Dirty Drivers are Out of Control — Nearly Unplayable

[chris090927]

The issue I have is with purposefully dirty drivers.

I raced in multiple races where one guy didn't qualify and waited at the back of the grid for the racers to come around on the first lap then started reeking absolute carnage!!! on anyone who tried to pass him. I was particularly pissed one race where I had pole and he ruined it for me on lap two. He had a buddy blocking for him and helping crash other cars.

I raced about 5 races that night trying different races and I was always in a race with this guy except once. It's impossible to raise your SR with someone crashing into you on purpose. I had an A SR rating thaty dropped to D that night. And so you know, I am (or was a B driver—until I lost my temper with this guy and crashed him—once!)

There needs to be a stricter set of penalties over multiple races for ass-hats like this! He should be banned for at least a period of time. Would that not happen in real racing?

Ideas:
1. Black Flag System: after sending drivers off the road your race is over. This could be contingent on your driveing level.
A & S drivers are immediately black flagged for sending someone off the road. B & C drivers get two chances. D & E get 3 chances. In addition you start at the back of the grid your next race.

2. Multiple race penalties: If you carry a penalty over from one race you start at the back of the grid, or carry that penalty over to your next race no matter when you play. You are also labeled with a penalty icon so everyone knows you're an ass.

3. Adding car damage: If cars attain damage from crashing into one another, then that really ought to solve some of these ass-hat driver issues. It will be less fun for them to ruin everyone's race if they can only finish a lap due to damage.

Thoughts?

 

[Alpha Cipher]

A blue flag would solve your problem. Car damage would also affect the victim, which obviously isn't very nice...
The crackhead you used as an example is an obvious troll and couldn't care less if his car died, really. Although I do agree that it might help on the divebombers
Before we can talk about multiple race penalties, let's fix the system of penalties in the first place. It's very flawed, and it doesn't really know how to know who's wrong or right. Time penalties are inconsistent as well.

Also, accidents happen. No one wants to be black flagged from missing a braking point (especially cone users)
Black flags irl are given after very thorough investigations and are always judged by race stewards. I don't think any system, no matter how advanced, can have the right to pass such a heavy judgement upon a player

 

[zzz_pt]

Of course there should be a black flag. Blue flags would also help backmarkers. No other things to add really.

 

[Robben]

As others have said: damage would just increase the fun for such trolls.

 

[snowgt]

In non-endurance races ghosting would help, if leaders are close to lapping backmarkers.

 

[chris090927]

A blue flag would solve your problem. Car damage would also affect the victim, which obviously isn't very nice...
The crackhead you used as an example is an obvious troll and couldn't care less if his car died, really. Although I do agree that it might help on the divebombers
Before we can talk about multiple race penalties, let's fix the system of penalties in the first place. It's very flawed, and it doesn't really know how to know who's wrong or right. Time penalties are inconsistent as well.

Also, accidents happen. No one wants to be black flagged from missing a braking point (especially cone users)
Black flags irl are given after very thorough investigations and are always judged by race stewards. I don't think any system, no matter how advanced, can have the right to pass such a heavy judgement upon a player

I like the Blue flag Idea.

I do think Black flags would work though, especially on a multiple offense system.
In your example, if you miss a breaking point and are notified you have one or two more incidents before you're black flagged, you'll probably drive better/safer. There's always the chance you'll have another actual accident and get black-flagged, but that should tell you you need more practice.

This worked well in the old F1 game I used to play. It's been a while since I've had aanother racing game.

 

[Sander 001]

I still dream of the great GT5 days of heavy ghosting where if somebody tried to ram you, they’d often ghost straight through you and pummel the barriers at full speed

Bring it back, PD!

 

[chris090927]

As others have said: damage would just increase the fun for such trolls.

I somewhat agree, but at least, that troll will be removed from the race.

In non-endurance races ghosting would help, if leaders are close to lapping backmarkers.

There's ghosting now, it just seems so inconsistent?

 

[Amaru]

How I would seriously love to see this black flag being implemented...

Yet I doubt it'll ever happen...

 

[chris090927]

How I would seriously love to see this black flag being implemented...

Yet I doubt it'll ever happen...

Why?

 

[_ApexPredator]

The issue I have is with purposefully dirty drivers.

I raced in multiple races where one guy didn't qualify and waited at the back of the grid for the racers to come around on the first lap then started reeking absolute carnage!!! on anyone who tried to pass him.

Ideas:
1. Black Flag System: after sending drivers off the road your race is over. This could be contingent on your driveing level.
A & S drivers are immediately black flagged for sending someone off the road. B & C drivers get two chances. D & E get 3 chances. In addition you start at the back of the grid your next race.

I like the principal of the idea, but I think in practice you may risk your punishment leading to further instances of the action you were punishing.
Being forced to start at the back of the grid is a troll's wet dream; what do you think their reaction to your proposed punishment would be?

