offer deals to Chiefs as late as possible. However, while you are waiting for Chiefs to lower their terms, rival teams might sign them up - so waiting is risky. Computer teams are pretty aggressive in signing Chiefs up and may strike deals as early as the first race.
High Teams - Don't waste any time. Try to hire the best Chiefs in the first turn of the season if possible. Don't let your rivals hire the best people.
• You can talk to as many Chiefs as you want at the same time, so a good plan might be to approach a large number of Chiefs and make each one a Job Offer without raising a single Contract Term. Sure, a lot of the terms will be rejected, but some might be accepted - which means you can cut a deal that is better for you. Once a contract term has been accepted, the Chief will not change his mind, so all you will then have to do is concentrate on getting the Chief to approve the terms he's rejected. The point to make here is that you shouldn't think that you always have to increase numbers before a Chief will agree with you. However, this wait-and-see approach might result in Chiefs signing with other teams.
• The best way to get value for money is to hire the cheapest Chief. All Chiefs of the same Ability level are exactly the same in game play terms, so why pay $150,000 for a Chief with Ability 1, when you can pay £100,000 for an identical level 1 Chief?
High Teams - You have the financial power to get whoever you want whenever you want. So go to the best available Chief (Ability 5) and offer him a deal well over the odds, just to make sure that he agrees to all your terms, and then sign him up straight away. Don't waste time. If you have good sponsor deals, you will be able to afford anybody. Don't be mean with your cash.
Low Teams - Try to find the best, cheapest Chief as possible. If cash is really tight, settle for low quality Chiefs. You will find that some of the Non-F1 Chiefs are much cheaper and easier to sign up than Ability 1 F1 Chiefs. However, you should also experiment with aiming high. A lot of top Chiefs will reject your offer for reasons outside your control, but you may get lucky and sign up someone who will make a big difference to your team's future. If you can afford only one or two top Chiefs, target them in this order: Chief Designer, Chief Engineer, Commercial Manager, Chief Mechanic.
Ace Tip - The Chief Designer is probably the single most important character in the entire game. You will see in the Engineering Module that the Chief Designer's Ability is the main factor in determining how good your cars are. Once you have good cars, your position will improve and then everything in the game will start to change in your favour. The Chief Designer is even more important than your Drivers.
• There is a chance that Chiefs' Ability may improve or worsen between seasons. This happens at the end of the year, so comes into effect (along with new contracts) at the start of the following season. If you are lucky, you may hire a cheap Ability 1 Chief only to see that he has improved to Ability 2 at no extra cost to you. If you are unlucky, you could spend a fortune hiring a level 5 Chief, only to have him drop to level 4 just as he or she joins your team.
Chiefs may improve if their team finishes in a higher Constructor Championship position than last year; and may worsen if their team finishes in a lower position than last year. It does not matter if the actual teams are different from year to year, so if a Chief is with Williams when they finish 4th in 1999, and then with Ferrari when they finish 1st in 2000, the Chief may improve at the end of the 2000 season. Lower quality Chiefs are more likely to improve than high level Chiefs, and younger Chiefs are more likely to improve, while older Chiefs are more likely to worsen regardless of team positions. Non-F1 Chiefs never change ratings - only when they enter the world of Formula One will they get the full experience they need to improve.
• Whether or not a Chief accepts all the terms of your offer and agrees to join your team is governed by some quite complex decision making. Various criteria have to be satisfied before the Chief is happy to join you. These are as follows:
YOUR TEAM STATUS
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A Chief will be happy to joining a team that is currently of a higher Constructor Championship position, than his present team. But if your team is ranked lower, the Chief may refuse. The bigger the difference is between the teams, the more likely the Chief is to refuse. You may be able to take advantage of this in any turn where your Constructor position has improved.
The Chief's decision here is influenced by a number of other factors:
Driver Loyalty - if the Chief has a Driver Loyalty and that Driver is racing with you next year, the Chief will be more likely to be happy to join your team.
Current Game Turn - the later it is in the season, the more likely the Chief will be to join.
Age of Chief - Younger Chiefs are less likely to want to join a lower ranked team than older Chiefs.
Chief Fired - A Chief who has been fired by a rival team is more likely to join a lower team.
Chief Approaches You - if you have received a mail saying the Chief wants to talk to you and you make him an offer in the same turn, he will be much happier to join your team.
Rejection due to Team Status is shown as a Red Cross in the Team Conditions strip of the Job Offer panel.
DEPARTMENT SIZE
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The Chief wants to know that he or she will have enough staff to do the job. A Level 1 Chief will feel comfortable heading up any department with 6 or more Staff, but a Level 5 Chief will want at least 26 Staff before he'll be happy. Other Chiefs fall at points in between these two extremes. So you may have to hire more Staff before you can get the Chief you want.
Rejection due to Department Size is shown as a Red Cross in the Team Conditions strip of the Job Offer panel.
TEAM CASH
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Chiefs want to know that they are joining a secure and well-funded team. Take a look at your Estimated Annual Revenue (shown at the top of the Summary tab in Team: Finance). An Ability 1 Chief will happily join a team with any amount of revenue, but an Ability 5 Chief will try to hold out for teams with $70,000,000 or more. Again, other Chiefs fall somewhere in between.
Rejection due to Team Cash is shown as a Red Cross in the Team Conditions strip of the Job Offer panel.
SALARY
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Naturally, Chiefs want a pay increase. The amount of increase is expressed as a % of current salary and is based on the Chief's Ability level and the Constructor Championship position of the Chief's team at the end of the previous season. A level 5 Chief whose team won the Championship last year, will be looking for a massive 45% increase.
Chiefs will accept a smaller increase than normal if: one of your Drivers next year is the same Driver shown in the Chief's Driver Loyalty table; if the Chief is being approached by his current team (i.e., the contract is being renewed); if it is late in the season; if the Chief was fired from his last job; or if the Chief has approached your team (shown in Mail).
Very rarely the above factors may result in the Chief being happy to accept a pay cut rather than a pay increase. However, this will happen only if the Chief is swapping teams. The lowest increase a Chief might accept if he stays with his current team is 0. If you keep a sharp eye out for these factors, you may be able to strike a very cheap deal.
Rejection due to Salary is shown as a Red Cross in the Salary strip of the Job Offer panel.
CHAMPIONSHIP BONUS
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Chiefs expect a reward if their team wins the Constructor Championship. The amount of bonus increase wanted is based on the current Constructor Championship position of your team. If your team is currently number 1, the Chief will look for a 50% bonus increase, but if you are number 11, the Chief may well settle for no increase at all. So try to cut deals when your position is low (not easy when the Chief also has to be happy with your Team Status!).
All the factors that can reduce a Chief's Salary increase request (Driver Loyalty etc.) apply here also. However, Chiefs will never accept a reduction in bonus.
Note that Championship Bonuses are payable at the end of the year, so make sure you have enough cash left before Race 16 to meet all possible bonus payments.
Rejection due to Salary is shown as a Red Cross in the Championship Bonus strip of the Job Offer panel.
RACE BONUS
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Chiefs want rewarding if their team wins races. The amount of bonus increase wanted is based on the Chief's Ability level, with level 5 Chiefs looking for roughly a 25% increase.
All the factors that can reduce a Chief's Salary increase requirement (Driver Loyalty etc.) apply here also. However, Chiefs will never accept a reduction in bonus.
Note that Race Bonuses are payable at the end of each race you win, so again make sure you have enough cash to meet these payments.
Rejection due to Salary is shown as a Red Cross in the Race Bonus strip of the Job Offer panel.
ROYALTY %
-----------------
Commercial Managers do not take Race and Championship bonuses. Instead they expect to be paid a % of all moneys you make through Sponsorship deals they themselves have made. This can be very expensive. If you have $50,000,000 of Sponsorship, and your Commercial Manager has a 5% royalty, he or she will take $2,500,000 of your money. You should never really pay any Commercial Manager 8% or more in royalties.
The amount of % increase the Chief will want is based on the Chief's Ability, but may be reduced by all the usual factors except Driver Loyalty, as Commercial Managers never form Driver Loyalties.
Ace Tip - A Commercial Manager takes royalties only from deals that are signed while the Manager is with your team. Get your manager to sign up a lot of good deals, then fire him! If you can replace the Manager with another Manager who is free NOW, that new manager will join you immediately. Your old Manager will charge you for redundancy compensation, equal to a whole year's salary multiplied by the number of contracted years or part-years remaining. However, if you time this right, redundancy costs will be far less than the Royalty % you would have to pay. Another method is to always hire Commercial Managers on one year deals, swapping from Manager to Manager - which in theory means you will never pay any % royalties. You should make sure that new Managers will serve you well for later seasons, but this should not be a problem if your current deals are multi-year. You should also note that fired Chiefs will not want to come back and work for you, for quite some time after being fired.
Rejection due to Royalty is shown as a Red Cross in the Royalty strip of the Job Offer panel.
SEASONS
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High quality Chiefs will want to sign as short a contract as possible because the more they swap jobs, the more quickly their financial package will increase. Low quality Chiefs are more interested in job security and so will want to sign as long a contract as possible.
Again, these positions change over time. For example, a level 5 Chief will almost always accept a 1 year contract, but will not be very interested in longer deals until around turn 9 of the current season. However, as with Salaries, a Chief is more likely to accept your offer (where your offer is different than what the Chief wants), if Driver Loyalty comes into play, if the Chief has approached your team, if the Chief has been fired and (most importantly of all) if your team is currently higher in the Constructor Championship than the Chief's team. So if a top team has a disastrous start to a season, and yours is doing better, you may be able to pull off a shock deal.
High Teams - Sign up the best high Ability Chiefs for as long a deal as possible.
Low Teams - You usually will not be able to sign higher Ability Chiefs in your first few years, so will have to sign up Chiefs typically at level 3 or less. In this case, you should do your best to sign 1 year deals only. If you play the game well, you should find that your team is earning more and more cash from 1999 onwards, and you should be able to attract the best staff within a few years. Because of this, you need to make sure that you can recruit good Chiefs, so should avoid having a job locked for three or more years with a poor quality Chief. At worst, you should sign 2 year deals.
• In summary, making an offer to a Chief is all about taking advantage of current conditions. Chiefs are intelligent and will look to make the best deal they feel is right for them based on a whole lot of current circumstances. As circumstances change, each Chief's position will change, so a Chief who says a 2 year deal is too short one turn, may later decide that 2 years is too long. This reflects the genuine uncertainty and occasional unpredictability of real-life deals.
