DCP announces Fantasy Drum Corps site
Drum Corps Planet publisher John Donovan today announced a new website dedicated to the fantasy drum corps activity – www.drumcorpsfantasy.com . The new site will be the home of Drum Corps Planet International (DCPI) – a ‘Fantasy Drum and Bugle Corps circuit’ which is comprised of member ‘corps’ that ‘compete’ against one another – using current-season or historic DCI corps statistics as the basis for their scoring system.
In announcing the new site, Donovan said: "We’re very excited about establishing a new, permanent home for the fantasy drum corps circuit that has existed on our Drum Corps Planet forums for over 2 years now. The activity on DCP has hosted nearly 250 virtual corps in competitions that represent 6 drum corps seasons, with a 7th season just about to get underway."
Donovan went on to say, "With this new site, current participants and those interested to learn more will have a focal point for schedules, DCPI corps listings and links, and news and information about the virtual activity. There are a lot of people having a great deal of fun with DCPI, mirroring the fantasy leagues that are available for all of the various professional sports . We expect that more people will become involved thru this new site in the fantasy drum corps activity. It gives people another opportunity to stay involved with and excited about ‘live’ drum corps."
Fantasy drum corps compete by using statistics that are recorded by ‘live’ participants in DCI contests throught the summer. Virtual corps "Directors" select DCI corps to use for each caption – creating a composite ‘corps’ that competes against others in their particular "Division". Each DCI corps is assigned a ‘cost’, based on their ranking in the past season (in inverse proportion to their DCI Finals placement), and caption selections for the DCPI corps are limited by a ‘cost-cap’ – requiring that the DCPI Director select DCI corps from a broad spectrum of the field. Like DCI, corps are grouped into three Divisions: I, II, and III – which each have their own cost-cap for caption selections. A calendar of competitions is defined and the DCPI corps ‘compete’ against one another – based on the statistics recorded by the DCI corps for the caption selected. The DCPI season culminates with the DCPI Championships for the virtual season, which are held in the ‘off-season’ and in parallel with the DCI Summer Music Games.
Some DCPI Directors have gone to great lengths to create websites dedicated to their particular corps. Many of these sites include detailed program design and descriptions, repertoire selections, uniform and drill designs – along with corps logos, staff rosters and tour plans. These corps-specific sites are listed in the corps directory on the DCPI site and make for interesting reading.
Content for the new site will continue to be developed and will expand over the next few months – adding online caption selection for DCPI corps directors, a fully-integrated statistics engine to replace the current spreadsheet-based system, and flexible on-demand reporting for DCPI contest scores and statistics.
You can learn more about Drum Corps Planet International and the fantasy drum corps activity by visiting www.drumcorpsfantasy.com. DCPI Season 7 gets underway in mid-January 2007.