And as others have said, you don't want to punish someone with an immediate black flag for 1 or 2 missed braking points, so in practice I think it would be difficult to implement fairly.

I think the system of actively discouraging such driving behaviour with ratings is actually pretty good, I personally have only encountered a handful of asshats, although I am late to the game.

 

[FUNanywhere]

As others have said: damage would just increase the fun for such trolls.

This.

People ram intentionally and even with damage they can cause havoc.

 

[polizei]

If it's in the game it's not cheating.

ftfy.

But seriously, they need some kind of feedback system. I'm sick of getting punted into the gravel AND getting a penalty while the person who punts me gets NO penalty. If we could give them feedback this would let them review data and adjust their algorithms or RNG they use to assign penalties.

 

[VFOURMAX1]

Really all that needs to be done is FIRST to start new players at the lowest level of the SR just like they do with the DR.

Second would be to tighten up the criteria which allows a racer to advance or remain in the SR ranks.
Currently it is to easy to game the system and racers are riding at the rear of a race to gain the points to advance to a SR ranking they may well not have the actual racing skills for.

To advance levels some sort of system needs to be implemented that requires a certain amount of DR points advancement before the game will advance an SR ranking which would make staying in the rear with no incidents not meet the requirements to allow the advance of the SR ranking above say level C.

The higher the ranking class the tighter the criteria to remain or the less amount of incidents of any kind that will not draw a penalty or negative SR moving a racer to a lower bracket.

Award positive SR points only on full laps which have no Negative incidents of any kind not for "clean" sectors.

Tightening up the criteria for the different rankings is all that is needed to keep drivers with above x number of incidents out of the higher classes. The game is designed to allow all racer types to play but to be assigned lobbies that they can race against other drivers that race in a similar fashion.

But before any of this can work the penalty system needs to be much better to assign a given penalty to the deserving party rather than an innocent driver. Right now the penalty system is more of a hindrance to cleaning up the racing incidents instead of a help because it can be so easily gamed as it is currently.

 

[_ApexPredator]

But seriously, they need some kind of feedback system.

I'd be very surprised if they didn't read forums such as this.

 

[polizei]

I'd be very surprised if they didn't read forums such as this.

that's not a feedback system.

 

[chris090927]

I like the principal of the idea, but I think in practice you may risk your punishment leading to further instances of the action you were punishing.
Being forced to start at the back of the grid is a troll's wet dream; what do you think their reaction to your proposed punishment would be?

And as others have said, you don't want to punish someone with an immediate black flag for 1 or 2 missed braking points, so in practice I think it would be difficult to implement fairly.

I think the system of actively discouraging such driving behaviour with ratings is actually pretty good, I personally have only encountered a handful of asshats, although I am late to the game.

In addition to staring at the back of the grid, what if there was a timeout penalty for going too slow so one couldn't actually wait

Really all that needs to be done is FIRST to start new players at the lowest level of the SR just like they do with the DR.

Second would be to tighten up the criteria which allows a racer to advance or remain in the SR ranks.
Currently it is to easy to game the system and racers are riding at the rear of a race to gain the points to advance to a SR ranking they may well not have the actual racing skills for.

To advance levels some sort of system needs to be implemented that requires a certain amount of DR points advancement before the game will advance an SR ranking which would make staying in the rear with no incidents not meet the requirements to allow the advance of the SR ranking above say level C.

The higher the ranking class the tighter the criteria to remain or the less amount of incidents of any kind that will not draw a penalty or negative SR moving a racer to a lower bracket.

Award positive SR points only on full laps which have no Negative incidents of any kind not for "clean" sectors.

Tightening up the criteria for the different rankings is all that is needed to keep drivers with above x number of incidents out of the higher classes. The game is designed to allow all racer types to play but to be assigned lobbies that they can race against other drivers that race in a similar fashion.

But before any of this can work the penalty system needs to be much better to assign a given penalty to the deserving party rather than an innocent driver. Right now the penalty system is more of a hindrance to cleaning up the racing incidents instead of a help because it can be so easily gamed as it is currently.

I don't think this would work in the current environment. I'm mixed in with E, D & C racers all the time. Also, this does nothing to stop a troll from waiting for you on the track a careening into you. Maybe if they had stricter races by rank, but that might not be possible depending on how many people are online that day. Plus it's always good to race with better drivers so you learn.

In some of the races I've been in, the only way to advance SR is to stay on the back, (or the front—save for Nuremberg where they always use the pole sitter as a brake on turn 1). I've let my DR drop to gain SR and then regained my DR by driving with racers whop actually race.

I'd be very surprised if they didn't read forums such as this.