• Once a Chief has agreed all terms, and the Job Offer shows a neat column of green ticks, that Chief is Ready To Hire, but is not hired until you hit the Sign Deal button. You can have any number of Ready-To-Hire Chiefs at one time. However, other teams may sign up Ready-To-Hire Chiefs, so just because you have agreed a deal with Chief it does not mean that the Chief will not sign with somebody else instead. So don't take too long to make your mind up. You may be warned by News stories that another team is negotiating with a Ready-To-Hire Chief.
• Finally, if you make an offer to a Non-F1 Chief, you will find that they will accept almost any terms you set. Once they enter the world of F1, however, everything changes and they will become much more careful over future deals.
7k. Computer Teams & Chiefs
• Computer teams are pretty aggressive about hiring Chiefs and will start recruiting as soon as possible into each new season. The top teams tend to act more quickly, favouring the best Chiefs in the best teams.
• When rival teams are negotiating with one of your own current Chiefs, or with any Chief at Ability level of 5, a story MAY appear in the News, warning you that your staff (or the best staff) may be about to sign up with the rival team.
• The same AI is used for computer team recruitment, so your rival team owners will be having the same headaches as you!
• You should also keep an eye on the News for teams who fire their Chiefs. Fired Chiefs are easier to sign up, and sometimes even the best Chiefs can be fired - scapegoats for the team's disappointing performance.
7l. Driver Loyalties
• Some Chiefs form loyalty attachments with Drivers on the same team. The result of this is that you can cut better deals with Chiefs provided that the relevant Driver will also be on your team in the year that the Chief plans to join you.
• Commercial Chiefs never form Driver Loyalties.
• Some Driver Loyalties are active at the start of the game, but new ones form simply as a result of the Driver scoring Driver Championship points, winning Pole Positions and winning Driver Championships. The more successful a driver is, the more chance there is of the Chief becoming loyal to that Driver. Loyalty is more likely to form with a Driver 1 than Drivers ranked 1=. And Loyalty is more likely to form with a Driver 1= than a Driver 2. Loyalty rarely if ever forms with Injured Drivers or Test Drivers.
• Once a Driver Loyalty is formed it stays in effect as long as both Chief and Driver remain in the same team, and for one season after either Chief/Driver or both have parted ways.
7m. Unfriendly Chiefs
• If you agree terms with a Chief who is ready to join you NOW, you hit the "Start Now" button, are warned of the cost of firing your current Chief and then cancel (because you don't want to pay the redundancy fee), the Chief you planned to sign up breaks off all contact with you and becomes Unfriendly towards your team. Chiefs may stay Unfriendly for up to 3 years, during which time they will not talk to you about working for you.
• Any Chiefs you fire will also become Unfriendly.
• Finally, Non-F1 Chiefs are much more tolerant and rarely, if ever, become Unfriendly no matter how badly you treat them. Once they join a team, however, things will change.
7n. Hiring Drivers
• The general processes, considerations and strategies involved in hiring Drivers are exactly the same as when hiring Chiefs. Likewise, the negotiation conditions and factors are mostly the same, but with these differences:
YOUR TEAM STATUS
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Drivers are also more likely to be happy with your team if they are Paying Drivers, or if their Morale is low (1 or 2). Drivers with high Morale (4 or 5) are less likely to want to change teams.
DRIVER SEAT
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This is an additional test that Chiefs do not make. The driver has to be happy with the role you are offering him. There are four possible roles you can offer:
D1 Driver is ranked first. Team has team orders.
D2 Driver is ranked second. Team has team orders, and this Driver has to play a subordinate role to D1.
D1= Both drivers are ranked equally. There are no team orders.
T Test Driver. Helps with your test programme but will not take part in races unless one of your two race Drivers becomes Injured.
Drivers are less likely to be happy with a role that is lower than their current role. So a D1 is unlikely to accept anything but D1. Drivers are happy to stay with the same role or to be promoted. The promotion order is T (lowest), D2, D1=, D1 (highest).
As always, other factors can influence a Driver's decision to accept the role being offered. These are:
Difference In Team Constructor Championship Position - Drivers are more likely to accept seat changes if offered by a team that is currently higher in the Championship than the Driver's team.
Current Game Turn - the later it is in the season, the more likely the Driver will be happy to accept the new role.
Age of Driver - A driver younger than 21 or older than 34 is more likely to accept the role on offer. Drivers between those ages are less likely to accept.
Driver Fired - A Driver who has been fired by a rival team is more likely to accept any seat on offer.
Driver Approaches You - if you have received a mail saying the Driver wants to talk to you and you make him an offer in the same turn, he will be more likely to accept the role offered.
Paying Driver - A Paying Driver is more likely to accept any role except Test Driver. A Paying Driver will almost always refuse a Test Driver slot.
Driver Morale - Drivers with Morale at 1 or 2 are more likely to accept a role change, while Drivers with Morale 4 or 5 are more likely to refuse.
Rejection due to Role is shown as a Red Cross in the Role strip of the Job Offer panel.
Although this is explained in the manual, you need to take care over what roles you offer to new Drivers. The roles have to be compatible so that your Drivers are either 1 and 2, or both 1=. If you have an incorrect mix of 1 and 1=, or 1= and 2, the role of your second Driver will be adjusted to fit the role of your first Driver (the first Driver being the leftmost Driver on the Driver tab of Team: Staff). This will happen any time there is a role conflict, regardless of whether both Drivers are new next year or not. For example, if I have Schumacher contracted for next year as D1 in the first Driver slot, and then hire Coulthard as D1= for next year, when the next year starts, Coulthard's D1= will automatically be changed to D2, to comply with Schumacher's D1. You may then have a whole bunch of problems due to Coulthard becoming Angry. Also when setting roles be careful not to get confused between what you want to offer a Driver and his current role (which gets displayed in the Job Offer panel as default).
OTHER DRIVER
----------------------
Some Driver pairings are incompatible. Drivers are generally less comfortable when paired with a direct rival, preferring instead to be paired with someone who is either much better or much worse. If a driver is with someone much better, he feels under no pressure as no one expects him to outperform the better driver; the better driver is happier because he sees the much worse driver as no threat. Things are much more tense and unpleasant if both drivers are of similar performance.
This test is based on the current Driver Championship positions of both Drivers (i.e. your already hired Driver and the one you are currently negotiating with). Paying Drivers are less likely to object to your other Driver.
This test is unusual in that it is possible to avoid it entirely! The first thing to remember is that we are not talking about your current Drivers, we are talking about your Drivers for next season. So if you already have Damon Hill for next year, and you try to recruit Michael Schumacher, you may well have a problem. However, if you have no Drivers recruited for next year, there is no Driver in place to create a problem. So the first Driver you recruit will be fine. Once you have recruited one Driver, the next Driver you try to recruit will base his reaction on the Driver you have already recruited. But, if you hire both Drivers in the same turn, they will both pass this test as there is no Driver already in place for either Driver to react badly to.
Rejection due to Other Driver is shown as a Red Cross in the Team Conditions strip of the Job Offer panel.
TEAM CASH
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The same as Chiefs, except Drivers use their Speed rating instead of the Chief Ability level. So faster Drivers will prefer to join teams with more cash. Paying Drivers will join any team regardless of Cash level.
SALARY
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Again, the same as Chiefs. Drivers who finished high in the Driver Championship last year will want a higher Salary increase. Drivers with a high Experience rating will want more money still. For example, a Driver who won the Championship and who has an Experience rating of 5 will want an increase of roughly 50%.
Drivers will settle for a lower increase if the Driver is being approached by his current team (i.e., the contract is being renewed), if it is late in the season, if the Driver was fired from his last job, if the Driver has approached the team (shown in Mail), and (unique to Drivers) if the Driver is joining a team that is currently higher in the Constructor Championship than his own team. Drivers being asked to join lower teams will want a higher salary increase.
Very rarely the above factors may result in the Driver being happy to accept a pay cut rather than a pay increase. However, this will happen only if the Driver is swapping teams. The lowest increase a Driver might accept if he stays with his current team is 0.
Once Drivers reach an annual salary of $10,000,000 they are happy to accept lower % increases, and this is further reduced with Drivers earning $20,000,000.
Paying Drivers pay you, so accept 0 salary increase.
On a separate note: if one of your current Drivers is Injured and unable to race, you still have to pay that Driver's full salary.
CHAMPIONSHIP BONUS
----------------------------------
Increases work exactly the same as with Chiefs. Paying Drivers will accept 0 bonus increase.
RACE BONUS
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Again identical to Chiefs except checks are made against the Driver's Speed rating. Faster drivers will look for higher bonus increases. Paying Drivers will accept 0 bonus increase.
SEASONS
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Drivers will look for deals between 1 and 5 years. If your offer differs from what a Driver wants, it is the difference between the two durations that determines the Driver's chance of acceptance. As always, Drivers are more likely to accept your offer if the Driver has approached your team, if the Driver has just been fired, if he is a Paying Driver or if your team is currently higher in the Constructor Championship. Drivers are less likely to accept your offer if your team is currently lower in the Championship.
High Teams - You should be looking to hire the best possible Drivers for as long as possible. However, if you are forced into a series of one year contracts with a top Driver, sign him up even though it means his costs will quickly grow very high - it pays to have the best on your team.
Low Teams - You should look at Drivers in the same way as you hire Chiefs. Take time to compare Driver ratings with Driver Costs (including Non-F1 drivers), to make sure you get the best deal for your money. That said, the single most important thing you can do in 1998 is to sign up two Paying Drivers. Your 1998 and 1999 seasons are going to be nightmares no matter what you do, so don't worry about getting good quality Drivers. More than anything, you need cash to build for the future. So see who are the highest Paying Drivers, and make sure you snap them up for one or two years. Even when you start to turn your team around, you may find it helpful to keep one Paying Driver (alongside one high quality Driver) until you reach a time when you can rely entirely on Sponsor deals and FIA grants for good team funding. You must sign Paying Drivers!!!
• As you can see from all the variables at work here, the best deals will be achieved through careful timing.
• As with Chiefs there is a chance that Driver ratings may improve or worsen between seasons. Changes to Driver Ratings are governed by a variety of factors including: Driver's Age, and a variety of performance scores that measure a Driver's performance during races. Drivers who retire then come back to F1 will almost certainly have lower ratings than they had prior to retirement. Non-F1 Drivers have fixed ratings until they actually join Formula One.
7o. Computer Teams & Drivers
• Computer teams are just as aggressive about hiring Drivers as they are Chiefs. Again, the top teams move first, paying attention to Drivers who are currently highest in the Driver Championship, then the Speed of the Driver and then the Experience of the Driver.
