Update on Cyrodiil Performance

OccultOverload

ZOS_PaulSage wrote: »

Actively, we are looking at changing the behavior of the players to remove incentives for large groups to stay in the same area. We want to do this by providing larger incentives for Alliances to split up and take on multiple-challenges in Cyrodiil. We’ll continue to work on this.

I sincerely hope you do NOT go in this direction. Alliances already generally have more than one group going after more than one objective at a time during peak hours. Redesigning the game because you cant figure out why your code is not optimized or your hardware is underperfoming is not an acceptable answer in my book.

People enjoy the design as is, when it works correctly. Changing this could be detrimental to the feel of Cyrodiil. One of the draws with this kind of PvP mode is the large scale fights. Re-designing the game to change this seems like an easy out because you dont want to invest in the resources to fix it right.

Duct Tape and Gum are not the ways to solve a problem.

TL;DR
THIS IS NOT A DESIGN PROBLEM, THIS IS AN IMPLEMENTATION PROBLEM. FIX ACCORDINGLY

Vivecc

As far as i have observed it ( and mayn others too), Performance was dropping after patch 1.3 (the improved lighting).

Think that was mentioned already a couple of times , but to bring it up again cant hurt. If anything went wrong than by the implementation of this piece of code. I would check there first....

NukeAllTheThings

@ZOS_RichLambert I know your are settling into your new role but would you care to give us an update on Cyrodiil, the games' biggest sore spot? How 'bout at least a /lurk?

Ghosted

Aoe seems to cause major frame rate issues on both consoles (have both) was wondering if this is a known issue, some optimization is in dire need atp

Bones_PXOXM

ZOS_PaulSage wrote: »

Hello everyone,

Our Cyrodiil performance is something we are very aware of. Performance drags when there are numerous players in the same place at the same time. This is why performance in Cyrodiil is fine for much of the day, but gets worse during more popular times. We are currently investigating ways in which we can reduce the spike of performance loss. We added in some features for Update 6 which we hoped would help, but ultimately did not. This is not a situation where we can just add more hardware. Player population in a given area hurts the performance and the more people that are in one area, the more performance is going to be hurt.

Actively, we are looking at changing the behavior of the players to remove incentives for large groups to stay in the same area. We want to do this by providing larger incentives for Alliances to split up and take on multiple-challenges in Cyrodiil. We’ll continue to work on this. We are also asked by players if there is anything they can do to help. In this situation, the best thing you can do is split off to different objectives when you notice performance going down. Cyrodiil is a big place with lots of different things to do. And thank you for asking.

So instead of fixing the game your trying to fix us? "This is not a situation where we can just add more hardware." "Actively, we are looking at changing the behavior of the players to remove incentives for large groups to stay in the same area." So we can't fix it, stop playing it the way we said you could and showed you in our commercials is what you are saying. The behavior your attempting to correct is players doing what many of them bought the game for and what you advertised it to do. That's like selling a toaster that doesn't toast bread and saying it's because the consumer should have been using it to warm their plates, [snip]

Currently the incentive for breaking up into smaller groups is getting slaughtered by a much larger group who isn't that stupid. And if your plan revolves around those dumb scout missions to try to split people up no one is doing them, I had a friend quit playing pvp cause he did that first and thought the mission was ***. The scout mission was half way across the map and away from everything else, the only thing we ran into were npc's and mobs, the mission led us away from any players.

Tell me this, is this all your plan entails? [snip] If so I promise you're going to lose a lot of your "Much appreciated support."

[edited for bashing]

Bones_PXOXM

Bouvin wrote: »

What is ZoS going to do when the console flops because the console players see how bad PvP is and all the other bugs?

Actually as a console player seeing this thread I'm getting there >:(

Bones_PXOXM

stefan.gustavsonb16_ESO wrote: »

We don't know what the console versions will be like. Different server architecture, less security problems. PvP might work as advertised on PS4 and XBone. Or, it might be the same imbalanced bug-infested lagfest we have on PC/Mac. We'll have to wait and see.

