Chocobo Racing and Weather Effects

[RyuujinZERO]

Lots and lots of speculation. If someone actually compares all courses, using all different builds, and comparing all 6 of the weathers: fair game. I'll be the first to agree that foul weather should be nerfed. But with a lot of theorizing still missing I dont see the point in making hasty assumptions.

While anecdotal evidence is not the most sound method scientifically - chocobo racing is inherently packed full of RNG and variables you cannot readily control, which means you'll probably never get the precise figures you demand.

You're quite right there appears to be a gradient, as OP says and seems true in my experiences too - the farther you push towards warm/wet, the better/worse performance becomes. But the experiences of dozens of people, with tens thousands of races between them and dozens of different birds all say the same thing: That fair weather chocobos are unduly punished in wet weather - whether that be simple rain, or a full on thunderstorm, compared to foul birds in the warm.

Nitpicking the methodology does not change the facts on the ground.

[Gallus]

Try doing this with a fair chocobo under rain weather:



I did this with a foul chocobo under fair weather.


I wish you some nasty luck trying to win these guys with a fair chocobo. I was lucky in this one there wasn't Teioh and an NPC called Star Breaker which I calculate have a maximum speed of around 500...just so that you make a slight idea of what that is, they can permanently sprint at roughly the same speed as any chocobo under choco dash. R300 is a nightmare even with an R285 chocobo with 460 max speed and 500 stamina. I dread to imagine what it would be like with a permaheavy every time it rains. I'm not gonna be the one to find out, you can give it a wild try though if you want.

[Natsuno]

I've on G5 and it's my 1st fair weather chocobo. And as someone mentioned before, I've been on the receiving end of a heavy whilst on a foul chocobo during rain. It only slowed me down to their pace, and as we were going the same speed, I stayed ahead. This was one of the later birds, so I assumed it was the results of breeding (better stats, high max speed, etc), or being a higher level. Either way, regardless of weather, I could sprint the entire length of sagolii/costa and I'd rank high unless I got badly screwed over during the race. Rain seemed to be a rarity (anecdotal).

Now though, as I've said, I'm on my first fair weather, and I've noticed what a huge difference the weather can, and does make to these birds. Also, anecdotaly, it seems to have brief showers in nearly every race at the mo.

On a side note, does anyone know if prefering foul weather is hereditary? Because if that's the case, then I'll just breed my foul weather chocobos with each other.

[Gallus]

On a side note, does anyone know if prefering foul weather is hereditary? Because if that's the case, then I'll just breed my foul weather chocobos with each other.

I can't confirm, but I think yes. This is however, horrendously annoying to test, given how SE decided not to share weather info on the chocobo registration cards, which means you have no possible living way to test this if you decide to breed with Gold Saucer chocobos (which is what everyone does until P9). Also, given how you can only have 1 registered chocobo at once, you don't know if your fledging's preferred weather is fair or foul until you retire your current racing chocobo. SE really needs to fix a lot of things up.

[Nyghtmarerobu]

One major offender in the theories thus far, in my opinion: everyone (OP aside) seems to compare total time the race took.

Thanks, and I agree with this. Only way to get an accurate reading on how it affects your chocobo is to have it rain the whole race. This is why I think it better to test running to the first chest. Its hard to track time wise except for maybe the clock on the side.

The most telling moment for me, is how once the weather clears up in the wet weather race, the rider gets heavied, but is still moving faster than when it was raining.

The one thing I noticed in the video at right about 4:05 and 4:06 you can see that the 2 birds she passed weren't sprinting. She was already running at a high speed so once the weather cleared up, her acceleration most likely drove her to max speed faster than the 2 npc's who weren't sprinting and trying to conserve stamina. As for the heavy, the NPc that was behind her, passed those other 2 with ease, but if you noticed, hit the red pad, and also took the turn far to the outside, kind of why she stayed in the lead.

I will continue to watch, just hit pedigree 3, so got a ways to go yet. I like all the feedback in the thread, if anybody has anything else to add, I'm all ears, and I'm sure others want to hear as well.

[Welsper59]

Try doing this with a fair chocobo under rain weather:



I did this with a foul chocobo under fair weather.


