The 'How to make this mod run AND look good' thread.

[Grand_Admiral_Pellaeon]

One thing that has realy bugged me is the way everyone seems to be able to describe these massive battles, yet my computer essentialy crys when its made to do anything over a small one v one battle. This thread could be made 'stickied' so as to help anybody else in my situation. Any advice would be welcome as long as it is not too patronising (ie do you have the latest graphics drivers, or have you defragged your hard drive recently).

 

My system is a 2.8ghz evesham lightning

Ati 9800 PRO 256 DDR 2 Catalyst 2.7 drivers

1024 gb of ram

Windows XP Home (who doesnt have it in a computer nowadays anyway)

Audigy 2 soundcard

 

My system specs are pretty good and i would imagine i should be able to run this mod pretty well.

[Grand_Admiral_Thrawn]

My system specs are pretty much the same (AMD Athlon 2800, not what your processor is [i've never heard of it]), and I get lag fighting one AI. It's because the models are in such great detail, your computer has to render it all. I don't know how every one else is having the epic battles (probably with very lowered settings), because I just don't see it happening.

 

I'll assume you ment 1024 Mhz of RAM . I don't have XP Home on my PC, I've got the professional edition. Not much difference though.

[BobTheGreat]

I think most people describing massive battles are playing at about 1.5-2 seconds/frame. That's how it is for me with any kind of capital ship combat, sometimes worse, even on low details. I think it has to do with the detail level of the models, and the sheer number of projectiles that are present. I know there is a lot of optimization that can be done, especially with the effects, and hopefully that will help it a lot. As is, I just hit pause, give my ships orders, then unpause it and watch the slideshow play out.

[Grand_Admiral_Pellaeon]

Thrawn my bad an evesham lightning is the model of my computer. What i ment to say was pentium 4 2.8ghz with hyper threading

[pnakotus]

Hey GAP, maybe your cat 2.7s are causing the problem, since they're more than a year old... I'm going to assume thats a typo. I'm further going to assume you've already tried turning aa/af off or to app preference. Then I'm going to laugh at XP:H.

 

Seriously, try a reinstall. My system is nowhere near as good as yours, and I have no problems until there are multiple super heavies on the map, and then it goes down like a taiwanese hooker. I really don't understand how your system is crashing, apart from a) XP:H being crap and b) you having a large page file. So sayest theDAN.

 

EDIT - Further, my lowly 9600xt/2100xp can handle all detail, including shadows, and have multiple ISDs in battle at a lowest FPS of about 15-20. Bad, but not unplayable, and I just zoom out anyway to even it out. If I turn off shadows its fine.

[Tanker]

My PC's a Alienware Area-51

P4, 3.2ghz

1G Corsair XMS DDR400 Ram

BFG Nvidia 5700 Ultra 128m video

120G 7200 RPM HD

 

I normaly run 1600x 1200 with things set high, but with lighting and shadows turned down

 

-Any thing over large fleet size no matter how many opponets and the game gets Laggy

 

-one of the biggest killers for me is that between the high polly count in the ships, and having the planets being 3d objects I still often get lame frame rates when space gets crouded

[pnakotus]

My PC's a Alienware Area-51

P4, 3.2ghz

1G Corsair XMS DDR400 Ram

BFG Nvidia 5700 Ultra 128m video

120G 7200 RPM HD

 

I normaly run 1600x 1200 with things set high, but with lighting and shadows turned down

 

-Any thing over large fleet size no matter how many opponets and the game gets Laggy

 

-one of the biggest killers for me is that between the high polly count in the ships, and having the planets being 3d objects I still often get lame frame rates

 

I don't mean to be rude, but running in 16x12 and complaining about lag is just stupid. Ever think bout lowering the res? :rolls:

 

Actually, does the interface scale? I play in 10x8, and the interface is fiddly; on 16x10 I'd imagine it'd be almost impossible to read.

[Grand_Admiral_Pellaeon]

Wow im amazed at how many typos i made when writin my specs. Let me try again lol

 

The Pcs an Evesham Lightning

P4 2.8ghz with hyper threading

Ati 9800 PRO 256 DDR 2 Catalyst 4.7 drivers (going to try the new 4.8s today)

1gb of DDR ram

Windows XP Home

Audigy 2 soundcard

[bobandrubert]

My PC's a Alienware Area-51

P4, 3.2ghz

1G Corsair XMS DDR400 Ram

BFG Nvidia 5700 Ultra 128m video

120G 7200 RPM HD

 

I normaly run 1600x 1200 with things set high, but with lighting and shadows turned down

 

-Any thing over large fleet size no matter how many opponets and the game gets Laggy

 

-one of the biggest killers for me is that between the high polly count in the ships, and having the planets being 3d objects I still often get lame frame rates when space gets crouded

 

 

YOU HAVE AN ALIEN WERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THEY ARE THE BEST SYSTEMS!!!!!!!!

[Grand_Admiral_Pellaeon]

alienware, best pcs if ya can spend 4000$/£ on em but basicaly a rip off

[Tanker]

I beg to differ I have had no problems with my system and it runs great. any hoo, it ain't the system it's what ya do with it, and when I'm done with it will not be the same system any ways

 

 

pnakotus:

I don't mean to be rude, but running in 16x12 and complaining about lag is just stupid. Ever think bout lowering the res? :rolls:

 

Actually, does the interface scale? I play in 10x8, and the interface is fiddly; on 16x10 I'd imagine it'd be almost impossible to read.

