Asphalt 9 Dev Chat (December - Grand Prix)

The December Dev Chat was the 4th Dev-Chat and was done on December 4, 2020. it was centered in discussing changes and improvements to Grand Prixes.
== Full #Dev-Talk-Answer ==
Chris718: Alright
Hope everyone's day hasn't turned into a total disappointed due to the Elite Prix having to be pulled
Let me start off apologizing for us having to pull it, as many of you would have noticed or seen in discord there was a little bit of an issue with some missing textures which caused a bunch of errors in the game.
As such we made the call to pull the Elite Prix that was meant to run so that we can fix it and run it properly at a later date. In the meantime we have launched a car hunt event to replace it and have kept all of the Elite Prix store offers still available (so if you are desperate for the car and want to spend you still can. or just wait till we run it again).
So overall perfect start to a day when we are going to talk about Gran Prix and Elite Prix
Let me also say a big thanks to everyone who sent in questions in preparation for this it makes life much easier for us and while I will try to answer as many as I can I'm also going to group them up into specific themes as there were quite a number of similar questions. If I don't answer your question specifically don't worry it doesn't mean I or the team didn't see it we have but sadly we don't have time to answer everything in each Q&A.
==== Grand Prix and Elite Prix ====
Ok so let's kick it off with everyone's favourite topic and also the one that never makes anybody happy. Rewards from the events.
We had a number of questions about decals and having them in every tier.
There are a few reasons why we don't have them in every tier. Firstly the time it takes to make (art needs to create them -> this gets sent to licensors for approval -> back into the game for testing) means we don't have time or resources to make tons of them so we decided that decals should be something that feels pretty exclusive. This leads into the second point which is to make them feel more exclusive they need to be both rarer and harder to get. So we only have them in some tiers so you know that when you see someone in a car with that decal that they have achieved something in order to get them.
Next question that came up a ton (and seems to be everyone's favourite topic) getting tokens.
I spoke a bit about this in the last dev chat so I'll recap what I mentioned then as well as how it impact the GP specifically.
We are including tokens in solo milestones in weekly and elite TLEs, and also in our seasonal TLEs, to introduce more sources of tokens for players who are not in the top of the leaderboards. - Is what I mentioned last time. For the GP especially we have rebalanced the tokens and how you get them. Now you will be able to earn tokens via meeting the criteria in practice races we hope that this makes it easier for everyone to earn them as all you will need to do is participate in the practice race to meet the qualification times to earn tokens (as opposed to ranking on leaderboards previously). Hopefully this helps everyone get some extra tokens they need and star up the cars.
So what about other rewards in the GP?
Well for the next season (starts in roughly 12 days or so) we have done a full rebalance for the Gran Prix and Elite Prix. This has been a lot of work for the team and hopefully you will all see and feel the difference it makes. These changes (and I'll go into more detail) include changing up not just how the leaderboards are calculated but also what all of the rewards are from them.
First up as I just mentioned we have played around with how tokens are rewarded so you can now get them from practice. We have also carried this across to the credit rewards you earn from ranking on the leaderboard, as a general rule of thumb we have increased the values slightly as well as what ranks earn credits has been modified.
But we haven't stopped there (I did say it was a big rebalance). We also took a look at the GACHA's you can win and have updated them in a couple ways: Firstly we have 3 levels of GACHA (Bronze, Silver & Gold) each of which contain new sets of cars and new balance for the BP you can get. Plus with 3 levels of GACHA we can distribute them even more across the leaderboards. And probably of the most interest given the number of questions about getting access to old cars each of the GACHA types includes BP from an old GP car. So for those of you who are looking for those BP you will now have a chance to get them. We will be rotating these pools of BP on a set basis so they will be around for a bit then new ones will come in.
Now of course changing the rewards is all well and good but doesn't help if you can't get on the leaderboard. Well we have adjusted this as well 
Firstly we have rebalanced the leaderboard segments so it should be a bit easier now to qualify into one of the leaderboard tiers. This also means though that if you want the best rewards you can't just sit in a lower tier anymore you will have to work a bit and set a good time to qualifier higher up. The second big change is that once you qualify you will no longer be competing against 20 other players for a ranking but only 14 which should help you get a reward.
Let's move off rewards a bit for now and talk about plans for next year for the Grand Prix and Elite Prix
===== Plans for Next Year (2021) =====
First off as I mentioned today and in previous dev chat we want to give everyone a chance to get at the cars that they may have missed previously, so we have added some of these into the GACHAs for upcoming events but we also want to re-use these cars and make them the focus of the event, so you can participate and try to get the key you might have missed.
So over the next year we will be running some elite prix using previous run cars, which ones and when, well you'll have to keep playing to find out.
Only hint I'll say is the next update is looking to be pretty exciting.
We are also looking at how the events run in general from a functionality point of view. I'll run through 3 of the main ones (which also correspond to a bunch of questions and feedback) quickly and will give a bit more detail afterwards. 
# Ability to control the ghost cars 
# Touchdrive vs. manual 
# Reporting as well as general improvements to detect hacks/cheaters.
While I go into more detail @Clauwudia will put up a poll as we would love to get your vote on which one you see as more important to your experience. It will help us prioritise resources on the work.
* 1- Okay ghost cars. Some people love them, some people are scared of them and some people are going huh? what?
Basically the idea we have is to add a toggle in settings which allows you to control if you want to see a ghost car or not. If it's off then ghost cars would not appear in any event they are used for. If on then well pretty self explanatory.
* 2- Touchdrive vs. Manual.
