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I think there are two issues here: 1) it is impossible in just a couple paragraphs to fully examine the effects of the assists and, 2) there are no "absolutes."

Both this thread and the quoted FAQs thread are individual opinions. They can - sorta - both be right, even though they are contradictory :)

- Don Ente

Why has this thread been banished to the abyss of "Racer Lounge"... Boooo!

I was looking all over this site to find this... This is to good to be hidden :(

Great post, thanks!

Is it possible to get this moved back to the main page. Lots of new drivers could really benfit from this being on the main page. Ever since it has moved there has been no conversation on here and very few views. Please oh please put this on the main page it deserves to be read.

This thread was 8 pages of fighting and arguing over assists and who had the biggest controller.

You also can't say have the right car and list what makes it because it's done on a track by track and car by car basis. There are too many variables, it's like trying to tell someone the only way you can add and get to 100 is adding 99 + 1 = 100.

Also, rewind is one of the most valuable tools in this game for learning.

It helped me immensely.... regardless of specifics its still good overall advice and will lead folks to what works best for them in their own framework. it is a pity it got muddied with nonsense. My personal opinion (as a noob here but lots of mod experience elsewhere) would be to clean out the junk posts, leave in the on topic posts where people talk about how it works for them like using rewind or whatnot, lock it then pin it. :)

*edit - its not the size of the controller - its how you use it.... heh heh

Edited by user Friday, March 28, 2014 10:31:21 AM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Cleaning 11 pages of any thread would take hours and it's not getting pinned. Way too much is pinned already and all anyone would do is try to create threads and bug you to pin them. I'm not opening that can of worms.

Understandable - been there, done that! ;)

Can't it be pinned in the racers lounge? I think it's a really good guide

"his thread was 8 pages of fighting and arguing over assists and who had the biggest controller.

You also can't say have the right car and list what makes it because it's done on a track by track and car by car basis. There are too many variables, it's like trying to tell someone the only way you can add and get to 100 is adding 99 + 1 = 100.

Also, rewind is one of the most valuable tools in this game for learning."

Moving the thread for any reason other than matching it with the right topic is wrong. You can't just move a thread because you don't agree with it's contents or because you feel there are 11 pages of "fighting" (which you yourself contributed to...). 95% of people wont go through the pages of arguing, and will just read the OP. I'm not showing any sort of disrespect by saying this but when you say "You cant just tell people to have the right car because its done on a track by track basis", well to that I say... read the post again. I clearly say that each track warrants a different car and build. Anything I say in my post is purely my opinion. My opinion seems to be working as well because I constantly get messages on XBL with people thanking me for improving their skill.

Just because you don't agree with the thread doesn't give reason to purposely move it to a section where it will not be seen. Clearly your intention for moving it was not because of the topic belonging in the Racer's Lounge, but because you didn't want the thread to be seen for reasons that you gave. Its evident because you never gave a proper reason for moving it and instead gave illegitimate reasons. Also, I'm curious as to why the thread was just moved recently, when it spent almost a month in the general discussion. You were well aware of the thread (again, you were posting in it) but didn't move it then, so why now? Nothing changed. This isn't right. I don't want it to be pinned BTW, other people asked but I don't mind because people were keeping it bumped anyways. If its come to moving threads because they possess inaccurate information, maybe your tuning guide should be moved or unstickied, because it contains a ton of obsolete information that no longer applies to Forza 5.

