unlag(shrub) vs antilag(osp/default)?

[nosy Profile]

<Jun1oR> for example the other day, b007y was kneeling in a doorway not moving at all and I fired alomst 10 shots into his back and he just turned around and killed me with ease. Server reported he had 127hp remaining

How have you concluded that unlag was the cause of the poor hit registration?

<Jun1oR> its easy for players to pull head shots and kill frag quickly when their not taking damage
<Jun1oR> so in 1vs1 situations it may appear to a player that he is hitting the enemy but its not registering and allowing the opponent to return fire without being hit

Agree with the first statement, but I don't believe it's established that unlag causes poor hit registration

<Jun1oR> unlag also seems to favor high pingers, low to normal pings shouldn't be pentalized for the high pingers

Unlag gives more assistance to high pingers, this is indisputable. It is an attempt to create a level playing field for players that would otherwise have no chance of competing simply because of where they live. I believe this concept is quite reasonable, especially given the need to make the game as accessible as possible given the small player base these days. I would not agree that high pingers get an overall advantage (assuming that was your intended meaning when you said "favor high pingers"), I'll address this argument below

<Jun1oR> for example, continuing to take damage seconds after you are no longer in the line of fire

This is the most obvious example of assistance to high pingers, it's understandably quite annoying but it is still consistent with the above leveling of the playing field. A basic scenario runs as follows:

Player A exits axis spawn on Beach and moves through radio room towards radio stairs. Player B sees player A from outside, aims accurately at the player model on his screen and shoots

Without lag compensation:
If player B has low ping, his shots will hit player A
If player B has high ping, all of his shots will miss (by the time player A was visible it was already too late)

With lag compensation:
Player B's shots will hit regardless of his ping

The only difference between high and low ping here is that if player B has high ping, then player A will have already passed the corner before the shots are registered. All player B has done is shoot at the player drawn on his screen, exactly as he would if he had low ping. Shooting "around corners" is simply the side effect of allowing high pingers to shoot at exactly what is drawn on their screen

On the flipside, all else being equal a low pinger will always win a 1v1 with a high pinger due to getting the first opportunity to shoot

The argument that unlag causes hit registration issues has already been touched on above, and it's the only possible way I can see high pingers genuinely having an advantage. If you can establish this as fact and that it consistently works in favour of high pingers, then I'll accept that high pingers have an advantage with unlag

<Jun1oR> I also think it might cause delayed registration as well
<Jun1oR> last example, you appear not to take damage at first and then all of a sudden take damage at once
<Jun1oR> appearing to the player that he was killed with only 1 or 2 shots

That should be simple enough to test

[Jun1oR]

This is not about high pingers. This is about unlag not correctly registering damage for whatever reason it may be.

The issue about the high pingers is they are playin on delay. The rest of us are milliseconds ahead of them...

Read this...

http://forums.fortress-forever.com/show ... 929&page=3

and this...

http://www.ra.is/unlagged/

Do we even know which version of unlagged was adopted into shrub?

Code: Select all

Unlagged 2.01 really is an attempt at making Internet play as smooth as possible, and it generally succeeds. I am aware that not everyone (including mod authors) agrees with full lag compensation for instant-hit weapons, and that's fine.

We're not shooting rockets... Well some of you are lol.

[MAN-AT-ARMS]

Yes I know what version is in there and it works. In RTCW not all weapons are unlagged.

I'm thinking you don't understand how it's done server side. I think you may be confusing spread to be honest.

The only part I'm not sure is coded in there is the ability to disable unlag on a per player basis because I haven't seen the game code for shrub. There is no shrub client..it's just the vanilla cgame.

[nosy Profile]

This is not about high pingers. This is about unlag not correctly registering damage for whatever reason it may be.