• When rival teams are negotiating with either one of your own current Chiefs or with any Driver currently in the top 6 of the Driver's Championship, a story MAY appear in the News.
• Again, the same AI is used for computer team recruitment.
• As with Chiefs, you should watch the News for teams who fire their Drivers.
7p. Paying Drivers
• A few Drivers start the game as Paying Drivers. They will pay you to race for your team, and will join almost any team provided the conditions are right and you are not offering a Test Driver slot. You can expect Paying Drivers to pay between 2.5 and 10.5 million dollars.
• Some times Non-F1 drivers become Paying Drivers, so you should check the Non-F1 driver lists from time to time.
• Paying Drivers may alter the cash they are prepared to pay. Usually this decision is made during the final year of their current contract. You should keep an eye on this, as your Paying Drivers may be worth more or less next year than this year.
• Paying Drivers usually remain Paying Drivers for the whole game and rarely, if ever, convert to Salary status.
Low Team - Recruiting Paying Drivers for your first two years is vital. Their cash will fund most of your operation.
High Team - Forget Paying Drivers and concentrate on signing up Drivers with the highest ratings.
7q. Retiring Drivers
• In the last year of their contract, Drivers may decide to retire. A Driver is more likely to retire if his current Driver Championship position is lower than it was at the end of the previous season, if the Driver is 26 or older, if the Driver has already won a Championship, and if the Driver has scored 10 or fewer Championship points in previous seasons during the game.
• If a Driver decides to retire, you will not be able to sign him up next year. Sometimes, a good year will cause a Driver to change his mind and stay in F1, in which case you will be able to sign him up if you choose to.
• Drivers may come back out of retirement, especially if they are younger.
7r. Chief & Driver Bonuses
• We have already seen that Chiefs and Drivers can get Race and Championship bonuses; however, not all Chiefs and Drivers may be eligible for a bonus at the same time.
• If a team wins a race, the winning Driver gets the bonus - other Drivers on the team do not. All three eligible Chiefs (not the Commercial Manager) also get a race bonus.
• If a team wins the Constructor Championship, the three eligible Chiefs all gain the Championship Bonus but the Drivers do not.
• If a Driver wins the Driver Championship, that Driver gets a Championship bonus - your other Drivers and Chiefs do not.
• So, if you win both the Driver and Constructor Championship, one Driver and the Chiefs for Design, Engineering and Mechanics all get a Championship bonus.
7s. Driver Ratings & Morale
• Driver Ratings come into play in the Engineering and Race sections of the game, and are discussed in the Hints and Tips for those modules.
• Driver Morale, however, is a little unusual in the way it works. If your Driver has a Morale of 3, there are no effects. If your Driver has a Morale of 4, one point is randomly added to one of the Driver's ratings for the next race. If your Driver has a Morale of 5, two points are randomly added to the Driver's ratings for the next race. However, if your Driver has a Morale of 2, 1 point is randomly deducted from one of your Driver's ratings for the next race. And if your Driver has a Morale of 1, 2 points are deducted.
So a Driver's Morale has a major effect on your Driver's race performance. All Drivers for all teams are affected by Morale.
7t. Morale Changes
• Morale for all Drivers and Staff starts at neutral 3. Any score above 3 is beneficial while a score less than 3 will cause problems.
• Morale for each department and Driver may change at the end of each turn. If and how Morale changes depends on how successful your turn has been. The list of events that influence Morale is too long to show here, but practically everything you do, and everything that happens in the game has a potential effect on Morale. For example, it is possible for your Morale to increase even if both cars fail to Qualify in the race, because you have just signed a two-year Team Sponsor deal, have recruited new staff, built a new piece of Technology and resolved an Angry Driver situation.
But while the fine detail of Morale is complex, the big picture is simple. The more good things you do, and the more successful you are, the higher Morale will be. If you just sit there and do nothing, and your team fails to make an impact on the race track, Morale will plummet.
8. Team: Rating
In this section you get to track your Game Score through the current season and through your 10 year career. Your ultimate goal is to score enough points to take the top place in the Hall of Fame.
• The only thing to know about this area is that the Ranking tab shows how many points rival team owners have scored in the current season.
• Like Morale, almost everything you do in the game earns you points. There are too many items to list here, but the general trend is clear. The more you do, and the more successful you are, the more points you will score during a season. Really big points, however, are paid out at the end of the season, in the form of the bonus points described earlier in the document.
9. Help - I'm Playing As Minardi!
A lot of people want to know how to succeed with lower teams such as Minardi. While these Hints contain lots of specific advice for Low Teams to follow, the advice must be followed within an overall strategy. It may be helpful to see the broad outline of this strategy right now. As you read later Hints & Tips you should be able to see where they fit in with this one golden rule:
If you want to win as Minardi, scrap 1998, forget about 1999, and concentrate on 2000.
• You can not succeed in 1998 so don't even try. 1999 too will be a struggle. You should focus all your resources on the future, and the first thing you need to do is secure a better line of Cash. In 1998 Minardi has Customer deals for Engine, Fuel and Tyres. You should allocate all your Commercial staff on getting Partner deals for all three resources as soon as possible. Forget about Cash and Team Sponsors, the saving you make from getting free Engines alone will help push you into profit. You also need to sign up two Paying Drivers. If you do this right, you will make more money with two Paying Drivers and three Partner Technical Sponsor deals than you make in 1998 with Customer deals and low value Cash Sponsors.
• You should guard all your cash jealously and not spend any cash you don't need to spend. Don't do testing, don't do race Hospitality, don't bother designing Driving Aids, new Technology or current Chassis improvements. Just put all your Designers on the car for next year. Save your Engineers for building Spares, and save your Mechanics for Car Maintenance and Repairs.
• When the time comes to build next year's car, you will need more cash than you have, so consider selling Shares, taking out a loan or both.
• This survival plan should see you into 1999, where you should be poised for modest financial growth. Also improving your FIA position by just one slot can make you a lot of extra cash in the form of FIA grants.
• It is fairly easy to improve your FIA ranking - this is discussed in more detail in the FIA module, but for now simply lower all your Driver Orders and make sure your cars qualify and take part in each race. You will qualify badly, but setting very low Driver Orders improves your cars' chance of finishing the race without mechanical problems. Other cars ahead of you will retire, so although your cars may be lapped three times, they will finish in a position higher than their qualifying position. Cars that finish higher than they qualify will almost certainly result in your team getting a modest improvement in FIA ranking.
• When your Cash position is better, you should be able to sign up a good Chief Designer. A good Chief Designer is vital to success. When this Chief designs his first car for you, you should do your best to ensure that the Chief's design is completed to 100% Efficiency. Once you start to race with better cars, you will find a whole new world opens before you. Your FIA ranking gets higher, people want to join your team, sponsors will sign Works deals with you, your share price will increase - in sum, you will be on the way to your first Championship.
• Success in Minardi can be achieved only by taking a lot of pain in the present day, while planning for the future.
10. More Grand Prix World
• For more information about Grand Prix World, and the latest software updates, visit the Official GPW site at www.edwardgrabowski.com
• If you have any comments or questions about Grand Prix World, you can Email the development team at gpw@egrab.globalnet.co.uk
• The Engineering module will be discussed in GPW Hints & Tips Version 2.0.
July 2000
© Edward Grabowski Communications Ltd., 2000
Welcome to the first set of Hints & Tips for Grand Prix World!
This document is to help you get the most out of playing Grand Prix World and contains a wealth of information not included in the game's manual.
Although the game's interface is simple to use, Grand Prix World is a large and complex game, and it may not always be obvious just what is going on in the game, and what you need to do, to succeed. These Hints & Tips will give you all the information you need to help you form your own effective strategy.
However, there is no single correct way to play the game. What you should do in a turn really depends on which team you are controlling, which resources are available to you, and what your current situation is. You will often have to prioritise actions to respond to events that are outside your control. However, these Hints can tell you how best to maximise the value and return of the resources you do have.
In addition, the Hints & Tips include special tips for High Teams and Low Teams. So, if you're playing with one of the more wealthy teams (such as McLaren or Ferrari), you'll want to look at the tips for High Teams; but if you're running one of the less wealthy teams (such as Minardi or Tyrrell), you should pay attention to tips for Low Teams. If your team is in the middle of the field, you should follow the general guidelines until you find the right balance and can progress. Extra cool tips for everyone are shown as Ace Tips.
These Hints are written under the assumption that you are already familiar with the game, and have read through the game manual.
As you know, Grand Prix World is broken up into the following modules:
Main Menu
Team
Engineering
Commercial
Racing
The FIA
Game Options
The Version 1.0 Hints & Tips includes information on the Main Menu and Team modules only. Other modules will be discussed in later Versions of the Hints.
Contents
1. General Comments
2. Main Menu
2a. Cash
2b. Bonus Player Points
2c. 1998 Cash Differences
3. Team: Profile
3a. Cash Balance
3b. State Icons
4. Team: News
5. Team: Mail
6. Team: Finance
7. Team: Staff
7a. The Four Departments
7b. Staff & Chief Effects
7c. Star Staff
7d. Recruiting Staff
7e. The Head-Hunter
7f. Department Size Limits
7g. Staff Resignations
7h. Firing Staff
7i. Department Costs
7j. Hiring Chiefs
7k. Computer Teams & Chiefs
7l. Driver Loyalties
7m. Unfriendly Chiefs
7n. Hiring Drivers
7o. Computer Teams & Drivers
7p. Paying Drivers
7q. Retiring Drivers
7r. Chief & Driver Bonuses
7s. Driver Ratings & Morale
7t. Morale Changes
8. Team: Rating
9. Help - I'm Playing As Minardi!
10. More Grand Prix World
1. General Comments
In the world of Formula One, nothing is certain. The best plans can go wrong, the most reliable car can breakdown, sure-fire deals can fall through, the best driver can spin off a perfectly clear track, and long term technical suppliers may decide to pull out of Formula One.
This uncertainty and unpredictability forms a major element in the design of GPW.
The AI in most areas of the game is complex to a fairly high resolution, and the game includes many elements of constrained randomisation - i.e., variability that is not totally random, but falls within certain limits or trends. This means that nothing is fixed in the game, but that the game will follow overall patterns. A wealthy team with a great car, a great driver, and great engineering may not win every race; in fact they may be unlucky enough to have a terrible season. However, on balance the probability is that a wealthy team will do better over time than all the others. Likewise, a poorly funded team may occasionally do better than expected, but will generally perform badly.
