53 replies to this topic

[9thDeathscream]

Local servers be better again.

[The Boz]

EvilCow, on 12 December 2014 - 04:37 AM, said:

The only way to have a reliable hit detection is to move it on the client side and use HSR on the server side to validate the information sent by the client using a time window rather a definite point in time for verification, the time window should be dimensioned to account for server FPS jitter and connection jitter too (within reasonable limits, like 10% fluctuation).

Using this model, the client always makes the damage as seen but it is the server to be authoritative and decide if the client is sending faked info.

That opens up the floodgates of hacks, aimbots, and delibaretly induced ping-shield, etc. No amount of checking can be done to verify this information in order to defend against these malicious actions, and still come out on top server-CPU-time-wise.

[Latorque]

FupDup, on 11 December 2014 - 11:38 PM, said:

If you step into the cockpit of one, they won't seem so "invincible" as they do when you're on the shooting end.

Mastering my spider now; and this little bugger eats shells something fierce. Seriously, you can pull off moronic stunts in this thing, stunts i wouldn't have dreamt of in my Raven.

You're not invincible; and if the team doesn't push you're dead meat as always; but one of the strengths is that you can bind down at least a quarter of the enemy team at the start of the game while they're lumbering into position. Just make a few annoying passes; weasel out of there with yellow armor, rinse and repeat.

Since i used to be frothing at the mouth while blasting LB-10X ammo and lasers into spiders for a long time for little to no effect; there's still definitly something off with HSR and Hitboxes. Ah well; better in the Spider than against the Spider i guess.

Edited by Latorque, 12 December 2014 - 05:02 AM.

[Lily from animove]

FupDup, on 11 December 2014 - 11:50 PM, said:

That requires either a very good light pilot, a very bad heavier mech pilot, or a mix of both. Assuming all other factors are equal (such as pilot skill), the light is going to be at a disadvantage in a straight fight, barring cases like the heavier mech boating LRMs or something.

No it just requires the heavy pilot havign a 100+ latency.

Mister D, on 12 December 2014 - 04:42 AM, said:

I think you're right there Boz, I'm having to lead targets again to even get hit confirmation.

Just like when the servers were running at low FPS.

I wonder why that keeps getting reset on their end..?

leding does not always work, only when those mechs run in a straight line, otherwise it's not working.

[Col Kurtz]

I had a match last night where i took a Vindicator with a large LL and two ML and SRM6. It was the marsh map, and i jumped up onto a platform and a spider is just standing their, shooting MG at me and not moving. Must be a new player. I start firing at his legs, everything is hitting. I get 3 good blasts with all weapons (most likely 4 good blasts). My indicator is going Red, his legs are flashin. So with the lasers alone, underestimating, i would get about 57 dmg. I could not destroy his legs, and he is standing their. Spiders have 28 armour on each leg. Even if i hit both legs i would have stripped their armor. This is not accounting for the SRM6 i am hitting him with, all leg shots. Only about 30 feet away. He runs abit and stops, i hit him a few more times. He runs around a corner and stops again, i follow, and hit him again. Nothing. I got target blindness so the zerg destroys me. I could not leg him. And he wasent even moving.

I have never had such an easy time shooting a spider and never received any results. I could just suck at MWO. it is a possibility lol.

[EvilCow]

The Boz, on 12 December 2014 - 04:52 AM, said:

That opens up the floodgates of hacks, aimbots, and delibaretly induced ping-shield, etc. No amount of checking can be done to verify this information in order to defend against these malicious actions, and still come out on top server-CPU-time-wise.

Sorry but I don't agree, the server would be as authoritative as in the current scenario because the same HSR rewind algorithm would be used for info validation.

The client would send both the current informations and its estimation of the hit location, the server would verify that the client estimation is close enough to its own estimation in order to validate it.

The client would only be able to give a more "detailed" hit location but it must be within the window of plausibility calculated by the server. This would make the server FPS and the connection jitter less relevant.

