Games Freezing

Kevin, the error message was "BadFrameInPacket":

http://www.atomic-album.com/showPic.php/22426/BadFrameInPacket-Game1.jpg

If it was a sunspot thing then we shouldn't see it again, but the two games that froze were the only two we used your Couriers and MiniMaps mod with so I for one would like to play some more with that mod.

Curiously Baylor also had a map mismatch error on the Alpine map. No idea what caused that. I was wondering if it was related to his use of your minimaps as part of his main install rather than plugged in via his mods menu. Any thoughts on that?

Last night, 3 brilliant problem-free games. Well... problem free if you don't count the destruction of one's entire command a problem...

It's been a while since I helped out on debugging MP, but I do recall a message similar to that when there was a bad internet connection. As for Baylor's Alpine map issue, I'm not sure what is causing that. My mod does not have the Alpine map in it. My mod of that map is part of the stock game. He may have a bad file. I can send him a copy of the files he needs. He can put them into my courier mod and see if that helps.

Well... problem free if you don't count the destruction of one's entire command a problem...

Very commendable. You gave your last full measure.

Mr. Digby wrote:Last night, 3 brilliant problem-free games.

Great news!

Morning everyone



We had this game freeze stop play in Stefan's excellent Iuka scenario last night and its not the first time. I should think I've experienced this game-stopping error message about 10 times now.

I have sent three lots of game logs to Norb now but I got a note back from NSD today saying "This is in the queue but we are doing other work right now." The NSD boys are hard at work on their next release and that could be weeks or months away so in the meantime we must try our best to stop these freezes happening.

I think the solution lies in the error message itself, where the word "frame" is involved it seems to be about frame rates, or the speed at which data is being fed from each players machine to the host. I'm guessing this because in the game logs generated last night I saw lots and lots of this:

