How are you using the new barns?

[The Steward]

Just curious how people are using the new barns. Your ideas might give others ideas. Our ultimate goal between the barn fixes and the still coming bookings page update is to eradicate off-game spreadsheets. Anyone with really specific SmartBarns, or making a massive host of custom barns?

[Kaine Saracen]

Still playing around with it, but a couple of observations:

A) Can't select based on soundness to separate horses.
B) Can't select multiple options in the smart barns, eg: Freak/stakes/Allowance or Productive/Solid/Claimer etc.

[Mr. Lord Rich]

Pete's guide to Easy Yearling to 2yo Transition:

The point of this idea is to make it easier to transition your yearlings once they turn two and don't have a home.

Once the year changes over and your yearlings leave the training barn they will just be sitting in your racing barn which is all of your race eligible horses. If you are like me and have created custom barns that house multiple types of horses you will need to manually sort out your new 2yo horses and push them all into your different custom barns.

So my idea is to create a bunch of 2yo only "smart" barns. One for each gallop type.

(2yo Freaks)
(2yo Stakes)
(2yo Allowance)
(2yo Productive)
(2yo Solid)
(2yo Claimer)
(2yo Different Career)

Once the year changes and your yearlings become 2yos all horses with that certain gallop comment will automatically transfer to the designated "smart barn". Then all you have to do is go into each smart barn and mass transfer to your main barns that you like.
And since you have these "smart barns" designated for 2yos only, all those previous 2yos would have already been removed from your smart barns when the new guys came in. It can be used year and year.

It's just something simple that for me will make it easier to transfer them all.

[Steph Lonhro]

Wanted to separate mixers from thoroughbreds, and my stakes runners from everything

[Chris Everett]

Its implemented really well. Like Steph said, the copy functionality is kind of weird. I mean initially you could just select a horse by putting a check in and then transferring over to the alt barn. Going a step further why not have a drop down for the barns that only shows for those who bought it and have it so you check the horses you want, and then select the barn in the new drop down menu? This would be a easier way and make it easier for people to understand because its similar to the original

[Ryan Whitehead]

Since I have many mares that have comments that don't show under the flat rating I created barns for each of the different types of mares. That way I can easily access all my blue hens, stars, etc... instead of having to search for certain higher quality mares.

[Cleo Patra]

I have a very small stable, but I love the barns so far.

For my racers I have active racers, two year olds and immature waiting until later barns.

I have a barn specifically for those $@!$% horses who get bandages from the vet so you don't know WHICH bandages. That way I can keep track of who I need to swap between fb and hb for their works.

I also have an equipped and a not equipped barn for my yearlings.

For breeding I have: stud barn, babies barn*, bred mares* barn and an unbred mare barn for each horse type (in my case unbred dirt routers* and unbred turf routers*)

I put 01, 02, 03 etc. before the names of all of my barns so they appear in the order that I want them to.

I would REALLY like my active racing barn to be the default. I would also super appreciate a page where the horses names and barns are listed so I can see exactly where they all are and if anyone is missing from a barn they should be in.

[Alleyne Torres]

I put 01, 02, 03 etc. before the names of all of my barns so they appear in the order that I want them to.

Nice! Going to use this.

[Regina Moore]

I put my answer in a different thread, since it follows the life cycle of the horse, rather than the horse quality. (I can have a diff career Arab sprinter start out with a 4: 4-0-0 record, and and allowance stock horse start out with a 4: 0-0-0 record. Not kidding. But if one races just a few categories, then the segregation by gallop would make more sense.)

It did cross my mind that I might be able to get rid of my racing spreadsheet some day, which was quite a startling thought. But, for me, what it would take to not need off-game tracking of my racers is their record in the *current year*. S:1st-2nd-3rd and earnings. Ideally, be able to put that info as an option for the barn grid. The game would lose a lot of its enjoyment if I didn't know, from a racing barn of 1000 horses across all 23 divisions, who earned the most money *this year* overall, or earned the most within their breed/division, or who won the most races *this year*, etc. I mean, an older horse can have high earnings in its SIM record, but have won very little the current game year. Or, a young horse can have high earnings because of placings in lucrative races, but still be a maiden as of the end of the year. Etc.

My spreadsheet template, which has been my bible for over two SIM decades, is all about what's going on *this year*. Don't know how unusual, or common, that might be for other players....

ETA: Right now, on the horse page, there is an empty field to the right of where the dam's name is. That's where you can put the horse's race record for the current year. (Oh, and, the win number can be in bold, if the horse is a stakes winner this year.)

