Why the netcode issue exists, and why it cannot be fixed.

[Astarica]

I bet if this game had a suicide command like most MMORPG, it'd still be lagged and you'd still be able to see things like:

You use suicide
Mob hits you for 500
You die

And some people will say well if you could commit suicide anytime you want it'd be overpowered which is why there's a lag and you just need to get better at knowing when to use your suicide ability.

[Steeled]

For Humor's sake, Astarica..

FFXI had "2 Hour Abilities", or "SP Abilities".

Paladin, the mighty turtle tank, had Invincible, which made them immune to all physical damage for 30 seconds.
White Mage, the first and strongest healer, had Benediction, which restored the entire party's hp.
Monk, a boxer of sorts, had Hundred Fists, where it would land blow after blow, non-stop, for the duration.
etc...

And then there was Ninja. Ninja had Mijin Gakure. The only purpose of this ability, for years, was to suicide, to "death warp" to your home point. It had no other real practical use. In the last few years, they changed it so that ninja's weren't weakened when raised after a mijin gakure, but it still is and was pretty awful unless you had Auto-Reraise.

(It did deal damage to the target, but it was worthless amount of damage.)

[MageBlack]

This needs a bump. people are still unaware of this...

[Xavin]

What's missing from this discussion is the understanding that it's not a black and white issue. No modern game uses purely server-side or purely client-side state tracking. There are too many problems related to either. Hacking from the client side, and delays from the server side. The proper way to do it, which most games do, is to have both the client and the server running the calculations and just sending verification back and forth. That way everything is smooth unless there is enough lag that the client has to be contradicted. That can be minimized by having a short polling interval (.3 is incredibly long for a modern game), and by having a lot of well designed prediction. That's why in most MMOs and FPSs, everything is great and visible lag is nonexistent up to the point where the prediction and compensation can't handle it anymore, and everything falls apart.That's typically 300-400 ms ping, which nearly everyone in the world can manage to anywhere else given a good connection. Overall game design also plays a role, abilities, animations, and UI effects have to be designed so that there is a little leeway and instances where there could be visible desync are minimized. The bottom line is that SE just has shoddy netcode for this game.

It's not unfixable, but it does appear that it will take more work that just a few tweaks. Proper prediction and lag compensation is a very complex subject, and it's not something you just stumble on, you have to read the academic papers and understand what solutions the rest of the industry has come up with. The best bet in the short term is likely going to be to design encounters around the problems. Fast AoE dodging and precision positioning should be taken out of their toolbox. They should also up the polling rate to something more reasonable, which would have an immediate and noticeable effect.

[Astarica]

This problem absolutely is black and white. If you're standing in a telegraphed area and the boss casts the "YOU DIE" spell, and you're just standing still, you absolutely expect to die the moment the castbar ends in any MMORPG. Unless other MMORPG have manaaged to figure out how to teleport data, the client absolutely is the one making the call here. Hacking is way overblown as a concern. If you get hit by the 'YOU DIE" spell, there's very little the client can lie to survive that. You can claim you didn't get hit by it, but the client still sends your current position and the server can see you're lying. You can change your position too but that's teleporting which is very easily caught. You can lie about the damage you took from but the server knows you're supposed to take a million damage from YOU DIE too. You can lie about what CDs you used to survive it, but the server also knows when those CDS are up.

The best case scenario is you might be able to lie about using a CD you forgot to use (but is still available), but you could just learn to use your CDS too.

[Sybreed]

Bump for great justice.

[Goreth]

What's missing from this discussion is the understanding that it's not a black and white issue.

The bottom line is that SE just has shoddy netcode for this game.

Looks black and white to me.

[Sunarie]

Bump cause this thread, of any of them.. really needs to stay on the first page. Lots of beneficial discussions that maybe SE could take note of.

[Alcyon_Densetsu]

Bump cause this thread, of any of them.. really needs to stay on the first page. Lots of beneficial discussions that maybe SE could take note of.

Yep!
Especially as we close in on the next LIVE Letter with a pile of questions about the netcode/lag issues.

[Wildsprite]

atleast 1 person mentioned this was client side polling. the issue with that is Yoshi-P confirmed it was server side polling

Yep!
Especially as we close in on the next LIVE Letter with a pile of questions about the netcode/lag issues.

most of which said questions were ignored, they did say something about changing the polling in wolves den, great for PvP. but they really need to fix the polling issues in DF bosses like the primals, 3ms polling in those fights makes them difficult even though they are predictable. you only have to be 1ms off with their predictability to end up with the fight going completely down hill. factor in 3ms server side polling and any possible lag nomatter how small and that predictability goes to hell