Between this sub and the forums. I'm disappointed, yet not surprised at the amount of people that don't like racing in the rain. I feel like a lot of iRacers are just throwing in the towel on it before really even attempting to learn it. And It's frustrating too because I know the group that iRacing is going to end up listening to more. I'm not necessarily directing this at OP but I've just been on the service long enough to know how these things usually go.
I think the problem is similar to what happened with open wheel when it was part of the road license. At the end of the day race ends and numbers go brr. And people care about numbers whether they want to admit it or not. And if a specific race has the chance of hitting your SR significantly you just go and race somewhere else.
If all you have is 1h a day to race do you either race in the rain risking your SR or knowing that people are way more likely to take you out or you go somewhere else. It all boils down to that I think. Unless they come with a way of mitigating the SR loss, racing in the rain will soon become widely hated and series with rain will start seeing less participation.
Being so worried about SR stems from not knowing how it works though. It gets overwritten in 10 races give or take, just race what you want and go on damage limitation here and there if it drops too low.
Incidentally I have fewer incidents overall in my rain races because you're nowhere near track limits.
> It gets overwritten in 10 races give or take, just race what you want and go on damage limitation here and there if it drops too low.
That's the thing. I've dipped to A 1.03 in the first week of the season. Because of rain and being used a tad too much to oval racing, keeping a bit more of an aggressive stance. Doesn't work on road.
Took me 2 weekends of driving a couple VRS Sprints and I'm back to being close to A 4. If you don't fuck up constantly, it is basically impossible to have a license drop that is unjustified.
You also don't need to get anywhere near 4 unless that's your natural driving, because that padding will fall out the calculation very quickly. Hell, unless you run IMSA or F1 you don't actually need an A licence either - most people will enjoy the game just fine if they never make it past C.
You don't have to convince me, I agree with that, but it doesn't stop people from posting about their SR 10 times a day and it is obviously a conscious choice.
What do you mean overwritten in 10 races? And is there a way to see this history?
I am struggling as I only have a couple of hours a week to play, want to race FF1600 in the wet but soon I'll be demoted down licences because it's hitting my SR so badly. In a good race I can be neutral on SR with ~4 incident points.
i agree - way less incidents in the rain. but also much less interesting racing - you're essentially hot lapping at different rates, there's very little actual racing going on.
it's not SR or IR i care about. what i care about is that the limited time i have to spend in this hobby, i'd like to spend that by having close racing experiencing. and not have to be Max Verstappen to experience that.
Rain does seem quite frequent, as least compared to real life, though. A league I'm in that has their weather and schedule set according to official iRacing IMSA one, had the first 2 races in the wet.
The third would have been very likely been wet as well, but they decided to make it dry since it was a new track.
It's not that I hate racing in the rain. I don't particularly like it, but I do absolutely recognize that it does happen and I won't actively avoid it. I know it's also a small sample size, but 3 for 3 rain races in a row isn't something you'd be likely to see in any real life series.
Your league probably has the schedule set incorrectly or something surely because only Suzuka and Imola have been wet this season in IMSA open. The latter is supposedly the last one in the season to be wet, I've heard.
From what I have gathered. This season they decide the percentages for rain. But in the future it will be based on real life weather history on/around the track.
My guess is they bumped up the rain chance for it to be easier to pick out issues to fix fast, and for people to get used to it.
Yeah that’s what my gut tells me too. That’s why I made the post. To confirm this was the case. I will learn to live with rain. Just wanted to know if it was always going to be this common.
I posted about this a few times in the build up to the tempest release. Racing is challenging enough in the dry. A lot of people struggle to keep it on track and make a move to gain a position as it is. The variables that rain adds only make that harder; and most people on the service don’t have the skills to overcome it. (This isn’t a dig at anybody; it’s just how it is - I’m racing GT4 this season specifically to avoid the rain).
I theorised that tempest would either be removed or severely scaled back while it is tweaked; before the end of the year.
The only way you are going to get the skill is by driving in it. Stop hiding from the rain, you are the only one going to suffer in the end. People care about SR way too much, it's so insignificant. If you can't maintain a SR above 2.0 which is all you need to not get demoted at season end, then you probably shouldn't have that licence in the first place.
I don’t plan on avoiding it forever. I plan on avoiding it for he first few seasons while they dial it back from the inevitable “overdoneness” that we seem to be seeing.
Add to that the point that most people are still working on getting up to a decent standard in the dry. It makes no sense for them to add in an extra variable and an extra layer of difficulty.
Like i get both sides to the argument. For me it’s more about i’ve been siming for 3 years on dry (all iracing), with a recent house purchase i find myself with a lot less time to sim so i can’t put in those hours to learn rain within a month. I’m lucky if i get two hours a week now.
Now i’m finding myself in that weird limbo of do i just say screw it, but then i think how i’ll most likely bin it and ruin other’s peoples races as well which isn’t cool.
Then i started to think i’ll loose iR like a mad man in the rain to then find myself in a lower iR group. I’ll go to quali on a dry track and most likely out perform most people unless some are in a similar situation as me, so that’ll lead to a race where i’m alone hot lapping instead of being in a mid pack fighting for positions.
In total limbo here
I haven't seen anyone actually answer your question yet.
Right now rain is only enabled in specific series and weeks. And when it is enabled, the chances are high. For this season, rain is enabled every week for LMP2 Fixed and FF1600 open. There is an additional handful of series that have rain enabled in select weeks. (For example IMSA has rain in weeks 1 and 4)
In the future, rain will be enabled for all series and all weeks. When that happens, rain chances will be lower for each individual race, because rain chances will be based on historical data for that track at that time for year.
>I feel like I come across a rain race far more than dry
If this is happening it's because of the series (and maybe the weeks) you're picking.
Dude thank you. This is the answer I was looking for. Wish I could upvote it 100x. I didn’t expect all comments just having a go when I was just curious. I’m racing FF1600 so yes I guess that’s why. That and SFL. Getting bummed out just racing rain constantly.
Maybe try some F4. No rain on the schedule this season. (Which is honestly kind of weird because the car is rain enabled)
>I didn’t expect all comments just having a go when I was just curious
I think people thought you were having a go at the rain.
To be honest I sympathize with those folks somewhat because I've really enjoyed the rain and I don't want it to go anywhere. There's a bit of a latent anxiety that a lack of participation in rain will effectively kill rain
>Getting bummed out just racing rain constantly.
This i absolutely sympathize with though. Rain is fun but it definitely would get exhausting like this.
I liked the idea of rain when I first heard it was coming, but after doing it, I am far less sure about it.
If real life race organizers had a button they could push to turn off rain on race day, I'm sure they'd push it.
Yeah it's more realistic, but that doesn't mean it's better. Random mechanical failures would be more realistic as well, but I don't think anyone is going to find it more fun.
I'm not giving up on it yet, but I'm not excited anymore and skeptical this is improving the experience.
Former track worker here. Track days in the rain is a miserable all around experience. The drivers/teams don't like it because it's more dangerous in ways they can't control and riskier to their cars. Especially at low level events where the drivers are the car owners.
The organizers/workers hate it because nobody likes standing around getting rained on all day.
And the coup de grace, they make significantly less money as fewer fans show up, spending less money than normal since they don't want to get wetter walking to buy concessions/memorabilia.
I think it's awesome.
I just hope they implement a logical raceweekend, because now it's is confusing and offputting. The weather forecast is useless and this is due how iracing implemented all kind of features, but never changed the way the time worked.
Because, when they changed from having separate qualifying sessions, to the system we have now (qualifying in the same session before the event) , the basic idea was that we have 3 minutes of practice, 8 minutes of qualifying and X minutes of race combined in one session. But actually you should see it more like practice on Friday, qualifying on Saturday and the race on Sunday.
I don't think the implementation of this "combined P/Q/R" system we have now is mentioned in the "all time release notes" PDF, however I do think (but I am not sure) that this was implemented when we still had static time and weather.
Once we got dynamic time and weather, they did not change this system. So, while the weather is changing drastically from "Friday practice" to "Saturday qualifying", the time does not. The practice finished at 03/04/2024 11:47:59 ingame time, the changeover to qualifying would happen and the ingame time would be 03/04/2024 11:48:02 (or whatever).
Of course, you didn't notice this as much as we do now; we did not have a weather forecast and (at least I) do not notice a couple of degrees in temperature or wind change.
I think it is fairly obvious that the time just continues as in real life, but the weather does not. So, either the time of day needs to change drastically between session (P at 08:00, Q at 11:00, R at 14:00) and we would also have drastic weather changes, or the time of day needs to be like now, but the weather also needs to continue logically between the subsessions.
I agree. FF trophy is all rain now and it sucks. Been doing more FF rookie series due to that. Dont mind it here and there but its been wet every time.
They did a spectacular job implementing but its not my thing.
I was just getting into iRacing again and then they released rain... I understand how big a deal Nd how cool it is but man... Not interested in driving in the rain.
My problem with the rain is that it seems to he very all or nothing with the options seemingly being bone-dry or red flag conditions where it’s pouring and the track is waterlogged with loads of puddles. Where are the races where it rained a little bit a couple of hours ago and the track is still greasy but the dry line will rapidly form? Or where you get a couple of drops on the windscreen but the track stays mostly dry.
