The online racing simulator
Quote from Becky Rose :Or: what if - this is just a suggestion - but when the new physics come out alleges will be worthless - maybe that's the time to introduce always on sharing? Would the guys who objected last time be won over by having nothing to loose.

Personally, you have it backwards. New physics mean new setups, people who then build those setups want to hold them (at least on the league side). Most will share, the same it has always been, but when something new comes out everyone swarms on it and hides what they have. It's always been that way, on any sim.
Quote from Dennis93 :As I said, it is quite easy to narrow down the search.
Those who have it has breached LFS rules, which to me is the same as cracking or whatever, tak away their accounts, super simple.

It's not like LFS is expensive, you just steal the setups and make another account and you're done.
You must be in the higher end of Mexico then, if you can afford that.
Quote from Dennis93 :You must be in the higher end of Mexico then, if you can afford that.

or he deals drugs
Making setups is part of the game and stealing setups is cheating. It's part of the job of a dev of an online game to fix cheating exploits so saying "someone's figured out the encryption but I am not going to fix it because someone will figure it out again" is a lazy abdication of responsibility. Hacking is not a problem that can be solved, it is a problem that is continuously mitigated against. Hackers are like herpes.

Yes, you can say that you make setups in the knowledge that they may be stolen by hackers but also, you make an online game in the knowledge that you will need to continuously fix security holes or else people will slowly find it unplayable and leave.

As I said, making setups is part of the game and making setups freely downloadable from other players would dumb the game down. Personally when I race in the absolute beginners league, I'll share setups with people who come practice on the servers in the week but I am not that bothered sending to people who turn up an hour before the race, without practice, asking for setups. Setups are subjective to a person but only to a point and time invested should give people an advantage in a game.
Quote from englishlord :It's part of the job of a dev of an online game to fix cheating exploits so saying "someone's figured out the encryption but I am not going to fix it because someone will figure it out again" is a lazy abdication of responsibility.

It's a matter of time. I could spend 100% of my days working on a shape-shifting LFS to try to stay ahead of 100 hackers. And any moment I stopped they would have the answer and spread it to their mates, so they can bask in the glory of their successful decryption and whatever thrill it gives them.

But you see, there would be NO time for development of anything interesting, and my working life would descend into a wallowing pit of misery, my little time on earth would be all about fighting these miserable cheating children who can't figure out a way to use their skills for constructive purposes.

But I am not interested in fighting with 100 children. I'm interested in working on new developments. I spend enough time on the boring stuff that is needed to support the interesting stuff, but there a limit. And that is not lazyness. It's just seeing sense, drawing the line, in the same way that we like a clean floor but we will not spend every hour of every day with a broom or a vacuum cleaner wandering around looking for new bits of dust.
Quote from Scawen :It's a matter of time. I could spend 100% of my days working on a shape-shifting LFS to try to stay ahead of 100 hackers. And any moment I stopped they would have the answer and spread it to their mates, so they can bask in the glory of their successful decryption and whatever thrill it gives them.

But you see, there would be NO time for development of anything interesting, and my working life would descend into a wallowing pit of misery, my little time on earth would be all about fighting these miserable cheating children who can't figure out a way to use their skills for constructive purposes.

But I am not interested in fighting with 100 children. I'm interested in working on new developments. I spend enough time on the boring stuff that is needed to support the interesting stuff, but there a limit. And that is not lazyness. It's just seeing sense, drawing the line, in the same way that we like a clean floor but we will not spend every hour of every day with a broom or a vacuum cleaner wandering around looking for new bits of dust.

All that can be said to such reply is: hooray and amen
As a sidekick / sidequestion Scawen, what is your veiw on the setups in general? Would it be beneficial for the community to have options like fixed setups, or allways-sharing in public/league racing?
I'm not taking sides or saying your opinion actually would do any difference - since you have stated that it's not this reason why you won't fight it.

For me I think fixed setups / allways sharing setups would be a blast. All that was the difference between the drivers where the drivers themself.

Then again someone would get pretty cross on me, claiming me to be a lazy **** who could and do not want to figgure out how to make a propper set, aswell that they would say it's a part of strategy to have secret setups.

So I guess it boils down to this: You people (now asking the other members here) think that secrets should be a key for victories, or should it be equally grounding between the drivers?
Well... the new physics version (that is still in development and will not be ready for the Westhill update) is planned to have a limited setup option.

I can't remember all the details at the moment but the general idea is that you can have realistic settings availability depending on the class. E.g. at minimum, like UF1 / XFG / XRG, you can just set your tyre pressures and for higher road cars you get to set some of the values that normal people could actually change on those cars.

