I'm sorry this has to be said, the terrible state of AI traffic

[Immense7771]

I'd personally rather have to come to a complete stop myself after the AI has an accident than see AI phasing through each other. SCS just needs to figure out how to route traffic to prevent the majority of the issues we are seeing. Making them phase is just a band-aid on a pretty large (imo) issue. I support having traffic move over to the left lane for on ramps. Shoot, I'd like to see traffic in the left lane more in general, cities are incredibly annoying because the AI just doesn't know how to marge to the left lane unless they are getting over to make a turn.

Where I'm from our town has 4 lanes of traffic and a turn lane the whole way through and it isn't uncommon at all to see people sit in the left lane to either avoid people or allow people to come onto the road.

[Reignman]

I'd personally rather have to come to a complete stop myself after the AI has an accident than see AI phasing through each other. SCS just needs to figure out how to route traffic to prevent the majority of the issues we are seeing.

From my understanding, it's not a routing or path issue, it's a spawning issue. Sometimes 2 vehicles end up spawning too close together, so a temporary phasing or clipping when they first spawn, until they get their spacing figured out, could help keep traffic moving. I personally don't like having to stop in the middle of a highway to wait for AI vehicles to sort themselves out because it can literally take an hour or 2 to get a heavy load back up to speed. Since AI cars spawn far enough up ahead, they should get their spacing sorted out before you catch up to them so you might not even see the phasing.

I support having traffic move over to the left lane for on ramps. Shoot, I'd like to see traffic in the left lane more in general, cities are incredibly annoying

Yeah I agree, the AI is obsessed with the right lane in general for whatever reason. I posted a screenshot earlier in this thread of an intersection that had about 20 cars waiting at a light in the right lane, with the left lane completely empty lol. In city driving I try to stay in the left lane unless I need to make a right hand turn soon, just to be courteous, because there's nothing more annoying than needing to make a right hand turn, but you have to wait for the light because the 1 car in front of you is going straight.

[Immense7771]

I misunderstood and thought you meant having them phase through each other on the on ramp in front of you. If they need to clip through each other while spawning out of sight that's fine. As long as SCS can fix the stupid behavior of the AI and they don't get magical powers that I can see in the process I'll be happy.

[Reignman]

Lol "magical powers" ... well I'm not saying you wouldn't see any magical powers as I'm sure the AI will still stop and wait for traffic at the end of a ramp, but it wouldn't happen all that often. It's not like cars will be flying down the highway phasing through each other all the time. I don't see why magical powers would be worse than what's already happening though, both are very unrealistic lol. The way the AI drives defies all kinds of logic. I use my own magical powers when it gets too crazy. I open the console and type g_traffic 0 and make all the problems vanish xD. I wish real life came with a console sometimes haha.

[xbgamerx]

I can't say how many times I raged with this ai traffic. I had come to the point many times to just hit g_trafffic 0, so I could play alone. here's a rant:

1. they go below speed limits: most annoying thing ever. trucks never go more than 60 mph so that makes 70 mph and 80 mph areas like Colorado useless. then there's those minibuses going 50 mph what a pain. speaking of 50 mph, in ets 2 they never go above 50 mph. I'd rather they make them go at least exactly with the speed limit or around 5 mph above.

2. they literally follow every speed limit which makes them nerdy and overall spastic annoying drivers. if there's a mod and the modder accidentally hasnt changed a city speed limit like 30 mph in a highway those idiots gonna go 30 mph for the rest of 3,000 miles or whatever. this has happened in ets 2 promods around london where there's a roadwork and go 20 mph on a highway for over 100 miles. they should follow interstate and national limits, like city, expressway and highway limits.

3. they do idiotic moves. what i hate is that when they overtake, they have no reason to and don't build enough speed so they return back to the right lane. they do this constantly, trucks and cars. I also hate when they flash lights to exit they decide to continue forward and also the fact when they switch to the exit lane at the end of it they decide to return back, I had crashes cause of them you know. one thing I also hate is that they break for no reason, like I'm about to ascend a hill having built a nice 70 mph with a 50 metric ton trailer then there's this dude braking in front of me causing to go down to 40 mph so I could end up ascending the hill with 10 mph pretty nice wasting my whole fuel and this also takes years to get the speed back. oh and yes, when there's an event that covers the entire lane, especially in ats, there's a law where you should merge with the free lane upon seeing it and not stay there until you have it in front of you, causing traffic jams, possible crashes and slowdowns in the free lane.

4. they only get reckless when they have to overtake. they literally go at least 10 mph above the speed limit to overtake me, then when they merge they suddenly push the brake like bro what are you doing, tryina slow me down for no reason? and this circle repeats. they should go reckless and continue this speed without braking down.

5. there's too many cars in the right lane. seriously they're just plain annoying. they won't go away, the right lane is simply designed for slow speed and not a million cars being around when they can just surpass.

