Before I go to bed, I would raise these suggestions.

1) I almost know what the answer is, but what the heck... Am I right that CTRA tries to host any aspect of racing? Well, drag racing is also racing (Against time more than against other racers). So, should there be another class dedicated to drag racing (Class like "CTRA", "Single-seater" and "Bumper racing")?

2) Other suggestion would concern rallycross (It could be just another server on CTRA-class).

3) And I have noticed that CTRA Race 1 is pretty full all the time, so what if there would be two racing servers for copper class?

4) And yet another question: Y18 allows demo-users to join licensed servers if certain criterias are met. Have CTRA thought to make a server so demo-users can also have races on CTRA server(s)? I know, it could become messy and lots of reports because of not-so-mature racers. Just a thought, nothing more.

5) Sometimes there are bunch of... Well, those who don't belong to CTRA on BnJ-server. I know BnJ isn't in top of SamH's list of to-do, but what if there would be another BnJ server for, say, red roof and above licensed users? That would make the races more clean. The problem would be that there aren't many dedicated BnJ-racers (Others than Jose. ).

6) Not a suggestion, but a simple question. How long does it normally take to process a report? I made a report 27 of april, and it is still "pending".

I'll take the points one by one..

1) I don't really see drag racing as a CTRA pursuit. It's fun to do, once in a while, but it's not really the CTRA thing. The Bump and Jump is very much on the limit of what we'd consider licencing, but drag is a bit further outside the CTRA remit. I don't honestly think it's our thing, I'm afraid.

2) I've been thinking about this for a while now, and the only thing that holds me back from opening a dedicated rallyx server is the limited number of tracks it can run. I know from experience that a server like this would be a one-day wonder. If/when we get more rallyx tracks, it'll become more viable. Not until, I'm afraid. Sorry

3) I don't think it's worth doing at the moment. Yes, Race 1 is popular, but I don't think it spends enough of its time being full. At any one time, ~60% or more of the racers wanting to race in Race 1 are licenced higher than Copper (from casual observation). If we open another entry-level server, the higher servers will suffer. A great many people do like to gravitate to the lower server, because the wins come easier. It's a sad fact of LFSing, and I'm guilty of it too. But hey, at least they're not in cruise servers (j/k)

4) I actually confirmed with Scawen before Y18 was released that demo racers wouldn't be able to race in our servers. I don't have anything against demo racers, but I value every CTRA licence very highly. Every one is bought and paid for, via the LFS shop. It is a fact that people value their CTRA licence because, to some extent, they see a $ value in it, and that value is directly reflected in their behaviour on the track. If we introduce demo racing to the existing CTRA licencing system, I'm afraid that it would/could be to the detriment of all S1/S2 CTRA licences. However, I have said that I don't rule out a CTRA-type of system for demoers in the future. Now that we have demo licencing, it would be a very simple thing to achieve, even with the existing software, just reconfigured accordingly. The two would have to always remain separated, though.

5) We have a bottleneck at the moment. There are 4 active CTRA admins, but unfortunately right now we all have heavy commitments. Normally when one is busy, the others take up the slack. Unfortunately, right now, everyone is busy. We've squeezed out 35-40 reports this week, by prioritizing the worst cases, but the flow in is currently higher than the flow out. We plan to have the backlog cleared before the end of this weekend, though. Apologies for the delays.

I hope that covers all your questions properly!

Quote from Gekkibi :

5) Sometimes there are bunch of... Well, those who don't belong to CTRA on BnJ-server. I know BnJ isn't in top of SamH's list of to-do, but what if there would be another BnJ server for, say, red roof and above licensed users? That would make the races more clean. The problem would be that there aren't many dedicated BnJ-racers (Others than Jose. ).

I would love to see an upper level B&J server.. If it was more active B&J never has more than 4 people when I have time to race

Oops.. I skipped one, didn't I?

Yes, a 2nd-level BnJ is definitely viable. We'll get that up and running. You guys think Red Roof is a good break point?

Quote from SamH :

Oops.. I skipped one, didn't I?

Yes, a 2nd-level BnJ is definitely viable. We'll get that up and running. You guys think Red Roof is a good break point?

Well, blue roof is caller "a class" and yellow "b class". Red is called "star class", so it sounds a logical break point. Blue roof is too easy to obtain.

One thing to help CTRA race situation would be that you can't join CTRA Race 1 if you have, say, silver license or higher. I think it is not fair toward newcomers that 60% (~15 racers) are über 1337, and thus new players (Read: Less talented/experienced racers) don't have a chance to score points.

PS. Sorry if I wrote unclearly. I just woke up, can't see anything because my eyes are fuzzy and I want my morning coffee.

