What is wrong with ESO FPS?

alephthiago

So i got the new gtx1070 graphics card in hopes my fps in pvp would improve a lot and give me an actual fighting chance in keep fights for example where my fps would go all the way down to 5-7 fps, my old card was HD7850.
After downloading and installing the drivers, adjusting settings and seeing how beautiful the game was in pve it was time to check the improvement in pvp...Surprise! It did almost NOTHING even setting view distance, shade quality, particles etc etc to medium-low quality.

I did try everything is this guide too, changing the ini settings, nvidia program profile, settings ingame, unpark cpu and etc https://www.reddit.com/r/elderscrollsonline/comments/3jjoql/are_you_having_fps_issues_wih_eso_on_a_pc_well/

My system is I52500k overclocked, 16GB RAM, asus gtx1070.











My question is: Do you get better results in big battles? How?
Why is ESO so poorly optimized?

SirAndy

alephthiago wrote: »

So i got the new gtx1070 graphics card in hopes my fps in pvp would improve a lot and give me an actual fighting chance in keep fights for example where my fps would go all the way down to 5-7 fps, my old card was HD7850.

Should have done a search here first before spending all that coin ...

It's actually the client/server netcode that is the bottleneck and dragging down FPS. All around god awful implementation.

What's even worse, we (myself and a few other programmers) have warned ZOS about this since early beta.

Rohamad_Ali

You bought the same one as me probably . Yes it is as Sir Andy has spoken . The net code restroom backs up more then a stadium restroom at half time during big battles .

Ravena

I've got a much weaker system than yours, and my FPS are much better than that. Muuuuuch better.

Very strange!

catsgomeow

its eso not you

alephthiago

Ravena wrote: »

I've got a much weaker system than yours, and my FPS are much better than that. Muuuuuch better.

Very strange!

How many frames per second you get in pvp big battles? Share your history with us sister/brother.

FriedEggSandwich

I have no hard evidence to back this up but I suspect you might have seen more difference in performance if you'd upgraded your cpu instead. Maybe someone with more knowledge/experience can confirm or deny. I have a 7 year old i7 980X @4GHz with original gtx titan, I run the game at 2560x1440 on high graphics and I see notably higher fps than your screenshots show in similar situations. Your gpu (1070) is more capable than my titan so the difference is my cpu which, despite being 7 years old, is still a hyperthreaded hex core with lots of cache and a clock speed that is still considered high these days.

alephthiago

FriedEggSandwich wrote: »

I have no hard evidence to back this up but I suspect you might have seen more difference in performance if you'd upgraded your cpu instead. Maybe someone with more knowledge/experience can confirm or deny. I have a 7 year old i7 980X @4GHz with original gtx titan, I run the game at 2560x1440 on high graphics and I see notably higher fps than your screenshots show in similar situations. Your gpu (1070) is more capable than my titan so the difference is my cpu which, despite being 7 years old, is still a hyperthreaded hex core with lots of cache and a clock speed that is still considered high these days.

@FriedEggSandwich I did think about that too, but im keeping track of cpu usage and it rarely goes over 45% when playing eso.

Cazic

Two things

1. A lot of performance issues are server side (ESO's problem, not yours)
2. Your CPU is pretty dated. Upgrading that would probably get your around 15-20FPS in a PvP situation like that.

Ravena

alephthiago wrote: »

Ravena wrote: »

I've got a much weaker system than yours, and my FPS are much better than that. Muuuuuch better.

Very strange!

How many frames per second you get in pvp big battles? Share your history with us sister/brother.

100 in less crowded areas, 70-50 ish on crowded cities, 30-20-ish in Cyrodiiil huge battles. There's definitely something fishy going on.

FriedEggSandwich

Ravena wrote: »

alephthiago wrote: »

Ravena wrote: »

I've got a much weaker system than yours, and my FPS are much better than that. Muuuuuch better.

Very strange!

How many frames per second you get in pvp big battles? Share your history with us sister/brother.

100 in less crowded areas, 70-50 ish on crowded cities, 30-20-ish in Cyrodiiil huge battles. There's definitely something fishy going on.

