My experiences have been really similar to those above me.
Driving the starter M3, upgraded to about level 170, my heat has been climbing almost twice as fast as it was the first few nights. The starter cops were relatively slow on the first night as well
Now, starter crown vics at level 1 heat will blow my doors off like i'm standing still, while i'm going 160-170mph, and will hit me for 20-50% health with ANY contact, even if i'm the one hitting them at speed trying to force them off the road. The chargers put out even more damage, and the corvettes are so fast they have to be going 200+ mph almost all the time.
My last chase started at the bottom of level 1 and I couldn't escape the starter cops for about 3 minutes, then the chargers and corvettes showed up within about 30 seconds of each other. I could lose them for a few seconds, but cops were FOLLOWING MY EXACT PATH in the city after I had broken line of sight and would obviously catch up and pass me in a few seconds. Now at heat level 4, all I could do was go to the marina and brake at the jumps and try to make them fall in the water.
In the time it took me to take out 3 cops, 4 or 5 more would spawn in. After a few minutes of this bouncing between ramps, I got up to heat level 7, I had used all 3 of my repairs and eventually got busted.
I have not had a single pursuit except for those on the first night that I could get away from, even with severe exploits like finding the two closest ramps over water and bouncing between them.
I've heard plenty of stories of people who have no problems with cops and even like them, but somehow the game is either bugged for me or has a really messed up way of calculating cop strength and it needs to be fixed, whatever it is.