Well their (Gran Turismo's) forum is still down in the U.S. so they need to read this one and others. Maybe they're not interested.
http://community.us.playstation.com/t5/Gran-Turismo-Series-General/bd-p/22128

 

[Corsa]

I have no evidence but it would seem highly likely PD do indeed scroll through our forums.
Why wouldn't they, it's direct feedback from some of their most loyal customers.
That, and correct me if I'm wrong but @Jordan has met Kaz a few times so I would assume there is some form of media/community relationship there.

 

[VFOURMAX1]

I'm mixed in with E, D & C racers all the time.

That would be the DR rankings, correct? DR is a level of how fast you are not how incident free you race.

In some of the races I've been in, the only way to advance SR is to stay on the back, (or the front

I have raced since the games launch and have managed to retain an SR S ranking since games launch with over 220 races ran.

Testing for the grip bug I started a new account a few weeks ago and because of threads like this I wanted to see how hard it was to advance rankings.
Starting that account as a complete beginner stat wise it took only 10 races to reach an SR ranking of S. and a DR ranking of C.

14 races I was back to a DR B ranking and still SR S which matches the rankings I have on the account that has been active since game launch.

During this moving up the rankings I ran every race like I always do at as fast of a pace that I can run while minimizing mistakes and doing my best to avoid contact with another racer. I do defend my position against a racer trying to force their way by using contact to do so.

My experience between two accounts is if you just race and not focus on the rankings the game will actually likely place you where you should be.

I've let my DR drop to gain SR

I have not experienced that you need to falsely game the rankings unless your gaming the system and that in many cases is what is causing the problem.

If a racer finds himself unable to remain within a ranking level whether it be DR or SR then his skills whether speed or safety then apparently their skills do not actually meet that rankings criteria and is causing the problem by continuing to game the system.

Also certain online races and tracks are more inclined to have a negative impact on a players rankings than others so what races you choose to race do have some impact as well.

Another note there do seem to be more issues finding clean races since the holiday with all the new players but my second account experience was done after the holidays so it is still not all the problem, just more than it was in my experiences since the holidays than before the holidays.

I am not racing as much online as a result.

 

[Crazy Taylor]

Blue flags need to be added especially when backpackers try to race in front of you. I had this on bathurst when they nearly cost me the rac

 

[chris090927]

That would be the DR rankings, correct? DR is a level of how fast you are not how incident free you race.

Yes. While the two are unrelated, they are somewhat related as you cannot move up in DR after a race where you receive a negative SR, or so I've read elsewhere.

14 races I was back to a DR B ranking and still SR S which matches the rankings I have on the account that has been active since game launch.

You are obviously an excellent online driver. I have only attained as high as a B (DR) but have attained S (SR) and have done it without falling back. That is, until lately. I hadn't experienced the kind of malicious driving until the last two weeks or so—maybe in the month of January?

I have not experienced that you need to falsely game the rankings unless your gaming the system and that in many cases is what is causing the problem……

My experience between two accounts is if you just race and not focus on the rankings the game will actually likely place you where you should be.

I'm glad you haven't had the experience I wrote about above. I have been involved in some such ridiculous races (total smash up derby's) that the only option was to quit, which of course lowers your SR.

Driver's literally wait on a lap for you to come around, and they don't care who it is, they crash them!

Why doesn't GT implement a warning for disqualification for driving extremely slow, as they do for if you're stopped?

 

[Johnnypenso]

Really all that needs to be done is FIRST to start new players at the lowest level of the SR just like they do with the DR.

Second would be to tighten up the criteria which allows a racer to advance or remain in the SR ranks.
Currently it is to easy to game the system and racers are riding at the rear of a race to gain the points to advance to a SR ranking they may well not have the actual racing skills for.

To advance levels some sort of system needs to be implemented that requires a certain amount of DR points advancement before the game will advance an SR ranking which would make staying in the rear with no incidents not meet the requirements to allow the advance of the SR ranking above say level C.

The higher the ranking class the tighter the criteria to remain or the less amount of incidents of any kind that will not draw a penalty or negative SR moving a racer to a lower bracket.

Award positive SR points only on full laps which have no Negative incidents of any kind not for "clean" sectors.

Tightening up the criteria for the different rankings is all that is needed to keep drivers with above x number of incidents out of the higher classes. The game is designed to allow all racer types to play but to be assigned lobbies that they can race against other drivers that race in a similar fashion.

But before any of this can work the penalty system needs to be much better to assign a given penalty to the deserving party rather than an innocent driver. Right now the penalty system is more of a hindrance to cleaning up the racing incidents instead of a help because it can be so easily gamed as it is currently.