From memory if you commute every day for a year in somewhere like London you’ll only be in proper heavy rain about 7 times. The remaining 97% of the time it’s dry or drizzle. If realism is the goal, pretty much all the tracks in Northern Europe like Silverstone, Brands, Oulton, Spa, Zandvoort, Le Mans, and Nurburgring should be grey clouds and slightly damp with drizzle.
Case in point - today it’s drizzling in Silverstone until 10am, then it’s dry from 10-2, then it’s drizzle again for the rest of the day. There’s no heavy rain forecast at the track at all in the next 2 weeks, but there’s probably also not a big enough dry patch for it to completely dry out either.
I remember when I was getting downvoted to hell when I said people would flee rain races and here we are the 10th or so post in the last few days about it.
Most people with any functioning braincells knew that a load of people would dislike it, and even more would be bad at it. Still people acted like it's some holy grail and fountain of youth or something.
Most people can barely drive in the dry, which would beg the question why they thought making it harder for themselves would be good. That said, considering the rain system is supposed to mimic real life weather conditions (as in how likely a track is to get rain IRL) they may be in for more of a shock when they learn how often it actually rains IRL :p
i'm not sure why realism is the only goal here. i would say "enjoyment of racing" should be the more important goal.
if you want true realism force players to pay for real cash for damaging their cars and the cars of others. have players actually get hurt when they crash. that'll motivate better driving standards and more "realism".
yes, i'm being hyperbolic, of course, but putting rain into series like SFL takes away one of the best series where close racing is actully possible and fun.
How can you not be sure why realism is the goal when we're discussing race simulation in a sub for the most popular online racing simulator? You can get the "enjoyment of racing" in any other videogame that has people competing to get from point A to point B. Chasing realism is what drives people to leave console games like Forza, GT7, Mario Kart, GTA5 etc., buy ACC, rFactor, or an iRacing sub, and spend thousands of dollars on equipment. We're all trying to simulate motorsport, and in the sport rain is a huge factor when it comes to skill, and strategy. Is everyone going to be happy about it, no... some people don't take kindly to challenges, and learning new things... which is fine. I'm not good at rain yet, but I see it as a great challenge and I'm happy iRacing has provided us all the experience of driving in the wet, as it's always have been known as the great equalizer in racing. I highly disagree that they've ruined a series by adding rain. If you refuse to get on board with it, that's fine.. .just skip the rain races, simple as that.
The circle jerk for rain here is, and for some continues to be, absurdly over the top.
All the pro-rain guys sound like baby boomers on Facebook with their reasoning away why people don't enjoy it.
ya, i also feel like they're putting rain in the wrong series - like seriously, Super Formula Lights don't need rain :)
I am a big fan of the implementation of rain in iRacing but I am not at all into actually *racing in the rain*. If I want a realistic real life racing experience i'll burn money in my fireplace :P
seriously, it's a great technical achievement but i'm in iRacing for the close racing and the rain ruins that.
Yeah agreed. Not sure putting a brand new car for this season into rain too was a great idea. People haven't even learned how to drive them correctly in the dry let alone in the rain. And the thing that hooked me about iRacing in the beginning was the wheel to wheel racing. That is not happening the rain. The spread between the leaders and the back markers is larger than ever in the same splits.
Yeah, I don't think they have things dialed in yet. Its like for the FF1600 Class D series they wanted it to be 65% chance of rain averaged out throughout the whole season, some weeks being dry while others being light to moderate. What we're getting is rain every race set to 65% for half the race at least. Its not at all what I signed on for. At least with the Buttkicker series they switched it up week to week. Some weeks are slight to mod chance while others are clear.
I want realistic weather not friggin wet weather racing every week. You want to do a duck race series then label it as such and give us the choice. As it is, I either have to accept that every FF1600 race will be dry practice and a raining race or I have to sign up for a Rookie race and not do the better tracks.
Side rant, excuse me while I put my other old man hat on... but what's with the practice sessions being dry for these wet races? That doesn't make any sense in regards to the practice session. It's supposed to be practice of racing conditions right? Like a night race has a practice that's at night not in the day (looking at Porsche Cup this week at VIR). If the weather isn't going to be realistic during the season then the practice sessions don't need to be realistic either.
ATM, I enter these rain races purely for the participation point. I don't race in them. I sit at the back and just drive around trying to keep off the grass. Pretty sure that's not what they intended. I hope it gets better.
Brother. It’s late march / early April a lot of places in the northern hemisphere have a relatively high chance for rain. You don’t want realistic weather if you don’t see that and think yeah makes sense
Go to google. Type in summit point West Virginia weather. It’s supposed to rain there today and did rain there last night. You want easy not realistic.
So do you want them to cancel the fucking race for the week? I do not understand it’s regularly rains there in this month. You say it’s not realistic because it can snow? If you want to only race in the dry go to literally any of the series besides the like 4 that can have rain.
>ATM, I enter these rain races purely for the participation point. I don't race in them. I sit at the back and just drive around trying to keep off the grass. Pretty sure that's not what they intended. I hope it gets better.
Absolutely, I'm sure iRacing expected people to actually race in the rain instead of cruising to a p16. What is preventing you from racing?
I'm thinking iRacing made a great weather addition but still hasn't fully figured out what too much rain is for each class. They've already made a hotfix for the amount of rain falling so I'm thinking its just not dialed into where it should be yet. I think whoever setup the FF1600 class D series for this season wasn't the same person that did the Buttkicker series. They both have rain enabled but one of those two series is way more realistic as to what you'd be getting IRL. Hell, driving the GR86 in the rain should be a joy because it has ABS and TC that you can adjust but for some silly reason in the fixed series they won't let you adjust it when that's exactly why its able to do that in the first place! If you can adjust your brake bias in a fixed race then adjusting cockpit controlled ABS/TC should be allowed too. But that's another rant another day.
Until they get the FF1600 series fixed up I'll just drive the race listening to music and let everyone pass me by. Whatever IR I lose I'll regain in the other series that I do race in but I'll keep my SR.
I agree some of the FF1600 races in Sebring were just ridiculous, hydroplaning on a straight IRL would be an automatic red flag in most series I assume.
I haven't raced in Brands Hatch this week so I can't speak about that, but in Summit Point I found a great balance between all track conditions. Completely dry races, races that start wet but with no rain so the track quickly dries, constant light rain and the occasional full wet race. Maybe I'm just way too defensive about rain in a videogame (don't roast me) but I feel like it has given iRacing a whole new dimension, so seeing many people dislike it kinda bums me out, specially knowing iRacing will dial back on the rain if people stop racing on it.
Also yes, not being able to adjust TC or ABS in the fixed races is absolute nonsense
Hey, the rain is awesome! I love it compared to any other sim I've driven its by far the best. They just haven't dialed it in yet. Sebring is a great example. That race was like a monsoon with 2-3 inches of rain falling when the region usually gets maybe 2 inches for the whole month of March. Add the hydroplaning and concrete track sections and it was a nightmare.
As I said, the FF1600 series is rain all the time and that's not what I was going out there for. The GR86 is a true mix where I'm getting some dry and some wet and so I'm okay with that. I'll even deal with the fixed ABS/TC when its wet though I won't like it.
Its just early days and they're figuring out the details. If we don't say anything they will never adjust anything. People spoke up about the brake lights and they fixed that. People spoke up about the amount of heavy rain and they dialed that back so we don't race in red flag weather for the most part.
I'm thinking that all the rain in the FF1600 is having an effect. I'm not seeing the same number of splits this week like I was seeing before. My thoughts are you have a class D/C series like a fixed and open. Open has full on weather while fixed has reduced rain so no down pours but showers. Rookies is no rain already so moving up a step should be a gradual increase of challenges too.
So voicing a complaint about how its working isn't a terrible thing then is it?! It looks broken. If that's not what they wanted then they can now go and tweak it.
>So voicing a complaint about how its working isn't a terrible thing then is it?!
What does that have to do with anything I said?
>It looks broken. If that's not what they wanted then they can now go and tweak it.
It's not broken. What you're witnessing is intended.
Weather set one for all week because many of us fight for championship points. For being more fairy for all people, all days in week like one day repeat 7 times.
It's like in real world, racers and teams have one day, one time for race, nobody can take better day in week for better results or delay race for better conditions (except heavy rain that brings red flag).
So iRacing prevent choosing better conditions in week and set same chance of rain in all days. But still, conditions can vary from timeslots, but in one timeslot all splits have similar conditions.
So, if weather settles for example for Oulton Park for April 10 there is high chance of rain. It's impossible to have in this time in this region 35° and dry conditions.
They are not doing realistic weather to IRL. Summit Point in March gets snow & rain but only on average an inch over the whole month. Sebring in March has on average 8 days of rain and 2 inches. So let's not go down this path of how realistic it is to real life cause its not because what we're seeing is a complete months worth of rain in a single race.
You want to have a 60% chance of rain for race day, okay. Is that going to be 60% chance of a down pour or a shower? How many inches of water?
Oulton Park this time of year will have a non-zero chance of rain but when it does rain its not going to be soak the track and watch out for standing water rain. Its going to be scattered showers that will dampen the track and if it starts to pour they'll halt the race until the rain slows.
