[VHFcontesting] A Brief History of (Captive) Roving

Ed Kucharski k3dne at adelphia.net
Sun May 4 01:57:50 EDT 2003


At 10:27 PM 5/3/2003 -0400, Ev Tupis (W2EV) wrote:

>Then this supports the idea that the "problem" (if there is one) of "captive
>rovers" (if they actually exist) is miniscule, and inconsequential to the
>overall outcome of an event.  Hardly worthy of legislating against.

Ev,

Hardly minuscule or inconsequential at all!  Think about the potential...if 
a multi-op sponsors a half dozen captive rovers (I define captive rovers as 
a rover who is sponsored by a multi-op and only QSO's with that muti-op) 
equipped for QSO's on just 4 (it could be more maybe up to 6) microwave 
bands and sends them all to just their own grid and all the grids that 
touch their grid (that's 9 grids) and works them all from each grid at 4 
points per qso that alone would add up to lots of points and potential mults.

That is 216 QSO's x 4 points per QSO = 864 QSO points and 54 grids.  It is 
possible, maybe probable, that the multi-op station would have worked all 
those grids on those 4 microwave bands with other multi-op, single-op or 
non-captive rover stations anyway so the big advantage may be more for QSO 
points rather than mults.

Take a hypothetical ARRL VHF QSO Party for example (this is an example only 
even though the QSO's, QSO Points and Mults are actual scores from a recent 
contest - there are NO implications or accusations intended in this 
example).  Multi-op station A worked 2363 QSO's,  4519 QSO points and 374 
grids for a score of 1,690,106 points and was the winner of the unlimited 
multi category.  Multi-op station B worked 1987 QSO's, 3323 QSO points and 
426 grids for a score of 1,415,598 points and finished 2'nd in the 
unlimited multi category.  If multi-op station A utilized the 6 different 
captive rovers as described above their QSO total would drop to 2147, QSO 
points to 3655 and for the sake of argument keep the grid total the same at 
374 grids the score would drop to 1,366,970.  If multi-op station B did not 
utilize captive rovers their score would remain the same (1,415,598) and 
now multi-op station B would have finished in first place in the category.

An interesting scenario.  At first blush it appears that multi-op station A 
would keep very busy trying to keep track of and work all of it's captive 
rovers and would have a difficult time working and scheduling other 
stations on those microwave bands.  At second blush that is a pretty 
demanding rover schedule to keep for those captive rovers.  Possible?

73,
Ed K3DNE









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