Limit lag compensation to 300 ms

245

Comments

  • UncleCrunchUncleCrunch Mayonnaise land Join Date: 2005-02-16 Member: 41365Members, Reinforced - Onos

    I don't wanna be the bad guy but :
    It would be nice to get an satisfying explanation on why the overall quality just decreased these days.

    Server are the same (mine included). Client are more or less the same. Ok, kenny bought a shiny new PC but not everyone. I believe there is no EMP bomb that fell on the InternetS that forces all packets to be rerouted through Japan... So... That doesn't leave much choices.

    I have a good ping on the servers i connect to (30-50 most of the time, 80 max in rare exception) as most of the other players. I never play on server above 18 slots. I use to check ping outside the game. They are the same.


    Examples :
    -If I stop shotting at a skulk after 15~20 bullets (early game) he just die after a second sometimes (clearly noticeable). Yes the health doesn't go down instantly as a compensation on the skulk side but recently it is clearly growing. It's like behaving like a samurai in a movie. You know he's gonna die, you stop taking care of this quadruped. And you sheath your sword and start to walk away. Then we hear the metal click sound of the sword locking, then the skulk just falls...

    On the skulk side, ambush spots as they are known by the opponent start to be death nests. Even if you anticipate and make a move, you're ultimately too late. At some point you can't manage it.

    -If I enter a room running and a skulk is waiting for me. I'm sure I emptied a full clip before he sees me firing half of it (and I'm generous). That is a noticeable amount of time. Sometime you don't even see them moving before they die. Ok, It's always the case for online games, but this situation cannot be unnoticed with this last build. Almost close to Battelfield 4 (sorry, just saying).

    -Same goes for FPS. Significant drop on client side since last patch. If FPS has an influence on the so called netcode... what can i say ?

    -Once I had the same symptoms posted by Metroid. I have a SSD (not full), an I7, a huge load of ram. Well where did i do wrong ? I mean I can render almost real time in blender while editing a simple scene. Restarting/resetting a game shouldn't look like this. If calculation are at 0, well maybe the calculation aren't in the queue yet...

    -We clearly see that if people have a ping above 100 the more they use mouse-wheel the more teleportation happens.
    But the fun thing is that if ppl have a really good ping (under 30) the same happens. But "net_stats" says no choke, no error and such. If he says so...

    I mean everything is the same except the build number of NS2. Unless somebody left "all_debug=1" which would be a good classic joke (everybody fell for that one, at least one time) : My opinion is "I'm afraid there is an issue there, not on the rest".
  • DaanVanYperenDaanVanYperen The Netherlands Join Date: 2013-06-16 Member: 185580Members, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow
    Compared to other fast paced games NS2 does make 50ms ping feel like 250ms.

    I kinda like this aspect of the game, allows me to blame my lack of skill on something else!
  • shonanshonan Join Date: 2013-01-28 Member: 182562Members, Reinforced - Shadow
    Compared to other fast paced games NS2 does make 50ms ping feel like 250ms.

    I kinda like this aspect of the game, allows me to blame my lack of skill on something else!

    Compared to what games exactly? I can say the same thing other way around, throwing claims like that without reference is useless.
  • cooliticcoolitic Right behind you Join Date: 2013-04-02 Member: 184609Members
    Compared to other fast paced games NS2 does make 50ms ping feel like 250ms.

    I kinda like this aspect of the game, allows me to blame my lack of skill on something else!

    I know for certain that COD makes 50ms feel like 400ms (they refuse to fix their crappy lag compensation).

    It is rather not the ping that's the problem, usually the tick rate.
  • IronHorseIronHorse Developer, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributor Join Date: 2010-05-08 Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
    edited October 2014
    @UncleCrunch‌
    Are you even playing on servers with (properly) modified network rates?
    Such lag compensated related issues happen in AAA games with insane budgets too :


  • DaveodethDaveodeth Join Date: 2012-11-21 Member: 172717Members
    Using Battlefield as an example probably isn't the best. A dev house notorious for buggy releases with up to 64 players is not a go to.
  • DaanVanYperenDaanVanYperen The Netherlands Join Date: 2013-06-16 Member: 185580Members, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow
    edited October 2014
    shonan wrote: »
    Compared to other fast paced games NS2 does make 50ms ping feel like 250ms.

