PCTC #1: Packbat's Car Tycoon Challege, 1955 [RESULTS]

[koolkei]

Oh, this is something I probably should have fixed but didn't because it was a massive pain: are you typing in the engineering and tooling costs as millions of dollars, or as dollars? If you're typing something like "16.32" into the boxes, you'll get the wrong answer - you need to type "16320000". I think that effectively works out to multiplying the break-even by a million (so 230,000 cars), but I don't have the equations in front of me to check.

Mmph - that's one of the unfortunate side-effects of the system: the actual winning values aren't determined until the end.

...I'm trying to decide what I can justly say as the organizer of the competition - and I feel a little bad saying anything, given that a number of people have already submitted. That said: I think only one person has taken their one resubmit, and I'd probably be willing to allow them another for unrelated reasons. So I guess I can say this much: When I used the same equations from the spreadsheet I posted on my test cars, the highest score in each category was in the ballpark of ten times the Idiosyncrasy score for that category except in Luxury and Track, where it was significantly higher and much higher, respectively.

well then...... screw me. but so glad i haven't submitted mine.

so i just figured out, the aggresive low pricing is going to need me to conquer at least a single market to break even.....
but then you said the other one...... my car sales price as is...... about 15x the idiosyncracy value of the market im targeting..
so 2 options right now. up the price or make the car more shit.

this clears up a whole lot more
EDIT:

NOT!
i can't math.........

[Packbat]

I'm not sure if I just misread your comment, but I wasn't talking about the sales price, I was talking about the desirability. If your car has a desirability of 15x the Idiosyncrasy, that's very, very good, and you can probably afford to increase the markup to make a bigger profit. (...probably.) If your car has a sales price of 15x the Idiosyncrasy, that doesn't indicate anything at all - sales price needs to be compared to customer budgets.

[koolkei]

oh. then i was the one that misunderstood....... okay. sorry bout that

just a heads up. my desirability scores are...... not even close to half of 15xidiosyncracy
although that said. now it's in perspective, both of my cars are similiar in terms of desirability : idiosyncracy score ratio. i'm going with two cars then

after i'm done with homework that is. so much homewoooooork

[koolkei]

the time limit is today right?


also i shoved myself even deeper in the hole. late last night i decided to try to make a luxury car for this competition just for fun...... on the second iteration i got a score of roughly 11x the idiosyncracy scores while only needing to produce a bit more than a quarter of full production to break even......

FML...

[Packbat]

If there are people who still want to enter and are concerned about the deadline, I can extend it.

[Packbat]

Talked to some people in the IRC channel tonight, and on the basis of that and some comments in the thread, I've decided: the deadline is being extended one week, to January 25th. Between the holidays and the glut of interesting competitions being posted, a lot of people who might have entered haven't gotten to making their cars yet, and I would like to give them time to.

[07CobaltGirl]

Thanks,Packbat. I am still working on mine.

[Packbat]

Well, now. This is quite interesting.

I decided to fix a stupid thing I did with the spreadsheet I'm using to enter the data on everyone's entries: instead of having one column for the fixed costs of engineering and tooling for each factory (a system which doesn't handle multiple cars in a single factory at all, besides being completely obscure and impossible to audit), I would have all the data for each car: engine engineering costs, engine tooling cost, whether the family and/or variant was shared; trim engineering costs, trim tooling cost, and whether the model was shared; whether the factory was shared, what size the factory was; and, finally, the net fixed costs for each individual car after accounting for all shared expenses between cars. At the same time, I decided to take advantage of the fact that costs are listed in the .lua files to get more sig. figs. than is given in game.

Which is when I discovered that the game freaks out when trying to save tooling costs for engines into the .lua files whenever you change the factory size.

I ended up having to do the following procedure to make it work:

1. Open trim in Sandbox.
2. Set factory size in Detailed Stats.
3. Go through all the tabs to settle out the numbers.
4. Close Sandbox entirely.
5. Open trim in Sandbox again.
6. Go through all the tabs to settle out the numbers.
7. Open the .lua files to get the costs.

I have no idea what's happening under the hood to make the numbers fall out the way they do in the .lua files, and the numbers are correct in-game, but that's my bug report.

Also, now my spreadsheet is much nicer.

(And it's a good thing I did this, because I had messed up my calculation of at least one person's fixed costs.)

[07CobaltGirl]

Alright, I have submitted something. I have no idea what I'm doing, so it will probably suck, but I'm quite used to being slaughtered in forum competitions.

[koolkei]

Introducing the
Kasuar Excellent. Family and City trims

PCTC1-koolkei-Excellent - Family-1.png (175.8 KiB) Viewed 5943 times

PCTC1-koolkei-Excellent - City-2.png (130.24 KiB) Viewed 5943 times

for all your family hauling and city driving. with fuel economy reaching up to 24.2 Mpg
your reliable, easy to maintain, cheap to run, trusty Friend has come.

get yours now for as low as $9500 & $9300 respectively

also packbat. i derped my submission a bit. the city car was supposed to be a 2 door variant. could you change it on your side? thx

[Packbat]

Heads-up: I live right in the path of a snowstorm coming this weekend, so there's a chance that I will lose Internet and it will delay the competition. Further updates as events warrant.

[koolkei]

just found an image on reddit that's way to relevant to not post

[Packbat]

Well, it didn't get downgraded to rain, but it didn't cut off power or Internet either. Tournament ends on schedule tonight (~16 hours from this post). Submit your cars if you haven't already!

[Packbat]

Still working on the results (running into a few ... issues), but here's some trivia to hold y'all while you're waiting:

• Most expensive: Žnoprešk Z5755-V12
• Least expensive: GSI Pigeon
• Highest engineering costs:
  
  • Vehicle: Žnoprešk Z5755-V12
  • Engine: Žnoprešk V12-200
• Lowest engineering costs:
  
  • Vehicle: Kasuar Excellent City
  • Engine: Storm Literblock Cast Cruiser
• Most power (and worst economy): Solo Motors Jetstream Deluxe
• Least power (and best economy): ABR Cricket Econo
• Fewest seats: tie between Storm Prince Deluxe, ABR Cricket Econo, and ABR Cricket Sport.
• Most seats: DMA O55 F
• Lightest: GSI Pigeon
• Heaviest: Solo Motors Jetstream Deluxe

(Apologies if I screw up any of the names.)

Thank you all for your patience!

[NormanVauxhall]

Time to unveil the car