Yeah the lowest fps I ever saw in cyro was 15fps at prime time back in the lag fest that was 1.7. Zos have made small improvements to performance since then so these days the lowest I see is about 20fps, but only in the most disgusting fights. In overworld pve though I get anywhere from 50-100fps with an average of about 70fps. Instances like vma I get 70-100fps.

Darethran

My word, the misinformation here is appalling.

Server-size code cannot affect client-side performance. Poorly performing server code means you have extreme latencies between actions, it does not affect framerates.

His CPU is not remotely outdated. The i5 2500k is only ~20% slower than the best Skylake i5, and that's only in the worst case scenariou outside of emulators. It's not an issue of CPU performance.

The problem lies with draw calls. There is too much on screen for Direct3D 11 to be anything other than horrifically slow. The solution is for the devs to implement a renderer that caters towards open world games; Vulkan/D3D12/Mantle

That being said, if OP is getting these abysmal framerates when there are few players on-screen, there is most likely some software gobbling up performance. Antiviruses, for example, can murder game performance. Avast made Skyrim into an unplayable mess that hitches every five seconds, whereas Avira lowered my minimum framerate by 5fps.

Also, if OP is using an HDD and not an SSD, the framerate is being slaughtered due to files taking too long to be loaded into RAM; each player has to have their armour meshes and textures loaded, among other resources, which requires high read/write speeds, and low latencies. Which is exactly what SSDs provide.


So aye. OP, you got an antivirus running? Is the game installed on an HDD?

SirAndy

MajinCry wrote: »

My word, the misinformation here is appalling.
Server-size code cannot affect client-side performance. Poorly performing server code means you have extreme latencies between actions, it does not affect framerates.

Appalling indeed since you clearly don't understand how ESO handles client/server communication.


The ESO client actually pauses rendering (in certain circumstances) until it has received all the data needed from the server.

Instead of using client/server based prediction to fill gaps of missing data, it *literally* suspends rendering.

alephthiago

MajinCry wrote: »

My word, the misinformation here is appalling.

Server-size code cannot affect client-side performance. Poorly performing server code means you have extreme latencies between actions, it does not affect framerates.

His CPU is not remotely outdated. The i5 2500k is only ~20% slower than the best Skylake i5, and that's only in the worst case scenariou outside of emulators. It's not an issue of CPU performance.

The problem lies with draw calls. There is too much on screen for Direct3D 11 to be anything other than horrifically slow. The solution is for the devs to implement a renderer that caters towards open world games; Vulkan/D3D12/Mantle

That being said, if OP is getting these abysmal framerates when there are few players on-screen, there is most likely some software gobbling up performance. Antiviruses, for example, can murder game performance. Avast made Skyrim into an unplayable mess that hitches every five seconds, whereas Avira lowered my minimum framerate by 5fps.

Also, if OP is using an HDD and not an SSD, the framerate is being slaughtered due to files taking too long to be loaded into RAM; each player has to have their armour meshes and textures loaded, among other resources, which requires high read/write speeds, and low latencies. Which is exactly what SSDs provide.


So aye. OP, you got an antivirus running? Is the game installed on an HDD?

The game is installed in my SSD, its a samsung 240GB (its the only game i keep in the SSD, the others are in the HDD).
These abysmal framerates are happening in BIG battles, like 100+ players involved (its very common on PC NA Trueflame), in pve my game runs 90-100 fps unless im in big cities like Eldenroot for example, there i get 30-50 fps.
Avast is always up.

FriedEggSandwich

alephthiago wrote: »

MajinCry wrote: »

My word, the misinformation here is appalling.

Server-size code cannot affect client-side performance. Poorly performing server code means you have extreme latencies between actions, it does not affect framerates.

His CPU is not remotely outdated. The i5 2500k is only ~20% slower than the best Skylake i5, and that's only in the worst case scenariou outside of emulators. It's not an issue of CPU performance.

The problem lies with draw calls. There is too much on screen for Direct3D 11 to be anything other than horrifically slow. The solution is for the devs to implement a renderer that caters towards open world games; Vulkan/D3D12/Mantle

That being said, if OP is getting these abysmal framerates when there are few players on-screen, there is most likely some software gobbling up performance. Antiviruses, for example, can murder game performance. Avast made Skyrim into an unplayable mess that hitches every five seconds, whereas Avira lowered my minimum framerate by 5fps.