GPW also takes a long term view of Formula One. The history or Formula One is a history of surprises. Top drivers unexpectedly join struggling teams, long term engine deals are terminated, new sponsors enter the sport and more. This "what if?" factor features heavily in GPW. During the QA of GPW, testers complained that two particular events were unrealistic, but before the game shipped those very same events happened in the real world of Formula One!
These elements of probability and uncertainty pose unique problems for players of GPW. Most strategy games tend to be deterministic. If something happens one way in a game, it will pretty much happen the same way every time. Or if a piece of information in a game says X, it will always say X. None of these assumptions is true in GPW.
The key lesson, then, is to always focus on the big picture and to occasionally take risks.
One final comment is that all data in GPW is as accurate as possible, and that intensive research went into the game. The development team drew on contacts in Formula One teams, agencies, autosport magazines, and freelance Formula One journalists. The team also had a wealth of data from their previous Grand Prix Manager products. It is almost impossible to obtain 100% accuracy on personal data such as Driver Salaries, but the team is satisfied that this game is as true a picture of Formula One as you're ever likely to get.
2. Main Menu
The only thing to consider in the Main Menu area is which team you choose to play with.
2a. Cash
• There are no difficulty levels in GPW. The AI for computer teams and race performance is fixed. Difficulty is reflected by the amount of cash you start the game with. It is much harder to be successful when running teams with low cash. However, some people will find the game too easy if they choose one of the wealthy teams.
2b. Bonus Player Points
• Another thing to consider when choosing your team is its 1997 Championship position. Your ultimate goal is to take the top slot in the GPW Hall of Fame. You won't be able to do this without scoring bonus Player Points, and how many bonus points you get is based on which team you are playing as, and how well you do from season to season. So in choosing a team, you might want to think about picking one that will help you climb the Hall of Fame more quickly.
This is how bonus points work:
• At the end of each season you may receive bonus Player Points that will help you get on the Hall of Fame. The total bonus is found by adding three possible bonus scores. The first bonus is found by comparing your Constructor Championship position at the end of the current season to your team's position at the end of the previous season. If your position this year is the same as, or better than, your position last year, you score bonus Player Points as shown in this table:
Last This Year's Final Constructor Position
Year's 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Unclassified
1 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
3 300,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
4 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
5 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
6 600,000 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0
7 700,000 600,000 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0
8 800,000 700,000 600,000 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0
9 900,000 800,000 700,000 600,000 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0
10 1,000,000 900,000 800,000 700,000 600,000 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0 0
11 1,100,000 1,000,000 900,000 800,000 700,000 600,000 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0
Unclassified 1,200,000 1,100,000 1,000,000 900,000 800,000 700,000 600,000 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000
• The second bonus element depends on which team you are playing and your Constructor Championship position at the end of the current season. Team related bonus points are shown on this table:
Team This Year's Final Constructor Position
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Unclassified
Arrows 800,000 400,000 400,000 200,000 200,000 200,000 100,000 100,000 0 0 0 0
Benetton 200,000 200,000 200,000 200,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Ferrari 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Jordan 800,000 400,000 400,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
McLaren 400,000 400,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Minardi 6,400,000 3,200,000 1,600,000 800,000 400,000 200,000 200,000 200,000 200,000 100,000 100,000 0
Prost 400,000 400,000 200,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Sauber 400,000 400,000 200,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Stewart 1,600,000 800,000 400,000 200,000 200,000 100,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0
Tyrrell 3,200,000 1,600,000 800,000 400,000 200,000 200,000 200,000 200,000 100,000 0 0 0
Williams 200,000 100,000 100,000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
• Finally, if your team wins the Driver Championship you get a special additional bonus of 500,000, and if your team wins the Constructor Championship you get another bonus of 1,000,000.
So in the unlikely event that you take Minardi from Unclassified in one year, to win both the Constructor and Driver Championships in the following year, you would score a maximum 9,100,000 for the season.
The third bonus element is not awarded to computer teams, so you may find that when you play some seasons you are voted Manager of the Year even though you didn't get Voted Manager of the Month very often during the season.
2c. 1998 Cash Differences
• Another thing to look out for when choosing a team is the difference between your 1998 Budget and your 1998 Estimated Revenue.
For example, if you look at Williams on the Team Select screen, you will see a 1998 Budget of $80,000,000. But if you then choose Williams and take a look at the 1998 Estimated Revenue (Team: Finance - Summary Tab), you will see a figure in the region of $75,000,000.
This shortfall is because you are expected to generate the difference in Licensing revenue. All teams have this drop in cash, to varying degrees.
3. Team: Profile
This screen is your "home" and gives you a snapshot of all the most important information. The two most important items to look for here are your Cash Balance (also shown in a window in the top right hand corner of every screen), and any State Icons against your Chiefs or Drivers.
3a. Cash Balance
• Cash is the single most important resource in GPW. If you don't have enough cash, you will not be able to do all the things you need to do, to be competitive. More importantly, if you run out of cash, you lose the game. So it's important that you keep an eye on your cash levels at all times.
• It may be useful to know that you lose the game only if you end two successive game turns in debt. If you end one turn in debt, you are charged a fee by "the bank" and are warned about going in debt again. If you end the next turn in debt, you lose. However, if cash is really tight, with clever play you can aim to go in debt every alternate turn and that way can cling on and stay in the game.
• Some cash costs are charged immediately, and some are charged at the end of each turn. Ongoing costs, such as Staff costs, Factory project costs, Hospitality are billed at the end of the turn. Costs due to immediate actions (building items in Engineering: Construction, the cost of Test Days etc.) are deducted immediately. So you need to be careful that you leave yourself enough cash to meet all end-of-turn costs.
• You also need to make sure that you can pay out bonuses in the event that you win a race, or win a Championship. All your Drivers and Chiefs receive bonuses should you win races or championships. On occasion, these bonuses can be huge, and may bankrupt you if you can not cover them. If you think there is a danger of bonuses putting you in debt, you should raise some cash to cover the danger period - either by selling Shares or by taking out a Loan.
High Teams - should spend as much cash as possible provided there is no risk of going into debt. You get no prizes for having a huge Balance, so spend, spend, spend! The game is designed so that top teams will spend larger and larger sums for smaller and smaller benefits. At the top end of Formula One, it is the minute speed advantages that can win Championships.
Low Teams - save, save, save! Do not spend money unless it is absolutely necessary. You simply do not have enough money to do everything you need to do, so don't even try. You should relax your financial controls only when you have done deals that will guarantee more sponsorship income and when you are in good regular profit. However, good Sponsor deals may be one or two years into the future, so you may have to be prudent for quite a while.
3b. State Icons
• Occasionally you will see a State Icon appear alongside the name of one or more of your Chiefs or Drivers. These icons are important and warn you of a problem. The icons are explained in the manual, but just to recap:
Red Diagonal Cross - Chief or driver is Unhappy
Red Lightning Bolt - Driver is Angry
Red Square Cross - Driver is Injured
Gold Diagonal Cross - Driver is banned from the next race
Red Exclamation Mark - the position is vacant and you need to recruit a replacement
• All these icons mean you have a serious problem. Most of the problems are self-explanatory, but you may not know that being Unhappy (Red Diagonal Cross) means your Driver or Chief has a Morale rating of 1. We'll discuss Morale in more detail later on in this document, but it's worth knowing that the Chief's Morale is the same as the Morale for that Chief's department. So if your Technical Director has a Morale score of 1, the Engineering department will also have a score of 1. For purposes of Morale, a Chief and his or her department are one and the same.
• It is important to keep an eye on Driver injuries, because you must have two Drivers at the start of each race. If you do not have two healthy drivers, you will have to recruit one before going to the next race. You can start a new season with no Chiefs (discussed later) and no Drivers, but you are obliged to recruit two Drivers before the first race of the new season.
4. Team: News
The News section in GPW serves three main functions. News stories respond to your actions and performance, they inform you of other things that have happened in the world of Formula One, and most importantly some news stories tip you off about something that has happened or is about to happen. It is important that you always pay careful attention to the News.
5. Team: Mail
Mail is similar to News but differs in two significant respects. Some Mail messages provide a tutorial function, basically saying, "You should be doing this." Other messages flag problems or are a reaction to you not taking an expected action. For example, you may have staff available who are doing nothing. Or you may have designed a new car component, but not actually constructed it. So most Mails are either status reports or gentle nudges that you need to do something.
• In the top left of each message is an icon. This icon is a tilted but otherwise identical version of the icon button for the game module where the message was sent from. So messages related to sponsor deals will show the sub-menu icon from Commercial: Deals. This is to help you find where you need to go, to deal with issues raised in Mail.
6. Team: Finance
There is not much for you to do in Finance, but the information shown here is extremely important.
• The Estimated Revenue figure on the Summary tab shows how much money you can expect to make this year. Unless your Sponsor deals are all on Fixed terms, the actual amount you receive may be more or less than the Estimate, depending on how happy you keep your sponsors during the season.
• Use of the Income and Expenditure tabs is pretty straightforward - you use these to see where most of your money is coming from, and where most of it is being spent. You can use this information to predict whether or not you will have enough cash to last the whole season. Both sets of figures will tend to be constant from turn to turn, but Income will peak if you sell shares or take out a loan, and Expenditure will peak if you make an Investment.
• You should also be aware that your Expenditure will peak at different times during the season. For example, Transport costs will be much higher for races not based in Europe. Additionally, building new cars for the next season is very expensive, so there's no point relaxing on a $100,000 profit per turn, when building cars is going to cost you half a million per car. With enough experience you will begin to predict and head-off cash flow problems.
7. Team: Staff
Next to Cash, Staff is the most important resource in the game. Ultimately, you use Cash to hire Staff, and you use Staff to carry out all the work you need to do, to be successful. A major factor in running a good team is having the right Staff. So you need to know (a) how Staff actually work, and (b) how to get the best Staff and how to succeed in negotiations with Chiefs and Drivers.
7a. The Four Departments
• In GPW there are four main departments: Commercial, Design, Engineering, and Mechanics. Drivers form a unique mini-department of their own, but we shall forget Drivers for the moment.
• Each department has two elements: Staff and the Chief. Information on each department tab is a combination of Staff and Chief data.
Low Teams - while all departments are equally important to a degree, departments can be prioritised thus: Commercial, Engineering, Mechanics, Design. Without a strong Commercial department, you will find it hard to sign all the deals you need to ensure future growth. Without Engineering staff, you will find it hard to build all the Spares needed for car Maintenance and Repairs, and for important Technology projects. Without a good number of Mechanics you will find it hard to maintain and repair your cars, and pit stops may go wrong. Without a strong Design department, design projects will take longer to complete and may not be completed to a satisfactory level. For you, the number one priority is survival which basically means keeping your cars on the road, and planning for the future. If you are unable to field two cars at a Grand Prix, you will lose the game.