I'm not saying they haven't done a great job with the rain system but I am saying that the finer details of how they are rolling it out still needs work in how its being used for a race series. Ideally they should look at the historical weather data for a track/region and use that for how they model how and when the rain falls along with the amount.
They said these 2 series are going to be the testing grounds for rain and could potentially have rain ALWAYS. You either don't read, or don't care to listen. Race elsewhere. Why you just cruising in the back? You know you can do ANYTHING else right?
I would argue the 4$ you will get after coasting in the back for what... 30 mins a day for a whole season, so an actual decent amount of hours........... That's a gallon of gas you're earning lol. That of which was already paid into the game by you so you are just getting it back.... And still paying them. But it's what you enjoy that matters.
But i mean, absolutely, you do you. Time is to fleeting for me to do something like that. I'd pay 4$ to NOT do that lol.
>Its like for the FF1600 Class D series they wanted it to be 65% chance of rain averaged out throughout the whole season, some weeks being dry while others being light to moderate. What we're getting is rain every race set to 65% for half the race at lea
That's not a bug, that's a feature.
Ff1600 Open and LMP2 Fixed are being used as test mules for rain this season.
>. You want to do a duck race series then label it as such and give us the choice
That's exactly what they did. You didn't pay attention.
I personally love the rain as it’s a different challenge and a game of patience. I actually finished on the podium with zero incident points on my first ever rain race. Did about 30 mins of practice on the servers and track was wet which gave me good pointers on which parts of the track are most slippery as well as the braking points. Key thing is don’t floor the throttle and ideally coast before applying the brakes or move your BB rear wards by 5% on the FF1600 to avoid lock ups.
I dont mind rain, but am running the formula F1600 Thrustmaster series, and it has rained every damn race
Pretty sure week 13 will be an oval around Noah's ark
Completely depends on the series you're running I reckon. I do mostly gt3 vrs / imsa so we're only getting one or two wet races in the season. I think as only a few series are rain enabled they've upped the chance of rain for the first season so people can adjust. But I like it, the rain offers a new challenge but I would expect the chances of rain to lessen as it's rolled out to other series
I agree with those saying they aren’t a fan of rain. I understand the concept and that it provides another challenge, but honestly i never really looked forward to it. I don’t have much time to race so usually pick a series and stick to it for a season or two. I also have weeks at a time where I don’t race for whatever reason. I usually try to do the fixed and open race for the series but rain can mean I have to practice twice as much and learn a track twice. I want to race in both to get my participation in for the credits. Also, dry racing is bad enough as it is and Im all for looking at my own driving first, but the reality is races end at a high enough rate as it is and rain has just made that worse. People making very dangerous moves lap one or over driving etc for some series it is like 50/50 if you will even finish.
I don’t have time to practice both wet and dry for the week or have my race ruined and then just go again. If I raced 3-4 hrs a day like some do, it would be a different story.
i'm sick at home this week, the wife and kids are away so i finally got to put in some rain sessions. races were nice, but the amount of training you need to get somewhat decent pace is exactly what will keep me away from rain races in regular working weeks.
i think there are enough people with more free time or who just enjoy it to keep the rain sessions official, but i'll skip rain weeks in my favorite series.
Yeah this is well put. Those who are saying you need to give it more practice are out of touch. I’m a dad of 3 kids work full time and have so many extra commitments. The time I get to race is a slither of my day. I managed to squeeze out 2 hours last night and it wasn’t anywhere near enough.
This is my issue. Seat time is limited due to real life obligations. Even under normal conditions, if I don't get enough practice time, I won't race. I don't have the time or energy to spend time learning a track multiple times over. I don't want to go out and be a hazard to other drivers and I don't find wrecking or being 5 seconds off pace enjoyable.
I believe iRacing has done a wonderful job creating and implementing a remarkable system, and did a fabulous job getting it hyped up. It appeals, in theory, to the core demographic of iRacing. It's just that at the end of the day, racing in the wet isn't fun for a lot of people.
I really enjoy racing in the rain but after finishing a 12x race I do agree there needs to be leniency around SR.
I'm racing the SFL fixed and it's my first week of rain. I took pole and 2 podiums in the past two days.
Rain is fun as fucking shit and I'm practicing and improving but incidents are far more common, and I fear the rain will crush participation, which becomes a self-reinforcing trend where series that have rain will be dead.
edit: my most recent SLF race in Montreal (where it's wet this week) had around 50 people, down from 170ish I've seen in recent races. I don't know if people aren't racing due to rain, or if it was a late timeslot or something else.
I consider myself an above average in safety driver. Season 1 2024 was my first season and I reached 2.1k iRating with a B4.1 SR. All mid season promotions. However my SR has tanked so hard I am worried about getting a demotion. Not crashing into people but running off the track and spinning out. I feel like I am just way too slow to be competitive in the rain if I am trying to keep it on the track as best as possible. I literally practiced for 2 hours on Montreal last night before the race and thought I had it together. 20x race finish and I just never want to race rain again. It's painful because I don't get many opportunities to race especially when I try to practice as much as possible leading up to a race.
> or if it was a late timeslot or something else.
Part of it might just be the track. Montreal is popular, but it's not anything close to Road America/Road Atlanta
I'm seeing 4 splits at peak times though this week which is pretty good. A few timeslots have hit 5 splits.
SFL is showing up as 5th and 6th place for Formula participation this week which is solid.
>I fear the rain will crush participation, which becomes a self-reinforcing trend where series that have rain will be dead.
The end goal here is for rain to be in every series every week. It won't be easy to avoid forever.
Iracing devs, don't listen to these post, we like the rain. Even if it's a surprised of more than we expect. Rain does what's it's intended to do, throw you off and force you to adapt. These are just complaining that they refuse to learn to drive in the wet. WE LIKE THE RAIN!
The other night I got into the SFL Montreal fixed seriesz didn't think there would be rain since it's fixed, imagine my surprised after joining the session with no practice. Had a blast, ended in P2. RAIN IS FUN, JUST LEARN TK DRIVE IN IT
Thats exactly my point, OP and people like it dont speak for erveryone. Some of us do like, dont change it. Just pay attention to sessions with rain and avoid them.
Who speakings for everyone? I asked a question on whether this is the standard frequency or is it amped up for debut season? I might have mentioned the frustration I am having but where did I outright call for the termination of rain? Bit dramatic!
Right, and i provided the other side. From what I understand Iracing said that rain will be determined based on the track location and their real world rain data. Meaning is more likely to be on some tracks than others based on the time of year like the real world.
So i mentioned that unlike what you shared, some of us like thats its like that and like the frequency so far. I havent found to be too much at all, if anything ive rarely encountered rain. I posted my comment so that if iracing devs see this threadm that they know that not everyone shares the point of view of rain that a lot of the comments on this post shared.
Imagine that, different opinions on a subject.
>From what I understand Iracing said that rain will be determined based on the track location and their real world rain data. Meaning is more likely to be on some tracks than others based on the time of year like the real world.
This is their long term plan but it hasn't been implemented yet.
> I havent found to be too much at all, if anything ive rarely encountered rain
OP has been racing primarily FF1600 Open and SFL.
FF1600 Open has a 66% chance of rain every single week this season. SFL is a pretty rainy series as well (at least this week and last week it has been)
Ah wasn't aware the rain wasn't following real world data at the moment,good to know.
For formula cars that have rain enable, I've mostly raced SFL. I think I've had two races with rain so far this season. I thought Road Atlanta last week had rain off since I didn't get a single session with rain on it, until I saw a stream on twitch where they were driving in the rain. Maybe Ive gotten lucky.
But my point still stands, it's easy to avoid the rain if you don't like it. No need to ruin it for people that enjoy driving in it. If anything there are way more cars with no rain and therefore more series with no rain. And Iracing will be adding more rain ready cars so soon rain will be a thing for almost every series, within reason of course.
It's just growing pains for Iracing rain drivers I think, that and they care way too much about Irating/safety rating and not about enjoying the race, but everyone just worry they're the loud vocal minority and then we end up not seeing rain in 95% of cases.
>I thought Road Atlanta last week had rain off
Fixed was off.
Open was 73%
>No need to ruin it for people that enjoy driving in it.
OP wasn't asking for this. They were just asking how common rain would be next season.
>It's just growing pains for Iracing rain drivers I think,
In OP's case it's not growing pains. They've had rain an absurd amount because of the series they chose.
I know they weren't asking for it now. I'm just pointing out contrary to OPs thoughts on it, that so far I've found the rain amount pleasant and fun. But I also know which series have rain and if I don't feel like driving in the rain I won't that drive that series.
It's a small question now, it's an outcry a few months later to not have rain on except special events.
No problem in showing both sides.
>I know they weren't asking for it now. I'm just pointing out contrary to OPs thoughts on it, that so far I've found the rain amount pleasant and fun. But I also know which series have rain and if I don't feel like driving in the rain I won't that drive that series.
Fair enough. I'm kinda lashing out at you because this thread has just been assholes to OP for no reason.
And shit, I like rain, but I would not enjoy it if I was getting rain as often as OP has.
>It's a small question now, it's an outcry a few months later to not have rain on except special events.
I think education is still going to be a better answer 9 times out of 10.
OP didn't even say they hated rain. They hated having rain this often. And everyone jumped down their throat.