Edit: Another thing popped to my head. What is the reason that white roof licensed racers get 50 points by finishing on the leading lap? It would mean that white roof is "pointless" class, because you can upgrade your license to yellow by racing 6 races.

I'm not sure about second-level Bump and Jump.

I got back into B&J recently, and yes, there are some people I'd rather not have to race alongside - but even so, they don't fill the server, and they don't last too long either. The worse they are, the sooner they kill themselves. I would definitely be concerned about the B&J servers being too sparsely populated, and I haven't seen the one we have full recently either. Obviously, it's entirely up to Sam, but I reckon I'd vote against. I find it more fun dodging slower people than being on my own

Cutting off at Red Roof, by the way, would mean only 38 racers were in the pool for the second server. Going for Blue Roof would give 185 racers, and I reckon the skill difference isn't that great. You need to be half-decent to get to Blue Roof, but you can get to Red by being still only half-decent, and racing more. Driving alongside Gekkibi, I should know!

Quote from Gekkibi :

One thing to help CTRA race situation would be that you can't join CTRA Race 1 if you have, say, silver license or higher. I think it is not fair toward newcomers that 60% (~15 racers) are über 1337, and thus new players (Read: Less talented/experienced racers) don't have a chance to score points.

It seems somewhat unfair that hot-hatch lovers should no longer be allowed to race their cars because they're 'too good'. Higher licences already earn fewer points than Copper/Bronze in Race 1, and there is a simply massive amount of points (over 80 a race isn't at all rare) to be had in Race 3 for Silver drivers and above - so there's no way Silver+ people are joining Race 1 because they want easy points/wins.
It's hard to get the wins because there's so many more people, and it's simply impossible to get the points. So, Silver+ drivers in Race 1 are obviously there purely to get some close racing in, more than anything else. Ban them, and they'll not be happy

(Oh, and I think White Roof exists purely as an introduction stage for B&J, and is meant to flag up eejits who can't get past it )

Sam

I'd prefer Blue Roof

But honestly, Red probably is a good cutoff

Quote by SamH (Sam Hornish ):
I don't think it's worth doing at the moment. Yes, Race 1 is popular, but I don't think it spends enough of its time being full. At any one time, ~60% or more of the racers wanting to race in Race 1 are licenced higher than Copper (from casual observation). If we open another entry-level server, the higher servers will suffer.

I've been thinking of this a while, and my idea was to run two entry-level servers (race 1 and ss1), but the first (Race 1a or SS1a) would be only for entry licensed drivers (and only copper and clubman could enter), and the other one could open for the above licensed racers.

The biggest problem with the race 1 and ss1, is the servers are almost full all the time, but the half of the peolple has got higher license. The higher licensed drivers obviously has got more experience, so at most of the time they (we) are finishing in the point scoring positions. So the "new and nervous" (LFS Song by Mp3Astra) has no chance to score the points. But this ctra thing is all about racing clean and scoring points. (I dont want to post the psychological and economical effects here:nod.

And 1 more thingy:

As i remember FIA is conducting drag races in Europe. It's a European Championship or sg like that. I dont like drag races, but I dont think its a very bad idea.

I have tried to join Race 1 multiple times. But haven't joined the race because there are too many silver (Or above) racers. I check the licenses from CTRA page before joining.

I can do 1:00 times on XFG @ SO1, so I have no chance to win if there are more than 8 silver+ licensed racers.

Quote from Gekkibi :

I can do 1:00 times on XFG @ SO1, so I have no chance to win if there are more than 8 silver+ licensed racers.

Why?

If you do consistent 1:00 times and a silver+ racer occasionally does 58:00 but hits a wall in every second lap you have a good chance of finishing in front of him.

And not every silver+ racer is actually fast (look at me, I even have Platinum ), and I'm sure there are a lot of Copper/Bronze racers who are fast.

Quote from zeugnimod :

Why?

If you do consistent 1:00 times and a silver+ racer occasionally does 58:00 but hits a wall in every second lap you have a good chance of finishing in front of him.

And not every silver+ racer is actually fast (look at me, I even have Platinum ), and I'm sure there are a lot of Copper/Bronze racers who are fast.

Thanks for persuading me. Maybe I should test it...

Quote from zeugnimod :

And not every silver+ racer is actually fast (look at me, I even have Platinum )

I bet that's the sentence that persuaded you the most. :smash3d:

Yes, but he doesn't know how you earned your platinum licence...

