How to Manage your B-Spec driver!

  • Thread starter Thread starter Malefic
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Malefic

Malefic

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Malefic
I see a lot of people confused on how to manage thier driver durring a race, and after playing a bit I think I could clear a few things up. If you have any extra questions post them and I or someone here will try and answer.

1. The Blue-Red meter needs to be used as a guage to how hard your driver is pushing, not so much his mood. If he is deep in the red and he has low skill he will over drive the car/tires and go off and just leave you worse then before. So if it isnt a PRIME time to make a pass, keep pressing "PACE DOWN" until he's at least 50/50 in the middle.

So in short, PACE UP and PACE DOWN dont neccisarly effect pace right away. It just affects how hard he will try. So play it smart and slow.

2. It doesnt matter if his car is MUCH MUCH faster then the rest of the field when it comes to gaining XP. So put him in something fast while he's a crap driver and save yourself a lot of time.

Hope this helps... its all the basics... but there was NOTHING in the game explaining how this all works together.
 
My B spec driver frustrates the heck out of me. He can't drive to save his life! I put him into my tricked out civic which I know is 10X faster than anything on the track on first race Sunday Cup beginner and three times now the best he can manage is last place...
 
Lillee
My B spec driver frustrates the heck out of me. He can't drive to save his life! I put him into my tricked out civic which I know is 10X faster than anything on the track on first race Sunday Cup beginner and three times now the best he can manage is last place...
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Really? I put mine in my chrome line Lambo and he just blew everyone away.
 
Wait till u put him into your stock Zonda R huhu
My question is while creating him, there are cool and hot types? I got 2 of each right now,
Another question, where do u train your drivers? I let em roll in my mercedes 190 evo2 ( they dont really like the car as much as i do) on schwarzwald in expert, 12 min race for 23000 cash looks like the bang for the buck right now someone knows better?
 
I've got 4 lvl 15+ b-spec drivers, and I'll share a few things I've perceived also...

It seems that the drivers get "better" with certain drivetrain types (AWD, FR, FF, etc.), the more you race with them. I have a driver that is killer with AWD, but spins a lot in every FR he drives. On the other hand, my other driver is skilled at driving FR cars, but always understeers off the track or into the wall with an AWD car.

They also seem to have a learning curve with new cars. I've used an S2000 in the turbo series on a certain track, and my driver couldn't handle it. After he finished mid-pack, I instantly restarted....presto, he was in first place by the 3rd lap!

This learning curve also applies to individual turns on a course. I've had a couple drivers that had one "Achilles" turn that he always messes up. A few turns before that bad turn, I always used Pace Down, until he got the hang of the speed. After that, he can corner it perfectly with a fully red bar.

They learn with experience. It took me until lvl 16 in B-spec to beat the Daytona track with the Truck Series. My driver ALWAYS used the brakes really hard in the tri-oval and before each turn, and there was noooo way he would ever win (this was at around lvl 8). I took him back at lvl 15-16, and he would go wide-open the entire track (with the exact same truck as before).

Remember, even if they lose, you get more exp/money that you would in A-spec. They will level up fast even with losses, so every loss is technically their gain.

Once you get a new driver, it doesn't hurt to put him in one of the higher-tier races with car that will dominate. Some races will level them from 0 to 5 in one go.

Good luck with B-spec! I'm loving it! I can't wait til the online functionality is implemented!

EDIT: To answer Vautwin's question about the hot vs. cold drivers:

I have two of both: Two hot, Two cold...

It seems to affect how quickly they get excited/pushed (the red end of the bar). My hot driver's will immediately race to the red, while my cool driver has a slower increase. The hotter driver is also harder to Pace Down, as anytime he gets close to another car, his bar increases or stops decreasing. The cooler driver is easier to Pace Down, and in fact, his bar will plummet if he's out front and you use Pace Down. The only downside is that his pace slows very quickly if he's out front and you don't constantly use Maintain Pace or Increase Pace.
 
Huhu i might have hit them with the ruler, am a very sever manager, they all get blue pretty quick after runnin at their pace without my intervention, my lvl 16 seems to master every type of car pretty good, so u think i should let them drive one specific type or mix the types from time to time?
 
What basic stats did you start with?

I chose a driver with cool mentality and good braking. During races I try to keep him as calm as possible and honestly his driving is very nice!

I also love all the mistakes he makes because that tells me that the AI in general is quite human-like.

In A Spec, I'm lvl 16 and the AI is ok, not so static as people claim. Though I do hope AI makes more mistakes as we progress in the game.
 
Fonzdaii
What basic stats did you start with?

I chose a driver with cool mentality and good braking. During races I try to keep him as calm as possible and honestly his driving is very nice!

I also love all the mistakes he makes because that tells me that the AI in general is quite human-like.

In A Spec, I'm lvl 16 and the AI is ok, not so static as people claim. Though I do hope AI makes more mistakes as we progress in the game.
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I've always worked from if he's a cool or hot driver and let him work his stats up from wherever they are.
 
Malefic
I see a lot of people confused on how to manage thier driver durring a race, and after playing a bit I think I could clear a few things up. If you have any extra questions post them and I or someone here will try and answer.

1. The Blue-Red meter needs to be used as a guage to how hard your driver is pushing, not so much his mood. If he is deep in the red and he has low skill he will over drive the car/tires and go off and just leave you worse then before. So if it isnt a PRIME time to make a pass, keep pressing "PACE DOWN" until he's at least 50/50 in the middle.

