F1 2010 Career Race Pace

[jdrawmer]

Hi All,

This is my first post - new to the forum but as I do with a lot of games I really get into, I thought i'd find a forum and community to join.

I'd consider myself a decent driver, but not expert by any means. I've got a career with legend AI difficulty but still lots of driver assists on, and still automatic gears, whilst inbetween career races, i'm doing time trials to improve my manual gears. I've got to the point where i'm pretty much able to match my automatic times now which is great.

However I digress. The reason for the post is simple, and probably mentioned a lot. Race pace in career mode.

I've started doing 100% length races, so started a new career, with fuel and tyre degration on (because i realised it was too easy with them off). I'm only at Malaysia, but have realised that my qualifying pace is far from my race pace.

Now i'm not one that's going to complain about this, because at Lotus it makes sense - able to put in a fairly hot lap, to then struggle with a full fuel load. I just want to know if there's any more info on this, and if that is indeed, and it's not just a bug.

 

[Andrew Bortz]

To reply to your pace at Kuala Lumpar id say you can qualify first if you use options but it wont be by much, however in terms of your race pace to qualifyng pace it should be that your slower than your qualifying at the start and around the last few laps able to come close or match qualifying pace.

 

[jdrawmer]

Hi Andrew,

I'm not talking in comparison to my qualifying times, because I know that shouldn't happen...

I have qualified 7th in Kuala Lumpar, however no matter where abouts I am on the track, there's somebody up my rear end. Obviously consistency plays a part, but even with an error-free lap, i'm having to hold off other cars.

I just want to know if that is simply because i'm in a Lotus (which is fine, and i'd expect that), or if this is the case no matter what

 

[Andrew Bortz]

Mainly yes it will be because your in a Lotus however im pretty well paced there, I finished 3rd there in my first season in the HRT but I put most of this down to me using a 1/1 wing setup that allows me to keep cars behind me when going down the straights.

 

[jdrawmer]

Well it seems whatever I do, i'm being pounded on the straights, and i ALWAYS have a car behind me. I've tried all the setups in the forums too, but no real difference. I won in Bahrain, but that's probably down to gaining about 2-3 seconds on the chicane, and I only managed 9th in Australia

 

[David O'Reilly]

Hi Jdrawmer.
The season 1 lotus is going to get blown away a bit performance wise. With R&D upgrades it gets faster.
Season 2 it is a race winning car at certain tracks, (Silverstone, Monza, Bahrain again).
Season 3of 7 its faster again: I have fuel sim off all other sims on, Legend AI and auto is only assist.
I have just finished China and have 3 wins from 4. Bahrain (race pace) , Melb (helped by wet quali), China (race strategy and rain moved me from P6 to P1 read my superb race report thread lol).
http://www.racedepartment.com/f1-20...e-strategy-overcomes-dastardly-legend-ai.html

But still I was P6 I think in Malaysia. AI are slow through turns 7 and 8 and you can pull a gap but they then seem to close you down again. Each track is a bit different and you will sometimes outpace them.
Andrew is very fast and such speed takes time.

 

[Wojciech Grabowski]

The problem is Fuel sim. AI is not affected, so they're much faster on straights (like without fuel). That's shame of CM, you can't be so as fast on first laps as AI is...

My only advice is... drive 50% races... Game isn't good enough to drive 100% race with fun.

And in fact, You need good set-up for every track. Try 1/1 wings in races, like Victor said... I always have 2 setups - Qualifying, which I'm setting in first practice for driving as fast as I can, and second setup (made on second pracitce) - Race. This setup is just slighty modified version of Qualifying set-up (less wings to make me faster with fuel loaded, balance to front, brakes closer to 50/50 etc...). Try to modify setups from forum.

And remember that Victor's setups are awesome

 

[jdrawmer]

Thanks guys,

That kind of brings me to another question I had actually - If I stay with Lotus for season 2, what happens?

1. Car gets better
2. Car gets better dependent on where you finish as a constructor
3. Season starts as it would in season 1
4. None of the above?

Thanks for the info anyway! At least I know it gets better.

What difference in the race does fuel sim have on the performances of the cars?

 

[Wojciech Grabowski]

Car gets better, but didn't noticed it depends on position of team. In S2 your car should be as good as Sauber and Toro Rosso.

 

[jdrawmer]

Thanks again...

Well if AI isn't affected, I think i'll try turning fuel sim off. Seems a little unfair if i'm trying to do a realistic season!

