Here are some common questions about the TMX Leaderboards and world record system. Many of your questions will have answers in this thread, so please take alittle time to read through...


Question In Order of Appearance
How do the front page Leaderboards work?
How do I delete replays I dont want anymore?
Whats the rule on use of shortcuts by WR hunters?
What is the TMX World Record System & how do I send replays?
My replay failed auto-validation. What can I do?
How can drivers on the leaderboard be caught up?
How can I keep track of my World Records?

Here is an overview of what each of the front page leaderboards are and how they work.

Main WR Leaderboard
Takes an average of your best 10 times on normal [img]images/recorda.gif[/img] tracks. Goto 'Find Tracks' and sort by Best Rated for Main LB to find the ones worth the most points. The scores of the tracks are based on the rating of those who have a time on that track. So the higher you get in the LB the bigger difference you will see in Track Ratings after you post a new replay.

The No.1 player in the main LB adds 10,000 to the tracks LB rating, with everyone else adding less than 10,000 according to how close to the No.1 in them main LB they are. If there is already 10 replays on a track, then setting a time will add the difference between the total of the old top 10 and the top 10 with your time, (if it works out less then there is no change).

Replays on the Main Leaderboard expire after 30 days. This means they only count towards your best10 if you posted them in the last 30 days. This means you have to set new good records to maintain your score. But as you only need 10 active good times, this should still be manageable without
being forced to invest a huge ammount of time.

To keep the supply of high rated tracks fresh, we will promote one of the top20 (that which has been in the top20 the longest) into a classic track once every 3 days.

Classics Leaderboard
These tracks will show with a [img]images/star-track.gif[/img] symbol. Once a classic, the track will no longer count toward your normal leaderboard rating and will instead count toward the classic leaderboard. To top the "classic" leaderboard you simply have to hold the most world records across all classic tracks. This will not be easy, as these tracks already reached a high level of competitiveness to become classics in the first place.

Nadeo Leaderboard
Finally, "Nadeo" tracks are marked with [img]images/nadeo-track.gif[/img] and will have their own leaderboard system that is based on your scores across all Nadeo tracks. Point allocation is similar to the normal leaderboard except Nadeo tracks are all worth 10,000 points for the world record and rather than count just your best we count your score accross all the Nadeo tracks.

The answer to this is you can't.

One of the bad sides (for some people) of the TMX World Record System is that it will find out how good people are. When you post a replay on a track it will count towards your score for a minimum of 30 days (and up to a maximum of 90 days). This is becuase there has to be something to encourage competition between players. Therefore when someone beats a time you have posted you can do 2 things....

Approach 1
Accept the hit of another 30 days of activeness on that track. This will mean the replay (if it shows as red) will be having a negative impact on your rating until those days run out. Of course if someone else beats it again in the meantime then the activeness starts again at 30 days. But as no replay can be active after 90 days, you can kow that if you do nothing, then after 90 days your replay has expired and nobody can activate it even if you beat it. Just accept the negstive impact of that replay anf move on, concentrating on other tracks.

Approach 2
Beat the person who re-activated your replay. This will mean that in turn, that person will take a knock on the track instead of you. Even if you dont beat it by enough to make it show as red, its still having less of a positive impact, but be aware that this means your new replay counts for 90 days again. So the risk you take is if the person you beat responds by again beating your time, you are back in the same position but with longer active time on the replay.

Here is an important rule of TMX:

Shortcuts are part of the game and they are not considered to be cheated in any way.

There are two areas of responsibility in this scenario...

The Author
Its up to the author to construct the track. This means deciding on all aspects of its build, where to put road, where to put check points. Part of this process is to eliminate, or include as the author chooses, alternative routes. If the author wishes the track to be driven in a certain way, then its up to the author to make it so the track will be driven that way by making that also the fastest route. Of course, not all eventualities can be covered by the author, as the author will usually be one person and there are many drivers. But with experience an author should learn how to build so that the route he intends is followed. Its the authors responsibility.

The Driver
The responsibility of the driver is much easier, simply to get from the start to the finish (going through all check points) as fast as possible. The intended route of the author is of no conern.

If we tried to apply any other rule on this it would be unmanagable.

Replays will not be removed if they use a shortcut and equally, tracks will not be removed because one is present.

The TMX World Record System is probabally the biggest competetion of its kind in the world. We let drivers complete offline on any of the tracks we host. In TMO and TMSX that includes over 20,000 tracks for each game. In Nations we expect there will also be thousands of tracks to choose from. The brilliant part is that every driver can pick which tracks he or she wishes to race on. So if you hate a track, dont play it.