This is actually a pretty tough area for us and is something that impacts not only the GP and EP but also MP so the team has been discussing this and going back and forth on potential solutions for a bit now. We know we want to make some changes we just need to work out how we can do it and were to start. For the GP and EP one of the solutions (may not be the final one we still need to look at the tech side) is to do the following: -Auto sort players into different leaderboards based upon the control scheme. You would be locked when you start your 1st race to that control scheme so if you start touchdrive then switch to manual during the race to cheat and set a better time you would not be able to do so. So basically you chose your control scheme then you live with it for that event. -Touchdrive only or Manual only events. This idea is to run an event were you can only use the control scheme. This is a bit easier for us to do so we might try it first. It also has the added benefit of we could run smaller events that are manual only to encourage people to practice and play manual long run (I personally think that playing manual when I'm home and have time is great (even though i suck at it), when I'm on a bus or train then touchdrive is easier so both types have their place)
* 3- Reporting, hackers and cheat. 
Hackers and cheating is something we are aware of and know ruins the experience for everyone. We are looking at what we can do to catch these people automatically and quarantine or even outright ban them. Currently we tend to play it a bit safer and give people the benefit of the doubt until we can clearly prove they have cheated and then when we do down comes the hammer. One thing that can help us with this and we have seen it work in MP is giving you the players the ability to report others as cheats.
The idea would be to add functionality into the leaderboards to allow you to report players. This reporting tool generates notifications for the team who look at the reports everyday and can do more in depth investigation (this is outside of our automated systems).
So those are the main GP changes we are looking at for next year. Now having said that we do keep an eye on how the events are performing (how many people play, how many win and what, how many races are done at each stage etc etc) and we will keep adjusting and tweaking things especially as we have new balance in and we want to see how it ends up feeling with 1000's of people playing it.
==== Questions and Answers ====
Let me look at my notes for some other questions that came up. Also big shout out and thanks to @DeepHeat for compiling the list of all the feedbacks. Totally awesome and made it so much easier to review
Someone suggested fixed ranks in finals and packs in the store. Fixed ranks in finals are how the Elite prix work and in all cases we keep the packs in the store both during the event and for a bit afterwards.
We got asked about increasing the attempts from 3 to 5 or 6. This is something we don't want to do as part of the excitement of this sort of event is the pressure of having limited attempts at setting the best time
when we played and tested it ourselves we found having just 1 or even 2 more attempts did not have quite the same amount of pressure feeling we were after.
Make special car hunts exclusively for the people who have unlocked the car in the grand prix. This actually makes it possible to get blueprints for cars like the Boatley, MK2, C7R and cayman. And similar questions came up a bunch.
As I alluded to previously we will be bringing them back not just in GP and EP events but also in car hunts, TLE. Basically all sorts of areas of the game will be expanding to include older cars
so even more chances to fill up your garage and star it up
Another questions was "Introduce key/BP packs after the finals are over or at some point in the near future after the event. The AT96 was the first GP car and still no encore event or key/BP packs. Progression with GP cars is essentially nonexistent. Not to mention any Epic Imports for them."
quick answer is check out the next update 
@Razihel good question about Spectate
not something we have currently planned for the GP but it is something we are looking at to add to the game in another area. I won't go into to much detail right now (mainly because the design is about 100 bullet points and a bunch of scribbling on paper on my desk). But I will say we are working on it
There are a number of statements about locking all cars during the event to a set level as it would level the playing field.
What we have found is it ends up actually doing the opposite
it levels the playing field for skilled players but makes it harder for less skilled players as they cannot compensate by improving there car. Now and I 100% acknowledge that it also causes the issue that a skilled player who stars up the car ends up with an even greater advantage.
Part of a leaderboard adjustments should help address this issue as these players will be pushed to compete in higher tiers and if they want to try and sandbag they will find the rewards they gain are not as useful for them since they won't get tokens from the leaderboard anymore and 2 they will have most of the BP rewards since they have already fully upgraded the cars.
@Danny good question about the stats. These come to us and get put in a giant DB which we then have analysts run scripts on to generate reports etc so it's not something we can easily pull out and expose to the public (not to mention other potential issues around tech, legal etc). What we can look at though and is something in our backlog (pretty low at the moment as we have some higher priority stuff) is to start recording some of this information in player profiles, so you would be able to look at someone and maybe see top GP placing, best time etc
Ok as were going to close the chat shortly couple last bits and pieces.
If you haven't tried it please think of giving multiplayer challenges a try. We rebalanced it for this run (started today and runs the week) and the more people who play it the more info we get to keep adjusting it (we have a few more planned each with some different tuning).
Secondly make sure to grab the next update when it launches in just under 2 weeks. as I mentioned previously there is a drive syndicate coming and it is amazing. So don't miss out on it
And last but not least thank you everyone for participating in these sessions they are really good opportunity for us to hear from you and give you some answers and get feedback. It's hard to see now but over the past few discussions we have revamped and modified plans for next year because of them so while it is slow you are helping us all improve the game. Thanks, have a good weekend and since this is the last one for the year have a good festive season and new year.
== #Dev-Chat-Vote ==
Mina:
===== 1st Vote =====
Please, rate from 1 - not that important, to 5 - very important, the following topics:
1- Ability to control the ghost cars
[Most people voted "Very Important"]
2- Touchdrive vs. manual
[Most People Voted "Not That Imporant"]
3- Reporting as well as general improvements to detect hacks/cheaters.
[Most people voted "Very Important"]
===== 2nd Vote =====
Do you like the idea of having TouchDrive only or Manual only events?
[Most people didn't liked this]
===== 3rd Vote =====
Last time we saw many votes to New Location + Types of races on tracks. Would you like to discuss about it on the next A9DevChat?
[Most people agreed on this]
===== 4th Vote =====
One final question for today. How did you like this DevChat about Grand Prix? (1 - I do not like it at all, 5 - I love it)
[Most people liked the Dev-Chat]
Category:Asphalt 9 Dev Chats