Does changing your settings really make much of a difference?

[homeforsummer]

I ask this on a personal level as opposed to an objective level. Of course changing the settings, when done well, can increase your car's performance.

I never do anything but the most basic tuning though (downforce, ride height, dampers, final drive etc). I know what everything does, and how it will affect the car if I change it, but most of the time I think it's unnecessary, and I think for most gamers it's more a placebo than anything else.

I mainly race in the expert 500PP races and I never struggle to achieve good results despite the fact that the only changes I make are to bring the car up to the 500PP rating. I'm sure changing settings makes more of a difference against the best drivers in the 750PP races, but I think a good driver with a standard car will still beat 95% of everyone else who's fiddled with the settings.

I think what I'm trying to say is;

Skill > Settings

What does everyone else think? Anyone here not tune their settings and still win? Or anyone get beaten the majority of the time but use all the settings recommendations from this site?

 

[HulaG]

I think it's Skill -> Tune also, but good tune helps pretty much

 

[BB-ANDY-]

E.G - if a car understeers loads, then you tune it so it doesnt; you will make around half a second up at a high speed corner....

 

[88c-v Racer]

I think this is true from playing GT4; good skills > tuning, but in B-spec mode good A-spec skills with the car = good B-spec tuning. With some of the cars I have, especially with high powered front-drive street cars, I think that no amount of tuning will get rid of the exessive understeer, I think that a great driver can get the car around the track with more breaking and later acceleration better than any setup I know of.

 

[ofspunk7]

E.G - if a car understeers loads, then you tune it so it doesnt; you will make around half a second up at a high speed corner....

wow is this really a thread?


Um... yes a good driver always helps, a good tune will improve anyone's lap times. You can tune the car to take every turn how you want it to. I know because I tune every car to how I drive. Here is my advice. Only adjust one thing at a time and you will see what I am talking about. Even the best driver will still do better with a good tune.

GT is not an arcade racer.
It is built off of tunes and real physics.

 

[88c-v Racer]

GT is not an arcade racer.
It is built off of tunes and real physics.

Yes I know, but instead of spending so much time tuning, I just adjust my driving to fit the car's characteristics. it works most of the time, but if it doesn't then I do a little tuning.

 

[888 Tuning]

I wish someone would explain the art of tuning to the guy trying to race his F40 in the Suzuka P750 at the moment... talk about holding the pack up...sheesh !!

 

[nd 4 holden spd]

Being a good driver helps enormously. However, having the right setup is hot on its heals performance wise. Eg. I was racing RudiRaser the other night, incredibly fast driver, both of us were in a 147. I was able to keep up with and occasionally even beat him because I had a good setup and he didn't. Most Touring Car series round winners are the ones who had a good setup on that weekend.

 

[ofspunk7]

Yes I know, but instead of spending so much time tuning, I just adjust my driving to fit the car's characteristics. it works most of the time, but if it doesn't then I do a little tuning.

Yeah I get what you are saying. But I think you can pull better numbers working with both. You have to change your style for every car... or every car type. (RWD, FWD, AWD, MR, FF, FR, RF, RR... you get the idea) All I am saying is if you want to beat the person ahead of you, the best thing to do is take them with driving and a better car. If someone beats me in a race I know i need to race better (unless someone bumped me ) and i think about where my tune let my driving down. I really don't think there is a reason not to have a good tune or to tweak a car. Sometimes it helps, sometimes you take it back and try something else. Trust me a lot of bad races before I can pull out a car that will keep me in the top 3 (or 5 depending on PP).

To each their own.

 

[nd 4 holden spd]

You have to change your style for every car... or every car type. (RWD, FWD, AWD, MR, FF, FR, RF, RR... you get the idea)

That would be the worst car in history, wheelspin all the way up to 250km/hr

 

[ofspunk7]

That would be the worst car in history, wheelspin all the way up to 250km/hr

um... yeah when they make one i will own it though....

 

[NLxAROSA]

A good driver with a bad car can beat less skilled drivers with a good car, no questioning that. Simply because the good driver will know the limitations of his car and knows how to handle it and the less skilled drivers don't.

Still, a less skilled driver can benefit from a good tune as well, if your car is very forgiving it will correct (at least a bit) the mistakes you make.

n4hs's Tuned Z06 for example: it is very forgiving with hardly any wheelspin: even a bad drive can probably still handle it, thus gaining better times than when using the standard Tuned Z06. Ofcourse this driver will still get his bottom kicked by a skilled driver.

