Great patch!

One thing though and it's not a small one! The view setting are fun but not when your using pov hat. I'm basicly driving blind. The 45 degree angles are useless because they dont give any extra visibility but the only important view, the 90 degree view, is now gone.

I would like to point out that this is not a small problem. Basicly the viewbuttons have now become arbitrary features

From what I understand you need bulk in the nose section of the following car. You need to fill up that area behind the leading car where normally the airflows meet after being split by that car.

Push-draft is a matter of filling up that area behind the leading car so that the airflow doesn't implode but carries on over the second car. To do that you simply need bulk, volume. A single seater's thin nose section may still split the airflow but by the time it does the turbulence has long since done the damage. Therefor only the second car benefits (mostly).

I have no experience with motorbikes, but considering their bulky front shape, in theory it would have to work.

From what I understand, Stock-cars are designed in the wind tunnel to support push-draft as much as possible. So in NASCAR the effect is stronger then in a normal tin top.

Quote from Fabri91 :

Today i was driving on FM oval Starters, because i decided to give ovals a go, and chose the FZR. I wasn't alone, there were a teammate and a couple of other chaps busy at racing.

I was sperimenting (trying settings, is it ok Mazz?^^) with ARB live-settings, as i spun out on the final corner of the 6th lap, IIRC. As you might know, a spinning car isn't exactly easy to control, so it happened what had to happen: some cars drove into me, while i was trying to regain control or at least stop the car, whils trying to reach shift+s, as server rules state that you have to immediately leave the track in case of an accident.

This has been my first spin involving other cars that was completely my fault in this session (i'm not sure on the other one, because i was lightly touched by a car trying to pass me), but luckily there was quite a big gap between me and the field in the first one, so i could get going again.

Immediately after that a ban was started at me, and i left immediately after saying that it wasn't on purpose to take 3 cars out, included mine.

Was this worth banning me?

Nope, no way.

The starters server is a bit of a confusion at the moment though. It started off with BF1 as way to keep the noobs away from the Junkies server but at some point it switched to GTR and stayed that way. It will be fixed though because the naming is confusing.

I don't like to get too much into rules and strategies but I think it is at the least fair to give some indication of what this is about.

First of all: forget everything (almost) you learned about racing. That includes NASCAR, INDY and other oval classes you know of. The way we race on the FM-Oval servers is forced by LFS's aerodynamic modeling which causes a too strong drag reduction when drafting and not enough fall off when leaving the draft. It allows you too clearly overtake the car in front of you, something that, at least to my knowledge, happens in NASCAR but the gain isn't even close so it is almost never used. On the FM-oval it is the only way to win.
So, you need to cooperate to win. Not doing so, or not knowing how to do so, gets you either ditched or caught. Blocking cars that are drafting you is THE way to get banned and not knowing when to overtake is the same as not drafting at all. It'll take a while to learn.

When you need help or answers, you can always join the junkies server when we're there. Just don't expect easy answers because even we still differ in opinion about the best course of action in some specific situations. It's got a lot to do with feeling.

Quote from Greboth :

FXO is a boat.
RB4 is a whale.
XRT is just tail happy.

So we need a 4th car in tbo's - A tail happy whaling boat .

I think it comes down to persona' choice, XRT for me is more fun to race but rb4 is quicker and fxo is just horrible.

Then we will have to degrade the RAC to TBO class. Fits the description very well

Funny though, ultra light but still handling like a "59 Bel Air

It looks like someone took a screenshot from a racing game with empty track and then photoshopped the cars on it from real car pictures.

I think that is what makes it look slightly artificial. The cars are so detailed they don't seem to be really on the track.

I think the problem is to figure out how much realism would still be fun. I remember trying Imola with GTR2 and I can't say it was nice. Parkinglot exercises are not my favorite occupation. I understand IRL they serve their purpose but for me there is no risk and I don't really consider them a challenge.

It would be interesting to change an LFS track so that it has the chicanes at the right spot and with the right speed reduction. I wouldn't be surprised when a lot of people would beg to have them removed.

