I tried to send this as a PM, but the board software informs me that the user 'manutoo' does not exist:
Hello, Manutoo.
It's been awhile since I played, so I broke out my 1.g mac version of TEM earlier this week. I haven't updated to 1.h because I don't want to lose the game I had 'in progress' (if you can call a game you haven't played in 11 months 'in progress'). Anyway, I've run into a couple of problems, and I'm notifying you in case there's something you can do about them for next year's update. Note that I'm still using OS 10.5 and a non-Intel Mac, so I can't send you anything important electronically.
The problems started when player contracts began coming up for renewal during the fourth season. Up until then I had been able to meet all the contract conditions, but I couldn't get Catherine Suire up to 1 in doubles, or Mary Pierce to 2 in singles (both stalled at 3), so they both left and had to be replaced. The first replacement was Demongeot, who was primarily interested in doubles play. So am I, so I thought we would get along well, but her singles ranking was around 130, so I couldn't get her into many high level tournaments, and the partner she came with wasn't very good, so I paired her with S. Pitkowski.
Their combined 6 and 23 rankings could get them into any doubles tournament, but Demongeot needed to play high level singles also, so she could accumulate enough experience to raise her mental attributes. This required her to enter qualifiers. She participated at Indian Wells in doubles, exiting early, but she was already signed up for the singles qualifier for Miami, which was held during the second week of Indian Wells.
At the beginning of the second week of Indian Wells I was asked if I wanted Demongeot to fly back to the coaching center in France. Since I was expecting her to go to Miami that week, I selected 'no'. I was then asked if I wanted her to go to the Miami qualifier, and I selected 'yes'. And then she didn't go anywhere, until after Indian Wells wrapped up. After both the singles and doubles finals concluded, Demongeot woke up in Miami without having flown there, and without her coach, who had flown with her to Indian Wells. She was allowed 42 hours of practice time before her first match, which she won, then 2 more before her second match, then another 14 after being told she had qualified to the Miami main draw, totaling 58 hours of practice that week, in addition to two matches. That was the first problem.
The second was connected to the coach not traveling with her, and possibly to her arriving in Miami without having flown there. The following week, when the main draw began, the other three players in my stable arrived with their entourage. (They're dragging about eight trainers around with them these days, though I don't see where the expenses for the trainers' travel and hotels are being deducted.) I didn't notice whether the coach went with them or not.
Now all four players and all of the trainers, except possibly the coach, were in the same city, playing in the same tournament, and every time I tried to do any training with Demongeot I received the message that there was no one available to train with her! I had to spend all 58 hours of the qualifying week and every available training hour of the two week Miami tournament working on either physical training (which she desperately needed) or her serve. She wasn't even allowed to spar with the other players who weren't in my stable.
An oddity also occurred shortly after the second new player (Nathalie Tauziat) signed with me. This happened right at the beginning of the run-up to the French Open. By the time she signed on it was too late to sign her up for any of the warm-up tournaments, though I was able to temporarily assign her Demongeot as her doubles partner (since changed). Demongeot was already signed for the Madrid tournament with the partner she had when I acquired her, but the game did allow me to change it to Tauziat, even though it was too late to enroll Tauziat at Madrid.
Then the week of the tournament arrived, and I received a message that due to her ranking Tauziat was required to play in the Madrid tournament, which I initially thought was wonderful. I was given four choices (including 'ignore the requirement', which I thought was odd), and I chose 'play both singles and doubles', since she was already going to be playing doubles as Demongeot's partner. When the pairings were displayed, Tauziat was only in the singles tournament, and Demongeot was nowhere to be seen. Demongeot had to qualify in singles for Madrid, and she went out in the second round of the qualifier, but she and Tauziat as a pair were highly enough ranked in doubles — 23 and 50 — that they should have been seeded.
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There is one other annoyance which has come up, but this is a feature which I assume is working as designed, not a bug. I have noticed that when playing at the highest level of difficulty, it's impossible to improve skills while in the training center. I have all of the +25% trainers and assistants, and purchased the physical fitness complex, but it takes 38 hours a week just to maintain the existing levels, leaving only 4 hours a week for improvements. That's 9 hours to maintain mental skills (2 each, except concentration only requires 1), 10 hours for physical (3 each for weight training and swimming, 4 for sprinting), 8 hours for the technical skills (2 for each of the four major categories), and 11 hours to rest scattered throughout to keep long term form from dropping below 84 or so. That leaves 1 hour each left over to barely improve the major technical categories.
It's even worse for Emily, because even though I gave her the maximum globetrotter skill, she loses ground faster than anyone else. She takes 10 hours for mental skills (2 in each), 12 in physical (3 swimming, 4 weight lifting, 5 sprinting), 12 in technical (3 in each major category), which leaves only 8 hours to rest, and that isn't enough, so instead she has to lose ground somewhere every week. By the way, the numbers she's trying (and failing) to maintain in the technical skills are only in the 50-55 range, which isn't anywhere near her potentials.
This doesn't happen when we are at tournaments, so I have begun leaving the players at the previous tournament site until the next tournament appears, which is totally unrealistic. The only times they can actually improve their skills is when they're away from the training center, which is also unrealistic. So, I'm fighting fire with fire.
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I am still enjoying your game, but I hope some of these issues can be straightened out before you introduce TEM 2.