Latest Roadmap Update - January 2020

Discussion in 'News & Notifications' started by Marcel Offermans, Jan 31, 2020.

  1. Paul McC

    Paul McC Registered

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    I’ve gotta say that I will pipe up when there is a bug and it frustrates me and I do it with this title a lot because I actually love the pants off this sim even though it frustrates the hell out of me sometimes but, I’m also more than happy to praise it aswell because it’s awsome! Yes there are areas where the ai could be improved like they don’t always go for the overtake on slipstreams (at lemans if you move over they don’t change their line to take advantage of your slipstream as you would do on straights)and some of the Reiza pack ai is very unvaried (the MCRs for example with 16 on track are sometimes less than a second apart in lap times, like a train). However the ai in general in this sim are far from rubbish! I would say the ai in this sim at their best are the best ai I have ever raced! In fact I have had some of the best races I’ve ever had (on or offline) with them and that’s really saying something! They’ll never be human but feck their good!
     
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  2. Paul McC

    Paul McC Registered

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    So with this whole Balance of performance thing. I love the GT3's and I want each car to perform as close as possible to how it does in the real world, obviously one make of car is going to be better in certain areas than another and vise versa. I understand that folks want an equal field to race against so hence the weight penaltys but, If i want a completely equal field I just race an Aston against a full field of Astons or porsche against porche. Whilst I appreciate equaling things out is this optional? As in can I go into the tuning options and opt to have the weight and torque penaltys on or off? Have not driven these cars since the update so am wondering if they've all now changed?
    Also (and please excuse my ignorance as I had'nt run into the BOP discussion until a couple of days ago) I was'nt actually aware that there was a huge amount of difference in these cars anyway, they all seem to achieve near enough the same top speeds on the tracks ive been racing, but the handling characteristics are different, which is how they should be, no?
     
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  3. Will Mazeo

    Will Mazeo Registered

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    BoP is weight, power, torque, top speed, etc. Not a single thing like top speed alone
    IRL these cars are made to run same lap times, they actually have 4 or 5 different BoP tables to be used depending on the track they go so Monza is one thing (weight, turbo pressure, power curve), Brands Hatch is another
    You either want the cars as close as possible to real life or remove the BoP, you cant have both ;)
     
  4. djvicious

    djvicious Registered

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    I think this is because the BoP is based on what the actual GT3 series does, so it keeps the relative acceleration and top speed performance of the cars similar. It's not just an rFactor-specific thing.
     
  5. Paul McC

    Paul McC Registered

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    Wow ok thats complicated, so thats how it is IRL, fair enough. Would be great to have the road going production cars in the sim aswell without the performance adjustments, id pay for that! Wish I knew wtf was going on with this TC issue though, so weird at Matsusuka that off the start line I cant get TC overide to work, yet a little way down the track after the pitlane ends it works! Definately gotta be a bug, found similar thing at Imola, and these are official tracks
     
  6. Bill Worrel

    Bill Worrel Registered

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    Well yours is the SimRacing United GT Pro Series and theirs is the rF2 GT Pro Series.
    And if anyone has a claim, copyright or trademark on GT Pro Series, I'd think it would be UbiSoft: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GT_Pro_Series

    And as far as the rF2 GT Challenge Series, it looks like this is going to be open to everyone and anyone who wants to. We'll see with the official announcement, but it doesn't look like it's going to just be for "aliens" as some seem to think.
     
  7. AMillward

    AMillward Registered

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    It looks like it'll be done like the European Football League Pyramid System- If you win your division, you move up. If you finish last, you'll go down.

    That way- Anyone can make their way to the top.
     
  8. burgesjl

    burgesjl Registered

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    I think @hitm4k3r created a good post, and we should have some debate about what comprises a good "competition system".

    iRacing began with "official races" for a number of series: open events that took place typically every hour or two, open to anyone with the right license class and safety rating. They then began to do what are now called "Special Events", which were really community events open to all (typically above "rookie" class) to race events modeled after big real-world events, like the Daytona 24, Daytona 500, Indy 500, etc. In those days, there was no team racing so everything was done as single driver, usually maxing out at about 3 hours for the longer events. Today, there are 14 of those events typically one or two per month, of different types e.g. 4 NASCAR races, 1 Dirt Midget (Chilli Bowl) of single driver type. leaving the rest (about 6) to be endurance, team events (and meaning, some of the most beloved events like Daytona 24 which had previously been single driver 2.4 hr event, got lost). Increasingly iRacing have moved to "professional eSports" type series, and that's where the supposed "community representatives" seem to be spending all their time and promotional efforts. Since that impacts at most 100 or so competitors, in my opinion that's a huge mistake for a company that claims to have 100,000 members. Those top-level events you have to qualify for, so there are some ladder series that help with that which were modified from the original 'Pro' series that were used to qualify for the big series. Initially these were aimed at 'gentlemen racers' like myself, for which just getting in that group was an achievement in itself, but now there are so many people that its become entirely populated by those who want to get to the top level, alien-caliber series. Which is, maybe 500 people now. These series are all managed by iRacing employees or close affiliates, selected by the company. There are also accredited broadcasters who stream these events.

