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

Originally Posted by Jinko

You can't cast whilst running no, because you are running before you cast the spell, the server already knows its an illegal action.

And it takes at least 0.6s from my testing before the server acknowledged what I'm doing is illegal, for an action that is illegal 100% of the time. If it was possible to 'force an update', I'd expect to get the result of my illegal action back earlier, but this is clearly not the case. Try it yourself. Start with autorun and try to reliably stop your spell by doing anything you want. There's no skill factor because what you're doing is 100% illegal to begin with, so all you're doing is trying to tell the server 'hey look this is impossible!'. The time it takes you to interrupt the spell represents exactly how far behind the server you are.

try walking and casting sustain or a spell with a short cast time, you actually get it to resolve! Pretty cool, but kind of sad.

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.

I don't know if this has been said in this long thread, but if they can't change the 300 ms position update system, I wish they would just apply the damage of AoE's 300 ms after the red area disappears (make the red area last 150-300 ms less to compensate for balance if needed). I don't care what the fix is really, as long as when I'm out of the red area I don't get hit by the damage (barring lag on my end). Raiding needs precision, and right now it can sometimes feel a bit too sloppy.

Originally Posted by APilgrim

Actually I just mentioned teleporting bots as demonstrable evidence of how the client server relationship works in this game. But it's completely possible with the way this game is set up for the client to be telling the server when/where/what is going on - as opposed to what you stated that the "client has no ability whatsoever to force anything to happen on the server". The server in this game listens to the client in regards to character position apparently (and not the other way around as you made it sound). Maybe I just misunderstood your other post.

My understanding of this hack is that they are modifying the packets to give the server incorrect information. People have decrypted the packets and are injecting them with false positioning data thus teleporting. Its basically a man in the middle attack.Modifying the packets before they leave your machine on the way to the server and modifying them before they are received by the client. Its how they were able to add any item in the games database to their inventory by buying hi potions.

Originally Posted by azethoth

My understanding of this hack is that they are modifying the packets to give the server incorrect information. People have decrypted the packets and are injecting them with false positioning data thus teleporting. Its basically a man in the middle attack.Modifying the packets before they leave your machine on the way to the server and modifying them before they are received by the client. Its how they were able to add any item in the games database to their inventory by buying hi potions.

Either editing outbound packets - or simply editing memory since that's probably easier than decrypting packets. Either way it works because the server accepts what it thinks the client is telling it.

From the server's point of view, you're always teleporting around. The server does not attempt to model the player's movement. Just look at pathing for mobs and it should be obvious why the server doesn't even attempt to try to figure this out (because it can't). When your client tells server that player is position XYZ, the server implicitly assumes that the player just teleported there, because it has no ability to model the player's pathing (way too computational expensive). So teleporting hacks are easy as you're just changing the value of XYZ you're reporting back. All the server can do is sanity check (e.g. see if you moved way too fast). It absolutely has no way of attempting to try to figure out how you moved there. But unless you're planning to use teleport hacks to deal with the unresponsiveness (and I'm sure that'll work, if you didn't get banned first), that's not exactly a viable solution.

Originally Posted by Astarica

From the server's point of view, you're always teleporting around. The server does not attempt to model the player's movement. Just look at pathing for mobs and it should be obvious why the server doesn't even attempt to try to figure this out (because it can't). When your client tells server that player is position XYZ, the server implicitly assumes that the player just teleported there, because it has no ability to model the player's pathing (way too computational expensive). So teleporting hacks are easy as you're just changing the value of XYZ you're reporting back. All the server can do is sanity check (e.g. see if you moved way too fast). It absolutely has no way of attempting to try to figure out how you moved there. But unless you're planning to use teleport hacks to deal with the unresponsiveness (and I'm sure that'll work, if you didn't get banned first), that's not exactly a viable solution.

Sort of (otherwise the server wouldn't override where the client thinks your character is in regards to AOE attacks and what-not and this thread and all the complaints wouldn't exist). I'm not attempting to offer solutions and bringing up teleporting was just to show it's not that clear-cut.

Originally Posted by Sethius

I don't know if this has been said in this long thread, but if they can't change the 300 ms position update system, I wish they would just apply the damage of AoE's 300 ms after the red area disappears (make the red area last 150-300 ms less to compensate for balance if needed). I don't care what the fix is really, as long as when I'm out of the red area I don't get hit by the damage (barring lag on my end). Raiding needs precision, and right now it can sometimes feel a bit too sloppy.

indeed sloppy is correct terminology