Nordschleife specific features (request/suggestion)

Hi everyone,
18 months ago I tried making a new, more accurate version of the Nürburgring and Nordschleife.
I used photogrammetry with every bit of video and image content I could find on the web and made a 3d terrain using public topographic maps.

Due to inexperience with doing my own project I got burned out a couple months later and after taking vacation I never resumed working on it.

I did not do it to be the one who did it but to have the track and to be able to drive it and everyone else as well. Therefore I am super incredibly happy that S397 is now doing a laserscanned version wich will be a lot better than what I would have ever been able to do.

BUT, I did a lot of research as part of the project and I think posting the main points here might be HELPFUL!
I think, please let me know how helpful it actually is.


Basically you can drive the track for practice runs/sprint races etc but the real PURPOSE of the track is the VLN series of wich the iconic 24h race is part of. The 24h race properly implemented is, in my opinion, a product in itself. It is propably the most unusual and adventure filled race in the calendar and NO ONE in the sim world has done a proper implementation including all its little specials and exceptions.

I dont expect S397 to go all in on that but after all, it is the first time that the Nordschleife is professionally made for rfactor 2, wich is propably the most advanced sim in terms of super long endurande races.
(I know there is PCars2 but...)

FIRST - WHEATHER
The Nordschleife is so big that you can have different wheather in different parts of the track. You could have heavy rain at Brünnchen while having a nice sunny warm day at the pits. Also you can have parts of the track covered with thick fog and parts with blue sky. Also the wheather is very hard to predict and very unstable in the region around the track. Fog usually starts to appear on the second race day in the early morning and can lead to race interruptions and restarts.

SECOND - TECHNICAL DEFECTS
On the Nordschleife a defect is a much bigger issue than on any other track. On the 24h and vln races you can bring back your car to the pits if it has stopped working somewhere on the track. You can propably repair it and continue the race. But all that costs a lot of time so continuing would be more of the sake of completing and taking part than winning, but in the 24h race that is usually done.
Engine problems are a much bigger issue on the Nords than on any other track because you might drive onto the Nords and suddenly white smoke might come out of your exhaust, and then you have to decide whether you want to A risk busting your engine and slowly driving 20km back to the pits or B going the safe route and stop the car and have it towed back to the pits for repair. Sometimes option B can save you more time overall, and possibly the whole race. Finally Tire damages are a huge thing as well. When your tire gets damaged and loses pressure shortly after entering Nords you have to drive VERY SLOWLY around the rest of the track or otherwise it might rip apart and be whipped around in the wheel well. Wich after 20km can do more damage than the impact that caused it sometimes. But such damage can also be caused by sharp objects on the track that broke off when 2 cars had contact earlier.
Also important is the fact that during long races the track fills with all kinds of dirt. Dirt from the trackside/oil binding sand/rubber bits/sharp carbon bits, these things mainly gather on the area of the track that is not part of the ideal line. Implementing that might be possible with the realroad feature?

THIRD - PITS AND GRANDSTAND DURING VLN OR 24H
One of the special things about the 40 or so pit garages an the Nürburgring is that it can house over 200 cars in the worst cases. So many cars require many many people, so the pits are alway filled with people. Before the race/during the race people are always walking around there making place for cars coming in to pit and taking another spot to stand around. Another thing are the grand stands. When the race starts they are usually fully occupied, during long races people usually leave and come back for the end of the race, but there is always somone there. During 24h races at night there are a small number of people even trying to sleep on the seats. During heavy rain the seats higher up wich have better roof cover are prefered. During the events you can hear the voices of the german commentaters on the entire track except at night. Before the race starts spectators are let into the start formation wich fills the start/finish line with hundreds of people. During the opening lap of the 24h race people are allowed to come through the guard fence and stand on the side of the asphalt. Of course once all the cars have passed they have to go back. After the race is finished and all cars have crossed the finish line the start/finish straight is once again opened to the public, usually to watch the celebration of the winners. The clothing people wear depends on the wheather, raincoat and t-shirt look both very different and subtle differences like that can bring the track much more to life.