    There are many issues with this structure, and it has tended to more an more focus on the very elite level, especially now they are sponsored by the likes of Porsche and other significant companies in the field. They've dropped the true community events - they'd gotten too big, and too much effort to pull them off. For example, each member in iRacing was assigned to a geographic "club", and there was then a "World Cup of iRacing" which the clubs qualified for by scoring points in the regular official open races. This was widely enjoyed, especially by John Henry the main founder/investor. But that series has now been eliminated (there's a private attempt to run it by the community, but with entirely different rules/qualification criteria). In short, other than the Special Events which are now completely dominated by team endurance events, there are no "community events" on iRacing. There are "official" NASCAR series that follow the real-world Cup series, and an Indy series that tries to do the same; but similar attempts for GrandAm and others have foundered. Big cash prizes are offered for winning those competitive events (not the Special Events).

    In my mind there are two types of event; true community events, which is where enthusiasts from all around the world want to celebrate their addiction to racing; that are club-level, gentlemanly events done for the fun of it. Then there's the competition side. This is, qualify your way up through various series and for the few elite aliens, a top-level championship. S397 seem to only be worried about the latter, or things they can 'market' in conjunctions with manufacturers etc. (e.g. McLaren series). They aren't aimed at the mass ownership. It's probably true right now that rF2 online competition is probably limited to a couple of thousand die-hards, but it doesn't have to be that way, and the events being put forward now are not doing anything to bring more people in and grow the platform and community. That's a problem, in my mind. Or in fact, several problems. There's hundreds of thousands, possibly millions, of people who want to be involved with sim racing. But, only a handful are being catered to by what's been announced by S397 so far. Is that the limit of their ambition?
     
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  9. stonec

    stonec Registered

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    Which makes the whole BoP thing a nightmare to control, especially for a small developer like S397. My suggestion is forget about customized BoP's for every single track and just run one standard set of physics applied to all cars for these events (sounds and cockpits can be kept original). IMO all this BoP tweaking must inevitably delay making actual improvements to the cars, it seems like a constant one step forward and two steps back process.
     
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  10. Will Mazeo

    Will Mazeo Registered

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    Wow single physics really... so you have a rear engined Porsche with an AMG like physics, dumbest suggestion ever.
    It's not a BoP for every track, IRL they have classifications from A to D, Monza or Fuji are A, slower tracks are D for example
    It's not really that much work imo if you get your physics right, I mean you wont have to keep messing with it all time. But they need to get their physics right first and keep it consistent, doesnt look like they have this goal seeing how it went with the GTE.
    Ofc they could just say which tracks were used in this BoP so ppl may have an idea
     
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  11. stonec

    stonec Registered

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    I still think it would be an immense task if not impossible, especially if you go the step further and not only do BoP across one track, but across a set of track categories. As you implied, BoP is not about tweaking one variable but multiple things like weight, power, torque, top speed. Having all these variables alone already adds a large degree of complexity. Add to that the increasing number of DLC cars they need to maintain across both GTE and GT3 series (and likely more cars and series coming). Finally, add in things like fuel consumption, tire wear etc. Testing all these variables with a single track is difficult enough. It's even a human resource issue as ideally you'd want to have the same guy testing across all cars across all tracks, otherwise you'd get variance from driving skill. And then the issue becomes that one driver's style might suit a particular car better so the BoP gets compromised...
     
  12. Sebastien Sestacq

    Sebastien Sestacq Registered

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    IRL the GT3 and GTE are not all uniform and do not all run in the same decimal!
    in the same second it's already extraordinary.
    for uniformity there are cups and monoseries!
     
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  13. Enoneado

    Enoneado Registered

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    my patience is ending, last year i was with hope... but you, guys, must focus in one thing, finish the game, you have a lot of tracks, cars and old material because your development is so so slow, when you end a new content the content before turn old... Formula E is a waste of time, i think only a little number of players like the formula E, Nurb, ok... two tracks per year, the Beta UI after 3 years... maybe we will be with the Beta UI during 3 more years, i think this is "i want but i can't do it", this game has overpassed your capacities, or you join forces with another studio or publisher to have more money, only with expensive DLC will end the patience and the budget of a lot of players, or you decide to contract more workers or you end to develop more new content and try to focus at the current content of the game or RF2 will be the neverending story, i decided to not buy more DLC, Finish the game, the current content, restyle the older content, the competition events are for 4 aliens, the money is in our pockets, the 99% of the rest of players.
     
