Lag compensation

A while back (with great difficulty) I conciously gave up on multiplayer gaming due to the deliberately initiated delay on my connection. And it wasn't just twitch shooting FPS's that were suffering, being rammed off of corners in racing games by invisible cars wasn't uncommon either. The only real regret I have is the inability to take any constructive part in BF3 matches. You would have to be blind and stupid not to be drawn to the diversity of the battles, but the frustration ended in one snapped controller and that was that for me.

The only MP I play now is COD Zombies, because it allows me to play with friends in private matches without the same level of frustration. That said, the same issues arise in that game if I stand anywhere near the other players. Hence why I only play private matches. That way each player takes an area and the lag doesn't really have an effect.

Anyway, this is all old news, but "restarts" recent thread made me wonder about the future and the inevitable latency improvement of the average connection. MrSaffron mentioned a while back that he believes it is down to poor netcode, but I think that is only half the story. I think that it is also a conscious decision by the developers to give balance to the middle 80% of players. Perhaps as high as the top 10% of connections latency wise, being unavoidable casualties of that strategy.

So what will happen as latency improves? Does anybody know what the maximum latency (discounting [censored] internal wiring) is likely to be on FTTC/B/P? Will the width of variation in latency reduce, leading to better matchmaking? Does anybody know what the current ping ranges for matchmaking are? Has anybody hired a PS3 server on BF3 and knows the format of the latency settings? Can you set the ping range manually in ms increments, say 10-50?

I don't have the time nor the patience to muck about with servers, but would consider it as an experiment if I thought they had that level of control?

Server based games with a set of playerswith similar latency should be fine.

Where one player is host with artifical compensation is the real killer.

I do see bf3 teams that manually kick the outlying latency players now

How would you quantify outlying Andrew? Assuming it is not "a duel" situation so to speak, what amount of discrepancy in latency do you think is ultimately playable, bearing in mind you cannot expect perfection?

With a connection varying between 10 and 15ms, would a server limit of 30ms offer a consistent experience? I ask because consoles only give ping bar graphs, not the ability to see the actual figures involved. I suspect even the highest connections are grouped up to 100ms.

I've played on servers in the past with pings of 90 plus and its been fine mate,I know you been going on about this problem for a long time and I still fail to understand what it's all about as its a technical problem your end I think.

I thought you had a real fast connection eventually so I'm in the dark here and have been ever since you mentioned it,I think I'm right in saying that you always end up been host or something based on your fast connection.

Problem is with most games multiplayer is where they shine,missing out on Battlefields and all the new games is going to be a major disaster ,is there nothing you can do your side to sort your online problems out.


I find it hard that in this day and age that there is not some sort of solution,then again I'm not understanding your problem and never have.

Would really like to help you sort it out,so if you can explain in baby words .....simples ....I will do some research and see if there is anyway we can fix your online issues.

Have you read this Thread

Are you trying a wired or wireless connection when trying multiplayer games mate,when reading the thread a guy with a similar problem went from wired to wireless to slow his connection down and now he says its better .

Edited by time2die (Mon 01-Apr-13 15:08:38)

You can't fix it mate, it's a deliberate part of the online format. The higher the ping, the greater the advantage.They know it's a problem they just don't want to fix it as it makes for quicker matchmaking and keeps three quarters of the players happy.

That's why I wondered about the flexibilty of the PS3 servers. If you can set the latency parameters yourself, it should be fine. You might just have to wait a bit longer to find 15 other players with a similar connection. To be fair toi Treyarch they introduced an option for matchmaking dependant on connection quality, but it still makes very little difference with a 9ms ping.

What is your ping? You could hire a PS3 server and we could try it out?

So you saying the higher your ping the better,I always thought it was the lower ping was where its at and people with something like 9ms would be laughing

Yeah I will just get you a dedicated server set up ,give me a couple of hours as it is April fools day ain't it buddy..

I'm going to pick up that MMO game Defiance tomorrow which is strictly online so no benefit to you my friend,I've also heard that Black Ops Zombies is ruined,not that I bothered after 20 minutes of trying it.

Actually if I could trade that game I would because quite honestly I have become tired of these same old Cod games,never even got past 20 minutes in the Black ops 2 single player either....bored me to death.

I don't know what my ping is mate because in most games it's a graph,in Battlefield it does have a server browser though and that might help

Can you hire playstation 3 servers then for your p3, if so tell me more..... You never know I might invest ....

Edited by time2die (Mon 01-Apr-13 16:25:40)

Yes, one month hire and upwards (I think) is available. The information was in the BF3 menu if I remember correctly. If I knew what I was doing I might try it out myself, but unlike you and spook I have never got involved in that sort of stuff in the past.

