GRV II-Challenge No 1

[Kitsune]

Are we allowed to build spur lines to another tile? Lets say the main line runs in Tile E, and I'm developing Tile B, would I be allowed to run a spur line to Tile B?

[BarbyW]

Kitsune, you will be able to build spurs eventually but not until you can actually build in another tile. At the moment you can't make any connections off the main line apart from in one tile that you can develop - B, E or H. If you are developing B then you cannot yet connect from E.

[mrbisonm]

Mr B, RHW 2 is a single tile network like the road.  I think that is why people are getting confused as it is intended for the purpose you are asking us to do. 

I don't use RHW because I never figured out how to plop these things and make them connect to other roads etc and make them look good.... Anyways.
RHW is as the name says (Rural Highway) in our opinion a highway and therefore will not be permitted to construct for the moment being unless demanded. That also goes for the Boulevard that is constructed in a small village or out in the country, where it makes no sense. You can build the Blvd though once you have a fair-sized town/city which irl could support such a road.

Kitsune, just like BarbyW said.



Fred


Edit:


I would like to add, while I have seen some players not yet posted their challenge 1 pictures, that the Deadline of the Challenge is Wednesday March 25th, Midnight Eastern time (NY time) and not a minute later. Those who have not contacted me before nor posted their challenge will NOT get any points for the first Challenge. Sorry.

Thank you
Fred and Lynn

[mrbisonm]

Please be advised:

24 hours left until shutdown!

mrb

[mrbisonm]

Challenge 1 is now closed!

Those who have not posted their challenge will get 0 Points in their score this time.(I guess you have some catching up to do)


Although the Challenge seemed to be very easy, it wasn't. There was some kind of a problem. The Budget.
The gouvernor gave you the budget, but wanted to see if you were a responsable mayor after all and spend the less for the best as most Mayors always do or at least "should" do. And this to see if you're worthy to continue to build up the wilderness of the river.
Fortunetly and generally all have done quite a fair job in creating the best route through Bordertown, but some of you were a little egoistic about the way roads and rails were laid, making sure that they will be for their advantage and without bother for the Governor's money they have spent.
Here are some facts: Bridges are expensive, sometimes we have no choice but they are expensive and tunnels are even worse and can be replaced by dozens of miles or km's for the same price. Then building a road over a tophill is not a good idea either, because again, the expenses will rise when the terrain rises.
We wanted you to build a road and a rail through your whole region and through 6 citytiles. That's what you all did. There were dozens of possibilities and many good and very good ones. More than half have chosen the lesser good ones, again thinking of their possible convenience and not the budget.
Anyways, I have asked two professionals (some friends I have) in this matter for their opinion and funny, they came up with a similar route for both the roads and rails. The minimum bridges to be forced to build was two, there was no other way around.
I took wouanagaine's map as an example to trace the ideal route through the region that my two friends proposed.



Having carefully studied all the mayor's maps individually and with the budget and also the shortest way in mind, we have finally made up our minds, and still are in process to do so. It wasn't easy at all. But we can say already, generally speaking, the average is quite good and no worst nor best have been chosen.

We will now finish all the entries and slowly show the results in each Player's Challenge 1 Thread. Keep an eye on them. They will not be uploaded all at the same time, but one by one when we find the time.
I will also upload my challenge 1 and you may judge me in the same way, and don't worry, mine was done before the Challenge 1 was published and way before my professional friends gave me their idea.
Everyone can judge my entry, Players, Lurkers and Visitors, but judge me fairly concentrating on the shortest way possible, budget and for the practical use to the region. Judge it in my Challenge 1 thread and give it points according to how and what it says in the Pointage-sheet thread, from 0 to 5 points. Plus have a short look at the points we gave to our players might help you judge mine. And don't worry I won't search revenge in the next challenge...
You have until Monday to do so, when I will announce the total points in the Pointage-sheet Thread. I will count all entries and divide them by the judgements to get the final points of my Challenge 1.

Hope you all had fun as much as we did,

Lynn and Fred

[Splime]

Heh, I knew that tunnel wasn't a great idea...

Actually, it still was in my opinion, only because I wanted to have one...  Regardless, that sounds like good criteria to use.

[mrbisonm]

Pleas read this in the Pointagesheet also:

http://sc4devotion.com/forums/index.php?topic=7315.0

[The_Hutt]

I think your points concerning budget are, for the most part, exceptionally valid. As a rule, it is always more expensive to build through mountainous regions, etc.

However, one little detail I do take issue with is your penalizing the use of the three-bridge crossing by deeming it "more expensive," especially since I operated under the impression that this was the cheapest available river crossing option in the "E" tile. Allow me to clarify.

I think you're really oversimplifying the actual expense involved in constructing bridges. There's a couple ways to quantify the cost it takes to construct a bridge. The first and most obvious factor is its length. Longer bridges require larger capital material costs and thus are more expensive; vice versa for short bridges. Your penalization of three bridges ignores this fact; instead of treating each bridge's cost as a function of length, you've seemed to have attached a rough lump-sum value to each individual bridge, no matter what the length is, with a small reward for using narrower river crossings. However, a series of short bridges whose aggregate length is no larger than the length of a single long bridge should have approximately equal construction and maintenance costs - and that's before considering my next contention. 

