Can anyone explain “Auto FFB”?

[Jean-Pierre Sarti]

I recently downloaded a mod car that has very heavy steering and that causes Sidekick to warn about force feedback clipping. As far as I know, I can’t adjust FFB strength on a per-car basis, but I ran the feedback controller app (I think this is a “developer app”, anyway, it’s a Kunos app) and noticed an “Auto FFB“ button. I clicked on it, drove a couple of laps, and the car’s FFB became much more acceptable.

All well and good, but nowhere can I find an explanation of just what “Auto FFB” does to the AC settings. If there are no per-car .ini files (correct me if I’m wrong), and the overall gain isn’t changed, is the mod itself being edited? From looking in the car’s folder it doesn’t appear that the car files are changed. Deleting the mod and reinstalling it gives the original heavy behavior.

Hoping someone here can enlighten me. Also, is Auto FFB something that all cars would benefit from? This mod was a pathological case, but perhaps most cars could use some tweaking.

By the way, I think this is the first time I’ve really understood what clipping means — it was a dramatic demonstration of how FFB strength obliterates detail.

Thanks for your help!

(Logitech G920, CSP, Sol, CM)

 

[OldRebel]

Hi Jean-Pierre. The force feedback strength (steering stiffness) can be easily changed on a per car basis. You do however need to access the data folder for the car. Some cars have a data.acd file that you will need to unpack first to get a data folder. This can be done through Content Manager. Go into the data folder and look for car.ini. Double click car.ini to open it or you may have to use notepad or wordpad. Scroll down through it until you get to the [CONTROLS} section. You will see a setting called FFMULT. Decreasing this numerical setting will lighten up the steering and increasing it will stiffen the steering. After adjusting this figure (or anything else in the data folder) you need to do one of two things. Either repack the changed data folder back into a data.acd file OR delete the data.acd file and just run using the data folder. I usually just delete the data.acd file. Realize that if there is both a data folder AND a data.acd file inside a car's folder the data.acd file information will take precedence over the information in the data folder. Therefore, any changes made to the data in the data folder won't be used unless the data.acd file is deleted. Experiment with the setting until you get it where you want it. Don't hesitate to ask me for more help if needed.

 

[Jempy]

Did you first try on track to use the - key of your keyboard to lower the FFB strength ? ( + of course makes the contrary )
Once this setting done this setting will be automatically saved for this car and next time you'll drive it you'll get the modified FFB strength again.

NB someone else will surely be able to tell you where this setting is saved.
EDIT: OK I found it: your Documents/Assetto Corsa/cfg/user_ff.ini

 

[RasmusP]

Did you find the "auto" button on ffb clip instead of the standard ffb app?

There's a standard, non developer app with a little steering wheel as icon.
If has gain, abs, slip, road, kerb like the FFB settings in the menu.

You can adjust these on the fly, while driving

Everything apart from gain will be saved for all cars.
Gain will only be changed and saved for the car!

Pressing plus and minus on the numpad will directly change this "per-car-gain".
As jempy said!

The config file for this is a single file with gain entries for every car you ever drove.

I'm not sure if the gain is even saved for each car for each track (so you'd have to make the adjustment for every new track you drive with that car).

The file is somewhere in documents/Assetto corsa/cfg.

I'll give the exact path tomorrow when I'm back at the pc!

 

[Jempy]

@RasmusP
I found this file and edited my message above when you were writing.

 

[Jean-Pierre Sarti]

Thanks all. OldRebel's response best fits what I've seen. Using app (the "standard, non developer app with a little steering wheel as icon" as RasmusP said), the "Auto FFB" feature will create a new FFMULT value for the particular car and that's saved in the car.ini file in the car's data folder. I think changing the other values using the same app (kerb, etc.) affects all cars. Using "Auto FFB" does not change the user_ff.ini file, though I imagine using the + and - keys would affect that value, which is also a per-car value but distinct from the FFMULT value.

