Zezo forum:

Post by BooBill | 2020-10-21 | 17:54:11

Looks like there will be a new race starting tomorrow at 1600z. Ft Lauderdale to Hamilton.

Interesting, as those are sort of my home waters. But, would be a lot more interesting if the game included currents. How you handle the Gulf Stream is the trick to that route.

68 Comments

Post by jacenty67 | 2020-10-22 | 05:35:56

Hi Cvetan,

Can zezo support this race, starting in 10 hours?

BR
Jacek

Post by zezo | 2020-10-22 | 12:22:57

Added.

Post by UUnet | 2020-10-22 | 17:23:12

Thx Cvetan ;)

Post by jacenty67 | 2020-10-22 | 12:34:43

THX

Post by Tlz1 | 2020-10-22 | 15:19:54

Je ne vois pas de course dans le menu

Post by Thx Cvetan | 2020-10-22 | 15:50:54

Bonjour,
sur la page d'accueil, il faut faire "F5" et la mise � jour fait appara�tre la course "Bermuda".

Post by Hardtack | 2020-10-22 | 16:21:48

Race is underway.
Dashboard shows impossible positions for some boats - boats have travelled up to 7-8km (5min after the start), but the position timestamps are in the past (eg, 2020-10-21 16:26Z)
Looks like the race was running yesterday from 16:00Z - 16:30Z

Post by Eliric | 2020-10-22 | 18:10:51

When using the VR dashboard extension (chrome), I do not have anymore "following" competitors in the list; nobody is there. So I use Zezo routing entering manually my position without the extension.

Post by Pierre | 2020-10-23 | 14:15:44

New user of Zezo... It takes me completely E/SE and then North East tomorrow.
Seems the pack of sailors is going directly North East... we'll see. For now I'm almost last... worst ranking ever (18000 out of 19000). Waiting for "la remontada" :-)

Post by zezo | 2020-10-23 | 20:01:21

There is the possibility of a low pressure system W of Bermuda. It rotates CCW and cuts off the straight track, favoring approach from South.

Those things are somehow unreliable when they form. Some of them turn into hurricanes and some die off, so it may not appear right there and then, in which case we lose.

But then the North Atlantic is probably the place with best marine forecast it the world, so it will probably come to the date. I've seen 7-day runs from NY to UK materialize with one hour difference from the GFS at the start.

Post by BooBill | 2020-10-23 | 15:26:10

Pierre, follow some of the folks you see at the top of the VSR list, or some of the names you see here. You will find you have some very good company down there. It's a marathon, not a sprint.

Post by Luis75 | 2020-10-23 | 16:22:30

I am not in the race Pierre, but I can tell you that at my very first race (lasting 20/25 days) after 3/4 days I found myself around 15000 position. In that moment I realized Tipapacheri (top VSR) was beside me and understood that the ranking in VR is really not accurate.

Post by Stevoo | 2020-10-23 | 19:27:34

its accurate, but always selects as the crow flies to the finish, which is not necessarily the fastest way, in most cases

Post by zezo | 2020-10-23 | 19:29:20

It also takes some (hidden) waypoints in the calculation, possibly the while line, so you may get worse ranking even if you are closer to the finish as the crow flies.

Post by Pierre | 2020-10-23 | 17:44:21

Thanks for your advices guys, we'll see!

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-10-23 | 18:26:07

They finally put paging back into the rankings list! So you can see who's ranked near you even if you aren't in the top 50.

Post by TickerO | 2020-10-24 | 13:58:35

Hi guys and thanks for taking time reading me

It seems that there is a difference in wind direction between Zezo and VR : at this moment, at my position (Ticker), VR displays 108� and Zezo 118�. Which one is right?

Post by BooBill | 2020-10-24 | 14:19:02

Yeah, I just noticed that myself. As far as I can tell the 00Z forecast failed last night. Router picked up and is running 06Z. Game I suspect is still running 18Z from yesterday. Go with dashboard for current conditions and game predicted path is probably the best way to go. It's affecting both Bermuda and Mauricienne.

Cvetan, I know this has been asked before, but is there a way to route off a cached GRIB? I'll take it one step further, old for the next 6h and newest after than, assuming game will sync up after next update.

Post by TickerO | 2020-10-24 | 15:33:42

Thanks for your answer BooBill :)
I'll do this and will follow predicted path.

Post by BooBill | 2020-10-24 | 15:44:04

Just got the early update of the 12z forecast and the issue appears to be persisting.

