Apparently, the drivetrain swap + race diff cheat will work (as in unrealistic boost in performance) on ANY car, it’s just most effective on the “banned” vehicles.
With that in mind, could this be a factor in the “runaway speed-demon drivatar” phenomenon? If the drivatars can use UGC tunes (and I remember hearing somewhere that this is the case), and they’re being outfitted with broken builds/tunes, it would explain a lot.
Edit: It’s also concievable that the game itself is combining these upgrades when setting up the drivatars’ cars, not realizing the result will be a broken car which hits well above its weight.
I played the career for the first 2 days of the pre-launch. And noticed the same thing everyone else has. One driveatar that is super quick. By the time I managed to get through the field of all the wrecking driveatars there was no way to catch the super fast one. I figured I might as well go get wrecked online if the driveatars were so bad as to ruin any chance I had to beat the really fast one.
Today was the first day I tried the career again since those first 2 days. I now have no issues. While there is still one really fast driveatar, all the other ones have improved. Its now possible for me to get through a race with very little contact if any at all. I will struggle to catch him on the tracks that are new or the ones I have not played since forza 4, wet and night tracks included. On any other track he is pretty easy to run down.
I think it may not have anything to do with a difficulty setting.
I say this because I play primarily on Pro and Unbeatable and have no runaway drivatar issues. As Turn10 stated, they believe the issue is a drivatar from a harder difficulty is being populated into the lower difficulty and therefore, players who play on the two hardest difficulty settings already don’t notice this as much because the issue does not appear.
On the other hand, I have only experienced runaway drivatar issues on two tracks in career - Daytona and Indianapolis. This is why I believe you may be correct in part B Wald. These tracks use large portions of the oval so when I equip my car (even as a pure speed build; not using any glitches or “cheat” tunes) I cannot win. On the Daytona Circuit I can pass drivatars on the inside of the circuit and I make up ground but the minute I hit the oval all the drivatars seem to hit well above C Class; I am passed as if I were sitting still I’m maxing out my vehicle at around 138 mph and I am being passed at speeds where the drivatar will pass me and gain so much distance I cannot catch and pass him once we hit the inside portion of the track again. This issue also does not happen only with the lead drivatar but with every drivatar in the race.
If you go do the Indianapolis Indy Car Race Driver Experience showcase event you notice that every racer is in the same car but you cannot tune yours. If you’re running at top speed on the track the drivatars ahead of you still gain distance ahead of you when you should all have the same maximum available speed. How can this happen unless the drivatar’s build is glitched or allowing it to use the differential error.
Now, keep in mind that the drivatar starting in pole position does not have a wreck fest during Turn 1 to deal with. This is especially true if they have a glitched build that allows them to launch and drive much faster than they should be able to in that class so they are able to most definitely get out ahead of the pack. Then positions 2 - 24 all have a pile up or slow down in the corner to deal with while 1st place continues to essentially have a clean, hot lap esque race.
It may not be a difficulty issue at all.
—Also, seeing these issues arise when they were not present in FM5 means they aren’t just straight porting these things, right? Or if thye are porting it, something that was new in the game has caused an issue when combined with the older code. Either that or whoever was in charge of porting it didn’t do a good job…
i spent a long time in career yesterday for the first time. I noticed a couple of things re: drivatars.
On the positive side i had a series of races where i got to the front after a couple of laps only to be overtaken by a “fast” drivatar who had started behind me on the grid. That seemed realistic
I also did a lap on rio where a drivatar put in a final lap time which would have been up near the top of the current leaderboard. I happen to know via twitch that the real person so to speak doesn’t yet own 6 but spent hours hotlapping the demo. rewinding etc. And yes the drivatar was racing in the 15 Ford GT.
I’m only theorising because i haven’t got much idea about how the drivatars are “created”
I’ve noticed when on an easier difficulty like above average they were running away but I can catch them, as now I’m on a harder difficulty this isn’t the case, it’s down to other players who played on easy and the cloud side of it , if they raced on hard all the time it would be much more fair and even for every one I’d say get rid of the difficulty settings altogether and have it very life like
I believe both are happening to an extent, as evidenced by everything PPi said, and I in my OP.
There is clearly a difficulty thing: Between 1 and 3 drivatars seem to ALWAYS be set to pro or unbeatable, regardless of the actual difficulty. You’ll notice the people complaining state they’re playing at lower difficulties- those of us who play at pro/unbeatable don’t notice the glitch, because they’re all that fast.
Having quick folk on your friends list seems to exacerbate the problem.
PPi’s situation on the semi-ovals is a perfect example of what led me to type the OP, the A.I. might be “cheating” too. The tuning cheat affects primarily speed. Combine this with the fact the drivatars never take the car to it’s cornering limits, only it’s top speed, then when you set the difficulty to pro/unbeatable you’d only ever get a runaway drivatar on a long straight (or slight bend i.e. banked oval).