But if you have two equally skilled driver and one of them has a car which is tuned specifically for the track at hand, he will have the upper hand.

 

[homeforsummer]

By and large I agree with what people are saying here. As I said, I do tune the cars I race to a basic level, but I've only once raced another person who was consistantly slightly faster than me in the same car, and I expect some careful tuning could sort that out.

ofspunk7: I don't think it's such a bad idea for a thread, especially seeing as it's already prompted discussion, but the point of my original post was to highlight that the importance of tuning seems to be overplayed, in that there are a lot of gamers for whom tuning won't make a blind bit of difference beyond the psychological effect of driving a car they think is better.

If you look in the main GT5 Prologue thread there's a post about "dodgy physics" or similar, where the author of the post is taking simplistic tuning, i.e. changing stiffness of front and rear suspension relative to each other, and expecting a black and white difference in handling.

 

[Ardius]

Being a good driver helps enormously. However, having the right setup is hot on its heals performance wise. Eg. I was racing RudiRaser the other night, incredibly fast driver, both of us were in a 147. I was able to keep up with and occasionally even beat him because I had a good setup and he didn't. Most Touring Car series round winners are the ones who had a good setup on that weekend.

A better example is with F1, all of the drivers are good in their own right. Most of the cars are quite competitive. However, if the car is setup wrong, they are going to have a hard time getting anywhere.

Its not a question of which you should concentrate on to win, its more a fact that two equally skilled drivers in the same car but one with a superior tune is going to lead to one winning and the other not.
Of course you should always concentrate on your driving skill before anything else, however, the tune of your car gives you a significant adavantage when against players of equal or even superior skill.

 

[nd 4 holden spd]

A better example is with F1, all of the drivers are good in their own right. Most of the cars are quite competitive. However, if the car is setup wrong, they are going to have a hard time getting anywhere.

Its not a question of which you should concentrate on to win, its more a fact that two equally skilled drivers in the same car but one with a superior tune is going to lead to one winning and the other not.
Of course you should always concentrate on your driving skill before anything else, however, the tune of your car gives you a significant adavantage when against players of equal or even superior skill.

Quoted for truth!

 

[P3nT4gR4m]

I consider myself a (slightly) above average driver and a (very) below average tuner, however the setup is crucial.

I hot lap more than I race. Usually it takes me a good couple of hundred laps to max out, the last 50 or so laps will be well within a 10th of a second of each other, I've seen be beating my best time by 1 thousandth.

At that point I'll start messing with the setup. Changing one setting at a time I can easy take another 2-4 seconds off my time, by the time I've finished.

Unfortunately this process can take months cos it's basically all trial and error (i really do suck at setups) but I'd say a good tune will make me between 2 and 4 secs a lap nonetheless.

 

[NLxAROSA]

Tuning is also a very personal thing, especially the handling of the car. You might hate and not get good results with a setup I love and get good results with.

 

[Scaff]

All other things being equal a good set-up will give you faster times and certainly any advantage you can gain in a race is well worth it.

On the flip side of it a poor set-up will hamper you in a massive way, sometimes to the point that even driver skill will not help (anyone wanting to test that set brake bias to minimum front and maximum rear, turn off the ABS and head out to the track).

As with everything set-up is often a compromise, but it is well worth doing in my opinion.

Regards

Scaff

 

[deadlyz33]

My tunes are very basic and I like to think I am a pretty competitive racer. My tunes usually only consist of lowering the car and more often than not stiffening the suspension a little (atleast on street cars) If I raise stiffness on something one point, then I will also rase stiffness on the rest of the settings. (IE If I will raise dampening and shocks F/R all 1 point at a time.) If I feel the car oversteers too much or understeers too much I will stiffen or soften the front or rear set-up accordingly. Also I think I always add some negative toe for good luck in AWD cars. Makes sense, no? Most of my tunes are very close to how they came set up.

 

[ofspunk7]

ofspunk7: I don't think it's such a bad idea for a thread, especially seeing as it's already prompted discussion, but the point of my original post was to highlight that the importance of tuning seems to be overplayed, in that there are a lot of gamers for whom tuning won't make a blind bit of difference beyond the psychological effect of driving a car they think is better.

Agreed, I guess i should have said do you really think tuning won't help? That is the only point I am making. You can do better with a better tune...

.... worse with a worse tune (as pointed out).

A good drive will rock any car
A good tune will help any driver
Both will help the most.

 

[HulaG]

A good drive will rock any car
A good tune will help any driver
Both will help the most.