FOURTH - CLASSES DURING VLN OR 24H
Before the 24h race are two long qualifying sessions after wich the 40 fastest cars should be established. These 40 cars will do a "top 40 qualifying" where they try to do the fastest lap they possibly can for prestige and the pole position. The race organisation uses this to adjust the "BOP" or "balance of performance" so sandbagging is part of the game. During the big endurance races all 160 to >200 cars are divided into over a dozen different classes in wich they compete while trying not to obstruct the cars from the faster classes. So a few laps into the race the overtaking process begins and then continues throughout the whole race. Because of that blue flags have to be shown in time and be well visible as well as the drivers having to watching the rear mirror all the time. Only the fastest classes do not just compete for victory in their class but overall victory, "Gesamtsieg". Racing is not exactly cheap but in the lowest classes it is still affordable enough for the more welthier bit of the normal people. So the skill and garage eqipment and team size varies quite heavily between the top end teams and the amateur teams and all the in betweens that also exist. At race start all the cars are divided into 3 groups wich make their opening laps in 3 different packs. The race gets started for each pack individually once the leader of the pack aproaches the start/finish line. The 40 fastest cars get a blue flashing light into their windshield wich should help the slower cars in identifying the "big boys".

FIFTH - CODE60
One of the many specialities of the Nordschleife endurance races is that there is no safety car rule.
In case of an accidant it would be pointless to use a safety car on such a long track. So instead the dangerous areas are slowed down enough for rescue/car towing/repair of the guardrails to commence safely. To be exact, first, cars are warned with a single yellow flag, a few hundred meters past that a double yellow flag forces them to slow down to 120 and finally at the point in question a pink code 60 sign forces them to drive 60km/h at most. A few hundred meters further then a green flag is waved wich means that all restrictions are over. Violating these rules can lead to penalties that can make the difference between overall first and not first.

SIXTH - PIT STOPS DURING VLN OR 24H
During the long endurace races there is a minimum time you have to spend in the pit lane.
Leaving the pit lane too early can cause severe penalties. The minimum pit time depends on how many laps you were on the track in a row. More laps - more minimum pit time. The pit time is always longer than it takes to fully refuel the car to make sure the refueling is done slowly and safely. Also because min pit time increases with the number of consecutive laps a car, that can do 8 laps with one filling, should not have an advantage over a car that can only make 7 laps with one filling, until the end of the race.
In the last hour of racing this rule is suspended to allow for "splash and dash" super quick fuel refills if the car needs just another 2 laps of fuel to cross the finish line for example.

SEVENTH - THE CROWD DURING 24H
The most hardcore fans come a few days earlier to secure the best spots and to build all kinds of contraptions using planks and scaffoldings behind the guardfeces. Large illuminated tents, neon lights, camp fires and many, many small light sources illuminate the space behind the guard fences at night. Lots of young people drink lots of beer, party and do-who-knows-what. A very nice but unfortionately now tradition of the past is the painting of the road surface. The nights before the 24h race hundreds of people used to write signs and slogans on the race surface near the camping areas. This "art" made the track look very interesting and it was then partially covered by rubber and dirt during the main event.

EIGHTTH - RACE INTERRUPTIONS AND RESTARTS
Sometimes the wheather gets so bad that the race needs to be stopped, wich means red flag and all cars need to slow down and carefully drive back to the pits. Once the wheather got better the race gets restartet. The order in wich the cars were before the interruption, gets taken from the last point in time when the wheather was accaptable. The restart procedure is the same as at the start of the race. When someone is more than a lap in front of someone else he will keep a 1 lap advantage. But if he was less than a full lap in front of his follower he will lose all his advantage except his advantage in position. This is to ensure that overtaking actually means gaining a position after restart and to take away the confusion that would otherwise come from all the time calculation shenanigans.

II might have forgotten a point or two but If I did I will add it later.

So concluding from this information, the following is my Nordschleife specific feature wishlist for the future.

Local wheather - one part of the track could be dry while another could be wet or foggy, also clouds to be above where it rains and not everywhere when it rains somewhere, and fog based on elevation and location, so that fog can cover the lower part of the track while the upper part has a blue sky "driving into the clouds".Race interruption based on wheather and restart possible

Tire damage - Tires being able to tear apart and damage the wheel well from inside if driving too fast

Dirt/oil binding sand to be part of the real road system.

Special race rules for vln and 24h - special top 40 qualifying/race start in 3 packs/code60/pit stops/race end conditions/penalties/being able to bring a stranded car back to the pits for repair and continue the race
(as described above)

Pits - parking slot for the pit stop being dynamically allocated based on pit requests/multible cars sharing the same garage/ cars being pushed out of the garage around obstacles (obstacles might be 3 other cars that are in the garage) (animated) Animated pit people making space for pitting cars

Environment and crowd - spectators being spawned and despawned with different clothing depending on wheather, time of day and time of race (like start and finish) / Animated people walking around in the pit lanes, people standing at the edge of the track during the opening lap, camp fires/neon lights and many more light sources at night in the camping areas. Commentator from loudspeaker during the day. Crowd being spawned/despawned in the start formation before the race and after race finish for celebration with celebration music from loudspeaker on the track.