Read this...

http://forums.fortress-forever.com/show ... 929&page=3

I read it, but I don't see how it supports your argument. The conclusion at then end from the main detractor was:

Unlagged is one of the better lag comp systems but my only point was it has it's flaws and could be better

Some things I found interesting:

Where server side lag comp tends to break down is when player latencies and update rates are inconsistent (ping jumping). Like you said the server tries to "rewind" the game state by whatever the player's latency is from the mouse click to the server message (ping + interp + whatever other internal latencies). The latency is where the guess work is. If everyone's ping was perfectly stable all the time this system would be perfect

Q3 client command timestamps are synchronized to the server. Furthermore, they contain sufficient information for the server to tell how far the client had interpolated between two gamestate snapshots, regardless of the client's cl_timenudge value. If I recall correctly, these timestamps have 1 ms resolution. Unlagged's implementation actually copies the client-side interpolation code exactly so that the server can figure out just what the client saw when it generated the command. This approach is not affected by ping fluctuation. The only condition is that client ping stay within the bounds of history kept by the server (like 500 ms or 1 s or whatever). Client ping is free to vary under that limit without damaging Unlagged's fidelity

[Jun1oR]

Yes I know what version is in there and it works. In RTCW not all weapons are unlagged.

I'm thinking you don't understand how it's done server side. I think you may be confusing spread to be honest.

The only part I'm not sure is coded in there is the ability to disable unlag on a per player basis because I haven't seen the game code for shrub. There is no shrub client..it's just the vanilla cgame.

What version is it?

Also I believe it does work for high pingers. I'm not arguing that fact but it doesn't work for me. There is no change when I disable it on my end.

[MAN-AT-ARMS]

The unlag code here is server side only.
It doesn't have the client parts like the Q3 mod.

[Jun1oR]

This is not about high pingers. This is about unlag not correctly registering damage for whatever reason it may be.

Read this...

http://forums.fortress-forever.com/show ... 929&page=3

I read it, but I don't see how it supports your argument. The conclusion at then end from the main detractor was:

Unlagged is one of the better lag comp systems but my only point was it has it's flaws and could be better

Some things I found interesting:

Where server side lag comp tends to break down is when player latencies and update rates are inconsistent (ping jumping). Like you said the server tries to "rewind" the game state by whatever the player's latency is from the mouse click to the server message (ping + interp + whatever other internal latencies). The latency is where the guess work is. If everyone's ping was perfectly stable all the time this system would be perfect

Q3 client command timestamps are synchronized to the server. Furthermore, they contain sufficient information for the server to tell how far the client had interpolated between two gamestate snapshots, regardless of the client's cl_timenudge value. If I recall correctly, these timestamps have 1 ms resolution. Unlagged's implementation actually copies the client-side interpolation code exactly so that the server can figure out just what the client saw when it generated the command. This approach is not affected by ping fluctuation. The only condition is that client ping stay within the bounds of history kept by the server (like 500 ms or 1 s or whatever). Client ping is free to vary under that limit without damaging Unlagged's fidelity

I didn't say it helped my argument but it had some useful info on how it works and how like no competitions servers used it and that its really for projectile weapons and not instant hit weapons like mp40/thompson. Also that it can miscalculate the players position.

[nosy Profile]

The competitive quake community has always had a stigma about lag compensation in all its forms, they seem to disagree with it in principle. As for RTCW, it was never part of the comp scene here because it was not implemented into OSP (the only decent mod for comp). Lag compensation is the standard in ET comp

Additionally, the default/OSP antilag is utter rubbish. On the occasions I've played high ping OSP I've found it far easier to land hits with it turned off, at least then I have a general idea of where I need to shoot

Also I think you got your wires crossed on its intended weapon type, lag compensation is specifically intended for hitscan weapons. It's buggy as hell with projectiles

[MAN-AT-ARMS]

It's based on 1.0, which is what it was in August 2003.

I don't think there were significant changes to the backward reconciliation between 1.0 and 2.0.x but I'd have to look at it closer.

The RTCW antilag was/is bugged which is why almost noone used it. The problems were somewhat fixed in ET.

