F1 2012 BBFred's Not-So-Expert F1 Career

F1 2012 The Game (Codemasters)
Hi guys,

So here comes (again ;)) my next instalment of the not-so-expert careers… Or should I say definitely-not-so-expert, as you know CM upped the ante quite a bit this year!
As usual, let's get the rules and specs down:

5-year career starting with Toro Rosso - Long weekends - 100% races (that's new)
No assists - Full sims - 0 Flashbacks - Pro AI

What I play with:
- Medion Akoya i7 2600 3.4 Ghz - 8 GB RAM DDR3 - GeForce GTX 560
- Thrustmaster RGT FFB Clutch edition
- TrackIR 5 w/ Trackclip pro
- DXtory for video capture

The mods I use:
- Competitive braking v.2.5 by Hill - new
- Mechanical effects & problems v.2.8 by Kartik Sri Hashra - new
- Revised performance v.1.1 by Johnny Dangerously - new
- Safety car fix RC1 by Roberto Costa, Remy de Leeuw, Driveroz247 & Wills - new
- Fusion Tyres HD by Zeno Dyk and Vlasovas - new
- Supla's Helmet pack 5 by Supla - new
- F1 2012 All tracks update HD by Dejanibanez - new
- HD Toro Rosso wheel by Kubi
- Toro Rosso helmet by Yoshikanji
- AI Realism mod v2.3 by Demy van Zoggel
- Stained and hard wear for tyres by Vlasovas
- Toro Rosso STR7 HD by Pebz
- Removed start lights by Filasbrezna
- Damage mod v2.0 by Cromiell (starting on S1-2)
- My own and humble cockpit and rear view mod
- Some personal changes to the database

Hope you’ll enjoy the series, and comments are always welcome in this thread!
 
So here we go for the new series. I chose Toro Rosso because I didn’t want it too easy on Pro AI, I drove for Williams in F1 2011, and I don’t like Force India livery colours… (how’s that for a good reason?!)

Also I’m going for 100% races this time… Not that I like it, but 50% means 1 pit stop on pretty much every track, and to me at least it kills the strategy side of F1 racing. Eh, we’ll see how it goes, and I can always have a 4-sec break (or longer…) during pit stops if need be.

Whatever, now is time for some Aussie racing!

Melbourne has always been a tricky start for me. I love the track, but it doesn’t always seem to agree with me, especially S3.

And… my first Practice of the season confirmed my impressions, as I couldn’t be faster than 1:31.8, chalking up a timid 16th at the end.

Still, I managed to pass Q1, on Primes. If barely, since I made 17th with a time of 1:31.6. Hopefully, with Options in Q2, there’s room for progress…

 
For this episode I added Cromiell’s damage mod, medium settings, that roughly multiplies by 3 the damage incurred by both the AI and me. No need to say I’ll be driving on ‘eggs’, especially on the 1st lap, since it seems, in that configuration, it only takes one hit of a bollard at moderate speed to get some damage!
I also took the time to set track difficulty to the right challenge for me. In this race, it's set at 81% (compared to the old 77% and new 85% Pro dif.).

Other than that, Melbourne sees me standing 15th in WDC, right behind my team mate. Which is refreshing because it's the 1st time a team mate provides any kind of challenge... :thumbsup: I feel this is going to make this career even more interesting!

But, to the race

Firstly, I kinda like Kuala Lumpur, esp. sector 2 and the beginning of sector 3, which are quite technical.

And P3 pushed my hopes up, as I managed to get the 8th time on Options eventually.

Q1 was uneventful in the sense that I made it through on Primes, with 15th pos and a time of 1:40.7.
I geared my setup towards some rain as 35% chance is forecast, so I don’t know where I’m going from here exactly, esp. since the slew of patches in the last weeks…

 
Sorry for taking so long to post again, there was work, moving up to a new video editing program, and then certain… changing… :mad: weather conditions :thumbsdown: during the coming race that really p*ssed me off… Well, the whole extent of my woes will become apparent towards the last laps of the race, so I’ll say no more.

I set difficulty at 81% and, starting this race, I’ve also decided to race with no proximity markers. Just as well use the TrackIR and the now half-decent mirrors to the most!

