Why do we accept the ENORMOUS performance drop in this game?
By
Addicted,
Posted on: 2010-02-18 11:57 in ALL ACCESS Gameplay Technical Issues Bugs
Amen brother (or/sister). On Feb 17 I tried an ITF. 45 minutes in the 3rd mish. Worst lag I have ever seen there. (and I have been D/c'd multiple times in that mission). This gave us an action about every 20 seconds. I liked the team, only reason I didn't quit right there.
Why does the staff of this game think that this is acceptable? Do they really think they are the only game in town? New players can get a 50 in like a week now. Then they do the ITF after playing the game for a week. They have no investment in your game or their character. This will be a huge turn off. Think about it. They will be like, this is why I Pl'd a 50? So I can run a laggy mission?
The ITF is a server-side problem. There's a lotta Romans in that valley and correspondingly there's a lotta calculations for whatever shield defense/grant cover/phalanx fighting crap they have going on. Nothing to be done about it because fixing it would involve throwing a lot of hardware at the problem. This is my understanding of it, as told by someone who knows a Whole Lot More than I do.
Other than that portion of one TF, the only other place that I can think of that irritates the hell out of me is the last room in the LGTF, where scenery, mobs and everything else randomly appear and disappear while you go about your merry way. Not sure why that occurs but I sure wish it didn't.
I am pretty sure that these problems frustrate and annoy the devs too. They have a lot of justifiable pride in their work so these things probably drive them absolutely warbonkers.
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Sorry, but that's a very naive way of looking at the problem. The devs on this game know that this is a small, niche game that is profitable but hardly a juggernaut. They know that if they blow it and alienate too many players, they're out of a job. I always shake my head when I see posts that portray the devs as arrogant sadists who somehow take pleasure in tormenting players. |
Originally Posted by Blue_Centurion
Why does the staff of this game think that this is acceptable? Do they really think they are the only game in town?
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They know about the lag in the ITF. If there was an easy way to fix it, they would. Hopefully it'll get fixed some day. If it doesn't, well, players have been working around it for a very long time now by not fighting in "the valley of lag." It's annoying to have to use special tactics to work around the problem, but even given that it's my favorite TF.
Freedom: Blazing Larb, Fiery Fulcrum, Sardan Reborn, Arctic-Frenzy, Wasabi Sam, Mr Smashtastic.
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way too many words and not enough to-the-point|
Originally Posted by Addicted
For a while now I"ve been curious into certain matters in this game that just seem absolutely absurd.
On my mind currently is the amazing degradation in performance that we seemingly accept blindly in the zone of Cimerora/ ITF maps specifically. Would someone please explain why a company/game currently celebrating it's 6 year condones such lousy care of its own game?? My real purpose of this thread is to seek out information that would allow anything to be done about such a beautiful TF/SF performance increase. I mean it's one of the latest advances in the game and plays worse than the first ever TF in 2004. Not to mention it is one of the best experiences as far as I'm concerned, well, if you have a great imagination to mentally negate the visual lag it is. P.S I"m a huge fan of this franchise. I'm not attempting to cause trouble- I'm just surprised about certain things that have gone on and continue to. |
i'm complaining about the lag your post caused in mah brain trying to make sense of the runons
Triumph Lurker: mintmiki 50 emp/archer
basically, if you see a miki on Triumph, it's probably cute and it's probably me.
Huge thanks to cuppamanga and all the folks in the mac help forum for prolonging my borrowed time on this game.
My compy doesn't like Cimerora, so I don't go there.
Elegant solution, neh?
There are no words for what this community, and the friends I have made here mean to me. Please know that I care for all of you, yes, even you. If you Twitter, I'm MrThan. If you're Unleashed, I'm dumps. I'll try and get registered on the Titan Forums as well. Peace, and thanks for the best nine years anyone could ever ask for.
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i likes. it's strong and pretty
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Originally Posted by DumpleBerry
My compy doesn't like Cimerora, so I don't go there.
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Triumph Lurker: mintmiki 50 emp/archer
basically, if you see a miki on Triumph, it's probably cute and it's probably me.
Huge thanks to cuppamanga and all the folks in the mac help forum for prolonging my borrowed time on this game.
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I don't really agree with this. The major problem in the "valley of lag" is the ambush spawns. The could completely remove that mechanism and save everyone a lot of grief. There is still a decent challenge with existing spawns, why make it worse? It isn't necessary and, like mentioned before, people are forced into workarounds to avoid the worst of the lag. Problems solved.