Very well said. :]

 

[homeforsummer]

Agreed, I guess i should have said do you really think tuning won't help? That is the only point I am making. You can do better with a better tune...

.... worse with a worse tune (as pointed out).

A good drive will rock any car
A good tune will help any driver
Both will help the most.

Oh no I understand what you mean, I know that tuning can help, I've just not really felt the need to use it because I don't suffer from not fiddling with the settings. If I suddenly found myself unable to beat a particular driver, I may be tempted. I just think that for a lot or racers on GT, they tune the car in the hope they'll see some massive difference, and still probably hang about in the midfield the whole time.

 

[NLxAROSA]

I just think that for a lot or racers on GT, they tune the car in the hope they'll see some massive difference, and still probably hang about in the midfield the whole time.

The midfield is actually a huge improvement if you usually finish last. Not everyone's a crack at racing. For a bad driver tuning can be the difference between ending up in the kitty litter all the time and actually finishing a race now and then.

 

[nd 4 holden spd]

Oh no I understand what you mean, I know that tuning can help, I've just not really felt the need to use it because I don't suffer from not fiddling with the settings. If I suddenly found myself unable to beat a particular driver, I may be tempted. I just think that for a lot or racers on GT, they tune the car in the hope they'll see some massive difference, and still probably hang about in the midfield the whole time.

Well when I tune a car I typically drop 2sec from the stock lap times. That's a vast improvement IMO. And it helps me keep pace with crazy fast drivers who don't have good tunes.

 

[888 Tuning]

Well when I tune a car I typically drop 2sec from the stock lap times. That's a vast improvement IMO. And it helps me keep pace with crazy fast drivers who don't have good tunes.

Same here... Even just the gearing alone can make a difference of a few seconds on a track.

I find it interesting for people to say they have never needed to tune a car, so dont see the point in it... We all are here for the enjoyment of driving a car fast (although I have had someone tell me they dont want to touch any settings cause they enjoy driving the car exactly as the manufacturer intended) but all the car settings in this game are set at a medium ground, a kind of average-for-all-conditions, I assume to try and reflect the cars real life handling characteristics.

What that means to us is that the car will perform well at most tracks, but wont perform as well as a car that has been setup for a particular track. Thats the difference a tuning makes. Setting a car up for a specific track or removing a particularly tricky handling characteristic of a car.. Ford GT LM is a good example. I've read more than a few posts from people who wont drive this car due to its savage lift off oversteer... with a few tweaks this can be eliminated and makes the car a joy to drive.

I mentioned gearing and thats the obvious one.. but it goes a little further than that in GT5... a great example of this is Daytona Road and Fuji.. Both are similar tracks in that they need some tall gears, but have some tight corners. But a car setup specifically for Fuji wont perform at Daytona as well as a car setup for Daytone... The reason is that the infield of daytona has some nasty bumps that will unsettle a car thats tuned for a lovely smooth track like Fuji..

Successful tuning is understanding the track and the car, and developing a setup that will best suit the conditions at hand.

Look at any serious race team and they will have a setup for each track they race at for the exact same reasons above... Personally I have spent enough time on a few different race tracks to follow this same principle and know the benfit.

Im not trying to sell the Tuning threads here (interestingly both myself and Need4HoldenSpeed run) but just trying to make people realise they dont need to drive around the short comings of a particular car for a particular track... and also its 8:00am saturday morning and I am bored at work

 

[homeforsummer]

I find it interesting for people to say they have never needed to tune a car, so dont see the point in it...

I don't know if you were referring to what I said there, but you've misquoted me a bit. Of course I see the point in changing settings for different tracks, but it is true that a lot of the time I don't really see the need. If I come up against someone who consistantly beats me then I'm more inclined to tune the car a little.

Now that I've got the Ferrari F2007 and there isn't much left to do in the game, I pretty much race online for fun now - and in cars I won't necessarily win in. I think I've tried the PP500 races in pretty much every car eligible, just to see what they're all like. I mainly use the Elise '96 because even though it's slower on the straights than everything else, I enjoy driving it. (My sig changes all the time as I decide to use a different car for most of the races!)

Admittedly, I have changed it slightly. It had a very high 5th gear so I shortened it, I gave it a shorter final drive, and I've lowered it. However, I kept the spring and damper rates the same because they're very forgiving when you slide, which the Elise does a lot with a bit more power through it. And a forgiving car is important in online racing where you're more likely to make mistakes than in a time trial.

 

[Ardius]

^I think he was speaking in general, not necessarily about you.