Tip: don't engage "Auto FFB" while the car is moving -- the results can be dramatic and unpleasant .

Thanks again for all your responses.

 

[Stereo]

Auto FFB will edit FFMULT if the car has that file available, otherwise it does it the same way as +- keys, in the user folder. I think that's why it's a dev app, end users are supposed to stick to +- and not be editing cars.

 

[OldRebel]

Auto FFB will edit FFMULT if the car has that file available, otherwise it does it the same way as +- keys, in the user folder. I think that's why it's a dev app, end users are supposed to stick to +- and not be editing cars.

Hi Stereo. First, thank you for your many inputs to Assetto Corsa. You are getting to be kind of a legend in the sim. Having said that, everyone has different ideas about what they want to get out of the sim. If you are one to only play single player and modify the crap out of anything you touch...so be it. Have fun in your own way...

 

[RasmusP]

One little note about changing the car data:
As far as I know you won't be able to drive that car online after changing anything. You'll get a checksum error and be kicked from the server.

 

[StefanoCasillo]

Hi Stereo. First, thank you for your many inputs to Assetto Corsa. You are getting to be kind of a legend in the sim. Having said that, everyone has different ideas about what they want to get out of the sim. If you are one to only play single player and modify the crap out of anything you touch...so be it. Have fun in your own way...

There's literally no point in changing the values in car.ini when there is a system designed to have exactly the same effect built in the game.

2 * 3 = 6 exactly like 3 * 2 = 6... so claiming that you need to change the car data to change the FF mult is simply wrong.

Just use the + and - keys while in the car to adjust, that's why the system is there.. hacking into anything else you have no clue about in order to obtain the very same effect is not a very smart way to use your time and can only lead to confusion.. as perfectly exposed by this very thread.

 

[StefanoCasillo]

obviously my rant above is only valid if you are a player.

If you are a modder you DEFINITELY want to set a decent value in the car.ini in order to offer a solid experience to the players using the car for the first time (when their USER ff mult will be 1.0)... in that case, using the auto ff function is a decent way to come up with a FF level that is comparable to vanilla kunos cars, because that's the reason the dev app was designed for.

 

[Cote Dazur]

If you are a modder you DEFINITELY want to set a decent value in the car.ini in order to offer a solid experience to the players using the car for the first time (when their USER ff mult will be 1.0).

Stefano, thank you for taking the time to educate us, as the creator of the code, your input is so very much invaluable.

If at all possible I would very much like to know 2 things.

One is, I have used the Dev app, on may mod cars, to correct what was non linear FFB in comparison to Kunos original content FFB, either too strong, too weak or just plain wrong.
After 2 or 3 laps, the FFB gets adjusted, both FFmulti and % strength, then I save and I end up with FFB I can live with.
The question is, under what circumstances is this method wrong and is their any undesirable effect that can happen using this method?

Second question is, what is the app doing, if it is not a trade secret, how does it know how to correct the FFMulti and the % strength?

Thank you in advance for taking the time to answer and most of all thank you for this wonderful simulator.

 

[StefanoCasillo]

The question is, under what circumstances is this method wrong and is their any undesirable effect that can happen using this method?

nothing really "wrong" or undesirable.
The final FF gain value is going to be a multiplication between the FF_MULT value in car.in and the user gain value that is adjusted, per car, using +/- while driving... thus changing one or the other will end with the same result.

Using the car.in is going to be inconsistent for cars without the physics data files unencrypted resulting in confusing behavior.

The app simply records FF level during a lap, does some kind of average of the peaks and readjust the FF_MULT to keep these peaks below 100%.. I don't recall the actual numbers but the logic is pretty simple.
So every lap you'll see a small adjustment, in theory adjustments will get smaller and smaller.. obviously this is very track dependent... again, I don't remember which track we used in AC to auto adjust.. it's been too many years

It's all really pretty simple, it's just a gain value, shouldn't really become a big deal.