7b. Staff & Chief Effects
• The effect of Staff and Chiefs is to give you Time Units (TU) that are spent in carrying out all the different jobs you do throughout the game. In addition to providing a much higher TU value than normal Staff, Chiefs also have special effects in different areas of the game. These special effects are described in the Hints for other modules of the game.
• The basic TU values of Staff are:
Trainee 20
Average 40
Good 60
Very Good 80
Excellent 100
And the basic TU values for Chiefs are:
Ability 1 250
Ability 2 500
Ability 3 750
Ability 4 1000
Ability 5 1250
So if you have an Ability 5 Technical Director and four Trainee Engineers, your Engineering department will have 1330 TU to spend per turn.
When you hire staff, you need to find the right balance between cost and TU, to make sure you are getting the most value for your money.
• You will often find that your TU score varies from turn to turn. Although exact figures are not shown in the game, this works as follows:
MORALE
------------
First of all your TU scores for each department will vary according to each department's current Morale rating:
Morale 5 Add 20% to TU
Morale 4 Add 10% to TU
Morale 3 Add 0 to TU
Morale 2 Subtract 20% from TU
Morale 1 Subtract 40% from TU
So a team with 480 TU in a department, at different Morale levels would actually be able to spend these points:
Morale 5 576
Morale 4 528
Morale 3 480
Morale 2 384
Morale 1 288
Low Teams - Morale will be a big problem for you in the first couple of seasons. As your team fails to perform, department Morale will fall, meaning that your low TU scoring staff will be worth even less. For this reason, you should not allocate staff to any job unless it is absolutely essential. You should be doing the bare minimum to ensure your cars can attend each race, and that you have good finance in place for future seasons.
STARS
----------
The effect of normal Staff becoming Stars is that Star Staff yield additional TU. The amount of additional TU is generated according to this formula:
(Ability Level x N of Stars) x (2 + Half N of Stars)
Example: I have 8 Star Trainee level staff, so:
(20 x 8) x (2+4) = 960
So that's 960 TU compared to 160 TU for standard Trainees.
EFFORT
------------
On each department screen, you will see an Effort %. This is a measure of the difference between your base TU and actual TU.
Example:
Before taking Morale and Stars into account, a department has a base Time Unit score of 2230 points. After taking Morale and Stars into account, the actual Time Unit score is 1976. As 1976 is roughly 88% of 2230, Effort is shown as 88%.
Remember, that each department has its own Morale and Effort scores.
7c. Star Staff
• Star Staff are workers who become highly motivated at no extra cost to you. Gaining Stars is a great way to improve the performance of your departments without incurring any extra expense.
• The appearance of Stars is determined by the game's AI. Because of this, you can never be sure that a Star will appear in your team. However, you can provide the conditions that will improve the chance of Stars appearing.
• Staff like their departments to grow or remain the same size, and they are made unhappy by redundancies. So on any turn you fire Staff from a department, there is no chance that a Star will appear in that department. The longer you leave a department alone, the more chance there is that Stars will appear. Also Stars will be more likely to appear in lower Ability levels of Staff, such as Trainee and Average. Department Morale also influences when or if Stars may appear, with low Morale (1 or 2) reducing the likelihood of a Star appearing.
• Stars are not permanent. Each time you fire Staff from a department, or each time Staff resign from a department, there is a reasonably high chance that Stars in the same department will revert to normal status.
• The final thing you need to know about Stars is that each department can have only one Star for every ten staff. So, a fully staffed department with 100 people can have 10 Stars, and a department with 27 people, can have a maximum of 2 Stars. So you might want to ensure that your departments are always staffed up to the next nearest level of 10. If your department size falls below these limits, you may find that you also lose Star staff status.
7d. Recruiting Staff
• The cost of Staff is fixed, so when recruiting new staff you need to consider only three things:
Can you afford the new Staff?
Are you getting the best Staff for your money?
Are the Staff available for hire in the first place?
• A highly staffed department with all the best Staff will cost you millions of dollars per year, but will give you the power to achieve almost anything in the game. Many teams won't have this luxury and must use and recruit staff strategically.
• When recruiting new Staff, keep an eye on the Annual Total Salary window in the bottom right of the Hire & Fire screen. As you add or remove Staff you will see the NEW salary figure change. Compare this figure against the CURRENT salary figure to see just how much less or extra cash will be needed as a result of the proposed Staff hiring and firing. If you don't like what you see, simply cancel the hire and fire changes you've made. Remember, the salary bill shown here is an annual figure. You pay only 1/16th of this figure after each turn.
• In the rush to build a good department, it is easy to get carried away and recruit way too many staff. If you find that your current balance is getting low, look at the Staff costs on the Expenditure tab in Team: Finance. This figure shows the cost of all four departments, and may occasionally surprise you by how high it is.
High Teams - When you have completed most of your key tasks for the year, don't be afraid of firing Staff to cut costs for the rest of the season.
Low Teams - Don't get carried away with hiring every new available Staff member - it will bankrupt you!
• Now that you have staff TU and Star data, you yourself can decide whether or not you are employing the right people compared to their costs. However, before you rush ahead and hire one Excellent Staff in place of four Trainees, you should read the Resignations section below.
• The final consideration in hiring Staff is their availability. If you have played the game more than once, you will see that there is some variation in the amount Staff and the ability levels of Staff you start the game with. This variation serves to make each game different, and adds a touch of realism. However, if you are unhappy with the Staff spread, you can simply scrap the game and start a new one. Once a game has begun, you have to keep a sharp eye on Staff availability.
In GPM 1 and GPM 2 players could hire as many staff as they liked, whenever they liked. This was unrealistic. In real life recruitment is constrained by the job market. And job markets tend to follow seasonal trends. Also it is harder to find skilled Staff in some career disciplines than in others. Finally, successful teams are more likely to attract new recruits. All these factors are taken into account in GPW.
• One interface feature added too late to include in the manual is that if Staff of a certain Ability level are available for hire, you will see a small red cross against that Ability level on your department screens. So you can see whether or not there is anyone you want to hire without having to click further to get into the Hire & Fire screens.
• How easy it is to recruit Staff for each department is generally governed by seasonal variation, with each "season" being four turns long:
Department Race Number
Race 1-4 Race 5-8 Race 9-12 Race 13-16
Designers High Very High Very Low Low
Engineers Very Low Low Very High High
Commercial Very High High Low Very Low
Mechanics Low Very Low High Very High
So you should find it easier to recruit designers in turns 5, 6, 7 and 8. However, these are only general trends, and Staff may become available in all departments throughout the year. You should also know that availability varies for each individual department, so while there may be no new Commercial Staff for hire, there may be a whole lot of Engineers ready for you to recruit.
• In terms of actual Staff available, you will find that lower quality staff are more readily available than high quality staff.
• Also, the number of staff available for hire will vary based on your current Constructor Championship position. So if your position improves during a season, even if only for a couple of races, you should be able to hire more, better staff for that period.
High Teams - You have enough money to hire anybody and everybody. As soon as the game begins, hire all available Staff until you have no more room in your Factory (if you can afford it, you should start to build a Level 5 Factory as soon as possible, so that you can increase your Staff to maximum levels). When you have a full factory, start an upward cascade of Staff replacement. For example, if you have 3 Excellent and 5 Trainees and you see 2 Excellent for hire, fire 2 Trainees and hire the 2 Excellent. If you follow this rolling process for long enough, you will have a factory full of Excellent staff. This cascade process also means that you maintain maximum TU at all times based on the Staff currently available.
Low Teams - Because cash is initially so low and the best Staff are rarely available, it is best to expand slowly in a reverse of the cascade process described above. Fill up your Trainee level, then your Average level and so on - this process will also encourage the appearance of Stars. Only when you cut new deals that bring you more cash should you consider hiring a lot of good Staff. However, if your Morale hits rock bottom, you may have no choice but to hire expensive new Staff just to get basic jobs done on time. If this happens to you, you will have to consider selling Shares or taking out a Loan to raise the cash.
7e. The Head-Hunter
• Using the Head-Hunter is a luxury for teams with cash to burn. If you want to see if you can find more Staff to hire, just hit the Head-Hunter button. Using the Head-Hunter costs you money whether Staff are found or not. If Staff are found, and you hire them, the Head-Hunter will cost you even more money. So only use the Head-Hunter if you can afford to, and if you are in a rush to find new Staff. Many times, the Head-Hunter will just rip you off!
7f. Department Size Limits
• Eventually, if everything's going well, you will run out of workspace and will not be able to hire more Staff until you have increased the size of your Factory. Any Factory construction work will not be ready until the start of next season, so if you do have this problem you should still try to improve the TU level of your Staff using the cascade recruitment process described earlier - you may be limited to 30 Staff, but better to have 30 Excellent Staff than 30 Trainees.
• Factory size limits Staff and Department sizes as follows:
Factory Size Staff Limit Department Limit
1 160 40
2 200 50
3 240 60
4 320 80
5 400 100
So if you have a Level 1 Factory, you can have a maximum of 160 Staff, with a maximum of 40 Staff in each of the four departments. However, the Staff in each department can be of any Ability type.
A summary of this information is shown in the bottom left of the Hire & Fire Staff screens.
• When looking at your Department or Hire & Fire screens, you should be careful to note that your total number of Staff is the total number of normal Staff plus the total number of Star Staff. It is easy to forget to include Stars in Staff calculations when looking at the Total row at the foot of these Staff tables.
7g. Staff Resignations
• Staff may decide to leave your company. You have no direct control over this, but you can help prevent it. Whether or not Staff resign is based on the current Morale of your departments. Staff in a department with Morale 1 are far more likely to quit than Staff in a department with a higher Morale score. The number of Staff who quit per turn is also likely to increase if department Morale is low. On a really bad turn you may lose up to 3 Staff.
• Trainees rarely, if ever, resign. Staff resignations are more likely to occur at higher Staff Ability levels. So if your Morale is low, hiring Excellent Staff may be a waste of effort. If you have fired someone to help pay for the Excellent Staff, you'll have an even bigger problem because (a) you will have spent redundancy money, and (b) you'll have no TU left for either the fired Staff or the newly resigned Staff.
Low Teams - Resignations can be good if you are looking to gradually raise the quality of your Staff. If you fire lower quality Staff to pay for higher quality Staff, you will have to pay redundancy fees. However, if you wait for Staff to resign, you can replace them at no cost. You don't pay any redundancy fees to Staff who resign, yet you get to save on their salary cost.
