Gameplay downgraded?

The slowest PC WON'T drag down everyone though, the server will. (Which it would anyway, even without time dilation)

You don't understand this isn't peer-to-peer the only thing that would slow down everybody would be the server. The server would slow down everybody though even without the time dilation, without time dilation the server is still just as slow yet units teleport, time dilation just makes it so units don't teleport when the main server sim slows down.

you're also misunderstanding : https://forums.uberent.com/threads/gameplay-downgraded.63351/page-3#post-987186


all of you who don't know what they are talking about here need to sit down, read some docs and stop commenting until they've finished.

Exactly. But this new time dilation feature is only lerping movements when the server is already tanking. It'll tank the same way it always did, the only difference is that your computer will try to smooth out the motion when the sim does this now.

nononono. Here's how it works; the sim has a set time period between sim frames. Each frame, it calculates what should happen in 0.1 seconds (of game time). This is the fixed framerate; this is why the sim is always running at 10.0fps (when all is going well). Normally, it calculates everything needed faster than 0.1 seconds, and has some time to spare, so of course the server does other things or waits during this time.

When lots of s***'s goin' down though, the server still has to calculate everything in steps of 0.1 seconds of game-time. This is the case for many games (especially those with physics engines); you have a fixed framerate for the simulation, which is independent of your conventional framerate. The simulation is based around this, these timesteps determine the game time.

So when the server is unable to perform the necessary calculations within the allotted 0.1 seconds... the sim drops below 10.0fps. And that means that your in-game time slows down by the same amount. This has always been the case, there's nothing new here.

What is new is that the client will now smooth out animations, etc. when the server starts running slowly. Time is still passing at the same rate as it would have otherwise, now your robots won't look like they're jittering all over the place though.

At first i thought my idea of time-dilation was plain wrong, but i'm almost relieved to know everyone is just as confused as me.

So i guess it's even open what triggers time dilation (slow internet connection, server load?), and some people actually think this might just be a form of purely client-side 'upscaling/compensating' low server framerates?

If this really is the case, im one happy panda...

The server is also running multiple game servers at once, if you have one big computer hosting ONE server rather than multiple it can put all it's power directly to that server, which means that there won't be any sim slowdown (Until a certain point where it gets ridiculous)

Server speed has everything to do with computer hardware and how many servers are being hosted on said hardware.

So if the connection gets better, will the clients side speed up to catch the server?

Neither of those two points are gone. Server-side time dilation does not change the network architecture from client-server at all. Nor does it make people slow down if another client is lagging.

You've seen the code in order to make these claims?

That's my POINT.

This whole "let's finally cave in to adding time dilatation to the code" is an admission of defeat to the lack of servers problem.

This code is not needed so long as the server can maintain 1.0 speed.

It can't.

Solution one :

1. add servers
   
   Solution two (for the bankrupt or lazy)
   
2. add time dilatation

Uhhh. What? This is a very confusing thread.

PA is client-server. The sim speed is 100% independent of clients. Completely, totally, 100% independent.

PA, by strict design, does not have a unit cap. There's nothing to stop you from building 500,000 tanks on a planet. Or even 5,000,000. Lord willing in another 30 years when we have quantum computers and terabytes of ram you'll be able to build play PA and build 50,000,000 tanks across 100 planets and we don't have to change a single line of code.

However if you build that many tanks today the server is gonna get slow. That's just a fact of life. When it does get slow you can let the client play back the simulated game world either choppy or smooth. Which choices you make doesn't affect the server one way or the other.

That choice is also completely independent of our ability and desire to continue optimizations. The overall performance of the client and server has done nothing but improve since we launched alpha in May 2013. It's been steady, continuous improvements the whole time. Those improvements have been made, are being made, and will continue to be made after launch.

I NEVER SAID THAT

https://forums.uberent.com/threads/gameplay-downgraded.63351/page-4#post-987203

this is an unimprovement.

the obvious solution here was unit cap and more servers

NOONE wants slowdown

So you

So you expect the server to still do 1.0 speed no matter how many units are in game

you missed my above post.

Ahh that's what I thought it was like.

Unit cap would be much worse of a solution.

Now everyone is slowed down because of the server. At least in FA you are able to kick the guy that slowdown the game...

The server however, is a fixable problem.

Once we get the ability that is.

You need to calm down. You are getting way too eager here.

The game is still getting optimised, it is a lot faster now than when they began. This time dilation is not changing a single thing in the game except make it appear smooth on our ends. On the server end this does not change a single thing. If the game is running slow because the server can't handle it the time dilation does not do anything else.

You're making a clusterfuck over nothing.

unit cap is part of the original Kickstarter plan.