I agree on tightening up the criteria but starting drivers at the lowest level would make it worse IMO. The reason is because, you're going to want all the trolls to accumulate at the lowest levels. That's going to make it much harder for you as a noob to advance out of the lower ranks. Starting at a halfway point is actually a good idea because it'll pit you with mostly decent racers if the algorithm is more refined and strict, and allow the trolls to naturally fall backwards and the clean racers to move up the ranks. Things like lapped cars going to ghost are a no brainer IMO, that should have been in from the beginning. Same with anyone going backwards or shooting across the track etc.

 

[Alpha Cipher]

I like the Blue flag Idea.

I do think Black flags would work though, especially on a multiple offense system.
In your example, if you miss a breaking point and are notified you have one or two more incidents before you're black flagged, you'll probably drive better/safer. There's always the chance you'll have another actual accident and get black-flagged, but that should tell you you need more practice.

This worked well in the old F1 game I used to play. It's been a while since I've had aanother racing game.

Point taken. This could work

 

[Koutch_Pro]

Blue flags need to be added especially when backpackers try to race in front of you. I had this on bathurst when they nearly cost me the rac

Yes, they should add the flags. Perhaps in the form of ghosting, to avoid accidents with backmarkers.

To be honest I expected FIA races at least honoring the flag rules. Before you get a black flag, a solid warning will be given, with a punishment (eg, 1 hour no acces, 2nd time, 4 hours no acces etc).

PD could take a look at Wargaming, they had a pretty good punishment regulation in world of tanks up till permabans. Making these unsanctioned casual style races as clean as they can is an inmence task witch involves a ticket system (report + evidence) and a lot of capacity (read paid staff hours).

To be honest, I am now rated c/b. And I totally do not like being punished for something what i did not cause. The absurd trolling I haven't seen thankfully, but being rammed of the track on the straights fighting for P14 back because got torpedoed out isn't much fun either.
And yes, I try to get my SB up as fast as I can, but just 1 race can kill that progress right away. Takes an extra 4 clean races to get it back on B. What I do?, I look at the available races (short oval gr 3? NO thanks...) and select the ones where the chance of a ramfest can be avoided, that works ! Although the nationcup isn't much better, this P14 fightback ram happened just this evening with the huracan on brands. pff.

 

[FastFurious77]

It's because they must be too busy having car porn with each other.

 

[TheGeologist]

When lead lad cars approach back markers, they need to be automatically ghosted.

 

[_ApexPredator]

that's not a feedback system.

Oh you'd be surprised. What's the difference between a third-party forum with a very active user base providing regular criticism, and a "mouth off" email address/dropbox?

As someone with 5+ years experience in the industry working for a AAA company, I can tell you with confidence that the forums, reddit, twitter, etc, are all scoured on a very regular basis.

Whether reported feedback is taken on board and/or acted upon is another matter, but that would be the same no matter the system.

What's your idea of a feedback system?

 

[VFOURMAX1]

When lead lad cars approach back markers, they need to be automatically ghosted.

If the race has a pit stop in it then I am not sure the game even knows at that time who is a leader and who is not. A racer can be shown in 14th place in the race but finish in 3rd in front of you running 4th on the final leader board.

So would it even ghost the correct players if that was the route they decided to go?

 

[Voodoovaj]

As others have said: damage would just increase the fun for such trolls.

We have damage in the FIA races, it doesn't do anything to change people's behavior. It's a minor annoyance at best.

Personally, I am all for damage because I love the spectacle of it and it was in car games over a decade ago. Seems grossly neglected now. That said, it won't stop people from driving into you. People crash into you for three reasons.

1 - They suck - Plain and simple they aren't very good and they hit you. Sucking isn't dirty, it's just sucking. The game is open to a wide public from preteens, to retirees, to those less than sober and less serious about their racing.

2 (A) - They are intentionally hitting you to gain an advantage. It's not that hard to give someone a tiny bump, or a spin, or run them into the grass without even losing much time, much less incur a penalty, or trigger damage. If someone is a "dirty" driver, they are getting good at being dirty.

2 (B) - They are intentionally hitting you out of anger. I'm guilty of this one and I believe many are. When the red mist comes, no one cares about penalties or deterrents.

I have suggested lack of inclusion, but that seems to trigger people getting upset, yet exclusivity is how every other sport is run. Do you want to play a recreational sport? Pay a fee. No fee, no playing. We have a "fee" system in place with the DR and SR, except it's way too easy to have a high SR. If people have to REALLY earn SR, that will help. Then, use SR to keep people out of ranked matches.

Daily RACE A = Any SR
Daily RACE B = SR A or higher
Daily RACE C = SR S only

This does the same as a black flag or damage, except it removes the player from the event BEFORE the damage is done. If someone wants to play a daily, they'd better behave themselves. But, like I said, SR-S is far too easy to gain and maintain.

 

[OrbitingCow]

Yes, I would like a small overhaul of algorithms that detect things too. Black flag for the idiots keep the tracks clean or at least semi-clean.