Safety Rating Explained, please...

[Asterix]

So how's the Safety rating worked out?

Last week I was 95 - been that for ages.

Now I'm 81 - I've had tons of clean races, won plenty, had some nice close battles but still hit by the usual dicks. Nothing changed really. I earned the rating through online racing, not farming or with AI.

Safety Rating has fallen through the floor and it's only going one way.

How so?

 

[PGSM]

It's also pretty sad that minolin seems to believe it's the most advanced safety rating system in the whole genre because complex math equations somehow mean better results.
It's pretty obvious how bad the system is by the number of people online, the number of people pulling aside at the start of the race or getting DQ on purpose to start last and the number of people sticking close to slow opponents online to raise their SA.

I completely agree with your sentiment. He only sees things from a mathematical perspective. 'Technically, this should work.' But in the real world, it simply doesn't.

 

[ThugUK]

All I'm saying is make sure your not doing something wrong before you go blaming the system because it's working fine for me.

"i'm alright so there isn't an issue"?

In the same way that VR works fine for me, no freezes, nice and clear and runs great.
So all those who are having problems should look no further than their own set-up rather than blaming Kunos (or Unreal).

Just because some people don't have an issue, it doesn't mean there isn't one.

 

[Turk]

"i'm alright so there isn't an issue"?

No??

I could throw that statement straight back at you. "I can't get a high safety rating so the game must be broken".

What I'm trying to point out is that this SA hunting may be leading people to unsafe driving (trying to tailgate other drivers) which is increasing the risk of having accidents.

 

[PickABetterUsername01]

What I'm trying to point out is that this SA hunting may be leading people to unsafe driving (trying to tailgate other drivers) which is increasing the risk of having accidents.

You are wrong. SA farming is not even the point of this thread.

 

[PGSM]

I think the game needs a monetary system instead. If they had built up the 'Career' this could have worked very nicely.
I.e.;
1. You start the game as a rookie driver.
2. You start with a low team.
3. You can do either SP or MP, but the results here directly affect your MP entry as well.
4. As you do races, you either make money by avoiding damage to your car, or spend money, by damaging your car.
4a. Along with the money aspect, there is a skill rating. If your team likes your performance they keep you and this opens you up to offers with better teams.
4b. As this all progresses, based on poor performance and high costs due to wrecking yourself and others, you can lose standing with teams and be unable to get into higher teams as well as be unable to enter certain races where the required SA (whatever you want to call it) is too high for you. (Make this all class-based???)
Right now, being a Silver driver or Gold driver means nothing! It should be something where that achievement means something in MP etc.

This would make an actual usable career mode as well as make for a better SA system.

 

[Zhabik]

Is it possible to unactivate Safety Rating offline ?
You're just testing in short races new updates with AI and your SA goes down too easily ! .... Normal ??? NO.

If it is possible it should be done automatically or asked by the game when starting a session or simply very well explained rather than to force you to begin searching or trying to find something or finally nothing in a lot of informations... a kind of respect for their "customers" is a minimum.

Sorry but to have to find your way in their official forum .... that's not normal.
Surely acceptable in Early Access, but not afterwards.
Moreover very difficult to find a real answer in there when it's all mixed up with so many ... too many comments and multiplied threads.

Not enough explanations in a game or simulation itself, that's really not fine .... but that's the way they often work.
I love Kunos for their realizations .... but for practical and precise communication ... there's still a lot to do.

The safety rating can be deactivated for offline races/practice in settings.

 

[Dominant1]

Sa improves when you run safely around cars in close proximity for long periods of time. Me, i dont like to run that way, i run to win not to increase my sa ratings. Dont get me wrong, when I’m close to other cars I overtake them when it’s possible to do so without touching them, and if they are close to me and faster then me, I let them by. The amount of time i spend in both scenarios i pick up an sa point or 2. My point being, race clean and courtious and win in the process. My Sa stays mid to upper 70’s . But I have win stats and videos that I'm more then satisfied with.

 

[ThugUK]

No??

I could throw that statement straight back at you. "I can't get a high safety rating so the game must be broken".

What I'm trying to point out is that this SA hunting may be leading people to unsafe driving (trying to tailgate other drivers) which is increasing the risk of having accidents.

