Oh, that's more like it
After restarting my MyTeam over and over again, I just had my most entertaining race in this year's game. They actually managed to fix the AI!
I had an epic battle for a point in a race that had me destined for a 15th at my best circuit, but the Hards started to really come to me midway through the 2nd stint. Picked off Zhou and Tsunoda over three laps going down the front straight (DRS/ERS works as well for me as it does for them now) and was resigned to 13th when Albon made a mistake(!) in Minerali and held up the two behind him. Piastri suffered damage apparently and I was able to catch him and use DRS, slingshotting me within striking distance of Albon and Bottas. Sold out my ERS to get within DRS range and held onto Bottas for dear life. Few laps later he finally went after Albon and I went after them both, 3-wide into Tamburello! Got the move done and the next four laps was musical chairs between the three of us down the front straight. Bottas got around Albon but had nothing for me in the final two laps as I pulled out of DRS range (their tires seem to wear at or even higher than my rate and there's a definite, almost too obvious crossover point). Finally, a points finish I could be proud of!
The racing on this iteration of my career has been nothing short of outstanding. With the exception of one strange occurrence of final lap rubberbanding in Baku, the AI feels neither stupid nor unfair so far. The best part isn't the enhanced speed (going from a 107-110 down to 102-104) but just how ferocious the AI finally is. I actually had to drive with my mirrors and had to make wise business decisions to let someone past, knowing that they weren't going to back off. And they now respect that I'm in position but aren't going to surrender the position before we even reach the apex. The days of self-imposing "house rules" in regards to racecraft are finally over. I'm still yet to see whether my biggest gripe with the AI has been fixed--not reacting to late-race changing track conditions, but Monaco's forecast looks like it'll be offering the chance to find out.
So far though, there is an extraordinary improvement to the AI and I'm grateful for that. Well done Codies. Be like this for all aspects of your game and we'd have an all-timer on our hands.
