Is Assetto Corsa's Penalty System too harsh?

[Terry Rock]

I love AC but the draconian penalty system is just 'killing' it for me.
I'm mostly hot-lapping with it now due to that system...
Recently on starting what was supposed to be a great race....(twenty four guys at Spain running the L125)).
I got in late and did not have a chance to qualify so I started twenty-third...not a problem since I like starting at the back and trying to work my way through the field.
I got a great start...up to tenth by turn one, then had to pull left and slow for a first corner pile-up at which point I got 'clobbered' from behind and pushed off track.
Penalty....I must now slow to almost a stop before the lap is over.
I watch as cars 'fly' by and disappear.
After what seems like an eternity, I can again race.
It's futile.
I pull over...hit escape and exit the game because I know based on the time I sat almost stationary, there is absolutely no way to catch up.
It's a race killer and needs addressing..

 

[Radu Oros]

Slowing to 21mph for any period while everyone zooms past and disappears, is always going to be a race killer.

Is not so black and white. It can happen when you're alone and opponents are far behind and ahead and you miss the track on your own. It can happen at the beginning of a race to avoid accidents, and here slowing down to 35kph won't have all your opponents get ahead much because if it happened to you, more cars will crash or exit the white lines and is better to serve a quick slow down than to get a couple of minutes added to your race time. This slow down you can even do it on a slow corner, but pull safely to the side if you have opponent behind you.
Just record this situation in a video so we can see how fair or how bad it is.

 

[Brandon Wright]

Is not so black and white. It can happen when you're alone and opponents are far behind and ahead and you miss the track on your own. It can happen at the beginning of a race to avoid accidents, and here slowing down to 35kph won't have all your opponents get ahead much because if it happened to you, more cars will crash or exit the white lines and is better to serve a quick slow down than to get a couple of minutes added to your race time. This slow down you can even do it on a slow corner, but pull safely to the side if you have opponent behind you.
Just record this situation in a video so we can see how fair or how bad it is.

So just because there are a couple instances where it may not be too harsh means the dozens of times where it's way too harsh are perfectly acceptable? No, I don't agree with that.

 

[Radu Oros]

So just because there are a couple instances where it may not be too harsh means the dozens of times where it's way too harsh are perfectly acceptable? No, I don't agree with that.

Every time I read these opinions about the track cut penalty system it seems exaggerated. Would be nice some clear cases, such as video of the situation to see if it was reasonable or not adequate.

 

[Brandon Wright]

Every time I read these opinions about the track cut penalty system it seems exaggerated. Would be nice some clear cases, such as video of the situation to see if it was reasonable or not adequate.

If you cut the track and penalties are on it orders you slow to a certain speed within a certain amount of time, you usually have to come nearly to stop in order to appease it. Obviously this will likely ruin your race as the field will zoom by you while you're slowing, and it also makes you a hazard to the other cars because you're now a slow moving object. Afaik it's always been like that, you can test it yourself, or wait for a video. It's a bit of a ham-fisted way to handle it, and that's why I never have penalties on in my server. Yes, there should be a penalty if you cut the track, but it shouldn't necessarily ruin your race or potentially ruin other peoples' race.

Just my opinion, of course.

 

[Jim Liak]

Warning for exceeding track limits, three warnings=drive through penalty. To avoid people gaming the system by using up 2 penalties to gain time advantage then anyone who beats their fastest lap on a lap where they receive a penalty gets a drivethrough, quali lap would be used to enforce that rule on lap 1, please please @kunos can this be done?

So in ten laps race, I can cheat in 2 last laps, so only warnings taken and win the race...
Penalty system is way more tricky and complicated.
Is it perfect? No. But it has to take into account all exec scenarios.

 

[Jim Liak]

Also guys you can also serve penalty with either releasing throttle : so when on a big straight, release throttle before braking point. Take advantage of it and reduce time without throttle significantly.

 

[Stereo]

Yeah, unless your throttle pedal is mis-calibrated (in which case you may not be able to go to 0% throttle), the timed lift is a much easier penalty to serve.

 

[Bokonon]

So in ten laps race, I can cheat in 2 last laps, so only warnings taken and win the race...
Penalty system is way more tricky and complicated.
Is it perfect? No. But it has to take into account all exec scenarios.