7h. Firing Staff
• Firing Staff in GPW is easy, right? You just hit that little - button and watch the Staff numbers go down. Easy!
Wrong!
• Each time you fire a member of Staff you have to pay an immediate Redundancy fee that is equal to roughly half a year's salary. So if someone is costing you $160,000 per year, his cost to you is $10,000 per race. But if you fire him, it immediately costs you $80,000. So Low Teams might panic when they see their annual salary bill and decide to fire Staff to bring the wage bill down, without realising that they are incurring a massive one-off immediate cost that could push them into debt. When you fire staff, keep an eye on the Redundancy costs shown near the centre of the Hire & Fire table.
• There is a chance that a fired member of Staff will successfully sue you for Unfair Dismissal - you have absolutely no control over this risk. If this happens, you will have to pay an additional cost between 1.5 and 3 times that person's annual salary.
• Firing people will also often result in the reversion of Star Staff to normal Status.
• Finally, firing Staff can seriously reduce a department's Morale, no matter what else is going on in the game.
So you have to think really hard before you decide to get rid of people.
High Teams - You're so rich that you don't care who sues you, or who costs you what. If you wanted a friend, you'd buy a dog! Just fire the deadwood, and bring in the experts who will make your team a winning organisation year after year after year. Even if Morale takes a dip, you will be hiring better staff, cutting cool deals, and winning races, so Morale will soon go right back up.
Low Teams - This is a people business. You are nothing without your staff. Fire even a single person at your peril!
7i. Department Cost
• One final thing to keep an eye on is the total cost of each department. This cost is the annual salary total of all your Staff plus the salary of your Chief. This figure is shown in the Cost window in the top left of your Department tabs. Also remember that Chief bonuses will not be shown here, as bonuses are not fixed costs. So if your current salary bill is near breakeven point, be careful not to win any races until you have enough funds to cover bonus pay-outs!
7j. Hiring Chiefs
• Some general points about Chiefs and Chief contracts:
Duration of Chief Contracts is measured in whole seasons. Where a Chief is recruited mid-season in the current year, the Chief's contract will run to the end of the next season. A Chief who is ready to start NOW has a small white + symbol in the Seasons field of your Job Offer. So a Chief offered a deal of 2+ will work 2 whole seasons plus the rest of the current season.
Chiefs never resign from teams or leave Formula One.
Each Chief may be approached only once per turn, but may be approached any number of turns until the Chief is hired by you or a rival team.
You can approach a Chief only if he or she is not already under contract for next year.
Chiefs will some times approach you for work. This is flagged in the form of Mail - so keep a look out for these messages.
Deal terms will change in the player’s favour, the longer a Chief has to wait before getting an offer.
You can not poach Chiefs under contract to another team.
• Hiring Chiefs is slightly tricky in that you can make only one approach to a Chief per turn. In addition, Chiefs often change their mind about the kind of deal they are looking for. Also Chiefs start the season looking for the best deal possible. But the longer a Chief goes through a season without being signed up, the more likely he or she will be to settle for a less favourable deal - they'd rather have a poor deal than no job.
• It is in your interest to offer deals to Chiefs as late as possible. However, while you are waiting for Chiefs to lower their terms, rival teams might sign them up - so waiting is risky. Computer teams are pretty aggressive in signing Chiefs up and may strike deals as early as the first race.
High Teams - Don't waste any time. Try to hire the best Chiefs in the first turn of the season if possible. Don't let your rivals hire the best people.
• You can talk to as many Chiefs as you want at the same time, so a good plan might be to approach a large number of Chiefs and make each one a Job Offer without raising a single Contract Term. Sure, a lot of the terms will be rejected, but some might be accepted - which means you can cut a deal that is better for you. Once a contract term has been accepted, the Chief will not change his mind, so all you will then have to do is concentrate on getting the Chief to approve the terms he's rejected. The point to make here is that you shouldn't think that you always have to increase numbers before a Chief will agree with you. However, this wait-and-see approach might result in Chiefs signing with other teams.
• The best way to get value for money is to hire the cheapest Chief. All Chiefs of the same Ability level are exactly the same in game play terms, so why pay $150,000 for a Chief with Ability 1, when you can pay £100,000 for an identical level 1 Chief?
High Teams - You have the financial power to get whoever you want whenever you want. So go to the best available Chief (Ability 5) and offer him a deal well over the odds, just to make sure that he agrees to all your terms, and then sign him up straight away. Don't waste time. If you have good sponsor deals, you will be able to afford anybody. Don't be mean with your cash.
Low Teams - Try to find the best, cheapest Chief as possible. If cash is really tight, settle for low quality Chiefs. You will find that some of the Non-F1 Chiefs are much cheaper and easier to sign up than Ability 1 F1 Chiefs. However, you should also experiment with aiming high. A lot of top Chiefs will reject your offer for reasons outside your control, but you may get lucky and sign up someone who will make a big difference to your team's future. If you can afford only one or two top Chiefs, target them in this order: Chief Designer, Chief Engineer, Commercial Manager, Chief Mechanic.
Ace Tip - The Chief Designer is probably the single most important character in the entire game. You will see in the Engineering Module that the Chief Designer's Ability is the main factor in determining how good your cars are. Once you have good cars, your position will improve and then everything in the game will start to change in your favour. The Chief Designer is even more important than your Drivers.
• There is a chance that Chiefs' Ability may improve or worsen between seasons. This happens at the end of the year, so comes into effect (along with new contracts) at the start of the following season. If you are lucky, you may hire a cheap Ability 1 Chief only to see that he has improved to Ability 2 at no extra cost to you. If you are unlucky, you could spend a fortune hiring a level 5 Chief, only to have him drop to level 4 just as he or she joins your team.
Chiefs may improve if their team finishes in a higher Constructor Championship position than last year; and may worsen if their team finishes in a lower position than last year. It does not matter if the actual teams are different from year to year, so if a Chief is with Williams when they finish 4th in 1999, and then with Ferrari when they finish 1st in 2000, the Chief may improve at the end of the 2000 season. Lower quality Chiefs are more likely to improve than high level Chiefs, and younger Chiefs are more likely to improve, while older Chiefs are more likely to worsen regardless of team positions. Non-F1 Chiefs never change ratings - only when they enter the world of Formula One will they get the full experience they need to improve.
• Whether or not a Chief accepts all the terms of your offer and agrees to join your team is governed by some quite complex decision making. Various criteria have to be satisfied before the Chief is happy to join you. These are as follows:
YOUR TEAM STATUS
------------------------------
A Chief will be happy to joining a team that is currently of a higher Constructor Championship position, than his present team. But if your team is ranked lower, the Chief may refuse. The bigger the difference is between the teams, the more likely the Chief is to refuse. You may be able to take advantage of this in any turn where your Constructor position has improved.
The Chief's decision here is influenced by a number of other factors:
Driver Loyalty - if the Chief has a Driver Loyalty and that Driver is racing with you next year, the Chief will be more likely to be happy to join your team.
Current Game Turn - the later it is in the season, the more likely the Chief will be to join.
Age of Chief - Younger Chiefs are less likely to want to join a lower ranked team than older Chiefs.
Chief Fired - A Chief who has been fired by a rival team is more likely to join a lower team.
Chief Approaches You - if you have received a mail saying the Chief wants to talk to you and you make him an offer in the same turn, he will be much happier to join your team.
Rejection due to Team Status is shown as a Red Cross in the Team Conditions strip of the Job Offer panel.
DEPARTMENT SIZE
----------------------------
The Chief wants to know that he or she will have enough staff to do the job. A Level 1 Chief will feel comfortable heading up any department with 6 or more Staff, but a Level 5 Chief will want at least 26 Staff before he'll be happy. Other Chiefs fall at points in between these two extremes. So you may have to hire more Staff before you can get the Chief you want.
Rejection due to Department Size is shown as a Red Cross in the Team Conditions strip of the Job Offer panel.
TEAM CASH
-----------------
Chiefs want to know that they are joining a secure and well-funded team. Take a look at your Estimated Annual Revenue (shown at the top of the Summary tab in Team: Finance). An Ability 1 Chief will happily join a team with any amount of revenue, but an Ability 5 Chief will try to hold out for teams with $70,000,000 or more. Again, other Chiefs fall somewhere in between.
Rejection due to Team Cash is shown as a Red Cross in the Team Conditions strip of the Job Offer panel.
SALARY
-----------
Naturally, Chiefs want a pay increase. The amount of increase is expressed as a % of current salary and is based on the Chief's Ability level and the Constructor Championship position of the Chief's team at the end of the previous season. A level 5 Chief whose team won the Championship last year, will be looking for a massive 45% increase.
Chiefs will accept a smaller increase than normal if: one of your Drivers next year is the same Driver shown in the Chief's Driver Loyalty table; if the Chief is being approached by his current team (i.e., the contract is being renewed); if it is late in the season; if the Chief was fired from his last job; or if the Chief has approached your team (shown in Mail).
Very rarely the above factors may result in the Chief being happy to accept a pay cut rather than a pay increase. However, this will happen only if the Chief is swapping teams. The lowest increase a Chief might accept if he stays with his current team is 0. If you keep a sharp eye out for these factors, you may be able to strike a very cheap deal.
Rejection due to Salary is shown as a Red Cross in the Salary strip of the Job Offer panel.
CHAMPIONSHIP BONUS
----------------------------------
Chiefs expect a reward if their team wins the Constructor Championship. The amount of bonus increase wanted is based on the current Constructor Championship position of your team. If your team is currently number 1, the Chief will look for a 50% bonus increase, but if you are number 11, the Chief may well settle for no increase at all. So try to cut deals when your position is low (not easy when the Chief also has to be happy with your Team Status!).
All the factors that can reduce a Chief's Salary increase request (Driver Loyalty etc.) apply here also. However, Chiefs will never accept a reduction in bonus.
Note that Championship Bonuses are payable at the end of the year, so make sure you have enough cash left before Race 16 to meet all possible bonus payments.
Rejection due to Salary is shown as a Red Cross in the Championship Bonus strip of the Job Offer panel.
RACE BONUS
-------------------
Chiefs want rewarding if their team wins races. The amount of bonus increase wanted is based on the Chief's Ability level, with level 5 Chiefs looking for roughly a 25% increase.
All the factors that can reduce a Chief's Salary increase requirement (Driver Loyalty etc.) apply here also. However, Chiefs will never accept a reduction in bonus.
