what is rhe better way to reduce PP?

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MonGnoM

MonGnoM

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MonGnoM
Is it better to downgrade the items you bought for example from a titanium racing exhaust to the stock exhaust or with the power limiter, to reduce the performance points of your car
what's the better method?
 
Power limiter. Its best to keep the titanium racing exhaust, engine upgrades, turbo, etc. and just lower the power limiter.
Rarely, but on some cars, it would be better to add ballast but the best option is to just power limit.
 
It's been discussed before (you can use the search function to find old threads)
But a power limiter would be better in my opinion instead of downgrading.
And it depends on the track, if you need power then yeah weight would be better.
 
Using the power limiter will give you less hp for your PP, so this needs to be taken into account when setting your gearing and tuning for certain tracks.

Using the power limiter is a bad idea when you can set your gearing to take advantage of peak power. If you can set your gears close, and your car can shift gears fast, downgrade parts. If your car has a very narrow and peaky powerband, and there are lots of corners, it's better to use the limiter since it will flatten the power curve.
 
If you're in a highly competitive league, and you want to build a stupid "exact PP special", then use the power limiter. Make sure to leave the oil dirty too.

If you care about the spirit of the game and you're only running against the computer (I.E. seasonal races), I'd downgrade parts if the excess is more than a percent or two.
 
What is the spirit of the game, and what about it excludes cars tuned to an exact PP? It's a racing game. The spirit of the game is to tune your car to the best possible performance allowed for a race so you can win.

And again, once you lower power to the point where your flat powerband is wider then your gearing, you're only slowing the car down. Just blindly lowering power seems unwise if you want to go fast.
 
Exorcet
What is the spirit of the game, and what about it excludes cars tuned to an exact PP? It's a racing game. The spirit of the game is to tune your car to the best possible performance allowed for a race so you can win.

And again, once you lower power to the point where your flat powerband is wider then your gearing, you're only slowing the car down. Just blindly lowering power seems unwise if you want to go fast.
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Tuning suspension and gear ratios and stuff sure.
But the A.I. cars are all stock. They don't use a turbo or racing exhaust or any of that. So he means keeping fair competition with the A.I.
 
GT5 is supposed to be a simulator. You'd never see a real-life racing team running a car with dirty oil, or the cheap organic oil it came with. Or any of the other hallmarks of exact PP cars, like stupid, nonsensical parts combinations - I wouldn't be surprised to find one out there with full racing exhaust, stock headers & catalytic converter, and sports (not racing) air filter.

The way I see it, and exact PP car is like a carefully minmaxed character in an RPG. Just like a minmaxed character is just a combination of pluses and cool powers with little or no backstory, a minmaxed car is built with no attention to realism or plausibilty, just whichever parts will give the narrowest, peakiest powerband and least torque for a certain horsepower/PP level. To the best of my knowledge, the power limiter was intended to eliminate the "This car totally fits this race, but I tuned it too much" issue, not to help you minmax your car.
 
RedPartyhat
Tuning suspension and gear ratios and stuff sure.
But the A.I. cars are all stock. They don't use a turbo or racing exhaust or any of that. So he means keeping fair competition with the A.I.
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Sure, but the AI isn't exactly fair either. It's usually around a dozen rolling road blocks, and then 1 or two prodigy drivers in hypercars that lead the pack. Historic Cup is one of the best examples. The game doesn't really offer much in the way of close racing, besides online.

Anyway, retuning to whatever PP is as fair as removing parts.

White & Nerdy
GT5 is supposed to be a simulator. You'd never see a real-life racing team running a car with dirty oil, or the cheap organic oil it came with. Or any of the other hallmarks of exact PP cars, like stupid, nonsensical parts combinations - I wouldn't be surprised to find one out there with full racing exhaust, stock headers & catalytic converter, and sports (not racing) air filter.

The way I see it, and exact PP car is like a carefully minmaxed character in an RPG. Just like a minmaxed character is just a combination of pluses and cool powers with little or no backstory, a minmaxed car is built with no attention to realism or plausibilty, just whichever parts will give the narrowest, peakiest powerband and least torque for a certain horsepower/PP level. To the best of my knowledge, the power limiter was intended to eliminate the "This car totally fits this race, but I tuned it too much" issue, not to help you minmax your car.
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I think a lot of that is fair, but the limiter isn't at fault for the tuning in this game lacking realism in the first place.