The system uses replay files that you save in the game. You can even drive afainst the replay of other drivers, by downloading their replay off TMX to see where you lost time. Once ou are happy you know the track you go into solo mode and try setting your own replay.

To get going you need to be a registered user. Thats totally free and easy and once you are registered you can take part in the TMX world record system.

Once thats sorted can join in! - Below is the steps to follow which will get you up and running with your first submitted personal best.

1) Download the track you want to drive on from TMX to make sure you have the correct version of the track.
2) Load the game and play the track in solo mode.
3) At the end of a good run, select to save the replay.
4) When you are happy you have saved a good time, go back to TMX and to the track details page.
5) On that page there is an option to upload a personal best, click on that takes you to our upload wizard.
6) When it asks for the file, it's located it ../GameData/Challenges/Replays/My Replays
7) The uploading wizard will advise you if your replay was accepted or not.

Note:
Replays made playing using another replay are also valid.
To do this download the world record and race it in the replay editor.

It's as easy as that. You will find alot more information such how things are scored in other parts of the FAQ.

The author has updated the track, so your replay is not for the same version.
Please check it’s the exact same version as the one you played. You can even test this by downloaded the track and making a time that is only of high enough quality to get into the top10 on that track. If this works then your replay may have been the wrong track version. Be careful though, if you upload a crap time and that work, you will need to beat it with another good time or your score will be hurt.

You set the replay time in a different mode then in solo mode.
Replays set in online mode or multiplayer mode via a LAN can not be validated either by the game or by someone watching the replay. There is no snapshot of the time that was done recorded as the car crosses the line, even it appears so by the file name. We reject these replays without exception.

You set the replay with the wrong version of the game
Only the latest version of the game is permissable. This is becuase we need everyone to be using the same software if we want them to be able to compete for 100'ths of a second. We reject replays from the wrong game version without exception.

You used a keyboard shortcut to save the replay
If you use a keyboard shortcut to save the replay then this can make it invalid. You should only use that function of the game to save a replay for visual purposes, not world record purposes. For the replay to be valid, you need to click in to view the replay at the end of your race and then click on 'save replay'.

Validating your replay
There are times when the replay fails validation. Uploading the replay will report the replay is not recorded in Solo mode. You can use the 'Export to Validate' option of the in game Replay Editor to generate a valid replay file which can then be uploaded successfully to TMX.


Other instances of failed replay files do occur, such as on some league tracks the replays from slightly different versions (maybe the name had changed) do work together, and these we allow. But if the track itself has changed, even if its just one piece of scenary, then this we dont allow as the track is a different version as far as the replays are concerened.

There is an option for replay failures which fail auto-approval to be approved manually by the submitter, but these are then reviewed by a moderator of the site before they become formally approved.

Finally, sometimes people cheat, we rely on the vigilance of every honest player who participates in our system to let us know about any replay they find on the site which they think might not be real. If we think someone has been cheating we deal with their account and replays in the severerst way we can. And thats to remove both without warning.

You can start off by picking tracks which have a higher WR rating (ie those that have the most PB's submitted). Unfortunately, these might also have the most difficult to beat times, but you are either good enough to be up there challenging to be in the top 10 or you aren't. You can do this by using the 'Find Tracks' function and setting the sort order to WR Rating (highest).

The thing to remeber is that the main leadboard restricts a drivers score to replays that are acive, which means only those replays posted in the last 30 days. Even then, you only need 10 high rating replays to become competitive, so even if you are new, it shouldnt be hard to catch up, if you are good enough.

Remember that its not about how many replays you post, but how good those replays are and whether tracks you have a WR on have a high rating.

You can also click on a player in the top 10 and try taking some of their world records off them. This has a double effect because as well as you gaining points, they lose some!!! - Try playing with the various sort orders to display tracks worth the most to you.

At first its probably best to concentrate on getting more points than the people around you in the list. Click on 'show more' at the bottom of the WR Leaderboard to see all players sorted by their points total, when you get to the area of the list you are in, click on some of those players and try beating some of the times that have the best WR rating.

What we are saying is there are lots of ways for you to compete in this system, so you have to decide your own strategy and then see if you can execute it.

Click on the 'My Records' link on the top menu bar. This shows you all the tracks for which you have submitted a replay.

The default sort order is where a replay has been submitted most recently. You should familiarise yourself with the filter and sort options the bottom to get the most out of this page.

There are some pre-set filters listed at the bottom which show some of the most useful searches such as all records you need to improve.

You should also pay attention to which world record are active and which are inactive. An inactive time no longer counts towards your overall ranking in the system. Replays have 30 days of activity from the time they are set or beaten. After that any replay that has existed on TMX for over 90 days can never count towards your score again.