Very subtle lag problem

Games Other Halo
1

Besides the big lag issues I’ve seen many people complain about, (teleporting, shield instant away etc, die after 2 dmr shots) I think there’s another problem and I would like to know if other people suffer from this as well.

The problem is that I sometimes have trouble winning battles games because I am always a fraction of a second later as the other player my BR/DMR battles / melee battles. And then in some games all is well and battles seem to go ‘fairer’. Especially in SWAT games this is notable. I am sure I made a headshot, but the other player kills me and isn’t killed himself. Other games I have no problem at all and when I die it is just because I am too late.

I am particularly interested in how Halo registers the hits, coördinates of yourself and other players and the coördinates you are aiming at vs timing. And how the system decides who won or not. Is it al clientside with input from coördinates you aim at? What if they get my coördinates before I get mine? It seems I have some kind of netwerk error where I am at a slight disadvantage over other players… Maybe has something to do with me being the host or not.

I have a 60mbs/4mbps internet connection and my ping is very low.

I have some friends who play Halo just as much as me and they don’t have this problem at their place (at home they score about 1.5 KD in a game, and when they are at my place they get 1.0/1.1) One friend scores an average of 2.0 in SWAT and when he plays at my place all you can hear is him cursing and getting a negative KD.

I could be whining though and I’m just not good enough :wink: Or do you have the same problem as well?

2

Its not just you it has happened to me a couple times as well…I would engage first, land first shot, not miss my shots and still lose the fight :frowning: I have a 15up/20down connection so its not my internet, must just be HOSTS locaton/connection. It doesnt happen enough to bother me but I have had it happen.

3

Had similar problems. You’re definitely not alone.

4

You simply aim at them, fire and wait for the game to register the shot.

My guess is that you are simply missing, or missing their head.

5

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Your connection speed doesn’t really matter unless you’re the host. Any broadband connection at this point is good enough if you’re not hosting. You also can’t know your ping, because you don’t know who and where the host is. There’s no way for you to determine how long a packet roundtrip to the host takes by doing a speed test online. When you do a speed test online, you’re testing your ping between you and that particular test server. Not between you and whatever random person on the globe is host in your Halo match.

The host is the Xbox of the player who is responsible for collecting all live game data and then sending it to all other players in the game. A player pulls the trigger > the host gets informed > the host informs all other Xboxes.

With that said, technically speaking, yes; people will receive game data x milliseconds before or after you. Imagine the following scenario:

[/li]- Slayer match, 8 players.

  • 1 player is from uh, Australia, while the other 7 are European.
  • Judging by how you spelled “coordinates”, I’m guessing you’re Dutch? Of the 7 Europeans, YOU are the host.

The pings between you (the host) and all other European players should be between 10 and 70 ms, roughly estimated. To make this example more clear, let’s just say it’s 20ms. In theory that means that when a European player in your game pushes a button, the host will be informed of this 20ms later, and all other players will be informed another 20ms after that. It took time for the host to receive the information, and to send it out to the other players.

Now your Australian player there has a ping of 750ms with you, the host, because he’s 16,500 kilometers away from you. When he squeezes the trigger, you’ll know after 750ms, and everyone else will know after 770 ms (750+20). In essence, EVERY registration takes between 750ms and 770ms longer for this Australian player. Theoretically, if he fires 5 DMR shots as fast as he can, his 5th shot will only register 3.75 seconds after he started shooting. That’s what, 2 seconds after he finished shooting? Crazy lag. That’s why local search options are important.

Anyway, I have the same issue as you, but only very rarely. My games mostly either lag like hell or are pretty smooth.

EDIT: This looked a lot shorter in the editor. Sorry lol.

6

I wouldn’t be sorry for that post, Aero.

It’s nice to see someone else who can actually explain how that works, but I don’t know if you answered the OP’s question :smiley: :stuck_out_tongue:

No worries though. Good post, good read : )

7

Ok so I can’t get into the details of my setup at the moment, but 9 times out of 10 I lose any lag-induced battle. Not quite understanding the complexity of lag, its almost as if the lag is not affecting other players the same way. I can continue to reset and run into a wall while the red dot on my radar gets closer and closer, when engaged I pummel, fire and toss grenades, most of all that landing, I hear one may two dmr shots and Im dead.

For those of you more technically oriented, can lag be player specific? I had one match where as soon as I got close to one specific player, things just got weird.

