B-spec driver arrow thingy??

[250 GTO]

What be this arrow? it can be in a neutral position, point upwards or point downwards

If this has already been answered several 100 times, I appologize, I tried searching for it but came up empty

 

[bigjoe]

Been answered many times... Answer is no one knows for sure.

 

[250 GTO]

Well

thanks anyway

 

[opelgt1969]

When he's pointing up he's good to enter a race
When he's pointing right he's OK to enter race ( might have hard time in championship race before its over)
When he's pointing down use another driver and after 3-4 races he's rested up and the arrow will go back up.

Little more useless info here:

http://us.gran-turismo.com/us/products/gt5/bspec/

 

[250 GTO]

Makes sense, thanks:tup:

 

[bigjoe]

When he's pointing up he's good to enter a race
When he's pointing right he's OK to enter race ( might have hard time in championship race before its over)
When he's pointing down use another driver and after 3-4 races he's rested up and the arrow will go back up.

Sounds right but doesn't seem to work that way in practice. I've got 4 Bobs at about the same level (16-18) and they all run pretty much the same times when grinding for credits (same car/same track) regardless of what "state" they were in at the start. And I've seen one go from yellow/down to blue/up after a race when they should be tired.

 

[opelgt1969]

Sounds right but doesn't seem to work that way in practice. I've got 4 Bobs at about the same level (16-18) and they all run pretty much the same times when grinding for credits (same car/same track) regardless of what "state" they were in at the start. And I've seen one go from yellow/down to blue/up after a race when they should be tired.

True but if you try to run "Bob" in the same HP car as the AI I think it would make a difference poor Ole Bob 's knees start shaking when he doesn't have that extra 50-100 HP.

 

[250 GTO]

So we're back to "no one really knows"

True but if you try to run "Bob" in the same HP car as the AI I think it would make a difference poor Ole Bob 's knees start shaking when he doesn't have that extra 50-100 HP.

Oh, never mind

 

[squadjot]

hmm.i'm pretty sure i was doing some races with the same guy, and when i entered it he was "neutral"..when i left 4 races after..the arrow was pointing "up"

I may be wrong-

 

[Danlisa]

I 'think' the arrows are an indication of 'Racing Form'. I'll see if I can explain:

Example (in one sitting): I had been grinding with the FGT in random races, which resulted in a down arrow, I then entered Bob into a Championship @ Lvl 20, by the last race of this championship, his arrow was neutral. I then entered 'neutral' Bob into the Schwarzwald League B races and by the end of those he was arrow up.

Reason:
Grinding with the FGT resulted in Bob having no competition at all from the AI drivers, if fact he lapped most AI cars.

Entering the Championship gave Bob more competition, where he actually had to battle and work for his win for a few laps.

Schwarzwald League B resulted in Bob getting an Up arrow because he was continuously pushed by the AI and was proper racing.

If I now go back to grinding with the FGT, his 'Down Arrow' will appear again.

Does that make any sense?💡

 

[shoeface33]

mental makes no sense. im not even sure its horsepower related tbh. in the french championship race, the AI are using about 150 - 200 bhp cars/ my bob used my 1200bhp veyron and was still pointng down!! :@

 

[Techy]

The arrows represent the driver's current mood & form:
1st Stage: An arrow pointed up by 45 degrees means the driver is in an excellent form & mood, meaning that he can respond better, understand his mistakes, & able to pace himself without little or no assistance from the player. His endurance, strength, & accuracy will be to the driver's optimal levels of effort.

2nd Stage: An arrow pointed horizontally means the driver is in a good form & mood. A driver having this means that he responds normally & requires little or more assistance from the player. The driver's endurance, strength, & accuracy will be to his medium or original levels of effort.

3rd Stage: An arrow pointed down by 45 degrees means the driver is in bad form & mood. A driver having this means that he requires some rest. Forcing the driver can mean high chances of mistakes because of exhaustion. The driver's endurance, strength, & accuracy will be to his lowest levels of effort. Force will pose suffering affects. The player can relieve a driver's exhaustion by instructing another positive driver until the other driver's arrow hits 2nd or 1st stage.

 

[IceMan PJN]

What be this arrow? it can be in a neutral position, point upwards or point downwards

If this has already been answered several 100 times, I appologize, I tried searching for it but came up empty

It's been asked but few people ever seem to have any meaningful understanding of the arrows. During the past couple months I've seen a broad range of hogwash explanations, most of which have since been shot down.

One early notion is that it has to do with how well you're "training" or "teaching" your driver, as though his driving ability is dependent on the issues you hand him, and suggesting that if the arrow is the blue up arrow you're teaching him well, the green neutral arrow is okay, and the orange down arrow is bad training. This seems to have been completely disregarded by the entire community, and rightly so. No matter what commands you give him and no matter whether he wins or loses, the arrows alternate between periods of up, periods of neutral, and downward periods, with no regard to what you do with him.