On the modding front, after last race and its slew of DNFs, I edited damage settings so that the AI isn’t so ‘fragile’, and also added an excellent tyre mod made by Vlasovas. :thumbsup:

Anyway, back to season news… Kuala Lumpur saw me rake up my 1st championship pts, boosting me up to 12th in WDC. Ricciardo, finishing just outside the points, is right on my gearbox in 13th. As a result, Toro Rosso has moved up to 8th, just ahead of Williams, so things are going well! :)

And now it’s on to China…

Which isn’t my fav race, not by far. Except from the snail-like turn 1, which is really fun to take, and gives me an edge on the AI, whenever I get it right! Some of sector 2 is technical enough to keep me awake, too, esp. the dreaded turn 9, but the rest I find uninspiring… :coffee:

Still, Practice left me at a surprising 1st pos, 8 tenths ahead of Button, but I didn’t take it for granted…
And I was right, because I couldn’t make better than 15th in Q1, on Primes though. Now, as it’s coming down to Q2, I’m confident I can take a decent grid position, although Q1 seems quite a bit of a stretch.

And then, there’s 20% chance of rain announced for race day. I don’t know what to think of it, as I haven’t raced in rain yet….

 
The disaster of last race set me back 2 positions in WDC, that is 14th. The ‘good’ news is, though, that Ricciardo didn’t fare any better, and lost 3 pos down to 17th! As a consequence, our team went down to 9th too. I’ll blame my teammate for it! And the weather too, for good measure… :D

Whatever, I got over it, and even installed an AI realism mod from Demy van Zogel, making the AI waaay more challenging! :thumbsup:
And for this race, I set difficulty at 81% again, which like last race stands in-between the old and new Pro levels.

Bahrain isn’t my best pick for a possible comeback in my team’s good books… At least sector 2 is fun, with in particular a treacherous turn 10 that can kill your tyres in no time if you don’t get your breaking right! :barefoot:

But it’s on to the race in Bharain, where at least it shouldn’t rain! :cool:

P1 as previously left me in a suspicious 1st pos, almost 1 sec faster than Alonso. No need to say I didn’t take that for granted… I was more careful to balance my car so I wouldn’t wear out my rear tyres faster than the front ones, as seems to be the trend on this track.

And even though I went through Quali 1 on Primes, with an honourable 11th pos, I’m getting the feeling Quali 2 will be a tough nut to crack… Thankfully, my objective is only to make 16th!
 
Thanks for the input guys, just the kind of drive I needed to start editing Catalunya! :thumbsup:

@Shane Butler I kinda agree with you on that. Although, with the new somewhat functional mirrors, it makes sense to have a wider field of view in cockpit mode.
 
Let’s start with a little AAR from Sakhir: I’m glad I’ve been back in the points, and even gladder I managed fuel to the best and held my own on the last stint, for a change!

Still, my result pushes me further back in WDC to 16th, thanks (or not) to Räikkönen making a good result on last race. Despite me & Ricciardo scoring points, Toro Rosso still sits 9th in WDC, but we’re only a breath away from Williams.

So let’s keep in on, and race in Catalunya!

And I’ll start with saying I love this track! I’m beginning to know it very well, and in this 2012 opus I’ve even found my way through Campsa. I”ve had to find a new breaking point to La Caixa though, and stay away from turn 11’s kerbs! The last chicane doesn’t prove too traitorous this year either, although you now have to watch the exit.

On to Practice 3, and, for a change, it left me in 1st pos, a full sec ahead of Schumacher. I’m now definitely convinced that the new Practice doesn’t mean a thing to the race, let alone Quali… All it helped with was making evident I have a problem with my left front tyre, wearing off well ahead of the others, so I’ve been trying to balance camber and front springs to counter that.

On to Quali 1, and I barely passed it with a measly 1:27.0 on Primes… plus the help of Alonso and Pérez who happened to have a very bad day, from a mechanical perspective.

So here I am, ready to take on Quali 2, but not exactly holding my breath for more. Actually, I’ll be happy if I can reach my target pos of 14th!

