TheHardwares Ultimate B-Spec guide (unofficial)

Edited - info added from "Lion-Face" info highlighted in Purple

Hello all

I have been playing the heck out of GT5 and I have fallen in love with the game. I am a Play-station G.A.P. member and a PS underground member, and I have been reading tons of posts. It seems know one really knows how B-spec truly works. I will try to shed some light on what I have accumulated though reading and playing. it's pretty long, but I hope it helps.

B-Spec

You create a Driver beginning at Lvl 0

Driver type = your drivers stats, chosen at random. Its important to note that you always end up with a few stats that are pretty weak. This will play into how attentive you must be during your races. "ie" if your racer has good speed, but weak cornering; during races you will need to direct him more carefully during lots of cornering.

- stats -

Braking = how well your driver slows down when entering corners, and in heavy traffic.
Cornering = How well your driver can take "in/out" corners.
Accuracy = How well your driver can follow driving lines, and during "take over" maneuvers.
Strength = How long your driver can hold up all of the above proficiently. I am under the impression that issuing command drain your strength faster, which is why you must issue only necessary commands.
Mental strength = (I am still not to sure about this one) my best guess is during long races which would come into play at higher levels.. Im still kinda low.
Experience = Determines which races your driver can drive...Please note that experience is relative only to your drivers stats, your over all Lvl which goes up when your driver places determines what races you can drive.
Personality meter = At your driver selection screen you randomize your personality meter I noticed that when you use a driver high in the Red he tends to get upset quicker under stressful conditions, but he also become calm a lot quicker, the opposite for mostly blue. became upset a lot slower, but became calmer slower also.
Name change = self explanatory
outfit change = self explanatory

Now for an issue thats confusing most people. Ill explain a lot so it makes more sense.

The personality meter = Its basically a meter telling you how your driver is feeling/performing
Blue means your driver is Calm and relaxed and will perform most of his high stats flawlessly. weaker stats may suffer even in blue depending on certain conditions. If your guy is weak at cornering, or is in the middle of traffic, even if his bar is blue to mid section, he may still under perform, and especially if he is pit against higher level competition (this saps his strength faster) And as I stated before, strength governs all your stats, so no strength all blue = no bueno!!
Red means you are stressed and likely to make mistakes when attempting corners and overtaking

From what I can determine, being about a second away from any car will drop your bar to more to a calmer state. Meaning a second behind and in front, so if you are in the middle of two cars and they are both a second away, you start to calm down, unless you are pushing your driver through corners (and your cornering sucks)

Member Lion-face has stated that from his findings he notices drivers become more accustomed to certain Car types and Also tracks,
I used a lvl 0 driver on the same course twice and He did show better lap times the second time around, I will do more tests .
Quote from Lion-Faces Post
"There are also hidden stats. Car control/layout. Your drivers get better as they drive a certain layout of car more, FR/FF/4WD etc. Early on in your B-spec career, your driver often drives FF based cars, so their first FR car is often a trial by fire and full of mistakes. Each lap and each race they will become better and better learning the nuances of each car. The more they drive of one car, the more speed they will get out of it."

- Racing menu -

Ill just skip to the controls
remember this is a simulation in this game you are in your racing tower looking at your car and driver, you are giving him commands, Lets generalize the commands, because this is what you would say to "your" driver knowing his strengths and weaknesses, right?

Pace down = driver uses the utmost concentration to take corners, attempts to avoid collisions with other cars (unless you are driving a super powered car you will mostly never overtake an opponent) also slows down a lot quicker when traveling at high speeds. takes corners best at this pace
Things to say out loud when using "Pace down" - "calm down", "slow down a bit", "these corners scare me, lets be careful here."

Maintain Pace = Driver tries to maintain current consistency. Your personality meter moves very slowly at this pace, allowing you to not Gain more red or lose more calm
Things to say out loud when using "Maintain Pace" Ok, "doing good, straight away coming up after these corners, dont want to slow down, and I'm not good at cornering ...let me "maintain this pace" then gun it after this corner".."lol yeah say that"

Pace Up = Driver pushes the limit, slows down a lot later when going into corners, and floors it on straight aways, will over take opponents doing both. this causes the most stress, so use it cautiously.
Things to say out loud when using "Pace Up".. "Ive been playing it safe, calm enough, let me gun this bad boy", "home stretch, neck and neck, come on baby" "Adios suckas"

Overtake = Direct your driver to become very aggressive and move up in place, your driver will attempt to find a spot to position up. I reccomend using this during your drivers strengths, good at cornering, Overtake during corners.

So - HOW DO I CONTROL MY DRIVER -

Its not simple and it gets really hard later, I used a lvl 11 driver with a maxed out challenger on a lvl 9 course and had to direct my driver near perfection...I won by under a second

1. know your drivers strengths
2. capitalize on the command duration, use commands before you get to corners, pile ups, straight-aways.
3. Don't forget the other drivers/opponents are controlled in this way also. "ie" if your car is slightly faster and you only use Pace up, the cars behind you will use Pace down" on corners and wait for straight-aways to Pace UP, thus by gaining on your recklessness slowly
4. Make sure your car is tuned well, you can have a great driver in a fast car but if its not tuned to get those high speeds and lightweight enough to corner faster, you will lose.
5. pay attention

Found an Article where Kazunori Yamauchi talks about GT5 and B-Spec really interesting stuff
The controls appeared relatively straightforward. Yamauchi issued commands to speed up, match pace, overtake other drivers and slow down. Commands given by the player might be ignored by an AI driver that's too "heated" and as the HUD's heat gauge maxed out, the virtual driver started to get a little squirrelly, making mistakes and eventually spinning out.
Taken from http://kotaku.com/5616425/gran-turismo-5-injects-some-rpg-in-your-racing-sim




I hope this helped , I have 3 drivers at the moment and 2 are undefeated.
Please feel free to send me cars as gifts if this helped you lol
If anyone has any info to add, please let me know and i will add it
PSN = "Strboymo" Add me

Thanks for posting this. 👍 Should be stickied IMO.

Agreed. Clarified a lot.

Don't forget to check and make sure you have on the best available tires too!!

You have the commands a bit wrong. They only control the meter, not how the driver drives. One can lead to the other, but if your guy is in the cold area and you press pace up he isn't going to start being aggressive right away, it just starts getting the meter to go up, and if it goes far enough, he will start driving aggressively.

Barkode

You have the commands a bit wrong. They only control the meter, not how the driver drives. One can lead to the other, but if your guy is in the cold area and you press pace up he isn't going to start being aggressive right away, it just starts getting the meter to go up, and if it goes far enough, he will start driving aggressively.

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I'm not too sure about this! I'm pretty sure I've hit "pace up" in the middle of the corner and Bob put his foot in the gas imidiately! Driving at a faster pace will make the meter go up tho. Anyone back me up?

iRepDaNAP

I'm not too sure about this! I'm pretty sure I've hit "pace up" in the middle of the corner and Bob put his foot in the gas imidiately! Driving at a faster pace will make the meter go up tho. Anyone back me up?

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He put his foot down because he exited the corner. You just had some confirmation bias is all. You pressed it and expected a result, and you got one and falsely attributed it to your action.

I used to play the way the op describes, until I was corrected by someone else. I haven't lost a race since.

A good example would be Eiger Nordwand in the Euro hot hatch championship. Because you can't use decent tires, the driver will spin out 90% of the time in the hairpins in the first part of the lap if he is over about 75% in his meter. If you go in cool, and use pace up in the corners, they won't spin out, because they haven't become warm yet.

I pretty much got all of that but the part where he says you "talk" to the guy, how do you do that? Is it a submenu, click once on the pace and quickly again to issue what to say?

Click on the headset and more options pop up. Then you click one of those to issue the order.

Barkode

He put his foot down because he exited the corner. You just had some confirmation bias is all. You pressed it and expected a result, and you got one and falsely attributed it to your action.

I used to play the way the op describes, until I was corrected by someone else. I haven't lost a race since.

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Well.. What I meant by "putting his foot in the gas" was he put it in a little harder... By listening to the sound of the engine it definitly sounds like the rpm's were higher.. The meter isn't a "pace" meter. U can be hitting pace down the entire race and if the circumstances are right the meter could still be pinned to the red side.. Get a nice loud engine and pace down a couple times then when u get back to the same corner hit pace up and u can tell he is definitly working harder just by the sound of the engine! "pace up" means pace up!!

Barkode

Click on the headset and more options pop up. Then you click one of those to issue the order.

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So all this time when I was clicking it I wasn't doing anything? It seemed like he was listening though and said "OK" Or are you saying you can give more precise orders and the first click is just a general order.

The hot and cold bar is his frustration meter. when its red he will be driving more aggressively that might cause him to wreck more or when hes high level and experienced enough it will make him just make him drive faster and harder. When hes calm he will drive a ton more slow but will save on tire wear and gas doing so. So technically his aggravation meter is the pace meter.

Im quite enjoying b-spec, got 3 drivers now........h hermans is the main man but got a senna and schumacher catching him fast......if you cycle through the names you can get all sorts of famous racing driver names.

I found you had to give your drivers quite a decent car advantage to win the early races but as they get better you can use more normal cars

The secret is to keep your driver of full hot setting, anything below and he'll do just fine, as soon as you see the "calmness" meter on the increase get straight on the decrease pace button. Once you get to first and your driver is relatively cool just hit maintain pace and he'll just keep the gap to 2nd steady.

Got to admit though i just give my man a huge car advantage, hit the overtake button before the race starts, generally he's first by the end of the lap if not the first sector and then leave him too it........do housework, make a snack, do a poo or something lol

Once im done i go back start him on another race and off i go again

MadBullBunny

The hot and cold bar is his frustration meter. when its red he will be driving more aggressively that might cause him to wreck more or when hes high level and experienced enough it will make him just make him drive faster and harder. When hes calm he will drive a ton more slow but will save on tire wear and gas doing so. So technically his aggravation meter is the pace meter.

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Does it make him drive more aggressively or is he making mistakes making it seem like he is driving more aggressively? I'm pretty sure pace and the meter don't have much to do with eachother except when he is driving at a faster pace (even on straights) it's more "stressful" therefore why it goes to the red... Like I said.. Get a nice loud engine.. Listen to him go around a cpl times and then hit pace up and listen to the rpm change as he UPS HIS PACE!! Whether he is red or blue his pace will go up!! That's why it says "pace up"!!

like i said. he will up his pace when you click pace up but im agreeing with the other guy. it doesnt happen right away. he slowly becomes more quick as his aggravation/pace bar goes up. When he goes faster he makes more mistakes. when you drive slower you make less mistakes. when his pace bar goes up his tire wear and gas usage is increased. When he drives slower they decrease.

*Bookmarks page*

thank you very much for the responses guys, I a'm doing a lot of Tests using My lvl 12 and using a lvl 0 driver, to get a better sense of some of the things that a little hazy.

keep the discussion going. I am learning also

MadBullBunny

like i said. he will up his pace when you click pace up but im agreeing with the other guy. it doesnt happen right away. he slowly becomes more quick as his aggravation/pace bar goes up. When he goes faster he makes more mistakes. when you drive slower you make less mistakes. when his pace bar goes up his tire wear and gas usage is increased. When he drives slower they decrease.

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Sorry guys but I still disagree.. Just got home from work and popped in some gt5.. Went to b-spec.. Did not give one single command.. Bob sittin there cursing around a LONG corner at about 40mph.. Before the apex I hit "pace up" and... 1/2 a second later.. His pace went up! Not at the cursing speed it was before but DEFINITELY working the throttle harder.. DEFINITELY!!! 100% positive... And this was after cursing for a lap in 1st place so my meter was all the way to the "cool" side


Try it for yourself.. Find a nice long rounded off corner where Bob normally cruises and hit "up pace" in the middle of the turn and u will hear a difference immediately!

iRepDaNAP

Sorry guys but I still disagree.. Just got home from work and popped in some gt5.. Went to b-spec.. Did not give one single command.. Bob sittin there cursing around a LONG corner at about 40mph.. Before the apex I hit "pace up" and... 1/2 a second later.. His pace went up! Not at the cursing speed it was before but DEFINITELY working the throttle harder.. DEFINITELY!!! 100% positive... And this was after cursing for a lap in 1st place so my meter was all the way to the "cool" side

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I agree

A few things I have found.

EDIT: In addition to what the OP has stated.

Mental Strength. Governs a drivers ability to battle with other drivers. The longer a battle for position goes, the more your drivers Mental Strength is drained. This is the fastest way to drain mental strength. Other factors are dropping physical strength and pushing your driver. A low Mental Strength will drain Physical strength more quickly to, and your driver is more prone to mistakes when they are mentally drained.

Characteristics - Aggressive drivers, drivers personality more in the red are also more prone to giving it a go, attempting overtakes more aggressively and jostling for position. They are more erratic with their lap times and their mood in the cockpit can swing rapidly.

Cool Drivers, basically the opposite, more calculating, less willing to give it a go and rather wait for an opportunity to come to them rather than muscle their way through. More consistent with their lap times and tend to make less mistakes under pressure.

Drivers stress levels will go up when close to opponents/in a battle. Will go down when no where near opponents, either way out ahead or far behind. If you leave your driver out in the lead and don't instruct him, he will calm down, but become slower and slower. If you aren't being cheap and using a similar car to your opponents, they will catch and pass you easily.

Opponents are governed under the same system, much like the OP mentioned. So if you get behind an opponent but can't find a way past, keep pushing, push the opponents stress up, if he breaks first, he'll make a mistake and you'll be through. It depends on their personality.

There are also hidden stats. Car control/layout. Your drivers get better as they drive a certain layout of car more, FR/FF/4WD etc. Early on in your B-spec career, your driver often drives FF based cars, so their first FR car is often a trial by fire and full of mistakes. Each lap and each race they will become better and better learning the nuances of each car. The more they drive of one car, the more speed they will get out of it.

Tracks. As drivers race tracks more frequently, they learn them, become faster at them. Corners they tapped the brakes for they learn to slide through without second thought of the brake pedal. Corners they seemed to get wrong every lap they learn to get right. Its always worth finishing races, regardless of finishing position.

Lion-Face

A few things I have found.

Mental Strength. Governs a drivers ability to battle with other drivers. The longer a battle for position goes, the more your drivers Mental Strength is drained. This is the fastest way to drain mental strength. Other factors are dropping physical strength and pushing your driver. A low Mental Strength will drain Physical strength more quickly to, and your driver is more prone to mistakes when they are mentally drained.

Characteristics - Aggressive drivers, drivers personality more in the red are also more prone to giving it a go, attempting overtakes more aggressively and jostling for position. They are more erratic with their lap times and their mood in the cockpit can swing rapidly.

Cool Drivers, basically the opposite, more calculating, less willing to give it a go and rather wait for an opportunity to come to them rather than muscle their way through. More consistent with their lap times and tend to make less mistakes under pressure.

Drivers stress levels will go up when close to opponents/in a battle. Will go down when no where near opponents, either way out ahead or far behind. If you leave your driver out in the lead and don't instruct him, he will calm down, but become slower and slower. If you aren't being cheap and using a similar car to your opponents, they will catch and pass you easily.

Opponents are governed under the same system, much like the OP mentioned. So if you get behind an opponent but can't find a way past, keep pushing, push the opponents stress up, if he breaks first, he'll make a mistake and you'll be through. It depends on their personality.

There are also hidden stats. Car control/layout. Your drivers get better as they drive a certain layout of car more, FR/FF/4WD etc. Early on in your B-spec career, your driver often drives FF based cars, so their first FR car is often a trial by fire and full of mistakes. Each lap and each race they will become better and better learning the nuances of each car. The more they drive of one car, the more speed they will get out of it.

Tracks. As drivers race tracks more frequently, they learn them, become faster at them. Corners they tapped the brakes for they learn to slide through without second thought of the brake pedal. Corners they seemed to get wrong every lap they learn to get right. Its always worth finishing races, regardless of finishing position.

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Brilliant..I will add a few things you mentioned to my Op if its ok with you

TheHardware

Experience = Determines which races your driver can drive...Please note that experience is relative only to your drivers stats, your over all Lvl which goes up when your driver places determines what races you can drive.

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This seems unclear.

Experience affects driver class, and increases stats as the class increases.

Any driver can increases the B-Spec level, and this determines what races your B-Spec drivers can enter whether there are class 0 or class 10.

So a class 0 driver can enter an amateur race, if the B-Spec level is high enough.

They may struggle with their Physical / Mental strength for the longer races, but with a decent car and a substantial lead you won't have a problem.

I see no need to enter my Class 0 driver in a beginner race now, as the money is peanuts.

Lion-Face

There are also hidden stats. Car control/layout. Your drivers get better as they drive a certain layout of car more, FR/FF/4WD etc. Early on in your B-spec career, your driver often drives FF based cars, so their first FR car is often a trial by fire and full of mistakes. Each lap and each race they will become better and better learning the nuances of each car. The more they drive of one car, the more speed they will get out of it.

Click to expand...

