Automobilista 2 October 2022 Development Update

This is a good and fair description in my opinion. We also have to compare to the random chaos that is MP racing outside of leagues and also look at the complete bonkers activities that often occur in the real world. The AI is easier to criticize because we can find patterns more easily and repeat processes over and over again.

 

Most AI issues in open wheelers, especially those related to braking points and acceleration power, which are not at all well calibrated in every mock-F1 class past 1972, only become apparent once you acquire a certain level of competence. It's only when you're able to drive these cars in a consistent manner that you notice how they often brake too early and accelerate too quickly, and how they also gain braking power and outside grip if you're next to them.

In this case, it's not about the player handling the AI wrong, it's about the AI missing proper calibration.

 

The 80's and 90's F1 are the ones I drive and enjoy the most

With an H-shifter + clutch yes, no autoclutch. I'm not fast, but I race clean, always look at my mirrors to give the AI 1 car length if they have the right. Really enjoy those cars.

AI taking me out or vice-versa is not an issue at all in AMS2 for me. What often happens is that the AI brakes far too early (basically a brake-check) in weird corners, so that unless you learn that the AI will always brake too early on corners X, Y and Z, you ram them from behind. Then comes the second issue, which is that once you learn where they brake too early, those places become 100% sure thing you can make the overtake, which kills a lot of the fun.

This is why I would like to know which track+open wheel has had a nice pass, so I can race them.

 

What you are referring to is most likely editing the draft_distance line which is the fix for AI overtaking issues and if you want the AI to actually cause FCY's. That and line.lp files (thats what it is called iirc, that's a side I've never messed with) that's what most people are gonna mess with outside of individual strength values of the cars is rely the only thing people who just want good racing are gonna mess with. Of course you have other stuff that people edit, but that's usually for funny effects like 500 mph racing at Daytona. It should also be mentioned that the decreasing of drafting distances usually causes pack racing at cookie-cutter tracks. So if you fix the "entertainment" problem that the vanilla AI for Nr2003 kinda has then you get the pack racing problem AMS 2 has.

Now I haven't tried this out but apparently there is a thing you can edit in the papy_ai.ini file that allows for a wider variety of racing lines. However you have to change it depending on the track meaning you'd have to decide the track you wanna race on before opening the game. Nr2003 is an incredibly complex game however in the end I think what AMS 2 is doing is more impressive.

The only reason Nr2003's AI is so good and complex is the simplicity of what's around it (which isn't a bad thing at all). Nr2003 has one "type" of physics vanilla with 3 more being able to be added with official mods (Grand National Series, Craftman Truck series. And Trans-Am). There are also only 5 main types of tracks, short ovals (0-1 miles in length), medium ovals (1-2 miles in length), Superspeedway (2+ miles in length), road courses, and Superspeedway without the restrictor plate. That's only 15 combinations, which is more than enough for a NASCAR sim but isn't nearly enough for a motorsports sim. Nr2003 runs Monoco and Spa as if it's just another road course, the only thing keeping it from being a complete fustercluck being the line.lp keeping the AI on track (which isn't nearly enough for good racing).

 

I am not aware that open wheelers are unique or different in this regard. Every AI in every game/sim has places they are not competitive enough and too competitive. It doesn't answer your question, but whatever series you focus on, you will find the same pattern of exploitable spots here and there.

We need to start cataloguing them (elsewhere than here), so it can be proven which are track-based (e.g., all series brake too early at corner x) versus which are characteristics of the car (e.g., series x overshoots corner A and goes on the grass with two wheels, but other series are OK). The most egregious ones may be able to be addressed sooner if we raise our voices ("Agree" icons ).

 

Good idea

 

There is definitely a large drop in AI quality if you move from tin tops or low formula classes to mock-F1 open wheelers. With tin tops, player acceleration roughly equals AI acceleration out of slow corners. With open wheelers, it's all over the place, with at least as many corners being wrong as are right.
It's not about "some combinations work better than others", it's open wheelers being infamous for overpowered AI exits and too slow corner speeds in most slow to low medium speed corners, which is not something that happens for tin tops.

I did at one point try to catalogue that for several circuits in the "AI issues" thread, but I found more "wrong" corners than corners where the AI actually had similar speeds to the player, so it was kind of a Sisyphos task.

SuperV8 was another particularly bad class about half a year ago, but not sure whether that's still the case.

 

I have a few nominees if we have a gang willing to populate some dedicated threads

 

EDIT: Just a few examples in here. The video is not on the current physics, and some of these are less egregious now, but it's still the same common theme which can be seen at several points in this video.

 

I like the music
Also agree with you

 

Is there agreement as to which series are the farthest off generally-acceptable calibration? Once again, saying that all open-wheelers are bad is both untrue and completely unhelpful to building consensus about where the most serious issues are and getting them addressed sooner than later.

We also know that series with major physics updates to the player car are most likely to wreak havoc with the AI behaviour and calibration. Reiza already knows this, but it would be good to rank the problems and identify the biggest problems as that could be helpful to their prioritization of fixes.

What would your list look like?

 

Entertaining, but not helpful when it is missing settings information and many of the items shown are AI errors (intentional that they happen). Player is passing AIs easily on the straight? Player is passing AIs easily on outside of corner? AI strength too low. AI braking too early into corner? AI strength too low. Or...vice versa.

I know that's not what is happening, but there is no ability to determine what is what from that video.

