Suggested

Leagues classified by spending limit

League hosts should be able to set spending limits for their leagues. Free leagues and different levels of spending should be seen in the league selection tool. Spectate should be separated into leagues by their spending level.

That'd require some complex development.

What happens if you never change staff and keep renewing their contracts? Those costs go up every renewal. What if you want to join another league and you're over the spending limit? It isn't fair.

The spending costs are also different in Rookie compared to Elite.

Wait what spending limits, and why would it matter?

I wasn't talking about in game cash but actual real money spent to buy tokens for faster headquarters development or driver training. You can't deny that those who want to play free are at a disadvantage when playing alongside those who don't care how much money they spend

Transfer market eats all the tokens, more people than ever now, get out bid easily, used to be able to get staff at 1 token. Now you need to bid 15 or 16 :(

TL;DR: I don't believe the advantages from digital transactions are pay-to-win ones, as good decision-making and manager level still triumphs, and IMO I'm not sure if this would be something in the interest of devs to implement

At lower manager levels, or among managers who haven't played for very long, the slow burn to upgrade the HQ is definitely a challenge, especially since you level up much faster than you can upgrade even just 1-2 buildings at lower levels (3 most important buildings being Design, Manufacturing, & Technology). It's a welcome challenge though. Still, even if someone comes in to spend real money on speed maxing their HQ as much as possible for their level, it's not like they will automatically win every race, especially if they don't have the right race or pre-race decisions (or attend the live race even). At the end, using tokens whether attained through sponsors or RL moolah to speed build your HQ is an advantage that others will eventually negate with time, or even immediately with the right calls.

For drivers, I believe the most defining driver attribute atm is Talent, and driver training to increase the other stats does not improve performance in as drastic or significant a way as in old iGP, though some effect is still there, especially for stamina and perhaps the speed attributes. In fact, I think spending tokens to refill driver health to enable more training is one of the worst ways to spend your tokens in this game. Once a driver's level goes over your manager level, their "normal training gains" will cease to be and they'll only get 3-2-1% gain per push of the training button with each level they are above your manager level. It'll cost a fortune then for say, a level 10 manager to train up a driver to max 20 stat in everything & lowest weight, when they can only gain 1% per push of the training button. And it'll be even more of a waste if it's not a 20 talent driver.

At competitive leagues, especially in the top leagues' elite tiers, tokens are most commonly used to purchase engines, as a fresh engine is miles quicker than a worn one. It's at most 20 tokens a season for 2 car teams solely on engine purchases, an amount of tokens easily saved up through the 3 tokens per race your sponsor gives.

People could also be spending RL money on tokens to hoard top Chief Designers too. Or to cover their in-game expenses from probably having too expensive or too many drivers, lots of Chief Designers to switch around, always missing that darned sponsor bonus, etc. Lower leveled managers especially tend to drain their tokens bidding vehemently for the lowest leveled and quickest-to-replace staff in the game...

IMO the question shouldn't be whether this poses an advantage, but whether it poses an advantage definite enough to be considered pay-to-win. There's the fact that you can earn 3 tokens per race through sponsors already, so any advantage from throwing real money into the game is also attainable to some extent by those who spend their sponsor-gained tokens prudently, and for the case of the HQ, with time and the right build order.

Spending limits for RL money would also IMO be rather complicated for and perhaps not even in the interest of the developers, who would seek to gain from tokens purchases.

Bottom line, I haven't spent even a single cent on this game across the 3 teams I have, and from my perspective I can definitely say this game is not pay-to-win. This rookie team of mine didn't even spend the initial & sponsor-gained tokens on anything other than speed building 2 or 3 HQ upgrades yet. Also, manager level trumps how much advantage you're able to gain with tokens in the end (A maxed HQ for a level 20 manager compared to a level 14 one is quite a difference). Tokens cannot allow you to upgrade your HQ beyond your current level.

to Blunion. The conclusion "It isn't fair" is irrational. What you have now is NOT an even playing field. The game can definitely be played for free and success will eventually come through patience as Boomer and a few others have demonstrated,

However the management style needed for success when playing for free is significantly different than the style used if real life money is used to speed things along. Thus forcing those who want to play for free to play alongside those who may not care at all about spending is decidedly NOT FAIR. In the era of micro transactions there are numerous games that use the drug pusher technique of luring new users into a game saying it is free while being aware that the temptation to speed things along using those micro transactions will be irresistible to the majority of active players. Thus you have those who download the app but never become engaged in the game because they immediately see that the game is not going to be interesting enough to them to pay the cost of JUST BEING COMPETITIVE at anything except the beginning levels. ( to Boomer, playing a year and a half to finally make it to the top of a relatively weak league is not what 98% of players are willing to do)

The game is designed this way to make money and I am not against the developers making money as those who have read any of my posts in the past will know. I do think the micro transaction method of making a profit is ethically questionable. But I also think that allowing leagues to be assigned spending limits will improve profits significantly. And, I do not believe that the development obstacles will be as difficult as you have stated.

I feel that having tiered real money spending limits would encourage more players to become engaged in the game. The free players would not feel cheated by having other players come in and make much greater progress than them by improving their drivers and headquarters and buying new engines using money. ( the assertion that using money does not really help is counter to the whole idea of micro transactions as a source of profit. Otherwise those purchases would be lies whispered in the ears of the innocent and gullible)

Even I, who spends plenty of money on this game, would welcome a league that would restrain spending somewhat so that I might at least have to make the decision of how much I wanted to spend and know that the other competitors where also following the same rules as I am.

In addition the spending curve is unfairly biased toward the Pro level tier so that those who have engaged in the game are more likely to to be tempted to spend money and to need to spend money just to raise their kers/drs to the level that they can keep up with those who are at higher levels or have been in the game longer than than they have.

Another reason why RL cash spending limits for each league could be hard, is that since it's different for every league, a manager can just go to one without spending limits, spend tokens to max their HQ there, and then jump to any other league they want (sacrificing 1 season because design points reset, but still). Arguments for the merits and demerits of micro-transactions and the way people use them aside, the issue of implementation arises if you somehow want to regulate your users'/customers' spending.

I'm also interested to hear from other managers on whether they find "pay-to-win" issues with this game. Since there's only so much RL money can do if you do not have, for one, high enough manager levels (which you need time to get), since things like HQ upgrades, staff & driver purchases, and driver training are capped by them. Since tokens are also obtainable in-game, there's also the argument that microtransactions in this game ultimately give an advantage in only reducing the time to build up a competitive team, and to help you with finances for managers struggling with that, rather than give you perks that non-paying players have no similar access to.

I agree that micro transactions do help managers. I don't agree that it is to a point that F2Pers would feel "cheated" by those who pay, especially if they know what they are doing. I've raced managers who've spent RL money to max their HQ, pay for their expensive staff, hoard some of the best CDs in the game and cover their expenses, and so on. Does it make them more competitive? Of course, and they're welcome to take it. Does it make them competitive or dominant beyond a level that those who don't spend as much or don't spend at all can reach? In my experience, no.

I do not find any issues, and am fine with it the way it is. Perhaps I am in leagues with managers who do not use real money, but I have had no trouble being competitive using the game as is. Also, I have no way of knowing who spends real money.