Practical Suggestions for Penalty System

[John Crellin]

This is not another penalty system complaint thread. Please don't suggest they scrap sport mode or something else, only practical suggestions please.

I know a lot of people blame the AI for how the penalty system works but I don't see this as an AI learning system (I don't think it is learning, maybe I'm wrong), but instead as a collection of static rules that the game follows which can be tweaked. So rather than just complaining about the penalty system maybe we can constructively come up with some ways that they could practically fix the system.

I have a a list of ONLY SIX minor tweaks to suggest that shouldn't be difficult to implement, uses tools the game already contains, and are practical to implement in a single update.

If I could change the penalty system it would be simple (in order of priority):



1. Remove the DR modifier on SR loss and penalties (I want a system that treats every driver on a grid by the same rules)

2. Increase the impact threshold for what constitutes a penalizable collision (impact should change affected drivers vector significantly)

3. In the event of a collision, assign 100% fault to the driver who:

a. brakes in a acceleration zone
b. rear ends another car in a braking zone
c. makes front end contact with the side of another car (t-bone/divebomb/ turn-ins and inside dives)
d. in the case of a multi car collision, only the first two cars to make impact in a chain event will be considered and the above rules will stand.

4. In the case of a side by side collision, equal blame is attributed to both drivers

5.Limit total SR loss in a single race to 25-30% of your total SR
(addendum: Multiply everyone's current SR by 10 and make the total possible out of 999; double the SR loss penalties and keep SR gains the same)

6. Make penalties easier to scrub (pre 1.13, I dont like stopping at the finish line, it's not better than slow cornering IMO)




That's it, I think this is all that PD has to do to make the system work, and these are all thing that don't require a sci-fi AI system in effect. Why cant this be instituted? Did I forget anything?

 

[kevlar_hybrid]

If the game is going to rank me by speed S and sportsmanship S, then throw me into T1 at Monza with drivers ranked as low as C-A then why bother ranking at all!?

So my suggestion is tighten up the match making. I want to drive with people VERY close to my ratings please. If that means a 4 car race then fine. Better than 13 low ranked *********** slamming into me in T1 and the game giving ME a portion of that blame.

Apart from that, apportion of blame is a huge problem in general. I would be fine with "ABSOLUTELY NO CONTACT WHATSOEVER OR YOU WILL BE DQ INSTANTLY" so long as the person ramming me from behind gets the blame when I'm within a few 0.01s of my regular race pace, line etc

 

[John Crellin]

If the game is going to rank me by speed S and sportsmanship S, then throw me into T1 at Monza with drivers ranked as low as C-A then why bother ranking at all!?

So my suggestion is tighten up the match making. I want to drive with people VERY close to my ratings please. If that means a 4 car race then fine. Better than 13 low ranked *********** slamming into my in T1 and the game giving ME a portion of that blame.

How would you tighten up matchmaking? They currently match based on SR then DR. What have been finding out is that being high DR is a fairly exclusive club (Im at 35k and in the top 1%) and there arent enough people on at a given time to really fill a room with all DR A and DR S unless im at SR S. and when Im at 99 SR at primetime the rooms are always stacked.

So how would you fix the matching system in a practical manner?

 

[kevlar_hybrid]

Quote : If that means a 4 car race then fine.

I don't want a "full room" if it means them ramming me will get be penalised. I want a 4 car room with people of the same ability and intent.

 

[O604]

Hi. I just signed up. I learn a lot from this forum. Thanks to everyone here.

I had a thought. An example where 2 drivers of different levels are competing. And how penalties are distributed in that case.

ex. Lets say a DR-S and DR-D driver fight for a line. Maybe it's up to the higher ranked driver to let the lower ranked driver through (not on last corner obviously)? Maybe the algorithm figures the stronger driver should be able to retake later therefore the priority of that situation is to avoid contact and not maintain position?

Just trying to think like a computer.

 

[John Crellin]

Quote : If that means a 4 car race then fine.

I don't want a "full room" if it means them ramming me will get be penalised. I want a 4 car room with people of the same ability and intent.

Id argue that you could have fair races with lower DR if my suggested rules were implemented. The ramming situation would be fixed with a 100% fault system as i stated above.