Aim hacks would not work because if the reported hit location is not compatible with the verified location then the damage is discarded.
Ping hacks would not work because induced fluctuations would move the HSR out of the allowed time window and would just make their own done damage discarded.
Server load would be about the same than in the current scenario, no extra calculations are performed.

Edited by EvilCow, 12 December 2014 - 05:36 AM.

[Darlith]

EvilCow, on 12 December 2014 - 05:35 AM, said:

Sorry but I don't agree, the server would be as authoritative as in the current scenario because the same HSR rewind algorithm would be used for info validation.

The client would send both the current informations and its estimation of the hit location, the server would verify that the client estimation is close enough to its own estimation in order to validate it.

The client would only be able to give a more "detailed" hit location but it must be within the window of plausibility calculated by the server. This would make the server FPS and the connection jitter less relevant.

Aim hacks would not work because if the reported hit location is not compatible with the verified location then the damage is discarded.
Ping hacks would not work because induced fluctuations would move the HSR out of the allowed time window and would just make their own done damage discarded.
Server load would be about the same than in the current scenario, no extra calculations are performed.

Having played client side hit detection games as well, they have their own set of annoying issues. The first is they are much easier to have "hackers" in them as the server takes a great deal of what the client tells it as truth. The second is they are in a way more troublesome based on pings than even MWO can be. You will often be shot long after you see yourself getting under cover because on their screen you still haven't so their client tells the server "I hit him, I totally hit him." and you die in cover.

Then you end up with people that game that system by pausing and unpausing downloads in the background to force high pings and screw with the whole system.

Neither system is perfect of course, and to make a system that is closer to perfect than those would require so much server overhead as to make it untenable for general use.

[EvilCow]

Darlith, on 12 December 2014 - 05:42 AM, said:

Neither system is perfect of course, and to make a system that is closer to perfect than those would require so much server overhead as to make it untenable for general use.

I agree, pure client side and pure server side have intrinsic issues that are not easily fixed. Personally I think that an hybrid approach gives the best overall experience to the player.

The current situation of uncertain hit detection does not give a good experience for sure. Currently it is bad enough that the very same game balance is affected by it, see hit detection issue on light mechs, for sure it is bad enough that some design choices should be re-evaluated, it is not simply a bug to fix.

[The Boz]

EvilCow, on 12 December 2014 - 05:48 AM, said:

I agree, pure client side and pure server side have intrinsic issues that are not easily fixed. Personally I think that an hybrid approach gives the best overall experience to the player.

The more you trust the client, the more you are open to hacks. Additionally, expanding the "valid frames" list (which is what hybrid systems do, by proxy) effectively increases the hitbox size of mechs, causing clear misses to hit. And last but not least, not only is there increased server overhead, but there is also increased traffic and client-side processing. Meaning good connection becomes more important, and the hardware requirements (especially CPU and RAM) go up.

[Cyborne Elemental]

Cheaters are going to cheat no matter what, it doesn't matter what game or genre or system.

I say explore other options if it can improve player experience.

Cheaters are easy to spot, because the majority of them are as dumb as a box of rocks and quite easily expose themselves just by using any cheat.

Look at the most common cheats, Aimbots, Wallhacks, Radar hacks.

I can't see aimbotting being of much use in this game in regards to most weapons, Ballistics take time to reach a target, and you have to compensate for target speed, bullet drop, and range. There is no aimbot out there and likely never will be that can adjust for those variables on the fly as fast as a skilled person can.

And spotting an aimbotter who is using lasers will be easy as pie.

Wallhacks? We've already got Uav's, Narcs and Seismic sensors which accomplish exactly that, it would be pointless.

Radar hacks? there again, already got Seismic and UAV's as part of the game.

If you ask me, just go full client side report for hitreg, and deal with whatever negative aspects that follow, at least when you shoot somebody you're shots won't magically disappear or be absorbed into the void.

Edited by Mister D, 12 December 2014 - 06:28 AM.

[Mr Ezzquizo]

Akulla1980, on 12 December 2014 - 04:47 AM, said:

Local servers be better again.

no hit.....

