To way oversimplify the issue: there are "hidden" transmission types/modes that are faster than the usual options, and I'm writing this so the community/moderators can make an informed decision on whether or not to allow them.
The exact questions that need answering are listed after this post. If you skip over everything to read them, they probably won't make sense, so please read the rest of the post first.
Transmission types
When you go into the control options, you'll find this:
There are two control options available to users: automatic and manual sequential. Most of the currently submitted runs use the latter. However, under the right circumstances, there can be additional options:
This third control option, H pattern (or "gated"), shifts faster than sequential. This wouldn't be a problem if it were available at all times on all platforms, but while this seems to be the case on PC, on console it's hidden unless a supported wheel is connected. This means PC players (and console players that own a supported wheel) have an acceleration advantage over console players that only have a controller.
Braking technique
Slamming the vehicle into reverse and using throttle and brake together leads to a braking advantage over sequential. I'm not sure how difficult this would be to use in practice since it messes with the steering a bit, but as a standalone maneuver it's fairly easy to do.
Launch advantage
I performed limited testing with the DeJong MXR and found that being able to start the race in 2nd gear provided a slight acceleration improvement over starting in gear 1, which sequential is forced to do. This is somewhat vehicle-specific so I'm not sure how widespread the advantage is.
Auto/manual clutch
Whereas Dirt 3 uses a dedicated fourth transmission type, H pattern w/ clutch, to allow the user to intentionally enable manual clutch control, Dirt 2 uses a separate option that's hidden from the user but is still present in the profile. Normally, this is set to auto clutch, which manifests as a small delay between gears and is often accompanied by hitting the rev limiter if using H pattern. When set to manual, use of the clutch is ironically unnecessary since gear changes are instant. Acceleration increases dramatically as a result. This works with sequential too, with equivalent speed to H pattern.
While I lack a suite of wheels to test and haven't yet checked the relevant code, based on the PC game's action maps I believe manual clutch control is enabled on at least one of the supported wheels, the Logitech G25, but is disabled otherwise. (The G27, Driving Force, and MS SideWinder FFB potentially enable it too.) I also believe the clutch control is rebindable in this scenario. The necessary tools for extracting PS3/X360 files are unavailable and I don't want to spend a bunch of time making them just for this, so I can't check their action maps but I know they differ from PC.
The game also has another hidden setting that sets the clutch pedal to be used as a brake instead of a clutch. Judging by this Steam post, I believe this is the default behaviour and would only be changed if one of the above wheels is used. Fortunately, since there's no need to actually press the clutch it doesn't affect runs.
Given these findings and under the assumption that at least the G25 enables the manual clutch, an acceleration advantage is granted to those who have such a wheel.
The questions
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Do we care about console players?
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Do we think using advantages that are only available by having specific peripherals is unfair?
The first question is put forth for a few reasons. Yes, as mentioned here, they can't access H pattern without a wheel, but via save editing they could enable the manual clutch and gain most of the advantage. More to the point though, the top players don't appear to have known about the manual clutch option at all, despite PS3 leaderboards being pretty consistently faster than PC. I don't know how to feel about having an advantage like that when their times are the ones we mainly compare to. On the other hand, the speedrun boards have just one console player and their times aren't exactly competitive, so it shouldn't affect that part.
The second question is more straightforward. Pretty much everything listed here is related to steering wheels and how using them makes you faster than keyboard/controller players. This can't be stopped on the in-game leaderboards, but if we wanted, we could level the playing field on the speedrun boards.
Possible rule changes
Let's assume, for a moment, that nobody cares about the in-game leaderboards or being fair to the people on them, and all we care about is the speedrun boards. Realistically, there are two ways to ensure everyone who speedruns the game has the same capabilities.
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Institute bans on H pattern usage and/or manual clutch usage. This way everyone is just as slow as one another, regardless of platform and peripherals.
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Distribute ways of making everyone faster. This would be savegames or programs/DLLs that set the manual clutch option. The latter could make H pattern more usable on controller/keyboard too. The rules around mods would have to be relaxed a bit, or exceptions would have to be made.
Personally, I prefer option 2 because I like to make speedruns faster instead of slower. Yeah, it's more complicated than that, but that's what wins out for me. Making a DLL mod for this is admittedly not easy, but luckily, not to toot my own horn here, but I'm an experienced modder who open sources all his work. So making this a reality wouldn't be a problem, and the moderators could inspect any mods before allowing them. To be clear, even though we'd be using mods to make the speed more accessible, these are still in-game options; we're not enabling cheats here. I'll leave that for the boost option that was left over from Grid.