Also, what led you to your opinion on reason behind the power limiter? I'd think the only way you could support your opinion is to ask PD. Power limiting is common across many race series, and a lot of race cars over perform before limiting so that they can achieve the max performance when they are set to comply with the rules. The power limiter doesn't really remove any excessive amount of realism, the problems you might run into were there from the start.
 
mstcle323
I raise the weight just because it seems to handle better
Click to expand...

Yeah, same. It makes a better weight distribution - make them balanced - 50/50 on FR and FF cars making them understeer less.

And then I sometimes take a little downforce off (if available) then I power limit it.
 
Exorcet
Sure, but the AI isn't exactly fair either. It's usually around a dozen rolling road blocks, and then 1 or two prodigy drivers in hypercars that lead the pack. Historic Cup is one of the best examples. The game doesn't really offer much in the way of close racing, besides online.

Anyway, retuning to whatever PP is as fair as removing parts.



I think a lot of that is fair, but the limiter isn't at fault for the tuning in this game lacking realism in the first place.

Also, what led you to your opinion on reason behind the power limiter? I'd think the only way you could support your opinion is to ask PD. Power limiting is common across many race series, and a lot of race cars over perform before limiting so that they can achieve the max performance when they are set to comply with the rules. The power limiter doesn't really remove any excessive amount of realism, the problems you might run into were there from the start.
Click to expand...

There, though, the parts and specifications used are usually fairly coherent. Where they're not, it's usually because certain upgrades are banned, not because they would give the car too much torque or too wide a powerband.

Plus, it just annoys me how narrow GT5 online play seems to be. From what I've seen of PP specials (and in forum conversations), you'd think the only PP levels that existed were 500 and 550, with 400 and 600(R) showing up occasionally, anything higher getting you branded a noob somehow. 500 is populated mostly by carefully minmaxed M3s and NSXs, and I'm sure the others have similar problems. Meanwhile, seasonal TT players only acknowledge the existence of the Nissan R390 and Chapparall 2J unless there's some strange regulation that prevents using either one, thus showing the other problem with the power limiter. Seriously, what's the point of having 1000 cars if you only ever use a select few?

If I ever host rooms, I should look into ways to block (or reduce the effectiveness of) minmaxed cars and make people look for more interesting choices.
 
RedPartyhat
But the A.I. cars are all stock.
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No they aren't.

White & Nerdy
500 is populated mostly by carefully minmaxed M3s and NSXs, and I'm sure the others have similar problems. Meanwhile, seasonal TT players only acknowledge the existence of the Nissan R390 and Chapparall 2J unless there's some strange regulation that prevents using either one, thus showing the other problem with the power limiter. Seriously, what's the point of having 1000 cars if you only ever use a select few?
Click to expand...

That has to do with how those cars are the best in their class by default even before you do anything to them. It has nothing to do with the power limiter because (as Exorcet said) those exact same cars were used for everything online before the power limiter or PP numbers were even in GT5.
 
You might be surprised at the differences in HP and torque using different engine upgrade combinations. I've seen more than 50 HP difference at a given PP just by trying different combos.
 
iamjajo
You might be surprised at the differences in HP and torque using different engine upgrade combinations. I've seen more than 50 HP difference at a given PP just by trying different combos.
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Sometimes that's down to cars with 50HP more and no downforce, or 50HP less and a wing.
 
White & Nerdy
There, though, the parts and specifications used are usually fairly coherent. Where they're not, it's usually because certain upgrades are banned, not because they would give the car too much torque or too wide a powerband.

Plus, it just annoys me how narrow GT5 online play seems to be. From what I've seen of PP specials (and in forum conversations), you'd think the only PP levels that existed were 500 and 550, with 400 and 600(R) showing up occasionally, anything higher getting you branded a noob somehow. 500 is populated mostly by carefully minmaxed M3s and NSXs, and I'm sure the others have similar problems. Meanwhile, seasonal TT players only acknowledge the existence of the Nissan R390 and Chapparall 2J unless there's some strange regulation that prevents using either one, thus showing the other problem with the power limiter. Seriously, what's the point of having 1000 cars if you only ever use a select few?

If I ever host rooms, I should look into ways to block (or reduce the effectiveness of) minmaxed cars and make people look for more interesting choices.
Click to expand...

The reason certain cars consistently show up at certain PP levels is twofold. One is, the PP system is imperfect and tends to favour cars that have great real life performance. Second reason is because there are combinations of parts added that max out your performance and buying a car and adding certain parts to get it up to a certain PP level will almost always be more effective than using the engine limiter to downgrade a car, or taking a car and maxing out all the upgrades.