21635236,LOWFRAME,10,0,5491,5493,5,0:Leffe7
21635236,LOWFRAME,10,0,5492,5493,5,0:Leffe7
21635236,HAVEFRAME,10,0,5493,5493,5,0:Leffe7
21635236,GOODFRAME,11,0,5494,5493,5,0:Leffe7
21634948,HAVEFRAME,8,0,5491,5491,6,0:Ararog
21634948,GOODFRAME,9,0,5492,5491,6,0:Ararog
21634948,LOWFRAME,8,0,5489,5491,6,0:Ararog
21634948,LOWFRAME,8,0,5490,5491,6,0:Ararog
21634948,RAND,23,428066,494,0,5493,11482
21634948,GOODFRAME,10,0,5493,5491,2,0:Digby
21634948,SENDFRAME,5493
21634948,HAVEFRAME,8,0,5491,5491,5,0:Leffe7
21634948,GOODFRAME,9,0,5492,5491,5,0:Leffe7
21634948,LOWFRAME,8,0,5489,5491,5,0:Leffe7
21634948,LOWFRAME,8,0,5490,5491,5,0:Leffe7
21634948,HAVEFRAME,8,0,5491,5491,3,0:Hays
21634948,GOODFRAME,9,0,5492,5491,3,0:Hays
21634948,LOWFRAME,8,0,5489,5491,3,0:Hays
21634948,LOWFRAME,8,0,5490,5491,3,0:Hays
21634948,HAVEFRAME,8,0,5491,5491,0,0:4TEXAS
21634948,HAVEFRAME,9,0,5492,5491,0,0:4TEXAS
21634948,GOODFRAME,10,0,5493,5491,0,0:4TEXAS
21634948,LOWFRAME,8,0,5490,5491,0,0:4TEXAS
21634948,HAVEFRAME,8,0,5491,5491,1,0:Kerflumoxed
21634948,HAVEFRAME,9,0,5492,5491,1,0:Kerflumoxed
21634948,GOODFRAME,10,0,5493,5491,1,0:Kerflumoxed
21634948,LOWFRAME,8,0,5490,5491,1,0:Kerflumoxed
21634948,GOODFRAME,8,0,5491,5491,7,0:Blaugrana
21634948,LOWFRAME,8,0,5488,5491,7,0:Blaugrana
21634948,LOWFRAME,8,0,5489,5491,7,0:Blaugrana
21634948,LOWFRAME,8,0,5490,5491,7,0:Blaugrana
21634948,HAVEEVERYONE,742,5491,8,8,8
21634948,RUNQUEUE,5491
.
.
.
21635092,LOWFRAME,9,0,5491,5492,3,0:Hays
21635092,HAVEFRAME,9,0,5492,5492,3,0:Hays
21635092,GOODFRAME,10,0,5493,5492,3,0:Hays
21635092,LOWFRAME,9,0,5490,5492,3,0:Hays
21635092,RAND,23,428073,4348,0,5494,4348
21635092,GOODFRAME,11,0,5494,5492,2,0:Digby
21635092,SENDFRAME,5494
21635092,LOWFRAME,9,0,5491,5492,4,0:Mar
21635092,HAVEFRAME,9,0,5492,5492,4,0:Mar
21635092,GOODFRAME,10,0,5493,5492,4,0:Mar
21635092,LOWFRAME,9,0,5490,5492,4,0:Mar
21635092,LOWFRAME,9,0,5491,5492,1,0:Kerflumoxed
21635092,HAVEFRAME,9,0,5492,5492,1,0:Kerflumoxed
21635092,HAVEFRAME,10,0,5493,5492,1,0:Kerflumoxed
21635092,GOODFRAME,11,0,5494,5492,1,0:Kerflumoxed
21635092,LOWFRAME,9,0,5491,5492,0,0:4TEXAS
21635092,HAVEFRAME,9,0,5492,5492,0,0:4TEXAS
21635092,HAVEFRAME,10,0,5493,5492,0,0:4TEXAS
21635092,GOODFRAME,11,0,5494,5492,0,0:4TEXAS
21635092,LOWFRAME,9,0,5491,5492,7,0:Blaugrana
21635092,GOODFRAME,9,0,5492,5492,7,0:Blaugrana
21635092,LOWFRAME,9,0,5489,5492,7,0:Blaugrana
21635092,LOWFRAME,9,0,5490,5492,7,0:Blaugrana
21635092,HAVEEVERYONE,777,5492,9,8,8
21635092,RUNQUEUE,5492
.
.
.
21635236,RAND,23,428084,4295,0,5495,4295
21635236,GOODFRAME,12,0,5495,5493,2,0:Digby
21635236,SENDFRAME,5495
21635236,LOWFRAME,10,0,5491,5493,4,0:Mar
21635236,LOWFRAME,10,0,5492,5493,4,0:Mar
21635236,HAVEFRAME,10,0,5493,5493,4,0:Mar
21635236,GOODFRAME,11,0,5494,5493,4,0:Mar
21635236,GOODFRAME,12,0,5495,5493,1,0:Kerflumoxed
21635236,LOWFRAME,10,0,5492,5493,1,0:Kerflumoxed
21635236,HAVEFRAME,10,0,5493,5493,1,0:Kerflumoxed
21635236,HAVEFRAME,11,0,5494,5493,1,0:Kerflumoxed
21635236,GOODFRAME,12,0,5495,5493,0,0:4TEXAS
21635236,LOWFRAME,10,0,5492,5493,0,0:4TEXAS
21635236,HAVEFRAME,10,0,5493,5493,0,0:4TEXAS
21635236,HAVEFRAME,11,0,5494,5493,0,0:4TEXAS
21635236,GOODFRAME,12,0,5495,5493,6,0:Ararog
21635236,LOWFRAME,10,0,5492,5493,6,0:Ararog
21635236,HAVEFRAME,10,0,5493,5493,6,0:Ararog
21635236,HAVEFRAME,11,0,5494,5493,6,0:Ararog
21635236,GOODFRAME,12,0,5495,5493,3,0:Hays
21635236,LOWFRAME,10,0,5492,5493,3,0:Hays
21635236,HAVEFRAME,10,0,5493,5493,3,0:Hays
21635236,HAVEFRAME,11,0,5494,5493,3,0:Hays
21635236,GOODFRAME,12,0,5495,5493,5,0:Leffe7
21635236,LOWFRAME,10,0,5492,5493,5,0:Leffe7
21635236,HAVEFRAME,10,0,5493,5493,5,0:Leffe7
21635236,HAVEFRAME,11,0,5494,5493,5,0:Leffe7
21635236,GOODFRAME,12,0,5495,5493,4,0:Mar
21635236,LOWFRAME,10,0,5492,5493,4,0:Mar
21635236,HAVEFRAME,10,0,5493,5493,4,0:Mar
21635236,HAVEFRAME,11,0,5494,5493,4,0:Mar
21635236,LOWFRAME,10,0,5491,5493,7,0:Blaugrana
21635236,LOWFRAME,10,0,5492,5493,7,0:Blaugrana
21635236,GOODFRAME,10,0,5493,5493,7,0:Blaugrana
21635236,LOWFRAME,10,0,5490,5493,7,0:Blaugrana
21635236,HAVEEVERYONE,494,5493,10,8,8

