What To Expect In 2024

The 2024 Season of F1® Clash is fast approaching and with it comes a number of changes and improvements; both visually and “under-the-hood”. The team is looking to deliver a season that is both challenging and competitive for all Players.

Track Stats

Up to the 2023 Season, all tracks in F1® Clash have had a rather homogenous feel. Players who develop a winning strategy can effectively carry this across all tracks and find relatively similar outcomes. In reality each track is unique; requiring specific car setups, unique driver skills and clever team strategies to compete. Our intention is to bring that feeling to the 2024 Season by introducing Track Stats.

Two stats will have an outstanding performance impact on each track in 2024. These are the 'Track Stats' that are worth focusing on to achieve the best performance. Players choosing to customise their loadouts to harness these Track Stats will notice a distinct advantage over those who choose to utilise a more generalised setup.

For Duels; each Series will focus around 1 specific Track Stat (eg: Series 5 features Cornering as one of the Track Stats on every track) while the second Track Stat will be determined by the specific track itself. In regards to Grand Prix’s; Tracks will feature the same Track Stats as in Duels, but since Grand Prix race tracks are known in advance, it's possible to focus on both the Driver and Component stats with the highest impact. Allowing Players to strategise on the best possible loadout before each, individual race.

Removing Reliability, Servicing and Player Breakdowns

In a continuous effort to create closer authenticity to real Formula One®, the new season will see the removal of the Reliability stat; the need for Players to service cars during pit stops and in effect, Player breakdowns during races.

This will allow Players to have one less distraction during races and able to concentrate more on their specific race strategy, tyre performance and Power Unit usage. The removal of the Reliability stat from Components does have some knock-on effects which you can read more about below.

While Players will no longer experience breakdowns during a race; AI opponents can still break down. This experience is handled randomly, similar to the chance of a safety car being deployed during a race.

Qualifying Revamp

With the removal of the Reliability stat, we needed to replace this with another appropriate stat for Components. We have done so by adding Qualifying to Components, similar to the Qualifying stat on Driver assets, as in reality it requires more than a good Driver to qualify well for a race.

The addition of a further Qualifying stat does result in a change to how race qualifying will work in the 2024 season.

At the beginning of the qualifying process, an average lap time is determined for the specific track being raced on. A Players total Qualifying stat (the Driver and Component Qualifying stats combined) is used to determine a Qualifying Time range that the two cars could achieve on this lap. This Qualifying Time is then compared with all other opponents to determine a Players starting position.

While a higher Qualifying stat does not always guarantee a starting position higher than your opponent; if two Players achieve the same Qualifying Time, the Player with the higher Qualifying Stat will receive the better starting position.

Grand Prix Event Grouping Changes

Grand Prix’s are the most competitive events in F1® Clash and maintaining fairness for Players taking part in these events is essential. Previous seasons saw Players grouped into competitive “buckets” based on their Season High Flag count. This resulted in the ability for some to be able to exploit this system, leading to some Players having an unfair advantage over others. This system will be changing in the 2024 season.

Players will be grouped in Grand Prix Events based on their performance in previous Events. Those that perform exceedingly well will find themselves grouped with other Players of similar experience while Players who still have some work to advance in the results will find themselves with other similarly skilled Players.

This new grouping system means Players cannot intentionally group themselves with weaker Players for an unfair advantage and will mean the competition during these Events will always be challenging, no matter the level of Player.

Race HUD Improvements

The removal of Reliability and the requirement to service the car during Pit Stops means less distractions during races as well as less elements in the HUD.

The Power Unit meter is now found next to the Engine Mode selection buttons allowing for much easier reference to the remaining Power Unit usage. Pit Stops now only require the desired tyre selection meaning you can pay more attention to the race than what buttons need to be selected. Lastly; the Attack & Defend notifications for Overtaking and Defending are now located under the Team Radio panel.

Boost Adjustments

Due to the removal of Reliability; this results in some Boosts which improved this stat to be updated. We’re aware of Players investment and existing collections of Boosts so have carefully updated only those Boosts which previously had an effect on Reliability. Instead of shuffling all of the affected stats for these Boosts, only the Reliability effect has been replaced with an existing stat. See the table below providing a guide on which Boosts are being updated and what new stat they will be improving.

Stat Cap Changes

During the 2023 Season; each individual Driver stat had a maximum cap of 99 and Component stats had an individual maximum of 50. Both the weekly Featured Asset bonus or the use of Boosts could not increase these stats above their maximum.

One noticeable change regarding both Driver and Component stats in the 2024 Season is the ability for stats to be increased above the maximum, base value of the Asset itself.

Driver stats will continue to have a maximum base value of 99 while Component stats have an increase to a maximum of 60 as their base value. Both the stat increase for Featured Assets in specific Grand Prix Events and the use of Boost consumables can increase these stats above the Asset’s maximum base value.

Using Level 8 Epic Charles Leclerc as an example: This Driver’s Race Start stat is 89. If this Asset received a 10% stat increase bonus during a Grand Prix Event, Players will be able to see this stat increase by 9 (8.9% increase rounded to 9), for a total Race Start value of 98.

If the Player chooses to use a Boost consumable, this can be increased further. Equipping Instinct, which provides a Race Start increase of +10, the overall total Race Start stat for this Driver would be 108.

Grand Prix Reward Changes

From the beginning of the 2024 Season, Players who compete in Grand Prix Events and achieve the best results could see more valuable Asset rewards across all difficulty tiers. Players will no longer receive Coins as part of the rewards earned from Grand Prix Events while Players will continue to be able to earn Coins normally in all other avenues seen in previous seasons such as Duels, Free Crates, Ads, etc.

Club Tournaments, Collection Milestones & Legendary Drivers

Further features coming later in the 2024 Season, see our Season Change video here for some details on what Players can expect.

Make The Call!

The 2024 Season is shaping up to be a very exciting year; requiring Players to utilise all of their Assets, skills and strategy to achieve the best results. Grand Prix Events are expected to be highly competitive with rewards to reflect the challenge. Do you have what it takes to reach the podium?