[Steph Lonhro]

Its implemented really well. Like Steph said, the copy functionality is kind of weird. I mean initially you could just select a horse by putting a check in and then transferring over to the alt barn. Going a step further why not have a drop down for the barns that only shows for those who bought it and have it so you check the horses you want, and then select the barn in the new drop down menu? This would be a easier way and make it easier for people to understand because its similar to the original

Yes I would like it to be more like the old alt barns where the horses actually move to where I am moving them to, right now that is my only gripe about the new barns

[Nena Olson]

I consider these 'flags' instead of actual barns since they aren't moving but getting a little tag on them but... I have it set up so my yearlings are all flagged by their gallop comment so it will be easier for me to remember who to prioritize with equipment findings. I also have a Horses I Love barn for my stakes or better runners (and Snowflake lol) and a horses that suck barn for my productive or less horses. I really like that I can see sires and dams (my favorite new feature).

[Alysse Peverell]

I'm not.

This helpful post was brought to you by 2016 disenchantment.

But in any seriousness, I have a small barn so it's just not necessary.

[Madelene Gilbert]

Some thoughts so far:

I'm loving the new barns, and I'm still playing around with the settings. I love being able to control the visibility of certain columns, although it would be nice if ALL columns were included. Overall I think the barns will replace using the un-used Horse Types as filters (a practice I picked up a few years ago after someone mentioned it in the forum). Having the Horse Type available to view should help cleaning up those types easy as well, although I don't know that I'll be using it in my table afterwards.

I seem to be using custom barns over smart barns for the most part, mainly because I organize groups that don't really fit into an existing filter. The only smart barns I have right now are to separate Foals and Stallions out of my Breeding barn. I *might* end up using more smart barns for my mares, but I don't think I'll use them for Racing/Training barns.

I love having the Manage Barns selection on the individual horse's page. VERY useful!

That said, I don't think I'll be giving up my off-game spreadsheets any time soon. I only use two: one for broodmares, one for yearlings. I track offspring gallops with sires in my broodmare spreadsheet, and have data that goes back 5+ years. I can see at a glance which mares are useful producers, poor producers, or one-trick wonders and that's helpful when planning breedings and/or culling. I also track all yearling workouts in my other spreadsheet and sort by fastest times, so I essentially "rank" all my yearlings. Again, this helps culling as well as organizing for the next year when I'm looking for their first starts at 2yo. As of right now, none of that organization is available in the SIM. In addition, my spreadsheets are color coded by conditional formatting; as a visual-type person, this helps me process a lot of information at a glance and keeps my eyeballs from bleeding. So until the SIM allows custom CSS integration, I'll be keeping my colors.

Questions:
1) I'm still not completely 100% sure on this, but I'm assuming that the 15k GP price is for the use of unlimited custom AND smart barns? I'm seeing conflicting posts that the payment was only towards one type of barn or the other, or that you got a set amount (2?) of barns before you had to pay. Maybe someone can clear this up?
2) I'm also assuming that one will have to reorganize horses in custom barns each new year, particularly for young horses as they move through the Breeding -> Training -> Racing barns? I could see that being a pain in the butt for larger stables. I don't know how to address this issue, but might be something to think about now while we have 16+ weeks, instead of realize it after the fact. Note: Yes, I realize that Smart Barns would "fix" this as they will still work over the year change, but again they aren't really useful for me when organizing Racing/Training barns and I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one.

Feedback:
1) I would love to see a "Notes" section under each custom/smart barn. I want to be able to leave notes regarding training schedules, etc. particularly when I can only schedule 2 weeks out. For instance, I can leave a note that says "W1 - 5 furlong work, W2 - 6 furlong work, W3 - 7 furlong work, W4-W7 - alternate schooling/gate training, W8-W9 - rest, W10 - first start" and when I get into that barn I'll know what to schedule next, or see if I missed any scheduled exercise. The notes are always right there, I'm not having to hunt them down in a different browser window or outside spreadsheet.
2) Filter by Broodmare comment in the Breeding barns. I love the addition of the gallop comment filter in the Racing/Training barns. But having the Broodmare comment filter will allow me to eliminate the need for using Horse Types to filter by comment.

ETA:
My list of custom barns that I've made so far, in case anyone is curious. Note that I run a decent sized, but highly specialized, stable. There's no need for me to separate by Horse Type.

Racing Barns
AW Racing
Mixed Breeds
2YO Race Ready - for equip sorted
2YO In Training - for equip not sorted, i.e. need 2nd piece or solid >=

Training Barns
All Equip Sorted - for productive =< that have been confirmed 0-2 pieces
Equip Found - for solid >= that have vet/trainer piece
Need Equip Found - for productive =< that are equip checked, but need vet/trainer piece
No Equip - for solid >=

ETA2:
Ok, I lied. Someone mentioned using custom barns for sorting Claiming vs. Non-Claiming and that's super smart and I'm making those barns right now lol.

[Carole Hanson]

I'm not.

This helpful post was brought to you by 2016 disenchantment.

But in any seriousness, I have a small barn so it's just not necessary.

Same for the same reason

[Andrea Bouwkamp]

I would love to give input but on a limited income, I cannot afford to spend real money to try it. Bummer.