Desync and why it's fixable

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DestroTheGod wrote:

@lolSaiph

A lot of people have solutions for desync. It's true. A lot of people think they can fix it (and I don't use 'think' to be mocking please don't take it that way). But GGG weighs practicality, time spent, viability, and effectiveness as major components to the process. Any and all changes that involve desync would require major strategizing and planning. Considering they don't even have a 'solution in the works', I'd say we're looking at a lot of time waiting for a solution at all, at this point.

I'm grateful that Rhys has given his thoughts because it helps see what areas they are thinking about in regards to the solution by Scrotie. It's good they are being so interactive with the community.

Hopefully this is another insightful discussion with the devs! :D

You know, out of the hundreds of player posts, and many developer posts regarding this subject...just once I would like to see something along the lines of "yes we know desync is a major issue and we are making it a priority" or "we have a fix that's in the works but its no small task ect.."

Its always explaining the desync, dodging addressing that it needs to be fixed and that it is an issue, or explaining how great their server side prediction system is (loosely)

Its unsettling to have an issue that many people said "its in beta" "it will get fixed at launch" "the game just launched let it settle it will get fixed" still linger now close to a year later...and it doesn't seem to be a priority...or really even acknowledged as anything more than a rare oddity...which it isn't.

Its consistent for me. Across several characters. The topic is the largest generator of posts on these forums and on steam.

I just don't see why we cant put this server side stuff on a test server and fix it, and at least put character and enemy locations client side. I know it wont be a simple thing to do...but I think the players deserve a better gaming experience while your cheat proof prediction stuff gets...fixed.

You could at least give us a keybind to sync with.

According to posts I've seen recently in account support, people are being banned for using AHK to bind console commands to a key.

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CapitalPunishment wrote:

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DestroTheGod wrote:

@lolSaiph

A lot of people have solutions for desync. It's true. A lot of people think they can fix it (and I don't use 'think' to be mocking please don't take it that way). But GGG weighs practicality, time spent, viability, and effectiveness as major components to the process. Any and all changes that involve desync would require major strategizing and planning. Considering they don't even have a 'solution in the works', I'd say we're looking at a lot of time waiting for a solution at all, at this point.

I'm grateful that Rhys has given his thoughts because it helps see what areas they are thinking about in regards to the solution by Scrotie. It's good they are being so interactive with the community.

Hopefully this is another insightful discussion with the devs! :D

You know, out of the hundreds of player posts, and many developer posts regarding this subject...just once I would like to see something along the lines of "yes we know desync is a major issue and we are making it a priority" or "we have a fix that's in the works but its no small task ect.."

Its always explaining the desync, dodging addressing that it needs to be fixed and that it is an issue, or explaining how great their server side prediction system is (loosely)

Its unsettling to have an issue that many people said "its in beta" "it will get fixed at launch" "the game just launched let it settle it will get fixed" still linger now close to a year later...and it doesn't seem to be a priority...or really even acknowledged as anything more than a rare oddity...which it isn't.

Its consistent for me. Across several characters. The topic is the largest generator of posts on these forums and on steam.

I just don't see why we cant put this server side stuff on a test server and fix it, and at least put character and enemy locations client side. I know it wont be a simple thing to do...but I think the players deserve a better gaming experience while your cheat proof prediction stuff gets...fixed.

You know, out of the hundreds of player posts, and many developer posts regarding this subject... just once I would like to see users stop asking GGG to apologize to them directly about the impact of desync.

They don't need to "come out and say it", it is implied. Also they don't owe you an explanation.

How about treating the desync effects like this: http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/669377

In some situations, being in sync is not mandatory. But the game should be able to detect when it should be and do it in an automatic way.

The game synchs up every n seconds... I think it's between 5 and 10. They could solve most of the complaints by cutting that number in half, BUT that would double their costs. It's simply not effective. Players would complain less often, but their complaints would be more angry when they did. Desync is not ever going to go away completely. It's up to the players to learn to deal with it or pony up $15/month subscription fees so that servers can be run (worked so well for Flagship... didn't it?)

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

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simnel wrote:

You can't just say "combat math wouldn't be a big deal" and wave your hands... we're not storm troopers :-)

I meant to say "changing the current combat math system wouldn't be either wise nor necessary." I'll edit the OP.

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syrioforel wrote:

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SponTen wrote:

Wouldn't client-side make memory hacking even easier?