Remember, the new tyre physics and more carefully developed default setups that are actually realistic, mean that the cars are quite nice to drive in default setup mode, so this system becomes feasible.

So, if you are in that "limited setup" mode, you have a limited subset of settings depending on the class. And when not in limited setup mode you can set everything.

Warning : I'm really busy now and I'm not going to answer more questions.
Quote from Scawen :...
Warning : I'm really busy now and I'm not going to answer more questions.

perfect

my 2c anyway : I am not a big fan of limited setup options as this allow to hide flaw in the physics in general (I have some serious doubt on AC on this point, 458 for example), while the total freedom earlier versions were allowing was so much interesting, even if not so realistic (I remember spending laps and laps on the FXO playing with scrub radius, caster, etc ... and this was actually fun and was proposing high technicity in the building of the final setup) ... but it is a game in the end, no ?
Quote from Scawen :Warning : I'm really busy now and I'm not going to answer more questions.

Great. I also just wanted to add an idea I had on the way home while reading the thread updates on my phone.

If you cant force people not to hack the setups, can you make it public when they did? Maybe its impossible to secure them, but what about any kind of identifier defined per setup which is then stored on your servers. If anybody uses this setup, and they have no right to, you issue a warning/message on the host.

I havent thought it through but generally my idea is to think in another direction. Dont secure the setup, secure the usage of a setup.
Quote from Flotch :perfect

my 2c anyway : I am not a big fan of limited setup options as this allow to hide flaw in the physics in general (I have some serious doubt on AC on this point, 458 for example), while the total freedom earlier versions were allowing was so much interesting, even if not so realistic (I remember spending laps and laps on the FXO playing with scrub radius, caster, etc ... and this was actually fun and was proposing high technicity in the building of the final setup) ... but it is a game in the end, no ?

Limited setup options, will be optional, so don't worry.
Quote from Yisc[NL] :Limited setup options, will be optional, so don't worry.

yep, rue

Quote from Scawen :...
Remember, the new tyre physics and more carefully developed default setups that are actually realistic, mean that the cars are quite nice to drive in default setup mode, so this system becomes feasible.
...

if open diff and clutch pack allow to brake without having the rpm to drop dangerously and generating a big oversteer in corner entries, I am sure it will be good
Quote from Warper :Great. I also just wanted to add an idea I had on the way home while reading the thread updates on my phone.

If you cant force people not to hack the setups, can you make it public when they did? Maybe its impossible to secure them, but what about any kind of identifier defined per setup which is then stored on your servers. If anybody uses this setup, and they have no right to, you issue a warning/message on the host.

I havent thought it through but generally my idea is to think in another direction. Dont secure the setup, secure the usage of a setup.

how many setups evolve from one passed to them by fellow racers who over time alter it and then pass it too another friend,how would it work out then.Im sure it would be quite a bit of work to get it fully implemented into lfs(im no programmer so could be wrong)

My opinion. Some of the top racers (past/present) never minded passing a setup to those that i believe showed an honest interest in improving there own laptimes/driving and also showed respect for the work put into them and appreciation
LFS, is still the best racing sim there is imo.. I had plenty of fights with people now kissing devs' asses after they announced updates but completely destroyed lfs with words before.

Anyways.. as LFS is the best >> SIM << I think it should be as realistic as possible. This means people should be building sets themselves as this is part of racing. I spend days and weeks on my server to build the best possible sets myself, 1 because i like doing it and 2. because it makes you a lot faster if you know what you are doing and why.

Especially in endurance races.. a setup can play a hugely important role in strategies, which is what endurance racing makes that much fun. This is why Corse developed their XRR set from scratch themselves when we took part in GTWS. I tried to build in some benefits vs the other competitors. when our set would be the absolute best compared to the others.. I would not like to see my possible advantage over the others, been thrown away for nothing although I was the one putting effort in it.


In order to remain loyal to the name of the game >> simulator << I would say; make it at least as hard as possible to steal setups. Setups are an important role in racing and DO make a lot of difference.
Quote from danielroelofs :Especially in endurance races.. a setup can play a hugely important role in strategies, which is what endurance racing makes that much fun.

Driving style is far more important than a setup.

Quote from Forbin :Among a variety of other factors, that's how CoRe won the GT2 class in the 2008 MoE 24HR @ AS5 ahead of Mercury, arguably the GT2 class favorite for that race. They were faster, but we had a smooth setup and, most importantly, smooth drivers who could eke out those few extra laps from the tyres and maintain good pace.

Another, very fast but less smooth driver on the same team with the same setup popped a tire 4 laps before the smoother drivers would have pit.

4 laps is an eternity at AS5, just under 12 minutes. The only thing that changed was the driver.
Quote from Forbin :Driving style is far more important than a setup.