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-10-24 | 16:28:06

It's really weird. Is it simply using outdated forecast data, or is it not advancing the wind at all? I don't think the wind I'm in is what was forecast for this time yesterday. But if it's simply stuck, then is the predicted path also wrong?

Post by BooBill | 2020-10-24 | 16:38:21

It's too late now, but leaving "reuse tabs" off and hanging on to old forecast routes would be helpful sometimes.

Post by zezo | 2020-10-24 | 16:42:36

VR is still stuck with 2020-10-24+18Z.

I can apply the same data, but the problem is it will get in sync sooner or later and you may get in the wrong place with the new forecast.

But then VR don't work on weekends, so the chances of the forecast moving before Monday are very small.

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-10-24 | 17:06:03

But... Is it advancing according to the old forecast's projections? Or is it reverting to the old forecast every 6 hours as "current" such that we're effectively racing in yesterday's conditions rather than just yesterday's forecast for today? I think the latter... If so, then you'd have to apply the same new data as a repetitive forecast for every 6 hours.

I agree with BooBill that it's preferable to get it aligned with the game if possible, but I also agree with you that the timing of when VR solves their end makes the whole thing guesswork. You're right that they don't usually work weekends, as far as we can tell, but with Vendee in two weeks, it seems likely they're scrambling to resolve bugs ASAP, so hopefully someone is paying attention.

Post by BooBill | 2020-10-24 | 16:53:43

Go for it. I just clicked off "reuse tabs" so I've got the current forecast saved and can always route with windy or another router for long term direction. I'm transitioning the latitude of the doldrums right now, so game wind for the next 24 hours matters more than anything else to me right now. There's my vote.

Post by Pimpi | 2020-10-24 | 17:29:47

It's a messy... :(

Post by Tigrou26 | 2020-10-24 | 17:30:17

I think it is not a problem with VR but with Nomads of NOAA, because we can't download directly the grib !

Post by BooBill | 2020-10-24 | 17:41:32

GFS in NOMADS is running fine, it's GEFS and NAMS that are currently down.

Here's the latest:

"The team has been working all day but were unable to find the root cause of the GEFS and NAM problems that are preventing them from being on NOMADS. This data will be out over the weekend, with restoration planned for Monday.

They are still available via HTTPS and FTP on FTPPRD here:
GEFS
https://ftpprd.ncep.noaa.gov/data/nccf/com/gens/
ftp://ftpprd.ncep.noaa.gov/pub/data/nccf/com/gens/
NAM
https://ftpprd.ncep.noaa.gov/data/nccf/com/nam/
ftp://ftpprd.ncep.noaa.gov/pub/data/nccf/com/nam/

We will be standing down for now and resuming at 12UTC Monday. We apologize for the impact this is having to your scientific endeavors, and look forward to getting this fixed."

Post by PML | 2020-10-24 | 18:07:38

Does anybody know which grib file is currently used by VR ? Is it a mix of several files ?

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-10-24 | 18:12:36

And, sorry to keep asking, but... Are we advancing in time against that GRIB, or is it being re-established as "current" every 6 hours? Are we sailing in yesterday's wind, or in the yesterday's forecast of today's wind?

Post by Citizen Kane | 2020-10-24 | 18:29:40

I think it�s yesterday�s forecast of today�s wind...

Post by BooBill | 2020-10-24 | 18:36:25

I don't have the old routes saved (who would have anticipated that), but my impression is I'm currently following the route from yesterday, as opposed to the current suggested route. So, I think that's the later, yesterday's forecast of today's wind.

Post by Rostef | 2020-10-24 | 19:14:35

And I�m sailing the routes predicted by the new Zezo files, but in the old VR wind of yesterday. I�m more supporting Cvetan�s idea of being prepared for a bigger shift as soon as the game adapts to the actual forecasts.

Post by QuiVaSadoVaMaso2 | 2020-10-24 | 19:15:32

Hello Cvetan. Is it possible to recharge the 18z winds of October 23 ?

Post by zezo | 2020-10-24 | 19:19:49

It is possible, but a bit pointless.

Because if and when the game gets in sync you may find yourself in the wrong place.

Post by QuiVaSadoVaMaso2 | 2020-10-24 | 19:33:51

Ok, thanks, We'll wait until Monday then and sail with the winds of VR.

Post by Rostef | 2020-10-24 | 19:23:20

The difficulty for Cvetan is probably that everyone will have different preferencies on that. If you�re racing the bermuda, it might make sense to just go back to the old gribs VR is still using, but in the Mauricienne, the bigger picture will be more important over time, so it�s better to be prepared.

