I have been playing Forza 5 for a little over a month now and have been steadily improving, I started out my career mode on average but as it had been quite a while since I had played a forza game I had to bump my difficulty down to below average while I got used to the way the game played. I read a few articles about becoming a better driver, and following the advice I found I turned a bunch of assists off. I still use TC and ABS however I have everything else turned off. In career mode I have gotten proficient enough at the game to race against highly skilled drivatars and usually finish first or secod. Last night I was flipping through the menus trying to figure our how to raise my drivatar % and figured out I need to run more races on the various tracks so I jumped into free play to run a few laps on Prague Short, 3 laps. I almost lapped my opponents, I thought the divatar difficulty must be different in career and freeplay but when I reloaded the track and checed, no my difficulty was still at highly skilled, so I bumped it up to Pro, and again beat the pack by a large margin, bumped it up to Expert and again, beat them by a large margin. I’m about to put it on Unbeatable just to see how I do but I’m very curious why the difficulty is so different in freeplay and in Career.
Also, why is splitscreen 1 vs 1?? It would be nice for my son and I to be able to play this together and race against some more competition than just him and I.
Well I did Prague short and went from 51% → 52%, then continued to Alps Club and went from 52% → 53%, so you do level your drivatar by playing freeplay, probably faster than Career because you can just continually do whatever races you want to do, in career you’re racing the same circuits repeatedly, my drivatar was ‘stuck’ at 49% for a long time, until I did some more races (laps) on a track I hadn’t done many on.
Yea, your drivatar will rank up in free play. Also, you only don’t get xp and cash if you choose to “rent” a car (ie choosing a car from forza’s roster that you haven’t bought in career). So long as you use one of the cars from your career garage, you’ll get xp and credits.
About the drivatar difficulty, that’s funny because I’ve discovered the opposite. Ever since my first race, I’ve kept their difficulty set at “unbeatable” because I can either leave em in the dust in races like chase events, or easily manage 2nd or 3rd at least by the end of any given race. Free play, on the other hand, sometimes gives me a legitimate challenge if I don’t have a decent car built for its class. Weird.
That is seriously bizarre. I did just bump my difficulty to unbeatable and ran a 3 lap race on Alps Club and won, altho not by a long shot, but I still won. However in career I still find it to be a struggle on highly skilled.
Having just finished career mode and now playing free play, I have noticed the same thing. In career, I was keeping difficulty at average/above average but on free play I noticed the same thing. The drivatars are a lot easier to beat. In career, I was fighting for all golds. In free play, I was lapping the field a couple of times in 20-25 lap races. All at above average. I’m going to start bumping the difficulty up tonight and check it out.
Also on free play, I have noticed a few things. I get 21,000 credits for running 25 laps on Alps Festival but only 30,000 for running the max of 50. Does anyone know the points breakdown of what determines the payout on free play races and if increasing the opponents, increases the payout. I have yet to try that.
This is absolutely the main reason why the opposition seem less difficult. Apart from bathurst you start at 14/16 in career mode. In free play you start from pole or possibly 2nd. Thats the world of difference. In terms of free play opposition they seem to drive upgraded cars within the class parameters you set for the race. as I’ve never ‘rented’ and only used my cars I don’t know if this applies for them as well.
Against unbeatable level it does help to run a more specific track tune for high speed circuits. I prefer grip tunes and look to balance out loss of top end with handling/momentum around the slwer sections. However this strategy doesn’t always work and almost never works at le mans. You can indulge in some slick blocking but it only takes one slip up and they’re through. On tighter circuits that suit my tunes its bye-bye opposition and hello finishing line.
A 50 lap race at le mans should net over 300,000 credits in free play if you are restrained with the assists and use your own car. You’ll also have the pleasure of having to pit. The game is kind enough to warn you when your tyres are 75% shot, saving you the need to keep consulting your telemetry while racing.
I noticed this yesterday while doing Free Play in my Ferraris for the “Not Just For Show” badge - I would finish three laps of Prague Full at least half a lap ahead of the next Drivatar, which was fine with me, but then check out the results after the race: I did, e.g., 2:02 clean with a final time of, e.g., 6:10, and every Drivatar did a best lap time of well under 1:50, mostly clean, yet finished at least a minute behind me.
I don’t have an answer to your question but I do find myself driving on freeplay (no opponents) most of the time to learn the track and then going over to rivals.
It got to the point that whenever I was going through career mode (league) whatever I just lost all interest in it because of the way the drivatars works.
Race starts and someone’s drivatar decides that they want to be where you are so they ram you on the first straight away. then you get to the first turn and it s a gang fight. 2nd corner same thing. On race of 4 or more laps it is tolerable but if it is just 2-3 laps I don’t even bother starting it. I have no interest in bashing my way through a few corners and eventually getting to number 1 whether it is because they have knocked each other out and I got lucky or I bashed my way through. When you get the checkered flag it feels empty.
I hate to whine but I just thought maybe you might be interested in the solution I have come to until something is fixed. Use free play to practice, learn tracks, experience longer drives for tuning purposes and then when you are dialed in do a rival. That at least gives you the satisfaction of knowing you accomplished it.
I agree with what you’re saying about the drivatars in the career mode, I find it’s a hit to pass affair because of the drivatars. Granted I don’t have many friends that have this game so it’s populated with ‘random’ drivatars and I think that might be part of the problem.
I believe opponents in free play don’t use upgraded cars or maybe slightly upgraded. If you upgrade your car and have the highest PI car, you will start race in first. You also need to set drivatars to use a class that will provide a challenge. The default class selection for drivatar is “any” and it will sometimes fill the grid with cars a whole class lower than yours.
Single player is “IMO” completely useless in this game, It’s just the two drivatars in top that are fast enough, the rest is completely useless to compete against.