Lastly, this thread doesn't belong in this forum. It belongs in the General Discussion. The contents of the post include cars, driving, tuning and general game tips, not just racing. From what I can see, the racer's lounge is about finding other racers, teams, private lobbies, etc. as outlined by the description of the forum itself. According to that format, this post does not belong here. Just look at the other topics in this thread and its obvious that this thread is nothing like the others in the Racer's lounge. I don't want to cause an argument, I don't wish to make anyone look bad, etc. I have received countless (and I mean COUNTLESS) messages and comments asking why this got moved. Many well known members of the community such as ONR Roadrunner and Raceboy77 have expressed their support for having this thread moved back as well. The thread is extremely helpful, creative, unique and useful. Much more so than much of the negative, nonconstructive junk that gets posted on the general discussion. I seriously put a ton of time and effort constructing this post, because I genuinely do want to help the community the best that I can. I'll admit it is a bit demoralizing having my good intentions and hard work thrown away to a section of the forum where this will never be read. I respect you as a person of the Forza community and as a moderator but this is just wrong.

Please consider moving it back. I, along with many others would really appreciate it.

Edited by user Tuesday, April 22, 2014 1:20:44 AM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Thank you so much for the time you spent on this. I've just returned to Forza after many years, and I was looking for guidance on how to do it right this time. This is exactly what I was looking for.

Cheers!

I'll simply say this - the guide helped me. People can disagree about some of the material in it but, I found it overall to be a valuable tool to improving my ability to race. I had not played a racing game of any kind for about 10 years (the original Project Gotham Racing for Xbox). And, I never learned how to race in a meaningful way. At certain points, I would say "no way I doing I'm my own braking" or "no way I'm driving manual".

Thanks in large part to Jawshe's guide, I'm now a mostly assist-free guy (occasionally use TCS and I use the brake line during MP) who is top 1% more often than not on all of the boards I do, now. I don't say that to brag (believe me, top 1% in these forums is nothing to brag about), I simply say it to show where I have gone in just six months.

There are a lot of great drivers around here. And, the vast majority of them do their best to be helpful. But, not of all of them are able to put the help in noob-speak so that a beginner can understand how to get better. Jawshe's guide is the best tool I've seen at doing that. The point is to give beginner's a starting point to respectability. It isn't to denigrate those who choose to use more assists or rewind.

So, thanks again, Jawshe. Your guide is excellent, regardless of which shelf the bookstore puts it on.

AX

Not to Disrespect you worm but Jawshe is correct! The OP is excellent and the community find this thread VERY useful.
This is slowly turning out to be just like the argument between me and Loco... and BTW worm, Loco replied to me and said that we were talking about the same thing!
As explained already, read the OP and you may find it useful yourself!
Also, I see why you placed the thread in the racers lounge but this is a GENERAL thread to help others, Racer or not!
Yours truly,
RR

Thankyou very much for your support Anubis. Feel free to contact/join me on XBL for in game advice if you want! Glad to hear I ws able to assist you :) and thankyou for clarifying the purpose of this post...something a lot of people are struggling to understand - its for new players, but there are some tips that maybe even the faster guys might try. This is just MY pathway to becoming faster, not THE pathway.

To this day i still wish this thread was in the General discussion area. There are so many positives in what Jawshe wrote to make up for some of the negative talk that this thread produced. It has helped out countless people and as you can tell Jawshe is commited to improving this. He has changed it 3 major times if im not mistaken adding more and more helpful advice for those wanting it. Half of the complaining on this forum can be cleaned up literally by just reading this page. If you follow these guidelines your overall forza experience will improve. If 100% of visitors to this website read this Post by Jawshe i can gaurantee you lobbies and headaches would clean up ever so slightly. It sitting in a thread (where it doesnt belong) that unforturnaltly doesnt get read as much as other areas do is just wrong. I applaud all the moderators for doing a good job and locking posts that need to be locked and always having a helping hand but i have to say moving this here is like hiding the setup guide for your xbox in a seperate box that gets shipped to your house the following day. Thats a pretty bad analogy but thats just what i thought of. Please moderators help all of us out that currently play and future gamers with getting this back to the main page and letting new racers read the great article that jawshe has put together.