These are just three blocks of these frame reports from various players: there were dozens of these in the log. I am sure they are not normal. My take is that it applies to a low frame rate and the game is struggling to feed the action data or graphical data from that player to the host, or that the player framerate is so low the host can't feed it back. Eventually the game, its feet being dragged back by too many LOWFRAMES gets out of synch, and literally trips over itself, falls headlong and freezes.

Looking at the logs of the Iuka game I saw that 4TEXAS and Kerflummoxed seemed to have the fewest incidences of LOWFRAME while Blaugrana seemed to have the highest. Generally the European players had more than the Americans but this could have been due to where the host is located. If, for example, Hays were the host, we might see this trend reversed. I don't know. It is worth us checking the game logs from European-hosted games that have frozen with this error.

Furthermore I believe this to be a couriers-related issue still. It has only showed up in the last version or two of the game and I haven't seen anyone from the GCM MP group mention it on the NSD forum - it would be worth checking with them. I don't have regular contact with them but if one of us does, please ask. The 'Packet' issue in the error makes me think its linked to the work Norb did on the MP courier data packets.

That's important though since it means its fixable. Norb can surely fix it when he gets the time. Until then though I think there's things we should try to help relieve the load on our PCs as we play the game. I would ask that every HITS and Couriers player, no matter how powerful your PC and internet connection, should go into the options screen of the game and go to the second screen. Here on the left we see two areas of interest:



I saw it mentioned on the NSD forums that tree graphics do hit game framerates quite hard so I suggest we have the 'Percent Trees Showing' option set down at about 75%. If your PC setting is already this low, try 50%. I think we might see some improved frame rates by just adjusting this. I would suggest we UNCHECK the 'Display Off-map Trees' option as this removes tree models from the areas of terrain off the map that you only see when your units wander near the edge of the world. This is going to be rare in most battles and at HITS viewing height we won't be seeing much at all off-map terrain no matter how close we are to the map edge. 'Max Transparent Tree Draw Distance (yds)' is a tricky one. Its the option that makes the trees 'ghost' away as you ride up to them. I don't think increasing the distance at which this happens will have much effect at all and in fact if its set high (at say 100) you are gaining a slight advantage from better visibility in woods from a Kriegspiel perspective as your visibility is better than a player who has it set low at, say, 50.