A second factor is river depth. Barring the use of a suspension bridge design with pylons on each end, the deeper the river is at any particular point, the more expensive it becomes to construct a conventional bridge at that location. A series of shorter bridges can take advantage of the naturally shallow depths surrounding the islands, substantially reducing costs. On the other hand, a bridge making a long river crossing must have exceptionally deep pillars for support, creating construction obstacles as well as potential seismological and weather concerns which much be dealt with.

Consider this scenario - there are two different bridges, the first being 13 units in length and crossing a slightly narrower width of river than the second, which is located on a wider portion of the river, but utilizes tho natural islands to reduce the length of the three shorter bridges of an aggregate 12 units in length.

!!!!!                  !!!!!
!!!!!                  !!!!!
!!!!!                  !!!!!
!!!!!-------------!!!!!       (13 units)
!!!!!     bridges      !!!!!
!!!!!---!!----!!!!----!!!!!        (12 units)
!!!!!                     !!!!!
!!!!!        River       !!!!!
!!!!!                     !!!!!

Not only is the series of shorter bridges actually shorter in total length, but it avoids the pitfalls of contending with deep waters. I would argue that this represents a substantial cost savings - not an expense.

Feel free to disagree - but that's just my two cents.

[mightygoose]

is it me or is the professionals road invalid, it doesn't start in tile A....

also any engineer will tell you it is cheaper to build on land than water and three bridges are most definitely cheaper than one longer one, less maximum available load, therefore less expensive materials can be used to construct the bridges...

As for good mayoring. where is you mention of network reach.... the road had to go from A to M, implying it was obviously built first, by giving the option of multiple end/start points for the rail an attempt to maximise region coverage should have been made, to save on overall network length at a later date.

Example, I as of challenge one had a infrastructure that reached 9 tiles, whereas some people only reached 6, thats half you region uncatered for by road and rail. a longer initial rout may have been more expensive at stage one, but by stage three the tables turn as much less extension of the main arteries is required to service the remainder of the region. I heavily factored this in my choosing of a rail route and I am sure other people did to. You did say think like a mayor, NOT think like a banker....

edit- also were bridge heights considered to gauge access to the upper part of the river...

[MandelSoft]

Another good reason to cross the river with three bridges in tile E: It's a good connection for future development on the islands. You can easily build some zones on the river isles and connect them with the main road. If you didn't build a bridge there, but still want to develop the area on the isles, you have to build more bridges (still expensive, and it's not subsidied by the gouvernment. 'Een dure grap', as I say it in dutch) or creating a ferry line, which is in my point of view not so very efficient.

Best,
Maarten

[metarvo]

I'm going to have to agree with mightygoose that the ideal road as shown in the pic does not start on Tile A.  You may have to take away some points from those professionals, Fred.    I can see how the third bridge could have been avoided, though.  If Route 10 had entered Tile A from the west and then made a turn to the south, it could pick up the ideal route outlined by the professionals and then continue.  The problem is that it would then go through one additional tile, but this actually corrects a problem as it looks as though it went through only five tiles anyway in the pic.  Okay, I see that it's edited.  Good job. 

[mrbisonm]

I am sorry about the starting point of the road in the picture not being in tile A, that was my fault. I have missed the line. Sorry.
We both have been working 5 hours in line yesterday only to get the points, pictures  etc sorting and when you're tired, mistakes like this happen. I made the line a little too fast.

I knew that the three bridges on these islands were bringing us arguments, and I understand clearly your opinion and facts. There is one thing you have to consider though. It is the basic supporting foundations (on each riverbanks) that cost the most in doing bridges and (not the ones in the river, deep or not), whether they are long or short. On one bridge you only have 2 of them while on 3 bridges you'll have 6. And it is not the length either because you had many shorter stretches over the river in other tiles to build a bridge.

It was told to me that each additional bridge you build is at least  15 % more of the total cost. That means if you build one bridge of 1000$ (just an example) it will cost you 1300$ minimum to build two at the same place (15%+15%=30%, if my math is still correct)......hm, and that comes from one of the biggest road construction leader's mouth in the city of Quebec. Maybe it can be argued, but hey,  I am a loghome-designer and not a bridgebuilder and a specialist and therefor cannot help you more. I listened to what he said about bridge building and put it into countable points of the challenge.

You were not "penalized" for the building multiple bridges. You would've maybe gotten one more point if you would have chosen a better or shorter location with lesser bridges.

Your opinions are respected and we did our best to judge these challenges to the best of our knowledge. If I don't know too much how things in the mayoring and construction world works, I ask others that I know of that specific trade for these challenges to get more competant help. Hope you understand.