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Originally Posted by Emberly
Nothing to be done about it because fixing it would involve throwing a lot of hardware at the problem. This is my understanding of it, as told by someone who knows a Whole Lot More than I do.
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easiest work around is to pull eveything to the bridge then go for the comp and av's or start from the back with the comp and av's first then move backwards through the map.
I don't have any performance drops ANYPLACE in this game.
I will re-read your OP.
But, is it possible this is on your end?
I could have 900 foes on top of me in a Bugged Rikti Raid with 900 players with me, and I don't think I will get choked up.
What would actually be easiest is to remove the hordes of Immunes that are sat on top of the viaduct, that next to no one ever kills. Immunes ALL have capes. That alone must chuck out a HUGE ammount of lag.
Also, if they stuck a trigger in at the entrance to the sinkhole that triggered a cutscene and the spawning of the rest of the mobs, they could simply have them 'not exist' until they were actaully triggered, again reducing the ammount of things that need calculating and rendering.
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Originally Posted by Zwillinger
GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.
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Originally Posted by Captain_Photon
NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.
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On my gameputer before I just had the 260... I used to lag. That was like, i dunno like forever ago... I think it was 2 9600 SLI... I used to get lag in that mission of the ITF.
Then I upgraded to the Nvidia 260, and had considerably less lag.
Now with the Nvidia 295 and the 260 as my dedicated PhysX card >.> (I know I don't need it) Anyways, I dont have any lag in the ITF now.
Your system specs don't have anything to do with lag like in the ITF or Hami raids (old school raids that is). Tray lag is server side not client side and there isn't much you can do about it.
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But I dont have lag now.
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Originally Posted by Synthetic CK
Your system specs don't have anything to do with lag like in the ITF or Hami raids (old school raids that is). Tray lag is server side not client side and there isn't much you can do about it.
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Then I look forward to your fraps vid example.
So do I.
I'm inclined to believe that the lag comes from the capes.
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Biggest Troll on the forums? I'll give you a hint:
I'd believe the lag comes from capes if it only happened when capes were on screen. However, I can face straight down in Lag Valley and see no mobs but still have mega lag. The server doesn't draw capes that you can't see, and neither does your PC, so cape lag can't happen when you aren't seeing a ton of capes.
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As people already mentioned it, it isn't client side lag, it is a server lag.|
Originally Posted by Perfect_Pain
I don't have any performance drops ANYPLACE in this game.
I will re-read your OP. But, is it possible this is on your end? I could have 900 foes on top of me in a Bugged Rikti Raid with 900 players with me, and I don't think I will get choked up. |
It manifests itself in such way, that client thinks that power has been recharged but server thinks it hasn't. So you cannot activate you powers even they are shown as recharged. Another manifestation of this kind of lag I observed during anivesary and carnie invasion events: once summoned PA was out for more than 5 minutes while they should have been despawned after 1 minute.
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Originally Posted by Perfect_Pain
I don't have any performance drops ANYPLACE in this game.
I will re-read your OP. But, is it possible this is on your end? I could have 900 foes on top of me in a Bugged Rikti Raid with 900 players with me, and I don't think I will get choked up. |
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Originally Posted by Techbot Alpha
What would actually be easiest is to remove the hordes of Immunes that are sat on top of the viaduct, that next to no one ever kills. Immunes ALL have capes. That alone must chuck out a HUGE ammount of lag.
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Originally Posted by Kheldarn
I'm inclined to believe that the lag comes from the capes.
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So P_P's new shiny comp can render zillions of f/x and capes and not suffer noticeably. But I'm pretty sure that the ITF suffers from true server lag, having to do with things like buff auras of hundreds of Cimeroran Traitors all interacting with one another.
So P_P, the way to test this is to get on an ITF and instead of pulling the Generals to the bridge, go out and fight them in the valley. I'm pretty sure you'll experience significant lag.
Freedom: Blazing Larb, Fiery Fulcrum, Sardan Reborn, Arctic-Frenzy, Wasabi Sam, Mr Smashtastic.
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The lag is definitely server side. Nord's comments regarding power recharge lag are indicative of this, just like the old school Hami raid lag.|
Originally Posted by Perfect_Pain
On my gameputer before I just had the 260... I used to lag. That was like, i dunno like forever ago... I think it was 2 9600 SLI... I used to get lag in that mission of the ITF.