Again please reconsider moving this post

ERS JOHNSON

Edited by user Thursday, April 24, 2014 5:32:05 PM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Thankyou so much Johnson for the support and the compliments. I really want to continueto update and improve the guide as I learn new things (learning from the best ATM) but sort of feel like "whats the point" If it never gets read. Who knows

Just keep doing what your doing. There is only so much you can update this since it is such a good read already. Good stuff bro

Bump

Wow, I didn't notice this thread was down here. Just one person's opinion, but there is NO WAY this thread belongs down here. Regardless of what has been said in the thread, the fact that its 11 pages long says a lot about what people think of it. Putting it down here is just ridiculous as it could, and would, help many new players. As someone who has only been playing this game for 5 months, threads like this are incredibly helpful.

Nice thread but there are a lot of flaws in it too for me.

For experienced racers yes this is flawed. This isnt for those that know what they are doing its more of a tool and good starting guideline for new racers. I wish all new commers would read this

I agree, its not for experienced racers at all. Too bad the thread got taken over by a lot of them though.

I agree that its flawed to some extent. I say that as the approach in the original post would not have worked for me at all. I arrived at the same point though, just through a totally different path. I agree with his premise mostly, just not his method. I don't know how flawed it is at all if you take the original post in the context it was intended for. I think most people that find it flawed are not newbs, and they were the targeted audience for his message.

I'd start a new thread with something similar, but it will be brought down here immediately like all of my threads are... Whatever.

Thanks for the great post Jawshe! I am a very new player to Forza (5 months now and I am really enjoying it) and granted I did start and complete most of the career and much of the Rivals with assists. This was exactly the type of post I have been looking for. I really wanted to get a more realistic experience with what the game had to offer, so I am giving the advice an honest attempt taking into some of the additional feedback to improve my driving and consequently, my times (hopefully). Obviously this thread was never meant to teach anyone how to be a top 1% driver nor will it possibly capture every single possible nuance, tip or trick people use to improve. I don't believe that to be the intent. I believe much of the additional "feedback" is preference on additional things to consider. For me, I will give the suggestions some due diligence and once I get to a point to where I am comfortable without assists, I will start getting into the finer details to further enhance my driving if it should come to that. But again I just wanted to stress it's merely a guide. Whether or not some assists do or do not slow you down, I can't say. All I know is everyone in the top 100 don't seem to use them for any given class/track. And thus the motivation for me to learn (and I am really looking forward to it), frustration and all.

So again thanks for the great original post and genuine constructive comments to those who responded. It really is a big help.

Note: For the purpose of this post, I will define 'accelerating' as it is used in layman driver terminology - giving the car gas to make it go faster.

Nice OP, Jawshee. I agree with the sentiment that this forum could used a sticky on driving theory (as well as one on racecraft/etiquette/rules of racing). It sure would have saved me a lot of trial and error. With that said, I think you have missed the most important tip for beginners and novice drivers:

Avoid accelerating from turn in to the apex! I believe that accelerating to the apex is the biggest and most common mistake that drivers outside of the top 1000 make.


-Why is it common? Because it is the easiest way to take a turn. You can come in slow. You don't need to worry too much about turn-in timing or angle since you can easily use the throttle to modulate your speed and turning arc.


- Why is it a big mistake? Because it's slow, duh. Let's compare driver A, who uses the throttle to modulate speed and angle between turn in and the apex... and driver B, who makes one move with the wheel (or stick) to turn in and then coasts to the apex.
1) Driver A has to brake earlier than driver B. This might only affect lap times by a couple or hundredths of a second per turn, which isn't a big deal.
2) Driver A takes Longer to get from turn-in to the apex. Why? Acceleration taxes the car's traction. Between turn in and the apex, you want all of your traction to go towards turning. A vehicle with zero net acceleration (or deceleration) can take an arc at a faster speed . Thus driver B has a greater average speed from turn-in to apex. Again, this time difference is only on the order of hundredths of a second but the speed difference makes a much bigger dent on time, which brings me to the next point:
3) Driver A carries less speed through the apex! How much speed? 1 maybe 2 miles per hour? Not much, you say? Well, an extra 1 mile per hour over a mid length straight will save you tenths of a second!
4) Driver A is often forced into a worse exit angle/earlier apex. When driver A accelerates before the apex, he increases his turning radius which pushes the car's nose outwards, in the direction of the track-out. Meanwhile, driver B's nose points more and more down the next straight as he approaches the apex. This means that driver B can get on the gas earlier.


