So here's an issue I have and I don't know if the technology works to do this yet, but I'm gonna ask.

I do a lot of songs where I will be at one tempo, then I want to do a ritard, but - in order to keep things in sync - I will do a change like this: 80 bpm=> 60 bpm (two measures. Hold on beat 1 of meas. 2) => 80 bpm again.
But that change is really abrupt, so I have to go into my software and manually shift the beats around so that it creates a gradual slowing. This is a time-consuming process, since I export all the tracks individually.

So my question is: is it possible to add an option to the tempo change section so it gradually slows (eg: 80 down to 60), but it maintains the tempo underneath, so it would be ritarding OVER the 60 bpm tempo? That way I could keep it in time with the metronome in Cakewalk (more or less).

I hope that made sense. But having ANY kind of ritard feature - where I can tell it what tempo I want it to slow down to - would be incredibly helpful and time-saving for me. Thanks.

This is an area where BIAB could be improved. Tempos are integers only, and the settings in F5 affect a full measure.

Your DAW (and, I think, RealBand) can handle non-integer tempos.

My workaround is the take the final audio and use my audio editor to stretch where I need a ritard. But I realize this doesn't help you in BIAB.

I can't say for sure, but I think this is on a list of improvements that PG Music are considering implementing. Hopefully in the next major release.

Definitely a +1 from me.

Great idea!
+1

In situations like you're describing I've found the "% change in tempo" F5 setting works better than the "tempo change to" F5 setting.

% change in tempo takes some experimentation to obtain the slowdown you want but the results are very natural once you find the right percentage for the song. Also realize the slowdown is cumulative so instead of trying to apply the slowdown in one bar try spreading it out over several bars.

I never thought of trying that, however the problem I run into is I really need to know the tempo I'm going to land at. Sometimes it's in the middle of a song and I need to have everything tie together before it goes back to a certain tempo, etc.
So for most of what I do, using the percent decrease isn't terribly helpful. However, it could be very useful for rits on outros where nothing's coming back in and it doesn't really matter all that much. Thanks for the suggestion.