Zezo forum:

Post by Hardtack | 2020-05-27 | 20:28:33

There seems to be an error in the gate groups this time.
If I understood correctly, you need to pass through one gate of each group (called checkpoint on the Dashboard map). This means you may not leave Copenhagen/Zealand to starboard AND leave Lolland to port. You will miss checkpoint 5. You must pass both islands on the same side.The route isn't likely to work, but who knows.

20 Comments

Post by zezo | 2020-05-27 | 21:53:29

You are correct. There should be group 5 gate at Storstr�mmen.

But then �resund seems unlikely way to Kiel.

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-05-30 | 15:05:09

It seems like some of the most recent forecasts might be able to support a route like that. It looks like light winds for the rhumbline, with better winds out by Copenhagen. I don't know if the difference would be enough to justify the extra distance, though.

I raised a topic entitled "Alternative Routes" in the VR forum a few days ago, and received confirmation that those routes should be ok. I had noticed the Group 5 issue, and I was hoping to discreetly get them to take a closer look at it. They don't appear to have checked it, though. I didn't want to actually discuss the specific issue because that means explaining about Dashboard and Zezo, which I tend to try to avoid in the VR forums. I don't know if it bothers them when those are discussed or not.

Does anyone know... if they discover this issue after boats have sailed that route... can they solve it by adding to Group 5 after the boats have gone through? Would it retroactively validate? Or does it only work if the gate exists before the boats pass through? If the latter, then what happens if a gate is validated twice? Any harm? If not, then I guess they could solve it late by adding a Group 5 gate from Damp to Heiligenhafen or something like that... Hopefully not relevant, though. Hopefully either the route won't be viable or they'll fix it.

I'm also wondering... will Zezo consider the Copenhagen routes, or does the land give it too much trouble?

Post by Hardtack | 2020-05-30 | 16:46:03

As far as the Dashboard is concerned, it can never hurt to exercise some caution. On the other hand it is unlikely that its existence (and use) has escaped their attention even before it was first mentioned on the VR forum. Meanwhile you can find numerous postings showing screenshots, even by regulars like Mousse Line and Pat Rock. There is even a posting somewhere which provides the Chrome Web store link.

I also saw that in the meantime, GeGax posted map screenshots in your topic showing the gates. They are still unchanged, but no one has drawn the right conclusion yet.

Correction: Pat Rock clarified that "There are no passing marks on this route."
So unless the gates are used for ranking, they serve no purpose at all?

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-05-30 | 17:44:07

My impression is that they realize all of these tools exist, but would prefer to not have the tools publicized in their forums. I don't have any basis for that, though.

I also would guess they'd prefer to keep the general public's understanding of the race courses simple, so as to not scare off new and inexperienced users with complex course diagrams. It's the only reason I can think of for gates to ever be invisible. But it's a problem because those invisible gates are indeed mandatory, as far as I know. So they have to get it right if they want to include them for ranking purposes while hiding them for visual simplicity.

Maybe I'll reply to that thread again to ask about that route, with reference to GeGax's image. It would be a shame if boats who sail that route are unable to record finishes.

Post by GeGaX | 2020-05-30 | 21:17:42

I replied to your post on VR @YourMom
For me there is no problem, I put you screenshots of the gates and the sequence is done correctly 😉

Post by BGSteMarine | 2020-05-31 | 07:06:27

By the way we have the same problem with the Guldborgsund, even if it is very unlikely to use that strait !

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-06-01 | 18:25:37

Looks like they fixed it. Probably won't matter for the main fleet, but it's likely that every route will be tried by at least a few boats, even if it's just for fun, and I'm happy to see that none of them will encounter an unexplained failure to finish.

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-06-03 | 00:20:33

Is it just me or is the positioning of followed boats even worse than usual now?

Every time I access the game, the positions of the boats I'm following relative to myself vary widely. Sometimes they're ahead by as much as half a mile. Sometimes they're behind by as much as a mile. Impossible to figure out who's ahead. (I'm talking about visually, after clicking on boats near me to get an update... not the mileage listed in the rankings... Boats like kallemans, Toppen, and Buddha).

I'm used to this being a problem, but it seems far worse now than usual. But maybe I'm imagining that.