I think a 4 car room would be boring. Id probably quit after a few races with the same people. Like lobbies with 4 people, they can be hit or miss and after a while a pecking order is achieved on a single track and the races become a procession.

Maybe they could place more priority on DR and widen SR range for pooling drivers and sorting them. that would allow SR 80 to race with SR 99 and put more available high DR drivers in the same the pool to be matched

I had a thought. An example where 2 drivers of different levels are competing. And how penalties are distributed in that case.

ex. Lets say a DR-S and DR-D driver fight for a line. Maybe it's up to the higher ranked driver to let the lower ranked driver through (not on last corner obviously)? Maybe the algorithm figures the stronger driver should be able to retake later therefore the priority of that situation is to avoid contact and not maintain position?

Just trying to think like a computer.

Welcome!
Thats most likely what they were thinking, but the reality is far from that. Many times its the lower DR drivers making the mistake, being too aggressive, not being aware, etc. Its all part of the process.

After going off track and ending up mid field or worse, there is not much that a high ranked player can do when surrounded with lower ranked drivers of questionable consistency and control. I can hold the inside line but that doesnt stop a DR B driver from turning in on me (which under the current system gives me a 4-5sec penalty and them a 1second penalty) and there is nothing that i can do about a rear end or divebomb in a slow corner by an aggressive/inconsistent trailing driver

 

[kevlar_hybrid]

Id argue that you could have fair races with lower DR if my suggested rules were implemented. The ramming situation would be fixed with a 100% fault system as i stated above.

I think a 4 car room would be boring. Id probably quit after a few races with the same people. Like lobbies with 4 people, they can be hit or miss and after a while a pecking order is achieved on a single track and the races become a procession.

Maybe they could place more priority on DR and widen SR range for pooling drivers and sorting them. that would allow SR 80 to race with SR 99 and put more available high DR drivers in the same the pool to be matched

True, fair point. Though my understanding on the reading the rest of this forum is that a blame apportioning system is nye on impossible.
As such giving *me* the option to choose to race with those of my ability or not would be a practical answer. From my perspective, there is nothing remotely fun about racing people 1sec per lap slower and with far inferior race craft.

 

[Outspacer]

5.Limit total SR loss in a single race to 25-30% of your total SR

Disqualification would be a reasonable option. That way there's also a DR hit - but in a way that other players get a DR boost. Which seems fair in the case that someone DQ'd has probably ruined a few people's race.

That's it, I think this is all that PD has to do to make the system work, and these are all thing that don't require a sci-fi AI system in effect. Why cant this be instituted? Did I forget anything?

Yes, lots!

Out1) SR system needs to be the first focus for improvement, it's simply not doing it's job effectively at the moment. No matter what tweaks are made to penalties, SR needs to work a lot better. Massive -ve SR punishments and uniform +ve SR gains mean it is not scoring people correctly at all.

Out2) Capping DR points when SR drops too far needs to be stopped. 1) it's technically bad to remove points, and 2) it puts people together who shouldn't be together. There should be a space for people who want to race fast but dirty, but a whole quadrant (high DR, low SR) is removed. (Of course they still won't show a high DR letter, but matchmaking can use the DR points).

Out3) Benefit of doubt should always be given. If the system can't determine blame for an incident to, say, 90% accuracy then no penalty should be given. Handing out a penalty to both players is just plain wrong.

I'm sure there's more, but essentially PD need to get SR (and DR) working well so they don't need to rely on penalties to enforce clean racing. Matchmaking can't do its job without proper driver ratings.

On that topic, I've raced against a good number of slower drivers after I've fallen off the road and TBH quite a few of them are doing their best to be clean as well. I don't mind getting matched with them if that's what it takes to fill a room - they probably mind it more than me!

 

[John Crellin]

True, fair point. Though my understanding on the reading the rest of this forum is that a blame apportioning system is nye on impossible.

part of the point in this post is that i dont beleive that having a high accuracy system would be impossible. I think the rules i suggested would guide the blame process so that its more accurate and attempt to determine fault. There are instances that can be conjured that would be hard to give 100% blame to an individual and therefore we should apportion equal blame in those instances. I think we could get 99/100 incidents correct. Ill take a 1% error rate. Hell even a 5%..