In the end chicanes were invented to remove the adrenaline parts from tracks were IRL people could get killed or at least seriously hurt. But when you know, for example, the reputation of a turn like Masta within the GPL community, it is possible that these risky situations is what Sim Racing is all about.

I really hate mine.

I got LFS right after returning from a holiday in Egypt and because every merchant there used to come at me saying "hey ramses!" (I'm rather tall) I thought it was a good idea to uses it as a nick.

Now, what, four years later I really became to dislike it. Especialy because I had a perfectly proper nick already. If I could only remember why I didn't use that...

One thing I will never understand. I did a search for my name on LFS some weeks ago and it came up with multiple variations like ramses01 or ramses_gp. When I checked wether the name was still available before I joined I would have abandoned the idea altogether when it would have been taken, because I know for myself that the only thing that sticks is the name. The flag will just be forgotten so you become part of a group sharing the same name. But yeah, I was the first

Last edited by Ramses, Mon 18 Jun 2007, 18:29.

EDIT: In my case LFS doesn't go to full screen but stays windowed! But black nevertheless.

Worked for me the first time I tried

Never got this before but no firewall here so never have to go windowed when connecting to masterserver.

I just started LFS and did the test Android provided straight from the main menu screen (so I wasnt in race or anything) The area of the desktop used by LFS in windowed mode turns solid black. I can shut it down by pressing Shift-F4 again. Then the window returns and I can click the "x".

AMD A64 3200 2.4 Gig winchester
ASUS Nf4 (A8N32-SLI)
AA=8x
AF=16x
SCreensync off
No limit framerate
1xASUS Gf 7950GT (EN7950GT) Driver 93.71 Forceware
Crucial 3200 XMS (Dualchannel)
Windows XP SP2 (No further updates installed)

Last edited by Ramses, Sat 2 Jun 2007, 14:24.

Just joined a server that was patched to 35. No one was on there at the moment but within seconds others joined. Everyone was on ventrilo at that moment and I verified who was there but the list with joined players didn't show up. So I could only see tthe players that actualy joined the race. AFter the racers that joined the race had readied and qualy started, it looked all fine but something is wrong with the entry screen.

The players were mixed 34/35 patched and no consistency there.

Quickly skimmed the messages here to see wether it was already posted. Sorry if I missed it.

This random green light doesn't seem to be working or at least not for all tracks. Tried KY1, FE6R and AS1.

You can start with your eyes closed. count 21-22-23-24 and off you go. We did many restarts but every start was exactly the same.

Wether AI can handle the Oval depends on the car. In a FZR or BF1 they will oscilate their steering input and crash after they figure out they can do it all full speed. In a FOX or XRT they do just fine.

On a normal track, when they have enough experience to not hit you, they will run off the track in a turn when you outbrake them and take the inside line. They want to take that turn the way they know is the fastest, but they can't anticipate that the turn has become sharper because you occupy the inside line. They enter way too fast and there is little they can do about that half way through.

Quote from Davo :

I've noticed the higher the degrees of ratotion used, the higher the force setting in lfs is necessary. e.g 20% feels totally different at 270 and 720. Lower rotation is easier to countersteer and with wheel turn comp on 1.0 the centre is still usable because it has the extra precision needed.

From what I understand this has to do with the maximum rotation speed of these wheels. When you use 200 degrees the wheel has to travel less degrees to reach a new FF centre position then with 900. Because the motor can only run as fast as his specs will let him it will tend to lag when you quickly move the wheel with a large rotations set. At 200 it can easily keep up.

I think in general people have different priorities. When you talk about reaction speed no wheel ever beat my first FF wheel: the logitech wingman FF with cable driven FF. It would flick from one extreme to the other at a speed that made you think twice of sticking you hand in there.

After it died I got myself a Force RS but I never got the feedback I had with the Logitech. In the end I just noticed it reacted too slow. It was smoother but also more vague. Never got the hang of it really. So I went back to the Wingman FF's but by that time they got geardriven and acted the same as my Act Labs.

These new large rotation wheels suffer even more from comparetively slow motors so I guess the G25, with its higher speed is the way to go. But they needs different settings.

I keep all rotation settings like they are supposed to be in LFS because that gives me the best weighted FF. When I set a GTR to 360 degrees it just doesn't feel right.

