Thread: .3 Second Positional Update Delay (Requesting Dev Response)

Originally Posted by FinagleABagel

If they reduce it to 200ms, does it not stand to reason that the dodge time frame gets adjusted accordingly? I doubt the devs will make the game categorically easier. *snip*

The issue isn't just about the positional check. That's what they reduced before to try and bandage the issue, so that's what I cited here. The issue is a very large portion of the player base (judging from the Titan strat of having to move -before- skills are cast), are being hit by aoe's if they aren't out by the time the cast bar reaches 85% to 90%. I don't necessarily know that the positional check causes that exact problem.. and I don't know enough about netcode and programming to know how to fix it.

I do know that anyone has yet to show me another MMO with this issue, and latency isn't a problem new to FFXIV, which means other games, even F2P ones, are doing something that SE should be doing. I've seen rubberbanding (I've personal had this happen years ago when my internet had hiccup nights because I couldn't afford something better).. that's not what this is. There are videos on the main post to show the problem.

People have also mentioned similar threads in forums in other languages (like one in the Japan forums or French forums).. so it's not just happening here. If you're fine with it not being fixed, then you're fine with a bug that majorly contributed to killing off the 1.0 release of this game. I'd like the game to remain afloat, I rather like it otherwise. I do find raiding can be frustrating sometimes though, because I dislike being hit by things I was out of, and it feels like a crap shoot for which nights will be okay and which won't.

Why is it so hard when you are hit by an attack to query the players position and if it has changed, and they should not be hit ... they don't get hit.
Last night in Titan a landslide goes from NW to SW, I was beyond clear of it. How do I know you ask ... because when I was 'hit' and fell to the floor I was no where near where landslide was. If you take in to account its a knock back how would I end up on the east side on the arena? I didnt even slide the direction the attack was but a completely new direction all together.

Again a simple solution is to ping the client for an update on hit to determine if they should be hit or not. Timer based updates are bad, have we not learned about asynchronous event based programming yet?

It is a design issue/flawness. Got Dmg or not should be checked in client Instead of sever. They need review this design.

Agreed, yesterday was especially bad, but I don't know if that is an every Monday event or not.

yes I totally agree that for a game with boss fights designed around dodging AOE it needs to be precise and the way to go is to parse the position event based i.e. per damage that may be taken by the AOE.
If they designed their whole thing around a synchronous timer (in which case they should rework their whole infrastructure if they want to keep this game running for more than a few years) the only easy solution I can imagine would be to probe more frequently i.e. per 100ms or so, certainly less than the average lag of a client.
They should invest in the new servers or whatever, the players shouldn't be asked to cope with it. That said, it can be coped with if you are not also having a bad internet connection. Since all major boss fights are scripted with little variation you can memorize the patterns and move preemptively.

Also, never use an action when you are moving away from AOE, because that will cause another position update delay.

@CruciasNZ:

I don't think that's remotely relevant. I've had the exact opposite experience with FFXIV - where this game performs far better than what I'm used to. I think there are network issues, but not driven primarily by the position check. As long as the connection remains stable, human reaction time is more than 100ms - you aren't going to see much difference at 200ms checks. Either way, there are way too many variables to simply claim that you can do X/Y/Z there, but not here.

@Jinko:

No, I don't. Developers compromise far too much. If people wanted a 200ms position check, I'd make all enemy casts 100ms faster. If you had issues under the 300ms scenario, you should still experience the same issues on 200ms.

If you are lagging, then you are both moving slower and noticing casts too late. It goes both ways. Not everything is simply on the back-end for positioning. You can't possibly react to what you can't see, which has to be considered when talking about lag.

Originally Posted by FinagleABagel

@Jinko:

No, I don't. Developers compromise far too much. If people wanted a 200ms position check, I'd make all enemy casts 100ms faster. If you had issues under the 300ms scenario, you should still experience the same issues on 200ms.

Thats ridiculous, so you would take away the actually issue and then make a fake one to take its place, glad you aren't making this game i guess.

Originally Posted by Jinko

/snip

No. I meant lag because it's a broader concept. There are several issues at work:

1) Latency - People see the skill activate late and then are unable to get out of the AoE fast enough.
2) Jitter - People see the skill activate in near real time, but have an inconsistent connection).
3) FPS - There is an ongoing issue that causes a sudden drop in control responsiveness and FPS. Fixed by computer restart.

None of this has anything to do with the 300ms position check. I do not support changes to the timing of skills, because this isn't a universal problem. It would change how combat is intended to flow for the majority of players and would make the semi-active dodging system almost pointless.

Having the server instant recognize when you leave an AoE would be infinitely worse than a 200ms position check, which is already likely to be impossible to implement due to server stress.