GTA Racing Rant

[fw3]

ELO System

 

Catch-Up

Destruction Derby & Daft Racers

 

Racing Pay Outs

 

I’m sure this has been brought up before but being new to GTA on PC thought I look for comments so people can point me in the right direction.

Hi there and welcome to the forums and to GTA racing! Glad you're here! I enjoy new voices and new perspectives.

 

I'll reply to each topic header you posted:

 

ELO - I'm sure that Arpad Elo would throw his controller in frustration if he ever played GTA. The Win/Loss display is fair, in that it's factual, but it discounts the factors of the wins versus losses, like how many people were in a particular race (1v1 or 1v16?) or that 29 out of 40 races were second place. I'd be happier without the Win/Loss display, but it doesn't bother me, either.

 

CATCH UP (and SLIPSTREAM) - Go back to GTAIV and these didn't exist. You had to win races based on skill and knowing the map or luck in escaping mayhem and pulling ahead. These elements seem to have been added to keep lesser agile players coming back. If they lose every time, they'll stop playing; however, if you give them free advantages without having to work for them, then they'll keep coming back for more. I remember in Mario Party 8 and how toward the end of the game, the "Ring Master" would take your money away from you (if you were winning) and give it to the other players so they'd have a chance to come back and beat you. What the?

 

DESTRUCTION DERBY/DAFT RACERS - you've gotta keep in mind it's GTA racing, not Forza. It's an extension of the violent, over-reactionary, adrenaline surged gameplay that you find in Free Roam. 97.863% of all racers (made that up!) get a real bum-tickle out of pitting other players and forcing them off the track within the first blinks of a race. Like in GTAIV, the one who manages to come out pointed straight often captures the win, purely by luck.

 

This doesn't make it any less frustrating, though. Nothing worse than completing 5 laps or more and coming around toward the finish line and some toolbag comes along to pit you out in the final stretch, because either Catchup or Slipstream gave them the ability to come back out of nowhere and knock you from 1st place into 7th. <sigh>

 

On the revenge count, I am guilty of this. There are times when I'll get wrecked by other players at the start of the race, leaving me no way to recover and win. So, I'll just wait until the very end of the race, hiding out in some obscure corner, when in the final stretch, I'll come out and do exactly what the other players did at the start of the race, just at the end. Everybody cries and moans about it, but for me, if you're going to be an armpitter at the start of the race, then I'll do the same thing at the end. Seems perfectly fair to me.

 

PAYOUTS - I've learned that you have to simply ignore the payouts and simply race for the love of racing. Yes, the payout system is terrible. I put more time & work into a single 5-8 lap race than I do in Rooftop Rumble, yet the difference is about $17,000 and 2000 RP. ugh! So, I just ignore the payouts, though it's nice after running a dozen races to see that I've made about $50,000... which I then spend on ammo and car paint within 3 minutes.

 

CHITTER CHATTER - One of my biggest pet peeves is people chatting on mics during a race. The other night, there was an 8 year old kid, his older brother, and his older sister playing. They were so offensive, loud, and utterly oblivious to the entire group of 14 players begging them to "please, SHUT UP!" It simply ruins racing for me when there's a player abusing the mic, either with chatter or by playing awful music (like the guy who kept playing country music one night, really loud).

 

Anyhow, that's my take on GTA racing. It's a lot of fun if you go into it with very low expectations and with the understanding that the same personalities that will shoot you and then blow up your personal vehicle, for no good reason, will be driving along side you in a race to win.

 

Cheers!

[blue1]

 

I think the top three should be featured at the end of each race, and the absolute win/loss ratio should be discarded. It's yet another useless stat that means nothing when the outcome of races can be decided in the pile-ups that usually occur before the first corner.

I disagree that it shouldn't track wins. A win is a win. It should also track podium finishes separately though.

 

This. Hosts using the cheat Catchup should not be given any RP or money for the race as punishment for using that lame setting. Catchup encourages people to ram the leader (who's easy to catch) and it's only luck if you win, not skill.

If it's only luck then why can some people consistently win catch up races?

 

It's a mental crutch that some people think that catch up races take no skill. They take skill, it's just an addition set of skills in addition to those used in normal racing. Dealing with other cars in close proximity is a skill. Braking just enough to let other cars up so they cannot pit you is a skill. Reading the other driver to know when a pit is going to happen so you can avoid it is a skill. Keeping your eye on radar constantly so you always notice when a drafting car is flying up your butt about to ram you is a skill, as is juking to avoid that car and letting him pass so you can immediately draft him back. Perhaps most importantly there is skill in keeping track of how much of the race is left so you make sure you are the one behind and drafting up for the pass behind the finish line without the other guy having time to do the same.

 

Note than none of those aspects of skill involve me ramming or crashing someone else. If you are a competent driver you just wait for the other guy to wreck himself or crash trying to wreck you. The vast vast majority of all wrecks are preventable by you.

 

Be better than the other guy. Find out how you can improve and do it instead of failing the same way over and over then complaining there's no skill. Remember, the only common element in all of your races is you!

Podium finishes, yes please. I have like 700 wins and 600 losses, probably 300 of them are 2nd place and 200 3-4th place.

 

I hear what you say, but it all depends on what people you get matched with geographically. I live in Sweden and I got wired 100Mbit, but some of the people I race are from Spain/France/Holland with 56k modem?! Their movements lag occasionally/all the time and sometimes the slightest touch can lead to a huge havoc due to bad connection/net code.

Therefore the "skill" in avoiding rams is sort of useless, since it's all down to the randomness of which databytes reaches the server first. Heck, sometimes I send people off track by just racing straight and they only came 2-3 feet close to me?!

 

I don't know if it's in my head but it feels like every time I'm first with catchup on number two always catches up on me, but when I'm second behind the leader my engine power drains just as much as me driving as leader....

 

I created a playlist yesterday and turned off catchup and slipstream, I won each and every race clean, like it should be. With catchup on it's not a fair race, it's a handicapped destruction derby and it should not be called a "regular race".

 

I felt like I had to rant a little bit, but I do think it's gonna be better when the new additions to the map creator arrives! Hopefully we'll be able to recreate real-life race track in more or less right scale, and such tracks will hopefully only attract real racing fans.

[mareepx]

The thing is, whilst I would support a podium finish stat, I wouldn't support it's implementation now because the game has no way of knowing about previous podiums. So whilst if I said half of my 900 something losses were seconds or thirds if the stat was implemented now, I'd still have 900 losses and 0 second places, if that makes sense.

[blue1]

The thing is, whilst I would support a podium finish stat, I wouldn't support it's implementation now because the game has no way of knowing about previous podiums. So whilst if I said half of my 900 something losses were seconds or thirds if the stat was implemented now, I'd still have 900 losses and 0 second places, if that makes sense.

Yeah indeed, but on the other hand it would be the same for everyone, but I doubt Rockstar would implement such a feature. I tipped them about that 2 years ago when I did most of my racing (and probably at least 100 people has posted the same suggestion during the lifecycle of gta online).

[Skeve613]

Races need

 

An option to lock custom vehicles to only same models as the stock ones allowed.

 

The ability to see what vehicle class(es) are allowed for a race - not all descriptions will actually tell you the info you want.

 

Reduce the effects of catch-up and slipstreaming - maybe tweak both to reward better driving somehow (not that I know how).