Less Players in the Americas VS EU?

  • Thread starter ceres2000
  • 37 comments
  • 1,938 views
179
India
India
I've been racing since the start back in October on my UK account. I recently created a new US ID and started racing there to see how much difference was between the 2.

Over the past few days I've seen some very unbalanced races while racing in the Americas. For instance at C/S in EU the races would mostly be a field of C/S or at the most a mix of B/S and C/S. However on the US account I've noticed a lot of times the field was C/S, B/S, A/S and sometimes even one or two S/S thrown in for good measure. And this has happened at different times of day.

And I'm not talking one or two I'm saying in a field of 20 players there are ~8 DR C, 4-5 DR B, 4-5 DR A etc. Can't be the player count is that low right?. Anyway it's just been little over a week with the US ID so I'm not sure if that's the reason why. Was hoping someone could verify if this is normal.
 
I've been racing since the start back in October on my UK account. I recently created a new US ID and started racing there to see how much difference was between the 2.

Over the past few days I've seen some very unbalanced races while racing in the Americas. For instance at C/S in EU the races would mostly be a field of C/S or at the most a mix of B/S and C/S. However on the US account I've noticed a lot of times the field was C/S, B/S, A/S and sometimes even one or two S/S thrown in for good measure. And this has happened at different times of day.

And I'm not talking one or two I'm saying in a field of 20 players there are ~8 DR C, 4-5 DR B, 4-5 DR A etc. Can't be the player count is that low right?. Anyway it's just been little over a week with the US ID so I'm not sure if that's the reason why. Was hoping someone could verify if this is normal.

Sad to say Yes its normal.
 
Very normal. When I was D/S I had quite a few races with B, A, and S DR players. Not enough people to fill the ranks. I have to put most of the blame on PD; they've done very little to push GTS owners to race in Sport mode when less than half the people have even tried it. I'm not sure what the cultural difference is though between regions.
 
It's the same in Oceania also, well during the day anyway. I'm never online late in the day or evening so I don't know what it's like then.
 
I don't think the problem is purely lack of people to the fill the ranks. There's been several times when me and a friend of mine who are both S/S were trying to get in the same race and it kept splitting us up in different rooms where we were the only S class drivers. There's currently over 150 S class drivers in the US alone, out of about 800 worldwide. To be S class, I would imagine you are playing Sport mode quite often, or at least a couple times a week. So out of 150+ people, you would think the likelihood of you being the only one racing at the time would be slim to none. And again thats just US too, that's not even counting the S class drivers from Canada and Brazil. As a S/S driver you should always be able to find a race with 3-4 other S class drivers at the very least during any reasonable time of day. The driver pool is never so thin that it should have to place me with C class drivers, unless maybe at 3 o'clock in the morning. So, I don't really buy that the problem is solely lack of drivers, I think the matchmaking is jacked also.
 
Last edited:
Is this during the daily races, or the FAI? I'm BS in the Asia/Pacific region and in daily races I am always matched with AS and SS, with a few unlucky C and D racers from time to time. In the FIA races, however, I've never had a race that wasn't completely DrB SrS.
 
Europe has the biggest GT players base so I'd say it's to be expected, however looking at your post it's quite scary to see that kind of mix... That would essentially mean there are not 20 players joining the race from C/S and B/S category? That is a crazy low number of players...
 
At a guess I'd think Oceania (Asia/Pacific) would have the lowest player base. I've had a race with only 9 players in a room that should've had 16 (approx. 10 am on a weekday). Check out the mix in my second race that day, everything from D/E to A/S and again, not a full room :confused:

Gran Turismo™SPORT_20180205101203.jpg
 
At a guess I'd think Oceania (Asia/Pacific) would have the lowest player base. I've had a race with only 9 players in a room that should've had 16 (approx. 10 am on a weekday). Check out the mix in my second race that day, everything from D/E to A/S and again, not a full room :confused:

View attachment 713738

That's the worst I've ever seen so far.
 