    I kinda like this aspect of the game, allows me to blame my lack of skill on something else!

    Compared to what games exactly? I can say the same thing other way around, throwing claims like that without reference is useless.

    Was just setting up the joke XD! But since you asked, there's a couple of Source games that on average certainly feel a lot tighter.

    I'm aware comparing a plain FPS with NS2 is not fair. High velocity aliens with wildly twisting hitboxes are bound to exacerbate latency issues, close range melee means a lot of abrupt turning, it's already quite a feat the game is even as playable as it is.
    IronHorse wrote: »
    Are you even playing on servers with (properly) modified network rates?

    It would be good if the server list would advertise properly modified servers for all us low-brow non server admins. A tickrate in the title tells me nothing with all the new tweakable settings. Plus might motivate the other server owners to invest.
    IronHorse wrote: »
    Such lag compensated related issues happen in AAA games with insane budgets too :

    Not a very strong argument against why a tighter experience shouldn't be more of a focal point in such a fast paced game. Especially with strong technical coders on the CDT volunteering their time. As long as they contribute your budget isn't gone. So why not put a couple of days towards making this experience better. Or better, just backlog it until some time frees up. Not saying redo the netcode, but at least work towards a status quo of better tuned servers.

  • IronHorseIronHorse Developer, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributor Join Date: 2010-05-08 Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
    edited October 2014
    Not a very strong argument against why a tighter experience shouldn't be more of a focal point in such a fast paced game. Especially with strong technical coders on the CDT volunteering their time.
    It is a strong argument given the vast budget differences and resources between the two developer teams : 4-8 people with fan funding versus 120+ people with an EA near unlimited budget.

    You can focus on something all you'd like - but if the resources aren't there to develop it.. all the focus in the world may not necessarily mean much.
    That being said, CDT HAS made this experience better.. these network variables HAVE been unlocked due to our team, allowing you to mimic HL1/gold src engine level of network updates if you know how and have the hardware to support it.

    If instead you are suggesting to change the default values for all servers.. well that would be a poor idea due to the hardware variances and the fact that even today, 2 years later, many populated servers are STILL mismanaged and suffer huge performance issues even using default values or no mods. (I won't name drop but if you live in the US you know exactly which servers do this and don't respond to emails)
  • DaanVanYperenDaanVanYperen The Netherlands Join Date: 2013-06-16 Member: 185580Members, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow
    edited October 2014
    IronHorse wrote: »
    It is a strong argument given the vast budget differences and resources between the two developer teams : 4-8 people with fan funding versus 120+ people with an EA near unlimited budget.
    That's a good argument why it isn't there /yet/, not why it never could. Plus, you can't with a straight face claim the team is too small to improve netcode, and then in the same post say you added parameters that do just that! With that logic the small team fallacy would be equally applicable to any other feature released in 267-269.

    What I suspect you are implying is "we have more important things planned out till the foreseeable future" or "this is not something I personally see any value in investing more time into".
    If instead you are suggesting to change the default values for all servers.. well that would be a poor idea due to the hardware variances and the fact that even today, 2 years later, many populated servers are STILL mismanaged and suffer huge performance issues even using default values or no mods. (I won't name drop but if you live in the US you know exactly which servers do this and don't respond to emails)
    Here, I'l quote one missed suggestion from that same post:
    It would be good if the server list would advertise properly modified servers for all us low-brow non server admins.

    Sounds like the new parameters caused a schism in the server pool, introducing partially broken and possibly optimized servers alongside vanilla ones. There's no way a player could tell the difference, except hoping NoLag tags are not made up.

    Maybe it's time to address mismanaged servers in a way that suits a smaller team with a community that loves to contribute. Like better self education resources for server admins, I bet one of the CDT, or even any community member can take an evening to write up a more detailed configuration and hardware guide.

    And if such a guide exists, promote it on the UW outlets! Lobby the server admins, package it with the server!

    You are 95% there, it's very much in the public eye, why not add it to the bottom of the backlog and if it ever turns up, great! If not, at least people here felt heard.
  • DC_DarklingDC_Darkling Join Date: 2003-07-10 Member: 18068Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver
    What is everyone complaining about?
    Source 2009 had 100ms interp, ns2 has 100ms interp.
    https://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Source_Multiplayer_Networking
    Also it shows many games use a tickrate of 30. Just saying!

