Feedback from a Newbie

This is my first season racing with TORA, and my first online at all. Prior to Forza4, I've never raced against anyone but the computer and never online.

As a newcomer to the fold, my experience has been a little mixed; learning the rules, for example, and having to tune as well as try and improve my racecraft at the same time makes you appreciate how tough it is in the "real" world.
As well as positive feedback, I have received criticism quite ferociously and verbally offensive during a race - when the incident was no fault of my own, it was clear I was a novice (the black cross/yellow background plate on my rear bumper) - which did, for a while, make me consider whether it was worth getting involved in online racing. I did return, as you can see, with no incidents since.

All of this made me wonder though, how could TORA be improved for people like myself - the newcomer to online racing? People who want to race and be part of the community, but who also feel daunted by the prospect.
One suggestion I have - and, of course, I don't know how TORA staff or other members will feel about this - would be to introduce graded racing.

For example, in the TORA GT Chanpionship, how about a GT4-style class? A selection of cars, with each model having a stock tune for all circuits which is available along with the vinyls, which can only be entered by drivers under a certain experience level on Forza4? With some mandatory vinyls on the rear of the car, it would be clear to all faster drivers that the car they were approaching was being driven by someone with less experience, and thus to approach with caution?
A similar approach could be taken in the TORA MSA TCC with perhaps a "Junior" championship banner?

I'd appreciate anyone else's thoughts on this - after all, we've all been on the bottom level at some point, and it may just give newbies like myself something else to work for if there were "novice" championships as well?

I appreciate the feedback, but I would also like to hear more from some of the 'slower' drivers and not just the new guys.

Every time a series gets serious and the big teams and fast drivers come out to play the slower guys always start to leave as they feel they have no chance of winning. Obviously I want people to stick around and to mainly have fun here, but if the uber serious nature of the current GT series is too much to handle then I would love to hear some ideas about how to attract more people and to get people to stay and have fun.

Now, the GT series is our core series and it will always be about finding the best of the best. This won't change and I do not see us splitting the formula down to two or tree classes in that series. The ISCC has many classes which cover all fields of talent. The TCC is again a series which finds the best tuners and racers.

We are open to suggestions on other series about how to make them more fun, but remember the fast guys will always be around and they will always bring out the best in what ever they are driving. No matter what the cars are, if you are not as quick as the fast guys then they will continue to win and TORA doesn't want to start telling people they can't race here 'because they are too fast'

PRO and AM have been discussed at length over the past year, but I have yet to see an foolproof system that doesn't revolve around us making a 'choice' as to who is in what class.

Being a slow driver I dont race in the GTs or ISCC for the reasons of getting my arse handed to me. TCC I still aint on top with that but the field is alot closer and more forgiving to little mistakes but like Richy said we cant say CQR, PLOW, BG and S2M to go away and race elsewhere. I have thought of ways thats maybe of PRO and AM of sunday race night doing a split but a total split of the pros in there own race and the ams in there race, same track maybe a couple of laps less then the PROs and less power but we get the problem of where to draw the line. Like me I have been here since the start so surly I should be a pro but I am nowhere near, this new guy just turned up first couple of races not so good then starts winning the rest of the races.

I totally understand that you don't want to tell people they can't race - in fact, I don't want that at all. It's great that there is such a mixture of experience and speeds amongst the drivers.

I can't help but think that, just like the back markers who are almost afraid to enter a series for fear of being a hindrance or being nowhere near competitive (thus removing all fun), surely the guys who are up-front get frustrated with either racing the same people all the time or by being help up by someone way off the pace.

One suggestion could be splitting a championship after a pre-designated race, with the proviso that drivers have to have completed x% of racing laps or something similar. Clearing points totals to close the field up (and freeing car availability too) would prevent any runaway leaders and also reignite interest in the championship?

As you said Richy, when interest starts to wain its disappointing for all; I've not raced in all of the TCC, but noticed the last round had three lobbies only, and I'm wondering - is that because it's British summer and people have gone on holiday, or because the people placed 10th downwards have nothing worth turning up for other than a bit of banter or proceeding around a circuit half a dozen times?

