Too many concurent events (The problem is likely not what you think)

Forza Motorsport Forza Motorsport (2023) Discussion
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Link to suggestion topic Eliminate/Reduce Race event overlap Read this and then go vote.

So my friend and a content creator created this video.

Small lobbies are a problem, but the I do disagree with him about there being too many hoppers. The playerbsae between different hoppers tends to be different anyways and not overlap as much. To me the problems resides in the fact that there is so much race overlap within the individual hoppers. The endurance hopper has 4 race events running concurrently without enough time to join the 5th and expect a decent sized lobby. That is a massive split of the playerbase. Medium/Long races overlap 3 race events. Short races overlap 2 race events.

This effectively splits the playerbase 27-37 ways depending on a players willingness to join the next event towards the end of the time limit almost guarunteeing ending up in a new small lobby. That is a ton of concurrent events for a small playerbase. I recommend eliminating overlap altogether with enough time to join the next with a reasonable amount of time left in practice. At the very least reduce the overlap so that no more than 2 race events are running concurrently in most hoppers and short/endurance should always never have overlap. Short races are short enough to have events to jump into quickly and endurance hoppers are time investments no one will stick out with small lobbies.

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Very astute observation, thank you! Its worth revisiting the scheduling cadence again for sure! :wink:

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This is where I like Gran Turismo Sport’s system:

https://www.gran-turismo.com/us/gtsport/manual/#!/sportmode/content03

You had 3 events, that’s it. Not 3 events per playlist, 3 playlists period. Initially, the track in each playlist didn’t even change, though the playlists changed daily.

They ran every 20 minutes (if I remember correctly). There was zero overlap in an individual playlist, only between playlists as a whole.

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This hyperfocuses players into specific races, leads to bigger grids and better matchmaking.

Importantly however, searchable custom lobbies were still there for people who don’t find the current official races appealing. That way everybody has something they can race in.

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At the moment Forza Motorsport has 11 active playlists (including Qualifier Series), and overlapping races in each. This is in a game that feels like it has far fewer concurrent players online than GT or F1.

To fill each of these rooms you need 264 people to be seeking races at the same time, and for them to be evenly spread across all rooms. Double that because we know some playlists are more popular than others. Now multiply that by 6, to get an even split across all Safety Ratings, then multiply it by 5 to get a good spread across all Driver Ratings.

So, to fill up every active playlist in Forza Motorsport with (a) full lobbies, (b) with good skill balance and (c) with good safety balance, you need over 15,840 people online at the same time, all searching for a race within the same 15-20 minute window.

Here is how many people are playing on Steam, you can probably 5x or 10x that when you factor in console and Game Pass: https://steamdb.info/app/2440510/charts/

This game cannot sustain the number of active events in Featured Multiplayer right now. This is why many races feel “dead”, the few players this game has have too many choices in what to race.

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Except because of overlapping races, you need even 2-3 times that number based on Short vs Medium/Long, and extra for Endurance which has 4-5 overlapping race vents. GT has shown that better racing keeps players coming back. I’m all for drift and drag lobbies, because I feel those players don’t overlap much with racing players. I do feel if they fixed matchmaking so that all players are matched in the whole event and cut down on race overlap, you would see better more competitive lobbies that are full or near full. That does rquire doing matchmaking at the end of practice or closing an event as soon as practice starts. Not everyone wants to do 20 minutes of practice, so the former makes more sense.

There also seems to be a bug in matchmaking/lobby building too, as I’ve been lobby hopping to test, and each time I end up in a new lobby of 5-12 players. Towards the end of entry, it’s new lobbies of 4-5, if I start at the begining of practice, lobby only goes to like 12-13, yet all those later joining players are ending up in new lobbies with barely anyone else. That goes beyond separating by safety/rating, or I would never have ended up in different lobbies but the same one I left (assuming it’s not full.)

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Gt does it better but i have a feeling turn 10 didnt want to copy what they have. Has this overlap always been a thing or is it due to practice being shorter and they didnt adjust anything to compensate.

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Lobbies were sparse last night that’s for sure

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well lobbies will be sparse if u have 5 lobbies with 5 players per lobby, yesterday when doing multiclass races, i joined lobby, with only 4 players, ok im doing re entry, and see another 5 player lobby BUT its different people, ok 1 more try and same thing 5 people lobby with different names.