Here's the stats
http://www.jasonguernsey.net/gts/Drivers-By/Country

Quick count:
NA: ~19%
EU: > 50%

And if you look at this
http://www.jasonguernsey.net/gts/Drivers-By/Driver-Rating

Only 5% of players are in SR.S, probably even less at 99/99

If you're max SR.S you likely end up with DR.A or even DR.S players no matter what DR you are. Most DR.S DR.A players will easily stay at max SR as they get to be the rabbit as soon as their SR drops a little. I'm not sure why but I've seen it plenty times. At max SR I got rooms with mostly DR.S and DR.A with me starting in the back. Then after a couple of destruction derby races (max SR does not mean clean at all) when my SR got closer to 90, matchmaking would put me on pole or 2nd place with a room full of DR.B to DR.D drivers.
 
Is there not a lot of countries on in Asia Region usually only see Japan, Hong Kong and Australia in replays and photos
 
At a guess I'd think Oceania (Asia/Pacific) would have the lowest player base. I've had a race with only 9 players in a room that should've had 16 (approx. 10 am on a weekday). Check out the mix in my second race that day, everything from D/E to A/S and again, not a full room :confused:

View attachment 713738

in Asia Oceania player mostly filled to Daily Race C. I never get that matchmaking so random like that on Daily Race B and C
 
It depends what race you're doing and the times frfr.

Daily race C is usually pretty evened out all day tbh. Daily Race B is usually balanced well provided it's a good combo folk like and usually Daily Race A has a decent matchmaking later on in the day. (Entered a Daily A race at about 7:30-8:00 P.M EST one day and all drivers were A/S as well as myself)
 
At a guess I'd think Oceania (Asia/Pacific) would have the lowest player base. I've had a race with only 9 players in a room that should've had 16 (approx. 10 am on a weekday). Check out the mix in my second race that day, everything from D/E to A/S and again, not a full room :confused:

View attachment 713738
Not sure what part of Australia you're in, but 10am your time is probably a bit early for most Japanese players. Many Aussies and Kiwis are still at work/school as well.
 
That's the worst I've ever seen so far.
Same here, that's why I took the screen shot. Even the race before with only 9 players was more evenly matched, with the second fastest qualifier only a tenth or two off my time and we had a great battle.
in Asia Oceania player mostly filled to Daily Race C. I never get that matchmaking so random like that on Daily Race B and C
This was in race B and it did get better later that morning. I also don't race that often so I'm not sure what it's like at other times.
Not sure what part of Australia you're in, but 10am your time is probably a bit early for most Japanese players. Many Aussies and Kiwis are still at work/school as well.
I'm in Adelaide, and while the split between Aussies and Japanese racers was even in that race, that's certainly not what I usually get. I do tend to notice a higher ratio of Aussies and Kiwis earlier, and as the day goes on, the population of the Daily Races normally becomes far more diverse.
 
Time zones matter, and the EU has always had a heavier player base. The actual matchmaking is anyone's guess however as PD does strange things, I would accept lag issues if they got rid of the region grouping personally.
 
I've been racing since the start back in October on my UK account. I recently created a new US ID and started racing there to see how much difference was between the 2.

Over the past few days I've seen some very unbalanced races while racing in the Americas. For instance at C/S in EU the races would mostly be a field of C/S or at the most a mix of B/S and C/S. However on the US account I've noticed a lot of times the field was C/S, B/S, A/S and sometimes even one or two S/S thrown in for good measure. And this has happened at different times of day.

And I'm not talking one or two I'm saying in a field of 20 players there are ~8 DR C, 4-5 DR B, 4-5 DR A etc. Can't be the player count is that low right?. Anyway it's just been little over a week with the US ID so I'm not sure if that's the reason why. Was hoping someone could verify if this is normal.
I found this (UK) when I moved up to B/S on Saturday... suddenly got Ds and Cs in one race, then Bs and Ss in others... matchmaking prioritises SR.

Time zones matter, and the EU has always had a heavier player base. The actual matchmaking is anyone's guess however as PD does strange things, I would accept lag issues if they got rid of the region grouping personally.

The UK alone has nearly as many players as the US.

Also, the majority of the playerbase in Europe is either GMT (UK) or GMT+1 (France, Spain, Germany). So people are pretty much on at the same time. I think in the US time differences are 3 or 4 hours? Not sure about S. America.

https://www.kudosprime.com/gts/stats.php?stat_preset=nb_players_by_country

Basically in USA, Canada and Brazil (top 3 in Americas) combined there are 618000 players. There are 784000 in just UK and France.
 