Which leads me to attempt to succinctly answer a very debatable question:

What makes a driver fast? In my opinion, the biggest determining factor is Corner exit speed! For the purposes of this post, I will define 'corner exit speed' as the speed the driver reaches as he passes the end of the track out. Actually, relative corner exit speed can be judged at any point in the straight past the track out, though it is important to note that speed at apex does not give you an accurate gauge of corner exit speed since angle and position at apex are a also a big factor since they determine how fast the driver can get the power on.

I believe that almost everything that a driver does to get faster actually revolves around improving corner exit speed. Car control, finding the limits of your car, knowing the track, timing (specifically turn-in timing)... All of these are slaves to corner exit speed. Which leads me to emphasize :

Turn-in to apex is by far the biggest determining factor in corner exit speed!
So how should we go about turning in? I have already discounted the 'accelerate to apex' approach, below are the approaches that fast drivers use:

Method 1-Coast- Brake straight (more on this later), release the brakes, coast for a moment (less than a tenth of a second) to ensure the wheels have stopped chattering, turn in with one movement of the wheel, coast to the apex, power out from the apex. The main advantage this method has over option 2 is that your turning radius will naturally decrease (because wind resistance and engine drag are slowing you down). This will give you a better exit angle at the apex (pointed more down the line).


Method 2-Maintain speed- Brake straight, apply enough power to maintain constant speed/counteract wind resistance between turn-in and apex. This works well for cars with corner-entry oversteer since it keeps the car weighted towards the rear, improving grip in the rear.


Method 3-Light trail braking- Brake straight, apply just enough brake pressure from turn-in to apex to keep the front end weighted. This can help counteract understeer.


Method 4-Moderate trail braking- Brake straight, but continue with moderate braking as you turn-in. It allows you to brake later at the expense of corner-exit speed.


So which is best? It depends, though I will say that it seems the top leaderboard drivers use a combination of one and four. Also, it's important to note that these methods are ideals to be strived for on most (the vast majority) of turns. Some sweepers might require you to accelerate/coast/repeat. Also, sometimes (more often for some of us) you will miss time your turn in and you will have to do some accelerating mid-turn to keep a reasonable line... It's just important make the distinction that you've made a mistake so it doesn't become a habit.




On braking late and braking straight

Jawshee has established that you get the most out of your brakes if you brake in a straight line, but I think that it's worth noting that you need to be straight before you brake. If you make adjustments, even minor ones, just before braking then you may enter the braking zone with your car weighted slightly to the left or right. You want to avoid this since it may increase your stopping time. A major goal in braking is to set yourself up for a consistent turn-in point and speed, you can't accomplish this without achieving consistent braking distances.

I mentioned before that braking late saves very little time, maybe 2 hundredths of a second. It is important to note that from a racecraft perspective, 2 hundredths of a second at the end of a long straight can mean the difference between keeping your position and losing it to the guy in your rearview. Why, because at 160 mph for 2 hundredths of a second, your opponent might cover a hundred yards, possibly giving him the chance to legally gain position on your inside before you get to your turn-in point.



A few other tips:
-Start wide whenever possible
-hit every apex point and every trackout. For a standard 90 degree/constant-radius turn, missing the apex by 1 foot will cause a 1 mph decrease in corner exit speed.
-Choose very specific apex spots. Maybe the size of a tennis ball. I think it has to do with how the mind works, but it definitely helps with turn-in timing.


... More to come later, probably.

Edited by user Wednesday, June 25, 2014 3:35:59 AM(UTC)  | Reason: typos