8

I don’t experience lag that much but what I do experience alot is the fact that I rarely get a red reticle when not zoomed in on an enemy. Anybody know why that occurs? the killcam shows the other dude with a red reticle every time when he is not zoomed in…

9

Good call on me being Dutch :wink: Next time I will spell coordinates right :wink:
I’ve been reading several threads about this, you gave me some options for searching the topics.

Seems lag compensation also has a lot to do with this. I am looking into this matter how lag compensation works in Halo 4. (Only for the host, or for everyone except host?)

Halo’s matchmaking mechanism also has a priority system; it uses your trueskill and prefers good connection, but if they can’t find fitting games they’ll just fit you anyway.

Tonight i will nerf my connection no 512 kbps and mtu of 1312 and play swat. See what happens!

10

> For those of you more technically oriented, can lag be player specific? I had one match where as soon as I got close to one specific player, things just got weird.

Hmm, could be. I’ve experienced it in an MMO game before. If somebody was lagging, all the monsters would stop moving while still having a walking animation, but they could still be killed easily. Perhaps somebody else can answer your question, hehe.

> I don’t experience lag that much but what I do experience alot is the fact that I rarely get a red reticle when not zoomed in on an enemy. Anybody know why that occurs? the killcam shows the other dude with a red reticle every time when he is not zoomed in…

That’s weird. The red reticle is limited to a certain distance, which is significantly less when you’re not zoomed in. If you are very close to somebody, and your reticule is still not turning red, something is definitely wrong but I don’t think it has anything to do with lag. I imagine this is something the game engine is calculating locally on your Xbox. And yeah, the killcam reticules are ridiculous. It doesn’t accurately display what your killer was doing or seeing.

> Good call on me being Dutch :wink: Next time I will spell coordinates right :wink:
> I’ve been reading several threads about this, you gave me some options for searching the topics.
>
> Seems lag compensation also has a lot to do with this. I am looking into this matter how lag compensation works in Halo 4. (Only for the host, or for everyone except host?)
>
> Halo’s matchmaking mechanism also has a priority system; it uses your trueskill and prefers good connection, but if they can’t find fitting games they’ll just fit you anyway.

I’m Dutch too, so I guessed as much. Wasn’t trying to pick on your spelling though, haha. I imagine lag compensation is an overall thing that works for everyone, just that it’s more effective when you’re not the host because you have bigger delays to compensate for. I’m just guessing though.

I kind of wonder how long the game tries to search for good connections before giving up. I know 343 said they do this to find you a game quicker, but to be frank I rather wait 10 minutes and have a lag-free game than wait one minute and lag like a maniac.

11

Quick question…what is a subtile? Is it a tile that has been placed underground? Or maybe a tile that is taking the place of a regular tile that has called in sick? :stuck_out_tongue:

But seriously…my biggest issue with lag is the always present delay when throwing sticky grenades. There’s is always a noticeable delay from when I push the button to when the animation begins and it’s killing my timing because it varies match to match.

12

I’ve looked up subtile and subtle :wink: seems both are right but subtle is the preferred version, thanks for that :wink:

I played some games this morning and I can easily tell now if I’m having an advantage over the other players or if I’m having a lag compensation disadvantage. One game was pure ownage from my side (with the help of the net code), a moment later there was a host change and I was firing blanks.

Some of the things I noticed is when I’m on the good side a needler supercombine is performed much faster. Also, most of the time I’m able to hide just in time when losing a DMR battle. The other way around I’m always a fraction late.

13

You do realize that when people play at your place, they do poorer because they are playing on a different TV right?
Even an inch different will throw people off gigantically.
If I’m leaving home for at least 2weeks, I bring my tube TV with me because I cannot stand playing on other TVs.

Also if you are playing on with an HD TV. I bet you 50 bucks that is the problem.

14

While the tv theroey holds some merit I notice a massive difference in lag between Reach and 4 on the same tv.In Reach its minor in 4 its about a subtle as a sledge hammer in the face.

15

Of course there is a difference in the setup, but we all have a 42 or 46" 1080P hdtv’s. Seems the difference is bigger than just that. When I’m at their place I score better then I do @ home :wink:

16

I get allot of delay in halo 4, but every other game is just fine except good ol halo 4. I remember when the game was first out it was great hardly any lag, then after the first update the lag got horrid.
Cant even use thruster pack it gets so bad sometimes, shoot shoot shoot thrust and then im dead because to them i didnt move but to me i thrusted outa the way, ive watched both gameplays meny times and it happens alot but people dont notice.