As such giving *me* the option to choose to race with those of my ability or not would be a practical answer. From my perspective, there is nothing remotely fun about racing people 1sec per lap slower and with far inferior race craft.

Ill agree with you there.

 

[Outspacer]

I think we could get 99/100 incidents correct. Ill take a 1% error rate. Hell even a 5%..

I think it would take a mircale for PD to get it anywhere close to 90% correct, TBH. (That's not a dig at PD, it's just there's a lot of difficult situations to judge - maybe I'm braking in an accel zone because someone has spun out ahead).

 

[TheNorfolkDad]

I'm just going to assume the penalty system works off of a highly complex algorithm (since we obviously do not have race stewards to point fingers). The penalty system is improving all the time, IMO they almost had it sussed at 1.14 but it's most recent patch made penalties and SR drops more severe, and seems to be calling a lot of incidents 50/50, when they clearly are not.

The penalty system would be fine, and they wouldn't have to make changes if people knew how to race better. It's the "win at all costs" attitude that needs to change, most incidents that I have are due to someone wanting my position so badly they push me off the track, or someone that tries to scrub a penalty on an apex because not only does it disrupt their own race the least, it disrupts other peoples race the most.

I don't even know if the report function has yielded any punishment for players so far, but I'll keep pressing that button regardless.

 

[John Crellin]

Disqualification would be a reasonable option.
Out1) SR system needs to be the first focus for improvement, it's simply not doing it's job effectively at the moment. No matter what tweaks are made to penalties, SR needs to work a lot better. Massive -ve SR punishments and uniform +ve SR gains mean it is not scoring people correctly at all.

Out2) Capping DR points when SR drops too far needs to be stopped. 1) it's technically bad to remove points, and 2) it puts people together who shouldn't be together. There should be a space for people who want to race fast but dirty, but a whole quadrant (high DR, low SR) is removed. (Of course they still won't show a high DR letter, but matchmaking can use the DR points).

Out3) Benefit of doubt should always be given. If the system can't determine blame for an incident to, say, 90% accuracy then no penalty should be given. Handing out a penalty to both players is just plain wrong.

1. Maybe they can increase total SR points by an order of magnitude (out of 999 lets say) and multiply SR losses by 2 or 3-fold with a maximum of 100pts lost in a single race. This would reduce the amount of bouncing around and make the climb tot he top much longer

2. I agree with the DR drops idea. Needs to go, takes points out of the system and is too drastic.

3. Id rather avoid the squeezes outside and the turn-ins inside by making it clear to the drivers that you will both get penalized equally for side contacts. but the threshold just had to be higher than it currently is. I wouldnt mind if a car could "lean on me" through a corner or bump draft me on a straight. Im all for a system thats more lenient but how do they determine the confidence interval to be able to assess whether they feel 90% correct about who is at fault.

I'm just going to assume the penalty system works off of a highly complex algorithm (since we obviously do not have race stewards to point fingers). The penalty system is improving all the time, IMO they almost had it sussed at 1.14 but it's most recent patch made penalties and SR drops more severe, and seems to be calling a lot of incidents 50/50, when they clearly are not.

The penalty system would be fine, and they wouldn't have to make changes if people knew how to race better. It's the "win at all costs" attitude that needs to change, most incidents that I have are due to someone wanting my position so badly they push me off the track, or someone that tries to scrub a penalty on an apex because not only does it disrupt their own race the least, it disrupts other peoples race the most.

I don't even know if the report function has yielded any punishment for players so far, but I'll keep pressing that button regardless.

The win at all costs is attitude will never go away. That's what the rules are for.

My problem is not that people want the position so badly that they will push me off track, its that 90% of the time i get unfairly penalized (usually more severly than the one who caused it)
The complexity of the algorithm wont change given my suggestions, just some static values that the alogrithm uses in its decisions.

 

[Mr616]

Out1) SR system needs to be the first focus for improvement, it's simply not doing it's job effectively at the moment. No matter what tweaks are made to penalties, SR needs to work a lot better. Massive -ve SR punishments and uniform +ve SR gains mean it is not scoring people correctly at all.

If this was implemented correctly, SR:S in any DR rank should be almost guaranteeing clean racing. People should not be restricted in SR because their DR rank is low. People who are not as quick should still be able to hold a high SR if they are clean.