Also, if OP is using an HDD and not an SSD, the framerate is being slaughtered due to files taking too long to be loaded into RAM; each player has to have their armour meshes and textures loaded, among other resources, which requires high read/write speeds, and low latencies. Which is exactly what SSDs provide.


So aye. OP, you got an antivirus running? Is the game installed on an HDD?

The game is installed in my SSD, its a samsung 240GB (its the only game i keep in the SSD, the others are in the HDD).
These abysmal framerates are happening in BIG battles, like 100+ players involved (its very common on PC NA Trueflame), in pve my game runs 90-100 fps unless im in big cities like Eldenroot for example, there i get 30-50 fps.
Avast is always up.

Framerates tank for everyone in big battles, it's the difference between your screenshots and my experience that interests me. I've literally never seen the game go down to 6fps. The background software suggestion sounds plausible, I don't run any 3rd party security software, i.e just windows firewall and security centre. Have you tried disabling your security software to see if it makes a difference?

Darethran

SirAndy wrote: »

MajinCry wrote: »

My word, the misinformation here is appalling.
Server-size code cannot affect client-side performance. Poorly performing server code means you have extreme latencies between actions, it does not affect framerates.

Appalling indeed since you clearly don't understand how ESO handles client/server communication.


The ESO client actually pauses rendering (in certain circumstances) until it has received all the data needed from the server.

Instead of using client/server based prediction to fill gaps of missing data, it *literally* suspends rendering.

I sincerely doubt that the game halts whilst it waits for packets to be sent/received during the vast majority of gameplay. Perhaps during a loadscreen, or when a keep changes ownership, but just running about cyrodiil?



I would like a source on that if it's true.

alephthiago wrote: »

The game is installed in my SSD, its a samsung 240GB (its the only game i keep in the SSD, the others are in the HDD).
These abysmal framerates are happening in BIG battles, like 100+ players involved (its very common on PC NA Trueflame), in pve my game runs 90-100 fps unless im in big cities like Eldenroot for example, there i get 30-50 fps.
Avast is always up.

Avast is definitely not helping, but mentioning Trueflame was key. A wee breakdown of how swamped the renderer is:

1 (Armour) Feet mesh
1 (Armour) Hands mesh
1 (Armour) Torso mesh
1 (Armour) Legs mesh
1 (Armour) Helmet mesh
1 (Armour) Waist mesh
1 (Body) Head mesh
1 (Body) Eyes mesh
1 (Body) Hair mesh
1 (Body) Torso mesh
1 Weapon

That's eleven objects, each of them making a minimum of 4 draw calls.

44 Draw calls per player x 100 players = 4,400 draw calls.

Factor in NPCs, skill effects, architecture, terrain, siege weaponry, vegetation, furniture...And then all the shadows and lights on top of that, oh boy.

Disable Avast completely, if you can. Then disable shadows and reduce draw distances. Does your framerate increase?

FriedEggSandwich

MajinCry wrote: »

SirAndy wrote: »

MajinCry wrote: »

My word, the misinformation here is appalling.
Server-size code cannot affect client-side performance. Poorly performing server code means you have extreme latencies between actions, it does not affect framerates.

Appalling indeed since you clearly don't understand how ESO handles client/server communication.


The ESO client actually pauses rendering (in certain circumstances) until it has received all the data needed from the server.

Instead of using client/server based prediction to fill gaps of missing data, it *literally* suspends rendering.

I sincerely doubt that the game halts whilst it waits for packets to be sent/received during the vast majority of gameplay. Perhaps during a loadscreen, or when a keep changes ownership, but just running about cyrodiil?



I would like a source on that if it's true.

alephthiago wrote: »

The game is installed in my SSD, its a samsung 240GB (its the only game i keep in the SSD, the others are in the HDD).
These abysmal framerates are happening in BIG battles, like 100+ players involved (its very common on PC NA Trueflame), in pve my game runs 90-100 fps unless im in big cities like Eldenroot for example, there i get 30-50 fps.
Avast is always up.