Totally agree.
And that may be a failing and another reason why it doesn't work.
If I want to increase my safety rating then hot lapping at the front in p1 or at the rear of the pack (or anywhere else) is pointless (literally).
Ok, you may win the race if in p1, but that wont help your rating what so ever.
Where if you gathered points for driving cleanly lap after lap you would.
Ok, it doesn't have to be as much as if fighting with others for position, but should still be something.
After all, it is built up of safety and trust. Safety can be if lapping cleanly, where trust can be if fighting cleanly.

 

[Turk]

I can see your point but at the same time, but if your hotlapping out the front what are you doing to earn safety points? This isn't an issue I have to contend with because I'm usually not in the front. Should someone be able to hotlap for 3 hours and build up an equivalent safety rating to someone who's been following a car for 10 laps, over took that car, avoided 3 accidents on lap 12 and 13, let 3 faster cars through on lap 20. etc..

I don't think people should be able to build up much safety rating just for being on track, they have track competence for that (which isn't very elaborate granted), I'm sure there's something in the safety rating to deal with leaving the track but there's only so high something like that can go, my guess would be that by the time you've hit 50% you've plateaued that particular variable and all it can do is go down.

 

[PGSM]

If I were a GT3 driver and I drove 15 races this year with minimal contact, everyone would agree I'm a safe driver that stays out of trouble. No one would keep track of how close I was to other drivers and take it corner by corner. They would simply say, 'He stays out of trouble' A lot can be said about my ability in ACC to get around the track cleanly weather I'm running in last, getting lapped, making no contact. That's a clean driver. But for some reason ACC demands that I be in the mix as close as I can to other cars and scrap with them to prove I am safe. Absurd.

Edit: Just did an AI race at 90. I was unable to catch the lead pack, so was in between lead pack and 2nd group. Stayed there the whole race. No contact. No gain in SA. According to the game, I am not safe and earned no increase in safety rating. If I do the same race and lower the AI ability and driver closer to the AI, according to the game, I am safe.

 

[ThugUK]

I can see your point but at the same time, but if your hotlapping out the front what are you doing to earn safety points? This isn't an issue I have to contend with because I'm usually not in the front. Should someone be able to hotlap for 3 hours and build up an equivalent safety rating to someone who's been following a car for 10 laps, over took that car, avoided 3 accidents on lap 12 and 13, let 3 faster cars through on lap 20. etc..

I don't think people should be able to build up much safety rating just for being on track, they have track competence for that (which isn't very elaborate granted), I'm sure there's something in the safety rating to deal with leaving the track but there's only so high something like that can go, my guess would be that by the time you've hit 50% you've plateaued that particular variable and all it can do is go down.

At least if you are hotlapping out in front you have something to race for (the win).
Where if you are hotlapping at the back or anywhere else in the field you don't.
I started a race (had one lap in Qual) in 18th out of 22. I ended 8th of 9.
Why did over half the field drop out? Was it because of wreckers or because there was nothing to race for? I mean, why spend 30mins lapping with nothing to show for it?

I agree, someone hotlapping out in front with no-one challenging them shouldn't get the same as someone fighting it out mid pack. That's why I would suggest a 2 tier safety rating, where you get points just for driving safely (even alone) but also more points for battling and defending.

If I do 30 mins or 15 laps (anywhere in the field) without going off the track, I am still safe and I would like to see some reward for that.

Edit: Just did an AI race at 90. I was unable to catch the lead pack, so was in between lead pack and 2nd group. Stayed there the whole race. No contact. No gain in SA. According to the game, I am not safe and earned no increase in safety rating. If I do the same race and lower the AI ability and driver closer to the AI, according to the game, I am safe.

My point exactly.

 

[miker]

The SA rating is not perfect and could maybe do with some tweaking, but in many ways it is working....I’m a big advocate of the fact it is hard to get and maintain a high rating, and the fact that people are modifying their on-line driving styles and trying hard to avoid contact is a good thing....it’s difficult to generate meaningful consequences for contact in a video game and this SA rating has managed it to some degree. With the recent 1.1 update I’ve noticed an upturn in people online that are farming rather than racing though...to the extend that they will pull over and then follow you so maybe something needs to change to eradicate this sort of approach.

 

[Turk]

At least if you are hotlapping out in front you have something to race for (the win).
Where if you are hotlapping at the back or anywhere else in the field you don't.
I started a race (had one lap in Qual) in 18th out of 22. I ended 8th of 9.
Why did over half the field drop out? Was it because of wreckers or because there was nothing to race for? I mean, why spend 30mins lapping with nothing to show for it?