Last edited:
Time zones matter, and the EU has always had a heavier player base. The actual matchmaking is anyone's guess however as PD does strange things, I would accept lag issues if they got rid of the region grouping personally.
You... wouldn't want to see that
Trust me

In Oceana on the weekdays the matchmakinf pretty much sucks. 9-10 player lobbies in race B
On the weekends though the field becomes much more equal
 
You... wouldn't want to see that
Trust me

In Oceana on the weekdays the matchmakinf pretty much sucks. 9-10 player lobbies in race B
On the weekends though the field becomes much more equal
Yeah I guess you have quite a big gap of time zones there too?
 
- Different time zones, 24h in a day and 7 days a week, and everyone has different schedules. That spreads out the number of players.
- 3 daily races, some of which are more popular than others, plus the FIA races which will gather more attention from high rank players. That spreads the players even more.
- Regions limiting the field you can run against, especially if you're outside EMEA (a single EU country can have nearly as many players as the whole american or asian region).
- 800 DR S players around the world is at the same time many and not much. Enough so there's most likely one of the few guys who spend their whole day in sports mode (I've seen a DR S guy claiming to drive 800 km a day in sports mode). Not much since most don't even fire the game daily, and those who do will usually focus on FIA or daily C races.
- There's like only 3 DR S people who aren't SR S as well according to stats. Which means if DR S people get their SR lowered, they are basically alone in that place, so they'll get free wins before coming back to full SR S.
- Matchmaking looks for SR first, and SR S drivers aren't the majority.


So the matchmaking actually does the best it can with what it is provided with. Only ways things could change :

- More active players (most likely not gonna happen).
- More SR S players (given how people react to the SR system, I don't expect it to happen in the current state of things).
- Telling DR S drivers "you waited half an hour to race but there are no worthy opponents lol kthxbye" (this wouldn't end well)
- Only allowing one DR level difference between players in a lobby (people would then complain they don't have full grid races and say the game is bad)
- Focusing on DR before SR for matchmaking (and have countless "I'm SR S and keep getting punted by dumb SR D players" rant topics on GT Planet and people quitting the game)
- Getting regions mixed together (and have people complain about lag)


To me, things can't change without a more active player base or a completely reworked SR sytem giving more radical incentives to race clean.
 
- Different time zones, 24h in a day and 7 days a week, and everyone has different schedules. That spreads out the number of players.
- 3 daily races, some of which are more popular than others, plus the FIA races which will gather more attention from high rank players. That spreads the players even more.
- Regions limiting the field you can run against, especially if you're outside EMEA (a single EU country can have nearly as many players as the whole american or asian region).
- 800 DR S players around the world is at the same time many and not much. Enough so there's most likely one of the few guys who spend their whole day in sports mode (I've seen a DR S guy claiming to drive 800 km a day in sports mode). Not much since most don't even fire the game daily, and those who do will usually focus on FIA or daily C races.
- There's like only 3 DR S people who aren't SR S as well according to stats. Which means if DR S people get their SR lowered, they are basically alone in that place, so they'll get free wins before coming back to full SR S.
- Matchmaking looks for SR first, and SR S drivers aren't the majority.


So the matchmaking actually does the best it can with what it is provided with. Only ways things could change :

- More active players (most likely not gonna happen).
- More SR S players (given how people react to the SR system, I don't expect it to happen in the current state of things).
- Telling DR S drivers "you waited half an hour to race but there are no worthy opponents lol kthxbye" (this wouldn't end well)
- Only allowing one DR level difference between players in a lobby (people would then complain they don't have full grid races and say the game is bad)
- Focusing on DR before SR for matchmaking (and have countless "I'm SR S and keep getting punted by dumb SR D players" rant topics on GT Planet and people quitting the game)
- Getting regions mixed together (and have people complain about lag)


To me, things can't change without a more active player base or a completely reworked SR sytem giving more radical incentives to race clean.
A very good an accurate assessment. I agree, it is the best it can be and those asking for more than 3 daily races will only complain more about worse matchmaking.
 
