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A few updates for Heartland today.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-Xm8KpOdHaGMM279NEsYbNj4MyrEebaY/view?usp=sharing 

Deleted some rogue files that may have been making the AI a bit rubbish

Updated the track surface texture though extension.ini

Fixed flickering advertisements on the building over the drag strip

Adjusted the terrain slightly around t/8 (or the north west corner of the south paddock

Also – the biggest part of the update! Upgraded the detail of the autocross skidpan at the south paddock. This is accessible by chosing either ‘Autocross A’, ‘Autocross B’ or ‘Skidpad Empty’ layouts. Autocross A and B are replicas of the cone layout from ~2008 – so a bit old I know, but it’s the most up to date reference I could find. Each of the autocross layouts have full timing, and even AI (although they don’t do a good job of respecting the track boundaries, as its too tight and twisty really) also some replay cameras are present. I found it a bit confusing trying to drive with all the cones, as there’s like 500 of them, so I added some painted white arrows and lines onto the ground to help learn the layouts, I know this isn’t realistic, but they don’t look too out of place, and I can remove them really easily if the general consensus is that they’re a bad addition. There’s full night lighting across the entire track, and now on the south paddock area. Enjoy!

Files

Comments

David Zemon

LOVE the fact that you've implemented a couple of autocross courses! I've been a huge fan of the work from SimAutox.com for a long time now, and these are even better (less performance intensive, load faster, proper timing, etc). Now... all that said... I think the cone setup needs some work. If the following suggestions require changing the cones relative to the original 2008 layout, I think that's okay. Current SCCA rulebook implies (it's not quite explicit, but this is what I've understood) that there are only two kinds of elements allowed: gates and slaloms. There are many variations of this, they all boil down to that. It's either a gate, or a slalom. And it IS a slalom (as in, the rules explicitly state this) if there are three or more cones roughly in a straight line. There are no other kinds of elements. Three cones placed along a sweeping curve are invalid, for instance. Each of those three cones would need a matching cone to complete the three gates; without the matching cone, there's no way to know which side you should drive on. The rules don't say anything about one inside cone using multiple outside cones, but certainly experience would imply this is allowed. The most extreme case would be a Chicago box, which can be considered many gates, all sharing a single inside cone (of course that's not how you should think about it when planing your driving line, but from a course design rules perspective, that's what it is). Long story short: it's either three or more cones in a line or it must be a gate. Nothing else is a legal element, because anything else would result in an ambiguous driving line. With all of that in mind, I hope you can revisit these two autocross courses, remove some superfluous cones, and add some cones where necessary (to make real gates) such that the course becomes much easier to drive (without the need for the arrows/white lines). Lay down cones could also help a lot when it's not obvious where the next element is. Okay, final statement: I've only read the SCCA driver's rulebook. I do not know if there are separate rules/regulations for designing a course. This is merely how I've interpreted the rules.

Tyrone - Racetracks & Models

Hi David, thanks for the feedback. When building up these autocross courses I overlaid the 2008 maps, and just put cones on wherever there were numbered dots on the map, there was like 500 or something. I think building courses to the regulations would be great, however I'd need plans for existing ones that'd fit in that skidpad for true authenticity. Failing that, I'd be designing my own, which would be quite a fun task, but I'm not sure how well they'd work!

Aircooled

First of all, thanks for an AutoX course. It's super helpful since I am mostly familiar with how my car handles in one. The course however is almost impossible to follow (getting lost on a large AutoX course is certainly not unprecedented of course). The arrows are helpful but are mostly lost in the surface texture. I can follow it for a few turns if I go really slow, but I am completely lost when it goes into the open area. I would suggest maybe lowering the contrast on the texture a bit, make the arrows a bit more prominent (thicker) and adding some course boundry lines (like the edges of a track), especially in the open areas. If you don't want to do the boundry lines (probably a more realistic solution in real life) having the hint lines you have a bit more visible should work.

Anthony Dvorak

As someone who has been autocrossing at this venue from 2016 up until the local SCCA region discontinued its usage this year (due to surface degradation), I'm very happy to see this show up. Unfortunatley my sim rig is packed up for a move at the moment, but I digress... If you're ever looking for additional material for course layouts, I've got more than a few videos to share, though I realize it may be harder to work with than a proper map: https://www.youtube.com/@t0ast_plus_plus/search?query=ks%20scca

Greg Mayled

Would it be possible to add physical cones that can me moved?