Site Updates; Fantasy Game, etc.

Just got done moving into my new apartment, so the next few weekends I'll be able to focus completely on the fantasy sports entertainment game. 

I've got a basic interface complete now for picking your rosters.  It is set up to do 2 weeks at a time - to deal with Smackdown being taped - and I think this upcoming week will be a good test for how the site handles it when Smackdown's tapings get shaken up.  (since I am pretty sure last night's episode was the last of a two-taping block, and this week it's just one episode taped since they can't tape the post-WrestleMania episode just yet of course) 

I'll have to make sure in a case like that, that the game can seamlessly switch from having players pick two weeks at a time to just one week.  I'm basically storing the taped/airing dates for all three brands in a database, and the site should be able to figure out based on those dates how it needs to be handled.

I also finished the script that calculates the user scores.  I had previously finished the script to run through all the wrestlers and get their scores for the week - but for players, there are bonuses that need to get applied.

Here's how I've done the bonuses so far:

- You get a 50% bonus on points earned by any superstar you chose that less than 15% of all players picked on their roster.  I may make that percentage smaller, but you'll definitely get bonuses for picking someone that very few people went with.

- You get a 15% bonus on points earned by non-main event wrestlers when you had to pick them 2 weeks in advance.  So on the normal schedule where Smackdown is taped 2 weeks at a time, your (non-main eventer) picks for that 2nd week will have a small bonus since you will have less to go on for making your picks.  (it's unusual that WWE announces matches 2 weeks in advance - except for main event matches, which is why they are excluded)

- You get a NEGATIVE bonus when you pick the same wrestlers too many times in a season.  Right now, I have it like this:  8 or more times, 15% of the wrestler's score is deducted;  12 or more times, 30%;  16 or more times, 45%; 20 or more times, 60%.  Those percentages may be too high, so I'll have to do some testing to see how it should go.  The interface for picking your rosters will definitely let you know if you'd incur a negative bonus for picking anyone.  I'm hoping this will prevent people from just going with John Cena every week from beginning to end, since you may want to hold on to your picks for Cena until further into the season.

- I'm still debating having another type of bonus, based on the Top 5 picks that players do here on the site.  If I do that, I may or may not explicitly state what those bonuses are.  I don't want people putting bogus top 5 picks just to try and boost points for a wrestler they want to pick on their roster.  It would take a lot for someone to get anyone besides Cena, HHH, Orton, HBK, Taker, or Edge on the top 5, though, so I don't think that'll be a huge problem.  I do, however, want it to encourage more people to start making their top 5 wrestler picks each week!

I really think this will be ready to go for season 5 here at the site.  It may be a bumpy first season, with bugs popping up here or there, so I'm going to preface the first fantasy game season by calling it a "beta test" - and if too many things go wrong, I would likely not keep that beta season's rankings on the site for historical purposes.  We'll have to see.

And we've got a lot of new players here with WrestleMania right around the corner.  Any of y'all new here that want to see something done to the site - anything to make it easier to use or understand - please don't hesitate to let me know!