Ew, the physics system is FPS dependent?

[Bloodsign]

On my laptop, I was lucky to get 15 FPS on planet surfaces. The gravity and object physics seemed almost slow motion. On my new PC, I get 70 FPS on planets on average. Much smoother and faster physics.

At first I thought physics was tied to body gravity, but apparently not. It seems dependent on FPS instead?

If so, how does this work for CMDRs in the same instance with very different graphics capabilities?

 

[Morbad]

Are you sure this wasn't an example of gravity variation? Objects like materials, debris, and canisters do not have any compensation like the SRV itself does. Stuff accelerates twice as fast toward the ground at 0.04g as it does at 0.02g.

 

[Ambroza]

Yeah, sounds like the faster or slower motion was just due to gravity variation.

 

[Bloodsign]

Yeah, sounds like the faster or slower motion was just due to gravity variation.

Are you sure this wasn't an example of gravity variation? Objects like materials, debris, and canisters do not have any compensation like the SRV itself does. Stuff accelerates twice as fast toward the ground at 0.04g as it does at 0.02g.

Fair point, gentlemen. I'm doing my rounds maxing out my raw mats, I'll check back in after.

I was thinking about this a bit more, it's also possible that at very low suboptimal framerates there is lag that messes with the perception of the physics. So maybe above, say, 20 FPS, or 30 or whatever, everything is smooth enough for consistency.

 

[MPL3D]

Not exactly the same issue but I can tell that the ammo of my multicannons lasts twice at 20fps than at 40fps, meaning that they do half the damage per second, so high FPS favour combat for those players with a good hardware (or low settings).

 

[Bloodsign]

Not exactly the same issue but I can tell that the ammo of my multicannons lasts twice at 20fps than at 40fps, meaning that they do half the damage per second, so high FPS favour combat for those players with a good hardware (or low settings).

Ooooh must test when I get back to the Bubble! 0.o

Mods on those MCs?

 

[Ted Striker]

Not exactly the same issue but I can tell that the ammo of my multicannons lasts twice at 20fps than at 40fps, meaning that they do half the damage per second, so high FPS favour combat for those players with a good hardware (or low settings).

That doesn't sound correct. It may be a ping or packet loss issue but it can't be tied to FPS.

 

[Morbad]

That doesn't sound correct. It may be a ping or packet loss issue but it can't be tied to FPS.

I'm not going to rule it out completely until I see it tested or get around to testing it myself...the game ties a lot of stuff to the frame rate. I haven't seen anything quite like it since the DOS days of gaming.

 

[Rick6549]

I remember emulating stuff in DOSbox and having it go wayyyyy faster than it was supposed to

 

[[PS4 Pro - PC] earthtone99]

I remember emulating stuff in DOSbox and having it go wayyyyy faster than it was supposed to

That happened to me when playing Terminator Future Shock. That game is mental fast on modern PC’s in DOSBox if you miss a setting...

I’m a quality man over framerate so on PS4 I’ve got ELITE set to buff the visuals and drop the framerate.

o7 my ARX

 

[Bloodsign]

That doesn't sound correct. It may be a ping or packet loss issue but it can't be tied to FPS.

Yeah, it definitely shouldn't be this way, but maybe it is.

 

[Viajero]

I have played Elite with 2 different PCs. A very old potato and a brand new one. Very different FPS in each. Physics worked exactly the same in both, as expected.

At 15 FPS (!) everything probably looks like a slide show irrespective of the accuracy of the physics.

 

[MPL3D]

The problem is the keystroke input.
The lower the FPS the lower rate of input, and some keystrokes can be missed.

That means that the trigger of the multicannons don't keep firing each and every millisecond.

The physics are fine and the bullets keep on going at the same speed, this is properly treated with timer based movement, but the amount of bullets in flight is reduced along with FPS due to the reduced input.

And so, what I experienced is that the lower the FPS, the longer the ammo lasts.

Of course feel free to test and post your feedback, it would be very interesting. However I think that the input/FPS issue cannot be easily solved as per nowadays software industry standard, or maybe yes? It is not, as far as I know.

 

[galahad2069]

The problem is the keystroke input.
The lower the FPS the lower rate of input, and some keystrokes can be missed.

That means that the trigger of the multicannons don't keep firing each and every millisecond.

The physics are fine and the bullets keep on going at the same speed, this is properly treated with timer based movement, but the amount of bullets in flight is reduced along with FPS due to the reduced input.