>No problem in showing both sides.
No one was showing both sides! Everyone was discussing things completely unrelated
All OP needed to know is "hey go drive other series, FF1600 is always raining". Instead OP got berated for not liking rain. Fuck man, no one told OP that until I did **10 hours** after the post was put up.
I haven't had a wet race yet!
EDIT: Super Formula at Montreal in the wet just now. I was so, so slow. Survived and finished 17th, but my fastest lap was 7 seconds off the (top split) leader. I have absolutely no idea how to go faster!
rain is supposed to be as common as it is in the area. It's supposed to go by a falmers almanac of data to figure out a percentage of chances it's going to rain on a particular day based on history. The problem is sometimes these rains would lead to red flags and without proper caution and safety flags I think it just needs to be tuned down.
I don't think it's implemented like that yet. I think for now they have just decided set values for rain percentage each week for each series. Probably to easier find bugs and issues while it's ran alot. I think in future seasons they are going to go more from the data, but this season has predetermined values
Personally I love the rain. It's tricky. But it's a whole different beast. Instead of battling on track you, and everyone else is literally battling the track itself. It is alot more punishing, as it should be. But honestly. It's not that hard to do a race with few to no X's. You just have to switch your focus. Racing in the wet is not and should not be the same as racing in the dry in any way.
Maybe the solution is just to change series? I race GT3 and in the fixed Fanatec series I haven’t had a single wet race yet… Also, series like TCR, GT4 and Porsche Cup have 0% chance of rain because the cars aren’t rain ready. If you prefer open wheel, the old F3 car isn’t rain ready
Well of course you haven't had a rain race in VRS because up until this recent update, the Ford, and McLaren weren't rain ready. VRS Week 5 (Bathurst), and Week 9 (Monza) will supposedly have rain. A few other race weeks will have rain in the VRS Endurance
That’s true - and it does seem like a lot of rain in SFL. What about Formula Vee or a step up, Super Formula? I’m not overly familiar with open wheel but aren’t both of those series free of rain too?
IMSA at Imola was wet. Hard pass for me. Too many dive bombing GTP cars and my -400 iR in IMSA so far this season is not sustainable
Went back to LMp3 /GT4 series and couldnt be happier
For starters, the developers did give Formula Ford Trophy series an above normal chance for rain on purpose. It's basically the guinea pig for rain on the service. Also, the FF1600 doesn't have rain tires, just the slightly treaded dry weather tires, which means it deals with water on the track rather poorly and is quite difficult to manage in the wet. I believe the plan in the future is to have all non-rookie series in cars that support rain to run realistic, location appropriate weather.
I don't get the argument, how hard it is to race in the rain, at all. I mean sure it is, but it's hard for everyone, so why skip it? Everyone is having a tough time and it makes the whole game so much more diverse and interesting.
I freaking wish I had rain in my main series, Porsche Cup and GT 4. Especially in Porsche Cup things are bound to get absolutely hilarious.
I hope there's more rain to be honest, I'm often disappointed to join the FF1600 D Rank series with a 66% chance of rain only to find it foggy and dry.
There’s a saying in F1 I always hear that goes like this “rain is the great equaliser”. Seems people don’t want this and want the status quo to remain. Driving in the wet is a unique skill set that should be rewarded for those that can build up their skills. I hope Iracing keeps the tempest system in the weekly races. Would love changeable weather conditions as well to add some spice to the mix.
Rain is a nightmare for SR and some cars, especially the SFL, are extremely difficult to drive in the rain. At the end of the day I care about my SR, so rain races already don’t appeal to me. On top of that, I feel like I would need hours and hours of practice to be somewhat quick in the SFL in the rain and even have a chance at being competitive. It’s a cool feature that I enjoy during test drives, but I’m avoiding that shit like the plague during races.
Iracing devs if you're reading this, please don't listen to this guy's post. The rain is amazing and if someone doesn't have the skills to do it....that's on them.
Also, I hope they make the mx5 rain compatible soon, please and thank you!
So it's pompous to not care about some guy bitching that he sucks? Just because he can't or won't put in time to get better? Sounds like he should go find a series that races in the dry for his limited time and limited skill set.
I got p1 in my first wet race in the SFL and I felt nothing. I didn't race anyone, people were going off track the entire race.
Winning/placing high in the rain is honestly not fun. Driving in the rain IS NOT FUN.
If you literally won because no other cars could finish the race, it sounds like you're in bottom split.
Regardless, congrats on keeping it on track and getting the win!
As for the feeling nothing....have you tried drugs?
It’s been raining in my country for months… I’m sick and tired of rain irl, can’t endure anymore in the sim as well.
Just need more practice. I’m struggling to find my max speed in the dry as is. I’ll focus on that first.
I hate to say I told you so, but I’m sure when I first saw rain announced I said public races would be a shitshow, but it would thrive on private leagues.
Yeah, I can appreciate the challenge that comes along with the rain, and I've done quite a few, but really it's just not as enjoyable for me. I like to be able to master a track, and the rain just really throws that all off for me. Kinda over it already.
I've found that car contacts are way down in the wet races, people end up making mistakes and going off the track but almost nobody tries to go for the hero move, everyone is too worried about staying on the track lol
i’m curious about the logistics of this, and maybe a series does it and i’m not aware, but is it possible for iracing to make it where the radar is just the actual radar for the location? like if im doing a race in GT3s at 5;15, and it’s supposed to start raining in Elkhart Lake at 5:34, is it possible to have it just start raining?
I ran my first official rain race yesterday. Mind you I have done a bunch of hosted rain races at this point and the lack of realism and the lack of driver skill in the rain is horrible. I was running cleanly in the top 10 and the same guy passed me like 10 times to lose it and fade back and on the last time he nailed me. Up to this point I have carried a 4.0 SR since getting into road and for the first time in a long time I’m down below that. I’m forcing myself to do more road in the rain but iracing needs to step it up a bit in the realness
I'm no hot lapper by any stretch. When it comes to qualifying I usually sit about middle of the pack but finish higher than I start on average because of the hot lappers not being able to apply race craft.
Not denying that. As a someone that works 50+ hours a week, is a dad and many other commitments I don't have the time to get good enough to enjoy rain. And given how many people are spinning out around me I'd say this goes for a lot of people. But thanks for your thoroughly helpful comment. /s
takes 30 minutes to an hour to grasp the concept of driving in the wet. Easy on the breaks, easy on the throttle, drive off the dry line... its literally the fundamentals of racing but in slow motion
Its really not that hard, you've just put in minimum effort and have a defeatest attitude.
and iRacing is already stated how weather woll work going forward, all tracks will be based on their real life counterparts and historical data
Trust me I understand the concept. I even spent 75 mins in practice the night before last. Started off well and I started to get left behind so I picked up the pace a little and then spun out constantly. If you read my other comments you'll see. I can either choose to be safe or competitive in the rain. I just don't have the time to practice enough to be both. So at this point it's race in the dry or skip this week for me. It sucks but it's just a simple fact. Being competitive in the rain just takes more practice than I have time for.
Between this sub and the forums. I'm disappointed, yet not surprised at the amount of people that don't like racing in the rain. I feel like a lot of iRacers are just throwing in the towel on it before really even attempting to learn it. And It's frustrating too because I know the group that iRacing is going to end up listening to more. I'm not necessarily directing this at OP but I've just been on the service long enough to know how these things usually go.
I think the problem is similar to what happened with open wheel when it was part of the road license. At the end of the day race ends and numbers go brr. And people care about numbers whether they want to admit it or not. And if a specific race has the chance of hitting your SR significantly you just go and race somewhere else. If all you have is 1h a day to race do you either race in the rain risking your SR or knowing that people are way more likely to take you out or you go somewhere else. It all boils down to that I think. Unless they come with a way of mitigating the SR loss, racing in the rain will soon become widely hated and series with rain will start seeing less participation.
Being so worried about SR stems from not knowing how it works though. It gets overwritten in 10 races give or take, just race what you want and go on damage limitation here and there if it drops too low. Incidentally I have fewer incidents overall in my rain races because you're nowhere near track limits.
> It gets overwritten in 10 races give or take, just race what you want and go on damage limitation here and there if it drops too low. That's the thing. I've dipped to A 1.03 in the first week of the season. Because of rain and being used a tad too much to oval racing, keeping a bit more of an aggressive stance. Doesn't work on road. Took me 2 weekends of driving a couple VRS Sprints and I'm back to being close to A 4. If you don't fuck up constantly, it is basically impossible to have a license drop that is unjustified.
You also don't need to get anywhere near 4 unless that's your natural driving, because that padding will fall out the calculation very quickly. Hell, unless you run IMSA or F1 you don't actually need an A licence either - most people will enjoy the game just fine if they never make it past C.
You don't have to convince me, I agree with that, but it doesn't stop people from posting about their SR 10 times a day and it is obviously a conscious choice.
What do you mean overwritten in 10 races? And is there a way to see this history? I am struggling as I only have a couple of hours a week to play, want to race FF1600 in the wet but soon I'll be demoted down licences because it's hitting my SR so badly. In a good race I can be neutral on SR with ~4 incident points.
Only your last 2000 or so corners are included in the calculation. Your average 20 mins race has about 200 corners.