Not quite, if you follow my proposed system then if the cheat uses their remaining penalties on two last laps then they still get a drive through for beating their fastest lap, if they don't take it then black flag disqualifies them. Potentially it could allow them to cut in the way you propose to negate a mistake with a net lap time that is slower than their fastest lap, but at that point I don't think a cheater would be in a position to profit from it. I am not saying my proposal is perfect, but I think it is a lot better than what we have now, and also relatively easy to code. I would try to code it myself as an app but I would rather it be baked in to the core of the game.

I am sure you are supposed to get black flag if you don't serve the drive through, I have only got it twice and both times I served my penalty so don't know if it functions correctly. I am off tomorrow so I will test and see what happens. If it doesn't punish failure to comply I will raise a bug on the AC forum.

.

Unless I'm mistaken, the drive-through penalty doesn't really do anything does it? A friend and I tested it when it first came out with the false starts, it would put a message on the screen saying I had three laps to serve the penalty but after three laps nothing happened, I finished the test race without serving the penalty and it did not change my position in the finishing results. I figure it would either warp me back to the pits or show me at the bottom of the finishing results and it did neither.

If you cut the track and penalties are on it orders you slow to a certain speed within a certain amount of time, you usually have to come nearly to stop in order to appease it. Obviously this will likely ruin your race as the field will zoom by you while you're slowing, and it also makes you a hazard to the other cars because you're now a slow moving object. Afaik it's always been like that, you can test it yourself, or wait for a video. It's a bit of a ham-fisted way to handle it, and that's why I never have penalties on in my server. Yes, there should be a penalty if you cut the track, but it shouldn't necessarily ruin your race or potentially ruin other peoples' race.

Just my opinion, of course.

The other bad thing about these penalties is that other drivers take unnatural action to serve the penalty and become a hazard and cause further damage to other peoples race. Drive throughs make the offender serve the penalty without hurting anyone else.

 

[Brandon Wright]

I am sure you are supposed to get black flag if you don't serve the drive through, I have only got it twice and both times I served my penalty so don't know if it functions correctly. I am off tomorrow so I will test and see what happens. If it doesn't punish failure to comply I will raise a bug on the AC forum.

Yes, when we were testing it to see how it worked I got a black flag and a message saying I had three laps to do a drive through. I ignored it to see what happened if I didn't serve the penalty and nothing happened, I didn't get transported to the pits after the third lap and the results screen showed me in the position I finished. I would have thought it would either teleport me back to the pits or show me at the bottom of the results screen but it did not so effectively the black flag seems to be as useless as the blue flag.

.
The other bad thing about these penalties is that other drivers take unnatural action to serve the penalty and become a hazard and cause further damage to other peoples race. Drive throughs make the offender serve the penalty without hurting anyone else.

My issue with that is that a minor track cut resulting in a drive through penalty would effectively end that person's race, and often times that person might just choose to leave the race and fewer cars on the grid doesn't really benefit anyone. I'd prefer some kind of system that makes the offender serve a 3-6 second slow down penalty so they are still penalized for their actions but can still have a chance of getting back in the mix. The worse the offense, the longer the penalty, and simply lifting off the throttle on a straight would suffice. Give them two laps to do it so they can choose a safe spot to lift.

Just my opinion, I think almost anything would be better than what we have now. Something that doesn't make them a hazard or completely end their race would be ideal IMO.

 

[P*Funk]

My issue with that is that a minor track cut resulting in a drive through penalty would effectively end that person's race

Well that's what they do in real life to penalise people and if the race is going to be over too soon they just stick on time.

Penalties are supposed to be punishing, that's the point. They should make you think twice about abusing the track limits, however at the same time any system that tries to punish you for every single thing you do is going to screw with people's races, particularly turn 1 or when its close fighting.

The problem with any system that doles out justice in a slow down on the track is that it needs to be calibrated and tuned to perfection or else its just going to be uneven and unfair in many circumstances. iRacing has had theirs for years and its never been able to be made so that it doesn't unfairly punish people. A drive through is a simple clean solution as long as the run up to getting one is based on repeated offenses.