If SR did work correctly, the penalties could be all but done away with (aside from major incidents and corner cuts), and the SR of who you are matched with would be a better indicator of the people you are racing against. As it stands SR:S means very little as it lets you get away with far to much imo. This would also allow players who accept contact in racing, to run at DR:B,A or S with an SR:A. The only problem being, that people want to hold the highest rank and see it as a levelling process, when it is there to categorise people on pace and safety.

 

[John Crellin]

If SR did work correctly, the penalties could be all but done away with (aside from major incidents and corner cuts), and the SR of who you are matched with would be a better indicator of the people you are racing against. As it stands SR:S means very little as it lets you get away with far to much imo.

I agree with this. Time penalties could be applied only in cases of exceeding track boundaries and 100% fault cases with SR losses making up for the rest of contact penalties. If they increased the overall SR points to 999 then it would take almost 6 bad 35 pt SR drop races to drop from 999 S to A. With a maximum of 10-20pts to be gained in a clean race it would take a while to raise your SR. This would stabilize the system significantly and allow further stratification of the SR classes so that there is a matching difference between SR 999 and SR 950 which would help to better match people based on SR stability.

If everyone starts at SR 500 then it would take almost 40-50 clean races to acheive SR 999 which assures plenty of experienced drivers at the top and that there is no such thing as an E/S driver

 

[Outspacer]

1. Maybe they can increase total SR points by an order of magnitude (out of 999 lets say) and multiply SR losses by 2 or 3-fold with a maximum of 100pts lost in a single race. This would reduce the amount of bouncing around and make the climb tot he top much longer

Certainly some more resolution would help. Without working it out in full, I think what could work is while everbody gets the same -ve hits, the +ve boost should be limited depending on currect SR level. Obviously SR hits and gains would need to be scaled to fit whatever revised scale. I'm not sure if this needs to be a change to the SR score people carry from race to race, perhaps it would work simply to use floating point when calculating the scoring during each race.

2. I agree with the DR drops idea. Needs to go, takes points out of the system and is too drastic.

3. Id rather avoid the squeezes outside and the turn-ins inside by making it clear to the drivers that you will both get penalized equally for side contacts. but the threshold just had to be higher than it currently is. I wouldnt mind if a car could "lean on me" through a corner or bump draft me on a straight. Im all for a system thats more lenient but how do they determine the confidence interval to be able to assess whether they feel 90% correct about who is at fault.

Any and all contact should affect SR, from very slight taps all the way up. I don't know if the current system ever gives a -SR without some time penalty as well - if it does it's the exception rather than the rule - so that's currently an under-used tool. Obviously this has to be fair and allow a small amount of contact without dropping you tens of SR, so has to be quite fine-grained - if you're SR 95 and might only gain 2 SR from a clean race, then that kind of nudge has to be only -0.2 or so. Whatever the numbers that give a good balance, every contact needs to be recorded in some way so that the scoring has statistics to work with.

What has to be avoided though is effectively giving people a 'budget' of bad behaviour they can judiciously use, at least at the highest levels. It gets harder to avoid at mid-levels, but, then others have the choice to aim for a higher level to get away from that behaviour.

It should never, ever, give time penalties to two players for the same incident. There should be no argument against this, because it has no parallel in the real world (aside from outright fights). As soon as there isn't clear-cut blame, the penalty should be done with -ve SR only.

 

[John Crellin]

Certainly some more resolution would help. Without working it out in full, I think what could work is while everbody gets the same -ve hits, the +ve boost should be limited depending on currect SR level. Obviously SR hits and gains would need to be scaled to fit whatever revised scale. I'm not sure if this needs to be a change to the SR score people carry from race to race, perhaps it would work simply to use floating point when calculating the scoring during each race.

I feel like scaling the SR penalties with the level is the same problem as scaling with DR. It changes the rules for players in a mixed grid. I dont want SR A drivers to have more of chance to recover SR after an incident than SR S on in the same race. I dont know if you can get rid of the "budget for bad behavior" without completely changing the system. Id rather just have the fact that SR gains are much slower than SR losses to be the incentive for clean driving. (Yeah you might win the race by bumping them off in the last corner, but it will take you 3 races to get back to the same SR.)