    Servers do not just need a stable 30 tickrate. Update rates and bandwith per player are also needed among others, and most servers currently running do it wrong!
    (if anyone wonders if the taw servers do it right... we are working on it. ;) )
  • DaanVanYperenDaanVanYperen The Netherlands Join Date: 2013-06-16 Member: 185580Members, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow
    edited October 2014
    Update rates and bandwith per player are also needed among others, and most servers currently running do it wrong! (if anyone wonders if the taw servers do it right... we are working on it. ;) )

    It would account for the bad experience people claim to have if most servers do it wrong. Sounds like a good place to start improving things!

    There's only a page of popular populated servers, even less if you ignore the atypical player count ones.
  • xDragonxDragon Join Date: 2012-04-04 Member: 149948Members, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Gold, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Shadow
    From what I have seen I wouldn't recommend changing any rates with NS2 currently, aside from maybe increasing the max data cap a bit. There are problems with NS2's net code that require some significant debugging to figure out I suspect, something which there is currently no reliable tools to do so with. However netcode problems are probably some of the most difficult things to debug, as the state of everything on the server is not something that can be easily monitored in real time. Probably every game ever released with lag compensation has had bugs, some which took a long time to fix, and some which have never been fixed.

    How Spark handles lag compensation has theoretical advantages to say Source which is dependent on server ticks for snapshots, so increasing the tickrate of NS2 is actually quite pointless, unless you want smoother drifters. That said increasing the update rates and adjusting interpolation to match would be beneficial and does provide improvements, however it also seems to exacerbate some of the netcode issues. Hopefully debugging tools can be added and some of the issues can be found, but its certainly no easy task.
  • DaanVanYperenDaanVanYperen The Netherlands Join Date: 2013-06-16 Member: 185580Members, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow
    edited October 2014
    What would such a debugging tool entail? A mod that records and an external tool to unify and analyse client/server recordings? Or would the recorder need to be lower level.

  • develdevel Join Date: 2014-09-13 Member: 198444Members
    What tool? Where have you got this idea?

    To fix this problem, the guy who understands that subsystem should just spend some time.

    If everyone on the server has 50 ping then I expect the lag to be around 150 (double ping + tick). And I don't understand how skulk lands two bites (it is normally 450 ms) during this time.
  • DaanVanYperenDaanVanYperen The Netherlands Join Date: 2013-06-16 Member: 185580Members, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow
    I'm referring to the tool in @xDragon's insightful post right above mine.
  • xDragonxDragon Join Date: 2012-04-04 Member: 149948Members, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Gold, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Shadow
    The tool would need to be engine level, you cannot do much currently in LUA to validate lag compensation results (aside from some stuff on a listen server).

    As for delays with response to inputs, that could unfortunately be more complex. I am not sure exactly how Spark handles player inputs - but I think they are processed immediately when the server receives them (ala Source post Orange Box), but they could also be queued on the server and processed all on the next tick. With the server tick and update rates being out of sync also, there is the potential for quite a bit of variability. You could also factor in human reaction times and the perception of taking the damage, the second which could use improvement in NS2.

    As a note, i've also noticed that NS2 can tend to over exaggerate pings and I sometimes wonder if the packet latency calculation is based on ping which often times seems inflated.. hmmm
  • IronHorseIronHorse Developer, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributor Join Date: 2010-05-08 Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
    edited October 2014
    To add to what dragon said :

    One of the symptoms we found in testing the highest rates that a very powerful server could handle, we found that many clients would run into a wall processing LUA, creating hitches.
    Meaning at the highest levels, (~4x the current update rates) the bottleneck became processing the world on the client - which is very difficult to improve upon. (although the CDT has recently implemented some potential improvements for the next patch)

    But this doesn't mean you can't currently increase values a bit for improvements, with little to no downsides, so long as your server can handle the extra traffic and processing and you know precisely how to configure it. Any improper configuration will have issues.
  • bizbiz Join Date: 2012-11-05 Member: 167386Members
    Compared to other fast paced games NS2 does make 50ms ping feel like 250ms.