Machmaking is not even working properly so idk why there 10-15 players were not in same lobby. [All races in open look the same, u got 1-3 fast guys, maybe 5 decent drivers, 5 randoms, and rest dont even know how to drive [well in full lobby that is]

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It would be sorted if they went back to the old 30 minute practice system for the Spec races. Open class can be 15 minutes.

Also the multi-class events should have some sort of locked class system. And you should matchmake with players with similar cars to avoid:
7x Lmp1 players
2x lmp2 players
7x forza gt2 players

After choosing the car, the game will put me in a lobby where i get atleast 6x LMP2 players so that I can actually race with LMP2 cars.

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I would like to see all events sorted by starting time order
Event. Time starting
A class. 5
Touringcars 10
Gt. 15
Mazda. 20
Edurence never overlap

Try not to overlap to many
The list should just keep populating with upcoming event

If there like 10 event make sure half of them don’t overlap

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Created a video on the subject. https://youtu.be/ZdJMtMUd5Qg?si=we_-LdyHd6vg4lwg

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Too many events active at the same time… the users on divide and the lobbies are empty

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Agreed, too many active playlists.

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The playlist are empty because drivers don’t want to play them period… players are going to play what they want to play. And not what they are forced to play. Take it down to three events and if they are not getting played you know why! My 2 cents on it… and match making is not up to standards either tbh…

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I totally agree. It happens way too often that you end up in lobbies with just 2-3 other drivers, and that just isn’t fun.

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U are right. I play only open multiplayer and mostly B A class racing, if it’s not available, I just don’t play this game, there are many other games I can play in this time.

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Unfortunately we don’t have the data on what people want to play, only anecdotes. Turn 10 do though, so up to them to optimise the lobby sizes.

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forza motorsport should’ve stick with what it was always been good at and not copying other Racing titles or at least do both systems. one that changes after every Race because I enjoy E D B C S R. A is not balanced and they need to ban the formula mazda in A Class they don’t need to change the cars power or wight just the stats of the car

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You said that to me the other day PJ but they are clearly not doing what you suggest. The endurance hoppers are pretty pointless as the game stands, not enough players are online at any one time want to do something like that on a casual basis. I’ve done 2, both started with less than 10 players, 1 finished with 4 the last one I did I was the last one in the lobby & left with several laps to go.
This is why I didn’t get the TCR exclusion over GT4. Why not put GT2, 3 & 4 together in a multi class system & leave what is clearly the most populated class permanent for now while it’s being enjoyed by many.
Again custom player created lobbies would solve these issues, regular players would populate well run lobbies they favour as in FM4, that would leave T10 to run special one off events with prizes that would create more interest…he said hopefully.

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Man formula mazda is one of slower cars in A class, it’s ez to drive and good with tyre wear, but slap sport tyres to any decent car, and f Mazda have no chance.

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Realistically, it’s too late. The player base has moved on.

This is all moving deck chairs around on the Titanic.

We’ve had seven other Forza’s, there’s nothing really that’s new about this game, it’s still cars going around the same tracks. There is nothing to pull people back into the game. It’s same old but with the added frustration of missing features, tiny player base, heavy restrictions.

Turn 10 are in a catch 22. I really think the whole practice session thing has massively contributed to killing the game off online. Forza is not a serious racing game (go to ACC, iRacing, rFactor etc for that). The player base are not wanting nor conditioned to spend the majority of their online lobby time in bits (Practice, Qualifying, Tuning) other than the actual race. This game has gone for a gap in the market that didn’t exist. To the casuals, the game is very restrictive and overly long for a quick race, for the simulation enthusiasts, this game is too arcade.

If they restrict the lobbies to only a few classes, they’ll lose other players. For example I’m a P class player, I have 0 interest in any other class. Narrow minded perhaps, but hasn’t been an issue for the previous Forza’s.

If they leave a wide range of lobbies open, then the already diluted player base gets spread thinly.

If I was in T10’s finance team, I’d pulling the plug on future updates and keep the game going with minimal dev support as per the contract with Microsoft. Objectively this game is dead and I think we have to face up to the fact T10 won’t throw good money after bad. This is pretty much it.

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