Sorry, Max. I am going to use you as an example, but please don't take it personally. But this is just hilarious.
And here I am, not even that good at putting my car in the right place, and I haven't had a bs penalty in months.
At a certain point it's luck of the draw. Perhaps racing 10, 20 times or more every day gives you a much higher chance at a bad draw.
Well, not sure. I think I know the reason why you don't get BS penalties. We'll get to that soon.
To be honest when I read this thread the examples - almost always posted without evidence - seem usually either vague to the point I believe they're exaggerated, open to interpretation as to where blame lies, or freakish outliers.
So you are accusing others of twisting the truth? Myself included? If I say I get a penalty for being forced off the track, is that a blatant lie?
Sure this is racing, one mistake can ruin 14 laps of racing, no one wants that to happen and not see the guilty party penalised, sure. However I don't think it's cool to outright bash PD and call their game broken and presume they don't care just because of one problem that not even every user is experiencing.
The rules of football exist, but a lot of times players can get away with fouls when referees aren't looking or human error can be made when judging them. Does that make football an inherently flawed sport that FIFA just doesn't care to get right? No. It's a few bad eggs.
To use your analogy: How about if FIFA frequently assigned blame to the wronged party? "Oh, you got knocked down aggressively for no reason - Ok, here's a red card for you and the other team gets a penalty kick". Do you think transgressions would increase or decrease. Right. THAT's the problem with GTS and PD.
And now we get to your experience.
My advice is just to care less. Gain some perspective. Let your ratings tank. Stop looking at K prime if you have to (sorry Milouse).
I honestly feel if you drive aware and relaxed, and stay out the way of clearly aggy drivers (let them spear themselves off rather than forcing passes on people who clearly hate being passed) you too can be like me and experience next to no injustice from the penalty system. Not every god damn position matters - it IS a game for all it's attempts to disguise itself as a sport.
So, in short: Adjust to the environment. That's why you're not getting penalties: You don't race.
Don't attempt to pass aggressive drivers, and let aggressive drivers pass you? Don't you see what a huge failure that is? Racing is all about going for the gaps, but with the understanding that no one will act in a manner that may put your life at risk. In a game that risk/fear deterrent doesn't work, so we need rules. But if the rules do not punish aggressive behaviour that would have threatened lives in RL, then the simulation is not going to be able to replicate RL racing in any way.
And here is the proof:
I'm not a great driver with a nuanced understanding of positioning for every corner or situation by a LOOONG stretch. I even raced in NA region the other day in the Tokyo race and experienced Brazilian ping pong. I was blocked, squeezed and outright rammed. None of that gave me a penalty, the only one I got was a wall penalty for my own overdoing it.
The points you so clearly illustrate here are two:
1. You got to enjoy a chaotic race that would NEVER have played out like that in real life. Blocking, ramming, squeezing. Fun, right? No.
2. Yay, you didn't get a penalty? You're missing the point: Likely, NO other player got a penalty either for their blocking, ramming and squeezing. So they'll do exactly the same thing again, because it worked.
At a certain point I just don't buy that the game is "out to get you".
Oh, my, that's a lot of pitchforks...
The game isn't out to get me. It's just broken and the "penalty system" designed to award clean racing is doing EXACTLY the opposite. It rewards unrealistic and aggressive behaviour that would end a racing career.
No pitchfork from me either (again, don't take this personally). I just cannot fathom how people cannot see how broken this is, and that PD either do not care, or are not competent enough to fix it.
I would go with "do not care" since clearly iRacing is doing much better by having a no-fault system (both parties get a penalty, so you can never get away with a bad move), and a real reporting system with reviews. If someone is driving badly enough, they get banned. Simple.
But anyway, I have now invested as much time on debating here as I did getting penalised and rammed in FIA yesterday. So unless someone blatantly attacks me or the logic above, I'll leave you to hopefully enjoy the broken mess that is GTS.
I will spend my time wiser in games that actually reward good race craft so I build skills that transfer well to RL track days.
