Online Championship Points Allocation Method – Why?

[TonyLomas]

Most online championships follow either the F1 or MotoGP style of points.

I.e.
25pts for 1st
20pts for 2nd
16pts for 3rd
13pts for 4th
11pts for 5th
10pts for 6th
9pts for 7th
8pts for 8th
Etc down to
1pt for 15th
0pts for 16th

I’m just wondering why over taking someone higher up the order is worth the equivalent of overtaking 4 or 5 people at the back of the field.

Would championships not be closer if you just gave 16pts for 1st and 15pts for 2nd etc?
With maybe a bonus point for winning and another for qualifying on pole?

I’ve no problem with championships being like this as it is how it is in real motorsport.
Without knowing the history of motorsport, I wondered why it was this way round.

 

[Weider]

I guess the reason there is a big gap is to give an incentive to really have a go at a place higher

 

[Famine]

I’m just wondering why over taking someone higher up the order is worth the equivalent of overtaking 4 or 5 people at the back of the field.

People higher up the order are faster, better and harder to pass.

Incidentally, F1 is scored 25-18-15-12-10-8-6-4-2-1, and your method would have seen Nico Rosberg win the F1 world driver's title by 348pt to Lewis Hamilton's 340 and Daniel Ricciardo on 289 - because it gives far higher consequences to not finishing races.

 

[TonyLomas]

Hi @Famine,

I know that F1 is different. I used the MotoGP example as it's what a lot of the online championships use.

Although, Nico Rosberg would win, I think it is more to do with a higher reward for consistently coming second rather than penalising not finishing. As F1 would end up giving 21pts for 2nd place. With the smaller grids that Gran Turismo has it would't be as noticeable. Especially, if you only gave 10pts for a win when only 10 drivers turn up to race. You cold also do what some online championships do and ignore the two lowest point scores of any drivers.

The thing about it rewarding more difficult passes, I'm not sure about. Keeping the F1 analogy going as we know those drivers. It's no harder for Hamilton to pass Rosberg than it is for Kobayashi to pass Ericsson. If you're running higher up the order, you are also faster and better too, therefore your overtaking is relatively the same difficulty. With F1 rules as they are, Ericsson could go from 22nd to 11th and gain no points. And Hamilton could go from 2nd to first and gain +7 points.

PS. As a Hamilton fan, I'm glad he won.

 

[Lewis_Hamilton_]

because it gives far higher consequences to not finishing races.

This.

You could have one person who has won every race of the championship by a country mile until the very last round, and another who has come in second for every race. Then, on the very final round of the championship the points leader is taken out by another driver and finishes at the back through no fault of their own. That one single mishap would lose the championship to the guy who was always second best. That would not do a very good job of representing a driver's true skill in my opinion.

A championship of any sort should be achieved through skill and not through luck.

 

[TonyLomas]

Fair enough then. I guess that's the main reason, plus the incentive to keep trying to get higher up. Thanks Guys.

 

[Famine]

Although, Nico Rosberg would win, I think it is more to do with a higher reward for consistently coming second rather than penalising not finishing. As F1 would end up giving 21pts for 2nd place.

Where's the reward for consistently finishing first then?

Nico's lowest finish of the season was 14th - 9 points in your system - and he retired (0pt) twice. Hamilton retired three times.

In the remaining 16 races, the results were:
Hamilton: 11 wins, 3 seconds, 2 thirds - 345pt
Rosberg: 5 wins, 10 seconds, 1 fourth - 339pt

That's twice as many wins and one more podium finish, but he still comes second behind Nico in your system. Where's the difference? The one extra race Nico finished that Lewis didn't...

The thing about it rewarding more difficult passes, I'm not sure about. Keeping the F1 analogy going as we know those drivers. It's no harder for Hamilton to pass Rosberg than it is for Kobayashi to pass Ericsson. If you're running higher up the order, you are also faster and better too, therefore your overtaking is relatively the same difficulty. With F1 rules as they are, Ericsson could go from 22nd to 11th and gain no points. And Hamilton could go from 2nd to first and gain +7 points.

