Tried to enjoy a Tinkoff career on PCM 14 with the new Daily.
BUT HOLY FUCKING COW. That AI is just plain stupid to play with. When i go in a break i get picked up again everytime. If it is only AI riders in the break, they go all the way.
And even if you put up your team to bring them back, you can pretty much waste all your riders and the break might still go to the finish. While the AI can use like 4-5 guys to ride you in.
The AI never works with you, always wheel suck you instead of helping out.
GOSH - One can download all the amazing stages and databases one wishes, but a broken AI will still shine through.
Now to something more contructive
I've noticed that some of you often win with a weaker rider on mountain stages, if you could explain how the hell you do that, then that would be most appreciated.
Nah, mountain AI is pretty decent for me on PCM 14.
It's the breakaway AI that's fairly annoying on PCM 14, indeed. I managed to win from breaks sometimes though, so not experiencing the exact same problem.
Regarding weaker climbers: If the guy's explosive, then attack, and do that earlier than the big guns(being a good downhiller helps, then you can expand your gap in a downhill, obv). Or an alternative method is to let the attackers blow themselves up and dot 84 all the way up. This doesn't work that often though(which makes sense, the chances to win with a worse climber shouldn't be too high)
Dusen wrote:
Tried to enjoy a Tinkoff career on PCM 14 with the new Daily.
BUT HOLY FUCKING COW. That AI is just plain stupid to play with. When i go in a break i get picked up again everytime. If it is only AI riders in the break, they go all the way.
And even if you put up your team to bring them back, you can pretty much waste all your riders and the break might still go to the finish. While the AI can use like 4-5 guys to ride you in.
The AI never works with you, always wheel suck you instead of helping out.
GOSH - One can download all the amazing stages and databases one wishes, but a broken AI will still shine through.
Now to something more contructive
I've noticed that some of you often win with a weaker rider on mountain stages, if you could explain how the hell you do that, then that would be most appreciated.
Just remember when playing a stage/race it's you vs all the AI teams. As long as you don't win the AI doesn't care which one of it's riders wins the stage/race.
Dusen wrote:
Tried to enjoy a Tinkoff career on PCM 14 with the new Daily.
BUT HOLY FUCKING COW. That AI is just plain stupid to play with. When i go in a break i get picked up again everytime. If it is only AI riders in the break, they go all the way.
And even if you put up your team to bring them back, you can pretty much waste all your riders and the break might still go to the finish. While the AI can use like 4-5 guys to ride you in.
The AI never works with you, always wheel suck you instead of helping out.
GOSH - One can download all the amazing stages and databases one wishes, but a broken AI will still shine through.
Now to something more contructive
I've noticed that some of you often win with a weaker rider on mountain stages, if you could explain how the hell you do that, then that would be most appreciated.
Just remember when playing a stage/race it's you vs all the AI teams. As long as you don't win the AI doesn't care which one of it's riders wins the stage/race.
Nah, I don't think so. In fact, only the breakaway AI is messed up IMO. Mountain AI feels good for me and in hilly races it's pretty decent, I think. I'd only like the riders to be more aggressive in flat races, because you can't see a difference between a flat TdF stage and any other flat classic. Especially the teams without a sprint favourite should attack more or try on echelons on flat stages.
However, maybe I can help you a bit with the breakaway stuff:
1. Getting into breakaways is most likely when you go as the really first rider. If you're lucky, you have a decent gap before all the hunting on the groups begins, so when finally the group has formed you can just let yourself fall back to that. If you have failed on that (which happens quite often to me because the AI attacks start very early), I usually just wait until a group stands that I think can get away and attack (hopefully alone) when they have more than 30 seconds. I don't know if that works for you, but like this I quite often get in breakaways if I want to. However, I've never won from a breakaway and I usually just put a rider in so I don't have to work with the team when I have not the top favourite.
2. When I am not planning to go in the break, I usually make sure, it doesn't get too big. I am always riding with one or two guys after the big breaks so they don't get an advantage. When there is then a break with 2-4 guys, I let it go and ride after the ones trying to bridge. Mostly, you then have a quite controllable little group. I agree that it's hard to pace with the team as somehow the AI domestiques are waaaaay stronger than yours, so even if I pursue with 2-3 guys at 75 to 80, I don't really reel them back in.
