Halloween Pace Riders not fun

I had exactly the same issue yesterday after trying, for a second time, to ride with the Halloween pacer.
The pacer was varying the w/kg from 1.2 to 1.9 on the rolling jungle route making it practically impossible for me and others to stay with them long enough to get any sort of multiplier.
I was riding with the pacer as a warm up for an event, so just at rode off the front. I’ve now tried this pacer twice and for me it is broken and I’ll not bother trying again.

Nice concept, poor execution. The tresure hunt type system from last year was IMO significantly. better.

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I Rode with Cosmic C and was able to get the full costume without ever accumulating more than 1.2 drops.
You have to complete the interval IE 1.0 - 1.2 etc and each time you do, you get another piece of the costume. I completed the 1.0 to 1.2 interval 3 times.

I couldn’t agree more with how irritating the Pace Partner feature is, and mine didn’t have any u-turns or anything.

Tonight was my first time trying pace partners in any way whatsoever, and you’d think it should be a fun incentive to unlock costumes. I can do a fairly steady 1.75w/kg or so but I can definitely also hit 2.5w/kg for bursts. So the Dino should be a nice fit for me. It seems like if I was alone on the road, about 140w or so would keep up properly. Except the problem is with so many people around one pace partner, I’m constantly getting stuck on other riders. Even getting to around 150-160w isn’t getting me unstuck. So I have to push 170-200w to get past them so I don’t fall too far behind the Dino. Which I can do without a problem for short periods. But that of course that ends up throwing me way past the Dino. And so I have to slow down to like 80w so I don’t pass the Dino.

It’s just constantly rubberbanding forward and back. And then the bot sometimes speeds ahead downhill, making it even harder to figure out what’s going to keep me steady with it. (Hint, nothing seems to). And then I’m basically filling up the bar for 1.2x and I fall behind for just a second or two, and it drops all the way down to zero.

Add to that the fact that all of these other people who I’m getting stuck on are just complaining that it’s too slow (they want to collect all the costumes* so they’re sandbagging the effing pace partner even) and it’s just not fun, and in fact it made me quit my ride at 45 minutes instead of the 90 minutes I planned on doing because I’m too irritated to continue.

I don’t do races, but uhhhh… .if people go to that length for a damn halloween costume incentive, then I understand why people say races on Zwift are miserable.

*Also, whose bright idea was it to have a different costume for every level of rider, when anyone with half a brain could predict that people would want to collect them all and the fast riders would then make it miserable for us slower riders?

Seriously, this has been the absolute most unfun experience I’ve had in Zwift, and the fact it happened during what’s supposed to be a fun little holiday perk makes it even more ironic.

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It was the same yesterday with Delta Daring, doing u-turns. I spotted it first because distance increased and suddenly I was out of multiplier range. Afterwards I stayed behind and saw the U-turns.

The proper place partners are really good. They maintain a more consistent pace. The Halloween bots are really annoying. So just try the actual bots!

I must agree we tried the Halloween Pace Partners and it was very disappointing. My daughter was very exited to try to get the Halloween costume but after 20minuites completely gave up.

Halloween on Zwift used to be fun but now that they try and satisfy the need needs of the 1% of people complaining about these fun things they made it worse for 99% of the community.

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What do you mean that they have satisfied those who complain about the fun holiday themes and tricks? Because it is a choice to follow the bots or not?

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Where’s the decorations, the selectable costume! Just a really bad sub game that was no fun what so EVER! This is the worst Zwift Hallowe’en party since … we’ll ever!

Last year was so awesome and the treasure hunt was great!

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Even if they only decorate Watopia and left the other worlds plain, you would at least have the choice for a bit of fun :grin::grin:

This year was most disappointing.

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@Mike_Rowe_PBR

Yes they tried not to anger the few that doesn’t like these fun things by making it optional to ride with the bot. But these bots are to hard to follow. So most people that wanted fun got frustrated.

At least last year we could get the costume free riding or in a workout.

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Wait what? There’s people who complain about the fun things? I guess people can complain about anything. I am about to start my attempt at the costume and I am already dreading it - I have a workout I should be doing and maybe I’ll just end up doing it instead.

All I would want would be a cool scavenger hunt, some funny selectable costumes and some fun decorations around Watopia

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Yeah major meh

To be honest my biggest beef is that you lose the costume the second you are out of range.

I wanted to go up the Alpe in my Astronaut costume

And yeah the whole staying with the pace partner thing is annoying and a terrible workout as it’s always start and stop. Bad idea all around Zwift.

But if you had at least allowed me to keep the costume for a bit, I would have forgiven everything else about the experience.

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I just gave it a try and didn’t enjoy it, sadly.

It would have been better if you earned costume pieces at the same rate as a drops multiplier, but instead I was able to ride for about 15 minutes with the pace partner without feeling I’d achieved anything. After my fourth(ish) time of it resetting without me gaining anything I dropped out and joined Coco.

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I spent about 2 hours yesterday getting the Space suit. I ended up reducing my trainer difficulty to 25% About an hour in as I felt like I had been having a hiit workout for an hour and all I had was 2 pieces ! Then it became fairly easy as doing that enabled me to use power to adapt to The bots pace change and it was almost smooth. As with everyone else whilst the game was fun and different , on rollers if you have a smart trainer it’s too variable to be really fun , and not being able to wear it on any Halloween ride was really lame, last years Halloween was so much fun . It was also particularly hard to get a clean shot of the complete suit because there were so many riders and you would lose it instantaneously if you go outside of the window. Seemed on the surface to be a interesting concept that could have been implemented better.

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Have to agree with many sentiments expressed above. The pace partner experience was painful. No matter how evenly I tried to stay with it, the pace bot kept yo-yoing in front of or behind me. This was especially painful on hilly segments where if I was a little ahead of the bot I had no chance of staying in range on descents.

I also experience the bot riding off course entirely, just long enough for me to lose all progress and drop back to a 1.0 multiplier. Took over an hour to get the astronaut costume fully unlocked.

First world problems, for sure! But, it shouldn’t take an hour or more of constant focus on chasing an erratic bot to get a costume unlocked. Not funny and not fun. And why couldn’t we ride free from the pace bot in our new attire after fully unlocking the suit?

Also missed this year was general halloween themed decor in Watopia.

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The point fences on the pace partners in general are way too tight, especially on the hills and large groups.

In fact, it shouldn’t reset in the back until someone turns around or stops. If someone wants to build up points, rest a lap, then hop back on when the bot comes back around their points should just pause until they’re with the group again.

Many users experience similar problems, including myself. I was shocked when I learned after my initial experiences that the 'bots were pushing the SAME watts all the time! One technique (two parts) that I’ve found helps (besides practice, practice, practice): Change your view to “9” (what I call the “drone” view). Your avatar will ALWAYS be in the precise center of the screen. I use a distinctive kit so I as to be able to recognize my avatar from on-high amongst the unwashed masses. Next, stay slightly ahead of the pace partner. As the pace partner closes on your position, you’ll have a longer time to make adjustments. When making those adjustments, make them slowly and incrementally and only up to a power level 10-20 watts higher than the guideline power. The more often you traverse a course with the pacer 'bot, the better you will get at anticipating those weird power changes you need to push in order to keep proper proximity. Luck!

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Long live the 1%.

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Long live the 1%.

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4 posts were split to a new topic: Halloween 2021 - it is that time of year. :slight_smile: