3D3 Racing: WRS-based races moved to new WRS sub-forum!

[Hydro]

For now I'm happy to see 2 full grids. (or close to)
But of course if we can get enough diehards to go into separating by divisions or rankings that would be even better, I'm sure if the people come it'll happen, for now let's enjoy what we have, which is pretty neat to finally have in any sense.

To WRP, Hydro, & Gravitron, for making it happen!

Exactly 👍
And Thanks Dominic

If we wind up with full (or close) grids () the obvious option is to split the drivers into a D1-D2, and D3-D5 setup, with a couple of the D3-5 drivers having the option of moving up to the D1-2 race.

Using Monaco as an example, 16 drivers may have been too much for that track, so a 8/8 split would probably be ok, and would make for some really close competition.
For Daytona, I'd be thrilled to see a 16 driver grid, and wouldn't want to split the field at all.
Of course, if 20 or so people sign up to one of the races, then it's a different story

We'll get there....

Then we will post the "Host Wanted" sign.

@Lefty--had you known how close at times you were to CSL, and how you were keeping pace for the start of the race, I imagine you would have pushed harder, and given Dominic a good challenge 👍
There is something to be said about imitating a D1 driver for the better part of an hour that is particularly awesome

 

[Cats_PJs]

I'm just glad there are people willing to put in the time and effort to organize events like this.
If it were left to me, there wouldn't be a series at all.

Great job with series so far.

 

[WRP001]

We're going to be hosting a practice session right after the WRS deadline on Monday night. Timing probably works best for NA drivers given we'll open a lounge around 6:00 PM Pacific Time. Details to follow later. There will probably also be a practice session on Tuesday at a time more convenient for EU drivers... not sure when the Spec II update is scheduled exactly and what that'll do to our schedule, but keeping our fingers crossed.

 

[poolhaas]

I'm gonna need practice, I'm never going to get the first corner right 2 times in a row. Not in a million years

 

[Vagabond]

I'm gonna need practice, I'm never going to get the first corner right 2 times in a row. Not in a million years

I'm sure that will apply to quite a few of us..

If its any consolation, I've spent all week running the Seasonal TT #20 @ Deep Forest so I'm going to be a bit off the pace with this car/track combo. Dom will get a white-wash and I'll have to get my hands dirty more than I did at Monaco.

 

[CSLACR]

I'm sure that will apply to quite a few of us..

If its any consolation, I've spent all week running the Seasonal TT #20 @ Deep Forest so I'm going to be a bit off the pace with this car/track combo. Dom will get a white-wash and I'll have to get my hands dirty more than I did at Monaco.

IDK about all that, I might have 40-50 laps under my belt, but I might submit with what I got now.

 

[Hydro]

If its any consolation, I've spent all week running the Seasonal TT #20 @ Deep Forest so I'm going to be a bit off the pace with this car/track combo. Dom will get a white-wash and I'll have to get my hands dirty more than I did at Monaco.

Thanks for posting your tune for the TT Chris 👍
Chased your ghost for a while a couple of days ago after switching to your tune.
Knocked 5+ seconds off my best lap, and placed as high as 99!

It's nice that you can follow replays from any region in those TT's

 

[Vagabond]

Yeah I noticed you pop up on the leaderboard Marc... nice improvement. 👍 A good setup makes a big difference... and a fast ghost to show the way can help. I got the hang of this course when we ran it on Week 15 in the stupid Civic RM but the lines are pretty much the same in the R390. I'm still chasing 2 or 3 tenths....

 

[Gravitron]

Looks like some more network downtime might impact the practice session tonight:

http://us.gran-turismo.com/us/news/d6006.html

GT5 INFORMATION
Maintenance Notice

Last Updated: Oct 10, 2011

The online service of Gran Turismo 5 will undergo maintenance during the following hours:

Start：10/10/2011 22:00 EDT
Finish：10/10/2011 23:00 EDT

During the maintenance, you will not be able to connect to any of the online services.

*Please note that the exact time of the maintenance may slightly vary.

 

[Hydro]

Yeah I noticed you pop up on the leaderboard Marc... nice improvement. 👍 A good setup makes a big difference... and a fast ghost to show the way can help. I got the hang of this course when we ran it on Week 15 in the stupid Civic RM but the lines are pretty much the same in the R390. I'm still chasing 2 or 3 tenths....

I'm definitely going to give it another shot at some point.
Watching your replay, and knowing that your setup allowed for the lines you drove really made all the difference.
Showed me that I was pushing too hard in key corners.
It also showed me that the car can add a wing in GT Auto

Goodluck on finishing in the top 10 👍
I'll be more than happy with a top 100 (at 150 now....)

 

[WRP001]

Looks like some more network downtime might impact the practice session tonight:

http://us.gran-turismo.com/us/news/d6006.html

Is this going to be the spec II update????

OK... Here's the practice schedule for tonight. I'll open my room early at 8:15 PM Eastern / 5:15 PM Pacific. That's right after the closing time of the WRS. I'll keep the lounge open until the network shuts down. Then at the end of the maintenance event I'll open the lounge again. Should be just after 8:00 PM Pacific if the maintenance window is accurate and I'll keep it open for about 90 minutes until 9:30 PM Pacific.

I'm not going to take part in the early practice session, but the lounge will be open. If you guys are online and want to do a couple quick mini races feel free to set that up. Maybe Hydro can handle that if he's in the room and if not anyone else can just hit "start race" after coordinating with the other drivers. I'll have the race lap count set to 5 laps so you can do mini events to practice the start and drafting without making anyone wait if they pop in for more than 10 minutes.

I would *definitely* recommend a little practice with drafting before the actual race.

I will take part in the post-downtime practice slot (~8:00 PM-9:30 PM) Pacific assuming anyone else is around.

Hydro -- are you still planning to host an EU practice slot tomorrow?

 

[CSLACR]

Looks like some more network downtime might impact the practice session tonight:

http://us.gran-turismo.com/us/news/d6006.html

Spec II ready or not guys, here she comes!
And my thoughts on Spec II - 💡 👍

 

[WRP001]

Spec II ready or not guys, here she comes!
And my thoughts on Spec II - 💡 👍

LOL. Yah, who knows what they are going to fix and what's going to actually break. I'm sure after a few more patches this update is going to be great, but I'm worried about the next few weeks. I hope they tested this update very well.

EDIT: Practice room is now open.

NOTE: On leaving the pits the proper exit is the small road to the left of the wall. Do not enter the track from pits directly into the entrance to turn 1 as that's going to be the trickiest part of the track with cars coming off the high speed straight. We'll update the OP and post another reminder. There is no pit lane speed limit in this series, but the exit/left turn on the small road is narrow and the user takes over from the AI before that point so it can be tricky.

 

[Hydro]

Hydro -- are you still planning to host an EU practice slot tomorrow?

Yes 👍
Room will open at 3PM eastern / 7PM GMT, same time as usual.

I'll be in for a little bit, but I'll leave it open for at least an hour - hour and a half.

 

[mohitraina91]

Ill most probably be there for the second practice session.

This is my first time ever going online on GT5, so expect some noob mistakes

 

[WRP001]

MadMax, RaceRyder and Lefty are in the room now if anyone wants to join. I'm going to be out myself for a while, but the lounge will be open until they shut it down for maintenance.

 

[CSLACR]

I'm tempted to join, but with the update/maintenance 17 minutes away, I guess I'll be patient.

Giddy up PD! Yee-Hawww!

 

[WRP001]

Got another 40 minutes of downloading for the update. Looks like it's going to be 9:30 before I'm back online... assuming everything works. What a huge update.... 60 minutes to download the thing.

 

[Gravitron]

Mine's taking longer to install than to download! 10min for the download, 10 and counting (at 79%) for the install.

 

[WRP001]

Only 10 minutes to download 1,192 MB? Wow that's a fast connection. Took mine 61 minutes and I don't have a slow connection. Only 30 seconds left....

Anyway, there was some good practice before the server downtime. The drafting is pretty fun and manageable. At least with 2-3 cars in a pack. It will be tricky at first with 9-10 cars going into corners, but it's a fun place to race and the car, even on S3 tires, is tricky enough that the field should spread out into packs pretty quickly.'

Looking forward to the race. Let's hope Spec II doesn't throw any major curve balls. Lefty and MadMax couldn't see eachother during the practice... here's hoping somehow Spec II fixes that issue (not holding my breath).

UPDATE: Installation complete... here we go. I'll be in my lounge for a bit seeing if the physics changed so much I can't drive the Jag anymore.

UPDATE: I'm in lounge and will run for about 45 minutes. Only new setting we have to decide on is slipstream strength and I'm thinking we should set it at weak (more realistic according to description), but willing to discuss.

 

[CSLACR]

Only 10 minutes to download 1,192 MB? Wow that's a fast connection. Took mine 61 minutes and I don't have a slow connection. Only 30 seconds left....

Anyway, there was some good practice before the server downtime. The drafting is pretty fun and manageable. At least with 2-3 cars in a pack. It will be tricky at first with 9-10 cars going into corners, but it's a fun place to race and the car, even on S3 tires, is tricky enough that the field should spread out into packs pretty quickly.'

Looking forward to the race. Let's hope Spec II doesn't throw any major curve balls. Lefty and MadMax couldn't see eachother during the practice... here's hoping somehow Spec II fixes that issue (not holding my breath).

UPDATE: Installation complete... here we go. I'll be in my lounge for a bit seeing if the physics changed so much I can't drive the Jag anymore.

UPDATE: I'm in lounge and will run for about 45 minutes. Only new setting we have to decide on is slipstream strength and I'm thinking we should set it at weak (more realistic according to description), but willing to discuss.

We can also enforce "no tuning" on any cars used in the lobbies if I'm not mistaken. (And enforce certain car types, etc) Not sure what all yet.

-Improved Online Lounge
[Car Restrictions] has been added in the regulations. You can now limit participants to specific categories such as "NASCAR" and "Super GT". Also, there are now more cars that can be used in shuffle races, and a new "Shuffle Base" setting allows you to set the performance level of cars allocated to each player.
For details, please see Top screen - [Manual] - [Online Race] - [Event Settings] and the "Regulation Settings".

Surface Water and Tire Load Indicator displays have been added to the race screen. The Tire Load Indicator can be set from the Quick Options menu that is displayed during the race (when the game is paused using the START button), or the standard Options menu.

Experience gained in online races have been increased by 60%, and rewards have been increased by 66%.
- You can now change the Slipstream Strength settings in the lounge.

Drivetrain settings has been added to the regulation settings in the Lounge.
- A setting to prohibit "Tuning" of cars has been added to the regulations settings in the Lounge.

Corrected an issue where the "Torque Sensing Center Differential" installed on a Lancer Evolution X was not functioning.
- Fixed an issue where you could participate in the Intermediate/Tarmac Rally of the Gran Turismo Rally in a Ferrari F1 by using the power limiter.
- Fixed an issue where the Controller Steering Sensitivity was not applied correctly.
- Fixed an issue where there was a server connection problem in certain network environments.
- Fixed an issue where auto-drive would make braking mistakes.
- Fixed an issue where the system would misjudge whether deceleration happens in time when making pit stops in the rain.

This is what I found that could have an effect.

 

[WRP001]

Had a good test of Spec II online with Gravitron and Welsh-Bain at Daytona Road Course.

Definitely the "weak" setting is enough for the new Slipstream Strength setting. I can't imagine how crazy the "strong" setting must be as there was plenty of pull with "weak". Maybe would have been fun to use strong last week at Monaco to enable more passing, but not this week.

Tires seem to be warmed and "grippy" from the very start of a run, either on the grid at the start or coming out of the pits. No need to warm them -- or at least minimal. It's kind of too bad they changed that or at least didn't make it an option as it requires a little extra skill to be able to adjust your driving for a lap until the tires warm up and know just how much you can push them when they are cold.

We didn't run enough laps to really test tire wear and if that's changed with the update. Physics seem to be about the same with this combo. We still had a glitch where Lucas was invisible for a moment, but he logged out and back in and he was visible again. Everything else seemed to be pretty much like before the update.

 

[Gravitron]

Super fun and educational. I think the pit thing was just due to me not ever entering on the correct "path" until you guys showed me the way. I advise everyone to practice, because if you can't get in to the pit when you need to, you are going to lose. And you don't want to lose to me, Mr Last Place/Street Sweeper.

EDIT: ffwd/rwd in replays Seems to go by sectors. 👍

 

[LeftyWright69]

ffwd/rwd in replays Seems to go by sectors. 👍

Oh well I guess you can't have everything you want, like the stuff that really maters (at least for the WRS) "frame by frame". It's still better then a stick in the eye I'll keep sharpening up my quick draw skills to capture that perfect frame, or if I miss it I'll at least be able to back up to the prev. T point and start my quick draw all over again ....

 

[Sjaak]

Guys,when exiting the pit lane,can we blend in turn 1 or do we need to drive the inner lane to turn 2.

 

[Speedy6543]

Guys,when exiting the pit lane,can we blend in turn 1 or do we need to drive the inner lane to turn 2.

NOTE: On leaving the pits the proper exit is the small road to the left of the wall. Do not enter the track from pits directly into the entrance to turn 1 as that's going to be the trickiest part of the track with cars coming off the high speed straight. We'll update the OP and post another reminder. There is no pit lane speed limit in this series, but the exit/left turn on the small road is narrow and the user takes over from the AI before that point so it can be tricky.

Marked red: I guess we'll have to practice that to avoid mishaps 👍

 

[MilleRSVR]

Guys,when exiting the pit lane,can we blend in turn 1 or do we need to drive the inner lane to turn 2.

I believe we need to follow the inner lane to turn 2. If you enter at turn 1 you get a time penalty.

Tim, Marc or Lucas should confirm, but I think this is the correct method.

 

[Hydro]

I believe we need to follow the inner lane to turn 2. If you enter at turn 1 you get a time penalty.

Tim, Marc or Lucas should confirm, but I think this is the correct method.

You are correct Blair, 👍
The pit exit lane we are using is the small one to the left that bypasses Turn 1.

The automated pit ends quite a bit earlier, so drivers need to stay to the left of the yellow line, then follow the narrow pit road that exits between turn 1 and turn 2.

I'll put a few pics up before practice. The entrance can be a bit tricky too, so I'll post both the proper entrance and exit procedures.

Practice room opens at 3PM eastern, 7PM GMT in GTP_Hydro's lobby.

 

[Gravitron]

Yeah, if you don't follow the correct path into the pits, and you "cut" some grass to get there, it'll just auto-drive you through the pits without stopping at your stall. Took me 3 or 4 tries to get it right. Pics would be awesome, Marc. 👍

 

[WRP001]

I'm wondering if the tire wear -- or really lack of cold tires -- was due to my picking "Road Course - Daytona" as my default track. After the update when I started my lounge it prompted me for a track. I thought it was a new feature of spec II where it asks you for track instead of loading whatever was last (that would be too smart). So I picked Daytona Road. But turns out it was just asking me for the defaults when they were reset.

Marc - when you set up your lounge for practice do the normal thing of starting with another track and then switching to Daytona once in the lounge. Maybe the old tire model will return... i hope. I like the cold tires feature and hope it's not gone.