Actually, there could be another way I didn't mentioned : get rid of fixed hours for races, and just start a race when there are enough people of the same level to fill a lobby. Waiting time will be huuuge though, when you see something played as much as Overwatch will take sometimes 45 minutes to get Grand Masters into a game.
 
Actually, there could be another way I didn't mentioned : get rid of fixed hours for races, and just start a race when there are enough people of the same level to fill a lobby. Waiting time will be huuuge though, when you see something played as much as Overwatch will take sometimes 45 minutes to get Grand Masters into a game.
Yeah, forget that. I like the schedule.
 
- Different time zones, 24h in a day and 7 days a week, and everyone has different schedules. That spreads out the number of players.
- 3 daily races, some of which are more popular than others, plus the FIA races which will gather more attention from high rank players. That spreads the players even more.
- Regions limiting the field you can run against, especially if you're outside EMEA (a single EU country can have nearly as many players as the whole american or asian region).
- 800 DR S players around the world is at the same time many and not much. Enough so there's most likely one of the few guys who spend their whole day in sports mode (I've seen a DR S guy claiming to drive 800 km a day in sports mode). Not much since most don't even fire the game daily, and those who do will usually focus on FIA or daily C races.
- There's like only 3 DR S people who aren't SR S as well according to stats. Which means if DR S people get their SR lowered, they are basically alone in that place, so they'll get free wins before coming back to full SR S.
- Matchmaking looks for SR first, and SR S drivers aren't the majority.


So the matchmaking actually does the best it can with what it is provided with. Only ways things could change :

- More active players (most likely not gonna happen).
- More SR S players (given how people react to the SR system, I don't expect it to happen in the current state of things).
- Telling DR S drivers "you waited half an hour to race but there are no worthy opponents lol kthxbye" (this wouldn't end well)
- Only allowing one DR level difference between players in a lobby (people would then complain they don't have full grid races and say the game is bad)
- Focusing on DR before SR for matchmaking (and have countless "I'm SR S and keep getting punted by dumb SR D players" rant topics on GT Planet and people quitting the game)
- Getting regions mixed together (and have people complain about lag)


To me, things can't change without a more active player base or a completely reworked SR sytem giving more radical incentives to race clean.
This x999999999
Yeah I guess you have quite a big gap of time zones there too?
-1 hour from Japan, which is half the playerbase in Oceana region. At night the grid is at least full but the DR gap is waaayy too much.
 
Well, the EU is Gran Turismo's biggest market outside Japan so...
Well....EU and EEUU are the biggest market's for gran turismo games...not at all Japan that is even behind the EEUU market ..
And the worst market is the Asian one.

Screenshot_20180212-162251.png
Screenshot_20180212-162241.png
Screenshot_20180212-162231.png
Screenshot_20180212-162205.png
 
I have maintained SR/S for most of my “Sport Mode Career” but mostly maintain a D for my DR. (I’ve hit DR/C for a few brief days twice). I play in the USA. No matter what time I play or day for that matter, I am mostly matched against DR/S, A & B drivers. It is terribly frustrating because this gives me a slim chance of winning, but I race anyway. I love the Sport Mode and all it offers, but just wish I could be grouped with more drivers in my skill set. I’ve been chasing that 5th victory forever it seems like...LOL. I’m not really interested in dropping down my SR rating either, so I trudge on
 
I've been racing since the start back in October on my UK account. I recently created a new US ID and started racing there to see how much difference was between the 2.

Over the past few days I've seen some very unbalanced races while racing in the Americas. For instance at C/S in EU the races would mostly be a field of C/S or at the most a mix of B/S and C/S. However on the US account I've noticed a lot of times the field was C/S, B/S, A/S and sometimes even one or two S/S thrown in for good measure. And this has happened at different times of day.

And I'm not talking one or two I'm saying in a field of 20 players there are ~8 DR C, 4-5 DR B, 4-5 DR A etc. Can't be the player count is that low right?. Anyway it's just been little over a week with the US ID so I'm not sure if that's the reason why. Was hoping someone could verify if this is normal.

Yeah talk about unbalanced lobbies! In back to back games in Nurburgring Gr. 3 today, I started 3rd in one race and dead last in another race using the same qualifying time.
 
Back