All these people who think one track cut is such a big deal though that its dangerous or really unfair to let anyone get away with any cut even just once or twice at all must never watch an actual real life race where on modern F1 style European tracks with run off for your run off where every car is pushing the limits, abusing the run off and they can't or don't want to punish them. Real racing is a lot more tolerant of cuts and limit excursions than sims with cut track slow down penalties. I frankly think its a bit silly myself that its so punishing in its current form but equally silly how paranoid people are about the advantage someone might get with two corner cuts.

 

[Brandon Wright]

Well that's what they do in real life to penalise people and if the race is going to be over too soon they just stick on time.

Penalties are supposed to be punishing, that's the point. They should make you think twice about abusing the track limits, however at the same time any system that tries to punish you for every single thing you do is going to screw with people's races, particularly turn 1 or when its close fighting.

The problem with any system that doles out justice in a slow down on the track is that it needs to be calibrated and tuned to perfection or else its just going to be uneven and unfair in many circumstances. iRacing has had theirs for years and its never been able to be made so that it doesn't unfairly punish people. A drive through is a simple clean solution as long as the run up to getting one is based on repeated offenses.

All these people who think one track cut is such a big deal though that its dangerous or really unfair to let anyone get away with any cut even just once or twice at all must never watch an actual real life race where on modern F1 style European tracks with run off for your run off where every car is pushing the limits, abusing the run off and they can't or don't want to punish them. Real racing is a lot more tolerant of cuts and limit excursions than sims with cut track slow down penalties. I frankly think its a bit silly myself that its so punishing in its current form but equally silly how paranoid people are about the advantage someone might get with two corner cuts.

That's kinda my point. I watch a lot of different racing series from all parts of the world and it's pretty rare to see anyone get penalized during a race for a minor track cut, or any track cut really. F1 has started doing it recently but even they are only doing it on a few select corners per track and let people run wide on all the other corners. So having your race ended for one small cut that may or may not have been your fault seems a bit severe to me, especially if you didn't gain any real advantage. Maybe they could make a system that monitored your lap time, if it detects you had four wheels off it waits for you to finish the lap and if you gained more than a few tenths it gives you a penalty, otherwise you're allowed to continue racing with no penalty. I don't know, I'm not a coder and I don't work for Kunos so I don't know what's possible.

 

[P*Funk]

Maybe they could make a system that

Never gonna happen, especially not with Kunos attitude I don't think. I don't think they want to be tweaking such a system for the next few years to get it perfect. I do'nt think you can make such a system without it being a long term commitment and Kunos has never really seen AC as being like iRacing, which is to be nurtured and cared for as a permanently updated thing.

The reason the drive through after nominal number of cuts thing works is because its like real life. If you cut too much they might give you a drive through. You can watch your number of cuts til you get a penalty count down and its like being given warnings.

Some say that if you have a fixed number before a penalty then people can just cut and win a race on the last lap. In that case I suggest then that track sucks and someone needs to kick FIA in the arse for making tracks that suck. American tracks don't have this problem because there isn't run off for your run off and you can't keep your foot down on the grass.

Frankly I think the best system for avoiding cuts is to just get rid of all this modern pavement they add to race tracks. This is a sim, nobody ever dies or gets injured, therefore all this safety pavement is pointless. It adds nothing positive and only introduces all the negatives that plague modern racing on these safe tracks. Just put grass on the other side of every white line where there isn't a rumble strip and you have all the cut protection you could ever need.

 

[Brandon Wright]

The reason the drive through after nominal number of cuts thing works is because its like real life. If you cut too much they might give you a drive through. You can watch your number of cuts til you get a penalty count down and its like being given warnings.

But that doesn't address the problem of someone else hitting you and you getting a penalty for going off track even though you didn't do anything wrong. That's what I thought the original point of the OP was, that someone else hit him off the track and he got a race ending penalty which made him decide to quit the race.

Eh, I don't think there's a real good solution and we're powerless to do anything about it so probably no point in discussing it further.

Cheers

 

[Alex Townsend]

But that doesn't address the problem of someone else hitting you and you getting a penalty for going off track even though you didn't do anything wrong. That's what I thought the original point of the OP was, that someone else hit him off the track and he got a race ending penalty which made him decide to quit the race.