I can tell you though that at all PP levels there are many more competitive cars than most people realize, probably because most guys don't have enough time or the inclination to go pouring through dozens of cars to find what's good and what is not, so they end up settling on the common few fast cars they see online. Nothing wrong with that, you drive what you enjoy driving, that's what the game is about. But for that reason, because I like to be different, I rarely race the M3's, NSX's, Elise's etc because winning is just too easy in those cars, and prefer to stick to the cars I hardly ever see but which are just as fast.

And this:

You might be surprised at the differences in HP and torque using different engine upgrade combinations. I've seen more than 50 HP difference at a given PP just by trying different combos.

.....is absolutely true and has nothing to do with downforce. As mentioned above, there are multiple combinations to tuning and some are better than others. And as a general rule of thumb, any car that has rear aero available only, never add the aero, it only slows you down.
 
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Generally speaking, I'm always going to get the car as light as possible first off. That way I can always add ballast, but the good part about that is, *I* get to choose where the weight goes.

Tires, power mods, suspension, etc., are all good. I prefer to have the power mods and limit the power output with the limiter - you'll notice you get all your peak power and torque much earlier that way, and a nice, flat torque curve.
 
White & Nerdy
There, though, the parts and specifications used are usually fairly coherent. Where they're not, it's usually because certain upgrades are banned, not because they would give the car too much torque or too wide a powerband.

Plus, it just annoys me how narrow GT5 online play seems to be. From what I've seen of PP specials (and in forum conversations), you'd think the only PP levels that existed were 500 and 550, with 400 and 600(R) showing up occasionally, anything higher getting you branded a noob somehow. 500 is populated mostly by carefully minmaxed M3s and NSXs, and I'm sure the others have similar problems. Meanwhile, seasonal TT players only acknowledge the existence of the Nissan R390 and Chapparall 2J unless there's some strange regulation that prevents using either one, thus showing the other problem with the power limiter. Seriously, what's the point of having 1000 cars if you only ever use a select few?

If I ever host rooms, I should look into ways to block (or reduce the effectiveness of) minmaxed cars and make people look for more interesting choices.
Click to expand...

👍

^ They are just about stock, sometimes they will use a slightly better tyre or have a power increase or decrease of about 5% Max so basically stock!
 
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aadil717
Yeah, same. It makes a better weight distribution - make them balanced - 50/50 on FR and FF cars making them understeer less.

And then I sometimes take a little downforce off (if available) then I power limit it.
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👍 that's the way to go
 
Kwicko
Tires, power mods, suspension, etc., are all good. I prefer to have the power mods and limit the power output with the limiter - you'll notice you get all your peak power and torque much earlier that way, and a nice, flat torque curve.
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This is a common mistake and the further you limit the power the bigger the mistake it is. You can test this for yourself. Take a car that's stock roughly 20-30 PP below the level you want to race at and reduce weight as necessary (my target weight for most street racing is 1200-1350 kgs), add racing exhaust, ECU and Catalytic Converter and detune using less than 5% power limiter. Then take the same car, tune the crap out of it with all upgrades, then detune it down to your target PP level. Yes the power curve is flatter, but you've also pushed the torque peak way to the left, and more importantly, your HP level is often way, way down. This type of max tuning and then heavy detuning can easily cost you 50-100 hp depending on the PP level you are racing at.

You will always be faster, if you tune up to a certain PP level with a minimum of the three upgrades mentioned above and then detuned less than 5% (up to 10% if you must). Always.
 
Johnnypenso
You will always be faster, if you tune up to a certain PP level with a minimum of the three upgrades mentioned above and then detuned less than 5% (up to 10% if you must). Always.
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Usually I do this ... but I thought that the common trend is just the opposite. Testing will clarify this for me but still in low PP rooms the lotus (genarlly speaking, it's just an examlple of power limiting working vs slight tunning) will obliterate usually everything. No?
 
f1webberfan
Usually I do this ... but I thought that the common trend is just the opposite. Testing will clarify this for me but still in low PP rooms the lotus (genarlly speaking, it's just an examlple of power limiting working vs slight tunning) will obliterate usually everything. No?
Click to expand...