6. they don't respond to your actions. simply do, whether its called the big scale lights, the warning lights, the blinkers or the horn they're just plain useless. no matter how many times I flash them off to get away they won't react, back in the day some used to. horn is entirely a decoy, and warning lights and blinkers partially work.

7. patterns are the exact same. simply unrealistic. there should be extremely reckless drivers going as fast 150 mph and police chasing them sometimes other than being random decoy meaning they should ignore traffic lights sometimes and try to pass through spaces if possible without hitting anyone. there should be traffic peaks, for example in the nights the roads can be empty but in the mornings and afternoons they could have the maximum peak. and basically peak days, like Monday could be a regular day with not many drivers but Saturday would and having more reckless drivers during night hours and peak days as well as peak areas. this shouldn't be limited to cars only. truck drivers on hurry, buses that are late and many more. also reckless drivers wouldn't mean causing havoc, we just mean them going extremely fast without causing crashes.

8. AIs should learn to understand where to stop and where not. many customs in ets 2 promods have stops indicating they should stop to get checked and after they get checked they stop cause of that. doing so the developer should have an option to ignore or not ignore stop signs. while you could also tell me about the yield, speed limits etc, those are excluded, as they mostly ignore them (except for yield). and speed limits are set on each road separately not that speed limit signs somehow do a magic job.

9. toll booths and customs are also extremely annoying. Europe is full of those, and there's suddenly many people going to the last right booth where trucks are supposed to go. there's like many empty in the left and they pick the last one which takes me time.

10. they react stupidly and unrealistic. when they crash, suddenly when they go like 80 mph they somehow manage to stop in less than a second. there's also the thing I've noticed whenever I overtake them, they slow down too much, that bothers me. whenever I get stuck somewhere and get the warning lights on they react yes but they never make space for me. ik its hard realistically when a traffic jam builds up but even when they're alone they simply won't back off. concepts such as car parking by a sidewalk is impossible if the road is narrow or the space there is narrow and requires maneuver. also ai traffic gets past anything thats on their way, especially with mods, speed bumps don't work for them. in ets 2 Iceland they can literally go 90 kmh on dirt and snow roads.

[justgettingold]

1. they go below speed limits: most annoying thing ever.

there should be traffic peaks, for example in the nights the roads can be empty but in the mornings and afternoons they could have the maximum peak.

I think Cip's traffic mod from the workshop helps with these. After subscribing to it, you'll also be able to adjust the parameters to your own taste through editing the files. I wasn't satisfied with the traffic volumes that the original mod provided, so I kept changing them until I was. You'll be able to regulate levels of recklessness too. (I guess you can do that even without mods, but as I understand, it will require substracting the hidden files first and then editing everything from scratch, which is more struggle). Although you better be satisfied with the original mod, or you'll also have to update it yourself lol.

Anyway, after playing around with this mod, my night roads are almost completely empty, my rush hours are busy, and my traffic usually goes 2-3 mph over the limit. Sometimes I can even drive 87 in an 80 and there will still be cars going faster.

[Optional Features]

10. they react stupidly and unrealistic. when they crash, suddenly when they go like 80 mph they somehow manage to stop in less than a second.

This is incredible to me: going 60 mph. Car brake checks. I tap them. Their wheels just stop moving instantly. I don't even think the brakes of a 747 could stop a car that fast. It's like they switch phases: moving, stopped.

[Sara]

1. they go below speed limits: most annoying thing ever.

there should be traffic peaks, for example in the nights the roads can be empty but in the mornings and afternoons they could have the maximum peak.

I think Cip's traffic mod from the workshop helps with these. After subscribing to it, you'll also be able to adjust the parameters to your own taste through editing the files. I wasn't satisfied with the traffic volumes that the original mod provided, so I kept changing them until I was. You'll be able to regulate levels of recklessness too. (I guess you can do that even without mods, but as I understand, it will require substracting the hidden files first and then editing everything from scratch, which is more struggle). Although you better be satisfied with the original mod, or you'll also have to update it yourself lol.

Anyway, after playing around with this mod, my night roads are almost completely empty, my rush hours are busy, and my traffic usually goes 2-3 mph over the limit. Sometimes I can even drive 87 in an 80 and there will still be cars going faster.

Can I ask what you have it set on with the edits? I am kinda curious on for that actually.

[justgettingold]

Can I ask what you have it set on with the edits? I am kinda curious on for that actually.

What part exactly? I have safety at 0.3 and patience at -0.7, I think these should affect the AI speed. Maybe they can even be changed simply through the console. The traffic density files are too long and detailed to give a meaningful answer tbh.

[Calibuddy99]

This game's AI is the worst. The cars always stop when merging on the freeway even if no one is there, they refuse to get out of your way and back up, and finally, they don't see you until you get close to them, if you're going 70 mph approaching an intersection then just as you are about to be in the middle of it, a bus will pull out in front of you when they could clearly see you sometimes. And then I have to swerve out of the way, and I always swerve back and crash into said Ai bus to get my revenge.