I wish you some nasty luck trying to win these guys with a fair chocobo. I was lucky in this one there wasn't Teioh and an NPC called Star Breaker which I calculate have a maximum speed of around 500...just so that you make a slight idea of what that is, they can permanently sprint at roughly the same speed as any chocobo under choco dash. R300 is a nightmare even with an R285 chocobo with 460 max speed and 500 stamina. I dread to imagine what it would be like with a permaheavy every time it rains. I'm not gonna be the one to find out, you can give it a wild try though if you want.

Was that while enduring a large portion of the race with Heatwave weather though? Rain is just way too common and is the extreme for the foul weather conditions, whereas heatwave, as uncommon by comparison as it is, would be for fair. I mean the fair weather birds aren't anywhere near as bad in cloudy/foggy weather, as long as it's not rain. Foul weather in general seems to be way more frequent than fair, and I don't think bias has too much of an effect, since people will generally always be looking for beneficial weather and happy to get it lol.

On a side note though, I really don't think the NPCs are bound to weather conditions. It really seems like they're just following a set AI difficulty (making stupid mistakes, slowing down to give an advantage, etc) and doing these things reliably as though they were at the max stat levels for the given R-bracket. I can't speak for anything above 200, but below that it seems to be the case.

[Gallus]

I don't remember if there was heatwave, but I recall getting heatwave a lot of times, and the stamina drain seems completely normal, if heatwave really drains more stamina from foul chocobos, I can guarantee it's almost negligible. I'm at 460 max speed, 500 stamina and 460 endurance. I can sprint just fine the entire race with the passives Increased Stamina III and Head Start regardless of the weather. I'm always left with around 5% stamina left, and my average seems to be around 82 seconds in sagolii (if nothing bad happens like choco meteors, which sadly, happen very often...). I've never experienced a type of weather where I was forced to stop sprinting because my chocobo's stamina couldn't keep up, all the weathers have absolutely the same effect to my foul chocobo (or very similar at least). The only things that drain my stamina abnormally are the occasional bachus wine, caltrops and choco meteors.

[Welsper59]

I don't remember if there was heatwave, but I recall getting heatwave a lot of times, and the stamina drain seems completely normal, if heatwave really drains more stamina from foul chocobos, I can guarantee it's almost negligible. I'm at 460 max speed, 500 stamina and 460 endurance. I can sprint just fine the entire race with the passives Increased Stamina III and Head Start regardless of the weather. I'm always left with around 5% stamina left, and my average seems to be around 82 seconds in sagolii (if nothing bad happens like choco meteors, which sadly, happen very often...). I've never experienced a type of weather where I was forced to stop sprinting because my chocobo's stamina couldn't keep up, all the weathers have absolutely the same effect to my foul chocobo (or very similar at least). The only things that drain my stamina abnormally are the occasional bachus wine, caltrops and choco meteors.

Hmm, but you don't notice a speed drop equivalent to heavy when you get hit with heatwave weather? Honestly, I don't notice much of a stamina depletion increase (not to the extent that Bachu's do anyway) as a fair weather bird in rain. I can see how it's easy for people to associate that though, if that's the case, given the slower run and the stamina it takes to get a short distance because of that.

IMO for now, the only guaranteed benefit that anyone can really "prove" is the frequency of foul weather compared to fair weather. For example, it can rain for the entire duration of a race but out of hundreds of races I've done so far, not one has ever had heatwave for the entire duration... or even for the majority of it. And I say that because there's so many variables at play that it makes it hard to really prove something without being able to do a controlled test. Items, weather shifts, brackets, stats, etc can all truly manipulate data collected to be one-sided unfortunately.

[RobinRethiel]

I mean the fair weather birds aren't anywhere near as bad in cloudy/foggy weather, as long as it's not rain. Foul weather in general seems to be way more frequent than fair, and I don't think bias has too much of an effect, since people will generally always be looking for beneficial weather and happy to get it lol.

Cloud/Foggy is neutral weather and has no effect at all for both chocobo types.

[Alexiell]

i never noticed the other two foul weathers, only rain so far. are they only in high rating classes?