Quote from Funnybear :

bloody bikes . . .

I do not want to picture that. especially not in Oxfort

I never understood the debate about the XRT really. A Supra? Ehrm...

There is only one car that looks exactly the same as the XRT. It has the same shape, style and details. The same popup headlights, sidepods, skirts, spoilers and beamers/rear lights. And I said style because this car has a sharp styling. There isn't a single rounded surface on the cars at all. Add a little grill to the nose and the XRT becomes basicly a clone of this car.

It's the Misubishi Starion EX Turbo.

There used to be a cheaper Starion version in the beginning. It had no sidepods and spoilers and no turbo either. Guess what car in LFS lookes pritty much the same.

The 2 ltr Turbo was the European Version. In the US the 2.6 ltr was sold. That engine was not performer for sure. They took it straight from the van/Pajero production line. The 2 ltr was nice though.

Last edited by Ramses, Sat 13 Jan 2007, 15:08.

I think they can't handle the speed. Saw them do that in FZR's too. When they are still too slow they don't do it but once they figured out how fast they can go this oscillation starts. The AI is the same as in S1 so its's pushed beyond its limits at speeds of 250+ km/h

Quote from Neil777 :

I wondered why they were always so slow on the banked turns.

They will but then they start to oscilate their steering input and will crash every singel lap. At least that's what mine did (bf1).

Quote from ajp71 :

As for the reasons GPL was faster than RL I guess the fact it has smooth grippy surfaces kind of answers half the question, road surfaces were still fairly crap back then and that makes a huge difference. I guess the other main difference is maybe what fuel is simulated in sim, the Eagle was thought to have had the last ever win on pump fuel that year at Spa (rules still required it but it wasn't checked) so what kind of fuel was assumed for the other cars? The physics is GPL certainly weren't a sophisticated as some elements of LFS though.

Another reason is that they risked their real life in those cars. I wonder how many alliens would be willing to repeat that 'full throtle through Masta" trick in real life caught between those flimsy turbular chassis bars they used in those days.

They had to take it from the bottom while we can take it from the top. Some Alien may find that 'full throttle' trick but he probably crashed a dozen times before going through properly. So IRL that can never be accomplished or could, in that respect, because the driver would be dead. They were brave but it's not like they had a deathwish.

I'm not really happy with them.

I'm getting more and more convinced there is some hardware issue involved though. I speak people on line that like it and I have spoken people that, like me, can't stand the sound for a second. It's simply unbearable and I can't believe this is the sound the more positive posters have spoken about.

It's hard to explain. It sounds like those old gaming halls you used to have in the 80's with their gambling machines and pinball machines. It's the modulations that seems to be the problem mostly. Driving away from a standstill sounds awkward. Blipping the trottle sounds like Space Invaders.

Guess AC'97 isn't the right way to go. Going back to the !Live again. See if that helps.

I'm 38.

I only get into trouble on long events on short tracks. When there are decent straights I rest my right leg on the computer case beside my feet. I stretch it a bit to make it feel more comfortable and when I have to brake I put the left foot from gas to brake and the right foot back where it belongs. It took some practice because I don't use auto throttle cut so I have to cut with left but it's no problem anymore.

But yeah, once you really start to do those long events it becomes more and more apparent you're not twenty anymore

From what I understand the AI learns by trying different lines and throttle/brake usages and when this results in better times they keep it, otherwise they discard it. How exactly they do this I don't know but I figure its kind of hard to do that by laptime so they prolly cut the track in pieces and use the time/speed accomplished over that sector.
I've been tinkering quite a bit with the AI in S1 and noticed that this causes some problems. First of all the experimenting with different lines doesn't seem to work at all. At least not with hotlapping. When overtaking it does work. I've used track objects to force them to change their line but they keep crashing into the objects. Even when I throw away the AI files and start all over again they end up doing the same thing. I tried both large and small changes but neither of it worked.
The other problem is that a corner is simply a part of the track. When there is a decent straight after it. we tend to enter a bit slower so we can exit faster and that is something my AI never figured out. Thats what becomes fatal at the busstop chicane at SO-Classic. They probably exit the first sector at the little straightaway and keep that method because they messure a good time/speed. They can never exit anymore because they are way too fast but they never get that. So it becomes an endless loop. They will not settle for a slower time on the first sector because they don't see it as part of the track.
Since the AI is only in an early stage I don't have any complaints though. It won't take rocket science to allow them to draw conclusions about where they crash and how that affects the sector before that so there is a lot of potential. Interaction with other cars however seems to me much harder. I noticed they cant really understand an attack. When you get under them somewhere around the apex they will often either crash you or themselfes. They don't see the consequences of not being able to take the ideal line. At least not on time.