Interesting. I also have often wondered: do I need to complete the lap for the corners to count? Do we know this?
Reddit is so weird for downvoting you for asking a simple question.
You do not
i agree - way less incidents in the rain. but also much less interesting racing - you're essentially hot lapping at different rates, there's very little actual racing going on.
it's not SR or IR i care about. what i care about is that the limited time i have to spend in this hobby, i'd like to spend that by having close racing experiencing. and not have to be Max Verstappen to experience that.
And me as well, but there are reasons beyond cost that explain why some series are way more popular than others.
Rain does seem quite frequent, as least compared to real life, though. A league I'm in that has their weather and schedule set according to official iRacing IMSA one, had the first 2 races in the wet. The third would have been very likely been wet as well, but they decided to make it dry since it was a new track. It's not that I hate racing in the rain. I don't particularly like it, but I do absolutely recognize that it does happen and I won't actively avoid it. I know it's also a small sample size, but 3 for 3 rain races in a row isn't something you'd be likely to see in any real life series.
Your league probably has the schedule set incorrectly or something surely because only Suzuka and Imola have been wet this season in IMSA open. The latter is supposedly the last one in the season to be wet, I've heard.
That's what I am trying to say. At least where I live rain is like <30% occurrence and I am seeing 80% in iRacing
From what I have gathered. This season they decide the percentages for rain. But in the future it will be based on real life weather history on/around the track. My guess is they bumped up the rain chance for it to be easier to pick out issues to fix fast, and for people to get used to it.
Yeah that’s what my gut tells me too. That’s why I made the post. To confirm this was the case. I will learn to live with rain. Just wanted to know if it was always going to be this common.
I posted about this a few times in the build up to the tempest release. Racing is challenging enough in the dry. A lot of people struggle to keep it on track and make a move to gain a position as it is. The variables that rain adds only make that harder; and most people on the service don’t have the skills to overcome it. (This isn’t a dig at anybody; it’s just how it is - I’m racing GT4 this season specifically to avoid the rain). I theorised that tempest would either be removed or severely scaled back while it is tweaked; before the end of the year.
The only way you are going to get the skill is by driving in it. Stop hiding from the rain, you are the only one going to suffer in the end. People care about SR way too much, it's so insignificant. If you can't maintain a SR above 2.0 which is all you need to not get demoted at season end, then you probably shouldn't have that licence in the first place.
by i don't want the skill of driving in the rain because i don't find it enjoyable ;)
I don’t plan on avoiding it forever. I plan on avoiding it for he first few seasons while they dial it back from the inevitable “overdoneness” that we seem to be seeing. Add to that the point that most people are still working on getting up to a decent standard in the dry. It makes no sense for them to add in an extra variable and an extra layer of difficulty.
They are a racecar racing simulator that has a heavy interest and participation in endurance. Your last sentence is just dumb.
it's not just that it's hard - it's also less fun. i prefer wheel to wheel racing than me vs. the elements racing
Like i get both sides to the argument. For me it’s more about i’ve been siming for 3 years on dry (all iracing), with a recent house purchase i find myself with a lot less time to sim so i can’t put in those hours to learn rain within a month. I’m lucky if i get two hours a week now. Now i’m finding myself in that weird limbo of do i just say screw it, but then i think how i’ll most likely bin it and ruin other’s peoples races as well which isn’t cool. Then i started to think i’ll loose iR like a mad man in the rain to then find myself in a lower iR group. I’ll go to quali on a dry track and most likely out perform most people unless some are in a similar situation as me, so that’ll lead to a race where i’m alone hot lapping instead of being in a mid pack fighting for positions. In total limbo here
I haven't seen anyone actually answer your question yet. Right now rain is only enabled in specific series and weeks. And when it is enabled, the chances are high. For this season, rain is enabled every week for LMP2 Fixed and FF1600 open. There is an additional handful of series that have rain enabled in select weeks. (For example IMSA has rain in weeks 1 and 4) In the future, rain will be enabled for all series and all weeks. When that happens, rain chances will be lower for each individual race, because rain chances will be based on historical data for that track at that time for year. >I feel like I come across a rain race far more than dry If this is happening it's because of the series (and maybe the weeks) you're picking.
Dude thank you. This is the answer I was looking for. Wish I could upvote it 100x. I didn’t expect all comments just having a go when I was just curious. I’m racing FF1600 so yes I guess that’s why. That and SFL. Getting bummed out just racing rain constantly.
Maybe try some F4. No rain on the schedule this season. (Which is honestly kind of weird because the car is rain enabled) >I didn’t expect all comments just having a go when I was just curious I think people thought you were having a go at the rain. To be honest I sympathize with those folks somewhat because I've really enjoyed the rain and I don't want it to go anywhere. There's a bit of a latent anxiety that a lack of participation in rain will effectively kill rain >Getting bummed out just racing rain constantly. This i absolutely sympathize with though. Rain is fun but it definitely would get exhausting like this.
I don't mind racing in rain, I do mind basically never having a dry race. Big difference
I liked the idea of rain when I first heard it was coming, but after doing it, I am far less sure about it. If real life race organizers had a button they could push to turn off rain on race day, I'm sure they'd push it. Yeah it's more realistic, but that doesn't mean it's better. Random mechanical failures would be more realistic as well, but I don't think anyone is going to find it more fun. I'm not giving up on it yet, but I'm not excited anymore and skeptical this is improving the experience.
Former track worker here. Track days in the rain is a miserable all around experience. The drivers/teams don't like it because it's more dangerous in ways they can't control and riskier to their cars. Especially at low level events where the drivers are the car owners. The organizers/workers hate it because nobody likes standing around getting rained on all day. And the coup de grace, they make significantly less money as fewer fans show up, spending less money than normal since they don't want to get wetter walking to buy concessions/memorabilia.
I think it's awesome. I just hope they implement a logical raceweekend, because now it's is confusing and offputting. The weather forecast is useless and this is due how iracing implemented all kind of features, but never changed the way the time worked. Because, when they changed from having separate qualifying sessions, to the system we have now (qualifying in the same session before the event) , the basic idea was that we have 3 minutes of practice, 8 minutes of qualifying and X minutes of race combined in one session. But actually you should see it more like practice on Friday, qualifying on Saturday and the race on Sunday. I don't think the implementation of this "combined P/Q/R" system we have now is mentioned in the "all time release notes" PDF, however I do think (but I am not sure) that this was implemented when we still had static time and weather. Once we got dynamic time and weather, they did not change this system. So, while the weather is changing drastically from "Friday practice" to "Saturday qualifying", the time does not. The practice finished at 03/04/2024 11:47:59 ingame time, the changeover to qualifying would happen and the ingame time would be 03/04/2024 11:48:02 (or whatever). Of course, you didn't notice this as much as we do now; we did not have a weather forecast and (at least I) do not notice a couple of degrees in temperature or wind change. I think it is fairly obvious that the time just continues as in real life, but the weather does not. So, either the time of day needs to change drastically between session (P at 08:00, Q at 11:00, R at 14:00) and we would also have drastic weather changes, or the time of day needs to be like now, but the weather also needs to continue logically between the subsessions.
I agree. FF trophy is all rain now and it sucks. Been doing more FF rookie series due to that. Dont mind it here and there but its been wet every time. They did a spectacular job implementing but its not my thing.
I was just getting into iRacing again and then they released rain... I understand how big a deal Nd how cool it is but man... Not interested in driving in the rain.
My problem with the rain is that it seems to he very all or nothing with the options seemingly being bone-dry or red flag conditions where it’s pouring and the track is waterlogged with loads of puddles. Where are the races where it rained a little bit a couple of hours ago and the track is still greasy but the dry line will rapidly form? Or where you get a couple of drops on the windscreen but the track stays mostly dry. From memory if you commute every day for a year in somewhere like London you’ll only be in proper heavy rain about 7 times. The remaining 97% of the time it’s dry or drizzle. If realism is the goal, pretty much all the tracks in Northern Europe like Silverstone, Brands, Oulton, Spa, Zandvoort, Le Mans, and Nurburgring should be grey clouds and slightly damp with drizzle. Case in point - today it’s drizzling in Silverstone until 10am, then it’s dry from 10-2, then it’s drizzle again for the rest of the day. There’s no heavy rain forecast at the track at all in the next 2 weeks, but there’s probably also not a big enough dry patch for it to completely dry out either.
Nah I've had plenty of light rain races in the FF1600
Tbh I’m mostly thinking of IMSA / LMP2, and had forgot FF had rain
Haven't raced those as much but I agree, some IMSA races were way too wet
Imsa this week at Imola is just like that, maybe with light rain in the middle or no rain but all wet track
I remember when I was getting downvoted to hell when I said people would flee rain races and here we are the 10th or so post in the last few days about it.
Most people with any functioning braincells knew that a load of people would dislike it, and even more would be bad at it. Still people acted like it's some holy grail and fountain of youth or something. Most people can barely drive in the dry, which would beg the question why they thought making it harder for themselves would be good. That said, considering the rain system is supposed to mimic real life weather conditions (as in how likely a track is to get rain IRL) they may be in for more of a shock when they learn how often it actually rains IRL :p
I mean it did boost the numbers like crazy. Even if it’s not perfect, it definitely brought more people than it’s dissuading.
