Server Tick Rate Is Holding the Game Back

[Deedlit]

Someone probably said it before me, but it would be fine if snapshots were consistent. But, they aren't. And it's by dev choice. They change them constantly for the same markers.

[RedLolly]

I believe PVP only has the activity it does because the rewards are outstanding compared to most other systems in the game.

And I agree that saying the hang-ups and bugs are because of consoles is completely bullshit. It makes zero sense that both Sony and Xbox would have issues on their hardware regarding online connectivity. These machines are also designed for streaming and have other major game franchises that require substantially faster reaction speeds to work (FGC, anyone?). They do this all without any third party software to alleviate lag, too. It's entirely on SE.

What I think is that we should look harder at the battle design team than the server infrastructure team. Tells being inconsistent in timing, attacks across the board having variable AoE effects, making everything in the game noticeably faster than ever before, are all only problems because they don't work under what is apparently the common connection speed in international regions FFXIV is playable in.

It sucks but it is something that the lowest common denominator has to be catered to, and fixing the combat snapshotting issues would actually benefit everyone. It's worth the investment.

[MAJRIS]

it's probably because we're dealing with, despite many heroic attempts and improvements to the engine, a turn-based combat.

proof: you can walk into telegraphs and explosions and you take zero damage because the time to hit register already passed and what you're seeing is just staggered visual for fancy spectacle (no offense indented).

or: boss is going to attack half of the arena with left or right arm. boss cast bar appears, boss starts leaning backwards, the castbar finished. the animation goes on, boss hands stretches, a telegraph appears, YOU MOVE OUT OF TELEGRAPH, the telegraph disappears, the animation finishes , boss arm hits the arena and explosion appears. BOOM.
yet, despite timely escaping the danger zone before the visual help is over, you get hit BECAUSE YOU STOOD THERE WHEN TELEHRAPH APPEARED. you should already have been gone BEFORE the visual help appeared. this is why your players cheat, suare. they see telegraphs that are synced with cast bars.

one might rightfully argue that it's the design intent and players should learn the fights by the boss attacks and not by telegraphs, but then it opens the question for localizing or game guide that would explain the abilities.
because they call "tank purge" raidwide attack and "homing lasers" a tankbuster. or "Duty's Edge" and so on.


personally, I'm glad they tuned up the difficulty in Dawntrail that require focus and getting good. Dawntrail dungeons have been lot of fun and even dying has been fun because they have been fun challenge. usually 2-3 wipes and group learns and adjusts quickly. the challenge itself made me better player.
most of my deaths have not been caused because I didn't know what to do... but because I amongst other others play by telegraphs, not by pokemon ability nomenclature.

[Rithy255]

I'd like to say I agree but I think theirs more then just the server tick rate holding back this game theirs honestly way too much for me that's holding back this game. Though the more they take away from job skill expression and put it into encounters it will display the tick rate issue tenfold. As this game has become glorified DDR but with really bad tick rate instead of a MMORPG.

[MuraBoy]

Finally someone talking about this!
I wholeheartedly agree with OP. This game feels so sluggish to play that PvP is hell

Not to mention some difficult PvE contents like Savage and Ultimate... 2 or more players gotta adjust in real time? Good luck with that xD

[SkankyRoe]

Fully agree with OP. It's especially an issue when it comes to passable mechanics like P4s rots/tethers that can fail to pass to the person running through, and combine mechanics like those in High Concept/Pangenesis. It also makes for finicky as hell baited turrets like in P10s and M4s.

[Umbrasin]

But if the thing you're talking about is only the player position refresh rate, yeah, as I agreed, it's terribad, no qualms about that, and it needs to be improved, especially for pvp if anything. But this still doesn't tell me where you got that it's 0.3s checks? I mean, it wouldn't surprise me that the server is that bad at checking positions mind you, because it shows.

Ultra minor nitpick, note that the eorzean clock which directly informs ingame time and HoT/HP/MP refresh ticks, is not every 3s but 2s and 11/12 (which is why full eorzean days take 70 irl minutes and not 72). Also note that DoTs aren't attached to the eorzean clock even though they have the same ticking interval, but are attacked to actors (aka, if you cast one dot, it will tick on the ability application after its delays, and if you apply more dots on top of the first one, they'll all align to the tick rate of the first because they're all yours).

I understand now. You’re using “server tick rate” to mean the internal processing clock (~40ms), but I was referring to the positional/state update interval that tools like ACT/XIVAlexander show to average ~0.3s. Both exist, but they govern different layers.

Server clock (~40ms): Governs action triggers and internal scheduling. Much faster interval compared to positional tick, ~7.5x faster.

Positional tick (~0.3s): Governs when your position is sampled for mechanics and when HoTs/DoTs resolve. Much slower interval compared to server clock, ~7.5x slower.

