rec.autos.simulators

I have a TSW2mod.  I think it's a pretty damn GOOD wheel, thank you very much.
My statement still stands.  There's NO good reason for the game to try to do a
pitstop when you respond to a BF.  Being in the situation of receiving a BF
*definitely* affects your thinking.  True, that's part of real racing, but a
real pit crew wouldn't 'forget* and change the f'king tires when you don't WANT
to...  This is a stupid 'feature' in the game, IMO.

We're going to have to agree to disagree here...

Eldred
--
Homepage - http://www.racesimcentral.net/~epickett
GPLRank:-1.680
MonsterRank: +334.169
N2002 Rank:+17.59

Never argue with an idiot.  He brings you down to his level, then beats you
with experience...
Remove SPAM-OFF to reply.

I never said you didn't have a good wheel, my point was it comes down to
have equipment to handle all the tasks in the sim, be it a good wheel or
extra controls to handle the other functions is all..  Anyway good luck with
it I was just pointing out my view and have never had an issue with properly
handling a BF or making pitting changes.

What it comes down to is this, no matter how good the sim is people are
going to find flaws with it and have issue with them.  This is not one of
the areas that I have an issue with.

I don't think the difficulty is underestimated, but it's also what makes
this stuff so rewarding. If you allow the mountain to discourage you, you'll
never climb it.

Racing online is not a matter of laptime but a matter of attitude. If you're
in control of your car and don't make unpredictable moves you won't be
barred from many races.

That said, the grid in the RASCAR races is hypercompetitive. Last night I
improved my personal best in practise and was still last, some 4/10ths off
the leader in 18th; position 5 to 10 where within a 1/10th of a second. I
agree it would take a lot of determination and concentration to enter that
race safely, but on a bigger track I don't see the problem with having "less
accomplished" drivers in the mix.

NR2003 is not a newbie friendly sim, true. GPL would be a better choice due
to the lower power vehicles available and the symmetry of their
construction. Anyhow, I don't think someone should go online in his early
hours with the sim. I think it takes that initial 20-50 hours (something
like that? -What do you think guys?) to get some sort of feel for the car,
plus a couple of hours of specific practise at the track.

There's your problem right there. Turn the aides off *now* and keep them
off. Not only do they, by construction, slow you down, but they also allow
you to get into bad habits (like stomping on brake and throttle) which will
be a bear to break once you feel confident enough to turn them off.

Break your dependance on the aides now, before it's too late. No matter how
frustrating the early going is, it's a lot easier than breaking a bad habit
later on, believe me. It took me nearly all of last year and a lot of
dissapointment to change certain aspects of my driving in order to be able
to progress. Had I realised I was approaching things from the wrong angle
back when I started out in GPL, it would have been a lot easier.

Misconception number one: if you think about what you're doing (or have
someone to give you some advise and learn from) it doesn't take countless
hours to acchieve a passable level.

Misconception number two: people don't practise endlessly. They are very
familiar with their approach, know what they want from a racecar and know
what to do to get it.

VRL member Steven Moerman learned GPL from the odd go he was allowed on a
friend's PC. He got his own computer last October and now it's just my
experience that keeps him from beating me all the time. Ok, the first couple
weeks he practised at least an hour a day, but now he just practises the
upcoming track by two 45 minute sessions or so, just like the rest of us.

The only way to practise racing is to do a lot of it. Against other
people... AI, while good in places, won't teach you a thing. Most people
who've caught the bug do as much of it as they can get away with. Because
it's more fun than practising.

2 mistakes here. 1) watching and thinking of emulating people who are much
faster than you. You have to set more feasable goals for yourself. If you
don't believe you can do it, you never will. 2) actually looking at or
thinking about that guardrail when you negotiate the Masta kink.<g>

There's no two ways about it: if you want to get the full enjoyment out of
your
purchase(s) you're going to have to be willing to work to get better at
simming. If I may be as bold as to offer some unsolicited advise:

Stick with GPL for the moment. <snobbism>You have learn to drive and race
proper racecars first.</snobbism> ;-))

Use the trainers to learn about line and carrying speed in a turn without
having to worry too much about getting power down. Don't use any aides.

Read and take in the driving/setup advise at Richard Nunnini and Alison
Hines' sites (see
http://www.racesimcentral.com/guides/gpl/intro/gplintro.shtml) for tons of
usefull links). While you're there, grab the fairly well sorted setups
(defaults are hopeless to learn the game with, IMO).

Find and download some replays which are only about one or two seconds
faster than you are and find out where that time comes from using
ReplayAnalyser. Merge them with your own laps and see how your approaches
differ from the cockpit. Visualize the driving change you are going to make
to incorporate this line into your driving.

Hook up with a league. If you happen to find a friendly, yet competitive
one, you can really "draft" the other members in more ways than the obvious
and improve your performance. Plus the replays from the races are prime
study material.

Ideally, hook up with another simmer near you. Check out each other's rigs
and watch/comment on each other's driving. I'm sure I wouldn't have caught
on to drifting the cars in GPL until much later, if Greg Renner hadn't made
me drive Lesmo 2 over and over again, until I got it right (by accident
almost) and learned to recognise the feeling.

I think that's a misconception. Yes, Darlington's racing surface is narrow
and abrasive, so you have to be more restrained in your driving and when
dealing with other drivers, but: the limit is the limit and that's no
different at Darlington, Rockingham, Atlanta nor Michigan. If you find
Atlanta easier than Darlington, you're just not driving it hard enough.

The only real trouble with Darlington is online racing there tends to boil
down to sprints between yellows, so there's usually no opportunity to taste
the sweet nectar of having a car that stays under you 40 laps in, while
first lap heros are slipping, sliding and losing seconds a lap.

Not quite, any driver overstretching him/herself and ending up in the wall
must take some blame for the consequences. If you're doing your thing and I
punt you into the wall, then you're blameless. It's easy to see when someone
is struggling and anyone who even attempts to pass such an individual in a
marginal way deserves every bit of what happens next.

Probably the biggest mistake the general public makes when buying a racing
sim is thinking that they're going to be able to "pick it up" easily. There
is a general belief that the ability to race virtual cars is inborn in every
one of us. Or, after the falsity of this statement manifests itself (which
it almost invariably immediatly does), that it's a talent only a few are
born with. This is equally false as, IMO, everybody can learn to sim at a
reasonably high level. But still some flat out refuse to believe it's normal
for there to be a learning process and to have to work at it, even if the
contrary is shoved into their faces on a weekly basis.

Yes, we were all newbies once. But that was when everyone was a newbie and
things had to be learned the hard way. Now, we are veterans and there's an
opportunity to pass on our experience.

We can tolerate newbies and newbie mistakes, but I find myself getting ever
more intolerant of voluntary, stubborn ignorance. I don't have any
experience racing with you and this not specifically directed at you, so
please don't take this personally, but most "newbies" could do with shelving
their pride and listen, really listen to what we got to say on the subject.

Jan.
=---