Avast is definitely not helping, but mentioning Trueflame was key. A wee breakdown of how swamped the renderer is:

1 (Armour) Feet mesh
1 (Armour) Hands mesh
1 (Armour) Torso mesh
1 (Armour) Legs mesh
1 (Armour) Helmet mesh
1 (Armour) Waist mesh
1 (Body) Head mesh
1 (Body) Eyes mesh
1 (Body) Hair mesh
1 (Body) Torso mesh
1 Weapon

That's eleven objects, each of them making a minimum of 4 draw calls.

44 Draw calls per player x 100 players = 4,400 draw calls.

Factor in NPCs, skill effects, architecture, terrain, siege weaponry, vegetation, furniture...And then all the shadows and lights on top of that, oh boy.

Disable Avast completely, if you can. Then disable shadows and reduce draw distances. Does your framerate increase?

You sound much more knowledgable than I am, but with all due respect, do you think the game makes drastically more draw calls now than it did back when the game had no lag? When I started playing at launch lag was almost non-existent and the amount of players on screen, especially in pvp, was just more. The lag was introduced shortly after the lighting patch, but devs deny this had anything to do with it. The game has gone through major adjustments since (cp system, dx11, x64 etc), but lag became a feature of pvp way before any of those major changes. We all know how laggy TF can get, it's why it's more laggy for some than others with similar systems that is puzzling.

alephthiago

MajinCry wrote: »

SirAndy wrote: »

MajinCry wrote: »

My word, the misinformation here is appalling.
Server-size code cannot affect client-side performance. Poorly performing server code means you have extreme latencies between actions, it does not affect framerates.

Appalling indeed since you clearly don't understand how ESO handles client/server communication.


The ESO client actually pauses rendering (in certain circumstances) until it has received all the data needed from the server.

Instead of using client/server based prediction to fill gaps of missing data, it *literally* suspends rendering.

I sincerely doubt that the game halts whilst it waits for packets to be sent/received during the vast majority of gameplay. Perhaps during a loadscreen, or when a keep changes ownership, but just running about cyrodiil?



I would like a source on that if it's true.

alephthiago wrote: »

The game is installed in my SSD, its a samsung 240GB (its the only game i keep in the SSD, the others are in the HDD).
These abysmal framerates are happening in BIG battles, like 100+ players involved (its very common on PC NA Trueflame), in pve my game runs 90-100 fps unless im in big cities like Eldenroot for example, there i get 30-50 fps.
Avast is always up.

Avast is definitely not helping, but mentioning Trueflame was key. A wee breakdown of how swamped the renderer is:

1 (Armour) Feet mesh
1 (Armour) Hands mesh
1 (Armour) Torso mesh
1 (Armour) Legs mesh
1 (Armour) Helmet mesh
1 (Armour) Waist mesh
1 (Body) Head mesh
1 (Body) Eyes mesh
1 (Body) Hair mesh
1 (Body) Torso mesh
1 Weapon

That's eleven objects, each of them making a minimum of 4 draw calls.

44 Draw calls per player x 100 players = 4,400 draw calls.

Factor in NPCs, skill effects, architecture, terrain, siege weaponry, vegetation, furniture...And then all the shadows and lights on top of that, oh boy.

Disable Avast completely, if you can. Then disable shadows and reduce draw distances. Does your framerate increase?

Shadow quality is at medium, do you mean just turning it off?

SirAndy

MajinCry wrote: »

I sincerely doubt that the game halts whilst it waits for packets to be sent/received during the vast majority of gameplay. Perhaps during a loadscreen, or when a keep changes ownership, but just running about cyrodiil?

Your personal doubts are meaningless, this has been discussed here ad nauseum, especially during the times when some of this "lag" was introduced.

The first round came with the anti-bot patch after PC release and the second round came with the now infamous "lightning" patch.

Several members here, myself included, have done extensive testing of the ESO client/server code and like i said above, the drop in FPS can be directly linked to packet latency.

Please provide references for your claim that the above is not true ...

Marto

SirAndy wrote: »

MajinCry wrote: »

My word, the misinformation here is appalling.
Server-size code cannot affect client-side performance. Poorly performing server code means you have extreme latencies between actions, it does not affect framerates.