I agree, we can't say to people 'race somewhere else, you're too good'. I also think we should have a division system where faster and slower guys are given separate championships in GT and TCC to fight over.

For example, lets say there should be 3 separate divisions and we'll call them GT1, GT2 and GT3. All divisions use the same cars, rules and calender. The divisions would be decided by times set in pre-season tests and past achievements with future seasons having a promotion/relegation feature for automatic entries i.e. GT2 champion, 2nd and 3rd placed drivers would have automatic entry into GT1 with bottom 3 GT1 drivers having to prove they should still be in GT1 in pre-season tests. Drivers in 4th, 5th and 6th would be guaranteed another season in their division unless they qualify for a higher division in pre-season testing. Divisions would probably be either 2 or 3 lobbies depending on the amount of entries to keep everyone close. This means drivers of all speeds would be able to have a championship to aim for and not be intimidated by the faster guys. This system would mean the staff wouldn't have to make a choice about anyone as the rules would do that for them.

I also think that there should be a day where there is more casual racing with short sprint races. We could use a rotating list of cars like Seat Supercopa, Radicals, Porsche GT3 cup and V8 Supercars all with stock tuning and upgrades. This could give newer racers a chance to get to know people and to see how things work on race night as well as letting the staff be able to try new ideas for championships without as much risk as a mini-series.

How about we go with the PRO and AM idea. Everyone qualifies, and at a certain cutoff Time or ET, You fall to the AM category. It truly is more fun minus tuning and trying for 7-14 days to be a half second quicker, and running 300 laps preparing for a 20 lap race. ANother way to go about it would be heat races like the American Sprint Cars. They have heat races, A B C,etc. then take the top three finishers from each race to get to race in the "Main Event" for 25 or so laps. Who goes into what heat depends on qualifying lap times. At least with the heats... I may at least have a chance to see or race against Bullet, Mopar001, Rollin, CQR Magictap, Duke of Bruno (who lapped me last night) etc. Don't mean to slight anyone, but those are the people I know.

i am a new driver on tora and in the gt season and i feel like a "gentleman driver" who comes out for a season and pootles round the track while the pros battle it out for the top spot...

as my first proper season online to have entered. i feel i have bitten off alot more than i can chew but it is all experience. i want to be a faster smoother better driver and the only way i can see to do that is to race faster smoother and better drivers.... and by god i found it....

i am spending most nights trying to tune my little lotus for all of its worth and i am still between 7-10 seconds off pace... but it feels good to be trying to make it work.

silentalarm42 wrote:I also think that there should be a day where there is more casual racing with short sprint races. We could use a rotating list of cars like Seat Supercopa, Radicals, Porsche GT3 cup and V8 Supercars all with stock tuning and upgrades. This could give newer racers a chance to get to know people and to see how things work on race night as well as letting the staff be able to try new ideas for championships without as much risk as a mini-series.

i think this is a good idea, being able to get some newer drivers to be more involved. and also be able to see what we are doing that makes us slower ;

All i'm going to say is, if TORA goes ahead with a drivers grading scheme ala Le Mans/Blancpain enduro series with Platinum, Gold, Silver and Bronze drivers is that people abilities change and most of the time improve i started off running 3-4 seconds off the pace of the fastest guys at TORA and can now run most of the time within a second of them. A grading system would not work as peoples abilities do change frequently and certain drivers suit certain cars etc.

Maybe the only way to do this right would be to run feeder series to give the slower drivers more of a chance of winning races but then it'd be difficult to police who enters which class due to different abilities. Best of luck guys trying to come up with a solution

I don't think I ever lapped you Dewey. I did managed to sneak up on you and zip around you at Catalunya though.

Feeder series would be kinda cool. Having to perform well at one level to be given the chance to go to the next level. In theory, after a few series, everyone should be racing against people that are similarly skilled.

I also like the idea of a series with stock builds and tunes.

Gold, Silver or Platinum? For me it all depends on class, car and track, as my results widely, very widely I'll add, vary. Sometimes even lap to lap for that matter.

if you wanna do it by bands i found this at work on a boredom spree

http://www.clubarnage.com/wiki/doku.php?id=ca_guide:driver-categories

you would just need to work out the differant series tora uses and put the drivers into catagories