I would imagine it would be quite easy ,before on my PC when we had a couple of servers all that was required was a FTP account and understanding the way of changing things on your server,like uploading those gorgeous maps made for united offensive from a site called maps n mods ,those where the days,did you ever play united offensive mate.

What a time I had then which was about 10 years ago but I don't think to this day I have had so much fun apart from gears.

Custom servers,with the awe mod running on Cod united offensive,not forgetting the modern weapons mod,was easy at the time and I enjoyed adding custom maps and different mods to our servers

In reply to a post by mrnelster:

Yes, one month hire and upwards (I think) is available. The information was in the BF3 menu if I remember correctly. If I knew what I was doing I might try it out myself, but unlike you and spook I have never got involved in that sort of stuff in the past.

So why don't you try going into some of them servers in the game browser of battlefield 3

Because it doesn't tell you the latency range and it still lags, that's why I wondered if it could be set more strictly. Otherwise it's not worth it.

So what your saying is we need to set up or get a server thats around 9ms.......Is that it.

In theory a max of 30 would be ok. I dont know the netcode margins, that's why I asked if 30ms would be ok. I would guess that any compensating code would not kick in between 10 and 30ms but I don't actually know that, hence the need to experiment!

I'll make a donation to the server cost. All I need is your account number and sort code, and..........

Yeah why not whats your waist and shoe size as you can borrow my flares and loafers

Just been watching a video on youtube and it appears you don't get to set the latency yourself, which is pointless and just means that in return for paying for their servers for them, you get to choose maps etc.

Waste of time.

So what you are saying is that those like yourself that have a real good connection can not play online games,there must be Thousands matey and i would hazard a guess that they are still playing online games without the issues you are experiencing.

So in all honesty what is the point of you even bothering with gaming,only on occasions like Far Cry 3 and Bioshock infinite is there a decent single player game in the first place.

You have The last of us to look forward to and Watchdogs and GTA5 but with the Playstation 4 i expect some awesome online games that in your case is a waste of space.

Pings of 30ms have been common for a decade, and even Be has has 5 to 10 ms pings for a few years. So its not new.
The way to go is to limit access to a clan, and know through other ways that you all have similar connections/latency.

You need to find a techie gaming clan who have spent the time to figure things out.

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

Pings of 30ms have been common for a decade, and even Be has has 5 to 10 ms pings for a few years. So its not new.
The way to go is to limit access to a clan, and know through other ways that you all have similar connections/latency.

You need to find a techie gaming clan who have spent the time to figure things out.

Lag compensation is catered to people with 30ms+ pings, The crapper your ping the better your online experience will be, My ping to germany is 32ms, I can shave another 8ms off that if i switch on fastpath.

I know when i'm host in cod games, Thats any cod game cod4,maw,mw2,blackops,mw3, The lag is far worse when host, Framerate drops.

Keep being put into lobbies with french, German, Italian, Spanish.

I'm host with 4 bars and a german, French, Italian, Spanish player with 4 or 3 bars who's not host gets a better connection to the game than i do.

Edited by deleted (Tue 02-Apr-13 13:20:59)

In reply to a post by time2die:

I'm going to pick up that MMO game Defiance tomorrow which is strictly online so no benefit to you my friend,I've also heard that Black Ops Zombies is ruined,not that I bothered after 20 minutes of trying it.

Have you managed to pick it up yet, If so what is it like? I have seen some user reviews though nothing from so called professional reviewers etc.

Edited by NilSatisOptimum (Tue 02-Apr-13 20:27:46)

Ive been playing it tonight and it quite good fun considering i have never played such a large open world game like this before,graphically its the pits if you put it side by side by other games such as Tomb Raider,Far cry 3,Uncharted and many others.

To be honest its early days at the moment and at 11.30 this evening a message flashed up saying server maintenance for 30 minutes and that put an end to that playtime.

There are fast travel points and plenty of people running around doing stuff ,side quests,mission,race quests and main quests,tonight when playing something Alien like spawned and we were told to kill it for some nice goodies and all that were around joined in but before we managed it the server went ofline.

i have the feel for the game but i don't think i fully understand what I'm suppose to be doing and im convinced im suppose to form squads or something as we all seem to be doing our own thing and at times when trying to do a mission its a little difficult with no help.

Think i need a good day on it to make a informed opinion but apart from the basic graphics im having some fun with it.

I found this One

but i guess with this type of game its going to take time for reviews to filter through,its no Killzone 4 or watchdogs i can tell you that but if I'm still playing it the end of the week then it will have had to have something that grips me.

Forgot to mention it took about 45 minutes to load the game and install it,then patch it and download all sorts of stuff that I've even forgotten what they called it,i thought i would never get into the game and was getting frustrated at starring at a download screen for ages.

Edited by time2die (Wed 03-Apr-13 00:56:14)