N2 Arcade Mode

Well, I have another name for this mode, but I won't get into it here. Things I see when running Arcade: 1-2 seconds a lap on me, with no letup. I am lapping in the 196-198 range, but the AI cars are lapping in the 200-202 range. 2. If I take the plate off, I am able to lap in the 222 range, and the AI leaders are in the 220-222 range. I can catch them, but by the time I get there, I am out of gas. Seems like I can only get 35 laps in while running without the restrictor. By the time I get out of the pits ( fuel / right only ), I am a lap down. Is this normal for Arcade mode? If so, why would someone want to put up with the frustration just to go fast, but loose so badly? I went through 3 pitstops in this mode ( 100+ laps ), and I didn't see the leaders adjusting their speed to allow me to catch up. I thought they were supposed to try to keep the race " close " in arcade mode. They did slow a little once they lapped me though....... Thanks, Robert

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> Well, I have another name for this mode, but I won't get into it here. > Things I see when running Arcade: > 1-2 seconds a lap on me, with no letup. I am lapping in the 196-198 range, > but the AI cars are lapping in the 200-202 range. > 2. If I take the plate off, I am able to lap in the 222 range, and the AI > leaders are in the 220-222 range. I can catch them, but by the time I get > there, I am out of gas. Seems like I can only get 35 laps in while running > without the restrictor. By the time I get out of the pits ( fuel / right > only ), I am a lap down. > Is this normal for Arcade mode? If so, why would someone want to put up > with the frustration just to go fast, but loose so badly? I went through 3 > pitstops in this mode ( 100+ laps ), and I didn't see the leaders adjusting > their speed to allow me to catch up. I thought they were supposed to try > to keep the race " close " in arcade mode. They did slow a little once > they lapped me though....... > Thanks, > Robert

R: I'm not certain exactly how to answer since I have no clue what track your talking about. But in general. Arcade single player mode after a few laps the cpu drivers are supposed to adjust to your skill level. Now before the patch I know this worked. I can't recall what AI % were talking. Possibly as low as 85%. Since the patch though the cpu players don't seem to be adjusting down to your level in single player mode. Now before I state this as fact. I've been feverishly setting up a network for ultimate playability in multiplayer arcade mode. I had to make heavy modifications in car setups, qualifying speeds and AI RELS speeds, along with major modifications to the player info skill ratings. So when I went back to staright single player quick race (not multiplayer/single player arcade mode two different beasts) I could no longer see the AI make an adjustment to my speeds. They just whipped on bye... Now is this because of the heavy mods I made or not??? So to answer your question in general. Before the patch the AI adjusted after say 2 laps to your skills. I was runnin I believe around 85-90% then. After the patch and after mods I no longer see this adjustment. Now to go further off your topic a bit. If you go into multiplayer and start up an arcade game and only play single player you then get to test and qualify something you can't do under quick race. At this time their is no cpu adjustment during the race. If you want a good race you'll need to heavily modify everything to have it tweeked just right. Which leads to..... I have done the later. If you play arcade multiplayer 1 driver or arcade multiplayer OR IF YOU DON'T, I have a complete set of car setups, track adjustments and skill adjustments that will knock the socks off many. Now there are diehards around here that won't even give arcade a try but from the feedback I've recieved from everybody who have used it so far it's been a overwhelming absolute 100% hit. People are amazed at how much better Nascar 2 is after these mod's. These are people who thought Nascar 2 realistic mode was awesome. Some comments are it's like a complete upgrade what Nascar 3 should be like... ect. Why is it good or why someone should give it a try? Two things: Car handling. Even competitive AI field. First the player driving skills have all been adjusted so the difference in abilities is much more narrower than the stock settings. What we've found was there was to much of a variation between the best and worst. What one would normally do was set the AI where they can hang with the top of the pack. The problem with this is you come up way to strong on the back and it was to dangerous especially in a multiplayer enviroment. By making everybody more even which I feel is MORE REALISITIC anyways, it makes all the cars much more even from A to Z. The next thing is to get a stable setup in Arcade mode. You'll have to adjust your realistic settings a bit. It's actually easier as one would probably assume to setup a car under arcade. Under arcade you get better grip (more realistic IMO), better braking. You'll also get unrealistic lap speeds but if one can put that asside it's no deal at all. You also get more sensation of speed with the added horsepower. The nice thing here is you get the sensation of speed along with better control. IMO a win-win. Also your car is more stable to collisions so IMO an arcade NRO league would be nice!!! After car setups are nailed down. You then have to adjust the RELS and BLAPS for each track. Nascar Head-Quarters utility comes in nicely here. You'll need to boost REL AI speed up so they can run with you. This takes quite a bit of time to get just right. After that you'll notice that your always qualifying first. You'll need to adjust the BLAP qualifying variable. What I aimed for was to never do better than 5th so you get to at least race a few cars instead of leading from start to finish, Boring!!! Mostly though you'll qualify 10-25 on a good lap. There is only like 2-3 mph seperating first to last. Under stock N2 it's usually 5-6 mph. This is a direct result in tightning up the pack. Once you've completed the above you have a much more finley tuned racing experience. Again 100% of the players so far have gave it a "no question better than stock setting realistic mode". About 10 players in all, I've only got to show people at my place so far. Now I'm willing to post text files and/or actual files to somebodys web page so others can try this out to see if this is more what they had in mind racing Nascar 2. I personally feel this is what it shoulda been in the least to attract outsiders to Nascar 2. The game is some much more forgiving and fun. Since your just a wisker faster when running the right line then your all your competition it makes the individual battles with each car much more fullfilling. You'll be battling for laps with certain cars to take the position side by side at tracks like Richmond ect... Speaking of Richmond. The smaller tracks really get enhanced by this adjustment. Richmond, Loudon, Pheonix, Martinsville ect. are all now very controllable to an average racer. These tracks are all strong using 4th gear throughout. The road courses win big here to!! I'm really very straight up about this and think many would raise a brow on how this game played. It's really a major gameplaying adjustment/enhancement that took well over 20 hours to bring in just right. Q.B.M.