Any and all contact should affect SR, from very slight taps all the way up. I don't know if the current system ever gives a -SR without some time penalty as well - if it does it's the exception rather than the rule - so that's currently an under-used tool.Obviously this has to be fair and allow a small amount of contact without dropping you tens of SR, so has to be quite fine-grained - if you're SR 95 and might only gain 2 SR from a clean race, then that kind of nudge has to be only -0.2 or so. Whatever the numbers that give a good balance, every contact needs to be recorded in some way so that the scoring has statistics to work with.

I can say with certainty that the system does penalize contact with SR loss without giving a time penalty. I have been bumped slightly on when side by side though a straight as i was being overtaken, and no penalties were handed out, no SR down arrow was shown, but i finished the race completely clean other than that one incident and ended with a white S at the end of the race. And yes... this is an underused tool.

I do not agree, however, with the assertion that all contact should be penalized as a way of recording contact for statistical purposes. Minor contact should not be penalized. I mean SUPER minor contact. The current system will give me a 4sec penalty and a 1sec penalty to the driver in front of me if we come too close in a corner even if contact is so minor we dont even notice it. Like any data set, there is a threshold set for what constitutes a significant departure from background noise (signal-to-noise ratio). These minor contacts should fall into to the statistical noise when assessing a drivers cleanliness. I propose we raise this threshold where only meaningful contact is penalized.

It should never, ever, give time penalties to two players for the same incident. There should be no argument against this, because it has no parallel in the real world (aside from outright fights). As soon as there isn't clear-cut blame, the penalty should be done with -ve SR only.

agreed

 

[BallPtPenTheif]

At this point I feel like they should just match iRacing's criteria to at least establish a consistent industry standards. If they want to tweak it in ways that don't ruin that minimum level of competence, they can do it after the fact.

iRacing is not perfect either but at least there's already a known standard.

 

[John Crellin]

At this point I feel like they should just match iRacing's criteria to at least establish a consistent industry standards. If they want to tweak it in ways that don't ruin that minimum level of competence, they can do it after the fact.

iRacing is not perfect either but at least there's already a known standard.

Im not against them making and improving their own system, This breeds healthy competition, and a real incentive for them to improve their algorithms so that they can beat the current competition and hopefully set the industry standard.

I honestly dont think they are that far off from a fair system that incentivizes clean driving, stabilizes rankings over time, and can determine fault with a fair degree of accuracy. This is still only the testing phase for their system, and it is a long term endeavor that they can build as intellectual property. My guess is the real vision is down the road to GT7 or whatever the next game is and they are using these updates as a way to gather the necessary data through variable permutations and optimize their algorithms so that they will have a really good system down the road.

 

[TheGeologist]

3. In the event of a collision, assign 100% fault to the driver who:

a. brakes in a acceleration zone
b. rear ends another car in a braking zone
c. makes front end contact with the side of another car (t-bone/divebomb/ turn-ins and inside dives)
d. in the case of a multi car collision, only the first two cars to make impact in a chain event will be considered and the above rules will stand.

I respectively disagree with number 3 John. I think it is too complex for a computer to define.

A. a car may attempt to brake in an acceleration zone if they are trying to avoid a crash. They should not be blamed in that case.

B. the driver rear ending a car in front of them in a braking zone may not always be at fault if that driver suddenly decides to go extra slow to bleed a penalty. They should not be blamed in that case.

 

[simsimsheree]

I wonder why real race drivers don't whine about the penalty system they have? Well, OK, they do when they get penalized, but nobody changes it much!

Maybe it's because the crux of the penalty system has to do with practical things that can be done on track. Hit a player from behind and pass? Return the position. This is already implemented in PC2 (maybe iRacing too, don't know about that game). You smash your way past another player, the penalty isn't a red dot, it isn't points being lost but you still get the win... It is the prompt return of position or you get a DQ.

Get a timed penalty for corner cutting? You serve it at race end, or if repeated sufficiently, you get a drive-through. This prevents incidents and accidents from players randomly slowing (with no rules about where and when, the player can game the system to his advantage). If PD refuse to adhere to real race rules, firstly, I think the FIA should withdraw their support. But maybe this could be still used if there were designated 'off the racing line' areas in which penalties could ONLY be served there (off-line on the longest straights seems about right).

Allowing players the right to slow down where and whenever they feel like it is insane!