[EvilCow]

The Boz, on 12 December 2014 - 06:03 AM, said:

The more you trust the client, the more you are open to hacks. Additionally, expanding the "valid frames" list (which is what hybrid systems do, by proxy) effectively increases the hitbox size of mechs, causing clear misses to hit. And last but not least, not only is there increased server overhead, but there is also increased traffic and client-side processing. Meaning good connection becomes more important, and the hardware requirements (especially CPU and RAM) go up.

Not exactly, under the proposed scenario the client would state the hit location (or state a miss), the server would validate the client assertion but would not "infer" hits where the client does not report them, shooting around the target and missing would not trigger ghost hits calculated by the server. So those virtual larger hit boxes are not the case.

It is not new ground anyway, MW4 did exactly this, laser hits were detected on the client side with several plausibility checks performed on the server (for example beams could not cross objects), other weapons were purely server side and you had to lead because lack of an equivalent of HSR.

MW4 had an excellent "user experience" with lasers, in fact the detection was always perfect (this coupled with the pinpoint nature of lasers in MW4 was a source of balance issues, but this is another story).

An hybrid like MW4 coupled with HSR for travel time weapons would make for an excellent gaming experience, that is what everybody want I think.

[Lily from animove]

Mister D, on 12 December 2014 - 06:26 AM, said:

Cheaters are going to cheat no matter what, it doesn't matter what game or genre or system.

I say explore other options if it can improve player experience.

Cheaters are easy to spot, because the majority of them are as dumb as a box of rocks and quite easily expose themselves just by using any cheat.

Look at the most common cheats, Aimbots, Wallhacks, Radar hacks.

I can't see aimbotting being of much use in this game in regards to most weapons, Ballistics take time to reach a target, and you have to compensate for target speed, bullet drop, and range. There is no aimbot out there and likely never will be that can adjust for those variables on the fly as fast as a skilled person can.

And spotting an aimbotter who is using lasers will be easy as pie.

Wallhacks? We've already got Uav's, Narcs and Seismic sensors which accomplish exactly that, it would be pointless.

Radar hacks? there again, already got Seismic and UAV's as part of the game.

If you ask me, just go full client side report for hitreg, and deal with whatever negative aspects that follow, at least when you shoot somebody you're shots won't magically disappear or be absorbed into the void.

God nooo, you have no idea what metainformation a cheat can give you.

Wallhacks are more than this, seismic does not tell you who looks where, and at which distance people are or even exactly where they aim at. Wallhacks could give you that infor for the perfect back scratching timing.

and no clever aimbots are far more than easily spotable, they simulate human aim, but yet give you the tiny edge of more perfection than others. You can even make them shaky but still stay on the same mech component and it would look like someone aimign natural.

broken Server hitreg > client sided hitreg.

I come from one of the most hacking infamous games, and true hackers (those who programm) make a poop ton of money by selling hacks ot the underhive and even the tryhards that want the small edge to be better than other tryhards.
hakcs are high developed software today and even without aimbot a skilled player can get so many metainformation that he can look like an epic skilld player. sure when they obvioulsy snap like this as well:



they are stupid, but there is still the mass of closet hackers.
haven't you read about the latest CS hacker bans and how even the high professional Esport tournament winners were cought hacking? And why? only because a hacker gave the hint (and hide a watermark in every screenshot those people made), no one were able to find it out that they hacked.

Just with all my hearth, no client sided stuff, Wallhacks can already happen and such, but additional softaim crap would turn the game to a home of trolls, haters and the worst kind of community you can imagine.

Edited by Lily from animove, 12 December 2014 - 08:28 AM.

[SaltBeef]

Had a match this morning I died but my team won and destroyed the Orbital guns and all thier mechs it still registered as a Defeat with no loyalty point awarded after the Match.

[Rosscoe]

Just face it guys, there are going to be people and units intentionally lag shielding to give them an edge. Hell in the public team death match que we faced another aim botter. Havent seen one of those in 6 months.