The common trend is probably the opposite but I rarely find in open lobbies that most people approach the true limits of any PP level. Most of the time, even the best drivers are at least a second off the lowest lap times at a given PP level and often 2 or 3. The 111R is one of those cars that punches far above it's weight and it's also easy for most guys to drive because the turn in is so good. But IMO if you took a spectrum of several tracks I could find probably a dozen cars that can compete with it at any PP level. I think the 111R and the NSX are some of the best in the game, but they aren't unbeatable even with equal driving skill.
 
off-topic: LOL, my 199 posts to yours 1999. :) Let's crash the record. :)

Yeah. I agree with you that most people just de-tune their much more powerful cars and usually have the upper edge, because these cars have better handling, especially when on RS tires and with lower amount of HP, as opposed to ppl with cars reaching their limits, or within the PP level. I do it sometimes myself, I must admit if I get beaten regularly. But if it a close 1 ... well I prefer to drive different cars to see how well they compare.
Pffffff, just when I get bored there will always be something new to discover and test. Just for fun.
 
2000!!

Just for gits and shiggles I looked at a couple of cars I have tuned for both 450 and 500 PP and if you take them and engine limit them from 500 down to 450 PP compared to tuning them specifically for 450 PP hp you lose 20 - 25 hp. This is true for every car. But cars like the NSX Type R 02', BMW GTR, BMW CSL, Lexus LFA etc. will still do well even with that 20 or 30 hp penalty. Nevertheless, it means that tuning up will always be better than tuning down when you compare the same car.
 
Thing is, though, it's not all about peak HP numbers. I don't really care if my car makes 250hp at 8500rpm if it only spends a few seconds at 8500rpm. I'd rather have it make more TORQUE, starting lower in the rev range, and staying more consistent throughout the rev range.
 
Kwicko
Thing is, though, it's not all about peak HP numbers. I don't really care if my car makes 250hp at 8500rpm if it only spends a few seconds at 8500rpm. I'd rather have it make more TORQUE, starting lower in the rev range, and staying more consistent throughout the rev range.
Click to expand...

You're right, it's not about peak power. It's about powerband and gearing. If the power limiter gives you 500 hp for any RPM, is it better than a car tuned to 520 hp between 5000-6000 RPM?

If your gear ratios are such that you never go below 5000 RPM, then the non limited car is clearly better. You get 20 extra hp. The only chance that the 500 hp car has is if the gearing needs for a track make it such that the RPM will have to go much lower than 5000 RPM, or that shifting takes so much time that being able to stay in gear for long periods of time is faster.

On torque, don't forget that it's basically the same thing as horsepower. The benefit to torque isn't being able to accelerate 4000 RPM below peak power, the benefit is insuring that you have lots of power at +/-500 or 1000 peak RPM.

There are cases where limiting is better than just tuning to meet your PP exactly, but just power limiting all the time is probably going to hurt you more than anything.
 
I always downgrade. If I have to set power limiter lower than 90% it just feels weird. I never add weight either unless the car already weighs like under 900kg.
 
Kwicko
Thing is, though, it's not all about peak HP numbers. I don't really care if my car makes 250hp at 8500rpm if it only spends a few seconds at 8500rpm. I'd rather have it make more TORQUE, starting lower in the rev range, and staying more consistent throughout the rev range.
Click to expand...

That's great in theory and it may be true in real life but in GT5 it doesn't work. Try it on the drag strip and see. In reality most cars with 6 speeds, which is most cars, have a very narrow rev range in which they operate, which is almost always 1500 rpm or less, so keeping within the peak power is easy. On some cars it's around a thousand, and if you use 5% power limiter or so on most cars you get a relatively flat power band and the extra 20-30hp, or in the case of cars tuned down 50-100 PP 50-75 or more HP, is easy to take advantage of. No matter what gearing you use, there is no way you will ever beat an equal driver, in a car tuned down 50+ PP, vs. one tuned up to just over the PP level and tuned back slightly to flatten out the power curve.

And if it's a flat torque curve you want, as you suggest, then definitely the power limiter is not the way to go, as it makes the curve peak to a sharp spike really early and drop dramatically well before the HP peak hits. The flattest, most usable torque curves are those with little engine limiter used.
 
Kwicko
Thing is, though, it's not all about peak HP numbers. I don't really care if my car makes 250hp at 8500rpm if it only spends a few seconds at 8500rpm. I'd rather have it make more TORQUE, starting lower in the rev range, and staying more consistent throughout the rev range.
Click to expand...
The power limiter doesn't do that. It does give you more torque in the beginning, but there is less torque later in the rev range because it flattens the power curve rather than the torque curve.
 

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