You could be such a good driver but if you got no clue why others can brake 10 Meters later than you without locking up and killing their tires, you will lose a lot every lap. (and the driver as a complete package is less good because he/she can't translate the car's behavior into setup changes)

Obviously driving style is very important.. after the moment you have got your setup right or at least competitive. I mean I would love to see everyone building a set completely from scratch. If your setup -and so theoretically your car- is nowhere near fast enough.. say bye bye.

For GTws BL1R it took me 12 evolutions of the first fast setup I created for the XRR. To make sure it was at least competitive and also making it suitable for other drivers so they were able to be fast with it as well without having to overpush or kill the tires. But in the end.. it was built from scratch myself, would not have liked it when someone stole it especially not prior to the race.
Quote from Dennis93 :You must be in the higher end of Mexico then, if you can afford that.

It's half the price of any PS3/Xbox game here, so it's "cheap"
Still I think it's not a solution, anyone can sacrifice his account in behalf of a team for example or a large group of people.
Quote from danielroelofs :LFS, is still the best racing sim there is imo.. I had plenty of fights with people now kissing devs' asses after they announced updates but completely destroyed lfs with words before.

Anyways.. as LFS is the best >> SIM << I think it should be as realistic as possible. This means people should be building sets themselves as this is part of racing. I spend days and weeks on my server to build the best possible sets myself, 1 because i like doing it and 2. because it makes you a lot faster if you know what you are doing and why.

Especially in endurance races.. a setup can play a hugely important role in strategies, which is what endurance racing makes that much fun. This is why Corse developed their XRR set from scratch themselves when we took part in GTWS. I tried to build in some benefits vs the other competitors. when our set would be the absolute best compared to the others.. I would not like to see my possible advantage over the others, been thrown away for nothing although I was the one putting effort in it.


In order to remain loyal to the name of the game >> simulator << I would say; make it at least as hard as possible to steal setups. Setups are an important role in racing and DO make a lot of difference.

hi danny . its where to draw the line though. nearly every setup that we may make or currently have will be based on someone elses setup unless we make a copy of the default setup and start from there
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(Drift1r) DELETED by Drift1r
my set is from scratch as far as making the XRT a "drift car" goes.
I just learned from Gran Turismo and Kaido Racer/Battle over the years.
sure making the average drift car is a very simple formula anyone can do, but making a good one is just as delicate as any race set when it comes to contact patches, damping and spring load.
mine started out basic ans rough but having made my own and putting the attention to detail into how a car behaves made me a better driver. but having said that, i don't doubt there are far better drivers than me who can't set up a car, but knowing how to drive a car is one thing and knowing what the car is doing while you're driving it is another.
those who i consider too be the best drivers like the late IMOL and also n0zzz they would be happy to share theyre setups when ive asked and along with that some advice/tips. I understand that in a leauge its all about the competition so that is one side of the coin but its a different story LFS online daily racing. Id guarantee that even the ones that say they made their own setup actually have made it/altered over time a setup which was originally someone elses
setup stealing is not cheat.

me gusta
Quote from NeverEatYellowSnow :IMO the best way to prevent setup stealing from replays is just not to store them in there. As I understand, the setups are needed for interpolating the vehicle's dynamic values between the samples stored in the mpr file. I remember the sample frequency being 10 Hz for multiplayer replays. Increasing this slightly to, e.g. 50 Hz, and use a linear interpolation might help there. Just my 2 cents...

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At least I hope it remains possible to extract data to external applications like it happens now. This perhaps means that data must be stored somewhere and must be read by those external applications. This could be a weak spot perhaps? Would be such a shame if we can't use telemetry programs anymore..
Quote from bishtop :those who i consider too be the best drivers like the late IMOL and also n0zzz they would be happy to share theyre setups when ive asked and along with that some advice/tips.

IMOL never shared a setup with me, at least, not even some 5 lap race setup, and there are a lot of drivers the same as him, not even a set for public racing, I accept that sometimes some setup cannot be shared (Endurance racing, world record) but a freaking decent set to race at cargame?
That's why sometimes I don't see setup stealing as something bad, just give a new guy a base setup he can be competitive with, but no, some ****s can be nice guys.

Or what can be done:
Good drivers, Teams, fast guys etc, can work with Scawen to provide a base setup for each combo, that can be fast and reliable in some situations (Qualy, quick races) like some games come up with.
Quote from chanoman315 :...Or what can be done:
Good drivers, Teams, fast guys etc, can work with Scawen to provide a base setup for each combo, that can be fast and reliable in some situations (Qualy, quick races) like some games come up with.

Good idea. I approve this!

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