Cannot reconcile disparity - Using wheel vs controller in Forza Motorsport

Suggestions Hub Motorsport Features Peripherals & Console
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Logitech G923 wheel/pedals for Xbox/PC vs. Xbox wired controller for Windows PC
Car - 2014 Corvette C7R PI 800
Track - Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta

Logitech G923 wheel/pedals - no assists for steering, braking, or throttle. Worked hard to establish a consistent best time for the car and conditions.
Lap time 1:27.7

Xbox wired controller for PC - steering and throttle full assist, braking partial assist. Laps were completed with no input from the player. The controller was placed on the desk and not touched.
Lap time 1:25.0

It is impossible to participate in multiplayer races driving with this equipment disparity.

This is not a complaint. This is not whining or asking for something that canā€™t be done. This is not a skill issue, I have done hundreds and hundreds of real world laps at Road Atlanta in many different cars, and I am a driving instructor for several sanctioning groups at that track.

This is just a statement of reality.

I like Forza Motorsport. I like it a lot. I think that Turn 10 have performed exceptionally well since the game release in update after update that have made the game work better and introduced great new features, tracks, and cars. My compliments to them for the outstanding work.
I am really impressed with the new Road Atlanta track in Update 11. Car handling matches the actual track very closely, down to the response to patches in the pavement, variations in track grip level in specific sections, car reaction to curbs, and overall grip and feel of the car. The visual presentation is detailed and faithful to the real track. Itā€™s a great simulation. I wish that I could be more excited about Road Atlanta coming to Forza Motorsport.

I know that controllers will always be faster - itā€™s inherent to the game marketing, demographic, purpose, and philosophy. That will not change.

I would be really pleased if there were controller only races and wheel/pedal only races. I guess that wonā€™t be happening, since this disparity has been widely known and accepted as fact for a long time. That makes me sad, because I would love to support Forza Motorsport with all the interest and effort that I can. But Iā€™m not going to plug in a controller and set it on the desk to gain 3 seconds per lap. Thatā€™s not what Iā€™m looking for. So, I have to look to other racing games instead. Iā€™m really sorry that this is the reality of Forza Motorsport.

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I believe there is a suggestion for wheel only races and/or controller only races in the suggestion hub.

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Depends on the class but Iā€™m a wheel user running top 30-50 times in P class.

There are a few of us around that can mainly hang with the controller ā€˜aliensā€™.

I think itā€™s just a numbers game though, we probably make up 2%.

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Iā€™ve set multiple Hardcore World Records in X on a wheel (Fanatec GT DD Pro 8nm), including regular sub 5 minute times at the Nordschleife (hereā€™s an outdated hotlap).

From racing with people Iā€™ve battled against for years and know the pace level of, this is the first Forza title where I feel wheel is as good as pad in terms of getting optimal laptimes. This is also the first Forza where I exclusively play on wheel, whereas Iā€™ve historically always been a pad-only player.

The challenge is that the wheel settings menu is quite obtuse compared to other games, and itā€™s a tricky thing to get right. Thereā€™s also the fundamental challenge when it comes to pedals, and getting the right feel out of the brake, particularly those with loadcell elastomers.

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Defo a challenge to get settings right, they mostly translate across fm6 to fm8. The jump though when 6 came was immense. Lots of new values to play with and 0 instructions. I took weeks to gradually understand how they all worked.

If youā€™re new to this game, itā€™s a steep steep curve to learn.

In comparison, ACC was pretty good straight out the box. I know realistically nothing will happen but itā€™d be good to be offered a drop down of differing wheel configurations (I donā€™t mean the button mapping either) dependent on wheel manufacturer.

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This is the Suggestions Hub. Look up at the top. ā€œSuggestions Hub Motorsport Features Xbox & Peripherals fm-Wheel Inputā€.