So in short, PACE UP and PACE DOWN dont neccisarly effect pace right away. It just affects how hard he will try. So play it smart and slow.

2. It doesnt matter if his car is MUCH MUCH faster then the rest of the field when it comes to gaining XP. So put him in something fast while he's a crap driver and save yourself a lot of time.

Hope this helps... its all the basics... but there was NOTHING in the game explaining how this all works together.
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hmm how certain of number 2 are you?
 
Malefic
I see a lot of people confused on how to manage thier driver durring a race, and after playing a bit I think I could clear a few things up. If you have any extra questions post them and I or someone here will try and answer.

1. The Blue-Red meter needs to be used as a guage to how hard your driver is pushing, not so much his mood. If he is deep in the red and he has low skill he will over drive the car/tires and go off and just leave you worse then before. So if it isnt a PRIME time to make a pass, keep pressing "PACE DOWN" until he's at least 50/50 in the middle.

So in short, PACE UP and PACE DOWN dont neccisarly effect pace right away. It just affects how hard he will try. So play it smart and slow.

2. It doesnt matter if his car is MUCH MUCH faster then the rest of the field when it comes to gaining XP. So put him in something fast while he's a crap driver and save yourself a lot of time.

Hope this helps... its all the basics... but there was NOTHING in the game explaining how this all works together.
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Great thread, and it has totally saved b-spec for me. I was gettin so frustrated with how he was driving.

For instance, I put E. Hahn in the 62 Special for the Beginners World Classic, I had him race it multiple times, cause I did notice that he would learn a track if ya race it a few times. But he would never do better than 3rd on Eiger, and P1's the other two.

I honestly started to think that the car just had too much mass and Eiger too many corners, so I took it out and of course was in P1 by turn two.

Followed the advice found here in this thread and got him to P1 it in two tries.
 
The B-Spec mode certainly taxes ones patience. Your AI driver is not the best at using his chances when it comes to overtaking opponents. I guess that's one of the reasons why the B-spec races are always twice as long as the A-spec races. To give your driver more time to end up in P1.

But i have to say i had a lot of fun with the mode so far. after the initial frustration phase which was mainly caused by the lack of instruction/explanation of the mode...i guess 5 years of development time is not enough to put together a decent manual...i really started to like it.

my driver is now on level 13 and his abilities really have improved from the beginning. seems that there is more depth in this mode than the initial "one button control scheme" might suggest.

anybody figured out what that "arrow icon" beside the drivers helmet means? when your in the menu, you see a helmet icon for each of your drivers, and beside the helmet is a varying colored arrow pointing in different directions. i figured it is something like "motivation"? is this explained somewhere?

regards
Max
 
From what i have experienced, unless your AI driver is higher level than the event itself, hes probably going to fail.
 
Does 'Sharing' your driver with friends do anything yet? I thought when your friend shares their drive he races with you in your races.
 
Schmo
Does 'Sharing' your driver with friends do anything yet? I thought when your friend shares their drive he races with you in your races.
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On the Sony website it says that the remote racing feature is planned to be activated sometime in December. So right now it does nothing, except blocking you from using the driver yourself locally.

regards
Max
 
I have only done two races in B-spec, but my driver is currently 2-0.

His strength is the highest overall and his mental stats is the 2nd best, while being considered "hot."

I had him driving each race with the Tommy Kara ZZ-S and both he cleaned the clocks against the rest of the pack (2nd place was about 4 seconds behind).

Not sure how drivers are suppose to acknowledge orders, but he has given me the okay each time I issue one. I haven't played much but my driver has been off to a good start.
 
maxdreamland
anybody figured out what that "arrow icon" beside the drivers helmet means? when your in the menu, you see a helmet icon for each of your drivers, and beside the helmet is a varying colored arrow pointing in different directions. i figured it is something like "motivation"? is this explained somewhere?

regards
Max
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Would much appreciate explanation on this.
 
I'm finding that keeping the Blue-Red meter down between 50-65% for much of the lap is really effective in the early stages. Using 'Pace Down' seems to be very effective oddly at getting him through the field. It ensures that he remains around the middle of the bar and makes miinimal mistakes.

I've found constantly using it throughout a lap allows him to at least hold his position before I use 'Increase Pace' as he comes out of the final corner and he gains spots on the straight before going back to 'Pace Down' to get that bar back down near the middle again for the rest of the lap.

This is of course using a quicker car which means he has the pace on the straights. The rest of the lap I just focus on ensuring he stays on the track
 
I'm so glad they up the lap count in B-spec. It gives Bob time to overtake all the cars and you don't have to tune the car to maximum wasting lots of money.
 
An experiment in Bob management:

At GVS in the GT-R GT500 I let Bob (20th level) run totally cold for a few laps, then sped him up so that he ran a couple of laps right in the middle of the gray area, then pushed him to the top of the red for the rest of the race. He was far in the lead so no other cars to affect the experimant.

Results:

Cold - 2:14.5
Middle - 2:00.5
Hot - 2:01.0

When pushed to the limit, Bob was sliding sideways almost every corner. He never spun out but he was leaving impressive black stripes and running the rears cherry red.

I have also found that Bob will not push to make a pass even if he's faster, so you have to tell him to overtake. If told to do so, he will push to pass.
 
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So I have a couple questions....

When I get ready to select my driver for the race it shows an ORANGE arrow pointing downward next to his helmet? What does that mean?

And when do I get the ability to get a 2nd driver? I've won gold in all races so far in the beginner circuit and my driver is a lvl 7
 

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