Strange Lag problem.

[Blitz the Coyote]

While hosting, whenever another player joins my server there's a sudden influx of this weird lag that makes you jolt back and forth slightly as you move, slowing down the game. What is this, is it common, and how can I fix it?

 

[Liliam]

This isn't lag at all. What you're experiencing is something new in SRB2 2.0, which is consistency failure protection.

In order to assure everybody in a netgame is playing the same game, the game runs consistency checks to maintain synchroneity between the players. In 1.09.4 and before, if the players were not synchronous, there was nothing the game could do to restore stability and thus the offending player was kicked out of the game, with the message "Consistency failure".

In 2.0, a console variable called consfailprotect was added. I'm not sure what its value really means, but while it's positive, instead of kicking players, what the game will try to do is restore the consistency of the game. How does it accomplish this? Easy. It sets all of the joiners' states to what the hosting client thinks they should be.

Some times this fixes the problem. Some times it does not. It may be due to differing versions between the host and the joiner, it may be due to slowdown on either end or it might very well just be the faulty netcode acting up. If the problem doesn't fix itself, there's two things you can do:

1) Disable consistency failure protection by typing "consfailprotect 0" in the console. The result will be what would happen in past versions of SRB2, all players unsynchronised with the host are kicked automatically. This is the worst solution, because even in recoverable consistency failures players will still be kicked.

2) Turn the console variable, "blamecfail" on. While this has the issue of continuously spamming the console until the problem is solved, it points out EXACTLY who is responsible, allowing you to manually kick them via their player number (KICK # in the console).

 

[Autosaver]

Make sure that other player isn't playing an early release of SRB2:MFE. As I joined a game with it, and Kay told me lots of lag was coming.

 

[Blitz the Coyote]

Neo, that was a really helpful explanation and I really appriciate your help. Incidentally, could you check out my over-the-shoulder camera idea in this section of the boards?

 

[Kopper]

2) Turn the console variable, "blamecfail" on. While this has the issue of continuously spamming the console until the problem is solved, it points out EXACTLY who is responsible, allowing you to manually kick them via their player number (KICK # in the console.)

Or better yet, turn off consistency protection to kick them. Not only can you not make a mistake, you don't look like a jerk to the newbs. An alias such as ckick "consfailprotect 0;wait 200;consfailprotect 10" can make sure you don't forget to turn it on again.

 

[Liliam]

blamecfail gives you the exact playernum of the responsible player. You only "look like a jerk to the newbs" because you so desire.

 

[Blitz the Coyote]

I'll try and let them down easy. Thank you!

 

[Kopper]

blamecfail gives you the exact playernum of the responsible player. You only "look like a jerk to the newbs" because you so desire.

No... the newbs are oblivious to the workings. Utterly so.

 

[Liliam]

Then how about EXPLAINING it to them? Hm?

Whenever I have to kick somebody to restory stability to the game, I let them know and they just rejoin right after. Nobody is offended and the game keeps going smoothly.

 

[Aegix]

@ neo: That's how it should be done. It's happenned to me twice. First time, I was asked to rejoin. I did so without hesitation, game went smoothly. Second time, they just said "OMG KICK AEGZ". ...I didn't leave, thinking it was just some people who got peeved at me for no particular reason.

So yeah, LET PEOPLE KNOW what the problem is! If someone tells me that I'm causing consistency issues, I will leave and rejoin, no questions asked.

 

[Blitz the Coyote]

That's how I do it :). I really appreciate all the help. May a mod please close this?

 

[Torgo]

No, but I will leave it up since other people might have the same problem can discuss it.

I also changed the topic title to something that would make sense to people who are searching for the solution to this problem.

 

[Blitz the Coyote]

Thank you Torgo. Also, in that server the other day, you failed to answer my question: Is your powder deadly but unstable? Also, I'll handle the topic namechange. Maybe this should be stickied?

 

[Torgo]

Sorry, I meant that I already changed the topic. It seems I made a typo. I don't think it needs to be sticked.

I don't quite understand the Futurama reference. I only know that they mentioned Torgo's Powder (which is probably a reference to the MST3K episode). Beyond that, I don't know about it. If this is not what you mean, PM me since I don't want to go too much off topic here.

 

[Blitz the Coyote]

I dunno. I just followed a link here from another topic asking the same question, one on the front page. I think this could use a sticky, and/or a place on the wiki. And yes, it's a Futurama reference, though I also have seen the MST3K episode; it simply didn't cross my mind when I hear "Torgo". It's like how I associate Leonard Nemoy more with Galvatron than Spock. Is that so wrong?