Percent Trees Showing = 75 (or 50 if your framerate is already quite low in MP)
Display Off-map Trees = uncheck
Max Transparent Tree Draw Distance (yds) = 50

Moving to the lower section, 'Max Terrain Draw Distance' will have an effect as its how far away the landscape is rendered, we could try lowering this from 'best' if we are still getting the Bad Frame freezes after we have lowered our Tree Percentage. Same with map objects which are fences, walls, buildings, etc. Taking this away from 'best' begins to remove them from the game and that then lowers our immersion so I'd resist doing that. 'Show Off-map Terrain' could be unchecked without too much loss of immersion since this only affects what is drawn beyond the edge of the world and we rarely see that at HITS height. I would suggest we uncheck that. 'Max Number Arty Hit Decals' is a nice feature but how often do you notice it unless a shell bursts among some men right near your avatar? I would lower this to a pretty low number. I suggest 10. The maximum draw distances are for how far away each type of object (units, trees, other objects aka scenery) are rendered by your computers graphics card. We might see some big framerate increases here if we lower these. I have them all set to 1500 yards right now but will experiment with them lowered to 1000. This shouldn't dent the immersion of the game too much as I think its rare we get many vantage points with that amount of uninterrupted view.

Max Terrain Draw Distance = best
Show Map Objects = best
Show Off-map Terrain = unchecked
Max Number Arty Hit Decals = 10
Max Units Draw Distance (yds) = 1000
Max Trees Draw Distance (yds) = 1000
Max Objects Draw Distance (yds) = 1000

In MP the host has a further options screen:



But this affects greatly how the game looks with no uniform variations and lowering the object setting (I think) begins to remove fences and buildings from the maps so I'd resist reducing those for now.

So lets all go with the settings I have given above in red and play a few MP games and see if the Bad Frame in Packet problem is still around. If it is we can try being more brutal with our settings but lets get some reports back here first.

I looked at the log of our two games last night. I found that the 1st game 4th Texas hosted, most of the low frame messages were from Element UK and AS Johnston. In the 2nd game that I hosted, the low frame messages were equally from both you and 4thTexas. Very puzzling. Note that the number of these were few, (2 or 3 in each group), nothing like what you saw in your log. Our games also ran trouble free.

I agree fully with your proposed option changes. Changing the number of trees to 75% will have an enormous positive impact, as will the drawing distance. I believe the default value is 1000 yd. already. The arty decal change, though, will have no noticeable effect. I'm not sure that the transparent distance will have much effect, but is certainly worth fiddling with. I agree that turning off the off-map terrain won't have any visible impact for our style of play. But since we rarely ever see it, I don't know if unchecking it will have much effect. Again, it's worth a try. Good proposal.

Good suggestions, Digby. I'm going to try and get a benchmark frame rate by running a big stock scenario with my current settings, make the changes you suggest and then play the same scenario to see how much difference there is.

I think some of my settings are already at the levels you suggest. I'll report back. I don't want the connectivity wooden spoon...

Well done Diggers. In terms of the veg, I often play sandbox with trees down to 30% for variety, as it gives several of the maps quite a different feel. So I would find that no hardship. Glad you propose holding the line on uniform quality. There need to be some standards, what?

I was averaging 10 or 11 FPS during yesterday's game. Don't know whether that helps anyone.

Martin

Yes, I would think anything in double figures is acceptable. I've seen games with FRs of 3 which can't be good.

If you're trying to run tests bear in mind what Blaugrana said on Friday which was that we seem to get these freezes when the action gets hectic. If our systems are struggling/borderline with the approach marches then it does seem to make sense that the game will get out of synch when it has to render a lot more troops in a small space with smoke, decals and throw around 1000s of calculations every few seconds as well. So a test should really involve some seriously big fights for it to be worthwhile.

System load is probably why the Antietam map gives us more crashes than most - if we can streamline our game settings so that games run on the Antietam map I will be pleased. As you say Martin, trees down at 25% or 33% would be a worthwhile loss if we got stable games in return.

OK:

I just ran an hour and a quarter of the full Antietam scenario (accelerated) with all my troops on All-Out Attack. Got up to about 7k total casualties so feel the game was fairly full-on.

With my settings as they were, I got down to 3 FPs at worst, mainly around 5 or 6.