Eh, I don't think there's a real good solution and we're powerless to do anything about it so probably no point in discussing it further.

Cheers

But couldn't they implement exactly what you said?
If you get hit by another car which forces you off you don't get the penalty?

 

[P*Funk]

But that doesn't address the problem of someone else hitting you and you getting a penalty for going off track even though you didn't do anything wrong.

And that's why the system should also be able to estimate if you gained time. It doesn't have to be a very good estimate, a very sloppy estimate would do, but it should be easy enough to tell the difference between someone who stayed flat 4 wheels off at Pouhon versus someone who lifted and braked using run off at Turn 1 Monza.

The problem mostly arises with quantifying the value of the cut as a penalty and applying it as a slow down. That's the real issue. To apply this penalty requires a very accurate estimate of time gained. Most of the time its wrong. In real life they don't even try to estimate these things so they just give you a flat penalty after a very generous list of warnings.

And so we get to Reiza's solution to this problem. They recently implemented the cut track protection system in AMS early access (probably more like months ago) and it works on a simple principle that you get cut tracks if you gain time out of the racing surface. If you didn't gain time it doesn't care. It seems to work really well on the basis that the cut detection of what is and isn't the racing surface is pretty aggressive which is actually the inverse of what real racing tolerates because of how hard it is to enforce. You get three cuts then the fourth is a penalty.

The system also doesn't penalise you for losing time on an off track. I just did a test race at Interlagos in the Formula V10 and turn 1 at the start I just went off while driving less than fast to simulate avoiding a turn 1 issue and I got no penalty. If I was flat out cutting other parts of the track or gaining time through a turn 1 cut it gave me warnings and the last cut literally warns me of an impending penalty. The only complain with the system I've seen so far is what is or isn't a cut because the system is set up to be pretty conservative but they relax it at particular corners that are driven in real life with no penalty.

 

[Tobiman]

The problem is that the penalty system is half arsed. There needs to be a system where people also get penalised for hitting others. Maybe add 5 - 10 seconds to their finishing time or cut off power and make their car a ghost so others don't get affected by them. Of course, small hits shouldn't be an issue.

 

[Jim Layee]

P*funk nice idea now code in C, run several GB of data through it, hand it out to you beta testers and pray to hell it doesn't break another part of the AI or collision detection system. It should only take a few days or there abouts and while you're at it add new content and fix the consoles problem. Job done.

I look forward to seeing your results is say 7 days ish ? Because we all know this coding lark is a piece of pish ....

 

[P*Funk]

I look forward to seeing your results is say 7 days ish ? Because we all know this coding lark is a piece of pish ....

I'm sorry, your reply was too salty for my taste. Would you mind trying again, and while you're at it maybe you could try speaking out of a different orifice?

 

[Jempy]

Base game penalties are just done for hotlap .... but are crazy in race !

A right penalty system exists but it's an app ... 1st problem as not everybody has it or not with the same rules.
2d problem is it needs control as nothing is possible for the modder to give a black flag to the driver who doesn't respect the given Drive Through.
Most league drivers know and use PitLane Penalty .... and if Wally Masterson can do it .... Kunos might do it !

A cut warning is not automatically given if your exit speed compared to the entry speed in cut is lower than what's foreseen in the config file for example ....
A second cut is not given if you cut a second time (due to a misdrive and out of track ) within a foreseen time in seconds ...
And so on and so on ....

The only problem is: it's an app ... server or game cannot control it and its configs ( as they may be different according to each server or league ) and nothing possible in game except control and extra penalty by an admin after a race ( or best lap in quallfying with a cut ).

So such a system is obviously possible ..... but it needs more than 2 hands to code it in game.

When I heard at first .... false starts should get a Drive Through, I thought the whole penalty system should be changed of at least different in race than hotlap ... but was really disappointed when I discovered nothing was done.

 

[William Levesque]

Did a random race yesterday and got wide exiting the chicane thing at the end of the lap at Imola avoiding a bunch of crazies... Well, RIP. It's more dangerous than anything IMO. Heck, I was coasting down the hill and when I did my blip on downshift the freaking thing reset, wtf lol.