Forum topic: Driver Salaries

I heard Mihnea outgrew the nest Tom! Why didn't you pull strings to keep him?

I put an offer in but as i have some other drivers joing up at Animal next season who i rate highly i decided not to go all out. He is a good driver but there surely must be better out there...

Possibly, and probably a lot cheaper too.

Putting a cap on things will just cause things to go stale as they so often do. New teams won't be able to compete in the short term as they don't have the funds to get the better staff. Somebody new to the game shouldn't be punished if they can do things properly. Besides if people join the game and see they can't get anywhere fast, then they might leave. Plus teams at a higher level can get disadvantaged by this as they can manage their finances well but just because they can't afford to pay all their staff in one go, they won't be able to sign them, even if they can afford to have them in the team and still make a profit.

The only realistic way of getting the top persons and to the top is to hoard money for several seasons sandbagging in the bottom divisions and then launch a large assault, something that has been pretty much wiped out in this game since so many teams did it in PW1 and it wasn't good for the game.

my drivers urge to get less wages and bonuses, but longer contracts - that's something I can deal with

@Adam: Sandbagging isn't an issue now at all since if you manage your money at the lower levels since you cannot develop and cannot get any where fast; hoarding has been created by the current aspects of the game. In 2 season I already have saved 20 million + since all I can do is slowly research better part while I wait for my HQ to increase in size so I can hire more staff to develop and research at the same time.

Since I am waiting; I haven't bothered signing anyone to huge contracts or worthwhile. But I think the whole aspect of saving money then making a big push still applies to Pitwall 2.0 since I will have huge pockets when I am ready to sign high end staff and have a car ready for a run.

Also helping me save money is the fact that division 3 is almost empty so running a terrible car still rewards heavily!!

So sandbagging on purpose might be gone but team collecting huge cash loads for seven season before making a push is more the reality!!

As is a team, like myself, signing long term deals with sponsors AND staff/drivers with no release clauses, then considering purposely throwing races so I sink back to Div 3 where I'll be cashing in Div 2 levels of sponsor in ome and applying minimal to zero chassis and car development and winning maybe 3 races a year to go up.

I'll promote back up in season 8 with a hoard of money and all the same staff I have now but epic morale for winning.

If I can do this, the system needs addressing.

But the counter to that IMO is that that would be boring. I couldn't play like that.

It's more exciting than sitting and watching your money burn to an inevitable zero figure.

At least there is an element of growth in doing that!

#95 by Robert Bouchard
@Adam: Sandbagging isn't an issue now at all since if you manage your money at the lower levels since you cannot develop and cannot get any where fast; hoarding has been created by the current aspects of the game. In 2 season I already have saved 20 million + since all I can do is slowly research better part while I wait for my HQ to increase in size so I can hire more staff to develop and research at the same time.

Since I am waiting; I haven't bothered signing anyone to huge contracts or worthwhile. But I think the whole aspect of saving money then making a big push still applies to Pitwall 2.0 since I will have huge pockets when I am ready to sign high end staff and have a car ready for a run.

Also helping me save money is the fact that division 3 is almost empty so running a terrible car still rewards heavily!!

So sandbagging on purpose might be gone but team collecting huge cash loads for seven season before making a push is more the reality!!

My point was if you put the cap on things, as was mentioned earlier, there would be no advantage of pushing early as if you did go up, you would struggle because you can't afford anybody decent. So the only way to go about things is to save money and stay in division 3 which a lot of new players will not want to do as people tend to look for short term success. Not having a cap still allows people to join the game and have a go at getting to the top quickly.

#98 by Dan 'Ross Brawn... Mills
It's more exciting than sitting and watching your money burn to an inevitable zero figure.

At least there is an element of growth in doing that!

If you are losing money, then that is an area you need to improve on. Blaming it on being in a higher division is not the way to go.

I don't think sandbagging can work - unless you have some luck on your side. If money is the issue you can sell all your shares have 100+ mil in the bank and then spend it in a massive push - unless you can get the right staff and drivers together quickly then this is wasted. Now you need the whole package together each season as we practically have to build a new car every season. - so having money to make a massive development push over one or two seasons is viable but after that if you run out of cash and have expensive staff you will be forced to let them go and then suffer for another few seasons. I am struggling to balance my books but every season I am increasing my income and making sensible decisions on wages to keep my team going forward. If I cant make a title challenge this season I hope to be able to next time. I spent some buck on a top designer and although he is worth it (as my car is good) his wage is unsustainable. He is leaving next season and I hope to evo the car he built for a couple of seasons - see how this goes as not tried before. Hoarding money is boring and the temptation is to keep doing it as you will never have the perfect position to make a launch from unless you have some luck.