As the first season is strolling along nicely, I wanted to make a news post that clears up some of the confusion about sponsors. Below are some of the statements I regularly read in the chat, and to which I would like to respond.
Why were there so few sponsors at the start?
Because in the beta simply we didn't need more. I hadn't anticipated on so many teams restarting straight away. Once it became clear, I re-enabled the functionality that allows sponsors to be added to the game (http://www.pitwall.org/my_sponsors_add.php).
The presentation made a too big of a difference!
The presentation does make a bit of a difference, that's correct. But this is only correct for the first season. Because in later seasons the difference between the different tiers in presentation might not be worth the extra money. By that time teams will have a reputation for sponsors already, who will be more interested in teams who have regular good results.
Managers who started earlier had a bigger advantage
This is only very slightly correct. If they started with the exact same settings (commercials assigned, same contract details, exact same commercial skill, exact same commercial level, ...), then this is correct. But I'm pretty sure there hasn't been a single team with the exact same settings.
If a team started negotiating before you, but had a blocking point, then they will have no progress at all. If the started negotiating a week before you with a really bad offer, then you will be able to overtake them quite easily.
Having the best commercial makes no difference
This is not correct. It does make a difference, just not as much as everyone would expect. It's part of the decision of how interested a sponsor is, but it's not all deciding. Otherwise having the best commercial would make you too superiour in the game.
Having the best commercial gives you an advantage, but not an all defining advantage.
The PW1 system was much better
Everyone is allowed to have their own opinion, but in my opinion this system is much better. When I thought of how I wanted to have the new system I thought about the game that I used to play so many times - Grand Prix World. In this game the team who would sign the sponsor first would get the sponsor. This PW2 system is based on that system, but with my own touch (and other extra features).
This new system gives more space for doing things different than your competitors. You can offer a lower amount of money, perhaps offer a better season length, or offer multiple spots to a section 5 sponsor (a section 5 and 4 spot for example). It also keeps the reputation of the team (and its division) in mind, which is something that is quite realistic.
This of course doesn't mean that I'm not open to suggestions. I'm always very open for constructive feedback (in a forum post for example) as I'm sure the current system can still be improved.
It's very annoying that I need to assign commercials first to the deal, and then also assign commercials to the deal
These are two different things. You can assign commercials to a sponsor in order to gain their interest in your team. This is done on the sponsor overview.
But you can also assign commercials to the negotiations. These commercials will negotiate with the sponsor, and will also gain their interest. So if you assign no commercials on the sponsors overview page, then you will still gather their interest.
This system can be used to gain interest in a sponsor, before you (can actually) negotiate with them, and thus give you an advantage once you actually start negotiating.
The sponsorship system is very frustrating, I keep losing sponsors to other teams!
The sponsors system has added another challenge to Pitwall. If you keep losing out on sponsors, then you should think about changing your strategy. Don't go for the highest rated remaining sponsor that has many teams negotiating with them already, but settle for now for a lower sponsor for just the remainder of the season.
Also, you can try to lower the amount of money that the sponsor will pay you, and they will become more interested in you and increase the speed.
It feels like all I'm doing is negotiating with sponsors in PW2
Even though the commercial aspect of a team takes up a lot of time, it's not meant to take up as much time as it does now (or used to in the beginning of the season). This is simply explained by the fact that every single team started without a sponsor, thus creating a bit of a rat race to sign sponsors.
In the next seasons your team will already have sponsors, which will allow you to focus on other things. Unless your team has only sponsor contracts that are expiring the next season (and not have multi season contract deals), you will never have to negotiate for all section spots again.
Are we just going to keep adding sponsor to the game?
Yes and no. Yes, for now we need to keep adding sponsor to the game as the number of teams increases. No, we won't keep adding teams as the functionality that allows everyone to add sponsors has set limits.
The reason for this is that I want it to be a challenge to sign sponsors. It won't be fun if there are 1000 sponsors for 200 spots, because then everyone will end up with the best thing. This game is meant to be challenging and that means that sometimes you will end up having to deal with an unexpected situation, just like it is in real life. There are many ways to change your approach and to be different than other teams.
That being said, there is already functionality built in that allows a sponsor to be signed to multiple teams. It just has never been tested, and I won't activate something like this mid-season. During season 2 I will be testing and improving this functionality, and if approved it should be released for season 3.
I hope this clears up some of the confusion or questions about the sponsors system. I wanted to build a system that was way more challenging than the system in Pitwall 1 where you just had to click a button. This is now more in line with the rest of the game, where changing your strategy or having a superiour strategy can give you a competitive advantage.
If you have any more questions, please ask them in the comments of this news post, or in the chat as is always recommended.