Same mess on pvp for sure.

defilade__ESO

DemonNinja wrote: »

ZOS_PaulSage wrote: »

Actively, we are looking at changing the behavior of the players to remove incentives for large groups to stay in the same area. We want to do this by providing larger incentives for Alliances to split up and take on multiple-challenges in Cyrodiil. We’ll continue to work on this.

I sincerely hope you do NOT go in this direction. Alliances already generally have more than one group going after more than one objective at a time during peak hours. Redesigning the game because you cant figure out why your code is not optimized or your hardware is underperfoming is not an acceptable answer in my book.

People enjoy the design as is, when it works correctly. Changing this could be detrimental to the feel of Cyrodiil. One of the draws with this kind of PvP mode is the large scale fights. Re-designing the game to change this seems like an easy out because you dont want to invest in the resources to fix it right.

Duct Tape and Gum are not the ways to solve a problem.

TL;DR
THIS IS NOT A DESIGN PROBLEM, THIS IS AN IMPLEMENTATION PROBLEM. FIX ACCORDINGLY

I think what he may be referring to is, is to change the current mechanics which encourage the practice of the giant zerg-ball, rolling thru and taking over resources and keeps.

The way it is now, the game incentivizes a group of 20+ players rolling in a giant, tightly grouped zerg, which rolls over everything in their path, spamming AoE heals and AoE damage the entire way. Whether it's a resource mine, the keep guards, defending players, etc... The only way to counter the assaulting zerg-ball is to duplicate it with a defending side zerg-ball, resulting in AoE spamming and lag, lag, lag....

Add to this, each keep can be attacked from a resource tower, or the high ground surrounding the keep. so a few assaulting players can take down any keep wall, while the rest of their zerg keeps defending players from taking out the siege engines. (Don't get me started on the stupid keep designs which place a keep in a valley, surrounded by high ground and resource towers, that the keep's siege engines cannot reach.)

CaptainObvious

Right now, the way that Cyrodiil experience is handed out pushes people into groups. You group up, you gain AP faster by credit for others work through both quest advancement and normal kills.

If you divide the AP gained by number of players in the group and only award based on kill, then the dip in AP gain will make advancement harder if you are in a larger group.

Keep placement, was probably accomplished by the same level of tactical genius as the quest givers who decide which keeps and resources should be taken next.

Cherryblossom

From all reports off of PTS the updates to performance issues in Cyrodill have failed. Is there anything else being worked on, are you testing more things.

You know any update would be nice. It's great that you start these discussions but it would be nice if you take part more often, especially when what you have announced does not seem to have any effect!

VoidParticle

DHale wrote: »

The other ability is soul shatter when you are about to die. It does min damage and should really level the playing field as in really doing tremendous damage but your death is imminent so it’s not ever going to be spammed. Maybe it does min damage when one person is there and scales as more ppl are within 5 meters for example.

The sound and explosion of soul shatter is startling when unexpected yet it does crap AOE damage. I agree this should be scaled based on nearby enemies within 10m or so.

Grymligast

Bring back Emain Macha.

Problem fixed.

(not rly but my god, Emain was immense)

broskboy

In my opinion it is unfortunate that you cannot simply add more hardware because in most cases it fixes the problems by asking people to split up to persue individual objectives you are taking the vital social aspect from a social game. with world of war craft the dev teams underestimated the popularity of their game massively so they threw up all of there servers at once instead of slowly switching server space on over time. adding more hardware would most likely solve the problem without asking players to comprimise this is suppose to a massive world and this sort of thing really breaks immersion.

gotta spend money to make money

wraith808

broskboy wrote: »

In my opinion it is unfortunate that you cannot simply add more hardware because in most cases it fixes the problems by asking people to split up to persue individual objectives you are taking the vital social aspect from a social game. with world of war craft the dev teams underestimated the popularity of their game massively so they threw up all of there servers at once instead of slowly switching server space on over time. adding more hardware would most likely solve the problem without asking players to comprimise this is suppose to a massive world and this sort of thing really breaks immersion.

gotta spend money to make money

When they say it's not about adding hardware, what they mean is that adding hardware wouldn't be a solution. It's not a matter of spending money- I'm sure they're spending more money on development time than hardware would cost. It's a matter that the problem isn't one of merely scale of processing.