And so, what I experienced is that the lower the FPS, the longer the ammo lasts.

Of course feel free to test and post your feedback, it would be very interesting. However I think that the input/FPS issue cannot be easily solved as per nowadays software industry standard, or maybe yes? It is not, as far as I know.

How is the input reduced while the FPS is lower? Maybe when you start firing the game will notice the pressed state of the fire button a tiny fraction of a second (less than 1/15 sec) later at 15 FPS than at, say, 144 FPS, but that's about it. You shouldn't be able to notice the difference of the numbers of bullets fired if you keep shooting for multiple seconds...

 

[galahad2069]

I'm not going to rule it out completely until I see it tested or get around to testing it myself...the game ties a lot of stuff to the frame rate. I haven't seen anything quite like it since the DOS days of gaming.

The bigger issue is that FPS is limited by the netcode... it was particularly visible in the final battle of the Wyrd Wars, when we somehow managed to get 60+ CMDR's drop into a single instance. As the number of ppl grew the FPS gradually went all the way down to the 25 to 35 range. And I had 120 FPS (I was using the limiter) at the beginning.

BTW I'm experiencing a severely reduced FPS since the September update. I used to have stable 144 FPS (a little bit less but still above 130 in rings and near stations) with my usual settings (1080p, no supersampling, everything else maxed out, ingame frame rate limit set to 144). Without the limiter it used to be well over 200 FPS in open space (it's an i7-8700 + RTX 2080 laptop with a 144Hz GSYNC display).

I've been using it with the limiter set to 90 FPS lately (because the fans are pretty loud at max RPM and I usually play while the kids are already sleeping), but yesterday I turned off the limiter because my son said the wasn't able to get more than 90 FPS on his new RTX 2070 rig. I was surprised to see that it was the same on my laptop (90 to 110 FPS, not only in rings but also in open space).

It may sound pretty good, but it's not - considering that it used to be more than twice higher the last time I checked. And my graphics settings are the same, and neither the CPU nor the GPU is close to the thermal throttling limit (I'm constantly monitoring the frequencies and temperatures and the figures show nothing unusual).

So there's definitely something fishy going on, but I'm not yet sure what. Maybe it's an issue with the latest driver, although I don't experience similar FPS drops in other games.

 

[MPL3D]

How is the input reduced while the FPS is lower? Maybe when you start firing the game will notice the pressed state of the fire button a tiny fraction of a second (less than 1/15 sec) later at 15 FPS than at, say, 144 FPS, but that's about it. You shouldn't be able to notice the difference of the numbers of bullets fired if you keep shooting for multiple seconds...

I'm afraid that happens because DirectX windows needs DirectX input, and DirectX input doesn't have the same latency than native input.

For example, not all key macros softwares dump the macro into games like ED because they do not use DirectX input. VoiceAttack works because it uses DX input.

But, what happens when you launch a long macro and the game lags with low FPS... Macro keystrokes miss some keys and the macro fails.

Key input latency is FPS dependant because it relies on graphic drivers when running games.

Multicannons on their side do not work in an on/off style like lasers, they can shoot a single bullet depending on how long the trigger is pressed, and they get affected by FPS rate when graphics card is bottlenecked.

 

[NecasekO]

I'm not going to rule it out completely until I see it tested or get around to testing it myself...the game ties a lot of stuff to the frame rate. I haven't seen anything quite like it since the DOS days of gaming.

You should check the patch notes for RDR 2 PC, I was quite amused

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

Not exactly the same issue but I can tell that the ammo of my multicannons lasts twice at 20fps than at 40fps, meaning that they do half the damage per second, so high FPS favour combat for those players with a good hardware (or low settings).

Honestly I think you are mistaken. I play in VR at a locked 90fps. By that reckoning I should be a death bringing monster. I am not!

 

[MPL3D]

Honestly I think you are mistaken. I play in VR at a locked 90fps. By that reckoning I should be a death bringing monster. I am not!

A ship doesn't handle good under low FPS, anyone has experienced this at some point. It is because of the same reason.

And low means like let's say 20fps, yes.

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

AHH ok so people are not saying that physics or ROF is linked to framerate.. just that if the framerate tanks below say 20fps the game essentially breaks?
TBH this maybe true. Anything sub 30fps is unplayable for me so I would never consider playing that low any way. It is feasible FD never tested that low I guess