Of course. It's a matter of tradeoffs and degrees.

Please elaborate.

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Spysong192 wrote:

Sorry even with my CCNA i don´t understand enough of the material (well it has little to do right now with networking right^^) to make a good post based on knowledge. But just from reading your OP scrotie, instead of moving_discrepancy/move_dsync you change that damage data will have a discrepancy if i understand that correctly?

The suggested additions themselves have very little to do with networking, although they definitely take networking into consideration; one way to explain it is a way to reduce (but not eliminate) the need for networked communication from server to client, by putting something which is normally a pure server-side function — monster AI/skill selection/movement decisions — on the client. Damage data would still be done server-side, as it is now.

to me this is the difference between LoL and POE

When LoL is loading a game it shows all the characters of that game all loading the game, with a scrolling % display.

when everyone is at 100% the game launches.

What I envision is that the LoL server is copying ALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL the calculations' "complexity" to the 10 players' computers.

the damage of each attack of the ten characters,

the amount of life each character has,

the move speed of each character,

everything. being worked on as much as possible by the horsepower of the 10 players, computers.

in a sense it seems like the server is trusting the 10 clients completely....they seem to be able to get away with this because you only fight other humans; a bots performance will stick out like a sore thumb.

I would guess thats why PoE is not quite free to lean so close towards pure performance; cheating assholes would overrun the game, becuase in PoE the AI controlled minions that populate the playing field can not identify a botting player in 30 seconds flat.......

I believe most of the calculations in LoL are made on server..not on client..hell..if client would calculate damage and movement while server fully trusting him.. it would be hack/cheat galore..

why not just allow the server to "trust" the client a tiny bit?

allow a tolerance of say, .001 or something like that. It would allow the player to move through a doorway at least without getting desync.

I realize that a .001 difference in floating point values could have massive impacts on the final outcome of a combat or movement but that's the point. You shouldn't care about how different the final outcome is you should only care about how different the server's and clients simulations are (which prevents hacking)

if the client sees the player walk through a doorway, but the server has the character .000000001 cm to the left which causes the player to NOT walk through the doorway then the server should just say "fuck it" and let the client's version take precedence.

but there's no way that you could "hack" your client to reliably give you an advantage with only a .001 difference.

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ManiaCCC wrote:

I believe most of the calculations in LoL are made on server..not on client..hell..if client would calculate damage and movement while server fully trusting him.. it would be hack/cheat galore..

oh yes I belive they go through the server. But what it feels like is that as much of the work as possible is offloaded to the other computers.

It justr seems VERY suspicious that it loads the maps and the game slower than...any game I can remember playing in the past 15 or 20 years....and then once your in the game ....lag is virtually non existant. and the nature of LoL? every frame of animation and every little millimeter count in a huge way so this only exaggerates the effect of lag or desync...and exaggerates the impressive abscence of it....


and as far as cheating and hacking goes, every single huge online game is infested with cheaters....even LoL im sure....but in an arena with 9 other human beings....way WAY less goes unnoticed...rohas dont care....10 of em..1000 of em...they wont bat an eyelash..

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Rhys wrote:

And of course if you try to attack it back, on the client you whack at it (for no damage, at least initially) while on the server you are running off into another room.

This comment here highlights something that players can do to mitigate one of the bad things that can happen do to desync, and it is something that I have always been doing.

In threads discussing desync I have seen people often comment that they suddenly find themselves in a room that they never entered. They point to this as a serious problem with desync that is more than just lag time.

However the reason this happens is hinted at in the line I quoted from Rhys.

If your client thinks the mob is next to you and you are left clicking to attack, you will see yourself standing there whiffing at the mob and doing no damage.

The server on the other hand does not see a mob next to you and all those left clicks are interpreted as move commands!

Then, when the resync occurs you find yourself warped into another room that you swear you never entered!


And why do I never see this behavior myself when I play? Simple, I only ever shift attack. The shift key is the hold position command and by always, 100% only ever left click attacking while holding shift, I never ever, ever, ever find myself getting resync'd into a room I never entered.

By shift attacking the server will never interpret my left clicks on a mob that's not really there as a move command.

Just thought I would point this out to anyone who finds themselves having this kind of problem. Shift left clicking at all times can greatly increase your survivability if you find desync to be a significant problem.