 

 

Actualy the interface is quie easy to read @ 16x12

 

Also I'm not complaining, just trying to point out what players are experiencing with their systems when playing the mod, hopefuly Evil will be able use the information to better judge how much to put in to the mod to what folks systems can handel. If people can't play it they

won't IMO

Edited August 23, 2004 by Tanker

[pnakotus]

I beg to differ I have had no problems with my system and it runs great any hoo, it ain't the system it's what ya do with it, and when I'm done with it will not be the same system any ways

 

 

pnakotus:

I don't mean to be rude, but running in 16x12 and complaining about lag is just stupid. Ever think bout lowering the res? :rolls:

 

Actually, does the interface scale? I play in 10x8, and the interface is fiddly; on 16x10 I'd imagine it'd be almost impossible to read.

 

 

Actualy the interface is quie easy to read @ 16x12

 

Also I'm not complaining, just trying to point out what players are experiencing with their systems when playing the mod, hopefuly Evil will be able use the information to better judge how much to put in to the mod to what folks systems can handel. If people can't play it they

won't IMO

 

*grin* Well that makes more sense! Makes GAP's problems even stranger tho, since he gets less performance than me on a much better system. I imagine these problems won't be as bad once EJ can optimise the projectiles.

 

Sorry for misunderstanding

[Grand_Admiral_Thrawn]

The make of your system has little or nothing to do with performance. What makes a system great is what is put into it. So, there is almost no way you could run the game at 1600x1200, all settings up high (shadows down, lighting down) and still get good performance. Why? Because you're using a 5700 which, as is well document, performs worse than the ATI Radeon 9800 (not pro or above). The fact that you have a P4 3.2 also makes your claim debateable since they perform lower than my processor, the AMD 2800+.

 

This thread has basically become a place to bragg about your system, and isn't going anywhere. If you want to talk about such things, go into the Outside interests forum.

[Tanker]

Thrawn: I'm not looking to get into a debate about who's got the best system. we all have better things to do then go back and forth about what hardware is better for what. All I know is that I have what I have, it works(really well) and I love every second of using my system.

 

take it easy yea'

[EvilleJedi]

I will make the comment that the ship detail has nearly nothing to do with the slow down, it is nearly all AI slow down in most cases (sensor manager excluded) the reason is that your video card can pretty much do the polys and textures with ease (when you pause the game the AI is turned off, notice how unless you are zoomed all the way in, that the game is smooth regardless of how many ships are on screen or how many effects are being rendered.) unfortunately there is no easy way to optimize the AI and it simply takes trial and error.

[bobandrubert]

for all of you with lag but class restrictions to heavy frigate. In my opinion it is more fun too.

[stormfury_2]

Hmm intersting topic, is there anyway to view the actual FPS you are getting, I'd like to see how my PC will fare. It has an AMD 1400+ (1.051ghz), 512DDR ram, GF3Ti200 64mb and will only experiance problems when the AI decides to attack me with about 100 figghters and covettes and other small things, if it were just cap ships heavy frigs, destroyers and cruisers I'd probably not experiance any problems. I run in either 800 x 600 or 1024 x 768 i'm not sure how much differnce it makes I've not compared it yet. Also I've turned OFF the geometric scaling (it reduces the quality of models when the battles get big). And what jedi said about the AI is intersting as like he said if you pause it it's very smoothe indeed.

 

storm...

[Grand_Admiral_Pellaeon]

Just out of curiostity does the game have to realy think about lasers because ofcourse they have to get somewhere so i imagine the ai has some involvement with that and are they made of polygons.

 

Oh btw i plan on playing a LAN with my brother. Seeing as there will be no enemy ai should performance be a lot better?

[Grand_Admiral_Thrawn]

I've played many LAN games with my friend, and there is little lag there... unless you get large fleets, but that is to be expected.

[Grand_Admiral_Pellaeon]

yeah just did a lan with my brother. His computer realy didnt like it. A 1.7ghz pentium 4 700 mb of ram and a geforce 4 ti 4600 realy just couldn't cut it. Still lost because his 1 destroyer was better than mine

[EvilleJedi]

hmm something must be up with his computer, I have a 1.3 athlon with a ti 4200 32 meg and 512 of ram, and it doesn't run too bad, maybe 15-20 fps in decent sized battles with shadows on, though pentium 4's less than 2 ghz are ultra crappy anyway

 

i've played a few internet games with a ping of around 90 and it wasn't bad at all

[Grand_Admiral_Pellaeon]

btw what options do you have evillejedi because my brother played it in 1024 by whatever it is, and with everyting at maximum

[EvilleJedi]

I normal test with 1024x768 with everything on max, but on large battles I will turn off shadows. mae sure he has antialiasing disabled, and ansiotropic filtering disabled, both of those options will halve the frame rate at least, unless you have a 9600 pro or better

[Grand_Admiral_Pellaeon]

Sorry evillejedi my brother continues to complain about performance. He argues that he can run Homeworld 2 flawlessly yet with this mod his pc has major difficulty. Also he believe 8 squads of b wings firing torps at an ISD 3 and destroying it is pretty unbelievable. I will try it on X-Wing alliance. Frankly i think its great and id like to see X-wings more powerful because the pilots in the films were always great. As an idea for heros i know you said you wouldn't put them in but i thought if ya could build a special command ship for each era, such as thrawns sd chimera in the post rotj era. Also special fighters could be quite nice such as rouge squadrons x-wings for the rebels.

[EvilleJedi]

well the mod has tons more detail and stuff going on than stock homeworld 2 so comparing it would be like comparing quake 3 to doom 3 (granted it doesn't have the volume shadows and bump mapping, but the texture and geometry improvment is comparable). as for the test on how many b-wings it takes to kill an ISD, try firing 504 torpedos at the ISD and see if it dies, thats what the b-wings are doing in the mod (I think it takes only 100 in XWA/XvT)