Appalling indeed since you clearly don't understand how ESO handles client/server communication.


The ESO client actually pauses rendering (in certain circumstances) until it has received all the data needed from the server.

Instead of using client/server based prediction to fill gaps of missing data, it *literally* suspends rendering.

I guess I can confirm this.

My internet speed is pretty slow, and I can see clear examples of this everyday.
When I load into a new area, say, a tavern, if I look at a chair, the chair is invisible. Only AFTER every single player characters has loaded in is when the chair will spawn.

That makes performance in empty areas far better than populated areas, not because the actual characters take a long time to load, but because characters take priority over everything else.

Sure, this helps PVP, because it means you'll never be killed by an invisible person, but messes up everything else in this game.

HatchetHaro

It's your CPU. PvP in ESO is extremely CPU intensive, what with all the flashy effects and abilities being cast by zergs from all three factions.

But then again, let's be real here; even the latest i7 won't be able to handle it properly because of just how poorly the game is coded.

Cazic

HatchetHaro wrote: »

It's your CPU. PvP in ESO is extremely CPU intensive, what with all the flashy effects and abilities being cast by zergs from all three factions.

But then again, let's be real here; even the latest i7 won't be able to handle it properly because of just how poorly the game is coded.

This sums it up. Don't listen to the long-winded technical explanations above. In massive PvP battles in Cyro you're only going to see 15-30 FPS at best. Your CPU is likely holding things back a little.

Sure, try disabling Avast or any other programs that are running in the background. That might help. But don't expect any dramatic difference.

AlexTech0x

The game is very poorly optimized.

FriedEggSandwich

alephthiago wrote: »

MajinCry wrote: »

SirAndy wrote: »

MajinCry wrote: »

My word, the misinformation here is appalling.
Server-size code cannot affect client-side performance. Poorly performing server code means you have extreme latencies between actions, it does not affect framerates.

Appalling indeed since you clearly don't understand how ESO handles client/server communication.


The ESO client actually pauses rendering (in certain circumstances) until it has received all the data needed from the server.

Instead of using client/server based prediction to fill gaps of missing data, it *literally* suspends rendering.

I sincerely doubt that the game halts whilst it waits for packets to be sent/received during the vast majority of gameplay. Perhaps during a loadscreen, or when a keep changes ownership, but just running about cyrodiil?



I would like a source on that if it's true.

alephthiago wrote: »

The game is installed in my SSD, its a samsung 240GB (its the only game i keep in the SSD, the others are in the HDD).
These abysmal framerates are happening in BIG battles, like 100+ players involved (its very common on PC NA Trueflame), in pve my game runs 90-100 fps unless im in big cities like Eldenroot for example, there i get 30-50 fps.
Avast is always up.

Avast is definitely not helping, but mentioning Trueflame was key. A wee breakdown of how swamped the renderer is:

1 (Armour) Feet mesh
1 (Armour) Hands mesh
1 (Armour) Torso mesh
1 (Armour) Legs mesh
1 (Armour) Helmet mesh
1 (Armour) Waist mesh
1 (Body) Head mesh
1 (Body) Eyes mesh
1 (Body) Hair mesh
1 (Body) Torso mesh
1 Weapon

That's eleven objects, each of them making a minimum of 4 draw calls.

44 Draw calls per player x 100 players = 4,400 draw calls.

Factor in NPCs, skill effects, architecture, terrain, siege weaponry, vegetation, furniture...And then all the shadows and lights on top of that, oh boy.

Disable Avast completely, if you can. Then disable shadows and reduce draw distances. Does your framerate increase?

Shadow quality is at medium, do you mean just turning it off?

Shouldn't be necessary with your system. I run the game at 2k on high, the only things I have turned off are AA and grass. Grass off is just to help me fight on inclines and to spot nodes more easily, it doesn't appear to affect performance.

Syrani

I was only in Cyrodiil for a few days, but I didn't notice any horrible lag. Where I DO see horrible lag is in vMA and sometimes trials, and I just don't know what to do to fix it. I do run Avast, and will try turning it off, but is that a security risk?