You could say that to lot of real drivers taking part in real races. You will often have times when your on your own, it can't be door to door action all the time. I think those drivers should be punished for dropping out though, maybe have any ratings removed (bar negative ones) if they don't cross the line to finish the race.

I agree, someone hotlapping out in front with no-one challenging them shouldn't get the same as someone fighting it out mid pack. That's why I would suggest a 2 tier safety rating, where you get points just for driving safely (even alone) but also more points for battling and defending.

If I do 30 mins or 15 laps (anywhere in the field) without going off the track, I am still safe and I would like to see some reward for that.

You probably do get some points for lapping safely but I don't think they can dedicate too many of the points to that, so you're going to quickly hit the limit. IE: If there are say 30 points (made up number) dedicated to lapping safely then once your over 50 points you've probably gained all the points related to lapping safely and you can move onto focusing on a different aspect of your driving. The only way to make those 30 points last is to release them very slowly.

It can't be unlimited or a person could just do a thousand laps on their own and get a high safety rating that's false because they have never actually done a race. There must be some sort of limit there because the rating is about racing with other drivers.

The current safety rating comes at a performance cost. You have to give a bit of performance to ensure you're safer during the race. IE: You come up behind two drivers fighting it out. Rather than join in you hang back and see if they take themselves out.
You see a crash up ahead but are in a battle for position. You lift off to ensure you make it through the incident rather than continue to fight for position. Safely passing someone can mean putting them under pressure rather than being overly aggressive about trying to get past them. People online drive too aggressively, in the real world drivers wouldn't risk a crash for a position, in the the sim world they to do all the time.. Longer races are the best way to race ACC, with 10-20 minute races everyone's putting everything on the line and just as the cars have gotten up to temp the race is over.

Safe drivers know when accidents are coming based on the behaviour of the drivers around them. That's what the rating is trying to do in my mind, get the driver to avoid the accidents in the fist place. Even T1 pile ups can be avoided if that's your main goal going into T1.

 

[Eckhart von Glan]

With the recent 1.1 update I’ve noticed an upturn in people online that are farming rather than racing though...to the extend that they will pull over and then follow you ...

really??? sounds like a sad story, but people will do the dumbest thing to milk a system ...

 

[ThugUK]

You could say that to lot of real drivers taking part in real races. You will often have times when your on your own, it can't be door to door action all the time. I think those drivers should be punished for dropping out though, maybe have any ratings removed (bar negative ones) if they don't cross the line to finish the race.

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But in most real races you get points if you are in the top xx. These point add together until the end of the season. Have enough points and you may get better sponsorship or better equipment or even better class of races.
There is more to race for in RL, than there is in sim racing (especially if hotlapping in a race).
Also a lot of real racers pay for the privilege too, so unlikely to rage quit.

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You probably do get some points for lapping safely but I don't think they can dedicate too many of the points to that, so you're going to quickly hit the limit. IE: If there are say 30 points (made up number) dedicated to lapping safely then once your over 50 points you've probably gained all the points related to lapping safely and you can move onto focusing on a different aspect of your driving. The only way to make those 30 points last is to release them very slowly.

It can't be unlimited or a person could just do a thousand laps on their own and get a high safety rating that's false because they have never actually done a race. There must be some sort of limit there because the rating is about racing with other drivers.

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How about (for the sake of discussion) the points system stood at 100 (like it is now) and for every 1 hour of clean lapping you get 1 point. Hot lapping alone will take 100 hours to get to 100 (obviously), so if you play for 1 hour per day this could take you over 3 months to get to 100, and this is CLEAN hot lapping ONLY. If you have an incident it will take longer.
So this is 100 hours of not going off track and lapping at a decent speed. Not many good players could do that, never mind poor players. If they did do that then that may prove that they can stay on the track. Now of course it doesn't mean that they can race, but the chances are they wouldn't want to destroy their 100 points over stupid mistakes, and are possibly to be more trusted than those who have farmed it other ways.

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The current safety rating comes at a performance cost. You have to give a bit of performance to ensure you're safer during the race. IE: You come up behind two drivers fighting it out. Rather than join in you hang back and see if they take themselves out.
You see a crash up ahead but are in a battle for position. You lift off to ensure you make it through the incident rather than continue to fight for position. Safely passing someone can mean putting them under pressure rather than being overly aggressive about trying to get past them. People online drive too aggressively, in the real world drivers wouldn't risk a crash for a position, in the the sim world they to do all the time.. Longer races are the best way to race ACC, with 10-20 minute races everyone's putting everything on the line and just as the cars have gotten up to temp the race is over.