    i've actually seen this mentioned in some form or another by a lot of players
    i don't see how 100ms interp accounts for way more than 100ms of extra lagginess


    and i don't think the tickrate is the fundamental problem
    other games with low tick rates (eg. quake live has 40) still manage to get updates to their clients in time


    if lag compensation is capped (most fast-paced/competitive games do this), then the most egregious problems should become less of an issue. that would at least be some progress



    in other news, I don't think I've actually dodged a NS2 GL in a while (and I only join unmodified 100% perf servers <80 ping)

    compared to other games with the same latencies, it takes an insane amount of extra time to detect the trajectory in NS2
    in NS2 feels like 2 or 3 whole nades explode before I even know the arc of the first one

    maybe the nades move slightly faster than in other games, but it's still broke ass

    i don't know the internals of NS2 netcode, but other games handle updates of non-hitscan projectiles on the server. that way clients have a chance to dodge them

    launchers are supposed to be balanced by strong aspects (damage/aoe) and weak points (being easy to dodge)
    not getting hit by one seems random since you get 0 reaction time. it doesn't feel like you can use any reflex/movement/awareness skills
  • develdevel Join Date: 2014-09-13 Member: 198444Members
    edited October 2014
    biz wrote: »
    and i don't think the tickrate is the fundamental problem
    other games with low tick rates (eg. quake live has 40) still manage to get updates to their clients in time

    Tickrate of 40 is two times faster than 20 of NS2 standard configuration. But it doesn't matter, because this is just a 25ms difference.

    We are looking for the amounts like 200-300ms.
  • ball2hiball2hi Join Date: 2012-10-22 Member: 163128Members
    devel wrote: »
    biz wrote: »
    and i don't think the tickrate is the fundamental problem
    other games with low tick rates (eg. quake live has 40) still manage to get updates to their clients in time

    Tickrate of 40 is two times faster than 20 of NS2 standard configuration. But it doesn't matter, because this is just a 25ms difference.

    We are looking for the amounts like 200-300ms.
    25ms is a pretty big difference, in a fast-pace FPS.
  • DC_DarklingDC_Darkling Join Date: 2003-07-10 Member: 18068Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver
    What are you all talking about?
    standard ns2 tickrate is 30 and should never drop below that.
  • SebSeb Melbourne, AU Join Date: 2013-04-01 Member: 184576Members, Forum Moderators, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, WC 2013 - Silver, Retired Community Developer
    edited October 2014
    What are you all talking about?
    standard ns2 tickrate is 30 and should never drop below that.

    They are referring to the update rate I think, which is at 20. NS2's tickrate doesn't really affect anything other than non player entities.
  • SebSeb Melbourne, AU Join Date: 2013-04-01 Member: 184576Members, Forum Moderators, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, WC 2013 - Silver, Retired Community Developer
    edited October 2014
  • turtsmcgurtturtsmcgurt Join Date: 2012-11-01 Member: 165456Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    edited October 2014
    clearly people are referring to the updaterate. its functionality is just referred to tickrate in every other engine.
  • DaanVanYperenDaanVanYperen The Netherlands Join Date: 2013-06-16 Member: 185580Members, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow
    IronHorse wrote: »
    But this doesn't mean you can't currently increase values a bit for improvements, with little to no downsides, so long as your server can handle the extra traffic and processing and you know precisely how to configure it. Any improper configuration will have issues.

    Without insight into the engine server admins are basically just guessing. Bit of a waste for the effort that went into the feature. Is there anyone here who has set up properly and can share? Any tips how to precisely configure it assuming median hardware? @xDragon seems to have some insight in the adverse consequences of some of the settings, anything concrete you could mention?
  • cooliticcoolitic Right behind you Join Date: 2013-04-02 Member: 184609Members
    edited October 2014
    Actually never mind this post.
  • IronHorseIronHorse Developer, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributor Join Date: 2010-05-08 Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
    edited October 2014
    Don't forget interpolation in the explanations, dragon, as it's the safety net that catches missed packets and oddities and ensures smooth gameplay
    FYI: We found around 60 or lower produces odd results.

  • BensonBenson Join Date: 2012-03-07 Member: 148303Members, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow
    Regarding server rate variables, I had head that there was a plan to set up "premade" settings that can be adjusted based on Server hardware...is that even possible due to the variety of server hardware outhere?
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