Area Statistics

[Legacy_kalbaern]

               Under the Build Tab of the toolset is an option to view and area's statistics. It lists two results in kb ... "model" and "texture". So the question is, is there a suggested or known limit at which an area map becomes laggy? Does this feature have much of a use to the average builder?
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Eagles Talon]

               I've kept a personal rule of no larger than 16 x 16 in area size.  And there is a noticable increase in load time the more placeables, NOPC's etc you add.  Laggy is often increased with animated placeables.  Other than that, trial and error are the best guages as each server can perform differently.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_kalbaern]

               

Eagles Talon wrote...

I've kept a personal rule of no larger than 16 x 16 in area size. And there is a noticable increase in load time the more placeables, NOPC's etc you add. Laggy is often increased with animated placeables. Other than that, trial and error are the best guages as each server can perform differently.

I follow similar building guidelines (albeit a bit stricter), but was hoping for something those test results in the actual toolset could be used for.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Sharona Curves]

               Excessive laggy placeables(Animated, light source) or Excessive NPC AI within the fog of war can and does cause lag.  Personally, I have not run into a situation where this is an issue for me.  But then again, I have a modern computer that by far exceeds the pitiful recommended specs of 1.3ghz, 512MB(133mhz) RAM. 
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Genisys]

               The Size of the area & the number of placeables &/or NPCs in the area contributes to server wide lag, especially if it's a heavily used area like Town..  I like to keep my town areas small, this way there aren't 40 people loading this large map when server resets...

Too many placeables in an area will kill a server bad with lag, and increase load time exponentially..

Too many NPCs running heartbeat / OnPercieved scripts will add horrendously to the lagg if there are numerous amount of NPCs just standing around, this is why they should always be spawned in and killed when there is nobody in the area...

BTW Sharon, it's the Player's computer that may struggle with bad lagg if they have a poor vid card or onboard video or a weak system (e.g. 1.5 - 2.0 GHz Laptops).  I still wonder why people go to the store and try to buy a gaming laptop, it makes me laugh so hard... lol!
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Genisys, 28 août 2010 - 03:56 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_kalbaern]

               I'm well aware of what's being posted in response, but thank you all anyhow. My question however is addressed at the single toolset feature of viewing and areas statistics and whether the results have any true worth.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Lightfoot8]

               In Truth I have never looked at the numbers before.   I would be interestion if someone has done a compairison with the numbers and areas That they know are causing lag to there server.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Shadooow]

               Placeables shouldn't cause lag unless they are not static. Static placeables are loaded once per area probably while area is loading and they are never refreshed for the player in area. Not-static placeables however are refreshed and server sends informations about them to player which may cause lags if there is too many of them. Also VFX placebles like fog/light may cause graphic lag on the user's end, if stacked.

Creatures and players are the same as non-static placeables. The more of them in the area the more lags - especially with players because server sends information about all players to all players, for 10 players thats 100 packets every while. So I suggest not make too crowded city, monsters are fine because player kills them.

I follow different rules, because I use only default nwn tilesets so I may afford to make bigger area (unless its Caste/Rural, bad bad tileset, unfinished imo) and I don't limit my builders to any number of placeables. So far, there aren't lags anywhere, if they will, its not so big problem to handle it in the given area.

Few more hints:

CEP1 has heartbeat script on light source placeables zep_torch_something, this may cause heavy LAGs, the solution is to remove the zep_torch_* scripts (nss and ncs) from haks on server.

Some monsters in CEP and even some monsters added in last patch have too much polygons (illithids in Cep, Wereboar in 1.69, DLA Ogre) this may cause graphic lag on older computers especially if you spawn more of them - not recommended.

Horses - lags...
               
               

               

                     Modifié par ShaDoOoW, 28 août 2010 - 05:23 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Lightfoot8]

               To try and get the post back on topic.   I agree with what you are saying shadow.  But there are also lag that the numbers here could help out with.  When a player is in an area the game engine only loads and compiles(if the tiles are ASCII and not binary) a total of 25 tiles.  The tile you are standing in and three squares out.  So knowing the KB of the models and textures in the area and getting an average per tile.   Could be a good measuring stick   for cutting back on some of the placables or preset creatures in an area, At least in large areas where the models  and tiles could be getting compiled as the player moves around.   This is probably more  of a client screen freeze then server lag.  but they both look the same to a player.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_kalbaern]

               

Lightfoot8 wrote...

To try and get the post back on topic. I agree with what you are saying shadow. But there are also lag that the numbers here could help out with. When a player is in an area the game engine only loads and compiles(if the tiles are ASCII and not binary) a total of 25 tiles. The tile you are standing in and three squares out. So knowing the KB of the models and textures in the area and getting an average per tile. Could be a good measuring stick for cutting back on some of the placables or preset creatures in an area, At least in large areas where the models and tiles could be getting compiled as the player moves around. This is probably more of a client screen freeze then server lag. but they both look the same to a player.

This is pretty much my own point. '> The questions still remains, how does this "measuring stick" scale? It could well be that "area statistics" are a moot point and we should just stick to the basics of good building in general.

- Avoid placeables that cross tile boundries in walkable areas.

- Limit non-static placeables and visual effects. (both I generally spawn into areas as needed and despawn with my cleaners)

- Limit pallette size to basically just objects that are created by scripts/encounters or a DM would like to be able to spawn. (IE ... loot and merchant items need not exist on the pallettes if in containers or stores already.)

- Limit map sizes.