The game already has a detection system that kicks in the Counter-steer Assist. So it already KNOWS when a car is starting to go sideways. I think that if a car DOES get sufficiently sideways (probably well past the CA kick-in point) this fact could be used to zero out any penalty imposed on the trailing car for hitting it. After all, you can't be blamed when the car in front loses it! But this data could also be used to determine whether any light contact from the car behind deserves a penalty or not. After all, if a light bump doesn't cause ANY loss of control (which would be detected by the CA mechanism), it's basically a 'racing incident' unless the trailing car passes in the next sector.

There are already a few F1 tracks with those white lines before heavy braking zones in the game. Those are used IRL to determine that, unless you have a half-car or more overlap as you cross it, you have zero apex rights. Hit the car in front in these zones, you alone get the penalty (and have to return position to the car you hit). This concept could be used invisibly at ALL heavy braking zone areas. In fact, that detection mechanism already exists in the game... The so called 'racing line display' - it clearly marks heavy braking zones in red. If more carefully worked out (it would need a fair bit of playtesting to determine the last possible safe braking point) it could be used to determine if the lead car broke too early, or the trailing car broke too late. And contact past that line could be assigned to whoever caused the issue.

I still maintain that no automated stewarding and penalty system will ever work 100%, but I believe there are existing mechanisms already in the game that are not being utilized to make a highly flawed system a bit better...

 

[cleanLX]

Only way I would agree to the SR.999 scenario is if the reset simply place a zero at the end of everyone's current rating.
I've had the game since it's release and have only had time to put in 50 races... if it takes 50 races to get to SR.99x... well, I really don't want to put in another 5-6 months (to get my next 50 races), while trying to survive at Sr.E if/after some random reset.

Penalties need be the same regardless of Dr./Sr. rating.
Hand of God car reset back to track needs go away.
Penalties do not scrub on track... serve in the pit or carry to the end.

Otherwise, I like where you are driving this.

 

[John Crellin]

I respectively disagree with number 3 John. I think it is too complex for a computer to define.

A. a car may attempt to brake in an acceleration zone if they are trying to avoid a crash. They should not be blamed in that case.

B. the driver rear ending a car in front of them in a braking zone may not always be at fault if that driver suddenly decides to go extra slow to bleed a penalty. They should not be blamed in that case.

I dont think this is too complex (pretty simple if-then logic), one of the situations that you presented are too complex for the system to figure out though and would be erroneously solved.

A. This would be the solved by the multi car collision rule where the last car coming in to the wreck would be penalized for rear ending not the middle cars. But i would also argue that the driver who rear ends the braking car should have seen wreck and it is their fault for not braking early. The same situation that happens in a train of cars when the accordion effect occurs and you have to brake super early for the cars in front. the trailing cars need to be aware

B. Again the trailing driver has to avoid the contact in a braking zone or its their fault. If a driver ahead decides to take the turn at half speed its it the trailing drivers job to avoid that regardless of why the lead drivers slows. Currently the system wont let you bleed penalty time in the corners anyways. If you are driving into a wreck in a corner, then the multi car collision rule takes effect and only the two cars who start the contact will be assessed for a penalty therefore no penalties for driving into a wrecked car

 

[cleanLX]

The game already has a detection system that kicks in the Counter-steer Assist. So it already KNOWS when a car is starting to go sideways. I think that if a car DOES get sufficiently sideways (probably well past the CA kick-in point) this fact could be used to zero out any penalty imposed on the trailing car for hitting it. After all, you can't be blamed when the car in front loses it! But this data could also be used to determine whether any light contact from the car behind deserves a penalty or not. After all, if a light bump doesn't cause ANY loss of control (which would be detected by the CA mechanism), it's basically a 'racing incident' unless the trailing car passes in the next sector.

Hmmm... I don't know... I think that you should still have to avoid the car that is "loosing it". I've seen some people recover from some things that appeared 100% un-recoverable in the game, and, if I was given free reign to finish them off... well... people.
The second part I could live with if the bolded part was implemented.
All the rest of your post I gave a like... just did not quote it all here.

 

[John Crellin]

it's basically a 'racing incident' unless the trailing car passes in the next sector.

The second part I could live with if the bolded part was implemented.