Lynn and Fred

[Diggis]

Although the Challenge seemed to be very easy, it wasn't. There was some kind of a problem. The Budget.
The gouvernor gave you the budget, but wanted to see if you were a responsable mayor after all and spend the less for the best as most Mayors always do or at least "should" do. And this to see if you're worthy to continue to build up the wilderness of the river.

Ummm, not to be picky, as I'm really not overly concerned and it is just a game, but there is no mention of a budget in the challenge.  You did mention you would be financing it so we couldn't change it later so I designed to how I wanted it, as suggested by you. 

Put it this way: Since the Governor (me) asks the mayors to build it and also finance it (allowing you a money cheat), these roads/streets and rails will stay federal/national property. That means you have to live with them once placed and shown in your update and only, only the goverment's office (lynn and me) can give you permits to change their route or diplace them in the future.[/color]

Marking me down for this is a little harsh don't you think?  If you had of let me submit plans for comment I would have Value Engineered (Don't you just love that term  ) it to suit. 

Possibly some indication of what criteria you are marking this on in the future (ie telling us before hand that the budget will be considered) may give us a better indication of what you are looking for.

[buddybud]

though not really concerned i would have to agree with others. I would just like to add that an island always exists because it has withstood the force of the water washing around it. Islands almost always represent the most stable part of a river for this reason. Also from a construction and planning point of view many small spans require far less in planning and development since all the engineering required is already provided in manuals and textbooks, much the same as a building code reduces the need for an architect's design or a engineer to design a joist or footer. It's all textbook that way. Also any look at history will show you that island hoping has always been the most efficient and preferred way to circumvent a water barrier..

anyways just my thoughts..
Bud

[mrbisonm]

Also any look at history will show you that island hoping has always been the most efficient and preferred way to circumvent a water barrier.

History ...yes, no doubt, since they did not yet know how to make longer spans of bridges, and that's a fact. Today it is done differently with some exceptions.
You have a good point and also a good explanation of some facts, it is understood and accepted, but we don't to argue here about proper bridgebuilding, now don't we.

This is supposed to be a simple game, something that I and my wife have taken several weeks to figure out how to do, so You might have some fun with it. We told you in the beginning that we will do our best to judge this challenge, but we cannot be pros in every Mayoring issue. Also we told you that this was to be fun, fun and only fun and nothing else than fun and fun, right?

Some arguments seem to become a little too serious, such as I have mentioned that it should not become this way. This is NOT a competition to see who has the right reason or not, or who knows best or not, or who will be the winner or not or who is the best Mayor or not. Please understand this.
We have spent hours and hours to set this up, not to mention to organize and analyze everything and everybody's challenge.
We are NOT here to judge YOU or what you have created or what is logical or not and real or not, we judge what you did with our challenge and make our best by doing so with our knowledge and logical sense for you to earn points and have fun at the same time.

I have problems expressing myself since english is only my fourth language spoken and written, but I honestly hope you understand what I mean. If someone thinks that we are not justified with our judgements is quite alright and understandable, also it was nice to mention it, and we respect that, but don't let it become too serious please, otherwise we will loose the sense of "having fun" with this.
You know, I would like to see you in our shoes at this moment right now....lol. One says this , the other that.....we don't want to please anyone by giving him/her reason, but having simply some pure fun. We judged to our best knowledge and that's the best we could do. Thank you.

I wrote this for the simple reason because my wife saw one comment she thought it would become to serious, and that's exactly she told me that it would happen in the beginning when I asked her to join and help me with this second GRV challenge.

Anyways, we'll try to better with the second round.   


Fred

[Diggis]

Fred,

To be honest, as long as everyone is judged evenly, it doesn't really matter does it.    I don't think anyone expects you to change their scores, but maybe are trying to get an insight into your thoughts to help next time round.

[XiahouDun]

is it me or is the professionals road invalid, it doesn't start in tile A....

It starts in A, unless we are looking at completely different images

I don't get the complaints sadly. Its just for fun. I scored low on the two things I worked the hardest on, and I still like how they turned out 

[soulchaser]

yes, fred you're right.
It's all fun, the discussion, too. I wouldn't take this too serious.
Nobody invested in this competition much more than time, so nobody is loosing anything.
I love to read, why everybody built it his/her way.
The judgement is fair.
I love it, not to know what the points will be for...that's what i miss on the game: Random change, I can't controll. That's why I participated.

I've thrown my piece in.

[buddybud]

hey i wasn't argueing...i've had fun starting the first city i've built in atleast 5 years or so....for that i have you to thank for. Just adding thoughts and input. Nothing was meant as argumentative...it's simply discussion.

Cheers Bud

[Rayden]

Fred,

To be honest, as long as everyone is judged evenly, it doesn't really matter does it.    I don't think anyone expects you to change their scores, but maybe are trying to get an insight into your thoughts to help next time round.

I completely agree with Shaun on that point, and I made a complete explanation [linkie] of the reasons I had to build the only thing the Governor didn't like, the road tunnels, and now, that I know the budget issue, I still would make things the way I did. But the only intention I had was to fully explain my point of view on the tunnel issue and I fully accept the points awarded because points of view can differ from one to another.