Lag: unit scale and graphic settings etc

**cromwell** · 10-22-2004, 17:24

Let me update my previous post. I 'm now experiencing some lag now as well. I guess I was just lucky before, mostly playing other vets, who know not to bog down their systems or whatever. I think the lag is 90% graphics related and 10% net congestions. The 10%, we have always had and dealt with before, it's no big deal. Run a tracert see where the ms times are high and there u have your bottleneck. The graphics problem we didn't have in previous TW offerings. Up until now the units were sprite based and most graphic cards have no problem rendering them, even in big 4v4 games. Now we have 3d polygon models and sprites( when you pull back with camera or units are far away it switches to sprites again) Now weak vid cards will have problems rendering large amounts of 3dunits, plus add the sprites to that equation and people systems will lag. I think this is one of the reasons for desync happening all the time. There needs to be a video setting for multi, or a utility that can simulate large battles and recommend what settings your video cards should have in order to play multi. In other words turn down the eye candy, if u cannot support it.

Anyways I could be talking out my A$$, just a few random thoughts.

Later, Cromwell

**CBR** · 10-22-2004, 17:41

I really dont think its the graphic card that is the main problem. On :com we also talked a bit about it: http://p223.ezboard.com/fshoguntotal...icID=352.topic

One posted:

Ive noticed that RTW is incredibly CPU intensive. I checked this by swapping my old AMD Athlon XP1800+ into my PC (using a 2800+ atm) and got barely half the FPS I had before. Even with a radeon x800 pro. Compare that to swapping the x800 for an 9600pro. barely a quarter decrease.

I have tried lowering my graphic settings to absolutely minimum and there was no real difference when watching the replay I posted here. So far I still believe CPU is the main problem.

CBR

**Puzz3D** · 10-22-2004, 18:15

The 1/3 slower speed I'm seeing in RTW vs MTW isn't due to the graphics in my case. I pull the camera back so all the men are sprites. It's RTW sprites vs MTW sprites that I'm comparing, and RTW is much less efficient at it. There is no network or AI involved when watching a replay. I've put all graphics setting on minimum, and it barely makes any difference in fps from high graphic settings since I have a good video card. It suggests either the cpu or the i/o is the bottleneck. It's hard to think of a reason RTW should be less efficient than MTW under these conditions except inefficient programming. For example, sequencing through a multi-dimension data array in memory can be very efficient or very inefficient depending on the order of the array indecies used. It's very easy to make a mistake when programming and use an inefficient addressing method. Another example could be floating point calculations being done in double precision when you could get by with single precision or even using floating point variables when interger would be sufficent. I suppose there could be more parameters associated with each man in RTW that have to be updated, but I doubt is 3 times as many as in MTW.

**Louis de la Ferte Ste Colombe** · 11-09-2004, 11:26

I have now played a few games....

I must be lucky; I host 2v2 games with large units, between 5000 to 10 000 denarii per army, and neither I nor my fellow opponent and allies faced any significant lag. At those denarri level, not all armies are fully manned (ie, with 20 units)
The only slow down is when I see flaming arrows. Also a lot of missile can be a problem (some slow down during a test with frobeastegg involving 20 archers units on each side

).
3v3 seems to be run OK too, although I have not tried a 3v3 10k large setting yet.

I got an Intel 3.0 Ghz, 1Gb RAM and a decent video card.

Louis,

**CBR** · 11-09-2004, 13:01

And whats a decent graphics card to be more precise?

But you have a 3 ghz cpu and that might be whats needed to play without lag.

CBR

**Louis de la Ferte Ste Colombe** · 11-09-2004, 13:17

Video card is a ATI X800 SE 128Mb. Not the best ATI available...

The good and surprising news is that other players, with slightly older computers and slower CPU were also able to play the game without lag. I don't know on what Tempiic is playing, but she reported that it was going fine.

My conclusion is that I am a good host

Louis,

**CBR** · 11-09-2004, 14:08

Well maybe host does need a good PC. I still like some info from CA but appears they have gone into hiding heh

CBR

**frogbeastegg** · 11-09-2004, 14:21

P4 2.4 Ghz
Radeon 9800 pro
1 gig DDR RAM
512k broadband connection

I get lag when arrows start flying; I played a 2v2 with medium sized armies not long ago and as soon as the player who has chosen Scythia started using his horse archers I started lagging. The same thing happened in other games I have played against archer heavy factions. In that missile test Louis mentioned things steadily declined with each volley of arrows until I was getting 1 FPS, if that. I couldn't even tell what was happening in the second half of the tests.

Right now if you want to kill a frog online just pick Scythia. I can't counter cav archers and the arrows lag me, getting slightly worse with each volley.

**Puzz3D** · 11-09-2004, 15:50

Originally Posted by frogbeastegg

In that missile test Louis mentioned things steadily declined with each volley of arrows until I was getting 1 FPS, if that. I couldn't even tell what was happening in the second half of the tests.

CBR and I had this same thing happen in a 2v2 with large units where he had a missle heavy army. The battle started out without lag. However, as CBR used his missles lag got worse and worse until it became unplayably slow.