Automobilista 2 Force Feedback - Overview & Recommendations

Thanks, that explains it!

 

It could be a very long answer but I will keep it short.
Where those details are present in the road models, yes, and otherwise no.
Also, although good when they are present, it seems to me there is still work for Reiza to translate those details in the best possible way to the ffb.

 

My observations so far
* Connectedness is mostly based on the feeling of the road details.
*.Detailed FFB that seem to be in harmony with how the road looks will make us feel connected.
* We can quickly feel very disconnected if the micro ffb is too spikey, the "jumping on stones" effect. THAT is really bad.
* Higher frequency helps in general, more important when driving fast.
* Softer feel when driving slow helps.
* Harder feel when faster. Still important these harder sensations NEVER become spikey/stoney.

Something like that. We can prob. expand this list easily

If you mean the variables in the txt files I think you can lower the road_scale variable.
Also lower your LFB in game possibly. This easily leads to those harder spikes that you def. don't want to feel.

 

It also helps to have FFB effects tuned to reinforce motion effects / tactile feedback systems, and vice-versa. Assuming Reiza fine tunes the tire noise further (Excellent in AMS1), that increases immersion even more.

I love the Scrub-Vibe effect in AMS2 FFB, it supports the D-box traction-loss vibe-effect very nicely.

The MCR2000 is an excellent example of a car having a stiff suspension / stiff dampening, and matching bump detail coming through the FFB vs. most other cars. It's pretty much my go-to car for testing FFB / motion / tactile tuning.

Having a bumpy ride in motion with butter smooth FFB causes a disconnect, even momentary confusion when we are used to feedback that works in concert . . . , er, wait, maybe that's just the way my brain works.

 

Thanks for these details. The only issue I have with the FFB at the moment (besides the temporary loss of road detail forces) is a bit too little "tire biting into the surface" at low speeds or when down force is NOT in play. Was just wondering if there was something to address that? If I could describe it in completely non-technical, touchy-feely terms, it's as though the tire is very slightly floating on the surface until some down force applies some extra "weight" and pushes the tire fully onto the pavement surface. Cars with aero will do it fairly predictably. Sometimes, just heavy cornering will progressively reveal the "tire bite" effect. It has no connection to the micro bumps or other normal road feel issues. It is likely just tilting a curve somewhere to provide a bit more of the resistance force under less severe tire stress, but I don't really know!

In regards to @Dean Ogurek's comment below, I agree about the MCR S2000. At the opposite end of the spectrum is the F-V10 at low speeds. Trying to get both of these to feel appropriate with the same settings is an extreme challenge. I fully expect both will get adjusted by Reiza at some point as they are "outliers," but in the meantime, they are great for testing and calibration purposes.

The 0.9.2 update, by lessening much of the road surface feel (still plenty there, but got rid of some of the sharpness in the firmer cars), allowed me to be able to better dial-in the feel for almost all cars. I am still searching for cars that need more than a +/- 1-2% strength adjustment and really can't find any besides the Sprintcar (too heavy) and the F-10 (only low speed forces are too light--perfect weight at high speeds with aero load, so it is likely just an in-car rebalance that is required). I use less LFB, but significantly more FX, than before and it revealed wonderful new SAT-type forces that allow me to feel what the back of the car is doing better than ever before. Had I used these settings before, the higher FX would have masked or interfered with the other desired FFB (driving over a rock field in the MCR S2000 or various too-sharp jolts and such from a variety of cars). I am highly concerned that the restoration of the missing road surface forces, even if less than before, will wreck the almost-perfect FFB I have now.

 

I think maybe there is a slight chance that its the LFB effect on the rack that you are describing?
You prob. saw that it's been posted before that there currently is an issue the way Reiza has it working. Prob. will be fixed soon, I hope.

It extra-strengthens the pull to center, which might make you feel this bite-like sensation more than it's actually there.
Might that be related?
If so you could try to set "gain" at full and "Lfb" at 1 and try to explain how that feels in comparison.

Which ffb config do you use now?
Old default/new default/a custom file?

Honestly no idea if this thought is way off...

 

Is there a single FFB-related aspect to the update or is it all UI functionality stuff? Appears to be the latter, which is still interesting, but there should be zero difference in feel.

 

Did it erase your settings on the wheel after you installed? Do you need fanalab?

 

Great! I just installed it to see what is like

 

With GAIN=100 and LFB=1 and not touching FX (New Default), the FFB is quite bad by comparison. There is oscillation in the wheel (very springy) coming from what feels like a very artificial ramp-up of forces away from centre. In simple terms, the more you turn the wheel, the stronger the resistance becomes, like a spring-loaded mechanism. The wheel will spring/shoot back to centre or even past it (oscillation) depending on the corner or bump you hit. There is also some rubbery jitters when sliding sideways, as if the road surface is rippled (but you can tell it is the tire grip that is causing it).

If I had this FFB and couldn't adjust, I would be extremely unhappy with AMS 2.

Should I try anything else, or does that tell you what you needed to know?

P.S., in my experience in a variety of sims since I have had this wheel, the CSW responds seemingly the opposite to many settings than the CSW v2 and v2.5, which I believe are quite different internals despite the same base name.

 

Great shout @Ivysaur, it fixes a problem that I didn't even know I had! Basically now it feels like the road noise is more constant and "rolling like", almost like it has its own channel now.

Dunno if its a consequence of me ticking the box for dynamic dampening in the Fanalab app or the actual new betadriver, but it feels much better for sure thanks.

 

Ok, yes, please download the latest custom ffb posted in this thread and set the "rack_lfb_ratio" to 0.0
Also set the ingame Lfb back to what you had before, and if you don't want the FX like added road noise, scrub and engine vibes, then set fx slider to 0.
Remember to select the "custom" option of course too.
Then try to describe how that feels compared to your first description.

 

They should call this thread "Fanatec FFB setting". Or is this all also applicable to other wheels?

 

Works great with my T500 and changes the feel dramatically compared to new default.

 

There are quite a range of different bases being used. The custom settings posted by @Karsten Hvidberg and myself were developed on Simucubes. Plenty of non-Fanatec users have posted that those and similar tweaks are working well for them. Plenty of in game settings posted by users of different hardware back through the thread too.

 

I'm using your config shared a few posts back (is there an updated one) and feels better than stock w/ my T300, though not familiar how to optimize it for my wheel.

 

Unless I have missed it is there a description of each line in the FFB file, what it does and how to change the parameters to increase / decrease effects? I could just jump in and tweak numbers and see what happens but that isn’t the best approach in my experience