Notes on Maximising A-Spec Points

[Geeky1]

Hi guys. Found this thread while searching for tips and general info on GT4. Some good information here... I must confess that I only READ the first 3 pages (I skimmed the last two tho) but I can say conclusively that suspension settings (at least some of them) DO impact A-Spec points, at least in the American version of the game.

Weight distribution does as well; for example, when I tried to get the Dodge Ram's weight distribution as close to 50/50 as possible by using 250 units (kg I presume...) of weight shifted all the way to the rear of the truck, my A-spec points in the truck series in the beginner races went UP from 121 to 127, despite the fact that the handling improved a great deal.

I've also noticed that when I put a racing suspension on a car and tweak it (with no other modifications made at the same time), a races' A-spec points will decrease.

However, I know someone with the Japanese version of the game (they just couldn't wait for the U.S. version...) and he's told me before that he doesn't think that the suspension settings etc. effect the A-spec points in his version of the game. It is concievable that they changed something for the American version of the game, seeing as how it came out something like 2 months after the Japanese version.

 

[TheWizard]

Weight distribution does as well; for example, when I tried to get the Dodge Ram's weight distribution as close to 50/50 as possible by using 250 units (kg I presume...) of weight shifted all the way to the rear of the truck, my A-spec points in the truck series in the beginner races went UP from 121 to 127, despite the fact that the handling improved a great deal.

I discovered this also (stated in post 25, when I talk about the MINI) - the units of ballasts only go up to 200, though, I believe.

I don't think it has to do with the distribution of the weight, though, but just with the fact that the overall weight of the vehicle increases.

This weight increase (and PWR - Power to Weight Ratio - decrease) causes an increase of the number of A-spec points being offered, since they depend, among other things, on the weight of the vehicle and on its PWR.

The Wizard.

 

[Geeky1]

You're right about the ballast weight (I just checked); my mistake... I meant 150 then, not 250.

You could very well be right about it just being added weight affecting it as well; I'd have to play around with it. Which I'll do later. right now I'm B-specing (hey, I just created a word! ) the DTM championship to make enough money to pick up these "special black cars" I keep hearing about when they pop into the used car lots here in about 125 days... Once I finish with this, I'll try playing around with some stuff.

 

[asparagus]

And B-SPEC points would be even more useless "look at me, i can do as little races by watching them instead!"

I find that usually when u have between 0-30 points though for a race, it is often very easy to take the win, even though you say they have no idication.

Like if for example, you done a race which only gave you 6 a-spec points, you would know you would sail through the race.

I have heard that b-spec points improve your driver though, mine sucks mostly cause i only use him on those damn like 4 hour endurance races so i can fast forward them. 💡

 

[Gabkicks]

No - you can only get A-spec points from each race once.

That is, if you get 80 A-Spec points from a race, you cannot go back immediately and get 80 more - or go with a better car and get 5 more.

BUT you can go back with a worse car and you'll be "refunded the difference". If you went back with a 200 point car and won, you'd get the 120 points credited to your A-spec point tally.

wait.. so if we dont get 200 pts the first time we drive that race we cant anymore>?

 

[iceburns288]

Does anyone know why my B-Spec driver is great, except at ONE track. Autumn Ring, maybe, I think. Anyways, he's great but just sucks at that track. Anyone know why?

 

[Gabkicks]

hasent gotten enough seat time in different cars on that track? not enough battling on that track manybe

the AI can be really stupid sometimes. 👎

 

[04Nissan350Z]

I was running the Tokyo race in the F1 championship and when I started I thought I woudl get like 100+ A-Spec points considering ur in teh same car as the others are, but noooooo, they gave me 2, yes, 2 stinking A -spec points. Now someone tell me why this is.

 

[Gabkicks]

because the developers realized that the AI they made suck. so they expect you to use a heavier, underpowered car with worse tires than the AI. And it is winnable under those criteria because even though the AI has better tires they suck at breaking and dont use the full potential of their tires most of the time

 

[04Nissan350Z]

Well the AI doesn't suck that much, I'm a pretty good racer on GT4 (been playing the series ever since it came out) and it took me like 10 laps to get by them all, but then again the last 4 or 5 were catching the 1st place car. But still the AI is pretty dadgum good, better than GT3.

 

[Gabkicks]

the A-spec rating doesnt always mean that lower pts mean easy race and higher pts mean harder race. But most of the time they do.

 

[TheWizard]

wait.. so if we dont get 200 pts the first time we drive that race we cant anymore>?