- Limit or exclude module wide heartbeats and psuedo heartbeats whenever another alternative exists.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Lightfoot8]

               

kalbaern wrote...

- Limit pallette size to basically just objects that are created by scripts/encounters or a DM would like to be able to spawn. (IE ... loot and merchant items need not exist on the pallettes if in containers or stores already.) 

lol,  I guess it is my turn to go off topic. 

Objects that are created by scripts do not have to be on the palette,  The game can find the item and create it Without the use of the palette.  This can easily be seen anytime you place an object into the override folder without rebuilding the palette. 

I have never tested stores to see if they need the item on the palette of or not,  Just a quick guess would be that it also does not need them. you would of cource still need the item on the palette when making the store in the toolset, to be able to place your items in the store.  After that you could most likely remove them from the palette with no problem. 

The only thing you really need to leave on a palette for the final build of the game are the things you want you DM to be able to easily find in the DM client.   even if they are not on the palette while they are DMing thy can still create the object with the console commands if they know the resRef of the Object. That is al long as the items are in the resource list of for the module( in the .mod file. in a hak or in the override folder.   Or for that matter in the standerd resources if you wanted to go so far as limitting the standard palette.

L8.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Sharona Curves]

               

Genisys wrote...

BTW Sharon, it's the Player's computer that may struggle with bad lagg if they have a poor vid card or onboard video or a weak system (e.g. 1.5 - 2.0 GHz Laptops).  I still wonder why people go to the store and try to buy a gaming laptop, it makes me laugh so hard... lol!

That was kinda my point.  No way am I EVER going to ask my artists (or myself) to limit the artistic vision and value of a scene because someone with an old machine, incorrect or outdated drivers, or whatever is experiencing lag.  Lag on the client side can not be corrected except by the client. 

ShaDoOow wrote...
Placeables shouldn't cause lag unless they are not static. Static
placeables are loaded once per area probably while area is loading and
they are never refreshed for the player in area. Not-static placeables
however are refreshed and server sends informations about them to player
which may cause lags if there is too many of them. Also VFX placebles
like fog/light may cause graphic lag on the user's end, if stacked.

Just thought I'd repeat and concur with this statement.  Too many false rumors are still roaming around this and many other communities in relation to static objects and people are still falsely believing that they cause lag no matter what the number of static objects are within the fog of war. 

Genisys wrote...
Too many NPCs running heartbeat / OnPercieved scripts will add
horrendously to the lagg if there are numerous amount of NPCs just
standing around, this is why they should always be spawned in and killed
when there is nobody in the area...

 
AH . . but there is a simple solution to this and you can avoid the lag potential caused by spawning in objects.  Just simply remove and/or modify the standard heartbeat/perceived scripts to only do as desired(or do nothing) on those NPCs painted within an area.  We have literally 1,000's of NPC objects floating around in the areas and no lag inducing effect is to be seen.  

Lightfoot8 wrote...
I have never tested stores to see if they need the item on the palette
of or not,  Just a quick guess would be that it also does not need them.

 
You guessed correctly.  When accepting .erf files from your building team that have store or items, unless you are going to be spawning such objects or otherwise need a ResRef file you should NEVER import these into your server/main module.  It's just a waste of palette resources.  Another simple idea for keys or objects your DMs may want to give out.  You can avoid using the palette by having a container placeable in a player inaccessible spot and then DMs can grab what's needed without using palette resources.   This is how we handle keys for Player Landlords to give out keys to rooms or property they rent/lease to other players.  No need to have the keys to these sections in the palette when a container inventory within an area works just as fine.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Knight_Shield]

               I have found like the rest of you that keeping 16x16 like I've been told helps.



Also placables especially the CEP ones like the trees...one of the map makers went a little crazy with these on 2 of the maps and WOAH ! I just now pulled out an axe and thinned them out . lol

I have heard keep it under 30 placeables per map ..but I would say as long as not cep related.If you do use fancy smancy cep placeables I would do less.



I will eventually spawn and destroy PC's also once I get the time and figure out the best way.

I also thinned out walkpoints .Again had like 5 npc,s with 16 waypoints so to manuver thru the town is not good. I would say get on yuor mod as yuor DM or fast monk and walk the way players will travel.There travel can be directed with landscape also.This way you can strategicaly place the placables or NPC's for the most effect of what you want.



Those few things have reduced what small issue I have had.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Dark Defiance]

               

kalbaern wrote...

Under the Build Tab of the toolset is an option to view and area's statistics. It lists two results in kb ... "model" and "texture". So the question is, is there a suggested or known limit at which an area map becomes laggy? Does this feature have much of a use to the average builder?

I figured the area stats were used by Bioware to judge the memory requirements for areas, and kept them to a certain limit as to keep with the minimum requirements of the game which was 128MB. HOTU upped the
minimum reqs a tad. A lot of the community tilesets, while are absolutely astounding, pushed the engine of the game. The area stats for the TNO tileset always crashes my toolset. That tells you something
about it.  I don't remember what the specs were for that tileset but it was stated it pushed the limits of the engine.

I have generally followed the "common law" of area building: no bigger than 256 tiles (16x16, 8x32, etc) , no
placeables on the tile seams, and use only what you need.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Dark Defiance, 15 octobre 2010 - 04:27 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Builder_Anthony]

               I use it as a guide...I do alot of high detail work and i know where im good at



16000 will run fast but your getting to your limit of 20000 i sometimes go to 22000 but never want to go poast that.16-18 is perfectly fine for either of the 2 lines.