Clean racing sometimes entails really close trailing and an overtake when exiting a corner with greater speed than a lead driver who maybe had their rear end kick out on exit. Since a car is on the edge of balance exiting a corner, small contacts may not be avoidable as the steering and throttle inputs have very little margin for error and the slipstream effect is so strong even at lower speeds. So these little bumps should be acceptable as long as they dont significantly deviate the lead driver from their line even if they get overtaken.

i dont know about you guys but most of my spins and position losses occur at corner exits when mashing the throttle and i lose control trying to countersteer out of the spin taking any close racers with me. It shouldnt penalize them for small contact and passinng me.

Also, many times minor contact occurs during fair overtaking attempts in tight places (nurb im looking at you). It is these penalties that we want to mitigate

 

[BallPtPenTheif]

You smash your way past another player, the penalty isn't a red dot, it isn't points being lost but you still get the win... It is the prompt return of position or you get a DQ.

Great point. There really should be more informative prompts to inform the player of their fault and to instruct them on how to remedy the situation.

The game already has a detection system that kicks in the Counter-steer Assist. So it already KNOWS when a car is starting to go sideways... In fact, that detection mechanism already exists in the game... The so called 'racing line display' - it clearly marks heavy braking zones in red. If more carefully worked out (it would need a fair bit of playtesting to determine the last possible safe braking point) it could be used to determine if the lead car broke too early, or the trailing car broke too late. And contact past that line could be assigned to whoever caused the issue.

All rad if possible but just because multiple systems are in the same game doesn't necessarily mean that each system can share information or that they are even designed in a way to work together.

 

[Outspacer]

I feel like scaling the SR penalties with the level is the same problem as scaling with DR. It changes the rules for players in a mixed grid. I dont want SR A drivers to have more of chance to recover SR after an incident than SR S on in the same race. I dont know if you can get rid of the "budget for bad behavior" without completely changing the system. Id rather just have the fact that SR gains are much slower than SR losses to be the incentive for clean driving. (Yeah you might win the race by bumping them off in the last corner, but it will take you 3 races to get back to the same SR.)

Maybe you misunderstood what I was getting at. Certainly not the same kind of abrupt change, like we have where DR B is so much less punished than DR A, with a hard line between the two.

For SR to work effectively it has to mean something, and that is basically something like incidents (scaled) per race. Naturally, you'd expect higher SR to have a lower ratio, so that's where the scaling comes from. I think scaling the boosts is better than scaling the penalties, since SR boost is too high per race for SR 99 - why should we get/need any at all?! But it has to be a linear scale - my example in another thread was that max gain per race should be enough to get you half way closer towards SR 100, so e.g. +5 at SR 90, +2 at SR 95, etc.

Also, because matchmaking is SR first, it would be grouping together those playing by similar rules. So you wouldn't get the same kind of problem as with DR B vs A.

I can say with certainty that the system does penalize contact with SR loss without giving a time penalty. I have been bumped slightly on when side by side though a straight as i was being overtaken, and no penalties were handed out, no SR down arrow was shown, but i finished the race completely clean other than that one incident and ended with a white S at the end of the race. And yes... this is an underused tool.

Ah yes, quite a few people have mentioned these phantom hits. Because it doesn't display anything, it leaves me wondering how much of it is intended, and how much of it is bug!

I do not agree, however, with the assertion that all contact should be penalized as a way of recording contact for statistical purposes. Minor contact should not be penalized. I mean SUPER minor contact. The current system will give me a 4sec penalty and a 1sec penalty to the driver in front of me if we come too close in a corner even if contact is so minor we dont even notice it. Like any data set, there is a threshold set for what constitutes a significant departure from background noise (signal-to-noise ratio). These minor contacts should fall into to the statistical noise when assessing a drivers cleanliness. I propose we raise this threshold where only meaningful contact is penalized.

Why not? I'm talking about being proportionate - a super minor SR hit for a super minor contact. It has to be at a level where anyone trying to be clean wouldn't even notice them, but someone who habitually rubs and pushes will end up with a different SR.

TBH I think it's the opposite - not statistical noise at all - when taken together the little contacts give perhaps a better picture of a driver's general behaviour than an occasional big crash. I've met a few players recently who have learned to gently nudge someone off the road when they're trying to pass on a straight, which right now gets no penalty at all.