Post by orev30 | 2020-10-24 | 19:22:06

Hi !
I don't understand why the wind in VR and in ZEZO are different, I don't know what to do, in zezo the best route is HDG 32, TWA 66 but in VR if I go to HDG 32, TWA is 56, and if I Block TWA 66, HDG is 22 !! It is a big difference (excuse my bad english) !!
Thanks for your answers
V�ro

Post by Rostef | 2020-10-24 | 19:33:57

Hi V�ro
If we would sail in the real world, we would very soon notice that forecast and real wind don�t always match. So actually we should be glad VR offers us some kind of unpr�dictability. Zezo�s winds are more actual at the time being. But you�ll need to do some interpretation what you want to follow, zezos route in different winds, or what looks good in the game. It�s a good lesson to learn. Enjoy the result, it makes this game interesting.

Post by Citizen Kane | 2020-10-24 | 20:33:12

See post upside

Post by orev30 | 2020-10-24 | 20:21:50

Yes of course ! I just wanted to know if it was a bug ! So it's not , ok !

Post by BooBill | 2020-10-24 | 20:26:12

For orev30, I would treat Zezo as the best prediction of the future, beyond 2 days. Put yourself in a position to benefit from the long term strategy. However, for the short term, manage by what you actually see from the cockpit and understand that could change dramatically without notice. Sort of like real sailing.

Post by Fouras_17 | 2020-10-24 | 21:07:03

We have just discovered the Roman galley

Post by Pimpi | 2020-10-25 | 09:40:08

Hi Fouras_17, What is the Roman gallery?

Post by Pimpi | 2020-10-25 | 09:40:08

Hi Fouras_17, What is the Roman gallery?

Post by Pimpi | 2020-10-25 | 09:49:30

Sorry guys, I don't wanna spamming. I see that my message has been published two times and unfortunatelly I cannot delete the second one. Could I kindly ask you (administrator) to do it on my behalf? and to delete this message too? Many thanks :)

Post by BooBill | 2020-10-25 | 10:05:02

Posted in wrong thread. Deleted and posted in NOMADS.

Post by zezo | 2020-10-25 | 10:07:50

Friday. And it won't update again until we see the game weather updating.

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-10-27 | 12:32:03

Well, it looks like I finished exactly 4,000th. Any idea how such a large fraction of the fleet finished within 3-4 hours of the leader? I don't mind that I finished 4,000th... I took a risk by pushing South while NOAA was under maintenance, and was terribly wrong. 3,999 boats simply beat me. Such is life. But usually in a fleet of 30,000, only 500 or so boats have foils and the relevant sail(s) while also navigating efficiently enough to finish within hours of the winner. So I took the risk figuring it's a Category 6 race so even if I'm terribly wrong, I'll finish 1,000th or maybe 1,200th. Dropping all the way to 4,000th was a bit of a surprise.

Maybe it's just that a lot of boats are tuning up for Vendee, so they bought foils and light sails with credits... And the new option for free boats to always have up to 2 programmations active without cards probably made a bit difference too. Is it that simple, or was there more to it? Did VR give a lot of boats free full options? Was the escort frigate dropping boats in with an advantageous position (at least relative to my stupid position) during the weekend? I'm not complaining about the situation - just trying to understand how so many boats did so well.

I stand to lose 29 VSR points. I gave up on VSR under the new calculation because it doesn't suit my racing style... I do better with a more logarithmic calculation, where one win can offset one awful finish, because I like to take risks. With the current calculation, I'll probably need a dozen top-100 finishes to overcome one 4,000th in one Cat 6 race. The current calculation favors risk-averse racers who consistently post high results without ever shanking one. I'm ok with that. It just means the occasional race like this one is going to knock me back pretty far.

Post by PML | 2020-10-27 | 13:48:56

" Did VR give a lot of boats free full options?

This may be reason, as I surprisingly got a free FP for the Bermuda Race although I only had bought Light sails (bought with the free credits given by VR) for the Jamaica Express.

Post by Pingi RIP | 2020-10-27 | 13:53:25

Everyone who started in the Jamaica Express started in the Bermuda Challenge with a free FullPack. So nearly the complete fleet was sailing with FullPack.

Post by BooBill | 2020-10-27 | 13:57:58

First hats off to the winner, ugolino69, he pulled the exact move I contemplated, gybing north early in anticipation of the change to current wind. I just chickened out when I lost confidence it would happen in time.

However, I agree there were a lot of weird things going on here. A lot of top VSR sailors finished poorly and this was probably the race with the lowest average VSR ranking among the top 100 finishers.