Post by Luis75 | 2020-06-03 | 17:30:18

I confirm your sensation...much worse than, for example, in the LA-Tahiti

Post by BooBill | 2020-06-03 | 00:48:31

Seen the same thing in Tahiti race. Visually a guy is clear astern, but dashboard says he's in front. Seems your boat moves every minute, but other boats only move on screen to last 5 minute update when you click them. Your position is always worse than it appears. Seemed in the past other boats moved more frequently if you kept clicking them.

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-06-03 | 00:53:22

Are the daily dots accurate? If so, I'm not doing as well as I thought.

Post by BooBill | 2020-06-03 | 02:30:12

I haven't noticed anything funny about the daily dots. I do tend to look at them to do a bit of post analysis and they never seemed off from my memory of who was ahead at what point. That's a bigger scale I think than the visual misrepresentation you're talking about though.

Post by lemulot79 | 2020-06-03 | 11:13:45

Hello
Personally, to perform the rankings of my friends, I use the rankings of players followed or my team. It is the most accurate for me.

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-06-03 | 12:03:58

Me too. It just seems like that ranking's validity has gotten worse in this race than I remember in the past.

Edit: Best way to stabilize the ranking is to get a mile ahead of second. ;-)

Post by BooBill | 2020-06-03 | 18:17:59

Now that we've brought up the topic of the daily dots, you know what would be really cool?

I'd really like to see a replay slider, either in VR itself, or maybe that's something that could be implemented in the Dashboard. What I'm talking about is sort of like what YB Tracker allows with real races. You can move a slider to see the boat positions at any timestamp of the race. Combine that with wind history and Wow!

I'm really big on analyzing a race, during and after. What did I do right? How did that guy get ahead? How did that strategy work?

Post by YourMomSA | 2020-06-03 | 19:57:34

VR used to do something like that... Not really like what you're looking for, though.

Before the more recent versions with the 3D view, they had a "satellite view". That view just showed the entire region with every single entry shown as a red dot (somewhat like the dots now shown in Zezo... which actually arose in Zezo in part because people raised the question of whether or not Cvetan could replicate the old VR satellite view). But... the view had literally every entry, so the main fleet was a big red blob. You couldn't identify individual boats, couldn't look back in time, and couldn't limit who was included in the view. Anyway... sometimes after a race, they'd publish a video of the timelapse of satellite views. It was fun to see the red blob spread out and then reconverge.

Not what you're asking for exactly, but the closest thing they've historically done.

Another thing I've always thought would be fun post-race would be to run Zezo using the actual winds we got, back from the start, to see what the ideal course was with 20-20 hindsight. Probably usually close to the winner's course, but probably not always. I think I suggested this a few years ago and Cvetan said he had done it a few times but had never encountered very interesting results because it usually just confirms the winner's course anyway.

Post by BooBill | 2020-06-03 | 20:52:49

I read recently something about them doing a project like that for Newport Bermuda. They run every boat's VPP derived polar through forecast and after the race actual. So, sort of like custom ORC rating based on actual weather encountered. Idea is whoever sailed their boat closest to its potential wins. Personally do not want to wait for a computer to spit out the winner long after everyone finishes.

Post by Zorba777 | 2020-06-04 | 10:18:22

Interesting idea. After a race a weather encountered grib file could be made for reanalysis purposes in programs like qtVLM. While it will usually confirm that the winner was sailing close to the best route it would be interesting to see where the eventual winner made the difference by moving away from the pack, as we saw in the recent Goa race. E.g. are the consistently better players using certain "tricks" by staying a bit more to the left or right of the reverse isochrones corridor, based on certain weather factors? How many days are they generally looking ahead? There is probably some optimum...

Post by zezo | 2020-06-09 | 16:55:19

I have archives of the actual weather at
http://zezo.org/grib/gribv1/archived/

You just have to mass-download the needed files and concatenate them together.

Post by BooBill | 2020-06-09 | 18:23:21

Regarding my previous post, they are actually doing it.

https://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/2020/06/07/innovative-approach-for-offshore-classic/

Two start lines, one off Newport, one off the Chesapeake. Leave when you want. YB tracking. After arrival, actual weather history > routing prediction, your polars, boat sailed to the max of its potential wins.

Theoretically one could exceed 100% if their actual route beats the predicted routing.