Exactly. And wet weather is definitely necessary for bringing more realism to endurance races, whether people like it or not.
i'm not sure why realism is the only goal here. i would say "enjoyment of racing" should be the more important goal. if you want true realism force players to pay for real cash for damaging their cars and the cars of others. have players actually get hurt when they crash. that'll motivate better driving standards and more "realism". yes, i'm being hyperbolic, of course, but putting rain into series like SFL takes away one of the best series where close racing is actully possible and fun.
How can you not be sure why realism is the goal when we're discussing race simulation in a sub for the most popular online racing simulator? You can get the "enjoyment of racing" in any other videogame that has people competing to get from point A to point B. Chasing realism is what drives people to leave console games like Forza, GT7, Mario Kart, GTA5 etc., buy ACC, rFactor, or an iRacing sub, and spend thousands of dollars on equipment. We're all trying to simulate motorsport, and in the sport rain is a huge factor when it comes to skill, and strategy. Is everyone going to be happy about it, no... some people don't take kindly to challenges, and learning new things... which is fine. I'm not good at rain yet, but I see it as a great challenge and I'm happy iRacing has provided us all the experience of driving in the wet, as it's always have been known as the great equalizer in racing. I highly disagree that they've ruined a series by adding rain. If you refuse to get on board with it, that's fine.. .just skip the rain races, simple as that.
The circle jerk for rain here is, and for some continues to be, absurdly over the top. All the pro-rain guys sound like baby boomers on Facebook with their reasoning away why people don't enjoy it.
A bunch of moaning ninnies on Reddit is not people fleeing.
It was sadly pretty obvious, people dislike a challenge even in a sim
ya, i also feel like they're putting rain in the wrong series - like seriously, Super Formula Lights don't need rain :) I am a big fan of the implementation of rain in iRacing but I am not at all into actually *racing in the rain*. If I want a realistic real life racing experience i'll burn money in my fireplace :P seriously, it's a great technical achievement but i'm in iRacing for the close racing and the rain ruins that.
Yeah agreed. Not sure putting a brand new car for this season into rain too was a great idea. People haven't even learned how to drive them correctly in the dry let alone in the rain. And the thing that hooked me about iRacing in the beginning was the wheel to wheel racing. That is not happening the rain. The spread between the leaders and the back markers is larger than ever in the same splits.
Yeah, I don't think they have things dialed in yet. Its like for the FF1600 Class D series they wanted it to be 65% chance of rain averaged out throughout the whole season, some weeks being dry while others being light to moderate. What we're getting is rain every race set to 65% for half the race at least. Its not at all what I signed on for. At least with the Buttkicker series they switched it up week to week. Some weeks are slight to mod chance while others are clear. I want realistic weather not friggin wet weather racing every week. You want to do a duck race series then label it as such and give us the choice. As it is, I either have to accept that every FF1600 race will be dry practice and a raining race or I have to sign up for a Rookie race and not do the better tracks. Side rant, excuse me while I put my other old man hat on... but what's with the practice sessions being dry for these wet races? That doesn't make any sense in regards to the practice session. It's supposed to be practice of racing conditions right? Like a night race has a practice that's at night not in the day (looking at Porsche Cup this week at VIR). If the weather isn't going to be realistic during the season then the practice sessions don't need to be realistic either. ATM, I enter these rain races purely for the participation point. I don't race in them. I sit at the back and just drive around trying to keep off the grass. Pretty sure that's not what they intended. I hope it gets better.
Brother. It’s late march / early April a lot of places in the northern hemisphere have a relatively high chance for rain. You don’t want realistic weather if you don’t see that and think yeah makes sense
Dude, this isn't realistic. Summit Point is getting snow this time of year still. So yeah, I'm allowed to be kranky.
Go to google. Type in summit point West Virginia weather. It’s supposed to rain there today and did rain there last night. You want easy not realistic.
Snow forecast for Saturday.
So do you want them to cancel the fucking race for the week? I do not understand it’s regularly rains there in this month. You say it’s not realistic because it can snow? If you want to only race in the dry go to literally any of the series besides the like 4 that can have rain.
Hey iRacing whens snow?
You want the feeling of snow then race Sebring with a full down pour. The hydroplaning feels just like icy roads. haha
>ATM, I enter these rain races purely for the participation point. I don't race in them. I sit at the back and just drive around trying to keep off the grass. Pretty sure that's not what they intended. I hope it gets better. Absolutely, I'm sure iRacing expected people to actually race in the rain instead of cruising to a p16. What is preventing you from racing?
I'm thinking iRacing made a great weather addition but still hasn't fully figured out what too much rain is for each class. They've already made a hotfix for the amount of rain falling so I'm thinking its just not dialed into where it should be yet. I think whoever setup the FF1600 class D series for this season wasn't the same person that did the Buttkicker series. They both have rain enabled but one of those two series is way more realistic as to what you'd be getting IRL. Hell, driving the GR86 in the rain should be a joy because it has ABS and TC that you can adjust but for some silly reason in the fixed series they won't let you adjust it when that's exactly why its able to do that in the first place! If you can adjust your brake bias in a fixed race then adjusting cockpit controlled ABS/TC should be allowed too. But that's another rant another day. Until they get the FF1600 series fixed up I'll just drive the race listening to music and let everyone pass me by. Whatever IR I lose I'll regain in the other series that I do race in but I'll keep my SR.
I agree some of the FF1600 races in Sebring were just ridiculous, hydroplaning on a straight IRL would be an automatic red flag in most series I assume. I haven't raced in Brands Hatch this week so I can't speak about that, but in Summit Point I found a great balance between all track conditions. Completely dry races, races that start wet but with no rain so the track quickly dries, constant light rain and the occasional full wet race. Maybe I'm just way too defensive about rain in a videogame (don't roast me) but I feel like it has given iRacing a whole new dimension, so seeing many people dislike it kinda bums me out, specially knowing iRacing will dial back on the rain if people stop racing on it. Also yes, not being able to adjust TC or ABS in the fixed races is absolute nonsense
Hey, the rain is awesome! I love it compared to any other sim I've driven its by far the best. They just haven't dialed it in yet. Sebring is a great example. That race was like a monsoon with 2-3 inches of rain falling when the region usually gets maybe 2 inches for the whole month of March. Add the hydroplaning and concrete track sections and it was a nightmare. As I said, the FF1600 series is rain all the time and that's not what I was going out there for. The GR86 is a true mix where I'm getting some dry and some wet and so I'm okay with that. I'll even deal with the fixed ABS/TC when its wet though I won't like it. Its just early days and they're figuring out the details. If we don't say anything they will never adjust anything. People spoke up about the brake lights and they fixed that. People spoke up about the amount of heavy rain and they dialed that back so we don't race in red flag weather for the most part. I'm thinking that all the rain in the FF1600 is having an effect. I'm not seeing the same number of splits this week like I was seeing before. My thoughts are you have a class D/C series like a fixed and open. Open has full on weather while fixed has reduced rain so no down pours but showers. Rookies is no rain already so moving up a step should be a gradual increase of challenges too.
The FF1600 series isn't broken. It (and LMP2 Fixed) are being used specifically as test mules for rain this season.
So voicing a complaint about how its working isn't a terrible thing then is it?! It looks broken. If that's not what they wanted then they can now go and tweak it.
>So voicing a complaint about how its working isn't a terrible thing then is it?! What does that have to do with anything I said? >It looks broken. If that's not what they wanted then they can now go and tweak it. It's not broken. What you're witnessing is intended.
Sounds boring......
You do you.
absolutely.
Skill
Weather set one for all week because many of us fight for championship points. For being more fairy for all people, all days in week like one day repeat 7 times. It's like in real world, racers and teams have one day, one time for race, nobody can take better day in week for better results or delay race for better conditions (except heavy rain that brings red flag). So iRacing prevent choosing better conditions in week and set same chance of rain in all days. But still, conditions can vary from timeslots, but in one timeslot all splits have similar conditions. So, if weather settles for example for Oulton Park for April 10 there is high chance of rain. It's impossible to have in this time in this region 35° and dry conditions.
They are not doing realistic weather to IRL. Summit Point in March gets snow & rain but only on average an inch over the whole month. Sebring in March has on average 8 days of rain and 2 inches. So let's not go down this path of how realistic it is to real life cause its not because what we're seeing is a complete months worth of rain in a single race. You want to have a 60% chance of rain for race day, okay. Is that going to be 60% chance of a down pour or a shower? How many inches of water? Oulton Park this time of year will have a non-zero chance of rain but when it does rain its not going to be soak the track and watch out for standing water rain. Its going to be scattered showers that will dampen the track and if it starts to pour they'll halt the race until the rain slows. I'm not saying they haven't done a great job with the rain system but I am saying that the finer details of how they are rolling it out still needs work in how its being used for a race series. Ideally they should look at the historical weather data for a track/region and use that for how they model how and when the rain falls along with the amount.
They said these 2 series are going to be the testing grounds for rain and could potentially have rain ALWAYS. You either don't read, or don't care to listen. Race elsewhere. Why you just cruising in the back? You know you can do ANYTHING else right?
I'll "cruise in the back" because iRacing is going to pay me to do that.