Then I upgraded to the Nvidia 260, and had considerably less lag. Now with the Nvidia 295 and the 260 as my dedicated PhysX card >.> (I know I don't need it) Anyways, I dont have any lag in the ITF now. |
As far Pain's new setup goes, the 295's 2nd GPU doesn't have any effect whatsoever on increasing performance within CoX (and may not even be used properly once Ultra mode comes according to Posi). As far as CoX is concerned, the 295 is running just like at 275/285 single GPU.
Additionally, the PhysX portion of CoX is very outdated as well. It cannot take advantage of any GPU cards pressed into purpose as a PhysX processor. CoX currently can only use the original dedicated PhysX cards from BFG and Aegia, otherwise it's all software processed.
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Ah, that's why that happens. Always found it annoying but with your explanation, there's not a thing I can do about it on my end.
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Originally Posted by NordBlast
As people already mentioned it, it isn't client side lag, it is a server lag.
It manifests itself in such way, that client thinks that power has been recharged but server thinks it hasn't. So you cannot activate you powers even they are shown as recharged. Another manifestation of this kind of lag I observed during annivesary and carnie invasion events: once summoned PA was out for more than 5 minutes while they should have been despawned after 1 minute. |
I have a novel idea:
Let's wait and see what happens after the code gets overhauled in order to implement ultra mode.
If all the known lag spots are still present, then we can take this back up.
I, for one, have absolutely no idea how deep the back end changes are going to be, but knowing what I do know about all the known ATI issues, and being told that they are all going away with ultra mode, tells me that something heavy is occurring.
If everything gets worse at that point, well... I know what that will mean for me.
Be well, people of CoH.
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I'd be fascinated to see any lag change at all due to ultra mode. My understanding is that UM is purely a client side rendering issue. Certainly framerate will change with UM, but I don't see why server lag would. The server doesn't care about the number of polygons your video card is rendering, or what resolution you're running at.
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Originally Posted by Bill Z Bubba
Let's wait and see what happens after the code gets overhauled in order to implement ultra mode.
If all the known lag spots are still present, then we can take this back up. |
Freedom: Blazing Larb, Fiery Fulcrum, Sardan Reborn, Arctic-Frenzy, Wasabi Sam, Mr Smashtastic.
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I understand what you're stating, and I've also heard that the lag in that particular case is a server side issue.|
Originally Posted by Sardan
I'd be fascinated to see any lag change at all due to ultra mode. My understanding is that UM is purely a client side rendering issue. Certainly framerate will change with UM, but I don't see why server lag would. The server doesn't care about the number of polygons your video card is rendering, or what resolution you're running at.
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The server may not care what my system is rendering, but the fact stands that some rigs suffer less lag than others during the same ITF. That implies that there's something going on there other than *just* the server getting hammered for your particular instance of the zone. And I've never fully bought that argument anyway. 1 section of 1 zone gets hammered but every other zone instance being managed by that server is unaffected? C'mon.
If I'm getting minimal lag while another player on the team flat out DCs when someone fires off a tier9 nova, then something beyond *just* server lag is happening.
This is why I'm in a wait and see mode. We don't know if the devs learned how to streamline some of the more ridiculous performance-degrading zone design decisions with the code changes involved with changing the game to allow for ultra mode. RV, Gville, CaD and Mercy these days are all poorly designed in relation to end client performance.
I'm curious as to whether those that choose not to turn on ultra mode will end up getting some performance benefits related to the back end changes necessary to get ultra mode working. <shrug> We'll see. The devs haven't stated one way or the other that I've seen.
Be well, people of CoH.
For a while now I"ve been curious into certain matters in this game that just seem absolutely absurd.
On my mind currently is the amazing degradation in performance that we seemingly accept blindly in the zone of Cimerora/ ITF maps specifically.
Would someone please explain why a company/game currently celebrating it's 6 year condones such lousy care of its own game?? My real purpose of this thread is to seek out information that would allow anything to be done about such a beautiful TF/SF performance increase. I mean it's one of the latest advances in the game and plays worse than the first ever TF in 2004. Not to mention it is one of the best experiences as far as I'm concerned, well, if you have a great imagination to mentally negate the visual lag it is.
P.S I"m a huge fan of this franchise. I'm not attempting to cause trouble- I'm just surprised about certain things that have gone on and continue to.
Don't be a mindless farm toon, we may need you on a non-soft SF someday. =)