With the past few years of emissions regulations here, increasing safety standards there, and increasingly good imports from everywhere, the traditional values of a luxury car are called into question. What will fill that role from here on?
Will it be more of the same Brougham-laden barge, just more sophisticated?
Or more of the same, just more shameless?
Will we instead pivot towards established practice from the old world, more quality than quantity?
Or damn tradition altogether and zoom forth to a future of origami styling and LCD gauges?
Is luxury for sharing with friends (or minions)?
Or with the family?
Or is it for me, myself, and I?
And last but not least, will luxury remain a maximalization of comfort at all costs?
Or do we need a little driving excitement?
Or a lot?
Pick a direction or invent your own. Deploy techpool wisely to further your car’s objectives. Period-correct looks are expected, but mechanically, don’t worry about historical realism - this is to be a showcase of new ideas and technologies that may or may not make it to the market. Whatever you and your teammate(s) do, make it cohesive and make it count, inside and out.
Priorities
One size does not fit all; cars will be judged in part according to what they try to be. On a 6-passenger limo, Sportiness will be totally disregarded, while Economy, Performance, and Drivability given a lot of slack, but a loud engine can ruin it. On a firebreathing V16 hotrod, Comfort expectations will be lower, but it damn well better dance and sing. On something smaller, Drivability will be expected more, and Prestige less, than a land yacht. Minor brake fade on a plush cruiser is more tolerable than on a GT, but a shortage of legroom goes the other way around.
Thus, the importance of Drivability, Sportiness, Fuel Economy, Handling Performance, and Off-Road depend heavily on what kind of car this is. That said, the common theme here is Luxury, so the kinds of cars the Expo is looking for have a few common priorities:
- Looks, inside and out.
- Prestige. 50 or below is unlikely to get very far.
- Ride comfort. There needs to be a solid foundation of it (30+) no matter how thrilling the performance, absent which, we’re expecting 60 and up. Note that this stat is modified (see below).
- Interior layout. The best ride in the world can’t make up for sitting in a garbage pail. Ergonomics and room will be measured manually and evaluated. Chassis visibility is not required, and recommended to be turned off.
- Straight-line performance, judged primarily by 1km time. Never unwelcome, even in the most sedate plushmobiles it should be at least Adequate (1km in 30ish seconds).
- Everyday useability. The actual Practicality stat will be ignored, for it is broken. Instead, we will consider size, ground clearance, visibility, seat and door count, cargo room (as modeled), and other factors.
- Reliability.
- Value.
Regarding styling, tuning, and equipment choice, the key word is Cohesion; do these things synergize or do they clash? Lore and accompanying notes can make a difference, but for the most part, Gasmean tastes are fairly mainstream. Worth mentioning is that in this universe, manual transmissions are about as commonplace as in Europe, contrasted with the US (where they’re unheard-of in anything without heavy sporting pretensions) and with Dalluha (where almost everything has a stick, and chauffeurs are trained to shift smoother than an automatic).
Rules & Protocol
Car rules:
- Trim year 1973. Model, body, and engine year 1973 or earlier.
- Model and engine family name shall be ATC3 - your forum names.
- No legacy bodies. No open-wheel bodies. Mod bodies generally ok.
- Price soft limit 60k, hard limit 85k.
- Rear double-wishbone adds $3k.
- No functional aero unless you choose aerodynamic techpool (see below). If so, the front and rear of the car are each limited to one wing, or two spoilers or lips.
- No semi-slicks.
- Tires may end in 0, will be interpreted as normal ones ending in 5, with pressure, caster, or other tweaks not in the game.
- For wagon and SUV bodies, the cost of the weight distribution slider will be deducted from the total price.
- Convertibles will get a scoring bonus to mitigate their stat penalties.
- Comfort will be recalculated to remove Gearbox,Torque, and Throttle Response modifiers, and the “Sound Insulation” modifier will be tripled.
- Seats: The Comfort stat will be read as if there were two front buckets and no other seats. This way, front bench or additional seats will not incur a Comfort penalty. Seat assignments are expected to be somewhat realistic and aligned with the modeling, with some leeway for bench vs. buckets or full-size vs compact. Four-seater sedan? No problem. One-seater ultra-personal luxury rocket? Weird but might just work. One bucket in a normal sedan? That stat cheese goes in the bin.
- Quality unrestricted.
Engine rules:
- WES5
- Race parts ok but use wisely.
- Maximum idle speed 1200rpm.
- V16 ok.
- 91 RON unless diesel, in which case the following rules apply…
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- Architecture must be 2-valve. Block and head(s) cast iron. Bore/stroke ratios expected to be somewhat more undersquare (smaller bore, longer stoke) than IRL. Compression ratio expected to be lower than IRL, in the 12-16 range.
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- Bottom end may not use any “light” parts.
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- Cam profile zero. VVT, VVL prohibited.
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- Exhaust must have one muffler set to None.
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- Diesel fuel is simulated by Compressed Gas, LNG 150 RON. Fuel system options:
- Diesel fuel is simulated by Compressed Gas, LNG 150 RON. Fuel system options:
Techpool:
Start with default +5 everywhere. Then choose any two of the following categories to specialize in, and set techpool for those categories accordingly:
- fuel system (+10)
- valvetrain (+15)
- turbo (+15)
- interior (+10)
- drivetrain (+12)
- aerodynamics (+10)
- suspension (+15)
- assists (+15)
Protocol:
Following rules deliberation, this will run in two phases. In Phase 1, sign up for the team-up challenge by posting here, along with which of three roles you could do: exterior design, interior design, engineering. You may select one, two, or all three. You will not be restricted to this role; the purpose is to make sure each team has all three roles covered. Please also state your preferred team size. You may also DM the hosts with preferences of whom you would or would not like to work with. Phase 1 will last one week, at the end of which, teams will be assigned and posted here. Phase 2 - construction - will last another three weeks.
Send .car files by DM here or on Discord to either myself or my co-host @DuceTheTruth100
Resubmissions allowed on a case-by-case basis. I tend to be pretty lenient with those.