They are there and will always be there. Just matter of how to go about dealing with it and getting reports in.

Seriously I hate cheaters as much as the next person.

[The Boz]

Rosscoe, on 12 December 2014 - 09:06 AM, said:

Just face it guys, there are going to be people and units intentionally lag shielding to give them an edge. Hell in the public team death match que we faced another aim botter. Havent seen one of those in 6 months.

They are there and will always be there. Just matter of how to go about dealing with it and getting reports in.

Seriously I hate cheaters as much as the next person.

There is no way to abuse ping in order to shield yourself in a server authoritative system.

[Sandpit]

SpeedingBus, on 11 December 2014 - 11:46 PM, said:

Tell that to NS who drop all in lights and manage to trade kill for kill against much heavier mechs.

tell that to all the players who seem to ahve no problem killing light mechs.

Ever stop to think that it's not the game that's the problem...?

[YueFei]

Latorque, on 12 December 2014 - 05:00 AM, said:

Mastering my spider now; and this little bugger eats shells something fierce. Seriously, you can pull off moronic stunts in this thing, stunts i wouldn't have dreamt of in my Raven.

You're not invincible; and if the team doesn't push you're dead meat as always; but one of the strengths is that you can bind down at least a quarter of the enemy team at the start of the game while they're lumbering into position. Just make a few annoying passes; weasel out of there with yellow armor, rinse and repeat.

Since i used to be frothing at the mouth while blasting LB-10X ammo and lasers into spiders for a long time for little to no effect; there's still definitly something off with HSR and Hitboxes. Ah well; better in the Spider than against the Spider i guess.

LB10x is one of the worst weapons to use against a Light mech. Most Light mech pilots aren't scared of it, because they have smaller frames and the LB10x will spread across multiple body parts, doing only small amounts of damage to each part.

Much more scary is single-shot ACs, Gauss, PPC, because it delivers everything to one spot. You could consistently hit a Light mech with LB10x only to be sanding off armor all over him. Or, shoot with AC/Gauss/PPC and miss half the time, but on the times you *do* connect, you tear half the armor off a leg. And then maybe next time you land a hit on that same leg, it's a death sentence for the Light mech.

It's not that LB10x won't eventually kill the little bugger. It will. It's just that it's not scary because the damage application is steady and predictable. The Light mech pilot has time to gauge the situation as he gradually takes damage. Whereas with AC/Gauss/PPC, he makes a slashing attack and suddenly his leg is one alpha strike away from falling off, and he has to be much more careful about the next attack he makes.

[Jun Watarase]

The Boz, on 12 December 2014 - 04:52 AM, said:

That opens up the floodgates of hacks, aimbots, and delibaretly induced ping-shield, etc. No amount of checking can be done to verify this information in order to defend against these malicious actions, and still come out on top server-CPU-time-wise.

Not true, this is a misconception of how client side hit detection works.

I will point out that many games with client based hit detection of some kind (such as half life 1) did not suffer from an epidemic of hacks that would have been impossible under server based hit detection. Stuff like aimbots are not reliant on client side hit detection.

Basically nobody is going to sit in their spawn, shoot the wall, and headshot people across the map by telling the server "the wall is the cockpit". The server will simply go "lol no".

[Karamarka]

Sandpit, on 14 December 2014 - 03:04 AM, said:

tell that to all the players who seem to ahve no problem killing light mechs.

Ever stop to think that it's not the game that's the problem...?

This game is international and most people when i play in my TZ have over 100+ ping




of course with 20 ping you have way better hit registration.



I agree with everyone else about client side hit detection, because of reasons stated above in my post and others. They should of gone for client side, because they don't have international/private servers it just makes sense.



The only downside is the hacks.

This game has the worst hit reg i have ever seen

Even BF4 has client side hit detection, and they let you host private with 30 ping. That's a double win, but obviously their will be no private hosting here in MWO, so make do with server-side laser leading.

be sitting at 2.7 kd/r for a longgg time with this laser leading

Edited by Karamarka, 15 December 2014 - 01:13 AM.