Is “Launching” important in races? Or is it only important in drag race.
And if it IS important in regular races (even if it can save me 0.1 sec I’d call that important), what is the optimal technique for launching?
I know each car is different but perhaps someone knows a general list of rules?
Or a list of rules per car type?
Thanks.
Launching is very important in racing, especially standing start. This past MotoGP at Czech Republic saw the 3rd qualifier, Johann Zarco, go from 3rd to about 15th before the first turn because of a bad launch. Real world aside, it’s important in game too, whether you play online or off, nothing hurts more than going from a good position with faster people, to having to fight through people who should have uninstalled Forza and went back to Halo a long time ago.
As for general rules for the launch, really depends on the layout and power.
RWD - 4000 - 6000rpm dump, while gradually feeding in power from 50% throttle.
FWD - 3000 - 5000rpm dump, also gradually feeding in power.
AWD - You want to be at 100% throttle with the revs climbing, near redline for most cars.
What I mean for AWD is you see people who just bounce it off the rev limiter for the launch, but if they launch when the throttle is cut or right as if first comes back on, the car is going to bog and they’ll have a bad launch.
More or less. Cars vary too much from one to the next to make blanket “4-6k RPM for RWD” statements, but the gist of it is there.
My version:
In Forza, you want to hold your RPMs at a point where you get a “squawk” of wheelspin when the light turns green, then squeeze up to full throttle as quickly as you can without spinning the tires. Where that “sweet spot” RPM is (note: it’s not always at redline) and how quickly you can stand on the loud pedal will depend on the car/build/setup/etc. Bouncing off the rev limiter is generally a bad idea; you’ll get a better launch holding the RPMs just under redline and matting the gas as soon as the light turns green. Lower-powered cars you can (and usually should) just stand on the gas from the second the flag drops. Higher-powered ones require a bit more finesse.
As for how much launch matters: Outside of Experimental Drag, the difference between an OK launch and a great one is pretty much nil. The extra 10th of a second or so you gain (usually) isn’t going to matter as soon as you reach the first turn.
The game really should display the RPM during countdown.
I’m still bewildered as to how the managed to miss something as basic as this.
The tachometer is showing revs during countdown. I drive in cockpit mode so I don’t know if it’s not doing it in any other view.
I drive in cockpit view too which fixes this but it’s still a pretty poor design flaw to say the least. In any other view you don’t have the speedometer visable until the countdown ends.
Yip. Fundamental error. All the updates released and this was missed. I don’t get it.
This really depends on one question I have:
Do you tune your cars yourself? Yes or no?
I ask this because the most efficient way to launch a car in this game is to essentially tune the 1st gear ratio to be as efficient as possible and just keep the throttle pinned. That will give you the most consistent result all the time and probably the fastest.
The best way to do this is to go to a drag strip (don’t go to the Test Track Airfield because that strip has more grip than any start line) and run a few 1/4 mile times while tuning the gears to get the best result while always keeping your throttle pinned at launch.
Launch is based off your gear length. lengthen or shorten your gears to get your car to its peak power for the best launch. Mid range cars like longer gears, high rev cars like shorter gears for launches so make the first 2-3 gears shorter than 5-6 which usually are for straight lines rather than turns and you need to keep the revs high while turning in a high revving car or you will lose power.
If you’re getting too much wheel spin at the start it means you are either using a rev banger which is practically useless and will lose time every single time you need to throttle or that your gear is too short and the car can’t rev properly. Any time you can’t just smash down the gas and go shows that your car either has too much power or the gear is not long enough. Fixing #2 is usually the problem, #1 means you need to redo the tune with less power or it won’t work.
If you cannot change your gears because you are using a non-adjustable gear box then drop the power and use weight reduction instead for a better launch and to have more control of the car. Also shift early if you need to in order to get rid of the revving RPMs to go.
Cars with a good launch can get away from the pack early to build up a lead and keep it. Cars with piss poor launches (generally FF drive cars) have to deal with the pack and pass multiple cars to get started on their real run. If you’re confident in your ability to pass then go for it, but all that fighting is lost time allowing for fast drivers with good launches to run away from you and keep the lead. Just think, if the race is 3 laps long and the guy with a good launch gets 4-5 seconds on you early on and you are only a second faster per lap, statistically speaking so long as he is consistent and calm, you’ll never catch and pass him and even if you do good defensive driving can make sure that you won’t be able to.
So not only do you need a good launch you need to think about your cars set up vs. others so you can think of offensive and defense strategies. A car with handling is good, but on long beach you’re not passing anyone on the corners. So if you went for full grip, you’d lose because you can’t keep up on the straights to make a pass and any side by sides would end up in your loss from the straightaways, for example.
It’s really a lot more complicated than just having a random built TBH.
Launch is very important. Even a rolling start. Not enough gas you get passed. Too much gas and spin the tires you get passed. Do it just right and you could make up a spot to several spots or pull away from the pack if you were on pole, right at the start.
More cars passed at start fewer cars need to be dealt with in race. As simple as that.
Every car is different do there’s no unvesal rule. I try to keep the wheels spinning a little. Too much spin results is slow get away. No spin at all is only fractionally slower if you’re good enough to keep it at traction limit - I’m not. Worst is bogging down - letting the revs drop to a point where the engine is producing vey little power. That will easily drop you to the back of the field.
Two points;
Yes launching is somewhat important, but not the launch statistic. i.e don’t compromise your upgrades or tune to get a good launch stat, rather optimize upgrades and tune for lap time, then just fine tune 1st gear for launching. I recommend for consistency, taking note of which point in rev range with engine produces peak torque, and fine tune 1st gear and differential so it lands at that point when you drop the clutch at 100% throttle.
For FM8, I would love to see time sitting in grid before the race extended, to a) Allow time to build revs and attempt a “perfect” launch, b) the start and first corner are always chaos, I would like a little time to look around at opponents cars and their relative positions and time to think about my approach into turn 1. If people have this opportunity maybe it’ll improve the “just bomb in there and hope for the best” method so many players adopt by default. c) Just the opportunity to add a little suspense and atmosphere to game would be welcome, F1 2019 does this well with Engineer over radio a nice touch.
I think a formation lap so we could heat the tires would be a nice touch. Then maybe increase the time delay to 5 or 10 seconds. The race engineer is a cool feature in F1 2019 but with the ‘Data Out’ feature, you can actually make an app to do that yourself which I’m considering doing.
Does crew chief work with forza?
No clue but it’s 100% possible to make an engineer app.