Entering the corkscrew at Laguna Seca...which series when AI strength is set to within 1% of our own consistent (from practice) player lap times brake too early relative to player? Not conducive to a video presentation, but helpful if a bunch of us can report the same issue across multiple series and skill levels. These sorts of examples could help.

 

Well tbh I haven't played several formula classes with AI in quite a long time; F-Ultimate Gen1&2 and F-Retro Gen2 being some of them.

Generally speaking, the more difficult traction is, the more likely you are to notice differences between player and AI car behaviour. But I would need to test the game a few hours to give you a detailed list, which I currently can't, because I'm not where my PC is (and my PC is on the verge of breaking down anyway).

Solely from memory of the last half a year
Tier 1 (pretty bad): F-USA Gen1&2, F-V12, F-Ultimate Gen2, F-Ultimate Gen1
Tier 2 (not as bad): F-V10 Gen2, F-Retro Gen 1&Gen2, F-Reiza, F-USA Gen3,
Tier 3 (good for a formula car, suboptimal compared to most other cars in the game): F-Classic Gen2&3, F-Retro Gen3, F-V10 Gen1.

But that is a rough approximation at best, and as stated before, the issue is very similar in nature for all high powered formula classes, just doesn't apply to the same extent for all of them.

 

There have been a lot of changes to AI in the past year and a half...or even in the past two months... But still, a good list as a reference point.

 

First of all, one question: AI straight line speed is determined by AI skill? That is interesting (and seems counter-intuitive, because even low skilled players can push a throttle pedal), because I always put these straight line speed issues down to the infamous AI battle groups.

Anyway, the interesting thing is that while the AI do brake far too early in some instances, they also accelerate quicker than I am able to, which points to some general balancing being off the mark in my opinion: No matter whether you lower or increase AI strength, you will inevitably make one of these two issues worse.

The video is obviously not helpful if you want to get down and know exactly which setting achieved what (I think back then I wrote it in my post, but I don't remember the settings), but it shows an AI issue that no AI strength adjustments can cure, because they are too weak in one area and too strong in another.

Yes I know. The "problematic corners" in the video also aren't necessarily representative of problematic corners now; for example the last chicane at Suzuka has gotten much, much better since then.

In general I'd be hesistant to make any specific "that's how it currently is" statements other than that the issue still shows in several instances, because I'm currently not able to check with the actual game and things are always changing.

 

Haha funny how some people allways read something into ones comments that actually isnt there.
Wow

 

My own conclusion was/is quite the opposite.
But just like in AMS2 a more casual user will not feel much difference changing some of the more subtle params in either car setups or ini files

This is some of the params in the track.inis of NR2003
[ ai_track ]
pace_merge_from_pit_line_dlong = 532.000
pace_merge_to_pit_line_dlong = 4415.000
pace_speed_limit_mph = 45
ai_accel_modifier = 0.40
ai_decel_modifier = 0.80
ai_fuel_use = 0.95
ai_grip_modifier = 0.982
ai_drag_modifier = 1.11
ai_line_modifier = 1.00
ai_qual_modifier = 1.043
ai_wall_offset = 100
ai_tire_wear_left = 1.08
ai_tire_wear_right = 1.07
ai_arcade_tire_wear = 0.01
ai_arcade_fuel_use = 1.00
ai_arcade_grip_modifier = 0.80
ai_arcade_drag_modifier = 1.55
strategy_lap_time_wear_loss = 8.725
strategy_lap_time_fuel_use_gain = 2.934
strategy_base_pitting_cost = 25.843
ai_pacing_distance = 2.0
ai_bunching_distance = 1.55
ai_drafting_distance = 1.15
ai_panic_decel = 4.5
ai_dlongpad_scale = 1.8
ai_dlat_pad = 0.8
ai_squeeze_pcnt = 0.0
ai_inverse_slipcurve_k = 0.65

 

There are some arguments here that are impressive, okay, reiza has made a lot of good content available at no cost to players, that we have to applaud, we also have to applaud the constant updates, but friend, if Reiza had just released AMS2 and left in version 1.0, this game would be dead for many, less for those who save the game on Force feedback rssss, but the fact is Reiza just announce something or promise a date if it will be fulfilled, they said that there would be no more delays as they would do this every 2 months, I don't care if it happens today or 10 days from now, but the people who are complaining are right, because it was Renato himself who said back there that it would be every two months, so instead of trying to fix more apologies like many here do to defend Reiza's problems, assume the mistakes and try not to make them anymore, or say that game and DEV updates will happen when they are ready to do it, without any date.

 

I don’t want to point out that obvious but the faster the car especially when it comes to acceleration and deceleration, will be the most difficult to calibrate for AI. Later gen open wheelers are generally the worst in every sim just as they are typically the most difficult to have a clean race in MP. The AI being say 10% off in any and every corner is going to be far more noticeable in F1 22 ultimate than say the copa classics or even the GT3s. Even if the AI is more accurately calibrated for the fast open wheelers, they will seem worse off than slower classes. This is the same reason that you can’t join the fastest classes when starting out in IRacing.

 

Yep, now the PC is back to brand new health I'll be doing alot more! V happy about that, honestly the stress its caused me over the last month & a half! Then with not being able to get a backup drive (which it turns out luckily I don't need, but I'll invest in one anyway now), I was thinking I could loose everything if it totally failed over Crimbo, two years worth of work, settings, basically my life on PC. The relief is immense!