- 786
- United States
Trying to put a positive spin on a very negative subject...
Two things seem to dominate penalty complaints, divebombing, or more accurately, simply shunting into the back of someone in a heavy braking zone, and bumping into people taking a poor place to scrub off their penalties. Perhaps there's a better way for PD to steward these, using game elements that are already inside the game right now?
Enable the racing line display... Can you see how there is already a pre-determined heavy brake zone? And there is an optimal racing line display...
So, the game already KNOWS where you should already be braking by, and it knows where the majority of cars should be when racing. So why not make anyone that fails to brake INSIDE the 'red zone' COMPLETELY responsible for penalties if they hit someone who DOESN'T fail to brake there? This is a bit similar to F1 IRL, where there are tracks with white lines before some heavy braking zones, and if you don't have an overlap before the white line, any contact afterwards is usually judged entirely your responsibility (unless the leading car loses it). You can spot several of these on GTS tracks that F1 runs on. So, if you brake early while ahead, game knows it, if someone doesn't brake in time, game knows that, too.
So, someone slams into your rear in the braking zone, the game should already know if they failed to brake in time. Problem solved! They get the penalty, you don't get one AT ALL...
Now, of course, the braking zone points probably need a bit of tweaking for car class and the difference between GTS's excremental AI's braking points and real drivers, but a bit of play-testing with competent drivers (do PD employ any of those? LOL) ought to pin down where that last line of safe braking should be on each different tire compound (racing line brake points already adjusts for car speeds and tires, so that's just a tweaking issue) when there is a car ahead (can't use the empty track braking points!).
I have a feeling that this could go a long way to avoiding the 'it's BOTH your faults' issue in places where it isn't..!
And secondly, the game KNOWS the optimal racing line (or close enough... might be nice if it were adjusted in the display to account for GTSport's egregious ability to flaunt standard FIA track limits!) and it could fairly easily set the car so that it needs to be at LEAST one car width away from that racing line before you can scrub any penalty. This ought to at least diminish the complaints about running into the back of someone doing a scrub in the middle of a corner or on the exit line, or down a straight.
I know that this doesn't cure EVERYTHING, but it could cure a couple of the big complaints without a total rewrite of the code. Computer stewarding is a very complex issue, but the current 'It was your fault you didn't know the guy behind (or ahead!) was an idiot' system doesn't take into account you rarely know him... Until AFTER those first few corners, by which time, it's too late. Plus many 'game' the system against drivers who actually care about proper racing rules.
But it strikes me that, as the game already has a system for telling the driver where to brake, and what line to take, that system could be used as an input to determine blame in some contact scenarios.
Do you think this could work?
Two things seem to dominate penalty complaints, divebombing, or more accurately, simply shunting into the back of someone in a heavy braking zone, and bumping into people taking a poor place to scrub off their penalties. Perhaps there's a better way for PD to steward these, using game elements that are already inside the game right now?
Enable the racing line display... Can you see how there is already a pre-determined heavy brake zone? And there is an optimal racing line display...
So, the game already KNOWS where you should already be braking by, and it knows where the majority of cars should be when racing. So why not make anyone that fails to brake INSIDE the 'red zone' COMPLETELY responsible for penalties if they hit someone who DOESN'T fail to brake there? This is a bit similar to F1 IRL, where there are tracks with white lines before some heavy braking zones, and if you don't have an overlap before the white line, any contact afterwards is usually judged entirely your responsibility (unless the leading car loses it). You can spot several of these on GTS tracks that F1 runs on. So, if you brake early while ahead, game knows it, if someone doesn't brake in time, game knows that, too.
So, someone slams into your rear in the braking zone, the game should already know if they failed to brake in time. Problem solved! They get the penalty, you don't get one AT ALL...
Now, of course, the braking zone points probably need a bit of tweaking for car class and the difference between GTS's excremental AI's braking points and real drivers, but a bit of play-testing with competent drivers (do PD employ any of those? LOL) ought to pin down where that last line of safe braking should be on each different tire compound (racing line brake points already adjusts for car speeds and tires, so that's just a tweaking issue) when there is a car ahead (can't use the empty track braking points!).
I have a feeling that this could go a long way to avoiding the 'it's BOTH your faults' issue in places where it isn't..!
And secondly, the game KNOWS the optimal racing line (or close enough... might be nice if it were adjusted in the display to account for GTSport's egregious ability to flaunt standard FIA track limits!) and it could fairly easily set the car so that it needs to be at LEAST one car width away from that racing line before you can scrub any penalty. This ought to at least diminish the complaints about running into the back of someone doing a scrub in the middle of a corner or on the exit line, or down a straight.
I know that this doesn't cure EVERYTHING, but it could cure a couple of the big complaints without a total rewrite of the code. Computer stewarding is a very complex issue, but the current 'It was your fault you didn't know the guy behind (or ahead!) was an idiot' system doesn't take into account you rarely know him... Until AFTER those first few corners, by which time, it's too late. Plus many 'game' the system against drivers who actually care about proper racing rules.
But it strikes me that, as the game already has a system for telling the driver where to brake, and what line to take, that system could be used as an input to determine blame in some contact scenarios.
Do you think this could work?
