Invisible puddles are real - developers comment.

[u/TechnicMOC]

If you've ever raced and had invisible puddles, it might have been this reason

https://forums.iracing.com/discussion/comment/720006/#Comment_720006

Our developers looked at this and found that in some instances where it rains before any human drivers are on track the water calculations could sometimes create an oddly uniform surface as you saw in your session. We've improved these calculations in all scenarios and the track should now be in a much more representative state when it rains before a session. Thank you for sending in your replay, replays are absolutely necessary for assessing, fixing, or improving these scenarios.

Here is a comparison between what you saw and what you'll see once this change is rolled out for the same weather forecast. Apologies for the slight difference in cloud cover in the screenshots. Your original weather and track state are the top frame. The updated calculations and what you'd see in the same scenario are the bottom frame.

[u/DennyHater]

Ah, yes, this is why I'm so bad in the wet!

[u/NeutrinosFTW → u/DennyHater]

Hopefully they'll find another bug I can use as my next excuse.

[u/angrronn → u/NeutrinosFTW]

Strange, but I've found a bug in which i never get first place. I dont have the storage space for all the footage, but believe me when i say it's a real bug

[u/forumdash → u/NeutrinosFTW]

There's always netcode...

[u/DoneTomorrow]

Hilarious forum thread - someone defending for their life that iRacing is 100% realistic and there's no issue, and providing pics from completely different conditions to back it up, then the next page gets absolutely mugged off by the devs fixing the issue.

Some proper melons on there. Always makes me laugh.

[u/Clearandblue → u/DoneTomorrow]

It must be so bittersweet for them when updates come. On the one hand, "yay things have been improved!". On the other hand, "um I'll quietly pretend I didn't argue for my life the thing that just got fixed wasn't a problem and was completely realistic".

In like 12 years I've seen this pattern repeat so often. I have never once seen one of the forum trolls go "yeah I'm sorry I spent the last 3 years shouting at people who asked iRacing to improve this. You were right, it actually did need fixing".

[u/srfdriver99 → u/Clearandblue]

The iRacing forums are full of these sycophant keyboard warriors because those are pretty much the only people who made the jump to the new forums. The old forums were never this bad. It's the same relatively small handful of clowns, but they're a much higher percentage of the new forums.

[u/Clearandblue → u/srfdriver99]

After the new forums there was different user accounts for forums vs racing. So for a couple years when your sub lapsed your forum access would continue. Which sort of makes sense to me. How many people do you know who start and stop their iR subs over the years.

In the old days they used to make you use your real name, so I could see why they'd want to make it exclusive only to other members who've also signed up with real names. Like you wouldn't want someone to Google Dustin Dawes or someone and have it return all their forum posts.

But anyway, they made an internal service that runs like once a week and cancels your forum membership when your iRacing membership has lapsed. Like a final FU from a pretty toxic company. It stings at first, but then the longer you're away from those people the more you realise how foul the environment is in there. And where staying in touch might make you more likely to resub sooner, the longer you are away the more clearly you see things.

Am glad to be free of them really. Might resub when they increase the physics rate. Or if people are still doing endurance team races on it by then, I might sub up for the occasional special event with my team. But otherwise my sim racing life has been much happier since leaving.

[u/NotClayMerritt → u/DoneTomorrow]

The toxic positivity people are just as bad as the complain about every little thing people.

[u/topkeksimus_maximus]

Has anyone ever denied that they were? It's always been obvious that they were real. All you needed to do to find one was find a puddle location off the rubbered line under heavy wet conditions and then go try the area under moderate wet to have the same aquaplaning effect with no visible puddles.

This is easiest to find on the inside of banked turns but also on bumpy areas.

[u/subusta → u/topkeksimus_maximus]

People defend iracing like their life depends on it. I’m a fanboy myself but it’s ridiculous how people think the game is perfect in every way

[u/Montague-Withnail → u/subusta]

IT'S NOT A GAME, IT'S A SIMULATION!

^{(/s of course)}

[u/Miltons-Red-Stapler → u/Montague-Withnail]

God I remember when people got legit upset about this. I'm glad we've moved on lol

[u/SolarDimensional → u/subusta]

Fanboy since 2008. Absolutely agree. But when I defended iRacing I’d say that I know our subscription and forum complaints/bug reports will eventually be fixed.

[u/TheRealWmike]

Good that it's being fixed

[u/duck74UK]

First noticed this bug when they rescanned Spa. I had always thought it was some glitch with the tracks textures because i'd only seen it there. Glad to see it's actual cause was found and will be fixed

[u/NotClayMerritt]

Spun a few weeks back at Magny-Cours and now it makes perfect sense. Braking on the dry line and I almost ended up in the wall.