Note that Race Bonuses are payable at the end of each race you win, so again make sure you have enough cash to meet these payments.
Rejection due to Salary is shown as a Red Cross in the Race Bonus strip of the Job Offer panel.
ROYALTY %
-----------------
Commercial Managers do not take Race and Championship bonuses. Instead they expect to be paid a % of all moneys you make through Sponsorship deals they themselves have made. This can be very expensive. If you have $50,000,000 of Sponsorship, and your Commercial Manager has a 5% royalty, he or she will take $2,500,000 of your money. You should never really pay any Commercial Manager 8% or more in royalties.
The amount of % increase the Chief will want is based on the Chief's Ability, but may be reduced by all the usual factors except Driver Loyalty, as Commercial Managers never form Driver Loyalties.
Ace Tip - A Commercial Manager takes royalties only from deals that are signed while the Manager is with your team. Get your manager to sign up a lot of good deals, then fire him! If you can replace the Manager with another Manager who is free NOW, that new manager will join you immediately. Your old Manager will charge you for redundancy compensation, equal to a whole year's salary multiplied by the number of contracted years or part-years remaining. However, if you time this right, redundancy costs will be far less than the Royalty % you would have to pay. Another method is to always hire Commercial Managers on one year deals, swapping from Manager to Manager - which in theory means you will never pay any % royalties. You should make sure that new Managers will serve you well for later seasons, but this should not be a problem if your current deals are multi-year. You should also note that fired Chiefs will not want to come back and work for you, for quite some time after being fired.
Rejection due to Royalty is shown as a Red Cross in the Royalty strip of the Job Offer panel.
SEASONS
--------------
High quality Chiefs will want to sign as short a contract as possible because the more they swap jobs, the more quickly their financial package will increase. Low quality Chiefs are more interested in job security and so will want to sign as long a contract as possible.
Again, these positions change over time. For example, a level 5 Chief will almost always accept a 1 year contract, but will not be very interested in longer deals until around turn 9 of the current season. However, as with Salaries, a Chief is more likely to accept your offer (where your offer is different than what the Chief wants), if Driver Loyalty comes into play, if the Chief has approached your team, if the Chief has been fired and (most importantly of all) if your team is currently higher in the Constructor Championship than the Chief's team. So if a top team has a disastrous start to a season, and yours is doing better, you may be able to pull off a shock deal.
High Teams - Sign up the best high Ability Chiefs for as long a deal as possible.
Low Teams - You usually will not be able to sign higher Ability Chiefs in your first few years, so will have to sign up Chiefs typically at level 3 or less. In this case, you should do your best to sign 1 year deals only. If you play the game well, you should find that your team is earning more and more cash from 1999 onwards, and you should be able to attract the best staff within a few years. Because of this, you need to make sure that you can recruit good Chiefs, so should avoid having a job locked for three or more years with a poor quality Chief. At worst, you should sign 2 year deals.
• In summary, making an offer to a Chief is all about taking advantage of current conditions. Chiefs are intelligent and will look to make the best deal they feel is right for them based on a whole lot of current circumstances. As circumstances change, each Chief's position will change, so a Chief who says a 2 year deal is too short one turn, may later decide that 2 years is too long. This reflects the genuine uncertainty and occasional unpredictability of real-life deals.
• Once a Chief has agreed all terms, and the Job Offer shows a neat column of green ticks, that Chief is Ready To Hire, but is not hired until you hit the Sign Deal button. You can have any number of Ready-To-Hire Chiefs at one time. However, other teams may sign up Ready-To-Hire Chiefs, so just because you have agreed a deal with Chief it does not mean that the Chief will not sign with somebody else instead. So don't take too long to make your mind up. You may be warned by News stories that another team is negotiating with a Ready-To-Hire Chief.
• Finally, if you make an offer to a Non-F1 Chief, you will find that they will accept almost any terms you set. Once they enter the world of F1, however, everything changes and they will become much more careful over future deals.
7k. Computer Teams & Chiefs
• Computer teams are pretty aggressive about hiring Chiefs and will start recruiting as soon as possible into each new season. The top teams tend to act more quickly, favouring the best Chiefs in the best teams.
• When rival teams are negotiating with one of your own current Chiefs, or with any Chief at Ability level of 5, a story MAY appear in the News, warning you that your staff (or the best staff) may be about to sign up with the rival team.
• The same AI is used for computer team recruitment, so your rival team owners will be having the same headaches as you!
• You should also keep an eye on the News for teams who fire their Chiefs. Fired Chiefs are easier to sign up, and sometimes even the best Chiefs can be fired - scapegoats for the team's disappointing performance.
7l. Driver Loyalties
• Some Chiefs form loyalty attachments with Drivers on the same team. The result of this is that you can cut better deals with Chiefs provided that the relevant Driver will also be on your team in the year that the Chief plans to join you.
• Commercial Chiefs never form Driver Loyalties.
• Some Driver Loyalties are active at the start of the game, but new ones form simply as a result of the Driver scoring Driver Championship points, winning Pole Positions and winning Driver Championships. The more successful a driver is, the more chance there is of the Chief becoming loyal to that Driver. Loyalty is more likely to form with a Driver 1 than Drivers ranked 1=. And Loyalty is more likely to form with a Driver 1= than a Driver 2. Loyalty rarely if ever forms with Injured Drivers or Test Drivers.
• Once a Driver Loyalty is formed it stays in effect as long as both Chief and Driver remain in the same team, and for one season after either Chief/Driver or both have parted ways.
7m. Unfriendly Chiefs
• If you agree terms with a Chief who is ready to join you NOW, you hit the "Start Now" button, are warned of the cost of firing your current Chief and then cancel (because you don't want to pay the redundancy fee), the Chief you planned to sign up breaks off all contact with you and becomes Unfriendly towards your team. Chiefs may stay Unfriendly for up to 3 years, during which time they will not talk to you about working for you.
• Any Chiefs you fire will also become Unfriendly.
• Finally, Non-F1 Chiefs are much more tolerant and rarely, if ever, become Unfriendly no matter how badly you treat them. Once they join a team, however, things will change.
7n. Hiring Drivers
• The general processes, considerations and strategies involved in hiring Drivers are exactly the same as when hiring Chiefs. Likewise, the negotiation conditions and factors are mostly the same, but with these differences:
YOUR TEAM STATUS
------------------------------
Drivers are also more likely to be happy with your team if they are Paying Drivers, or if their Morale is low (1 or 2). Drivers with high Morale (4 or 5) are less likely to want to change teams.
DRIVER SEAT
-------------------
This is an additional test that Chiefs do not make. The driver has to be happy with the role you are offering him. There are four possible roles you can offer:
D1 Driver is ranked first. Team has team orders.
D2 Driver is ranked second. Team has team orders, and this Driver has to play a subordinate role to D1.
D1= Both drivers are ranked equally. There are no team orders.
T Test Driver. Helps with your test programme but will not take part in races unless one of your two race Drivers becomes Injured.
Drivers are less likely to be happy with a role that is lower than their current role. So a D1 is unlikely to accept anything but D1. Drivers are happy to stay with the same role or to be promoted. The promotion order is T (lowest), D2, D1=, D1 (highest).
As always, other factors can influence a Driver's decision to accept the role being offered. These are:
Difference In Team Constructor Championship Position - Drivers are more likely to accept seat changes if offered by a team that is currently higher in the Championship than the Driver's team.
Current Game Turn - the later it is in the season, the more likely the Driver will be happy to accept the new role.
Age of Driver - A driver younger than 21 or older than 34 is more likely to accept the role on offer. Drivers between those ages are less likely to accept.
Driver Fired - A Driver who has been fired by a rival team is more likely to accept any seat on offer.
Driver Approaches You - if you have received a mail saying the Driver wants to talk to you and you make him an offer in the same turn, he will be more likely to accept the role offered.
Paying Driver - A Paying Driver is more likely to accept any role except Test Driver. A Paying Driver will almost always refuse a Test Driver slot.
Driver Morale - Drivers with Morale at 1 or 2 are more likely to accept a role change, while Drivers with Morale 4 or 5 are more likely to refuse.
Rejection due to Role is shown as a Red Cross in the Role strip of the Job Offer panel.
Although this is explained in the manual, you need to take care over what roles you offer to new Drivers. The roles have to be compatible so that your Drivers are either 1 and 2, or both 1=. If you have an incorrect mix of 1 and 1=, or 1= and 2, the role of your second Driver will be adjusted to fit the role of your first Driver (the first Driver being the leftmost Driver on the Driver tab of Team: Staff). This will happen any time there is a role conflict, regardless of whether both Drivers are new next year or not. For example, if I have Schumacher contracted for next year as D1 in the first Driver slot, and then hire Coulthard as D1= for next year, when the next year starts, Coulthard's D1= will automatically be changed to D2, to comply with Schumacher's D1. You may then have a whole bunch of problems due to Coulthard becoming Angry. Also when setting roles be careful not to get confused between what you want to offer a Driver and his current role (which gets displayed in the Job Offer panel as default).
OTHER DRIVER
----------------------
Some Driver pairings are incompatible. Drivers are generally less comfortable when paired with a direct rival, preferring instead to be paired with someone who is either much better or much worse. If a driver is with someone much better, he feels under no pressure as no one expects him to outperform the better driver; the better driver is happier because he sees the much worse driver as no threat. Things are much more tense and unpleasant if both drivers are of similar performance.
This test is based on the current Driver Championship positions of both Drivers (i.e. your already hired Driver and the one you are currently negotiating with). Paying Drivers are less likely to object to your other Driver.
This test is unusual in that it is possible to avoid it entirely! The first thing to remember is that we are not talking about your current Drivers, we are talking about your Drivers for next season. So if you already have Damon Hill for next year, and you try to recruit Michael Schumacher, you may well have a problem. However, if you have no Drivers recruited for next year, there is no Driver in place to create a problem. So the first Driver you recruit will be fine. Once you have recruited one Driver, the next Driver you try to recruit will base his reaction on the Driver you have already recruited. But, if you hire both Drivers in the same turn, they will both pass this test as there is no Driver already in place for either Driver to react badly to.
Rejection due to Other Driver is shown as a Red Cross in the Team Conditions strip of the Job Offer panel.
TEAM CASH
-----------------
The same as Chiefs, except Drivers use their Speed rating instead of the Chief Ability level. So faster Drivers will prefer to join teams with more cash. Paying Drivers will join any team regardless of Cash level.