Anyway. I want to hear people's thoughts on this, especially the moderators' thoughts, before doing anything further. So please, spew them out :)
Honestly, either way seems okay to me, but its kind of a difficult situation. Either there's the awkward feeling of everyone being forced to be slightly slower for fair competition, there's modding of, maybe not in game files, but still files related to the game, which is... meh. Or just letting people use the wheels/PC keybinds for clutch makes it awkward as well, because console players are basically locked behind a slight paywall, and theres still the problem with the manual/auto clutch. For me, idunno.. i would probably most prefer if it was just left as is, so for people who care enough for H pattern gaming and/or have a wheel that lets them use manual clutch, just let them. But on the other hand, if someone was competitive enough to beat WR's on a track or a category with said H pattern or manual clutch, then theyd be practically unbeatable by non H pattern/manual clutch users. So.. im honestly not sure
The easiest option is defo just banning it, though it is kinda lame. But lets be honest: DiRT2 isnt exactly ran by a lot of people: surely it wouldnt make a big difference if H pattern&manual clutch was allowed only when the game allows it to? if you have a g25 or something, then go ahead.
Either way, this is probably for the moderators to decide, not me. Just sharing my opinion in case its important. ^^'
I think banning it wouldn't be quite right. All it takes is for someone to beat a WR with H pattern/clutch for it to become unbeatable for keyboard/controller players. In my opinion this is a good opportunity to push the speedruns to the limit by allowing the H pattern.
A good idea would be to make a Variable in IL leaderboards for H pattern and Sequential/Auto runs, that way we can keep both sides happy.
rkatime, but how about category leaderboards? splitting would lead to too many categories, and like you said, it takes one person to make a category, perhaps not unbeatable, but unfairly challening.
A good idea would be to make a Variable in IL leaderboards for H pattern and Sequential/Auto runs, that way we can keep both sides happy.
I like that idea. May as well have 5 options, auto, seq, seq w/ clutch, h pattern, h pattern w/ clutch. Or remove the clutch options if moderators won't allow it.
surely it wouldnt make a big difference if H pattern&manual clutch was allowed only when the game allows it to? if you have a g25 or something, then go ahead.
Enabling the manual clutch is locked to G25, but keeping it enabled isn't. It'll still be manual on keyboard/controller unless the controls are changed. Also, anyone else who gets the savegame would have manual clutch too. So everything I'm discussing here is viable without mods provided you know someone with a G25. All I want to do is remove that restriction.
huh, i see. then its for you all guys to decide, i'm fine with what burninrubber suggested :3 i thought thered be need for modding or changing something for everyone but if its as simple as a save file, then sure. The only problem is that some people have the license version, and some people play on pirated.. dunno how it would work with that
ok so i skimmed thru the opinions here and on discord and rn even if it will be allowed im personally against of splitting the boards(again). we will look into this.
As a moderator, I would like if this mod gets released. I want to test it out for myself.
Done: https://github.com/burninrubber0/Dirt2Gearbox/releases/latest
DLL goes in the game folder.
Let me know if it works. I only tested on the Steam version but that should be the same as disc and cracked (xliveless) as long as they're updated to v1.1.
im personally against of splitting the boards(again).
I think the idea was to have the variable as an annotation instead of a subcategory so the boards wouldn't be split. At least, that's how I interpreted rkatime's suggestion.
Small update with some new discoveries. For one, brakeAsClutch (a setting mentioned in the initial post) turned out to be the determining factor in how the transmission_type setting is set. If brakeAsClutch is 1 (brake), which is the default, H pattern will be set with auto clutch. If it's set to 0 (clutch), H pattern will be set with manual clutch. Sequential always uses auto clutch.
Given this, it's interesting to note that once set, it seems that nothing can change brakeAsClutch. Not device detection, not changing controls, not changing transmission type. It appears permanent.
Which makes this post all the more interesting: https://www.overtake.gg/threads/colin-mcrae-dirt-2.6371/page-12#post-409617
And this: https://www.overtake.gg/threads/colin-mcrae-dirt-2.6371/page-11#post-409600
So we have a firsthand account of the G25 with a manual clutch on PC and two secondhand accounts that describe it working on PS3. Sure, it's not the strongest evidence, but it's more than we had before.
Unfortunately, the rest of that forum is filled with people who couldn't get the clutch working, saying it acted as a brake. I'm guessing there's some specific criteria that has to be met to set brakeAsClutch to 0 before anything else happens. Since kleis found someone to test it, I wonder if they can get it working or if it'll just be a brake.
Oh, also, the string for the G25's name is hardcoded on PC, which it isn't on other platforms. I assume this has something to do with its unique clutch behaviour on PC since no other device names are hardcoded. Just more evidence to support it being a thing.
To coalesce my thoughts from Discord over the past week:
- Given the majority of G25 owners on overtake.gg couldn't get the manual clutch, I don't believe it should be allowed.
- Kleis's tester tried with his G25 and the clutch acted as a brake.
- It's probably possible to get manual clutch with a G25 through specific actions, but I don't know what those actions are. Even if we knew, I'm not sure that's enough to justify allowing it.
The moderators have said they'll ban manual clutch. I'm leaving the DLL up anyway since it'll be useful for anyone wanting a clutch pedal for legitimate reasons, even though the game's clutch is janky. You'll be able to tell if someone's using it from the speed of their shifts.
As for H pattern, it's sounding like it'll be allowed. I'd like to see an annotation variable (at least on levels) to differentiate transmission types, but it doesn't seem like the moderators want that. I'll work on a DLL to make H pattern more usable on controllers when I have the time to do so; it won't affect gameplay, only accessibility/ease-of-use.