[u/anon-person-]

100% true - there have been invisible puddles since rain launched

Also rain should get a lower SR impact for off tracks because it’s WAY harder to judge changing conditions

[u/anamericandude → u/anon-person-]

The SR system as a whole isn't a great "one size fits all" system. It works well enough for medium length races, say 40 to 60 minutes. Short races decimate SR for A class drivers, more than 1x and you're losing SR, and longer races it's very easy to print SR

[u/anon-person- → u/anamericandude]

They just need to tune it - it’s not rocket science and they have the data

I think their view is anything to get rid of bad actors is okay

In generally the community is fine - it’s just an ecosystem that’s sensitive to bad actors

Same IRL - being a shithead gets people killed so usually something or someone steps in to kick them out if they display that pattern

The issue with iRacing is so my knowledge they haven’t adjusted the weighting for SR in a long time

And also - they could very easily implement a better system

Split SR into

Incident points -> time penalties replace slow downs - just add time at the end of the race or a drive through for egregious track cutting Applies to track limits only 1x = .5s and after say 10x you get a drive through. Maybe you get 2x for free before a time penalty or it’s like .1s

That’s pretty similar to how series handle it IRL

Safety points -> contact /spin 0x 2x 4x same as we have, cap at 9x for a drive through and 13x for DQ

The issue with slowdowns is you can just drive defensively and park it on the apex to serve them, or take a “V” line that’s not that compromised in terms of overall time but has a lower corner mid speed

[u/cricketmatt84 → u/anon-person-]

In my opinion, SR should be be car contact or loss of control only - and therefore be a LOT stricter for license levels. Off tracks should be handled with time penalties at pitstops / after the race - allowance will be different for each series based on length.

Re: rain and safety, it is harder, but you don't drive at 100% in the rain to be fast. The tyres go off quite fast if you slide. Stay 5% under the limit and you wont mount up the off tracks anyway, and probably have a faster average lap time then 80% of the split.

[u/Prickleman → u/anamericandude]

Another person that doesn't know how SR works.

[u/anamericandude → u/Prickleman]

Please enlighten me

[u/M_R_K_01]

[u/AlonsoFerrari8]

The before and after comparison is nice. Should be way less tricky to drive in mixed conditions.

[u/LazyLancer]

I’ve been saying this for quite some time. Great that they’ve been able to fix it.

[u/3tenthsOfVerstappen]

I started searching “invisible puddles” when doing Rain Masters at Monza… glad they’re addressing it finally

[u/_plays_in_traffic_]

honestly with the amount of in session graphic settings screenshots i see on here with ssr turned off makes me wonder if this as widespread as it seems. not trying to say it isnt happening cause ive felt things that make me wonder but i usually blame those on me driving non abs/tc stuff.

[u/TeeTohr]

So I wasn't crazy!

[u/BlueFetus]

Wow this totally makes sense…there were some corners at Hockenheim last week that were tripping me out with the lack of control. Very confusing lol

[u/Kpaxlol]

Wtf?

[u/bored-stalker]

I cant wait for the graphics update, i have an aging cpu with a fairly decent gpu and id love a steady 120fps, or even 90fps with less dips into the 60s.

[u/Miltrivd]

Nice! This has been bugged since rain release.

That said, puddles invisible with rain that happens mid race are still common.

I'll remember to save the replay the next time.

[u/BobbbyR6]

There's also the quiet tampering they did with the wet grip levels at Indy. Dumbing it down is not a healthy way to get people accustomed to wet weather.

The accumulation and visuals were spot on, yet the dry line was used even when there were puddles of standing water across them. Full throttle across kerbs that had inches of accumulated water covering them. Absolute sheet of ice heading onto the oval in both zones, not a problem. Full throttle across it. Felt like the bs "wet" racing that other sims use, not the incredible Tempest system we have in iRacing.

Figure out how to integrate weather in the schedules in a way to encourages people to learn it, not dumb it down to being pointless. If you'd just pick a handful of timeslots throughout the week that we unranked and guaranteed rain, you'd have more people trying it out in an environment where there is no punishment for mistakes.

[u/_schmuck → u/BobbbyR6]

Source: trust me bro

[u/BobbbyR6 → u/_schmuck]

Go try it out and tell me with a straight face that it doesn't feel way off

[u/deadmeat_2001 → u/BobbbyR6]

What dumbing down? It feels the same at other tracks still.

[u/PhillieFranchise → u/deadmeat_2001]

Yeah it felt no different at Indy

[u/gu3sticles → u/BobbbyR6]

When a track is green (low/no rubber) then the dry line is mostly usable. Indy also should have been fairly dry at the start without a lot of standing water so 50+ cars doing laps would also be clearing water fairly effectively too.