Rune_Relic

Agreed , you can have 1000 server cluster.
Wont help if the network speed technology limit doesn't allow the throughput.
Doesn't help if the cluster LAN bandwidth is maxes out.

Keshya

problem solved. thanks.

Lifecode666

Last night I Went into cyrodil for the first time in months.
I've been testing out pledges, grinded sewers and played through wrothgar.

Azura star eu. I had 4 fps, got kicked out 3 times. totally unplayable.

Millerman34n

Paul.... Please read!
The 8 things you could do to improve pvp that would take you little to no time. Please read the whole post before you respond please.
1) Remove Aoe caps, why were they a thing in the first place?
2) create objectives in imperial city and questing Towns, even if It's a flag with a few npc's on it also it does not have to count towards the campaign score , although It would be nice if it was.
3) You need to rework the damage, healing and shield nerf even if it is only by 10 percent less.
4) Balance dk by increasing the percentage dragons blood heals you 50%? Increase the base damage of whip and make a Stan whip. Buff battle roar and work around the passives so dk get more base spell resist and physical resist, I know the already get 3k spell resist but they need more.
5) Nerf the nb by reducing the base damage Of surprise stack and the mini stun from teleport strike. And finally nerf fear it is the most op stun in the game!!!!
6) Templars need more base armor and spell resist and sorcs are very powerful but they have their weakness and with The other classes becoming balanced they will work them selves out.
7) Add back dynamic ultimate regeneration not like 1.5 but something similar, we can sill gain ultimate of light attacks.
8) With these changes people who want to Zerg can still Zerg. Solo and small scale pvp would have a place in Imperial city and the questing towns. The separation of people will reduce the lag, and people will not be upset that their class is under performing for the most part. Their will always be problems with pvp and exploits but with these few changes 99% of people will be happy, if you agree Or disagree let me know and if you see this Paul let me know!

Xeven

Millerman34n wrote: »

Paul.... Please read!

Paul doesn't work at ZOS anymore.

Kwivur

Millerman34n wrote: »

Paul.... Please read!
The 8 things you could do to improve pvp that would take you little to no time. Please read the whole post before you respond please.
1) Remove Aoe caps, why were they a thing in the first place?
2) create objectives in imperial city and questing Towns, even if It's a flag with a few npc's on it also it does not have to count towards the campaign score , although It would be nice if it was.
3) You need to rework the damage, healing and shield nerf even if it is only by 10 percent less.
4) Balance dk by increasing the percentage dragons blood heals you 50%? Increase the base damage of whip and make a Stan whip. Buff battle roar and work around the passives so dk get more base spell resist and physical resist, I know the already get 3k spell resist but they need more.
5) Nerf the nb by reducing the base damage Of surprise stack and the mini stun from teleport strike. And finally nerf fear it is the most op stun in the game!!!!
6) Templars need more base armor and spell resist and sorcs are very powerful but they have their weakness and with The other classes becoming balanced they will work them selves out.
7) Add back dynamic ultimate regeneration not like 1.5 but something similar, we can sill gain ultimate of light attacks.
8) With these changes people who want to Zerg can still Zerg. Solo and small scale pvp would have a place in Imperial city and the questing towns. The separation of people will reduce the lag, and people will not be upset that their class is under performing for the most part. Their will always be problems with pvp and exploits but with these few changes 99% of people will be happy, if you agree Or disagree let me know and if you see this Paul let me know!

This is what we all want for PvP!! LISTEN TO THIS GUY!! AND FENGRUSH AND SYPHER AND EVERYONE ELSE WHO HAS COMPLAINED ABOUT PVP!!!

Tyvarra

Yeah its unplayable for me too atm. I join PvP almost every evening hoping it somehow works, but it does not.
When entering a breach I have 1-3 fps and >500-999+ ping. This is the time when I quit the game and stare at my screen wondering what to do with the rest of the evening (its sad I know).