 

[simsimsheree]

Hmmm... I don't know... I think that you should still have to avoid the car that is "loosing it". I've seen some people recover from some things that appeared 100% un-recoverable in the game, and, if I was given free reign to finish them off... well... people.
The second part I could live with if the bolded part was implemented.
All the rest of your post I gave a like... just did not quote it all here.

I rather doubt the game has a system to recognize whether you could or could not avoid a car that spins in front of you (as is pretty obvious at the moment!). And, if you do contact the spinning car, that usually means you lose time anyway (so a certain degree of penalty is automatic). Naturally, the desire is to avoid the car ahead if you can, because that is the fastest option. But if you can't, you shouldn't be penalized for unavoidable contact. The desire to 'finish off' the sideways car will soon be apparent that it gives the car behind you to attack, and will probably be little used.

All rad if possible but just because multiple systems are in the same game doesn't necessarily mean that each system can share information or that they are even designed in a way to work together.

But at least they exist... Which is more than we can say for half of the ideas floated in these kinds of threads! Whether they can be leveraged is of course speculation. But the crux of the problem is detection, not implementation. Without that, no implementation is possible. Personally, I don't honestly think PD care (the majority of their player base is incapable of clean racing in the first place and enforcing really clean racing would lose them vast sums of money), but it's interesting to speculate on how things could get better if they did care...

 

[Haitauer]

Been thinking this a while. I think the car in front (even slightly when side by side) should not be penalized after braking zone starts unless the car behind leaves track due/after contact. This way lead car should be allowed to choose its line as long as it doesnt push follower out of track. Its the following drivers responsibility to not hit the car in front while going through a corner.

People really should learn to lift off/brake early while entering braking zone behind another car. One can easily gain the lost distance by adjusting braking power to the car in front AND quite often end up getting better exit by slowing down a bit early.

 

[Sean Renon]

Been thinking this a while. I think the car in front (even slightly when side by side) should not be penalized after braking zone starts unless the car behind leaves track due/after contact. This way lead car should be allowed to choose its line as long as it doesnt push follower out of track. Its the following drivers responsibility to not hit the car in front while going through a corner.

People really should learn to lift off/brake early while entering braking zone behind another car. One can easily gain the lost distance by adjusting braking power to the car in front AND quite often end up getting better exit by slowing down a bit early.

There are multiple corners in the game where the car who is slightly behind, but on the inside has the optimal line and the outside driver should back off.
Turn 1 Suzuka
Turn 1 Dragon Trail
Turn 1 Brands Hatch GP
Turn 1 Nurb GP

 

[Mr616]

Maybe you misunderstood what I was getting at. Certainly not the same kind of abrupt change, like we have where DR B is so much less punished than DR A, with a hard line between the two.

For SR to work effectively it has to mean something, and that is basically something like incidents (scaled) per race. Naturally, you'd expect higher SR to have a lower ratio, so that's where the scaling comes from. I think scaling the boosts is better than scaling the penalties, since SR boost is too high per race for SR 99 - why should we get/need any at all?! But it has to be a linear scale - my example in another thread was that max gain per race should be enough to get you half way closer towards SR 100, so e.g. +5 at SR 90, +2 at SR 95, etc.

Also, because matchmaking is SR first, it would be grouping together those playing by similar rules. So you wouldn't get the same kind of problem as with DR B vs A.


Why not? I'm talking about being proportionate - a super minor SR hit for a super minor contact. It has to be at a level where anyone trying to be clean wouldn't even notice them, but someone who habitually rubs and pushes will end up with a different SR.

TBH I think it's the opposite - not statistical noise at all - when taken together the little contacts give perhaps a better picture of a driver's general behaviour than an occasional big crash. I've met a few players recently who have learned to gently nudge someone off the road when they're trying to pass on a straight, which right now gets no penalty at all.

I'm with you on this, and the other posts from you in this thread. Fix SR in the way you describe and do away with all minor penalties and the serving of them on track. Any major corner cuts are added to your race time at the end. Every other incident on track would be SR related.

They would have to make sure that whatever they did, couldn't be gamed like the SR system was pre penalties. i.e clean race for 9 out of 10 laps, then punt the leader at the last corner for the win and blue SR. We cannot go back to that what so ever.