ccorpora wrote in article ... Sorry, I thought that the lap speeds would have given it away. I am refering to Talladega. Well, after 100 laps the only thing that was being adjusted was my temper. I kept waiting for the suckers to slow down. They never did. Will give it another shot tonight just to see if i need to eat some crow tomorrow. RELS was set at 104, strength was 100%. So, it isn't just that I suck so bad? That's a relief. So, how does one get the setups and stuff you were refering to?

In regards to Arcade Mode setups: R: Glad you asked. I would personally email you about this but right now my email is in the crapper. Why? I don't know, provider most likely. So I'll do it here since were one big happy family. :) I'll email you with notes and file attachments when I can. Basically I'll have instructions on what to do. You'll want to copy your cars and tracks directory elsewhere so you have the stock settings available if needed. I'll give you car setups and track files for all the tracks. Simply copy over the stock files. You'll have to manually adjust the player skill ratings yourself due to file size and my personalized cars. I'll give you in the instructions on the basic parameters for the skill settings. Once your done with that you want to play this in arcade mode but go into multiplayer only and go that route. Which also lets you practice and qualify, in quick race arcade mode the AI runs away and never comes back. You may want to get Nascar Headquarters as well. This will let you make final adjustments to track speeds so you can tweek it more yourself. Also in my setups I have all tracks except Michigan, Talladega, Sears & Watkins qualifying with two laps. Also I bumped up the pit speed to 100 mph at all tracks we usually run <60 laps multiplayer. Again with Headquarters you can adjust this where you want it. Look for this Wednesday or Thursday. And please let me know what ya think! Q.B.M.

>Things I see when running Arcade: >1-2 seconds a lap on me, with no letup. I am lapping in the 196-198 range, >but the AI cars are lapping in the 200-202 range. Turn down the AI % or the RELS some. Fuel consumption is certainly higher without the restrictor plate, as the engine is making more power. Making power takes gas. There's a range in which they *should* be adjusting. But, if you've got the initial AI % and/or RELS set too high, they will never adjust enough to keep it close. ---Jim

> There's a range in which they *should* be adjusting. But, if you've > got the initial AI % and/or RELS set too high, they will never adjust > enough to keep it close. > ---Jim Look at that! Ole Jim is still hangin' in here. Just goes to show ya' how much the guys of (the true) Papyrus team really loved what they were doing. The reason none of you boys got that tasty treat of Anti-aliasing in N2 was because of the Political BS buyout of SIERRA guys! -DG- IMO

Newsgroups: rec.autos.simulators Date: Wed, 07 May 97 08:05:44 Subject: Re: N2 Arcade Mode X-Newsreader: NEWTNews & Chameleon -- TCP/IP for MS Windows from NetManage MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Robert: > >1-2 seconds a lap on me, with no letup. I am lapping in the 196-198 range, > >but the AI cars are lapping in the 200-202 range. > Turn down the AI % or the RELS some. JIM: R: The above settings that Robert reported seem like stock settings to me. Jim does the AI adjust in arcade mode if set at 100%? Also repeating myself it seems in the patch this adjustment has been completely eliminated, probably by mistake maybe not. Everybody seems to be mum about this. Q.B.M.