Don't worry.

The maximum amount of A-spec points you can get in a race are 200 (except the driving missions, where you get 250).

What Famine is saying is this:

You enter a race, you get offered 80 points, you win it, you get awarded 80 A-spec points that are added to your total.

You enter that same exact race again, with the same exact vehicle, you win it, you get Zero points added to your total, because you got those 80 points already.

Now you only have 120 more points available in that race, and to get them you have to enter the race with a worse vehicle.

Say next time you enter the race you get awarded 90 points and you win it. This time the only actual points that get added to your A-spec total is 10, because you got the first 80 already.

The maximum you can get in each race is 200 A-spec points, but this reason doesn't mean you can win them multiple times.

To put it in the simplest terms I can possibly find:

You only get awarded the difference between your current maximum number of points for a given race and the new maximum number of points for that given race (provided the latter is higher than the former).

I hope this explains it, because I can't say it any better than this

The Wizard.

 

[DEO3]

Tires play a big role too. I was doing the 206 race and couldn't figure out why I was totaly unable to keep up with the rest of the pack. I ended up spending as much money as one can spend on a 206 and still I was unable to compete with the 5 other 'stock' cars. Seemingly no matter what I did to my car the A-spec points would always list at 200 and the race would always be impossible.

But my mistake was that I had just assumed that the race would be restricted to normal/sports tires, after noticing that there were no tire restrictions I bought some racing tires and sure enough upon joining the race the A-Spec listed less than 100 and I was able to destroy the competition.

 

[Gabkicks]

yup, i understand now, i thought thats what it meant.

I use n class tires most of the time when I'm trying to get high a-spec pts. My win ratio is crap though, because i often will quit a race if the A-spec pts arent high enough. I wish they would tell you the pts before you entered the race.

 

[Crayola]

My theory is that each car has a "co-efficient of A-Spec" which gives it a predisposition to get more or less points.

 

[Gabkicks]

in another thread talking about A-spec ratings. It was proven that What determines A-spec points the most is weight, then after that the weight to power ratio...

 

[Geeky1]

Yes, but more factors into it than that. At least in the US version.

 

[hitman146]

hi
but what do u accually get out of these points do you win a car or some thing

 

[Famine]

in another thread talking about A-spec ratings. It was proven that What determines A-spec points the most is weight, then after that the weight to power ratio...

That was THIS thread, Post 1...

The primary determining factor in A-spec points calculation for a given field of AI cars is the player's vehicle mass, followed by a power-to-weight ratio curve.

Tires play a big role too.

Yes, but more factors into it than that. At least in the US version.

Yes - aware of that too. Post 61.

A-Spec Points Are Dependant Upon (in rank order):
1. Comparison of figures with opponent car which would score lowest A-spec points if entered into race.
2. Tyre choice (softest axle only).
3. Weight of player car.
4. Power-to-weight ratio of player car.

A-Spec points are Independant of:
Car power.
Remainder of AI grid.
Any non-power, non-weight, non-tyre part (including suspension and Nitrous).
Track.

hi
but what do u accually get out of these points do you win a car or some thing

A-spec points have no functional operation in GT4 at all.

To quote Duke, for the love of trees people, read the whole thread before commenting.

 

[Geeky1]

A-Spec Points Are Dependant Upon (in rank order):
1. Comparison of figures with opponent car which would score lowest A-spec points if entered into race.
2. Tyre choice (softest axle only).
3. Weight of player car.
4. Power-to-weight ratio of player car.

A-Spec points are Independant of:
Car power.
Remainder of AI grid.
Any non-power, non-weight, non-tyre part (including suspension and Nitrous).
Track.

To quote Duke, for the love of trees people, read the whole thread before commenting.

Saw that. It's wrong. As I've stated, at least in the U.S. version of the game, A-Spec points are NOT independent of the suspension or its settings to the best of my knowledge. I can go back and check it again if you like, but in the past, changing suspension settings has resulted in altering the a-spec points. I thought I made that abundantly clear.

 

[Famine]

Ah, so what you mean is not "It's wrong" but "It's different in the US version"?

Just checking.

Everyone KNOWS it's more complex than just weight, power-to-weight and tyres. That's why this thread is a work in progress.

Any input you can provide to this end will be gratefully received.

 

[Geeky1]

You could look at it that way yes.

At any rate, either I'm not remembering it correctly or the US version is, in fact, different. I'll play around with it later and see what I come up with.

