What does "desynchronise animations" do?

[Grand Duke Vytautas]

Hi everybody! I'm wondering what that "desynchronize animations" button in advanced video options do, actually I don't know how does it affect the performance or quality of the game, so should I mark it? Please explain .

[nokhor]

it slows down your performance because the animations within a unit are handled separately instead of as a unit.

example: say you have a cavalry unit. all the tails on all the horse will cycle through exactly the same motions at exactly the same time. if you desynchronise animations, then the tail of one horse in the unit is going to move differently than the tail of another horse in the unit.

[Zatoichi]

It's a performance versus realism type thing - when your animations are sychronised, all the soldiers within the units are marching in step, the horses' tails all wag at the same time etc. This is less taxing on your PC than if you desychronise the animations - whereby each individual is animated 'separately' (or at least appears to be), making the unit look more realistic when moving. So - if your PC can handle it, desynchronising is the way to go for a more immersive experience.

Gah! You beat me to it, and said it better!

So, yeah, what he said!

[professorspatula]

I'm sure I read somewhere that if you play back a replay of a battle and have different desynchronise settings to when the battle was recorded, the whole thing gets out of synch. So if that's true, don't go turning it on/off during a custom battle you might want to save.

Although I often have it on, I don't think it makes a great difference to the game experience. I always switch it off during large battles to improve frame rates as much as possible.

[Grand Duke Vytautas]

Ah, now I understand Thanks everyone Now where was I with those Scythians? In the middle of nowhere amazon land that's where. Gah! Horse Archers rule!