 
Google translator ==> That's life? :D But it seems you're improving. Catalunya is a hard track because the AI is at it's best, but you were in the points. You'll prolly take some wins in the end of the season. :)

Yep that's the translation. :D Thanks for the comments! Although keep in mind I played that race at 80% difficulty, halfway between the old and new Pro difficulties. So I've got a lot of progress to make still! :p

Very nice BBFred, comparing Melbourne and Catalunya, you made nice progress.:thumbsup:
I would start with my career, only highlights of races. But I can't get HD videos because of my hardware. Will people be interested in that anyway?:unsure:

Thanks Sasha. It's true that since Melbourne I've learnt a lot about the new handling and AI behaviour. :thumbsup:
As for putting your career on Youtube, don't ask whether people will be interested or not, just do it! And as long as you don't get dislikes, keep posting them. People often just watch and don't contribute, even if they liked it.

I can testify it's taken me almost a full year to start getting feedbacks on mine! ;)
 
Sasha Jednak, Yeah I aggree with BBFred. You can try. I tried and I got only.. I think 1 guy who was watching regularly. Altho now I lost motivation due to low views and likes and etc. I hoped I'll get something around Andrew Bortz's views. I don't think I look like a noob or something. It seems people just don't like my videos for some reason. You may become a YouTube star. Who knows. You won't know before you try. You can always stop if you see it's pointless. :)

BBFred, well if you continue making 100% races, you'll see a big big improvement in no time. My cousin made 1 full season on 50% races and he's maybe 1-2 seconds faster than he was before. And this F1 game is his first one. So if you make 100% races - you're gonna get double the experience. Just keep on doing your career. :)
 
First an AAR from Catalunya: Pole came as a complete surprise to me. I should have lost it during the 2nd stint of Q3, but apparently Webber caused a major pile up that saved my day, while pushing him back 20 pos on the grid! But the race didn’t go that well… My setup was wrong as it ate too much off my left front tyre, to the point that I couldn’t stick to my original pit stop strat. And then there was the penultimate lap… No comment! :D

As a result of the bad… results in Spain, our driver and team standings haven’t changed. Ricciardo finishing ahead that race is making things interesting for the team mate challenge though, as I’m leading 4 – 1 in qualis, but he’s ahead 3 – 2 in races!

Let’s move on to Monaco anyway!

Not exactly my favourite track, as it feels so cramped in there! On the plus side, this year I find it easier to find the correct line in high speed corners, and can take on the Piscine corners at full speed with confidence. Conversely, finding the right breaking point for Chicane, and not corner cut it, has proved quite difficult. Also, I’ll have to deal with extra tyre wear on the rear set. Finally, I’m planning on finishing my 2nd engine, which now stands at 85% and trying out Aggressive fuel strat, since raw horsepower and consumption shouldn’t be a big issue here.

All in all, this is my 1st 100% race at Monaco, and I know this event will be an endurance race, with only one goal: Finish! :coffee:

To make things a little more interesting in Practice I’m not using Mix 3 anymore. I still managed a decent 1:19.6 on Primes during testing, which earned me 3rd. Still, I’m not sure that’ll be enough to make Q3 this time! Further testing leaves me somewhat optimistic on tyre wear balance, as long as I keep it easy on the throttle. Easier said than done in race when you can smell someone’s gearbox, though…

However, Q1 earned me a solid 10th on Primes, and I even made it through Q2 in 8th pos! Knowing how important grid position can be at Monaco, I’ll try and do my best on this last session…

 
  • Deleted member 137812

That is some great races you have there!
I really like the way you are battling for positions, seems your difficulty is exactly what it needs to be.
And don't tell yourself you're not good yet, cuz driving with that camera isn't as easy as driving with the default camera. Think i might try that cam when I've got some time to race again.

What version of my mod are you using? You might want to try the latest one which prevents you from random retirements. (If you feel like do so, your season looks great without!) So an HRT will retire more often than a Ferrari. The only thing you have to copy do your database is the "team_round_modifier" values (or something like that) and the "ai_mechanical_failure" value. You also need the latest ai_driver_config file to get this well-balances. ;)
 
Thanks for the kind comments and the info on your latest mod version Demy!
Indeed I take the time (now that I know how to edit the DB :D) to pick the right difficulty track after track. Makes the game so much more interesting!

I've been using v2.2 so far, but thanks to your heads up I'm moving to v2.3 in time for the Montréal race! Could you just tell me which tab the team_round_modifier is in? I found ai_mechanical_failure in the ai_driver tab, but not the other one.
 
  • Deleted member 137812

it says canned_events_team_modifiers, its in the left column.
when you get there copy my engine_failure and engine_problem into yours.
you need my latest ai_driver_config file to get this working though, because you will have to much retirements without!
 

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