Massive performance impact

dariusz · Post by **dariusz** » Thu Jul 17, 2003 10:04 am

Anyone else having a really massive performance impact when playing standard maps with the Chaos Mutator? The map loading times are way longer (OK I know it's due to the stuff that needs to be loaded, I can live with that), but what greatly disturbs me are the lags I encounter even when playing on LAN

Usually I play 1024x768x32, all details on "high" or "highest", getting 40+ fps mostly (AthlonXP 1800+, GF4 4600). But now I have to go back to "normal" on a lot of maps to get 30+ fps. Especially when some CUTTER blades are flying around or when the weapons cycle. A friend of mine even has to go back to 800x600 with his GF4 4200 to get decent frame rates or to get a constant gamespeed.

Aside from that: I love this MOD, great job guys!. Think I know what I'll be doing over the next few moths

(A pity there's no ERDW smiley... yet

)

-- Dariusz

jb · Post by jb » Thu Jul 17, 2003 12:09 pm

dariusz,

that is certianly not good nor what we intended to do. We can look into it to see if there are anything else we ca do.

But can you tell me if you had other muts running? Bots and if so how many? My PC is pretty fast (2800 XP+ R9700) so its hard for me to gauge. I have all of the details cranked, AA/AF on and I still dont see any slow downs. I have a PC that a 1600XP with an 8500 that should be a good test system. I will test it tonight and see how it goes and use that as a base line. Again sorry for the slow down....

dariusz · Post by **dariusz** » Thu Jul 17, 2003 1:19 pm

jb,
actually I have quite a few mutators running

let's see...
- ChaosUT of course
- BonusPack's CrateCombo + PintSizedCombo
- QuadJump
- a modified Vampire (only made leech configurable)
- when playing CTF the CarryTF mutator
- 2 additional mutators to add 2 new combos (shouldn't be a problem, one is a configurable speed combo, the other gives the player ammo when triggered)
- DropsLifeTimeConfig
- a selfmade mut replacing the standard maplists to allow random map and gametype cycles
- a selfmade mut giving ammo pickups a little more ammo and weapon pickups a little more initial and max ammo
- a radar interaction similar to Epic's Invasion radar

I will kick a few these days and test if there's a difference.

Normally we play 3vs3 or 4vs4 (3 being human players, the rest bots).

-- dariusz

jeditobe1 · Post by **jeditobe1** » Thu Jul 17, 2003 1:24 pm

dariusz wrote: - a selfmade mut replacing the standard maplists to allow random map and gametype cycles

Hmm... dont suppose you ever thought of releasing this?

dariusz · Post by **dariusz** » Thu Jul 17, 2003 1:41 pm

jeditobe1 wrote:
dariusz wrote: - a selfmade mut replacing the standard maplists to allow random map and gametype cycles

Hmm... dont suppose you ever thought of releasing this?

If there's interest I could

Still tweaking it a bit but after testing I could just do that...

Have to warn everyone who might be interested though: No nice config GUI or something, only configurable by ini file.

bitterman · Post by **bitterman** » Thu Jul 17, 2003 3:30 pm

theres already one out.... i dled it when i jumped on a server a while back
acctually there are quite a few of em

Wormbo · Post by **Wormbo** » Thu Jul 17, 2003 3:51 pm

dariusz wrote:- a selfmade mut giving ammo pickups a little more ammo and weapon pickups a little more initial and max ammo

Check you logs and try playing without that mutator to make sure it's really Chaos UT and not that one. I suspect either an Accessed None flooding or your mutator needs a little optimization.

Shuri · Post by **Shuri** » Thu Jul 17, 2003 4:22 pm

dariusz wrote:
jeditobe1 wrote:
dariusz wrote: - a selfmade mut replacing the standard maplists to allow random map and gametype cycles

Hmm... dont suppose you ever thought of releasing this?
If there's interest I could
Still tweaking it a bit but after testing I could just do that...

Have to warn everyone who might be interested though: No nice config GUI or something, only configurable by ini file.

I'm very interested in this. Any inspiration from XMaps?

What abilities does it have exactly? Can you specify what gametypes can be randomly selected?

dariusz · Post by **dariusz** » Thu Jul 17, 2003 5:25 pm

Shuriken wrote: I'm very interested in this. Any inspiration from XMaps?

What abilities does it have exactly? Can you specify what gametypes can be randomly selected?

Never used XMaps before, I just got bored always playing the same cycle over and over again, so I started looking into the MapList class...

You can configure individual parameters for each gametype like this:

Code: Select all

Configuration=(GameType="XGame.xBombingRun",Parameters="?MinPlayers=8? \ Translocator=false",Mutators="DPack.MutNewVampire,XGame.MutQuadJump")

The map list itself looks like this:

Code: Select all

Maps=BR-Anubis?game=XGame.XBombingRun
Maps=BR-DirtRun?game=XGame.XBombingRun
...

You can specify gametypes to be cycled like this:
(Actually I implemented this one only yesterday...)

Code: Select all

GametypeToPlay=ChaosGames.ChaosTeamKOTHGameInfo
GametypeToPlay=xGame.xBombingRun

Basically the new maplist class uses this information to build one hell of a commandline for the next map and returns it to UT on level change. The gametype feature is still untested, I'll have to do that when I'll have some time the next few days.

-- dariusz

Pio2001 · Post by **Pio2001** » Thu Jul 17, 2003 5:25 pm

Athlon 1800 + XP, ATI All-In-Wonder Radeon, 512 MB DDR here.

Options set to "normal" when "normal" is the lowest setting, "low" otherwise. 640x480x32.

No noticeable slowdown.

Shuri · Post by **Shuri** » Thu Jul 17, 2003 5:49 pm

dariusz - Would you mind sending that to me? Understand if you want to keep it to yourself at the moment, but I'd love to try it out.

dariusz · Post by **dariusz** » Thu Jul 17, 2003 7:35 pm

For all who are interested: I put my most recent version of the RandomMaplist mutator here. Please don't spread it too much as it's still alpha status, probably contains bugs and will most likely be updated quite often. But feel free to test it and report any bugs to me

Zachariah · Post by **Zachariah** » Fri Jul 18, 2003 8:24 pm

I get that same kinda fps impact when I have 10-15 vortexes going onscreen at once , wierd huh???

actually you guys should mebbe include the option to turn down some of those particle effects clientside , like the particles on the cutterblades , and the number of particles in the smoke effects on the grenades , that would help improve performance those on lesser machines.

Post by **R.Flagg** » Sat Jul 19, 2003 1:16 am

For all who are interested: I put my most recent version of the RandomMaplist mutator here. Please don't spread it too much as it's still alpha status, probably contains bugs and will most likely be updated quite often. But feel free to test it and report any bugs to me

Any chance you have tried as Wormbo requested, to run Chaos w/o this mut, just in case, to verify this mut of yours is not the issue?

And BTW- If you have UT, I highly recommend checking out XMaps. I've never seen a finer map selection tool thingy. Before hanging it up, he released a BETA for UT2003, which is lacking many features of the UT version, but already allows you to select any map in the middle of a game. (and more)

Bound to be inspiring to someone starting from scratch to do something simlar.

dariusz · Post by **dariusz** » Sat Jul 19, 2003 11:34 am

Sorry, didn't have time for further testing yet, real life got in the way hard

I hope I'll find some time in the next few days.

-- dariusz