Server Lag During Events

[Calculator]

I'm sure most everyone knows about this..but, I can't seem to find recent, constructive discussions about it.

 

During mass spawn events when in a large group (a league of 2 or more teams,) there appears to be some massive delays that build up over the course of the fight.

 

It cripples targeting and power cycling to the point of the game being unplayable during the battle.

 

The delays are non-existent at the beginning of a fight..but, can extend to a couple of minutes at the end.

 

During the recent MapServer event, I watched combat numbers and graphic effects continue on well after the last enemy had spawned (for two minutes...) - this is not simple network lag or high detail graphics settings.

 

I've seen it in the Rikti Invasions and First Ward zombie events, as well as some of the singular GM events..though, to a much lesser extent with the GM events.

 

To me, it seems like the packet buffers are flooded and the communications between server and client become disjointed in time.

 

I've seen some people post that targeting a pet helps with the targeting issue..which reinforces my thoughts on buffer saturation as the cause.

 

Is this something that can be looked at?

 

Anyways, my two cents...

 

Thank you for keeping such a great game alive!

[srmalloy]

21 hours ago, Calculator said:

During mass spawn events when in a large group (a league of 2 or more teams,) there appears to be some massive delays that build up over the course of the fight.

 

It cripples targeting and power cycling to the point of the game being unplayable during the battle.

The mass spawn events have been ugly for a long time. The initial problem is that targeting and attacks work differently if you are attempting to target mobs directly or targeting through a pet. Because pet targeting occurs entirely on the server, as soon as the server 'knows' about an arriving mob, you can attack it through the pet, sometimes even before it appears in zone. If you are targeting mobs yourself, then mobs spawning in become targetable before they appear, but cannot be attacked for at least a second after they appear. This puts an immediate severe hindrance on melee characters in a mass-spawn event; targeting through a pet will often target incoming mobs at some distance from the character, and by the time they move to within melee range, the mob has almost always been taken down by ranged characters targeting through a pet. Similarly, trying to target directly, the ranged characters targeting through pets will have had the opportunity to take multiple shots at the mob before it becomes attackable by the melee character. This handicaps the melee characters, resulting in them sucking hind teat for damage contribution, and in the case of Brutes, impairing their ability to raise and maintain Fury (and momentum for TW characters, due to not being able to get off a momentum-building attack).

[Rudra]

3 hours ago, srmalloy said:

The mass spawn events have been ugly for a long time. The initial problem is that targeting and attacks work differently if you are attempting to target mobs directly or targeting through a pet. Because pet targeting occurs entirely on the server, as soon as the server 'knows' about an arriving mob, you can attack it through the pet, sometimes even before it appears in zone. If you are targeting mobs yourself, then mobs spawning in become targetable before they appear, but cannot be attacked for at least a second after they appear. This puts an immediate severe hindrance on melee characters in a mass-spawn event; targeting through a pet will often target incoming mobs at some distance from the character, and by the time they move to within melee range, the mob has almost always been taken down by ranged characters targeting through a pet. Similarly, trying to target directly, the ranged characters targeting through pets will have had the opportunity to take multiple shots at the mob before it becomes attackable by the melee character. This handicaps the melee characters, resulting in them sucking hind teat for damage contribution, and in the case of Brutes, impairing their ability to raise and maintain Fury (and momentum for TW characters, due to not being able to get off a momentum-building attack).

While not ideal, that can be mitigated by simply fighting outside the core milieu. Around the perimeter of the league, where enemies do still spawn, melees can attack and defeat spawns during server events without the problem of having to target through pets.

[Lunar Ronin]

50 minutes ago, Rudra said:

While not ideal, that can be mitigated by simply fighting outside the core milieu. Around the perimeter of the league, where enemies do still spawn, melees can attack and defeat spawns during server events without the problem of having to target through pets.

 

Yep.  That's really the only effective way to play melee on teams or leagues on Homecoming - go where no one else is, even if that means jumping two or three spawns ahead.