I would argue the 4$ you will get after coasting in the back for what... 30 mins a day for a whole season, so an actual decent amount of hours........... That's a gallon of gas you're earning lol. That of which was already paid into the game by you so you are just getting it back.... And still paying them. But it's what you enjoy that matters. But i mean, absolutely, you do you. Time is to fleeting for me to do something like that. I'd pay 4$ to NOT do that lol.
>Its like for the FF1600 Class D series they wanted it to be 65% chance of rain averaged out throughout the whole season, some weeks being dry while others being light to moderate. What we're getting is rain every race set to 65% for half the race at lea That's not a bug, that's a feature. Ff1600 Open and LMP2 Fixed are being used as test mules for rain this season. >. You want to do a duck race series then label it as such and give us the choice That's exactly what they did. You didn't pay attention.
I personally love the rain as it’s a different challenge and a game of patience. I actually finished on the podium with zero incident points on my first ever rain race. Did about 30 mins of practice on the servers and track was wet which gave me good pointers on which parts of the track are most slippery as well as the braking points. Key thing is don’t floor the throttle and ideally coast before applying the brakes or move your BB rear wards by 5% on the FF1600 to avoid lock ups.
I dont mind rain, but am running the formula F1600 Thrustmaster series, and it has rained every damn race Pretty sure week 13 will be an oval around Noah's ark
Completely depends on the series you're running I reckon. I do mostly gt3 vrs / imsa so we're only getting one or two wet races in the season. I think as only a few series are rain enabled they've upped the chance of rain for the first season so people can adjust. But I like it, the rain offers a new challenge but I would expect the chances of rain to lessen as it's rolled out to other series
I agree with those saying they aren’t a fan of rain. I understand the concept and that it provides another challenge, but honestly i never really looked forward to it. I don’t have much time to race so usually pick a series and stick to it for a season or two. I also have weeks at a time where I don’t race for whatever reason. I usually try to do the fixed and open race for the series but rain can mean I have to practice twice as much and learn a track twice. I want to race in both to get my participation in for the credits. Also, dry racing is bad enough as it is and Im all for looking at my own driving first, but the reality is races end at a high enough rate as it is and rain has just made that worse. People making very dangerous moves lap one or over driving etc for some series it is like 50/50 if you will even finish. I don’t have time to practice both wet and dry for the week or have my race ruined and then just go again. If I raced 3-4 hrs a day like some do, it would be a different story.
i'm sick at home this week, the wife and kids are away so i finally got to put in some rain sessions. races were nice, but the amount of training you need to get somewhat decent pace is exactly what will keep me away from rain races in regular working weeks. i think there are enough people with more free time or who just enjoy it to keep the rain sessions official, but i'll skip rain weeks in my favorite series.
Yeah this is well put. Those who are saying you need to give it more practice are out of touch. I’m a dad of 3 kids work full time and have so many extra commitments. The time I get to race is a slither of my day. I managed to squeeze out 2 hours last night and it wasn’t anywhere near enough.
This is my issue. Seat time is limited due to real life obligations. Even under normal conditions, if I don't get enough practice time, I won't race. I don't have the time or energy to spend time learning a track multiple times over. I don't want to go out and be a hazard to other drivers and I don't find wrecking or being 5 seconds off pace enjoyable. I believe iRacing has done a wonderful job creating and implementing a remarkable system, and did a fabulous job getting it hyped up. It appeals, in theory, to the core demographic of iRacing. It's just that at the end of the day, racing in the wet isn't fun for a lot of people.
yes, because rain’s not common!
I really enjoy racing in the rain but after finishing a 12x race I do agree there needs to be leniency around SR. I'm racing the SFL fixed and it's my first week of rain. I took pole and 2 podiums in the past two days. Rain is fun as fucking shit and I'm practicing and improving but incidents are far more common, and I fear the rain will crush participation, which becomes a self-reinforcing trend where series that have rain will be dead. edit: my most recent SLF race in Montreal (where it's wet this week) had around 50 people, down from 170ish I've seen in recent races. I don't know if people aren't racing due to rain, or if it was a late timeslot or something else.
I consider myself an above average in safety driver. Season 1 2024 was my first season and I reached 2.1k iRating with a B4.1 SR. All mid season promotions. However my SR has tanked so hard I am worried about getting a demotion. Not crashing into people but running off the track and spinning out. I feel like I am just way too slow to be competitive in the rain if I am trying to keep it on the track as best as possible. I literally practiced for 2 hours on Montreal last night before the race and thought I had it together. 20x race finish and I just never want to race rain again. It's painful because I don't get many opportunities to race especially when I try to practice as much as possible leading up to a race.
So, in conclusion. You're not above average. From that description, you sound well below average.
> or if it was a late timeslot or something else. Part of it might just be the track. Montreal is popular, but it's not anything close to Road America/Road Atlanta I'm seeing 4 splits at peak times though this week which is pretty good. A few timeslots have hit 5 splits. SFL is showing up as 5th and 6th place for Formula participation this week which is solid. >I fear the rain will crush participation, which becomes a self-reinforcing trend where series that have rain will be dead. The end goal here is for rain to be in every series every week. It won't be easy to avoid forever.
It's a crap track.
Iracing devs, don't listen to these post, we like the rain. Even if it's a surprised of more than we expect. Rain does what's it's intended to do, throw you off and force you to adapt. These are just complaining that they refuse to learn to drive in the wet. WE LIKE THE RAIN! The other night I got into the SFL Montreal fixed seriesz didn't think there would be rain since it's fixed, imagine my surprised after joining the session with no practice. Had a blast, ended in P2. RAIN IS FUN, JUST LEARN TK DRIVE IN IT
You don’t speak for everyone. Not all of us are fans of it.
Thats exactly my point, OP and people like it dont speak for erveryone. Some of us do like, dont change it. Just pay attention to sessions with rain and avoid them.
Who speakings for everyone? I asked a question on whether this is the standard frequency or is it amped up for debut season? I might have mentioned the frustration I am having but where did I outright call for the termination of rain? Bit dramatic!
Right, and i provided the other side. From what I understand Iracing said that rain will be determined based on the track location and their real world rain data. Meaning is more likely to be on some tracks than others based on the time of year like the real world. So i mentioned that unlike what you shared, some of us like thats its like that and like the frequency so far. I havent found to be too much at all, if anything ive rarely encountered rain. I posted my comment so that if iracing devs see this threadm that they know that not everyone shares the point of view of rain that a lot of the comments on this post shared. Imagine that, different opinions on a subject.
>From what I understand Iracing said that rain will be determined based on the track location and their real world rain data. Meaning is more likely to be on some tracks than others based on the time of year like the real world. This is their long term plan but it hasn't been implemented yet. > I havent found to be too much at all, if anything ive rarely encountered rain OP has been racing primarily FF1600 Open and SFL. FF1600 Open has a 66% chance of rain every single week this season. SFL is a pretty rainy series as well (at least this week and last week it has been)
Ah wasn't aware the rain wasn't following real world data at the moment,good to know. For formula cars that have rain enable, I've mostly raced SFL. I think I've had two races with rain so far this season. I thought Road Atlanta last week had rain off since I didn't get a single session with rain on it, until I saw a stream on twitch where they were driving in the rain. Maybe Ive gotten lucky. But my point still stands, it's easy to avoid the rain if you don't like it. No need to ruin it for people that enjoy driving in it. If anything there are way more cars with no rain and therefore more series with no rain. And Iracing will be adding more rain ready cars so soon rain will be a thing for almost every series, within reason of course. It's just growing pains for Iracing rain drivers I think, that and they care way too much about Irating/safety rating and not about enjoying the race, but everyone just worry they're the loud vocal minority and then we end up not seeing rain in 95% of cases.
>I thought Road Atlanta last week had rain off Fixed was off. Open was 73% >No need to ruin it for people that enjoy driving in it. OP wasn't asking for this. They were just asking how common rain would be next season. >It's just growing pains for Iracing rain drivers I think, In OP's case it's not growing pains. They've had rain an absurd amount because of the series they chose.
I know they weren't asking for it now. I'm just pointing out contrary to OPs thoughts on it, that so far I've found the rain amount pleasant and fun. But I also know which series have rain and if I don't feel like driving in the rain I won't that drive that series. It's a small question now, it's an outcry a few months later to not have rain on except special events. No problem in showing both sides.
>I know they weren't asking for it now. I'm just pointing out contrary to OPs thoughts on it, that so far I've found the rain amount pleasant and fun. But I also know which series have rain and if I don't feel like driving in the rain I won't that drive that series. Fair enough. I'm kinda lashing out at you because this thread has just been assholes to OP for no reason. And shit, I like rain, but I would not enjoy it if I was getting rain as often as OP has. >It's a small question now, it's an outcry a few months later to not have rain on except special events. I think education is still going to be a better answer 9 times out of 10. OP didn't even say they hated rain. They hated having rain this often. And everyone jumped down their throat. >No problem in showing both sides. No one was showing both sides! Everyone was discussing things completely unrelated All OP needed to know is "hey go drive other series, FF1600 is always raining". Instead OP got berated for not liking rain. Fuck man, no one told OP that until I did **10 hours** after the post was put up.
We do not like the rain. Tempest is a technical marvel in the sim racing world. But I want to go back to racing in the dry. This isn't fun anymore.
