I think Atrophy could be separated from the stat itself, and work similar to how the 'repair' function works in the HQ now.
Each season (or upon joining a new league, or signing a new driver), a small percentage is deducted from the drivers stats, and it can be retrained as a new training option; Driving ability/Mental ability/Physical/Recovery. I also think 'Recovery' can train faster, may be each 'session' recovers by the star rating of your doctor - 5 stars = 5%, 2.5 stars = 2.5% (I know there are hidden decimals on these stats!). So it becomes much easier to recover and 'get back into the groove'.
When you see the drivers stats, it can show the atrophy as a negative in red next to the actual stat:
This could even be hidden to anyone but the drivers manager when they're under a contract (transfer market should still be visible perhaps).
As for the calculation, I have been playing with some ideas and numbers. I am basing the Atrophy on these 3 points:
- Number of race days per week
- Number of non-race days per week
- Number of races completed so far in the season
The latter isn't necessary really, but I felt this helped prevent managers joining mid-season and having a decent driver, and will deter league hoppers.
This probably looks complicated, but on the surface it is easy to manage and understand. I've included the formula's for anyone wishing to use this and play with it.
- The green highlights are the only inputs required.
- The calculations in the middle are used to work out how many race days and non-race days there will be in the remaining season.
- Actual days is how many days a season will need to complete, which accounts for the race frequency and if there is a 'less than full week' at the end. I was going to use this number, but in the end I realised I should consider race days and non race days differently.
- The atrophy levels are quite low, because I don't think it should ever exceed 10%.
- I'm not sure these should be cumulative or not ... I like the idea that a driver would become so unfit due to lack of recovery training... but I also think that it would take too long to recover fully.
- I have not included driver age in this, but I suppose that could be added to the rate that the driver recovers - so instead of just based on your doctors star rating, it somehow includes age too.
Open to feedback of course! Let me know if you can spot some errors as well, but if nothing else it will give a rough idea.
Edit... for ease, if anyone wants them:
B4: =IF($B$2>0,$A4*$Q$2, 0)
C4: =IF($C$2>0,$A4*$Q$3, 0)
D4: =IF($D$2>0,$A4*($D$2/100)*$Q$4, 0)
E4: =SUM(B4:D4)
Can drag these down to row 14.
B2: =J2
C2: =L2*K2
D2: =H2
J2: =G2-H2
K2: =ROUNDDOWN(J2/I2,0)
L2: =7-I2
M2: =IF(MOD(J2/I2,1)>0,(K2*7)+I2,K2*7)