Some points.

- FP was offered for free to many boats, but not all. I got my FP for free and without asking. Not everyone did though. But it seems like 90% were sailing fully loaded.
- When the winds got out of sync with updates that strongly favored the no router crowd. Sailing to the game predicted path gave an advantage if some continued following routings.
- It's very clear that not everyone was sailing in the same wind, especially after the change over. I had some private match races going on to the finish and lost them all badley and inexplicably. At the last gybe Cvetan was precisely 1nm ahead of me (he didn't know I was racing him). We followed the exact same line and he finished 3nm ahead. With dimishing winds that gap should have closed, not openned. At one point a teammate had a 25 degree bearing advantage on me at the same twa.
- The new engine is suposed to give better real time rankings and data on other boats. I find it worse. Constantly I put myself in a position to have better wind speed and angle. The cards confirmed my boat speed advantange over benchmark boats I was using, yet they pulled ahead. Inexplicable.

It's the last point that troubles me the most. I put a lot of effort into playing a good tactical game and if the results end up being random, when then I'm out.

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-10-27 | 15:23:12

Thanks for the info. I have posted a topic in the VR forum to see if they're willing to limit the losses for this race. I hope I won't come off as too much of a whiner. I can live with the loss of VSR points, and I freely admit that 3,999 boats simply beat me. I just wouldn't have split so far from the fleet and adopted so much risk if I had known that most of the fleet had full packs, so it's frustrating that it will take months to recover from the VSR loss.

I think the new engine does better with the rankings. It's definitely far more stable. I haven't seen it jumping around like the old version did. Data on other boats, though... I don't know. Under the old version, I stopped looking at that. I found it to be a recipe for confusion and irritation. I guess I was too far out of it to have any idea whether or not random gains and losses were occurring. If that was real, that would be a serious problem with the game's basic integrity.

Post by zezo | 2020-10-27 | 17:13:57

The ELO system is not very appropriate for sports including random variables, like offshore sailing.

Also, in real real world sports you'd enter tournaments at your approximate level and there is zero chance of amateur player beating Kasparov (or Federer)

To quote Wikipedia,

"The Elo rating system is a method for calculating the relative skill levels of players in zero-sum games such as chess."

Sailing is definitely not a zero-sum game, unless we are talking about match racing.

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-10-27 | 18:21:11

I agree, but I'm hesitant to be overly critical of the system because I don't want to sound like I'm criticizing the top-ranked boats. Those boats have earned their positions just as thoroughly as I earned my top ranking when I had it under the old system. Every ranking system will have its flaws, and the old system favored my style, whereas the new system favors consistency, and I take too much risk for that. I'm fine with that. I just would have been less risky in this particular race if I had known such a large fraction of the fleet was running full packs.

i'd like to see them adapt it a bit to still be ELO-like, but with a more logarithmic scale. So that first is worth a lot more than second, and 10th is worth a lot more than 100th, and a finish has to be really quite awful to not be corrected by a win. With the current calculation, I believe that even if I win Category 1 Vendee overall, I'll get less than half the points back that I lost for finishing 4,000th in a Category 6 race. Oh well. C'est la vie.

Post by BooBill | 2020-10-27 | 20:35:07

Something like golf scoring makes more sense. Bottom half doesn't score and a log scale above that. Winner takes home twice what second does for instance.

That would radically change the way people sail. If you have a bad race, no biggy, just no points. You'd take big risks to win and we wouldn't have these tightly packed fleets.

Then do something like the World Golf Rankings, where it's a rolling 2 year point total with a weighting for each race based upon strength of fleet.

Post by zezo | 2020-10-27 | 21:10:14

It used to be like that.

Then VR decided to stimulate new players by huge initial gains. In reality it makes you pay each and every races if you wan to be competitive.

Funny thing is that if more people start playing, more of them will drop down in VSR and lose interest.

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-10-27 | 21:21:12

That was the format when I hit #1. :-) But its downside was its cumulative nature. Despite the dropoff after two years, it was still down to the accumulation of who put up the most points in those two years. I like the ELO nature of a capped limit for "perfection", as it removes the need to enter every race to be at the top. I just wish it was a hybrid where the scale favored top finishes more and penalized mediocre finishes less, so that you could post a stinker and overcome it with one win.

Post by BooBill | 2020-10-27 | 21:28:19

The way the math works, it's your percentile in the fleet, relative to your ratio of current points to 5000. So, more entrants in a race might lead your absolute rank to go up, but as long as your relative rank doesn't your points stay the same.