Another suggestion that seems to still persist is that the arrows are influenced by how much you run him. The notion here is that if you run him a lot you wear him down and the arrow dips down until you allow him to rest. This is again false because even if it's the orange down arrow you can still keep racing him and despite never giving him a period of rest it eventually turns to the green arrow and even rises to the blue up arrow. Conversely, a driver that you never touch can go from the up arrow to neutral and then down, despite you having never raced him at all.

The only things that really seem to be unquestionably true is that 1) his performance is better when it's the blue up arrow, okay when the green neutral arrow, and worse when the orange down arrow, and 2) the drivers switch back and forth between up and down over time with absolutely no regard for what you do with them. You cannot do anything to keep them from dipping downward and eventually they go back up even if you ceaselessly run them without ever giving them a break.

 

[caladina]

a tiny hijack as i didn't want to start a thread, why are the b spec drivers refered to or called 'bob'? i've not done b spec so i got a tinny on lol
thanks

 

[njg425]

just a nickname

 

[TenEightyOne]

Mostly Mood.

 

[Villain]

a tiny hijack as i didn't want to start a thread, why are the b spec drivers refered to or called 'bob'? i've not done b spec so i got a tinny on lol
thanks

It's just a generic nickname that kinda started back in GT4 when the B-Spec driver didn't have a name. It's good you're not starting a thread on this because there've been about fifty of them.

PRO TIP: Use the search function when you have a simple question like that. Honestly, most generic questions about this game have been answered. 👍

 

[Carlos]

Mostly Mood.

This is exactly what I was thinking of... 👍

 

[Flogger]

I think that I have it figured out. I was grinding Indy, and one of my Bobs (who has a hot personality) had the down arrow. It turns out that pace up and maintain pace didn't have the same effect, he cooled down much more quickly than normal. This causes you to "pace up" more often, and wear out your driver more quickly.

 

[Blutgang]

Also, i've noticed that when your bob levels up its "stats" grow differently depending in the arrow. i finished susuka 1000km with 3 bobs, 2 with the arrow pointing up (good mood or whatever..) and the other pointing down, then at the end of the race all of them leveled up and i paid attention in their stats; the stats of the 2 with blue arrow grew more than the other.
You can see this more clearly with 2 bobs, each 1 with different mood and both at the same lvl. try to go from a lower lvl to a higher lvl (let's say 5-17) and see the difference in their stats.

 

[SirAlanClive]

Also, i've noticed that when your bob levels up its "stats" grow differently depending in the arrow. i finished susuka 1000km with 3 bobs, 2 with the arrow pointing up (good mood or whatever..) and the other pointing down, then at the end of the race all of them leveled up and i paid attention in their stats; the stats of the 2 with blue arrow grew more than the other.
You can see this more clearly with 2 bobs, each 1 with different mood and both at the same lvl. try to go from a lower lvl to a higher lvl (let's say 5-17) and see the difference in their stats.

Now that was a interesting answer. I'm at lvl 40 and to be sure, the meaning of the arrows has eluded us all so far. It does not affect their performance. We run them in the SLS competition which really tests their ability to take instructions, and it has no correlation whatsoever with their performance.

I have yet to get a level 40 driver to achieve a full speed bar. This could be why.

 

[SmokinTyres]

First time I've gotten this;

How'd it happen? I make sure to use everyone.

When you don't use them, they get cold (down-arrow). When you DO use them, you get the blue up arrow and they're on a "hot-streak". Don't know how much their driving ability is affected by the streak-status, but I imagine it does make a difference.


Or I could be wrong...

 

[Sander H]

They also get green (and blue eventually) after 5 or 6 ingame days even if you don't use them

 

[turbolefty78]

What I'd like to know is where is the "official" description of this icon? I've searched high and low for it and nothing. Not in the booklet that comes with the game, not in the in-game manual, nothing online apart from speculation here and at other sites. What's up with that PD? Why are they forcing us to guess at what it's all about?
I'm inclined to believe in the mood theory though. It seems to fit the gameplay the closest.

 

[Missed_the_Apex]

I've just started in on B-Spec so I can't tell for certain or not, but I swear I thought I read somewhere that Kaz said the B-Spec drivers would have "moods" or something along those lines. Would kind of make sense if that was it, but like I said, I haven't gotten far enough into B-Spec to see any difference.

 

[BlademanX]

lol is that the real Vettel?

 

[Cowboys965]

I never knew how that worked either lol I just put the same guy in a race all the time I never knew what the arrows meant I guess it's time for a driver change lol

 

[zodicus]

sony likes to do that. there where all kinds of things we had to guess at in FF11. some really imoportant, but they would never tell us what certian stats did we just had to guess.

but from my limited exp in B spec the mood thing dose sound right. at first i thought it was endurance but i had a driver out go from blue to red so....