//EDIT
It may depend on the car in question as well... I'm going to have to back up my save game onto an extra memory card (since I can't seem to get GT4 to stop saving whenever the hell it feels like it, despite disabling autosave) and play around with it. I just tried switching from the standard suspension on an Elise to a tweaked fully customizable suspension, and it did nothing to the A Spec points. However, I DISTINCTLY remember swapping out JUST the suspension on something and having the A spec points change. I'll be damned if I can remember what car it was I was using, but I did see a change in the A Spec points from the use of different suspension settings. Either that or I've just lost whatever feeble grip I still had on my sanity... which is entirely possible... At any rate, I'll continue playing around with it and see if I can dig anything up. 👍

 

[Famine]

Quick test with PAL version:

American Championship, Chevrolet Camaro LM Race Car (601hp) used.

Opposition
Dodge Viper GTS-R Oreca '00
Panoz Esperante GTR-1 '98
Ford GT LM Race Car Spec II '04
Ford GT40 Race Car '69
Chevrolet Corvette Z06 (C2) Race Car '63

(if you weren't aware, GT4 has a specific set of opposition cars on each game day - visit the same race on the same day and you'll have the same field of AI cars)

Seattle - Stock settings. Qualified 1st. 47 points.
Infineon Sports - Stock settings. Did not Qualify. 47 points.
New York - ASM off, TCS reduced to 1. Other settings stock. Did not Qualify. 47 points.
El Capitan B - ASM off, TCS reduced to 1. Other settings stock. Did not Qualify. 47 points.
Laguna Seca - ASM off, TCS reduced to 1. Other settings stock. Did not Qualify. 47 points.

Second time around - same AI field:

Seattle - Slammed to the deck wiv NOS. ASM off, TCS reduced to 1. Did not Qualify. 47 points.
Infineon Sports - Slammed to the deck wiv NOS. ASM off, TCS reduced to 1. Did not Qualify. 47 points.
New York - Slammed to the deck wiv NOS. ASM off, TCS reduced to 1. Did not Qualify. 47 points.
El Capitan B - Slammed to the deck wiv NOS. ASM off, TCS reduced to 1. Did not Qualify. 47 points.
Laguna Seca - Slammed to the deck wiv NOS. ASM off, TCS reduced to 1. Did not Qualify. 47 points.

So it seems apparent that in both NTSC/J and PAL versions, suspension settings and qualifying do not affect A-spec points. The Camaro LM has a full race suspension as standard, so I can't check yet on whether the part affects A-spec points.

 

[hitman146]

do the a spec points add to the total completed

 

[Famine]

A-spec points have no functional operation in GT4 at all.

.

 

[Small_Fryz]

Famine, ive noticed a difference between parts, i took off my racing suspension and racing gearbox, clutch, flywheel, carbon driveshaft and got an extra 40 - 50 points, even though i was only a second or so slower.

I also know tires make a big difference but youve covered that already.

 

[Famine]

Cheers. I'll investigate that further when I get some time.

I'm beginning to suspect that application of customisable parts (transmission, suspension - probably not LSD/AYC/VCD) may affect the points - although there was no evidence for that at all in the NTSC/J version.

 

[Small_Fryz]

I think even a wing can affect A spec points, i was in a bone stock WRX (except wing) racing in subarus event and i was getting 80 - 90 A-spec points for a win. I was racing other bone stock STI's as well.

They were slow though i won by miles, and i was on S-2 tires. BTW i had no downforce in the settings.

Basicly what im rambling on about is when you do your testing, include the wing as well 👍

 

[hitman146]

thx famine

 

[jbrennen]

It's been established that tire selection makes a difference in the A-Spec points...

Considering that the A-Spec points for a race is shown when you begin the race, and you can change tires once a race has started, does this lead to some loopholes? I could start the race on Economy tires, pit after the first lap, switch to Racing Softs, and get A-Spec points based on Economy tires?

The only "fair" way I could imagine that working is if the number of A-Spec points shown at the beginning is based on the best tires that you have available for the race. If so, I've been hurting myself, because for my "workhorse" cars which I've used for many races, I've bought all of the tires to give myself maximum tactical choice during races.

So what is it for A-Spec points and tires? Is it:

- the tires on the car at the beginning of the race
- the tires on the car at the end of the race
- an "average" of the tires used during the race
- the "best" tires used during the race
- the "best" tires available during the race (even if not used)
- or something else???