Pay-to-Win Test: Are MotorPass/Summit Interceptor cars better than the free ones?

Well, you're read the title.

People have stated in this subreddit that the MotorPass cars (and to a lesser extent, the 1 Summit Interceptor car) are Pay-to-Win because they have better performance than the other Interceptor vehicles you can get with Bucks, but I haven't seen a post that tries to confirm that or not scientifically. It's just people saying 'oh, it can only be acquired with real money so it must be Pay-to-Win!' Other times, some people swear that the Demon is the best SR Interceptor vehicle. Sure, there is one post in the forums that mentions the Corvette Interceptor is better than the Demon by 8 seconds but I hardly call that definitive proof.

So, with me having (and completed) the MotorPass, I can test whether these cars are better or not. Let's begin.

HYPOTHESIS

The Premium MotorPass Interceptor vehicles and the Summit Interceptor vehicle are better than the other Interceptor vehicles you can get with Bucks.

For the base hypothesis to be true, the data must show that those vehicles are better regardless of the player's skill level and Pro Settings by a noticeable margin.

For it to be considered Pay-to-Win, the data must show that those vehicles are better regardless of the player's skill level and Pro Settings by a significant margin.

THE TEST

Here's how I'm gonna determine that; Event times. Unfortunately, this game doesn't currently have something like a FreeEvent mode (I'll discuss that on another day) so I improvised with what's available.

I'll pick 2 races; The Middle of Nowhere for SR spec and Maine Highlands East for HC spec. I picked these events because they have the same weather condition and time of day each time you do those events. I'll do these events 10 times with each vehicle at Normal difficulty (to effectively ignore the AI racers) and then average the times.

Here is the setup I'm using for this test:

1. All Icon Bonuses in the Profile->Pilot->Icon PTS menu will be disabled.
2. The Interceptor vehicles will use max level green-quality parts. This guarantees no hidden Icon Bonuses.
3. Nitro boost will not be used.
4. The Pro Settings used to set the times will be identical for all Interceptor vehicles. You'll see them down below.
5. The path used in the events will be the same as what the GPS line shows; they'll be no corner-cutting and no shortcuts (intentional or otherwise) will be used.

I'm not the best driver but I'll try my best to get consistent times. Additionally, in order for the times to be accurate, I have to follow the setup above and try not to hit solid objects like barriers head-on, trees, or rocks. If something stops me or significantly slows me down, that's a restart. Additionally, if I break setup #5, that's a restart as well.

Also, there have been claims that vanity tires slightly change the performance of vehicles when applied because some vanity tires slightly change the suspension setup model. While I'm not entirely convinced of this, I'll have to report, for the sake of full disclosure, that all Interceptor vehicles have the Interceptor Unit Tire equipped.

Finally, I'm using a regular Xbox One controller, no steering wheel with pedal setup.

PRO SETTINGS

Here are the settings I used for this test:

TRACTION CONTROL  ABS  ESP  DRIFT ASSIST  AERO DISTRIBUTION  DIFF DISTRIB*  GEARBOX  TIRE GRIP FRONT  TIRE GRIP REAR  BRAKE POWER  BRAKE BALANCE  SUSP COMP FRONT  SUSP REB FRONT  SUSP COMP REAR  SUSP REB REAR  SUSP GEOM CAMBER FRONT  SUSP GEOM CAMBER REAR  ARB FRONT  ARB REAR  *Used on the BMW M8, Bugatti Chiron, and Lamborghini Veneno 

Ugly I know, but it is what I used.

Also, you could argue that these settings might not be the best for the vehicles but the implied argument when people accuse these cars to be Pay-to-Win is that they're better regardless of the Pro Settings. If you tweak the settings to get a better performance, that's not Pay-to-Win, that's tuning your vehicle to get a desired performance and you can do that with every vehicle. If the implied argument is correct, then the data should show that these cars will get much faster times when all vehicles are using the same Pro Settings.

RESULTS

So, after all that, what are the results? Remember, the events chosen for this test are The Middle of Nowhere for SR spec and Maine Highlands East for HC spec.