*goes to /pics/zeugnimod/... *

I have to go. :hide:

dawedus12, you are right. zeugmond (and me aswell) reached the platinum license in the early months of ctra (it's name was stcc at those times), when fewer racers joined the server, than nowdays. We had some good races with the tbo class 1-1,5 years ago, but since than many other people has bought the S2 LFS, so it's much harder to gain points.

These times i prefer single seater racing on ctra. To let new people gain their points, we (high licensed drivers) are almost all the time racing on SS3 (sometimes SS2) server. We are gaining points rapidly, as FO8 got 4 times more points for the same yellow flag/best time/finish circumstance than the FBM on SS1.

That's why i suggested two race 1 and ss1 servers.

Quote from SamH :

..I don't have anything against demo racers, but I value every CTRA licence very highly. Every one is bought and paid for, via the LFS shop...

Erm.. sorry for my nubist post but, what? What is bought and paid for via the LFS shop? or have I missed something? or was it a joke?

Quote from mkinnov8 :

Erm.. sorry for my nubist post but, what? What is bought and paid for via the LFS shop? or have I missed something? or was it a joke?

He meant that every licensed user have "supported the cauce" by buying a license.

Quote from mkinnov8 :

Erm.. sorry for my nubist post but, what? What is bought and paid for via the LFS shop? or have I missed something? or was it a joke?

Does not seem like a joke to me...
CTRA is free as stated xxx times by Sam, but you have to buy the S2 license to get it. This way it is a part of what you get when you buy S2 (call it bonus or whatever). Is it too late or too early?

Regarding race 1:
I love race 2 but the population is variable as well as the skill range. This means you can spend a race all by yourself there, and I am not fond of this. Therefore I go to race 1 sometimes for a door to door race in a (half) full grid, not for points or wins but to enjoy good fights.
And I usually do not win...
I really appreciated working towards my silver license on a race 1 server populated by silver and more racers, and feeling that all points gained there were deserved. When you get a racing standard decent enough to compete with silver and above then you start getting points, that is how it should be don't you think?

Getting silver should not be an easy task, or there would be no point in CTRA

Okay, I thought to join CTRA Race 1 and give a shot.

Ended pretty well. Finished 2nd. Really: I am shocked! I hardly play FE1, and used setup I have never used before (Quickly downloaded it from team inferno)...

MOAR!

I drag race from time to time in RL and I would love to see it in the CTRA. Right now however there just isn't enough variables to make drag racing as challenging as it can be in real life.

You don't have to stage, you don't have water pits to go into/avoid. The track surfaces don't change, VHT isn't added changing traction for every launch, and parts need to fail to name a few. As I crossed the line at over 100mph the guy next to me dropped a prop shaft IIRC, try dodging one of those, still have chips from the little metal bits in my hood/bonnet...

Once these things are added to make drag racing more challenging I think we will consider it, but not until then. Right now it's too mash and go with no challenge, you don't have to slide the clutch in really and weather conditions don't change to alter your performance.

Quote :

Edit: Another thing popped to my head. What is the reason that white roof licensed racers get 50 points by finishing on the leading lap? It would mean that white roof is "pointless" class, because you can upgrade your license to yellow by racing 6 races.

I havnt read the whole thread but I wanted to answer this question, sorry if it has been answered already.

Originally the system knocked off 50 points if you didnt finish on the lead lap - it was a "rookie" system designed to hold players on white roof until they got the concept. Unfortunately it was so unpopular that it had to be taken off in order to ensure the survival of the type of racing.

Quote from Mille Sabords :

Does not seem like a joke to me...
CTRA is free as stated xxx times by Sam, but you have to buy the S2 license to get it. This way it is a part of what you get when you buy S2 (call it bonus or whatever). Is it too late or too early?

Hmm makes it sound like part of the content you get when you buy lfs.. which its not, its a 3rd party addon.

Sorry to take it literally, However, it did send more traffic to the lfs shop

EDIT: I love BNJ Racing, particularly late on a drunken night, its a lot of fun. Just never seem to get the time anymore.

The CTRA is only available after you've bought LFS (as was the point in the original post). Of course you can't buy CTRA licences from LFS shop, but you can't obtain a CTRA licence until you HAVE bought an LFS licence. That was (and is) my point.. demo racers don't have a vested interest in racing. There is no "risk" for them.

Quote from SamH :

...There is no "risk" for them.

True. The amount of reports would be astronomical...

And little bit off-topic: I hate the excuse "I bought LFS license, I can do whatever I want in here". Heard it couple of times on CTRA servers.

Ya, thats right: Buying a license gives you rights to ruin others racing experience... Oh, wait.

hehe.. I've never heard that in a CTRA server, but I've heard it on the forums before! In neither case are they correct