[Jun1oR]

The competitive quake community has always had a stigma about lag compensation in all its forms, they seem to disagree with it in principle. As for RTCW, it was never part of the comp scene here because it was not implemented into OSP (the only decent mod for comp). Lag compensation is the standard in ET comp

Additionally, the default/OSP antilag is utter rubbish. On the occasions I've played high ping OSP I've found it far easier to land hits with it turned off, at least then I have a general idea of where I need to shoot

Also I think you got your wires crossed on its intended weapon type, lag compensation is specifically intended for hitscan weapons. It's buggy as hell with projectiles

from the author himself "I am aware that not everyone (including mod authors) agrees with full lag compensation for instant-hit weapons"

Regardless I'm glad it works for others but it doesn't for me. I've been playing today with no issues at all. I no longer have to empty a clip into someone for them to die and even sometimes that doesn't work. Only people that complained was pingrage and parcher. Other players even said shots seem to register more accurate now.

Like I said this is not about one person including me. I will respect MAA or the ECGN community's decision on unlag. I just know when it goes back to the way it was I'm done with Shrub for good. There is no point of playing a game that does not count my shots.

I've been playing this game since the the demo. I know when and when I'm not hitting a player. Even played for nyX who won Cal-Main. I'm far from a noob.

[Jun1oR]

It's based on 1.0, which is what it was in August 2003.

I don't think there were significant changes to the backward reconciliation between 1.0 and 2.0.x but I'd have to look at it closer.

The RTCW antilag was/is bugged which is why almost noone used it. The problems were somewhat fixed in ET.

I don't have the most evil of Internet connections, but it really is sporadic sometimes. It's not unusual for my ping to fluctuate between 100 and 150, which does terrible things to my rail aim.

Unlagged 1.0 was an attempt to fix that, using a server-side technique called “backward reconciliation.” Except for a bug in the interpolation code, it worked fairly well.

fairly well????

Yes but if we didn't enabled some sort of anti/unlag no one would play lol. Obviously for high pingers its a problem but so is unlag for me and I'm sure others.

I appreciate you letting me test this out. At least I know I'm not nuts even if you guys believe so. hahaha

[nosy Profile]

from the author himself "I am aware that not everyone (including mod authors) agrees with full lag compensation for instant-hit weapons"

the full quote reads

Unlagged 2.01 really is an attempt at making Internet play as smooth as possible, and it generally succeeds. I am aware that not everyone (including mod authors) agrees with full lag compensation for instant-hit weapons, and that's fine. You'll definitely want the rest of it even if you don't implement that part. Playing an Unlagged mod without full lag compensation and cl_timenudge at -30 feels almost like playing with 80ms shaved off of your ping.

As I noted before, there's a big stigma about lag compensation in competitive quake. They disagree with it in principle, which is the main reason for the quote above. Reading the features section on the same page there is a clear focus on hitscan weapons

[MAN-AT-ARMS]

Frankly, I'm somewhat agnostic to the setting since I have a ping lower than 50ish.
It was enabled in the first place for the sake of the 100+ pingers.

It never really took me more than a few minutes to adapt to it (if you can even call it that).

If most players want it disabled, I don't have an issue with turning it off.

As mentioned there is no client side prediction like in Q3 so it's not an exact parallel and does not behave the same.

Stable ping / fps always was more of an important factor to me.

[Villain]

Perhaps a reset of the stats page would be helpful to be more objective about the pros and cons of a disabled unlag setting.

[Jun1oR]

Frankly, I'm somewhat agnostic to the setting since I have a ping lower than 50ish.
It was enabled in the first place for the sake of the 100+ pingers.

It never really took me more than a few minutes to adapt to it (if you can even call it that).

If most players want it disabled, I don't have an issue with turning it off.

As mentioned there is no client side prediction like in Q3 so it's not an exact parallel and does not behave the same.

Stable ping / fps always was more of an important factor to me.

I guess it's just best to leave unlag on. I don't want to upset anyone or cause ecgn to lose any players.