As it turns out, that is the only difference between the Fugger build and mine - I swapped the S Tire compound for the S Cam. There's an old saw named "Coals to Newcastle" that came into play and I am sure that Fugger isn't taking it into account. To Forzatize the saw one could say, "why spend Pi adding grip when you already have more grip than any car in the class and most of the next and you really need more power..." or something like that. And that was the case here.
With the S Tires, the Starion's G@120 was 0.90, which is two points higher than my best C class car, the Eclipse GSX which weighs in at 0.88. And it's pretty damned grippy, if I do say so myself, and I do. On the Cheeze side, I think the AMX is still top dawg at 0.82. So, 0.90 is quite a bit for a D class car.
I drove the car as Fugger built it, with only the tires needing adjustment in just one race on Tsukuba. It was nice being able to drive the car anywhere I wanted with my foot planted on the floor - if it would just go. I decided to check into swapping the S Compound out - how bad would it hurt me, how much power could I gain?
One other characteristic of the Starion is that it is one Torquey little outfit - its Tq/Hp ratio was 1.239 and it had a tendency to torque out the rear wheels when pulling low rpms in 2
nd or 3
rd, so I figgered I'd check out the cam - see if I could buy that for my Street tires. Trading in the Street tires would get me 29 Pi back. I check the cam, it only cost 26 Pi. Hot damn! I looked a little further and it looked like I could get a tunable suspension for the change. It was a no brainer as far as I was concerned. The suspension would get back some of the grip I was giving up with the downgraded tire compound.
Well, it turns out that without the street tire compound, the cam cost more Pi - 29 to be exact. That really pissed me off. I went ahead with the deal because the sitting on an S Suspension be default and it wasn't that bad to begin with. But why the change?
If nothing else, it seems like one could do more damage with the tires
and the cam and it should have been pricier with than without. But even more significant is the fact that it changed at all, and the changing program may be part of the whole Pi issue.
The game is obviously making some qualitative decisions and making adjustments to stay within certain parameters. Boy, I bet those algorythms are a spooky to look at bunch. So, their whole Pi priority
system is in need of adjustment. They are trying to shape performance with a bunch of qualitative algorythms that are buried in a rather intense, I imagin, program. With 580 cars in play I doubt there is very much "by hand" tweaking going on.
So, back to the Starion. The swap, cam for tires, netted a 10% increase in Hp and a higher rpm power range. The hurt to the G@120 value was only in the 5% range, down to 0.85 which was still 0.03 points better than any other D car in my garage, and actually quite high for the next class as well. To top it off - the Tsukuba time was improved by 0.224 seconds - my thoughts were that it would be hurt by the loss in grip, but the increase in power trumped the grip in this case.
So what have you heard? I don't think there is a quick fix for the Pi problem. I think it runs deep and permeates the entire garage, not just the Muscle cars... Look at the decisions the program is making concerning the Pi cost of a Race Transmission for the Hondas.
And if they make the wholesale change required to set things a-right, can they leave the leaderboard in place? Will any of the times set previously with any car be relevent?
I bet they're tearing at their hair up there in the Turn 10 offices. Yes sir, not a happy time up there...
$
I continue on with the Mitsubishis - chasing down their factory driver award. I'm just about to clear the 25 level and the process should speed up from there. I shouldn't need too many more cars, the Starion to C, the Eclipse to B and maybe an A Classed Evo VIII MR should to it...