Without further ado, here are the results:

STREET RACE

2018 DODGE CHALLENGER SRT DEMON INTERCEPTON UNIT

Times:

1. 2:27.577
2. 2:25.296
3. 2:24.534
4. 2:26.005
5. 2:26.356
6. 2:26.696
7. 2:25.319
8. 2:24.618
9. 2:25.429
10. 2:24.713

AVG: 2:25.654

2019 BMW M8 COMPETITION COUPE INTERCEPTION UNIT

Times:

1. 2:22.614
2. 2:21.976
3. 2:21.868
4. 2:22.391
5. 2:22.934
6. 2:23.760
7. 2:23.347
8. 2:21.815
9. 2:21.712
10. 2:22.198

AVG: 2:22.461

2020 CHEVROLET CORVETTE STINGRAY INTERCEPTION UNIT

1. 2:27.747
2. 2:26.613
3. 2:27.392
4. 2:24.874
5. 2:24.683
6. 2:26.455
7. 2:25.990
8. 2:26.548
9. 2:24.633
10. 2:26.855

AVG: 2:26.179

2020 FORD MUSTANG SHELBY GT500 INTERCEPTION UNIT

1. 2:28.722
2. 2:28.516
3. 2:27.358
4. 2:26.987
5. 2:27.751
6. 2:27.181
7. 2:27.962
8. 2:27.844
9. 2:27.978
10. 2:27.039

AVG: 2:27.734

HYPERCAR

2013 LAMBORGHINI VENENO INTERCEPTION UNIT

Times:

1. 3:28.517
2. 3:25.288
3. 3:22.131
4. 3:21.350
5. 3:24.036
6. 3:23.282
7. 3:28.840
8. 3:23.256
9. 3:21.759
10. 3:22.646

AVG: 3:24.111

2017 BUGATTI CHIRON INTERCEPTION UNIT

Times:

1. 3:18.224
2. 3:17.734
3. 3:21.667
4. 3:21.316
5. 3:21.234
6. 3:17.117
7. 3:19.829
8. 3:20.678
9. 3:16.573
10. 3:20.593

AVG: 3:19.496

2017 FORD GT INTEREPTION UNIT

Times:

1. 3:19.297
2. 3:22.376
3. 3:24.014
4. 3:22.460
5. 3:23.132
6. 3:23.505
7. 3:20.966
8. 3:20.778
9. 3:19.321
10. 3:22.648

AVG: 3:21.850

FINAL RESULTS

Street Race Times:

1. 2:22.461=2019 BMW M8 COMPETITION COUPE INTERCEPTION UNIT
2. 2:25.654=2018 DODGE CHALLENGER SRT DEMON INTERCEPTON UNIT
3. 2:26.179=2020 CHEVROLET CORVETTE STINGRAY INTERCEPTION UNIT
4. 2:27.734=2020 FORD MUSTANG SHELBY GT500 INTERCEPTION UNIT

Hypercar Times

1. 3:19.496=2017 BUGATTI CHIRON INTERCEPTION UNIT
2. 3:21.850=2017 FORD GT INTEREPTION UNIT
3. 3:24.111=2013 LAMBORGHINI VENENO INTERCEPTION UNIT

CONCLUSION

I want to say that I have no bias here, considering that I don't do events to get world records. That being said, 2 MotorPass Interceptor vehicles are better than the free Interceptor vehicles, but the Bugatti Chiron doesn't really count as that vehicle is in a free reward tier, meaning anyone can currently get it, which leaves the BMW M8 as the 1 vehicle that's better than the Dodge Demon, the free vehicle.

As for the Summit HC Ford Interceptor? Well, as you can see from the data, it's average so it's a non-issue.

But is this Pay-to-Win? I would argue no.

Pay-to-Win means that all you have to do is purchase this item with real money and when you use that item, it's much better than the other items with no work needed from the player to make it better. As you saw from the data, the BMW M8 is 3 seconds faster than the Dodge Demon. 3 seconds is a noticeable difference to make the base hypothesis true but not significant enough to make it Pay-to-Win, like the 8 second difference mentioned in that forum post.

Speaking of that forum post, the most likely explanation for its claims is that the player the forum post is referencing must've tweaked the Pro Settings to make the vehicle perform better. For something to be Pay-to-Win requires no additional input from the player apart from acquiring the item in the first place.

Are the MotorPass vehicles high on Summit leaderboards? Yes, they are but this is because people are tuning them to get the best performance out of them (something some players have already been doing since the game's launch to get world records) and not every player will deal with the Pro Settings. It makes it a bad decision to put those cars exclusively in the MotorPass and it's unfair to those who don't pay but I can't outright claim that they're Pay-to-Win.

Do you disagree with my testing? Then you're more than welcome to do the same testing I did with the same setup I used and the same events I did and see what times you get. Hell, if there were better events I could've used for the event time testing, let me know.

In the end, regardless if these vehicles are Pay-to-Win or not, having exclusive vehicles in the MotorPass was a very bad idea. I'm doubtful that S1E2's MotorPass won't have exclusive vehicles but this, at the very least, must not be repeated in S2E1.

^{EDIT: forgot about the HC Summit vehicle.}