That's another reason why these little races with small fleets of engaged players are dangerous. I think that's YMSA's point. Normally you only have a group of few hundred that play hard enough and competently enough to stay with the lead pack.

To go back to my golf ranking proposal, the other thing I missed, it's average per event (with a weighting I don't get), with a minimum number of events per year. Tiger Woods dominated the ranking for a decade while playing the minimum number of events. But, he played only the tournaments with the strongest fields and 30% of the time he teed it up he won and never missed a cut.

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-10-27 | 22:08:47

Here's how the OWGR calculation works...

http://www.owgr.com/about?tabID={A01A4052-F0DF-4DDE-9BE2-940A54F2CA50}

The min and max denominators are interesting elements, to your point. You can play fewer than the min, but the min denominator is still used in the calculation, making the gap equivalent to missing the cut until you get to the min. The max denominator means someone could boost their ranking by playing a lot of events, but it's hard to do that and still play well consistently.

The basic calculation isn't complicated, and you're right that something like that could work well. The complexity in OWGR comes in the varying max scores for the varying events, sorting out how much each should be worth, and calculating the sliding scale of how much each finishing position is therefore worth in each event. Entirely do-able in a VR format, and potentially more appropriate than ELO.

I still like the ELO concept of a number (5000, in this case) being "perfection" and the math being to see who can get closest to perfection. Maybe some kind of hybrid solution. I dunno. Doesn't really matter. It works as it is. It's just very harsh on poor results, so you have to race conservatively enough to never shank anything too badly. Even if it's Cat 6.

Post by freudenoli | 2020-10-28 | 19:07:41

as we are talking rankings now...my two cents are that the whole endless cumulative ranking system is a bit of a problem because its super hard (now with ELO) to impossible (old system) to ever catch up as a new player. I think it would be a good idea to add a yearly "championship race" similar to the ATP tennis system...with logarithmic scoring and some strike results...this would add some motivation and excitement in my opinion...anyways, I agree that something like the golf scoring system or a hybrid between ELO and "old style" logarithmic scoring would be ideal...the system as is in the moment is somehow super boring...where is the motivation and fun if it basically does not matter point wise if you win a race or just come in top100???

Post by freudenoli | 2020-10-28 | 19:12:19

this ELO system is especially toxic for the long record races, which are basically lotteries...not many top players do them anymore because the risk to loose a lot of points is super high...even more so because the windows are so short that you can only complete one run...

Post by Stevoo | 2020-10-28 | 20:50:01

You can do your VSR points calculation , shortly before the finish line . If you don't like the result, you can scrap the run . Restart ,try another , or not.
Nothing lost.
As long you DON'T finish , no results will show on your rap sheet.

Post by BooBill | 2020-10-28 | 22:31:47

See the Records 2020 thread. It's reported that doesn't work anymore. Once you start, not finishing results in a last-place finish.

Post by Stevoo | 2020-10-30 | 12:14:59

We had a Team mate doing some fancy stuff all through the NY2SF race, he never finished. i checked his podium and his race was not on the list

Post by BooBill | 2020-10-28 | 20:43:33

There is nothing in the current ranking system that makes it overly difficult to get to the top. It took me one year from starting VR to get to roughly 100th ranking. To get all the way to the top would take another year of outscoring all the players ahead on average. That's what number one means, not just consistently good, but better than everyone else.

The problem is, it overly rewards consistency, rather than excellence and that as you point out makes for some real risk-averse sailing. There's no difference between 1st and 10th in terms of points awarded and taking one chance could knock you back so far it would take months to recover.

To beat the golf metaphor to death, it's like you are one off the lead on 18 and laying up. Not a very exciting competition.

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-10-29 | 00:20:13

You don't actually have to beat the other top boats. As you pointed out, 1st is usually worth the same gain as 10th, and often 50th or even 100th will be within a point of 1st. You DO have to be consistently very good. It is en entirely valid measure of putting up consistently very good results. But finishing between 30th and 80th in every race will result in a much better VSR than putting up better finishes than that with an occasional stinker.

And per my first post on this topic, I'm fine with that. It doesn't suit my style, but that's ok. I had my run at the top under the old system. I don't mind where I'm ranked or who's ranked ahead of me. My frustration is solely about the damage that one awful finish in one Cat 6 race is going to do, and how long it will take to recover.

Post by blkhd48 | 2020-10-30 | 09:23:39

Just a thought , in real world sailing regattas it's written into the instructions how many races are required to constitute a series and how many results can be discarded. Could VR implement a system where after say 10 entered races your worst result was discarded