Well I played Blade&Soul Beta this weekend. Its fun and maybe an alternative to ESO, if things are not getting any better soon. Speaking of loading screens and FPS! That is the most annoying for me, because its game-breaking!

Lifecode666

Kwivur wrote: »

Millerman34n wrote: »

Paul.... Please read!
The 8 things you could do to improve pvp that would take you little to no time. Please read the whole post before you respond please.
1) Remove Aoe caps, why were they a thing in the first place?
2) create objectives in imperial city and questing Towns, even if It's a flag with a few npc's on it also it does not have to count towards the campaign score , although It would be nice if it was.
3) You need to rework the damage, healing and shield nerf even if it is only by 10 percent less.
4) Balance dk by increasing the percentage dragons blood heals you 50%? Increase the base damage of whip and make a Stan whip. Buff battle roar and work around the passives so dk get more base spell resist and physical resist, I know the already get 3k spell resist but they need more.
5) Nerf the nb by reducing the base damage Of surprise stack and the mini stun from teleport strike. And finally nerf fear it is the most op stun in the game!!!!
6) Templars need more base armor and spell resist and sorcs are very powerful but they have their weakness and with The other classes becoming balanced they will work them selves out.
7) Add back dynamic ultimate regeneration not like 1.5 but something similar, we can sill gain ultimate of light attacks.
8) With these changes people who want to Zerg can still Zerg. Solo and small scale pvp would have a place in Imperial city and the questing towns. The separation of people will reduce the lag, and people will not be upset that their class is under performing for the most part. Their will always be problems with pvp and exploits but with these few changes 99% of people will be happy, if you agree Or disagree let me know and if you see this Paul let me know!

This is what we all want for PvP!! LISTEN TO THIS GUY!! AND FENGRUSH AND SYPHER AND EVERYONE ELSE WHO HAS COMPLAINED ABOUT PVP!!!

5) Nerf the nb by reducing the base damage Of surprise stack and the mini stun from teleport strike. And finally nerf fear it is the most op stun in the game!!!!





Nerfing the nightblade is not the way to go.

Give DK and Templar the possibility to morph more skills into stamina or magica=win

PhxOldGamer68

PS4 NA Azura Star

I feel like "The Flash" when my game crashes. Everyone is frozen, but I get to run around looking at everyone's gear or costume. And then BAM, "Unable to connect to server" error.

And then when I return, everyone in my group died as well. Took three attempts to take Alessia because game crashed and killed everyone. Went to Chalman and fought DC zerg. Game crashed. I was "The Flash" again.

...and then I started up Fallout 4.

hamburgerler76

I love that the last official ZOS post in here was march 13 a lil after 1.6 lol there really helping us pvpers out

Kiramura

Players complains about lag, even if they spam skills like there's no tomorrow? Put cooldowns on some skills...

and what if you split cyrodill in 3 istanced maps? For example, if you pass trough a bridge's door, you literally change map... but you'll still be in azura's star.

I'm sorry if these kind of suggestions were already made

Nutshotz

actually kiramura is correct. if cyrodil was split into 3 different area's it might help with lag and fps issues in cyrodil, as of right now pvp is unplayable during prime time. whats the point of pvping when your ping spikes to 999 or to 3k and at some times when the server cant handle it anymore 12-15k ping and that's when you get a big F U from eso and bam your booted and takes you about 5-10 minutes to get back into game, but yet zos cs states that its our internet connections and or pc's that cant handle the game ( rolls eyes ) well maybe if wheeler and the so called other devs would log onto eso and pvp during prime time and experience what we experience than they would understand how frustrating it is for us. so yes I am calling out wheeler and whats his name wrobel or something like that.

cuz tbh if cyrodil was split into 3 different zones not only would it make a huge increase on performance in pvp your getting your pvp members back instead of losing more and more members by the day. that must hurt your company bad when your game is failing miserably and that you're taking a snails pace at fixing issues.

I do know if you had a weekly maintenance where the servers are shut down 3-5 hours on a Monday or a Wednesday like most mmo's out there and not playable and that there is a patch and that the servers are reset that would also help out the games performance out a lot.

