Getting a late start in the modding community. Holy Smokes!PC

[Beezer215]

I'd like to say, starting out now in the modding community can be absolutely mind bending with a side of frustration but underneath all this I can see the amazing amount of fun to be had. I'd like some help if you will and maybe this can help others who are getting a late start into Assetto Corsa on PC.
I have searched through these forums and have been following the other Mod Thread but I didn't think it would be pertinent to ask too many questions in there. There's people doing important stuff in there.

1. First thing, understanding Content Manager. Am I correct in my understanding that there is no official Manual for this? Yikes
   I understand that people have made videos on youtube but it would be nice if there were physical words to read and fall back on rather than searching through some random video.
   -Now that I have too much content, the original AC load screen will not finish, does Content Manager override ALL settings in the Original Program? Do I ever need to go back into there again? Is that all just a dream now?
   
   -In races, within the first lap or so, sometimes I'm getting the screen freezing for a brief moment once or twice but just works itself out and doesn't do it in mid/later laps of the race ever again. Does this sound familiar to anyone? I can get into PC specs and Custom Shader settings if need be. I'm running PC2, rF2, ACC no problems at all.
   
   
2. SOL.
   Ok, we don't have a manual for this as well? What's the best way of working out dynamic weather? If it's editing the text file then so be it.
   When I look into Custom Shader Settings, I don't see SOL settings. Are they somewhere? Other then in the app settings within a race in which, let's face it, kind of hard to change while your driving unless you're just stopped there in a Practice session. Kind of weird that you can't set up the conditions in the screens before. I understand there's no droplets of actual rain but it does hit the windshield I guess?
   
   
3. What are you guys doing with cars that have triangle exclamation points on them? They range from not having skins to skins preview is missing.. Some of these are what's causing races to be cancelled when starting I presume. Some of them don't have any warning by them like a Suzuki Swift I have that if used will not allow any race to start. If I use the Content Manager Tools to Analyze Cars, it finds all sorts of neat stuff. Flames obsolete, weight suspected to be not right, suspected transmission loss of power, tire model too old. Do I just leave this alone? Some of it I'd say yes because it even says that on Kunos cars too.
   What do you guys do when you download a car and it has a "problem"?
   
   Thanks for any help.

 

[BrandonW77]

I know nothing about modding and not a ton about CM but I'll answer what I can (which isn't much).

Am I correct in my understanding that there is no official Manual for this? Yikes

I believe that is correct. If you hover your mouse over some of the options a little pop-up will sometimes appear giving you a description of what it does but often the descriptions are cryptic or useless. But feel free to ask questions in the mod thread, peeps in there know a ton about it and are usually more than happy to help (as long as you're polite with your requests).

-Now that I have too much content, the original AC load screen will not finish, does Content Manager override ALL settings in the Original Program? Do I ever need to go back into there again?

Not really. I occasionally have my wheel lose it's mind and I have to go back into the default launcher to run through the calibration wizard but that's the only time I ever open it. CM can handle everything, it can probably do the calibration wizard too but I've not found that option yet (haven't looked real hard, if I'm honest).

What's the best way of working out dynamic weather? If it's editing the text file then so be it.
When I look into Custom Shader Settings, I don't see SOL settings. Are they somewhere? Other then in the app settings within a race in which, let's face it, kind of hard to change while your driving unless you're just stopped there in a Practice session. Kind of weird that you can't set up the conditions in the screens before. I understand there's no droplets of actual rain but it does hit the windshield I guess?

Not real sure what you mean here. I choose all the conditions setting before entering the race, like time, weather, track conditions, etc. I've not tinkered with the rain mod so I don't know anything about that but as far as selecting time, time progression rate, cloud status, and track grip levels you do all that in the main CM screen before you launch to track. I don't think there's any need to edit text files unless you're doing something advanced I don't know about.

What are you guys doing with cars that have triangle exclamation points on them?

