"Swap driver" ICM button needs some rework; swap-accidents.

Hello,
I come to make a request about the ICM menu "Swap driver" function.


It needs to become much more obvious when turned on, or be allowed to be disabled as a whole through ingame options. Either by being highlighted when set to ON, or requiring some "double tap" to confirm when you want it activated, or by allowing to hot-swap the bot with you in case of mistake mid-lap.

Right now it's way too easy to mis-input it to ON and you not noticing. It happened to me more times than I wish, as my eyes are too busy... well, driving.

I know some of you will tell me "set pit strategy before the race", and I did. But real weather for me just decided to give me a flash storm and I had to switch to wet tyres without fuel addition on a 90 minutes race. Surprise! Not only you got replaced by the bot, it is also driving like a granny, and now you have to do another pit stop to get rid of him!

Yes, this might be a somewhat post-rage thread, but I had to write about it while the iron is hot. I love to experience longer races with pit-stops, but more often than I want they get ruined by me not noticing I just got myself into a massive "one lap plus a drive through" penalty for the simple fault of not paying enough attention to the "smartphone" and not on the road.
Once it happened to me on Nordschleife. Needless to say, the race was way beyond recoverable once I got control back.

Even an update to the UI to make it very apparent when activated by mistake would help.

Thank you for your time!

 

I agree, it would be nice to have this an option to turn OFF in the game setting menus and have the option to disable it on a multiplayer DS. It happened by mistake to our of our racers last night as he pit for damages during a league race.

 

TBH I think the ICM specifically around pit stops needs to be completely reworked, with a focus on shortcut keys and potentially its own dedicated ICM

Trying to change pit strategies at race pace is extremely difficult, if not impossible to do without mistakes (both in selecting incorrect options, and driving errors).

It would also completely remove the necessity for multiple strategies if there were a "Smart" pit option that does the following:

Change tyres (pre-determined wet/inter/dry compound)
Repair only damaged components/Repair damaged at XX%

I think having shortcut keys/buttons alone would make all the difference, with an on-screen message that pops up in your line of sight

• Next Strategy
• Prev Strategy
• Driver swap on/off
• Request/Cancel Pit

Optionally:

• Tyre Compound (would cycle through e.g., wet -> inter -> soft -> hard)
• Repair on/Repair off
• Refuel off/Refuel Max/Refuel Minimum/Refuel Smart

 

I agree with this thread wholeheartedly.

I did a LFM nascar race last week and had my pit strategy ready. However at some point I got caught in a crash and had to improvize and while modifying the strategy in the ICM (while driving) I did not notice that instead or requesting the pit stop, I had swapped the driver. The pit panel didn't appear and I thought I had exited the ICM somehow so I quickly reopened the it to request the pit stop but then the Swap driver option was On and I simply didn't pay attention.

So after my pit stop, I had 0 control over the car and understood my mistake

Not the first time it happened to me but in the heat of the moment, one bad click is all it takes. This option should have its own panel in the ICM at least.

 

Since we're not supposed to have human to human driver swap ever, it would make sense to remove that option, especially in online sessions. Accidental driver swaps happens too often.