To be honest, I have enjoyed the first 2 races on 100% length - testing concentration and consistency and I think it helps me learn the tracks a lot more, especially with doing a lot of laps in practice as well. Going to see how that goes.

 

[slavko.g]

First of all i will say welcome to the forum....

Now to answer your last question. The answer is 2. The car is better in the next season and yes it depends on the place in the constructor championship. Try to use manual gear shift probably you will be faster for about a second per lap. Also use lower wings setup but use the movable front wing in the corners. In Malaysia you will need higher downforce setup. I use lotus too. Put the suspension height on 1/1 and stiffness to 4/5 (front/rear). Wings... maybe 6/3 or 7/3. Balance to 50/50 and roll bars 2/10. I drive it like this on legend without any assist on. And after all lotus is not ferrari or redbull...be calm and wait for the second season...

 

[Andrew Bortz]

The problem is Fuel sim. AI is not affected, so they're much faster on straights (like without fuel). That's shame of CM, you can't be so as fast on first laps as AI is...

My only advice is... drive 50% races... Game isn't good enough to drive 100% race with fun.

And in fact, You need good set-up for every track. Try 1/1 wings in races, like Victor said... I always have 2 setups - Qualifying, which I'm setting in first practice for driving as fast as I can, and second setup (made on second pracitce) - Race. This setup is just slighty modified version of Qualifying set-up (less wings to make me faster with fuel loaded, balance to front, brakes closer to 50/50 etc...). Try to modify setups from forum.

And remember that Victor's setups are awesome

Cant say I agree with you here 100% races may not be fun for you but some of us like the challenge of having to keep the pace up for the entire race distance, it provides way more in satisfaction once you get to the end. 100% races also gives you the experience of being consistant lap after lap.

I said try 1/1 wing setups not Victor he hasnt posted here.

Jdrawner if you turn fuel sim off expect to win every race as it make a massive difference in pace to the AI, I would just advise to attempt to keep position on the track at the start preferably on primes so when you come to being on options later you have the edge over your competitors.

Wings... maybe 6/3 or 7/3.

Again dont agree with this he has already said about getting hammered on the straights.

 

[Wojciech Grabowski]

Sry mate, I'm little tired and didn't see who was that.

I was driving before 100% races, with sim and then without sim... That's annoying for me to just defend for 70% of race distance. I like 100% races, but with fuel sim it's just not looking real F1-like, no driver is 2 secs slower in start of race and 2 secs faster at the end. Maybe someone else liked this - that's OK That was my own point of view.

Can't wait for 2011 "Be the driver, Live the life"! I hope this game will be more like real F1.

 

[My993C2]

I only ever do 100% length races, but I have had to do some tweaking to the game (fortunately I am playing on the PC which allows tweaking) to make it work for me. I practice and qualify against the "Legends" AI level using the True AI 1.4 mod, a modified database file and I have access to the AI toolkit. But I race at the "professional" AI since the AI is super aggressive with the 1.4 mod at "legends" and yes I turn off "fuel sim" in my races. I am in my 2nd season in the HRT and my race results are more consistent as I often finish in the points (usually around 6th to 8th place), but I am not qualifying as high in this 2nd season (I think this is because of the modified database file). Access to the AI toolkit is key. On some tracks the AI is too fast in certain corners and on other tracks they are too slow. With the toolkit I can tweak the corners speeds the AI takes them at and my races are much better. But the tweaks don't always work the way one might think they do. In a recent race in Monza, the AI cars were losing it mostly in the first chicane but also the 2nd one as well. I tried speeding the AI up, but that made it worse. The only way I could prevent the AI from crashing every lap was to slow them down. It made for a good race, but I still need more work on Monza as it is one of the easier races for me. I don't want easy wins (especially in the HRT). I want to have to work for my points driving hard and driving clean.

It's not perfect, but I like doing 100% length races and I have total respect for the real drivers. I get an idea what it is like to do 100% race lengths mentally, but we do not have to deal with the physical G-Forces they do. I know a day at my local track doing opening lapping sessions is tiring and my 911 does not do a lot of Gs.

 

[jdrawmer]

I don't want to do anything other than 100% races, but now i'm left confused.

Do I stick it out on fuel sim, even though each and every race is ruined by cars storming clear, and therefore the challenge is holding position as opposed to actually racing, or do i turn fuel sim off and, later in career, just hammer every race!?