I just ignore them and click the "go" button, I've not had one fail to get on track yet. I think there's a way to have CM fix all that stuff but I've never really messed with it, I only know a small fraction of what CM/SOL/CSP are capable of.

 

[GIBBONS]

1. - Correct, I've worked out most of the functions through trial and error or asking, but even then there's some stuff that I've no idea about and am reluctant to fiddle with for fear of ruining everything I've done thus far.
- Since I've installed CM, I've had no reason to go back to the original launcher and as far as I'm aware, there's nothing it can do that CM can't.
- I've not had any screen freezing but you will likely get stutter on some poorly optimised mod tracks or with lots of poor quality mod cars. Try using only original game cars and tracks and see if it still does it, otherwise it's probably poorly optimised mods.

2. - There's a PDF with some basic instructions for Sol, or for general settings, just fiddle with this in a practice session in the app, most of the options are explained to some degree and I found most to be fine at default.
- For dynamic weather you need to set a plan in the weather selector app, as far as I know this remains active between sessions so you can setup what you want to happen in practice and it will carry over into your next race. It's been confirmed that in a coming update there will be a 'real conditions' dynamic mode which will change the weather automatically in real time as it changes in the real world.
- Rain is visible as droplets on interior glass but you won't see it falling from the sky.

3. - Fix them using CM, for most errors it's surprisingly basic and pretty essential as I'd estimate about 90% of car mods I've installed range somewhere between bad and 'WTF, this is offensive to people that like cars'.
- Skin/preview related errors can generally easily be fixed by just clicking the error and asking CM to solve it, typically it will just generate a new livery icon or preview.
- Errors picked up when using the 'Analyse' function can and generally should be solved just by clicking the solve button. Some of these such as obsolete flames will cause the game to fail to load, others such as transmission power loss and inaccurate weight are generally UI changes only.
- Good rule of thumb is don't use the analyse function on Kunos cars and don't edit their data (CM even advises this).
- As above, almost every car I've downloaded has numerous problems, I'm about a third of my way through my DL list and have been basically working near full time, almost every day on fixing it for the best part of two months (minus weekends). It's long winded work fixing everything that's wrong with a bad mod and sometimes you can spend several hours on it and still get to the point where you decide that it's unsalvageable. Everything I've learned to fix has come through searching online and then trial and error. It can be both super frustrating and very rewarding, it also makes you really appreciate those modders that genuinely do a really good job and how much extra work they put in.

If you're planning on going down the route of trying to fix the bad mods then I'd suggest downloading the following from racedepartment for starters:

- https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/assetto-corsa-car-tuner.13946/
This lets you create a duplicate of any vehicle and adjust power, weight, brakes and swap engines easily (then just delete the original mod car). You can also go in depth into the data files and adjust everything else to your liking. For me it's completely essential as realistic vehicle performance is my number one goal with my cars and my absolute biggest peeve is downloading a 'stock' hot hatchback and then checking the data and finding that it's got 500bhp at the wheels and a 97.5% match with a Pagani Zonda R in terms of aerodynamics...

- https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/lod-generator.24394/
This is a bit of an ordeal to setup but once done it's a life saver as it allows you to generate LODs for any car that's missing them. Most good mods already have these but a great deal are missing them.

- Use the following link's instructions to unlock the developer analysis function for cars in CM, this lets you see additional information about mod cars such as, which physics the modder has stolen from Kunos and how badly they've optimised their model (and consequently how much you need to use the LOD generator to ensure you GPU doesn't melt when running a grid full of them) - https://www.racedepartment.com/threads/content-manager-physics-check.171784/#post-3020188

Then the following are the sources I typically compare and then use to get basic data correct for various cars:
- https://www.ultimatecarpage.com/
Has a boatload of details on lots of cars, particularly good for racing cars as finding data for these can be difficult at times.
- http://tech-racingcars.wikidot.com/rally-cars
Really good for rally cars with lots of great data or links to other sources with data and specs.
- https://www.kudosprime.com/
Includes data of cars that were included in various Gran Turismo and Forza games, only the basics but still often useful for weights (just remember not to use Forza 7 for data as the info for that is based on the retarded homologation settings for that game and not OEM specifications.