So I just give them some space to build up a lead and with about 100 to 70km to go, I let one or two guys reduce the lead to about 3 mins. You don't really need big effort to do so. I've always felt like there's a magic mark at 3min, because reducing the gap to this point is very easy, but going beyond takes very big effort. And, yep, I think that's kinda bad. Then I pursue with 80-85 from 50km on, but at some point just the other AI teams will join you and then you don't have to do anything, as you can't really contribute anyway. I don't like that either, but just got used to it.
Nah, I don't think so. In fact, only the breakaway AI is messed up IMO. Mountain AI feels good for me and in hilly races it's pretty decent, I think. I'd only like the riders to be more aggressive in flat races, because you can't see a difference between a flat TdF stage and any other flat classic. Especially the teams without a sprint favourite should attack more or try on echelons on flat stages.
However, maybe I can help you a bit with the breakaway stuff:
1. Getting into breakaways is most likely when you go as the really first rider. If you're lucky, you have a decent gap before all the hunting on the groups begins, so when finally the group has formed you can just let yourself fall back to that. If you have failed on that (which happens quite often to me because the AI attacks start very early), I usually just wait until a group stands that I think can get away and attack (hopefully alone) when they have more than 30 seconds. I don't know if that works for you, but like this I quite often get in breakaways if I want to. However, I've never won from a breakaway and I usually just put a rider in so I don't have to work with the team when I have not the top favourite.
2. When I am not planning to go in the break, I usually make sure, it doesn't get too big. I am always riding with one or two guys after the big breaks so they don't get an advantage. When there is then a break with 2-4 guys, I let it go and ride after the ones trying to bridge. Mostly, you then have a quite controllable little group. I agree that it's hard to pace with the team as somehow the AI domestiques are waaaaay stronger than yours, so even if I pursue with 2-3 guys at 75 to 80, I don't really reel them back in.
So I just give them some space to build up a lead and with about 100 to 70km to go, I let one or two guys reduce the lead to about 3 mins. You don't really need big effort to do so. I've always felt like there's a magic mark at 3min, because reducing the gap to this point is very easy, but going beyond takes very big effort. And, yep, I think that's kinda bad. Then I pursue with 80-85 from 50km on, but at some point just the other AI teams will join you and then you don't have to do anything, as you can't really contribute anyway. I don't like that either, but just got used to it.
Hope, I could help
These seem to be some good tips, but I've experienced some different things about breakaway AI. So I'd like to give more things that a person could have happen to them, so they can possibly try to work around it or anticipate it.
About #1, what you said about attacking to get in a break before other people do is probably the best sure way to get in a break. However, if for example, when I've played, and I try to get into a break that has about 30-50 seconds on the peloton, the AI domestiques will just literally sit on your attack and stay on your wheel until you give up or tire out. It's been like for a while now. Also, when you try to get in the break when you have the favorite for the win or have the leader of the race on your team, the AI will either not let you get in the break, or in a stage race, when you have a guy in the break and you have the leader of the race, the AI will not let you sit on, they will attack you 'cause you don't want to try to help the AI shoot you in the foot
To add on about breakaway AI before getting to #2, if you get in the break on a hilly stage or in a hilly classic, whoever leads the breakaway or peloton group going up a tough or even a late climb in the classic/stage can basically ride the group off their wheel and win the classic/stage. If you're in the break, it's a good idea to lead the group up the climb because you will pretty much win, cause for some reason, the peloton cannot reel in breakaways on hilly stages even when they actually try to do so, they actually lose time to a breakaway on climbs. I've have 2 examples, one of where I dropped the breakaway and wound up winning the stage and GC cause the peloton lost time to me, and another example where just yesterday I accidentally forgot to put my guy in the break to lead the group and the 2 other riders, even though weaker climbers and weaker riders in general, actually just rode my guy right off their wheels. So here are my examples, and BTW, I'm using the FCD DB that has edited for team competitiveness, which there is a small chance that could have caused these situations as any database has a small chance of doing so.