 

[jdrawmer]

what's also annoying is, that i might have alonso right behind me, but Rosberg 5 seconds back - then as soon as Alonso goes past, Rosberg is on my tail in seconds. Surely, i should have a massive trail of cars queueing up? It's so confusing!

 

[My993C2]

what's also annoying is, that i might have alonso right behind me, but Rosberg 5 seconds back - then as soon as Alonso goes past, Rosberg is on my tail in seconds. Surely, i should have a massive trail of cars queueing up? It's so confusing!

The AI is really messed up in this game and it varies from track to track (some are more messed up than others). I have had some good races where I can stay close to the car in front of me all race long. But there are also some races where the cars in front of me run away and there is no a hope in hell in staying with them. It is interesting how at a track like Singapore Kovalainen in a Lotus laps in practice and qualifying in the 1:50:xxx range, but come race time he can cut 5 seconds off of his lap times and run away from me at 3 seconds per lap. The game is still fun, but the invented out of thin air AI lap times are retarded.

 

[David O'Reilly]

In general terms I am really enjoying the game. (50% Expert Mode except no fuel sim and auto) Season 3 in Lotus.
Catalunya is in my view the most frustrating track in terms of AI behaviour. Some time though you have to laugh at them!
I arrived with 3 wins from 4 rounds (helped by rain in Melb quali, and strategy and rain in China).
I qualified P11 which is fair enough. Mugged some guys at turn 1 and 3 on lap 1 and had P8.
Over the first 5 laps two cars well in front of me spun in the turn 7-8 section of sector 2 (the tricky uphill left right). One was left parked against the wall. That part was fun and netted me P6. Over the rest of my Primes stint (running prime-option) three times the chasing car (both Renaults and Rosberg) spun there too leaving maybe a six second gap behind me. I would think ok three laps at least of no pressure but sure enough 1 lap later they are on my gearbox.
I would get a glimpse of a few cars on the minimap at the other side of the circuit and I was thinking hey I am pressuring these chasing cars into error, Ive got points in Catalunya tonight!
But no I pitted from P6 at lap 20/33 for options and the cars I could see earlier in the mini map were the tail enders of the greatest "Trulli train" ever. All 18 cars passed me while I pitted and I returned dead last. aaargh!
I passed 4 cars for P20. My teammate Trulli who I out qualified by 2 secs beat me with P19.
I farewell Catalunya with little fondness and head to Boats, Babes, Bacardi and Briatores beer belly at Monaco.

 

[jdrawmer]

I read a statement from Codemasters that said something about simulating Practice and Qualifying is not as accurate at 6x and 30x as it is at 1x speed. I guess that also counts when you skip through events.

That might have something to do with those differences? I was thinking of running some qualifying tests today, letting time run down naturally to see the differences in lap times

 

[David O'Reilly]

I read the same statement and I read it to say quali is from d/base essentially to facilitate the fast fwd. They can't have real laps happenning in quali and have X30 as they can't manage an AI car at 6000mph(pussies lol).
So runnnig time down won't change the D/base.s
atatement follows: (quite a cool one really)