My internet it 20 mg/3mg. It's not the best, so would getting a faster service help? I am also in the US playing on the EU server, so I know that will cause some lag, but it seems to be getting worse, so I would think it has to be something else.

My specs are as follows:
i75820k, haswell, liquid cooled
Asus x99 pro mb
GTX 980ti
16 gig corsair vengeance ram
EVGA 500w 80+ power supply

Is there anything in my setup that could be a chokepoint? If not, is there anything I can do to improve lag?

Rohamad_Ali

Ya it's not my new ASUS lol . When star citizen maxed out has twice the graphics load as here and runs at 75fps still . It is as SirAndy has stated . We have been through this a thousand times . I don't care if you buy a million dollar computer , it's going to slow down because the server information backs up .

AlexTech0x

alephthiago wrote: »

So i got the new gtx1070 graphics card in hopes my fps in pvp would improve a lot and give me an actual fighting chance in keep fights for example where my fps would go all the way down to 5-7 fps, my old card was HD7850.
After downloading and installing the drivers, adjusting settings and seeing how beautiful the game was in pve it was time to check the improvement in pvp...Surprise! It did almost NOTHING even setting view distance, shade quality, particles etc etc to medium-low quality.

I did try everything is this guide too, changing the ini settings, nvidia program profile, settings ingame, unpark cpu and etc https://www.reddit.com/r/elderscrollsonline/comments/3jjoql/are_you_having_fps_issues_wih_eso_on_a_pc_well/

My system is I52500k overclocked, 16GB RAM, asus gtx1070.











My question is: Do you get better results in big battles? How?
Why is ESO so poorly optimized?

Now don't get me wrong, that CPU u have is very old but still the way this game is coded just sucks. It basically drains your CPU. Now, having that beast of a card you have a bottleneck because it just cant keep up with your video card. You need to upgrade it, or most likely should.

TyroneShoelaces

I would appreciate the graphical option to disable all other players textures, and simply have them modeled as all red, blue, or yellow depending on their faction.

Sure it will look silly, but it should help with the nasty frame rates.

knavery

SirAndy wrote: »

alephthiago wrote: »

So i got the new gtx1070 graphics card in hopes my fps in pvp would improve a lot and give me an actual fighting chance in keep fights for example where my fps would go all the way down to 5-7 fps, my old card was HD7850.

Should have done a search here first before spending all that coin ...

It's actually the client/server netcode that is the bottleneck and dragging down FPS. All around god awful implementation.

What's even worse, we (myself and a few other programmers) have warned ZOS about this since early beta.

You know as well as I do that upper management of any company doesn't give two *** what developers have to say. Even though they're right most of the time. Then they *** and moan and blame you when something breaks.

alephthiago

AlexTech0x wrote: »

Now don't get me wrong, that CPU u have is very old but still the way this game is coded just sucks. It basically drains your CPU. Now, having that beast of a card you have a bottleneck because it just cant keep up with your video card. You need to upgrade it, or most likely should.

So, do you think getting a i5-6600 SKYLAKE 3.3GHz Cache 6MB would be better?
Because i dont see much difference, sandy bridges still hold fine.

http://cpuboss.com/cpus/Intel-Core-i5-6600-vs-Intel-Core-i5-2500K
http://cpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Intel-Core-i5-6600-vs-Intel-Core-i5-2500K/3514vs619

reesenorman

Like many people have said already, this game is coded poorly and only allows the use of 2 CPU cores at max. So essentially half of my CPU is sitting idle while I play ESO because it has 4 cores. So really what you wanna aim for is something that's fast and has a large cache (GHz). But I don't know if it will help you out as much as you are looking for.

Recently there's been rumour that the new i3 that's coming out next year is outperforming Skylakes i5s in single threaded activities so it might be worth waiting for the newest gen. It's hard to explain but the CPU pretty much tracks where everything (players) is after being sent the info from the server, that's why during huge battles on TF it can get super laggy even with a really awesome graphics card like a 1070.

Again I'm pretty sure how that works so don't quote me and someone else may be more knowledgable on the subject. I'm really interested in how the netcode effects the fps we are getting though because I didn't know latency could make a difference it.