Example #1: At a 8 day stage race in Brazil in the month of February, as team BKCP-Powerplus. Yes,a Belgian Continental Team in a Brazilian stage race, realism FTW .
Back to my point, I have a 69 hill climber with 67 Res in level 3 form and average Rythem vs a rider with 72 hill and 64 RES, and a rider with 70 hill and 62 Res. Basically, on the final categorized climb with about 28-30 km to go and about 1:30 to a hard chasing peloton, everyone's done the same amount of work up to this point, no one is struggling, and suddenly, about 1.5-2km into the 7km climb, I just drop/cracked them completely. I almost immediately put about 1 min in about a km or 1.5km on the 2 other guys, and about 45 seconds into the peloton. At the summit of the climb, the peloton has nearly caught the 2 other guys, but I now have 4 minutes on a pretty much cracked peloton of about 40 riders. I wind up having to chase my guy down a little just to make sure attacks from other favorites don't get any distance. To finish up, my rider winds up winning the stage by 3:20 on the peloton. He'd wind up winning GC by 20 seconds or so on my teammate Mathieu Van Der Poel ( Yes, that Mathieu Van Der Poel). That just doesn't make any sense how the break can take time out on a fresher and better climber led peloton? I mean, he made 2:30 out on a peloton just like it was nothing?
Example #2: Same team, but now at The Tour of The Gila, stage 1. Breakaway has 2:30 on a peloton which completely failed on chasing us down, but the climb is very sharp and cycling logic would say that the break would still get reeled in. The situation has my rider, who is in 3 form, has excellent Rythem, and has 70 hill and 67 RES vs a rider with 65 hill and 65 RES, but does have nationality Bonus, however much it may be, I don't really know, and a rider with 64 hill and 62 RES and also has nationality bonus. The only difference is that I didn't lead the break up the final sharp climb. Basically, what happened is that the guy with 65 hill and 65 RES just launched a huge attack and completely sped off, empty my guy's red bar in not even 5 seconds. The other guy also launched an attack just after the first guy launched his, and they both took off, holding the gap between them and the peloton at about 2 minutes until finally attacks were sent off by 3 of my riders who were Mathieu Van Der Poel with 74 hill and 72 RES, Niels Albert (Even with his heart troubles) at 72 hill and 70 RES, and Phillp Walselben at 69 hill and 67 RES, who was also the same guy who won in Example #1. They, in which I mean Albert and Van Der Poel working together and Walselben hanging on for dear life tried to catch the rider with 65 hill and 65 RES who had been leading the whole time, but were only able to catch the other rider with 64 hill and 62 RES and make up only 30 seconds by the end of the stage. Result: Not very realistic results, and that more tired you are, the faster you go. .
I don't think I'll cover #2, but hopefully this small novel can help some people anyway.
The AI is most annoying in classic races. I had my leader in Tour of Flanders getting a bit tired on the last cobbled sections so when Cance and Sagan attack, I decide to stay in a 12 rider group (which included Stybar, Degenkolb, Boom and basically all the other favourites) thinking that we'll reel them back. When suddenly... they all go full retard. Not a single rider on relay except from mine, but when I attack they all respond, and then just go retard mode again.
And this happened more than once. It's almost like the AI riders think: yeah, sure, we want to win, but we want to make sure YOU don't win first.
I find the best way to still be in contention on this type of races is to make all the effort to stay in the first group, but unfortunately this is pretty hard when your rider is not amongst the top 5 favourites.
deek12345 wrote:
Never bought this years game,but do the AI still all attack on the bottom of last climb,GC guys I mean,that pisses me off .
No, sometimes they sue even earlier climbs now when it makes no sense. not a single contender goes without attacking on a stage and actually uses their team for attrition like in real life.
RIP Exxon Duke, David Veilleux, Double Feature, and Monster Energy
As a NetApp Player, i see big differences between HC and WT Races. Really. In HC Its a lot easier to come in the break of the day than in a WT Race. A lot. The Gap must more than 2 min because the peleton is always chasing riders between the leading group and the peleton.
But if the break is ssave, alll riders are on relay.
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