Safe drivers know when accidents are coming based on the behaviour of the drivers around them. That's what the rating is trying to do in my mind, get the driver to avoid the accidents in the fist place. Even T1 pile ups can be avoided if that's your main goal going into T1.

I would like to think that this would also be respected by those who have gained it through clean hot lapping too.
Clean hot lapping is not easy (especially for poor drivers). Ok, its FAR easier than clean racing, but the points should reflect that.

 

[PickABetterUsername01]

really??? sounds like a sad story, but people will do the dumbest thing to milk a system ...

Bad system induces bad behavior to milk such system. If people feel the need to farm Safety Rating, then maybe it's not a safety rating, but just an annoyance to join "high" SA lobbies, thus not working as it should, since bad driving is everywhere, from high to low SA lobbies.

You cannot blame people wanting to get around a bad system, they are not bots.

 

[Mr.Mints_Taboo]

The current safety rating comes at a performance cost. You have to give a bit of performance to ensure you're safer during the race. IE: You come up behind two drivers fighting it out. Rather than join in you hang back and see if they take themselves out.

Except it is currently "safer" to drive as close as possible to those battling drivers, fingers tightly crossed that nothing goes wrong. The longer you can tailgate those two in front, the "safer" you are considered.

 

[miker]

really??? sounds like a sad story, but people will do the dumbest thing to milk a system ...

I think this is caused by the fact it’s now harder than it used to be to build SA in single player....there was a lot of noise from some people saying SA shouldn’t be accrued in SP so Kunos made it harder to gain....hence why people now farm in MP. It doesn’t bother me much but mildly irritating when you chase someone down....get ready for battle and they just move over and drop in behind you!

 

[Turk]

How about (for the sake of discussion) the points system stood at 100 (like it is now) and for every 1 hour of clean lapping you get 1 point. Hot lapping alone will take 100 hours to get to 100 (obviously), so if you play for 1 hour per day this could take you over 3 months to get to 100, and this is CLEAN hot lapping ONLY. If you have an incident it will take longer.
So this is 100 hours of not going off track and lapping at a decent speed. Not many good players could do that, never mind poor players. If they did do that then that may prove that they can stay on the track. Now of course it doesn't mean that they can race, but the chances are they wouldn't want to destroy their 100 points over stupid mistakes, and are possibly to be more trusted than those who have farmed it other ways.

No, I couldn't agree with that system because it tells you nothing about the drivers ability to drive with other cars on the track. The track competence sort of already does what your talking about although it's much too easy.

Any driver should be able to lap all day every day without leaving the track accidentally. A driver could just take it easy and rack up easy points for effetely doing nothing to improve their ability to race safely. What your talking about is a shortcut to get into server with a high safety rating when you have not earned your right to be there.

The safety rating applies to racing against other people. You shouldn't be able to build it up by lapping. The current system may not be perfect, and may never be perfect, but it's on the right track. I'm still of the opinion that people are way too focused on building up ratings rather than getting better at driving.

 

[ThugUK]

No, I couldn't agree with that system because it tells you nothing about the drivers ability to drive with other cars on the track. The track competence sort of already does what your talking about although it's much too easy.

Any driver should be able to lap all day every day without leaving the track accidentally. A driver could just take it easy and rack up easy points for effetely doing nothing to improve their ability to race safely. What your talking about is a shortcut to get into server with a high safety rating when you have not earned your right to be there.

The safety rating applies to racing against other people. You shouldn't be able to build it up by lapping. The current system may not be perfect, and may never be perfect, but it's on the right track. I'm still of the opinion that people are way too focused on building up ratings rather than getting better at driving.

Actually thinking about it you are correct.
SA should not be gained in any SP mode, from hotlapping or racing.
I still think it should be (partly) gained in MP racing though, if you are forced to hotlap, or as I said, what is the point of it if there is nothing gained? Ok, it should never be the same as battling it out, but it should still go towards SA. That doesn't mean you can coast around taking it easy though.

On the point of coasting, what would happen if you did just coast around and when other players caught you up you battled for a corner or 2 then just let them passed you. Then the same with the next car. You could get lapped several times in one race by the same car, but still be considered safe and worthy of racing in the higher ranks.
Perhaps a loophole and a way to farm.