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Thanks for your input. I understand what youā€™re saying. From your viewpoint, everything you say is 100% correct. I am able to take your viewpoint, and see that.
There are problems, however, with that process. First, everyone knows who PJTierney is. In any activity, there will always be a small number of people who are supernaturally good, for whatever reason or multiple reasons. Those people are outliers, and not representative of the majority. You are an outlier, and you canā€™t speak as representing anyone other than what you are - a supernaturally good example in this particular activity.

Also, and no doubt related, is that with all your years of wisdom and experience, you didnā€™t listen to what I said. Your reply can be summed up as ā€œDude, itā€™s a skill issue. Try harder.ā€

Having done both racing and sim racing, I know that they are very different things. Theyā€™re nowhere close to being the same. Thereā€™s an overlap of skills between the two, but thereā€™s also a very large area of disparity where the two are very different and donā€™t overlap.

If you take a poll of unbiased players, the majority will agree with me. If you go over to iRacing, virtually everyone there will sneer at Forza Motorsport and say itā€™s a childā€™s arcade game. And their reasons would generally be consistent with what I said. If you are addressing people who are passionate about Forza, of course theyā€™re going to deny that thereā€™s any problem or issue there. But they would be wrong.

In real racing, I was never very good at sprint races. I was pretty good at endurance races, which require very consistent driving and the ability to keep the car on the edge of but within its performance limits.

I was attempting to explain, that neither I nor most other people, can match the consistency and precision of a computer. Itā€™s undeniable that, in a game thatā€™s about piloting an automobile around a highly technical racetrack, someone using a crude device with on/off buttons will be highly governed by how the game drives the car. Not by how they personally drive the car.

So, with all respect, I donā€™t accept your statements. They are representative of you, but you arenā€™t representative of the majority. And apparently, so far removed from that majority that youā€™re unable to shift viewpoints and listen with a different ear.

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Thanks for the reply, much appreciated and well written.

Perhaps I did lean on ā€œskill issueā€ a bit much there.

Still though, I do think wheel and pad have the same potential in this game, unlike in previous titles where pad had an inherent and extremely obvious advantage.

One big downside for wheel however is that in this game in particular itā€™s an absolute nightmare to set up the force-feedback. I think thatā€™s why many people canā€™t seem to extract the same pace they would on a pad.

Having the live telemetry of FFB is fantastic, but the Advanced Wheel settings menu has 20+ sliders, some of which are using terminology not seen in any other racing game. Itā€™s not intuitive at all and itā€™s very easy to end up with bad settings that can make a player slower than they ought to be.

Itā€™s a brick wall for most players in terms of understanding because the vast majority of us are not engineers. It wasnā€™t until @KaylosJFB did some very thorough videos on the topic that I was able to figure out what to adjust to get the feeling I want. Without help like that, Iā€™d probably say the same things as yourself.

No other game Iā€™ve played on a wheel has a menu like this, it shouldnā€™t be this complicated for people.

One advantage I have experienced compared to pad though is in front tyre wear. On a wheel you can be more precise with steering inputs, and not scrub the tyres as much as a pad player who can go lock-to-lock. Even with the gameā€™s dampening behaviour a pad player will have a little more scrub than optimal and it adds up over a race.

A pad player I regularly race with and am even with pace-wise tells me that he often has to use Mediums in a race where I can just scrape by on Softs, because of the different between pad/wheel.

That being said, some things are easier on pad than wheel. I find that Iā€™m not as forceful or consistent in braking as pad players as Iā€™m fighting a loadcell. Also sometimes itā€™s easier to have a tankslapper on wheel than pad due to the weight transfer being more obvious through the hands. Subconsciously, itā€™s much easier to drive in external camera views (which do give advantages in peripheral vision) on pad too, because on a wheel you want to feel connected to the car visually as well as physically.

On a separate topic, since youā€™ve driven Road Atlanta in real life a lot, how does the game version compare now? Older games seemed to have a very outdated version and I could clearly feel the difference after a few laps.