With the addition of Career mode endurance races, the rubber-banding on the AI has gotten extremely bad. For example, I just completed the Forza P1 endurance race at Silverstone. I used a Hard/Medium/Medium strategy, getting off the Hards on Lap 10 when the fronts started to fall off. A few AI kept going. Once I exited on fresh Mediums, I was gaining six to seven seconds per lap on the top two AI. I caught 1st and 2nd at the end of Lap 12.
This is when things got stupid. The top AI suddenly gained all of that pace back, on tires that should have been nearly falling off the car, and I was unable to pass them until they pitted at the end of Lap 14. FOURTEEN. Their tires would have been destroyed.
It’s immersion breaking. It’s no surprise there’s rubberbanding in a racing game’s AI, but my goodness, at least try to make it semi-realistic. This isn’t Mario Kart.
General Info:
Bug Info: AI Rubberbanding in Career Mode, Endurance Tour
Platform: Steam
Edition: Premium
Account: Solo account
PC GPU: Nvidia 3080Ti
Settings: Noticed on Difficulty 6 and 7
Attempted fixes: None
Content Update: Update 9
@Pooya995016 Nothing there about rubber banding though, which i experienced at Sebring.
On max difficulty 7 cars had faster laps than me. When I somehow got to the front, 2nd stayed 2 seconds behind me. When i had to pit an extra time, 2nd was 17 seconds ahead.
Caught and passed 2nd within 4 laps (+4 seconds a lap) and thereafter, (again) 2nd sat 2 seconds behind me for the rest of the race.
With a faster lap by 1.5 seconds.
@Pooya995016 That’s not the issue I’m reporting, as Smurf said. They did seem to be affected by tire wear (hence me gaining 6-7 seconds per lap on them) until I caught them, at which point they were no longer affected it seemed.
So, possibly related, but not the same. I appreciate the extra info though.
On the first Retro Endurance race that I raced just now, the 2nd place ai drivatar set at least one lap 4 seconds faster than my best (8 seconds faster than its best qualifying/practice time) to catch up with me. Ridiculous.
Yup. The rubberbanding I think has always been there to an extent, but now with endurance races being added and the interaction between tire strategy and the AI, it’s REALLY showcasing how awful it can get. There’s no point in AI endurance races if the AI can just gain or lose 6-8 seconds of pace like this and ignore tire wear completely.
Interestingly, I tried to run endurance races in Freeplay before, and I didn’t notice this issue, however…In those cases, every time I went into the pits for a refuel it wouldn’t actually refuel me, causing me to have to pit in again and putting me in a position to never be able to catch the leaders, so…No way I could really know for sure if it was an issue back then.
Just did the GTX Sportscar career mode endurance race, and this is so silly.
Start 24th. Difficulty 6. Practice lap is 4 seconds faster than fastest AI (Thimse, see screenshots).
Go from 24th to 1st by end of Lap 3
Thimse AI begins rubber-banding, running identical lap times to keep within 2-3 seconds of me
My tires start wearing at Lap 8. I push to end of Lap 10 because I know the AI cheats on tire wear and I want this to be a one-stop race). Thimse AI is 1.5 seconds behind me when I pit end of Lap 10 (tires are >60% worn)
Come out 20 seconds behind 1st place Thimse AI.
Make up 19 seconds by end of Lap 12 prior to Thimse AI pitting. AI pits at end of Lap 12. At this point my fastest lap is a 1:47.2. AI’s a 1:47.3
Thimse AI comes out 6th. New 2nd place AI (e Ghost 66) and 3rd (Siiug) are rubberbanding now, only losing a couple seconds per lap rather than the 10+ seconds per lap prior to me passing them. They have not pitted.
Thimse AI cycles back to 2nd on Lap 14, 27 seconds back
At this point I seem to have “broken” the rubberbanding. Thimse AI drops back ~1s per lap until Lap 20 when I run a slow lap due to worn tires. Finishes 30s behind.
So yeah. The rubberbanding completely ignores tire wear (AI’s on what should be >80% worn tires are still keeping pace with player on fresh tires), and can clearly tell when the rubberbanding “turns off” once I’m behind them after a pit stop and their tire wear suddenly matters again. But there does seem to be an “upper bound” to the rubberbanding.