Otherwise feel free to ask questions, the main thread here and then racedepartment, the F1 classic forum and assettocorsamods.net are great sources of information for how to fix or edit stuff to your liking. Having typed all this out, it now looks quite overwhelming... So I hope it hasn't put you off.

Also very important, if you start editing mods then backup your progress! I bought an external HDD for just this purpose as it would be so easy to lose months of work through stupidity, updates or hardware failure.

 

[deCarrera]

@GIBBONS Thank you for your very helpful reply and excellent resources. As someone who is just now beginning the daunting task of learning how to create mods the info you've shared is invaluable

 

[Beezer215]

1. - Correct, I've worked out most of the functions through trial and error or asking, but even then there's some stuff that I've no idea about and am reluctant to fiddle with for fear of ruining everything I've done thus far.
- Since I've installed CM, I've had no reason to go back to the original launcher and as far as I'm aware, there's nothing it can do that CM can't.
- I've not had any screen freezing but you will likely get stutter on some poorly optimised mod tracks or with lots of poor quality mod cars. Try using only original game cars and tracks and see if it still does it, otherwise it's probably poorly optimised mods.

2. - There's a PDF with some basic instructions for Sol, or for general settings, just fiddle with this in a practice session in the app, most of the options are explained to some degree and I found most to be fine at default.
- For dynamic weather you need to set a plan in the weather selector app, as far as I know this remains active between sessions so you can setup what you want to happen in practice and it will carry over into your next race. It's been confirmed that in a coming update there will be a 'real conditions' dynamic mode which will change the weather automatically in real time as it changes in the real world.
- Rain is visible as droplets on interior glass but you won't see it falling from the sky.

3. - Fix them using CM, for most errors it's surprisingly basic and pretty essential as I'd estimate about 90% of car mods I've installed range somewhere between bad and 'WTF, this is offensive to people that like cars'.
- Skin/preview related errors can generally easily be fixed by just clicking the error and asking CM to solve it, typically it will just generate a new livery icon or preview.
- Errors picked up when using the 'Analyse' function can and generally should be solved just by clicking the solve button. Some of these such as obsolete flames will cause the game to fail to load, others such as transmission power loss and inaccurate weight are generally UI changes only.
- Good rule of thumb is don't use the analyse function on Kunos cars and don't edit their data (CM even advises this).
- As above, almost every car I've downloaded has numerous problems, I'm about a third of my way through my DL list and have been basically working near full time, almost every day on fixing it for the best part of two months (minus weekends). It's long winded work fixing everything that's wrong with a bad mod and sometimes you can spend several hours on it and still get to the point where you decide that it's unsalvageable. Everything I've learned to fix has come through searching online and then trial and error. It can be both super frustrating and very rewarding, it also makes you really appreciate those modders that genuinely do a really good job and how much extra work they put in.

If you're planning on going down the route of trying to fix the bad mods then I'd suggest downloading the following from racedepartment for starters:

- https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/assetto-corsa-car-tuner.13946/
This lets you create a duplicate of any vehicle and adjust power, weight, brakes and swap engines easily (then just delete the original mod car). You can also go in depth into the data files and adjust everything else to your liking. For me it's completely essential as realistic vehicle performance is my number one goal with my cars and my absolute biggest peeve is downloading a 'stock' hot hatchback and then checking the data and finding that it's got 500bhp at the wheels and a 97.5% match with a Pagani Zonda R in terms of aerodynamics...

- https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/lod-generator.24394/
This is a bit of an ordeal to setup but once done it's a life saver as it allows you to generate LODs for any car that's missing them. Most good mods already have these but a great deal are missing them.

