@grimuletz That boots part was in response to user troubleshooting we're asked to do by CMs when highlighting game issues. It's a bit of running joke now.
I fully agree with this ''It's not their fault for asking, it's (y)ours for keeping on giving money and time to them.'' and i also agree it's very likely in vain but i'll still try as i think many would like to see these improvements. When they said we have a 10 year roadmap then reduced player count or lack of revenue for a period of time would force them to take some action to sort some things out. I doubt they'll stop supporting Apex at the first hurdle and they did a few rounds of improvements with Anthem for example before cutting the string.
Adding unnecessary visual and audio clutter has also been a complaint for awhile. Simple things like my health bar flashing instead of my screen when i charge an evo or the kill leader blinding me amongst many others. It's just not needed.
@OldTreeCreeper So they're just holding onto what they have.. I'll have a look and think on those numbers and come back as i want to check some bits from the updates and those times. I didn't even think to look at AHQ activity.
@DoYaSeeMe They're old but still relevant and the Kovaak article just explained a bit more how high ping effects your matches. Clientside tickrate was 60hz for the first video and likely went to 20 in the second if he alt tabbed out to check and Apex was running in the background. Either way, even if they did increase it since, the server side is still 20 with a huge network delay and a simulation that still favours people with ridiculously high ping leading to many being shot behind cover ect. The time that passes when you're meant to be safe has increased significantly since then as we're well beyond milliseconds and that's without mentioning actions not even happening.
The problems we have now are much much worse than they were when Battle(non)sense's made those reviews and likely hasn't done more as there's nothing more to update us on. I haven't seen any announcement to make any of us think otherwise. In fact the only thing i heard about server side was the partial downtime maintenance and that wasn't even on the servers the matches are played on.
Graphical optimisations won't be much improvement if the main problem is on the network or server side. I'm not saying there won't possibly be minor improvements but my PC can already run Apex well above 144fps most of the time so reducing GPU load for extra frames won't really solve the major issues although i would welcome those changes as long as they don't effect the quality of the experience like the silent nerf to Caustic and Bangalore past update.
In reply to what you said a few post ago as i just needed to double check before posting, battlefield had more players in match (64) destructible environment (we don't have here) and bullet physics simulation on a fully server side hit registration to mitigate how far behind cover you get hit and this is all running on 64tick servers over 5 years ago so yes, i believe they can do it.
The developers just need to feel like the changes are necessary and the e sport market is just one incentive for them to do it that will lead to improvements for everyone else.
@Midnight9746 The days of providing a quality experience are overshadowed by profit.
I don't know how the contracts/agreements work with server providers. I know when it's community rented you used to be able to do it on a monthly basis but this was years ago for the users. What arrangement Respawn have with Multiplay and if they're locked into a contract is still to be confirmed as it's just hearsay atm. Hopefully something can be changed or improved upon.
Thanks for the input. Appreciate it.
@apostolateofDOOMI think you got a few things wrong.
Matchmaking happens on dedicated lobby servers, which are in control of Respawn. Groups of matched players are then forwarded to Multiplay's hybrid cloud solution, where they get a game server assigned. Now, Respawn doesn't have control over this server, they only provide some parameters, like minimum requirements, region, etc.. To get an idea of how spread Multiplay is, they are integrated with the 3 biggest public clouds (Google, Microsoft Azure and AWS) and over 190 data centers, a lot more than any game studio could afford. In simple terms, it's like picking the right server from a list of 1000 instead of 50, so I don't really get how this is the worse solution.
The ping you see on the performance display, in the top right corner of your in-game HUD, is to the match server, not the lobby one. That's why you see a different, usually higher average value than the one you get when you select the data center to connect to.
I've revisited some of Battle(non)sense's videos recently and learned some new things regarding data transfer. Packet sizes have limitations, which is why large updates must be split into more packets and sent in quick succession. Servers do actually send packets at a high rate, so the tick rate may be a variable one, going from 10-20Hz at the beginning, when there are 60 players on the map, up to 30-60hz (not sure if all lowest end devices can support 60hz).
@DoYaSeeMe I was under the impression the performance display was to the lobby server and why there was a discrepancy between what was displayed and what we were dealing with. If that's not correct then i'll change it but that's all the more reason something needs to be improved upon when people have a really good connection being displayed but performance is really bad.
This isn't necessarily about being the worse solution for the masses but it's not the best one for those that play competitively or a wish to do so where performance is clearly lacking as most, if not all in comp scene or aspiring to be in, are running hardware that can take advantage of 60hz+ and the majority of regulars are also experiencing these problems frequently. I don't understand why lower end hardware couldn't take advantage of higher tick rates when Valorant is really low on resource req for PC but older machines can run on those high tick servers just fine. Excluding Switch and in the future mobile.. Also having a vast pool of servers doesn't do justice to those that wish to participate in e sports or want a consistent experience which we don't have at all currently.
Do you have a source for the servers running at a higher rate?
I knew the matchmaking and actual match servers were separate which I've edited slightly but will do some more on OP this evening and come back to reply to more of the posts.
@apostolateofDOOM There's no way to show the performance of a server when there's none booked yet. Keeping a machine reserved for much longer than a match goes completely against this scale with demand model.
Pros were supposed to have competitions on LAN, but the pandemic removed this option for a while. Competitions and private tournaments do benefit from private, dedicated servers, most probably, but their connection is not protected from network related issues. Add this to the fact that pros are the most sensitive type of players and you get the perfect recipe for endless whining.
Here is good proof that the servers were able to send updates at a rate over 60Hz 2 years ago. They made some changes since then, I think that the graph would probably stay around 60hz now. But there's no way to make updates fit into a single packet and, judging by the evolution of this game, there are chances that the servers send packets even at 128Hz, to keep an entire update around 20-30Hz. What would you say if the instability would actually be caused by a tickrate increase?
@DoYaSeeMe I imagine it's set at 60hz but will have a slight threshold buffer but that's not saying you will consistently get those higher rates. You keep saying they made changes but the experience is much worse now. Season 1 and 2 which weren't perfect by any means was much sharper than S3 onwards and the problems just keeps going downhill from there with no noticeable improvement.
Pros or even just those adept at FPS games criticize, complain or whine as you put it because they're able to see when the backend isn't performing to expectations and it's currently that bad even most casuals are recognising the problems. Look around at those that have played since the beginning and been avid supports of the game see it's in an unhealthy state. It's undeniable that server performance (or whatever is bottlenecking the experience) has always been underwhelming for the users and far from improving over time it's getting far worse.
Look at the main selling point for Valorant and their focus on performance.
“The Valorant team has put extensive effort into determining the best combination of tick rate and latency that will minimize peeker’s advantage, and those tests showed that a 128hz tick rate and 35ms (or less) latency would be best for our players,” said Dave Heironymus, technical director of Valorant at Riot Games. “Blind tests also showed that elite FPS players … can reliably detect when the game is running at a lower tick rate.”
I know they have much smaller matches and an entirely different setup but Apex is a much better game overall and if Respawn focused on these things that comp players having been asking for it would attract many of those players back. Battlefield did when there was a outcry from their community and overwatch did when they started focusing more on the comp side.