  14. Will Mazeo

    Will Mazeo Registered

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    Honestly going ahead with this is a waste of time like talking to a door, I prefer to go watch Bathurst, you dont have any idea of what you are talking so nvm

    This was funny tho
    We had an alien in the forum once that would get everything from every car despite his preferences for mid engined ones, he has a lot of setup knowledge. Just find more of these aliens and pay them well, yes, pay.
     
  15. Lazza

    Lazza Registered

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    Even in real life BoP tends to be a constant process. Sometimes series end up taking the easy option and developing a base, then throw different bodies on top (which are more easily balanced) and call them different cars - Supercars for example. NASCAR I don't think does this exactly, but I gather teams can inspect each others cars at certain times and basically copy them, and again they have different 'brand' bodies thrown on top that are nearly identical anyway.

    The issue I think is that this shouldn't be a major issue for the end user - if the initial physics are close, you can close minor gaps (let's say up to 1s/min) with ballast and power tweaks that are barely noticeable. There shouldn't be any real handling changes.

    Part of why BoP has become a swear word is that the BoP prior to the Le Mans races also slowed the cars (because, surprise surprise, aliens were doing faster laptimes than the guys testing during development, and it doesn't help a simulation's credibility if your high profile race has unlikely laptimes being set) and that pushed those cars back towards others not involved in the BoP process.

    As long as there's a formulated, logical and incremental approach to BoP it shouldn't involve any major enough changes to cause issues. But it takes a decent sample size and some well defined goals, which is one reason individuals shouldn't really try to judge them either. No matter how good someone is, you can't be sure they're getting everything out of every car. You need a number of drivers of similar level across the different cars, all pushing their driving and setups to the limit, in order to judge performance - and again, you need to decide if that's single lap performance or race performance.
     
  16. Andregee

    Andregee Registered

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    To adapt a BOP to the lap times of aliens makes no sense, because they often take a risk while driving, which no driver would take. In addition to that you use exploits like the missing downshift prevention or setups which nobody would use to reduce the lap times. I don't need to talk about the extremely many practice laps anymor
     
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  17. DaVeX

    DaVeX Registered

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    Who cares of BOP??
    I mean...do you really think the only issues with GT3 is bop? What about all the bugs found on GT3 pack and game overall?
     
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  18. davehenrie

    davehenrie Registered

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    If you look at GT3 online events, after a short time most folks figure out which car is faster. And then you have a near homogenized field. In real life the BOP is crucial to keep manufacturers onboard. If brand A is always faster than brand B, B will soon drop away. In sim events, the sim driver has as much, if not more, impact on the car's performance. So BOPs are trickier. You don't have The Stig driving every car and getting the most from each.
    Randy Pobst does that for a car magazine, most like Car & Driver, he hotlaps dozens of cars each year at Laguna Seca. This eliminates some of the varibles of testing. Still weather can alter many of the test times. Dodge/Chrysler execs were often publicly feuding with Pobst because, until the Viper ACR, he usually gave poor reviews. They claimed bias, he claimed he didn't like risking his life everytime he climbed into a Viper. But the ACR settled that.
    Stephane Ratel has data sets from almost every car ever run in GT3 events like the Blancpain, so that too eliminates much of the bias or style preferences some drivers may have. At this years Rolex, Ferrari was extremely upset with the GTE BOP, yet halfway thru the event, the Ferrari was challenging for the lead.
    I am pleased S397 is/are? working on issues OTHER than UI/Online stuff, now another positive step would be to provide the pace gap between GTE and GT3, we still get some mixing of lap times at Sebring when the best GT3 should be a couple of seconds slower than the worst GTE.(2018 GTE best race laps Aprox. 1:58+. GT3, 2:00 to 2:01. ) 2018 is the year of the Laserscan of Sebring and many of the GT3 cars are 2018 variants so it 'should' provide the closest data results.
     
  19. jordan3878

    jordan3878 Registered

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    Not sure if this is just me but the skins I have on some of the GT3 cars have been cleared again.I know this has been a known issue from hearing other skin makers, but why hasn't this been sorted yet? Skin makers put enough time in effort to create skins in the first place and they have to put more time into updating them to the newest updates each time. There have been so many created for the GT3 cars over the last year but you can't download them and use them anymore.
     
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  20. Paul McC

    Paul McC Registered

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    Single physics with different looking cars! Really, REALLY! Get the feck outa here! Never heard anything so fecking ridiculous, this is a sim! A sim with different cars but same physics, yeah there’s something no ones buying! I had a fecking great race with the a.i. The other day, bloody fantastic! Was with the Aston GTE, bop was perfect guess why.... I was racing 15 other Aston’s! Simple as that! Want exactly same performance and a total fair race, use the same car!!
     

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