SALARY
------------
Again, the same as Chiefs. Drivers who finished high in the Driver Championship last year will want a higher Salary increase. Drivers with a high Experience rating will want more money still. For example, a Driver who won the Championship and who has an Experience rating of 5 will want an increase of roughly 50%.
Drivers will settle for a lower increase if the Driver is being approached by his current team (i.e., the contract is being renewed), if it is late in the season, if the Driver was fired from his last job, if the Driver has approached the team (shown in Mail), and (unique to Drivers) if the Driver is joining a team that is currently higher in the Constructor Championship than his own team. Drivers being asked to join lower teams will want a higher salary increase.
Very rarely the above factors may result in the Driver being happy to accept a pay cut rather than a pay increase. However, this will happen only if the Driver is swapping teams. The lowest increase a Driver might accept if he stays with his current team is 0.
Once Drivers reach an annual salary of $10,000,000 they are happy to accept lower % increases, and this is further reduced with Drivers earning $20,000,000.
Paying Drivers pay you, so accept 0 salary increase.
On a separate note: if one of your current Drivers is Injured and unable to race, you still have to pay that Driver's full salary.
CHAMPIONSHIP BONUS
----------------------------------
Increases work exactly the same as with Chiefs. Paying Drivers will accept 0 bonus increase.
RACE BONUS
-------------------
Again identical to Chiefs except checks are made against the Driver's Speed rating. Faster drivers will look for higher bonus increases. Paying Drivers will accept 0 bonus increase.
SEASONS
--------------
Drivers will look for deals between 1 and 5 years. If your offer differs from what a Driver wants, it is the difference between the two durations that determines the Driver's chance of acceptance. As always, Drivers are more likely to accept your offer if the Driver has approached your team, if the Driver has just been fired, if he is a Paying Driver or if your team is currently higher in the Constructor Championship. Drivers are less likely to accept your offer if your team is currently lower in the Championship.
High Teams - You should be looking to hire the best possible Drivers for as long as possible. However, if you are forced into a series of one year contracts with a top Driver, sign him up even though it means his costs will quickly grow very high - it pays to have the best on your team.
Low Teams - You should look at Drivers in the same way as you hire Chiefs. Take time to compare Driver ratings with Driver Costs (including Non-F1 drivers), to make sure you get the best deal for your money. That said, the single most important thing you can do in 1998 is to sign up two Paying Drivers. Your 1998 and 1999 seasons are going to be nightmares no matter what you do, so don't worry about getting good quality Drivers. More than anything, you need cash to build for the future. So see who are the highest Paying Drivers, and make sure you snap them up for one or two years. Even when you start to turn your team around, you may find it helpful to keep one Paying Driver (alongside one high quality Driver) until you reach a time when you can rely entirely on Sponsor deals and FIA grants for good team funding. You must sign Paying Drivers!!!
• As you can see from all the variables at work here, the best deals will be achieved through careful timing.
• As with Chiefs there is a chance that Driver ratings may improve or worsen between seasons. Changes to Driver Ratings are governed by a variety of factors including: Driver's Age, and a variety of performance scores that measure a Driver's performance during races. Drivers who retire then come back to F1 will almost certainly have lower ratings than they had prior to retirement. Non-F1 Drivers have fixed ratings until they actually join Formula One.
7o. Computer Teams & Drivers
• Computer teams are just as aggressive about hiring Drivers as they are Chiefs. Again, the top teams move first, paying attention to Drivers who are currently highest in the Driver Championship, then the Speed of the Driver and then the Experience of the Driver.
• When rival teams are negotiating with either one of your own current Chiefs or with any Driver currently in the top 6 of the Driver's Championship, a story MAY appear in the News.
• Again, the same AI is used for computer team recruitment.
• As with Chiefs, you should watch the News for teams who fire their Drivers.
7p. Paying Drivers
• A few Drivers start the game as Paying Drivers. They will pay you to race for your team, and will join almost any team provided the conditions are right and you are not offering a Test Driver slot. You can expect Paying Drivers to pay between 2.5 and 10.5 million dollars.
• Some times Non-F1 drivers become Paying Drivers, so you should check the Non-F1 driver lists from time to time.
• Paying Drivers may alter the cash they are prepared to pay. Usually this decision is made during the final year of their current contract. You should keep an eye on this, as your Paying Drivers may be worth more or less next year than this year.
• Paying Drivers usually remain Paying Drivers for the whole game and rarely, if ever, convert to Salary status.
Low Team - Recruiting Paying Drivers for your first two years is vital. Their cash will fund most of your operation.
High Team - Forget Paying Drivers and concentrate on signing up Drivers with the highest ratings.
7q. Retiring Drivers
• In the last year of their contract, Drivers may decide to retire. A Driver is more likely to retire if his current Driver Championship position is lower than it was at the end of the previous season, if the Driver is 26 or older, if the Driver has already won a Championship, and if the Driver has scored 10 or fewer Championship points in previous seasons during the game.
• If a Driver decides to retire, you will not be able to sign him up next year. Sometimes, a good year will cause a Driver to change his mind and stay in F1, in which case you will be able to sign him up if you choose to.
• Drivers may come back out of retirement, especially if they are younger.
7r. Chief & Driver Bonuses
• We have already seen that Chiefs and Drivers can get Race and Championship bonuses; however, not all Chiefs and Drivers may be eligible for a bonus at the same time.
• If a team wins a race, the winning Driver gets the bonus - other Drivers on the team do not. All three eligible Chiefs (not the Commercial Manager) also get a race bonus.
• If a team wins the Constructor Championship, the three eligible Chiefs all gain the Championship Bonus but the Drivers do not.
• If a Driver wins the Driver Championship, that Driver gets a Championship bonus - your other Drivers and Chiefs do not.
• So, if you win both the Driver and Constructor Championship, one Driver and the Chiefs for Design, Engineering and Mechanics all get a Championship bonus.
7s. Driver Ratings & Morale
• Driver Ratings come into play in the Engineering and Race sections of the game, and are discussed in the Hints and Tips for those modules.
• Driver Morale, however, is a little unusual in the way it works. If your Driver has a Morale of 3, there are no effects. If your Driver has a Morale of 4, one point is randomly added to one of the Driver's ratings for the next race. If your Driver has a Morale of 5, two points are randomly added to the Driver's ratings for the next race. However, if your Driver has a Morale of 2, 1 point is randomly deducted from one of your Driver's ratings for the next race. And if your Driver has a Morale of 1, 2 points are deducted.
So a Driver's Morale has a major effect on your Driver's race performance. All Drivers for all teams are affected by Morale.
7t. Morale Changes
• Morale for all Drivers and Staff starts at neutral 3. Any score above 3 is beneficial while a score less than 3 will cause problems.
• Morale for each department and Driver may change at the end of each turn. If and how Morale changes depends on how successful your turn has been. The list of events that influence Morale is too long to show here, but practically everything you do, and everything that happens in the game has a potential effect on Morale. For example, it is possible for your Morale to increase even if both cars fail to Qualify in the race, because you have just signed a two-year Team Sponsor deal, have recruited new staff, built a new piece of Technology and resolved an Angry Driver situation.
But while the fine detail of Morale is complex, the big picture is simple. The more good things you do, and the more successful you are, the higher Morale will be. If you just sit there and do nothing, and your team fails to make an impact on the race track, Morale will plummet.
8. Team: Rating
In this section you get to track your Game Score through the current season and through your 10 year career. Your ultimate goal is to score enough points to take the top place in the Hall of Fame.
• The only thing to know about this area is that the Ranking tab shows how many points rival team owners have scored in the current season.
• Like Morale, almost everything you do in the game earns you points. There are too many items to list here, but the general trend is clear. The more you do, and the more successful you are, the more points you will score during a season. Really big points, however, are paid out at the end of the season, in the form of the bonus points described earlier in the document.
9. Help - I'm Playing As Minardi!
A lot of people want to know how to succeed with lower teams such as Minardi. While these Hints contain lots of specific advice for Low Teams to follow, the advice must be followed within an overall strategy. It may be helpful to see the broad outline of this strategy right now. As you read later Hints & Tips you should be able to see where they fit in with this one golden rule:
If you want to win as Minardi, scrap 1998, forget about 1999, and concentrate on 2000.
• You can not succeed in 1998 so don't even try. 1999 too will be a struggle. You should focus all your resources on the future, and the first thing you need to do is secure a better line of Cash. In 1998 Minardi has Customer deals for Engine, Fuel and Tyres. You should allocate all your Commercial staff on getting Partner deals for all three resources as soon as possible. Forget about Cash and Team Sponsors, the saving you make from getting free Engines alone will help push you into profit. You also need to sign up two Paying Drivers. If you do this right, you will make more money with two Paying Drivers and three Partner Technical Sponsor deals than you make in 1998 with Customer deals and low value Cash Sponsors.
• You should guard all your cash jealously and not spend any cash you don't need to spend. Don't do testing, don't do race Hospitality, don't bother designing Driving Aids, new Technology or current Chassis improvements. Just put all your Designers on the car for next year. Save your Engineers for building Spares, and save your Mechanics for Car Maintenance and Repairs.
• When the time comes to build next year's car, you will need more cash than you have, so consider selling Shares, taking out a loan or both.
• This survival plan should see you into 1999, where you should be poised for modest financial growth. Also improving your FIA position by just one slot can make you a lot of extra cash in the form of FIA grants.
• It is fairly easy to improve your FIA ranking - this is discussed in more detail in the FIA module, but for now simply lower all your Driver Orders and make sure your cars qualify and take part in each race. You will qualify badly, but setting very low Driver Orders improves your cars' chance of finishing the race without mechanical problems. Other cars ahead of you will retire, so although your cars may be lapped three times, they will finish in a position higher than their qualifying position. Cars that finish higher than they qualify will almost certainly result in your team getting a modest improvement in FIA ranking.
• When your Cash position is better, you should be able to sign up a good Chief Designer. A good Chief Designer is vital to success. When this Chief designs his first car for you, you should do your best to ensure that the Chief's design is completed to 100% Efficiency. Once you start to race with better cars, you will find a whole new world opens before you. Your FIA ranking gets higher, people want to join your team, sponsors will sign Works deals with you, your share price will increase - in sum, you will be on the way to your first Championship.
• Success in Minardi can be achieved only by taking a lot of pain in the present day, while planning for the future.
10. More Grand Prix World
• For more information about Grand Prix World, and the latest software updates, visit the Official GPW site at www.edwardgrabowski.com
• If you have any comments or questions about Grand Prix World, you can Email the development team at gpw@egrab.globalnet.co.uk
• The Engineering module will be discussed in GPW Hints & Tips Version 2.0.