30 September 2010 by Keith Collantine
Codemasters have issued the following response to the reported AI problems in “F1 2010″ and detailed their plans for how the game will be patched:
As you are aware work is on-going towards a patch for the game, and we will release details on this as we move through the patch creation process. Your constructive feedback has been invaluable in helping us both identify and work to resolve issues with the game, and we appreciate your detailed posts.
Some of the identified issues have led (understandably) to people making assumptions about the game that are not accurate, so we felt that in order to reassure you and explain better the process which we are going through at the moment, we’d address a few common queries, in particular relating to AI. In putting this post together, we spoke to various people from across the development team, including the leads and specialists who are working directly on addressing the issues that have been raised.
The AI system implemented in F1 2010 is very complex, and is certainly not scripted in any way. Every AI driver is trained with a series of race behaviours such as overtaking, defending a position and slipstreaming etc. On top of these behaviours we have a unique set of characteristics. These characteristics are defined per driver so you’ll notice some subtle differences. Some drivers are better at race starts or are better at overtaking (they look for narrower gaps), or are better in the rain, or are more aggressive, or are better around certain race tracks. We also have a system which can make certain drivers have a particularly good or bad race depending on a number of factors. All of this driver variance is of course combined with the cars themselves also having varying levels of performance.
It’s also important to note that in order to make the tracks as richly detailed as they are, we use far more textures than the consoles can physically hold. As with many games, we actively stream in and out textures based on the position of the player. This, plus the fact we don’t simulate many visual effects on the far side of the track from the player – a “level of detail” system employed to save valuable processor time – would mean there would be a significant pop or delay if we were to allow you to switch cameras between drivers on track.
Practice & Qualifying AI
In practice & qualifying (P&Q) there are two fundamental issues which have meant that we had to make some implementation decisions for the AI in F1 2010. These two issues are our jump-to-sector feature and the fast-forward feature that is available on the car monitor in the garage.
The jump-to-sector feature necessarily simulates teleporting a car instantly to a position while the fast-forward feature allows the player to speed up time. The latter prevents us from simulating the actual AI travelling around the track 100% of the time as we cannot accurately simulate 24 cars where we have accelerated the passage of time by as much as a factor of 30. An F1 car can move at over 200mph. With 30 times speedup, we cannot simulate car physics at 6000+mph without losing some fidelity. F1 cars obviously cannot move this fast. We therefore implemented a system whereby the AI times in such circumstances are calculated based on a ‘football management” style simulation model. Using this model all of the race factors, such as the car, driver, weather, tyres, engine, track conditions, traffic are all taken into account and a lap time is produced. These generated times are well considered and guided by a huge amount of data; they are not randomly generated. Nevertheless they remain simulated approximations using this model.
For P&Q sessions we spent a long time experimenting with flipping back and forth between this simulated system and actual AI physical timing, as the fast-forward is engaged and disengaged, but it lead to the potential for subtle exploits which we were not comfortable with. Therefore all AI times in these P&Q sessions use this simulation method.
Race AI
As none of the above feature restrictions are relevant in the race itself, we DO NOT use any other systems in the race other than the AI cars all physically driving the race just as the player does. Other factors also contribute to the AI lap times and the variation in their race pace. These include race start behaviours, their ultimate race pace which takes into account elements such as fuel and tyre degradation, weather, conserving / cooling engines etc, their in and out laps in the pit stop phase and their finishing pace.
We have seen several email and forum threads which suggest that an AI car’s performance is determined by where they are positioned currently in the race, or where they are in relation to the player which absolutely isn’t the case.
Based on some of the feedback we’ve received we are looking into the variation of AI race pace, as well as working hard to address as many of the following issues as possible in the upcoming patch, which aren’t AI specific but are adding to the assumptions that we are using fake or scripted AI:
Pit Stop
Several pit stop issues have been reported;
The AI not making a mandatory pit stop during a dry race of 20% or more
The player being forced to wait in the pits before being released
The player or AI cars becoming stuck in the pit lane
The use of flashback breaking the AI pit strategies
We’re currently investigating each of these issues and recognise that these would have a significant impact on the way that the race pans out. As ever with fixing these issues it’s a case of finding out how to repeat the problem so that we can track the issues down and fix them.
Split times
A few of you have correctly spotted that the race leader isn’t always the quickest on the first lap of the race. This is an issue whereby the start line is resetting the AI lap timings rather than everyone’s time being taken from when the start lights go out, which of course should be the case on the first lap.
It’s important to also note that the lap times displayed on screen in F1 2010 are compared to the gap to the leader, rather than being split times to the car in front or behind. They are calculated on the time difference within sectors, on a lap by lap basis. For example, the players lap and individual split times on any given lap is compared to the race leader only.
Track reset
There are a few videos and threads where the AI have been seen to spin off and then teleport around the track. Again this isn’t an intentional component of the AI systems. We have a retrieval system that will reset cars to the track if they manage to get out of the world which is intended for use in a number of scenarios such as violent collisions. In these cases it appears that this retrieval system has fired off by mistake.
Race engineer speech
There are a few issues whereby the information which the race engineer is feeding you in relation to gaps to the car in front seems to be at odds with what is happening in the race. Again this isn’t tied into the AI at all. It’s purely speech logic and triggers.
Fuel simulation and tyre degradation
This has been implemented for both players and AI cars. We’ll investigate the drop offs and see if the numbers need tweaking as part of the patch.
As ever your feedback really helps us track down these issues so many thanks to everyone who has taken the time to post up as many details as you have. We have already made significant advances against some of the issues thanks to those of you who have contributed a clear and comprehensive account of problems. We will let you know the full details of what the patch will include and when you can expect it as soon as possible.
Rest assured that we do read the forums and your feedback is extremely important to us.