It may be no harder for Kobayashi to pass Ericsson, but that's because relative skill levels and pace are low - there's more opportunity to pass a slow car even if you're also in a slow car than there is to pass a world champion elect with world champion elect racecraft.

I agree that Caterham and Marussia and the like could finish 11th all season long and never score any points, but that's why I invented Famine's Adjusted Constructor's Championship - so the constructors could gain points and have a sensible objective way of telling them apart across an entire season rather than on the basis of the number of fluke 12ths they got.

 

[TonyLomas]

Thanks @Famine, than illustrates your point really well and answers my question. I also agree with your idea for the alternative constructors championship. At least until they ruin it with a third driver.

 

[snowgt]

I agree that Caterham and Marussia and the like could finish 11th all season long and never score any points, but that's why I invented Famine's Adjusted Constructor's Championship - so the constructors could gain points and have a sensible objective way of telling them apart across an entire season rather than on the basis of the number of fluke 12ths they got.

That's so brilliant an idea it has no chance of ever being used.

 

[Malcolm Tucker]

F1 changed to the 7-point gap between 1st and 2nd for the 2010 championship, to promote more overtaking. Drivers used to give up about two thirds into the race because it just wasn't worth risking a fight for a win when it would only get you an extra two points. It's nothing to do with what's fair or what represents a tougher challenge, Bernie Logic

 

[Wide Boy]

Bernie Logic

Brilliant says it all

 

[CraigHyphenO]

The system we use online is the same points system as F1, with no double points, points for pole or anything like that. It is seven lots of two races, with a feature race and a reverse grid sprint. Points are awarded equally. The only thing is that the best 12 out of 14 results count towards the Drivers' Championship, and all points count towards the Teams' Championship. That is there in case somebody suffers a few disconnections or has to miss a round. It has worked really well so far, with the clear top driver winning the championship last season, and looking like winning it again this season.

 

[Sick Cylinder]

Tony races in my championships which use the Moto GP points system. We use that system because it awards points down to 15th place so that people are assured that they will almost always score points when they attend a race meeting (we only rarely get 16 entrants). The points spread fairly differentiates between the top positions and incentiveises overtaking.

Generally you would expect that the higher up the field you progress the harder it gets to overtake, hence increasing the incentive.

I deal with disconnections by scoring the disconnected person points for a place one below the last place finisher - doing this instead of allowing dropped scores creates an incentive for people to attend all the rounds and also simplifies the scoring.

MotoGP used to use the two dropped scores system, which was originally introduced because cars and bikes were not reliable machines - the dropped scores accounted for the fact that people would normally lose a few scores due to breakdowns. The dropped scores were abolished when Barry Sheene, who had wrapped up a world title early refused to race at the final two rounds, on grounds that why should he risk his neck racing in a series which he had already won - I suspect that he would have raced if his negotiations for increased start money hadn't been unsuccessful!

Personally I think the current F1 system has too great a difference between the points - I remember when it used to be scored down to 6th place with 9 for 1st, 6 for 2nd, 4 for 3rd etc. I think 1st was changed to 10 points because Bernie didn't like the result. Points were extended to 8th place because the teams which scored points used to get their travel costs paid and the teams were unhappy that with points down to 6th a few of the minor teams weren't scoring any points at all.

 

[Harsk100]

For my future rally championship, I will use the F1 points system, but maintaining also the spirit of Power Stage of WRC and ERC.

My point system was going to be 10 points for the winner while the last place would get just 1 point. But after my ideas have been changed and I wanted to make it realistic as possible like WRC and ERC.

So, my points will be following F1's points:

Here's my regulations for my future rally championship:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1myFts4Ptgb3Xr6rUA-yKZqBEW5j8O3QrB-clWyErzDs/edit

I know that I shouldn't do that, but I couldn't resist because my regulations contains points system, too!

No offense guys, just a opinion of mine. Please let me know what you think of my regulations and if there is any problem in my regulations, please PM me.