- Use the following link's instructions to unlock the developer analysis function for cars in CM, this lets you see additional information about mod cars such as, which physics the modder has stolen from Kunos and how badly they've optimised their model (and consequently how much you need to use the LOD generator to ensure you GPU doesn't melt when running a grid full of them) - https://www.racedepartment.com/threads/content-manager-physics-check.171784/#post-3020188

Then the following are the sources I typically compare and then use to get basic data correct for various cars:
- https://www.ultimatecarpage.com/
Has a boatload of details on lots of cars, particularly good for racing cars as finding data for these can be difficult at times.
- http://tech-racingcars.wikidot.com/rally-cars
Really good for rally cars with lots of great data or links to other sources with data and specs.
- https://www.kudosprime.com/
Includes data of cars that were included in various Gran Turismo and Forza games, only the basics but still often useful for weights (just remember not to use Forza 7 for data as the info for that is based on the retarded homologation settings for that game and not OEM specifications.

Otherwise feel free to ask questions, the main thread here and then racedepartment, the F1 classic forum and assettocorsamods.net are great sources of information for how to fix or edit stuff to your liking. Having typed all this out, it now looks quite overwhelming... So I hope it hasn't put you off.

Also very important, if you start editing mods then backup your progress! I bought an external HDD for just this purpose as it would be so easy to lose months of work through stupidity, updates or hardware failure.

Thanks Gibbons. I've learned soooo much since posting this. Soaking in information like a sponge. One of the biggest problems with car mods is that all these people fail to use the car as an AI and alter the AI.ini.
All these cars that have upshift values higher than the limiter.
Sometimes you get a car with wheels facing in sideways to the car and it just starts bouncing around like crazy when the race starts. lol
Right now I'm working on a car that reflects the road on the windshield. Other cars that say driver model missing that will crash a race start.
I'm trying to figure out what's due to the shader patch or if it's in the car. Obviously something has to be wrong in the car. Haven't got much into the 3D models yet but I do have Blender.

Making AI lines and using AI Line Helper has been nice to save some tracks as well.

 

[GIBBONS]

Glad to be of help.

BTW, driver model missing is a very easy fix, if you haven't solved it already, just open the driver3d.ini and then after 'NAME=' delete what is there and enter the name from the driver model of your choice, the ones installed can be found under the folder: assettocorsa\content\driver

 

[Beezer215]

I've just tried this and the front wheels are fine for me, the problem I see is that the left rear wheel is wobbling around like crazy at lower speeds. TBH from the 2 minutes I spent with the car, I expect that when I've worked my way though my library to cars beginning with C, I'll be copying the sound of this one and then it'll be going straight in the recycle bin.

I don't want to waste space on the other modding thread.
I know the car isn't worth it's weight in gold. This is more a learning process to try and fix cars. It has this problem as an AI car. That's what I find interesting and trying to figure out. There are different settings for AI and using the car yourself I suppose.

Thanks for taking the time to respond. I'll see if I can get a pic when I can fire up the PC.

 

[GIBBONS]

Ah, that explains it then as I didn't let the AI drive it. I have no idea what could cause that, but then I've not looked at any AI stuff yet so I'm yet to discover the joys of editing those files!

In general I've had to take a break from my car editing as it was starting to get depressing, at least trying out and rating my tracklist I actually get to drive a bit and the quality standard on tracks seems to be overall much higher (or I'm far less fussy about it...).

 

[RaceFuchs]

One single advice... be picky about your mods. Honestly i never had issues with them because i only use the mods that are considered to be the best... guys like Chris Haye on Youtube will help to decide which mods are worth your time and work properly.

 

[Beezer215]

Boy you're not kidding. Some of them are messed up. I've already fixed a couple dozen myself. I do a little programming so it's not foreign to go into the code and see what's going on. I'll check out that youtube channel. Thanks!