This is carried over from GT4. I used to use my Bob to milk the DTM challenge in GT4, it gave a way a lot of money, but was repetitive, and a bit dull when raced repeatedly (just the job for Bob!)

When I first got Bob racing at the track, I found he wasn't very good, and would struggle to finish in first. After repeatedly racing Bob in the same car, and on the same tracks, he was able to win every race by a comfortable margin. 👍

magburner

This is carried over from GT4. I used to use my Bob to milk the DTM challenge in GT4, it gave a way a lot of money, but was repetitive, and a bit dull when raced repeatedly (just the job for Bob!)

When I first got Bob racing at the track, I found he wasn't very good, and would struggle to finish in first. After repeatedly racing Bob in the same car, and on the same tracks, he was able to win every race by a comfortable margin. 👍

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I always raced in the DTM Tournament with my B-spec and after winning the Mercedes I sold it and did it all over again. That's how I afforded my 4,500,000 Cr. cars!

Nice thread OP! 👍

The blue-red meter is definitely basically equivalent to a pace meter. It just becomes inaccurate when at times in the red due to driver errors. This is easily observable by going around a track a few times with the marker held at different points along the meter. As you position the marker further to the left, the driver's lap times will be slower even though you'll be issuing the same maintain pace command.

With that said, the commands you issue do have the potential to be used strategically beyond just moving the marker. A pace up command will cause the driver to push harder immediately, which can result in the driver getting on the gas if they aren't currently full throttle or going through the next set of corners more aggressively. The pace down command can also be used to get an immediate response from the driver, which is to either loaf it a bit around a corner he's in or do the next set of corners more cautiously. Naturally, the overtake command gives the most obvious effect on the driver's behavior. The driver will attempt to pass on a straight obviously, but the command will also get your driver to push up on the rear of the car in front through a series of corners. This can be used quite effectively the corner before a main straight to get your driver to press up through the corner so they get a good draft on the straight. As an added bonus, the driver in front may make a mistake under the added pressure. I've also found that issuing an overtake command when a driver in front makes a mistake seems to help your driver capitalize on that mistake to improve position.

I think to say that blue means he'll perform most of his high stats flawlessly is suspect. It seems to me that his stats are spot on when the bar is perfectly neutral. The further blue it gets, the more calm he is, and the less he concentrates, thus not bothering with apexes, not putting his foot down on straights and generally just chilling out too much for serious racing.

What also would be interesting is what the little arrows on the top right on the drivers icon mean. I've noticed three so far: a blue up arrow, a green level arrow and an orange down arrow. Anybody noticed some influence of these arrows?
Also i read on the GT5 website that you have to keep your drivers career in mind (there's also a meter for that). If he's past his career height, then his stats will go down. So you obviously need to train new drivers in time...
I also noticed that the career meter is growing even if you don't use your driver in races.

cannedReality

What also would be interesting is what the little arrows on the top right on the drivers icon mean. I've noticed three so far: a blue up arrow, a green level arrow and an orange down arrow. Anybody noticed some influence of these arrows?
Also i read on the GT5 website that you have to keep your drivers career in mind (there's also a meter for that). If he's past his career height, then his stats will go down. So you obviously need to train new drivers in time...
I also noticed that the career meter is growing even if you don't use your driver in races.

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The Blue, Green, Orange arrow is basically your drivers condition. He'll perform better then his level, even or worse. I was just racing though Nostalgia Supercars in a Lamborghini Countach that you win, unmodified. My two drivers started as blue, and were able to get bronze, gold and silver in the blue state. It finally dropped to even, best they could manage was 5th. I stop racing the drivers when they go orange. (EDit: For reference, my drivers were levels 8 & 7)

I'm certain the heat meter controls how hard the driver is pushing himself around the track. The redder it is, the more he's pushing and the faster he goes. However, it opens him up to mistakes. Not so bad early in the race, but as it continues and his strength saps and tires fade the mistakes get worse. At least in my recollection. Of course, pace up/down immediately tells your driver to do exactly that.

There are also the hidden statistics that aren't shown when selecting your driver. Cornering, Braking and Accuracy, with my two drivers that are the same level. One is significantly better at braking and he uses it to gain places by dive bombing the car he's attempting to pass in the corners. The other though has a better speed and cornering ability. I haven't tested to much but I suspect both drivers would perform better on courses that naturally suite their abilities.

who do i contact to make this a sticky?