Quote from IamKoyote :

Hello guys!

I have started the recording session for your BRM-MOVIE.

It is a lot of work but will finish it soon.

In the meantime you can try find out what "BRM" means

definately Blackwood Reverse Madness

Gotta try this

Lifting off is definately neccessary to draft properly but it IS a sign something went wrong earlier. It is something most new drafters don't understand. They are so obsessed with not losing the draft that they keep hanging on nomatter how close they are to the car before them. Good drafting however involves more insight then just that. Ideal situation is that you are far enough to pick up a lot of speed and ofcourse close enough not to lose the draft.
S2 has had a lot of effect on drafting. A clumsely executed draft will end up being slower then a good hotlap. Usually when this happens an experienced drafter will fall back a bit to pick up more speed. He then overtakes faster and forces the other car to keep some distance. And then you hope the newbee gets the message. But people tend to think that when they pick up some speed because of the draft they are allready going faster then a normal hotlapper. The truth is that because you can't drive the ideal line when you're drafting, that advantage is lost. What follows is a situation where the cars end up driving side by side going even slower and because of the 'not lifting off' attitude they stay side by side and get cought by the pack. All it takes is one of them to lift off and get a good distance from the leading car. Make a good quick pass and immediately the two cars are back on speed. Sure the laptime will not be a record braker but you are ready to make the next lap a good one.
So in general, lifting off is common practice. How much you have to lift depends on how big the screwup was.

But for fast drafting modulation of the throttle happens allmost constantly if ever so slightly (unless you're in front of course). You want to position your car so you can benefit the most from the draft but still pass soon enough to allow the next pass. Rithm is the most important thing. When you make all the passes and at the right spot on the track you atleast avoid being actually slower then hotlappers. One missed pass and all drafting was for nothing. Since you cant go beyond full throttle, the only way to have any controll over distance and speed is lifting, meaning that most drivers will secure the draft first and then, when needed, modulate throttle and steering to get into position.

So full throttle laps are actually a hotlap thing.

Last edited by Ramses, Wed 11 Oct 2006, 18:56.

Quote from dave4002000 :

gee, that's a nice oval on top of that factory there. They should have a little autocross course set up in the ::ahem:: "infield"

just trying to bring this thread out of the woods and, at least, somewhat back on topic.

I have a whole bunch of pictures of that track including the tracksurface and the rather awkward entrance to the track but it's all copyrighted
Magazine (from 1984) was allready on the scanner.

Oh well...

I think it can go either way. Fatigue will definately kick in at some point but one of the problems of oval racing I've noticed is that one tends to lack concentration because there simply isn't much to concentrate on. On the OvalJunkies II event with the XRT I noticed that driving a car that is rather unstable actually helps concentration. It's tiresome allright but there is little chance of underestimating a situation because you're constantly aware of the danger. The shorttrack could go that way too. No chance to get bored so hopefully little chance to crash... knocks on wood...

SERVER 1:
01. [FM]Dr.Bleifuss (XRR)
02. [FM]Crazy Harry (RB4)
03. Tomschok
04. tomylee
05. TeamPlayersBlue
06. G
07. {FIB} Lucasinio
08. spookthehamster
09. Stix (XRR)
10. Elderado
11. Rawex^[FM]
12. Eleanor SpeedGT
13. [FM]Plaztikman (XRT)
14. CJ Ice
15. DeKo (XRR)
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18. [FM] 2March
19. [FM] ???
20. Pacecar

SERVER 2:
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