Changed my settings as per your suggestions, Digby, except where mine were already less demanding. I went for 50% of trees showing (which still seemed to make it hard to see what is going on through woods).

Repeated the Antietam scenario and got slightly improved frame rates. Started off quite a bit better then, once the fighting started, dropped to 5 at worst, settling around 6 or 7.

Without more rigorous testing (can frame rates be recorded?) I surmise it is well worth changing settings as Digby suggests. I will experiment with trees at 25%.

I also think it would be worth hosts experimenting with 8 men per sprite, instead of the default 4 (confusingly represented by '0' in options!).

HTH

Perhaps a new desktop PC should be n my Xmas wish list - any recommendations for cheap UK models that will run SoWG like greased lightning????

3 of us just played a 2 hour (small) corps-sized game on Antietam with trees at 75%, no freezes. We really need to test this with more players though, around 5 would be a good test. I'm on all night

I have implemented Mr. Digby's suggested settings, except I've set my "Percentage Trees Showing" to 50, as I already have single-digit frame rates and have experienced a bit of lag or "stutter" when there are a lot of troops and action going on. Hope that helps.

As a quick test I ran an army level game (Union c65,000) on Antietam for a few mins, but before any combat. FPS was 6-11. Then did same thing on alpine map on same basis and FPS roughly doubled. I guess that's because of the lack of cornfields, walls & fences. It might be an idea to use that map more than we do.

The new ElPine maps perfom more like Antietam.

Personally I would rather not change the sprite ratio. At least not at this stage. Having regiments that look like regiments rather than companies plays a big part in my own suspension of disbelief. But I appreciate that we don't always get what we want however.

Martin

Reducing trees is certainly helping. Several people on and offline report big positive framerate jumps when they are set to 75% or 50% with no appreciable loss in game inmmersion.

One thing we tried last night was every player set his game to full screen mode, not windowed. JJ suggested this causes less strain on the game (trying to get past this Bad Frame in Packet crash). We played a 2 vs 3 game on the Antietam map for 2 hours successfully although only the last 15 minutes had any combat

You'll need to set up whisper buttons or channel switch buttons for teamspeak though

Neither is ideal since if you switch channels you don't know which channel the player you want to talk to is in (and you must both be alone in a channel) and with whispering you can only talk to one other person, not a group. Whispering seems the best option even with that limitation as everyone can stay in the same channel (useful for stuff like 'oh the game crashed' discussions and such) plus 90% of in-game meetings are between just 2 generals, and even if its 3 usually each other subordinates only needs to talk to his superior, they actually don't need to converse in such a situation.

So my suggestion is - everyone set up whisper lists in TS in case we use full screen mode. These may have to be set up on the fly each time we play due to the number of players we now have in the group.

I think we should definatly play some games in full-screen mode and see if it helps. I encountered the "bad frame in packet" bug only in the last weeks. So it could be because I started playing in windowed games or it could have something to do with the latest patches (maybe an old bug, but new error code).

I prefer full screen so that's ok with me. If we use whisper keys tonight, will you just talk us all through it Digby, or do I need to read your tutorial?

Are we aiming for 7 or 7.30 pm GMT btw?

Martin

Martin wrote:Are we aiming for 7 or 7.30 pm GMT btw?

British Summer Time

I'll be there at 1900 BST so we have time to talk about whisper keys.

My tutorial was for channel switching hotkeys which is not very useful in fullscreen mode.

I shall have to do one for setting up whispers though I think most of us know it now.

Seven of us had a great game last night. We experimented with using full screen and whisper keys to allow us to communicate with fellow commanders we coincided with on the battlefield without having to switch channels.

It all went very well, with only the occasional lapse in 'radio-security' when someone would forget and talk to the enemy by mistake...

I've started doing some screenshots on how to set up whisper keys (see start of a post in 'Tips & Resources') but came unstuck when I couldn't upload screnshots. I'll try again later.