Odd shell rendering issues.

[rwkeen]

Every now and again I get this odd issue where my shells appear to time out before they usualy should.

Whats even more strange is that if I move a little suddenly they render out to their normal range.

For example, in a fairmile v fairmile battle I'll see my shells render out short and never land, where as I can see my enemys shells render and even hit way past me. Thus I can't hit and damage them, but they can hit and damage me. The odd part is this only happens every now and then, no idea what causes it.

[GOPHUR]

Do you have other timing issues on your computer?

AMD Athalon by chance?

[rwkeen]

Do you have other timing issues on your computer?

AMD Athalon by chance?

Yep an old Anthlon FX57 chip.

As for timing issues none. Play on the same PC for years, only happens every now and again. I sail a LOT, and it probbaly happens once or twice a map.

If it's a timing issue, which seams to make sense, I presume the incoming rounds I see are working on a different timing loop or something, thus they go further than my out going rounds?

[GOPHUR]

Not sure. Guess it depends on what you mean by: "Every now and again I get this odd issue where my shells appear to time out before they usualy should."

I ASSUME you mean that sometimes you fire your shells and then don't see the explosion?

The lifetime on these rounds is 16 seconds but I think they only draw explosions about to 6km. Could be less.

[rwkeen]

Sorry, I'll try to clarify what I mean. Appologies for the following wall of text.

On a normal campaign, I probably sail between 250-300 long Fairmile missions. Of which I'll only notice this issue on maybe 5 of them.

I'm well aware of the 6k vis limit and that shells do time out.

I've often come across enemy AT guns on hill tops that can hit me but my round times out well short of hitting them. I've always put this down to a combination of their height advantage and better muzzel velocity, therefore there shells will travel further before they time out then mine.

This is what I expect.

The odd issue is when it happens on the flat canals when facing another fairmile. In theory both boats have an identical maximum range they can hit each other at, and most times this is how it works.

When it's being odd my shells appear to time out before hitting the enemy boat, but his shells are still hitting and damaging me.

The standard way of fighting at range with the fairmiles 3pdr is to shoot then switch to one of the spotter to observe the fall of the shot, thus you either see your round time out or actualy hit something.

Now we all know that only the shooter sees acurately where his shells hit, and that any hits & damage are calculated on your own PC. Therefore I have to see my shells hit him on my PC to do damage, even if on his PC the shells appear to miss, etc.

And of course I could see his shells apparently hitting me even though they are timing out just short, however when this is the case I take no damage.

MY guess is you are correct that it is a timing issue of some sort, thus for what ever reason on my PC the round I shoot times out quicker than it should, and thus doesn't travel as far as the other players correctly timed round.

As it only happens a few times each map I'm not too bothered by it, but I am just curious to understand what causes it.

[GOPHUR]

The rarity makes me thin there is a math error somewhere, possibly timing on your end but also could just be weird game calculations.

I've asked (low priority) if we can just increase the range of these effects to see if that helps. I can also ask that we increase the time out on these rounds to see if we can simply overshoot the problem.

[GOPHUR]

I upped the timeout from 8 to 12 seconds on these rounds (3pdr) for 1.34.

Next time you see this issue it might help if you could time the rounds to see when they timeout for you. Anyway this should address the issue if it really is a timeout issue.

We use round timeout for a couple reasons.

1) Running round physics can be expensive especially firing multiple MGs. This was much more an issue 10 years ago when we started.

2) sometimes a round will fall through the ground and if it didn't time out you could run physics on it forever creating some possibly nasty side effects.

[rwkeen]

Thanks Gophorr, appreciate it.

I'll have to try and replicate it on the training server with my 2 PC's.

Hard to time rounds when actualy in combat!

[Hinfoos]

not possible to up the timer for all large calibers?

kinda sucks to see tanks near 2.5km and trying to shoot with M10 or something and not being able to see impact at a certain range and further.. fairly hard to aim

[GOPHUR]

I don't really have the time for a global audit atm. I'm also not sure that time outs are the problem. Let's see what this fixes and then we can look at other main gun rounds.

The M10 is already 8 seconds. I find it very hard to believe that it hasn't traveled 3000m bu that time with an initial MV of some 800 m/s.

[Hinfoos]

I don't really have the time for a global audit atm. I'm also not sure that time outs are the problem. Let's see what this fixes and then we can look at other main gun rounds.

The M10 is already 8 seconds. I find it very hard to believe that it hasn't traveled 3000m bu that time with an initial MV of some 800 m/s.

maybe its the render range of explosions i thought of, nvm that.

[to]

i missed this

but i can concure with what rwkeen is saying.

he describes it pretty accurately but it happens all the time in my case.in every engagement my targets incoming tracers and round explosions are hitting me or around me and my outgoing rounds are timing out before detonating.

its hard to guesstimate the distance since often were both moving but i usually have to close about 30m before my shots start detonating

now i do more open water sailing therefore possiblely more max range shooting,so i may notice it more.

at 2600m my outgoing tracers drop on target and rounds detonate, at about 2700m i see my tracer drop on target ,but no detonation

no doubt my target is seeing the same thing on his end

i don't think its a cpu timing prob , i'm on a intel

Edited July 12, 2011 by to