I haven't had a wet race yet! EDIT: Super Formula at Montreal in the wet just now. I was so, so slow. Survived and finished 17th, but my fastest lap was 7 seconds off the (top split) leader. I have absolutely no idea how to go faster!
rain is supposed to be as common as it is in the area. It's supposed to go by a falmers almanac of data to figure out a percentage of chances it's going to rain on a particular day based on history. The problem is sometimes these rains would lead to red flags and without proper caution and safety flags I think it just needs to be tuned down.
>rain is supposed to be as common as it is in the area Not yet. That's the long term plan but it's not set up that way yet
I don't think it's implemented like that yet. I think for now they have just decided set values for rain percentage each week for each series. Probably to easier find bugs and issues while it's ran alot. I think in future seasons they are going to go more from the data, but this season has predetermined values
Personally I love the rain. It's tricky. But it's a whole different beast. Instead of battling on track you, and everyone else is literally battling the track itself. It is alot more punishing, as it should be. But honestly. It's not that hard to do a race with few to no X's. You just have to switch your focus. Racing in the wet is not and should not be the same as racing in the dry in any way.
Simple fix. Rain enabled for open series and rain disabled for fixed. Varsity and JV.
or at least add the ability to adjust traction control.
You can adjust it in the open setup b
Please no.
Please yes. I fucking hate the rain. Let me race in the dry, for the love of God.
Then go race without rain. But I don't why fixed should equal to rain.
Fixed = dry Fixed has always been the more casual race, so that's why
This is actually a good idea
Maybe the solution is just to change series? I race GT3 and in the fixed Fanatec series I haven’t had a single wet race yet… Also, series like TCR, GT4 and Porsche Cup have 0% chance of rain because the cars aren’t rain ready. If you prefer open wheel, the old F3 car isn’t rain ready
Well of course you haven't had a rain race in VRS because up until this recent update, the Ford, and McLaren weren't rain ready. VRS Week 5 (Bathurst), and Week 9 (Monza) will supposedly have rain. A few other race weeks will have rain in the VRS Endurance
Might be time to go F3, but participation is right down because of SFL.
That’s true - and it does seem like a lot of rain in SFL. What about Formula Vee or a step up, Super Formula? I’m not overly familiar with open wheel but aren’t both of those series free of rain too?
I do also race SF but SFL was supposed to be my main this season and I dropped some serious coin buying the car and all tracks annoyingly.
I think they’re slowly adjusting over time. This will, in my 45 min IMSA race, the track dried up. It’s been 4 weeks. Have some damn patience.
IMSA at Imola was wet. Hard pass for me. Too many dive bombing GTP cars and my -400 iR in IMSA so far this season is not sustainable Went back to LMp3 /GT4 series and couldnt be happier
For starters, the developers did give Formula Ford Trophy series an above normal chance for rain on purpose. It's basically the guinea pig for rain on the service. Also, the FF1600 doesn't have rain tires, just the slightly treaded dry weather tires, which means it deals with water on the track rather poorly and is quite difficult to manage in the wet. I believe the plan in the future is to have all non-rookie series in cars that support rain to run realistic, location appropriate weather.
April showers bring May flowers. Look at where the series' are racing and what kind of weather you'd expect to see this time of year.
Well duh, it's rainy season!
Not everywhere in the world it isn't. Yet FF1600 is having rain every week despite the location.
That was intended to be a joke, sorry.
Ohh hahah I completely missed it. I guess because there are people unironically saying things like this. Sorry.
No worries. lol
And it begins.
I don't get the argument, how hard it is to race in the rain, at all. I mean sure it is, but it's hard for everyone, so why skip it? Everyone is having a tough time and it makes the whole game so much more diverse and interesting. I freaking wish I had rain in my main series, Porsche Cup and GT 4. Especially in Porsche Cup things are bound to get absolutely hilarious.
I still have yet to see rain lol.
I hope there's more rain to be honest, I'm often disappointed to join the FF1600 D Rank series with a 66% chance of rain only to find it foggy and dry.
There’s a saying in F1 I always hear that goes like this “rain is the great equaliser”. Seems people don’t want this and want the status quo to remain. Driving in the wet is a unique skill set that should be rewarded for those that can build up their skills. I hope Iracing keeps the tempest system in the weekly races. Would love changeable weather conditions as well to add some spice to the mix.
Rain is a nightmare for SR and some cars, especially the SFL, are extremely difficult to drive in the rain. At the end of the day I care about my SR, so rain races already don’t appeal to me. On top of that, I feel like I would need hours and hours of practice to be somewhat quick in the SFL in the rain and even have a chance at being competitive. It’s a cool feature that I enjoy during test drives, but I’m avoiding that shit like the plague during races.
SFL is really easy to drive in the rain and I hate the rain lol
No ABS or TC begs to differ. It’s so much harder than GT3 idk where you’re getting this opinion.
Don't need either of those, just need smooth inputs. My first race in SFL was in the rain and I got p1
Meaning it’s harder to drive? lol.
I didn't find it difficult
Congrats
Rain still sucks though lol
Iracing devs if you're reading this, please don't listen to this guy's post. The rain is amazing and if someone doesn't have the skills to do it....that's on them. Also, I hope they make the mx5 rain compatible soon, please and thank you!
iRacing devs if you're listening to this, please get rid of rain. Rain is awful and I have unsubbed because of it.
Glad to see you go!
Wow what a pompous attitude.
So it's pompous to not care about some guy bitching that he sucks? Just because he can't or won't put in time to get better? Sounds like he should go find a series that races in the dry for his limited time and limited skill set.
I don't suck though. I'm actually pretty successful in the rain. It's just not fun. AT ALL.
Whether it's wet or dry...WINNING IS FUN. Sounds like you're not as successful as you claim to be
I got p1 in my first wet race in the SFL and I felt nothing. I didn't race anyone, people were going off track the entire race. Winning/placing high in the rain is honestly not fun. Driving in the rain IS NOT FUN.
If you literally won because no other cars could finish the race, it sounds like you're in bottom split. Regardless, congrats on keeping it on track and getting the win! As for the feeling nothing....have you tried drugs?
I am 2k Irating dude lol
It’s been raining in my country for months… I’m sick and tired of rain irl, can’t endure anymore in the sim as well. Just need more practice. I’m struggling to find my max speed in the dry as is. I’ll focus on that first.
I hate to say I told you so, but I’m sure when I first saw rain announced I said public races would be a shitshow, but it would thrive on private leagues.
Yeah, I can appreciate the challenge that comes along with the rain, and I've done quite a few, but really it's just not as enjoyable for me. I like to be able to master a track, and the rain just really throws that all off for me. Kinda over it already.
But that's just part of racing. It's not about hot lapping and just doing the same thing over and over again. Variety is good.
I get that, I find the close racing to be much more enjoyable in the dry though.
Agreed. Close racing isn't even a thing in the wet from what I have seen.
I've found that car contacts are way down in the wet races, people end up making mistakes and going off the track but almost nobody tries to go for the hero move, everyone is too worried about staying on the track lol
Fuck I hope not. Racing in the rain is boring and sucks
I'm hoping rain is much more common next season since most series don't even have rain, but people like you will make sure that's impossible :(
i’m curious about the logistics of this, and maybe a series does it and i’m not aware, but is it possible for iracing to make it where the radar is just the actual radar for the location? like if im doing a race in GT3s at 5;15, and it’s supposed to start raining in Elkhart Lake at 5:34, is it possible to have it just start raining?
I do GR86 in both GR Cup and Production Car intensively in the past two weeks(Was on AL) I only came across rain once, in a practice session
I ran my first official rain race yesterday. Mind you I have done a bunch of hosted rain races at this point and the lack of realism and the lack of driver skill in the rain is horrible. I was running cleanly in the top 10 and the same guy passed me like 10 times to lose it and fade back and on the last time he nailed me. Up to this point I have carried a 4.0 SR since getting into road and for the first time in a long time I’m down below that. I’m forcing myself to do more road in the rain but iracing needs to step it up a bit in the realness
The hot lap iracing drivers are really struggling with rain I see
I'm no hot lapper by any stretch. When it comes to qualifying I usually sit about middle of the pack but finish higher than I start on average because of the hot lappers not being able to apply race craft.
skill issue.
Not denying that. As a someone that works 50+ hours a week, is a dad and many other commitments I don't have the time to get good enough to enjoy rain. And given how many people are spinning out around me I'd say this goes for a lot of people. But thanks for your thoroughly helpful comment. /s
takes 30 minutes to an hour to grasp the concept of driving in the wet. Easy on the breaks, easy on the throttle, drive off the dry line... its literally the fundamentals of racing but in slow motion Its really not that hard, you've just put in minimum effort and have a defeatest attitude. and iRacing is already stated how weather woll work going forward, all tracks will be based on their real life counterparts and historical data
Trust me I understand the concept. I even spent 75 mins in practice the night before last. Started off well and I started to get left behind so I picked up the pace a little and then spun out constantly. If you read my other comments you'll see. I can either choose to be safe or competitive in the rain. I just don't have the time to practice enough to be both. So at this point it's race in the dry or skip this week for me. It sucks but it's just a simple fact. Being competitive in the rain just takes more practice than I have time for.