NightRibon23444

Lmao. There is no way to split groups up. The only time that's happens is taking resources. Your not going to split your group up too take over a castle. That's just nonsense. So your plan is to add more stuff so the lag gets worse.

DaveMoeDee

Bouvin wrote: »

HiP wrote: »

better hardware and bandwidth is the solution.

Anyone with a degree in C.S. master+ would disagree.

No amount of bandwidth and hardware can fix sloppy code sucking up all of those clocks.

Still, better hardware can help significantly. Look at how a computer bogs down when an app sucks up 100% of memory, but doubling the memory can provide enough space that memory usage never gets near the level that makes the computer perform so poorly. An app that uses all memory might not need infinite memory. It might just need 50% more than is available on the system. Doubling the memory could completely remove the problem. I've had issues like this at work where just giving a service more memory to work with resolved all sorts of bugs, but the nature of the data was such that it was exceedingly rare that anything above the new setting would ever be needed. That last point also indicates that apart from hardware and coding, configuration is another variable that can cause problems and the people doing configuration in operations are typically different from the people doing coding.

The 'throw hardware at the problem' solution can often be a bit naive at this scale since going up to a higher tier in hardware can be prohibitively expensive at the high end.

Beyond that, there are problems where all solutions are of exponential complexity. When that happens, the perfect code still won't be able to handle a large enough exponent.

Rune_Relic

DaveMoeDee wrote: »

Bouvin wrote: »

HiP wrote: »

better hardware and bandwidth is the solution.

Anyone with a degree in C.S. master+ would disagree.

No amount of bandwidth and hardware can fix sloppy code sucking up all of those clocks.

Still, better hardware can help significantly. Look at how a computer bogs down when an app sucks up 100% of memory, but doubling the memory can provide enough space that memory usage never gets near the level that makes the computer perform so poorly. An app that uses all memory might not need infinite memory. It might just need 50% more than is available on the system. Doubling the memory could completely remove the problem. I've had issues like this at work where just giving a service more memory to work with resolved all sorts of bugs, but the nature of the data was such that it was exceedingly rare that anything above the new setting would ever be needed. That last point also indicates that apart from hardware and coding, configuration is another variable that can cause problems and the people doing configuration in operations are typically different from the people doing coding.

The 'throw hardware at the problem' solution can often be a bit naive at this scale since going up to a higher tier in hardware can be prohibitively expensive at the high end.

Beyond that, there are problems where all solutions are of exponential complexity. When that happens, the perfect code still won't be able to handle a large enough exponent.

I disagree with that fundamentally.
We have always used software limiters to ensure variable don't go out of range, option is valid and such.
Fundamentally because physical limitations can never meet our mental demands.

With campaign size limit + AoE caps ZOS can simulate the maximum burst traffic throughput and ensure the server can handle it.
I just hope they use US clients to test EU servers and vice versa.
Prime time active players then becomes the main issue, where they should be scaling hardware to meet player demands anyway.
More people playing with more hardware should also allow greater burst traffic by default.

If I hit 60 people, I become permanently attached to those 60 people until the damage is confirmed and my costs are incurred at the server.
All of which is synchronous and not asynchronous because people expect the animations to follow the sequence they executed.
That's without considering all the HoTs/DoTs buffs and debuffs that are attached to me (some conditional) for any amount of ticks that have to be maintained on the server to eliminate hacking.

All in all thes hit storm created by ball groups, breeches and flag stacking is completely foreseeable and manageable through software limiters and planning.
They are required to always prioritize functionality over cool.
Alas...who cares what you break or if the game even functions as long as it looks cool.

McJR27

I think a way to distract PVP players would be to introduce another PVP setup. Imagine a colosseum with different landscapes. Players can choose team battles. Randomly get put into one of those landscapes. Door opens and you take off in. Could still maintain the 3 sided battle by having 3 teams running at once, with a team representing each alliance. Can have a really cool leaderboard set up. COULD INTRODUCE A GLADIATOR STYLE ARMOR! That'd be some sweet business right there. But! You could set it up to allow optimal size teams in the same area without it affecting the performance.