As you said, the complaints stem from primarily lower difficulty players. I’ve noticed when I set the game to average that I am far in the lead, followed by a drivatar or 2, and the rest of the pack (4th - 24th place) is well, well back. Let me put it in perspective - I played on average difficulty setting on Watkins Glenn and in a 6 lap race, the lead drivatar and I lapped some of the other drivatars. I then did the exact same race (Group 5 Showcase in case you’re wondering) on the Pro difficulty and there were no runaway drivatar issues. Sure, at some point the lead drivatar was losing me but I was driving like a slob. The minute I backed off a bit and began driving better I easily caught the drivatar and had a nice 1.5 lap battle for 1st place (I won).
I tend to play on Pro and Unbeatable and so there is no runaway drivatar issue. As I said in my first post - the issue of the speed glitch is still in play and very much noticeable on tracks with long straights and banked ovals - I tried a race in C Class on the Old Mulsanne Straight version of LeMans and I had no chance of survival. I forced the game to put me in 1st, I kept the position until we got on the straight and then I very quickly landed myself in 24th place and all I had on the car were engine upgrades. Same happens on the Daytona and Indy Circuit tracks.
(On Pro) In the corners I’m taking a better line and/or passing 3 or 4 drivatars at a time but on anything resembling a near straight line I need the Falcon 9.
In the Stories of Motorsport I was able to get past the Daytona Circuit race by placing the drivatar on average and barely finished 1st. I was able to pass because only one or two drivatars were on the higher difficulty and I was able to keep the lead and do some aggressive “blocking” to ensure I got podium at least.
For those playing on lower difficulty they have the problem even worse. They get (for them) super hard drivatars and drivatars that cheat.
If it helps - I can make some videos and share them here as well as an example.
The runaway drivatar always make one or two mistakes on the last lap for me, just like that the game wants me to catch up, it makes the game feel arcade, not a sim.
On the other topic about this, both Dan and Brian posted, saying that the runaway drivatar was due to a pro or unbeatable difficulty drivatar being added in to the grid. Also, that lowering the difficulty would not help this matter. They said they were working on it. I raced a race on pro just a few mins ago and noticed the field was equally competitive, so here’s to hoping they fixed it!
Yep, and let’s hope it gets fixed fast. I’m getting severely ticked off with this issue, and I’m sure others are the same. How many players will there be, who don’t think to check the forums, who will just give up on the game because of this?
I just finished the day break series and out of 5 races not a single drivatar pulled away. I was racing on pro. Almost every other race I completed on career mode there was always one drivatar that just pulled away.
Well they should drop the drivatar stuff alltogether. I rather race against a proper AI with names like M. Rossi than those rolling chicanes that we have now.
I noticed that not only one drivatar but at least half of the grid is way faster than me on straights (or oval parts) even if I tuned my cars to top speed. That’s at least until expert difficulty, which I prefer due to the wreckfest during the first lap and drivatars being WAY too slow while cornering.
Speaking of cornering: why does pretty much every drivatar brake at the corner exit? Doesn’t make any sense. Turn 10 gives us mostly 3 laps to get into the top three and then adds so much cars to the track and then puts you right in the middle of that rolling chicane. And they seriously expect us to get a clean race into the top 3?
I sometimes wonder if anyone at Turn10 even properly tests the core components of their game…
I have watch the runaway drivatar and most of the time its the pole sitter.the problem is there is not enough laps in the early racers to try and catch him.
How the hell can you catch him within 3 laps when you start 12th and it takes a lap or 2 to get past all the carnage and by this time he is about half a lap ahead.
I have the same problem. I’m driving at medium level (I’m driving ok but I’m not pro). It’s not easy to pass cars in front of you, with some unbearable behaviors (wrecking drivatars). I can manage that but when I’m in second place it’s all or nothing. I go first really easy and I’m chasing a car for the remaining laps with no real chance to catch up. That really hinder my pleasure in the game. So now I’m spending my time in the painting room (and I’ve not a very good artist) or I play online with some friends.
And I’ve tried at lower difficulties. It’s not easier. So there is something wrong.
literally just had a drivatar on the easiest difficulty run what would be the 7th best lap in the world and that is in a car that has a PI 25 levels below the max PI for that class… turned the game up to pro difficulty the next race and won by a few seconds… broke game is broke…
And we most likely will get a patch on this and some other issues probably the first Tuesday in October. Or there abouts. Just a guess, but mine is as good as though saying Turn 10 is probably never going to fix anything, as well as making assumptions about how the developers feel and think.