Tips from the pros

 

Hey Guys,

If you don't mind I'd like to hog up your computer screens here for a few minutes and talk about a technique I use to deal with the environment we online racers are forced to deal with. It's sort of an online racing strategy issue and I believe you'll find most of the guys that do well over a championship season subscribe to it, I know it has helped me achieve better overall standings from race to race. For lack of any real imagination I call this issue the "internet buffer" and I would best describe that as the zone around a car near you, within roughly 1 car length front to back or side to side where those normally unimportant little internet induced wiggles you may or may not see become potential wrecked race cars.

Why do I call this the "internet buffer"? This is the area where I start to consider the fact that the internet could go from my best friend to my worst nightmare faster than I could say @#%@! Every time I find myself in a situation where I'm compressing my "internet buffer" by being very close to another race car I have to decide, real quick, how safe I feel about what I'm going to do. I know the driver I'm mixing it up with so I've already decided how to handle that part of the challenge but, have I seen my connection fluctuating? Have I seen the other car show any signs of connection issues? How stable has the race looked overall as far as warp? How bad do I need to push my internet luck right now? We're all highly competitive racers and it's definitely exciting to race a fellow competitor door to door at "insert track name here" but it has served me well to tender that urge with a good dose of caution and the caution level should skyrocket right along with the excitement factor when you find yourself inches from you competitors. Even the most insignificant imperfection in the internet will slap you down when you're that close and the longer you stay that close the higher the odds of it happening to you. See the idea now? Of course we are going to get that close in the heat of the battle for position, it's risky but it's racing and we'll always have close racing. If anybody ever tells me I can't race closer than "xxxx" to the next car I'll politely tell them they've lost their mind! We're here to race, and I mean RACE! How much time you spend jammed in next to another car is a major factor here though, odds are the tighter you run someone and even more so, the longer you run that way, the more often you will be involved in warp related incidents that wouldn't have occurred if your "internet buffer" was just a touch bigger. Now, I've run multiple laps with various racers during practice sessions where the racing was scary close every second, real white knuckle stuff, really some of the most intense laps I have every hammered out on this sim and it was INCREDIBLE!!! Would I do that in the race the next day with the same racers just because it worked in practice? Not necessarily, again, case by case basis, got to be just as smart as you are fast to finish up front repeatedly with this level of racing.

But wait....my internet connection is perfect, I never have a problem with it, always perfect numbers. If you still think this is possible please consider this. N4 online play requires that your computer reach way beyond your ISP's span of control. In order for 2 cars to successfully run side by side, inches apart, the information flow to AND from the server AND BOTH clients would have to be seamless, no breaks, perfect data transfer, CONTINUOUSLY. You couldn't pay a knowledgeable Internet Specialist to lie that much about the capabilities of the internet. The internet was never designed to, and in it's current form never will, provide a stable platform for any game that demands uninterrupted, continuous, perfect data transfer such as close quarters racing does. Just because you don't get disconnected doesn't mean you got all the data. Your computer just fills in the blanks with your programs best guess as to where that car was headed until the next piece of real information gets to your system. This happens, in both directions, more than you might think and it doesn't matter how good your ISP is, a good 56k, Cable, DSL, T1, it just won't make any difference when the internet beyond there is choking. This is why I use my "internet buffer" as a part of my racing strategy.

Well your just talking about warp, we all know about that, can't do anything about it. That's right, I am talking about warp and while we can't stop it there are steps we can take to avoid it without hurting performance. That's why I didn't start this story (turning into one isn't it?) as a discussion of warp. I'm offering a suggestion, or if you already do this, a reminder because we've seen a few cases of warp related incidents recently and it seemed like a good time to throw this out here. I know we have a lot to think about when we're in close quarters racing but I am absolutely convinced that using this "internet buffer" strategy has saved me from more wrecked race cars or worse, DNF's, than I care to count, it really works. Call it whatever you like, but try it for a while and see. The first time your outside another racer in a turn and you pad the distance by a car width then watch that car next to you side warp right up next to you and back a few times, you'll be glad you weren't down there trading paint with him, even though it might have been more fun right up until the warp wreck!

So your low in a turn and someone slides in on the highside reeealy tight, no more buffer, then what?. I'm not suggesting this is an answer to all of racing's challenges but if I'm all of a sudden 2 inches from this guy and I have room to even double that I would, when your that close the connection becomes super critical but hey, when there's nowhere to go it just becomes a close racing moment and you DRIVE. Every driver that's using a strategy like this has to measure each racing situation for himself and do what feels right at the time. This is all about minimizing a risk factor associated with online racing, not eliminating risk by minimizing the race factor. Better leave the computer turned off if that's what you want. I'm not even going to mentioned the fact that racing like this has saved me from having non-warp related minor slips (mine or otherwise) turn into multi car incidents, that's my little secret about all this and....ahhh.....welllll....shoot.... I just don't know when to shut up do I.

Think about it.....

I'm no innovator, not the first guy to figure this out by any means, just decided to take the time to put my thoughts on it down in print so I could more easily share them with the whole group at once. If this helps even just one racer figure out how to get through these excellent races just a little cleaner, , , , Don't pass me. ;)

I'll see you gentlemen at the track!

Al Rosemeyer

SORSWest 2001 series driver

SORSEast 2002 series driver