Again, things might be missing and if so will be added later.

From the 17th to the 23rd I will be offline and therefore not be able to respond to this thread.

English is difficult so please forgive any spelling mistakes, I will try to fix them tho.

 

dynamic pit stalls is something I requested long ago https://forum.studio-397.com/index.php?threads/more-pit-stop-functionalities.57411/
They also should teleport the car back to garage for damage repair, would save space too in the pit stalls

 

Nascar Racing 2 or 3 added tow trucks. You teleported back to the pits, but the time it should require to be slowly towed was added to the repairs in the pits. rF1 had an entire list of car .hdc items that could be edited to require longer pit time repairs. So there are examples of what could be done.
Now.... the real question....
Will folks here want the track to be delayed a year or so to enable all these features??? or Will they accept the track pretty much as all other tracks that are available for rF2 already?

 

rF2 had for years IndyCar and Indianapolis, but we are yet to see 3 wide starts. They didn't bother making different technologies in Formula e, etc...
What makes you think that they'll make any feature for the Nordschleife ? They'll sell this 20€ and be done with it.

 

S397 actually added content specific features, even for Formula E that you mentioned. I know, we would like to have everything and I never really understood why the Indycar content wasn't finalized before Formula E got a thing, content that I wouldn't have bothered with tbh. But that's just how it is and sometimes priorities shift. For the GT stuff they implemented position LEDs and car specific assists, for Serbing they implemented dirt maps (even if not finalized yet), so there might be a good chance that we see some of the things mentioned above, maybe even with the new UI. Sometimes it is better to take a closer look before that glass is half empty.

 

I doubt it would take a year to implement this in a basic functionality tho. No need to add delays (Reiza did it anyway), just teleport the car to garage for repair, and make the pit stall larger, it's already possible to get 2 cars pitting at the same time right now in the same stall, they just need to make this officlal with proper indications.
They'd just need to pay attention when you have some cars that in garages stay behind another (I think only happens when you load more cars than the track can handle), when a car retire it should use the garage in the back even if it started in the front.

 

For me these are nice to have (but no nessesary) features but to implement them will take too many resources for such small team, that could be better spend elsewhere.

 

This post have a lot of information, but sadly, all this features will never make it, and even if they did probably the track would be +20€
Also all this features suits more a officially licensed game about 24h of nurburgring.

 

just make the same Sebring quality, and 30€ is a good price.

 

You must have a couple of Lambo's in your home garage...

 

no, but i have bought 500€ karsim pro for rF2 and it's awesome, and 30€ for Nordschleife with same Sebring quality is good for me.

 

Dude, get real... really...

 

dude, ONE kart season has cost 5000€ for me, for ONE year only...so sorry 500€ for the best kart mod in the world is very good.
Each year i'm on the Nordschleife, i have crashed one time a 35 000€ car but 30€ for the track is very very good if i can race at my home.
So don't worry i race for real too, but now i like sim racing too for the low price comparing to real driving, and cause i can drive when i want.

 

So you're just rich AND stupid. Good for you.
That's thanks to people like you that graphics cards prices keep increasing, and phones, etc... People waiting in line to buy some crap no matter the price.

 

Do you live in Germany? In my country 2x10min or even 32 min on smaller track costs ~€17. Didn't know karting can be so expensive, probably you race a lot. Also what sim rig you have?

 

You don't have to be rich to pay 30 EUR for something

 

Generally, when you have a 35k€ car, you're not poor. When you can go to the Nurburgring to crash it, i don't think you're poor either.

 

Not in my country. Lots of people have cars like that.
Also see for Germany it is more or less average price:
https://www.statista.com/statistics/589607/average-prices-new-cars-germany/

 

I think you should brag a little less, no matter what you did or did not do irl.
If you can buy a really good sim for the same amount including lots of tracks and cars, 30€ For one track is just ridiculous. It will also lead to very low sales figures for rF2.
Maybe this is your way to get some likes from the devs (though I think they are sensible enough to not do that). Well forget it...
Not bragging here but my RL karting experience (e.g.) will hugely exceed yours (3 years racing 125 cc shifters), 3 - 6 -12 -24 hour races, track days, off-road endurance races etc...

I do agree with you that sims are lower cost and less time consuming though.
But please, (again ) get real...

Oh, and FYI, I have never crashed a car, not even on the Ring...
I have access to the Ring in all of my sims, must have done over 200.000 km by now...always keen to try a new version, but no way in hell I would pay 30€ for one track in one sim. Final....

 

I would happily pay €30 for a track that's likely going to cost S397 tens of thousands of Euro to produce