For the HoT/DoT timing you’re correct that they are actor anchored and HoTs stack, but the combat interval is still ~3s real-time, not 2s11/12ths. The Eorzean clock is a separate system used only for timekeeping.

Fully agree with OP. It's especially an issue when it comes to passable mechanics like P4s rots/tethers that can fail to pass to the person running through, and combine mechanics like those in High Concept/Pangenesis. It also makes for finicky as hell baited turrets like in P10s and M4s.

Yes, I remember those janky turrets well. While I didn’t emphasize latency in my first post, the effective tick interval is always longer in practice since nobody has 0ms ping to the servers.

Effective tick length looks like this once you factor in latency (~0.3s base tick rate plus half your ping, since it's the one-way time for the packet to reach the server):

100 ms ping -> ~0.3s + 0.05s = ~0.35 seconds
150 ms ping -> ~0.3s + 0.075s = ~0.375 seconds
200 ms ping -> ~0.3s + 0.10s = ~0.40 seconds

This means that at 200 ms latency the server can be judging your position on data that’s nearly half a second old. For anybody raiding in Savage and beyond, a half a second lapse is an enormous amount of potential error.

[RedLolly]

I'm learning a lot in here, wow.

For some reason, I recall multiple instances of 230 ms ping being labeled a comfortable limit for high ping to still play FFXIV reliably. Years ago. That's half a second delay and still being able complete any encounter.

I've always played with high ping, every test getting around 190 to 210. I have one of my area's best services from my ISP. This fully explains *why* DT content suddenly feels so brutal while others just do not see or feel it as a problem beyond lack of skill. That comfortable ceiling got drastically lowered with zero change on how our games communicate with the server. Thousands of us are just screwed over.



That's bad.

[Umbrasin]

I'm learning a lot in here, wow.

For some reason, I recall multiple instances of 230 ms ping being labeled a comfortable limit for high ping to still play FFXIV reliably. Years ago. That's half a second delay and still being able complete any encounter.

I've always played with high ping, every test getting around 190 to 210. I have one of my area's best services from my ISP. This fully explains *why* DT content suddenly feels so brutal while others just do not see or feel it as a problem beyond lack of skill. That comfortable ceiling got drastically lowered with zero change on how our games communicate with the server. Thousands of us are just screwed over.



That's bad.

There's another factor at play that has helped bridge the gap (especially for those with high latency) which has helped fights feel more responsive but has a number of tradeoffs. SE uses server-side movement prediction to try and smooth the gaps between the positional tick updates. To help break it down:

• When you hit a movement key your client sends a packet saying “I’m moving forward/back/left/right.

• The server receives that input and assumes continuous movement in that direction until it gets another packet telling it you stopped or changed direction.

• This means that for mechanics like Titan’s Landslides, as long as you begin sidestepping early enough, the server will already be projecting your position outside of the danger zone even if the exact position packet hasn’t been received yet.

• This is also why you can move near an AoE and not go in it, yet be hit by it. It's the server prediction failing because it erroneously predicted you moved too far. The server didn't receive a new packet in time stating you stopped right at the edge.

That’s why you feel responsive movement in typical fights. The prediction bridges over the 0.3s tick + latency gap. Here's the problem, however, what if you need precise movements and positions, such as those required in more difficult fights?

• Savage fights often demand tight pre-positioning or last-second dodges (think P10S towers or P12S Phase 2 spreads).

• If you adjust direction suddenly (e.g., dodging out of a cleave at the very last tick), the server is still assuming your previous trajectory until your next position packet gets received.

• That means you can be visually outside on your screen, but the server thinks you were still inside when the mechanic snapshot occurred, so you get hit.

• This is why “move early, stop early” advice exists in high-end content. You’re basically trying to work with the prediction window so it doesn't kill you.

[Umbrasin]

What does all of that stuff just above mean?

At 100ms+ ping, that correction packet confirming your new direction takes longer to reach the server. Combine that with the 0.3s sampling window, and the server may be working with data that’s 0.35–0.40s old at the moment of mechanic resolution. Prediction can’t save you if your last-known “move vector” is wrong, so the faster and more precise the mechanic, the more punishing this gap becomes.

Movement prediction is what made older encounters feel playable despite the 0.3s tick + latency delay, since AoEs and slower mechanics gave the server’s assumptions room to be “good enough.” But with modern Savage and Ultimate fights now demanding sub-second prepositioning and sharp directional changes that same system falls apart. The result is that what once masked the lag now actively exposes it and and the cracks in the game's netcode.

This is why I ultimately decided on emphasizing the positional tick rate here. Increasing it would drastically improve positional accuracy on the server side, cut down on prediction failures, and make the modern fight design actually fun rather than feeling like we're fighting against the infrastructure.