The World of Avlis

Do static placeables cause lag? Further, what is the extent of lag caused by any type of placeable?

Anyone?

From what Psyco told me they cause more lag clientside than they do serverside (if I remember correctly) I might be wrong though

yup. causes little server side lag due to the fact that it has no scripts, (or very little). where as client side, the GFX card etc has to load it all up for ya, which causes your screen to jump a little

Short answer: No ... and yes

Long answer: They do not cause lag at run time directly. A static placeable will not be affected by any scripts so they do not add directly to processing load.

Indirectly they can add lag. If you have too many (especially on tile boundries) the pathfinding scripts for moving PCs or NPCs can and will be more resource heavy. Also they do increase the size of areas, which increase the size of the mod, which can increase lag after it hits certain limits.

Also if you have a lot of placeables in an area the client needs to load every one of those models into memory to display them, this is why some areas take much longer to load when you transition than others. To avoid this you can use multiple copies of the same object, as it will still only be loaded once. It will of course have to be displayed more than once which can cause lower end graphics cards certain amounts of grief.

Excellent response, thank you.

Next question: In your opinion, how many placeable are too many for any one area/mod? (estimate)

I'm asking because currently I'm using some CEP walls to make structures. Stacking them up and using quite a few of em.

There is no real fixed number, its not something that be easily quantified.

If you are building a single player mod then it won't really matter in the slightest. If you are building for a PW (eg. player housing) then it could have more of an impact.

Best test is to host the mod, find someone with a lower end machine and get them to play around and see how long it takes to load the areas.

If you are worried about something in particular you can send the mod to me and I can take a look. I probably still won't be able to give you a definite answer, but I can compare it to things already around and give you feedback.

Thank you. I may just do that.

I have a feeling I may get "Placeable Crazy" everyonce in a while.

Hey necrozombie, I have a question for you regarding these CEP Walls that you speek of. Are these placable walls? I am wondering becuase I am making a players house right now and am making it in city interior tileset; it has lots of static placables that I am getting rid of by putting a lot of doorways everywhere and covering them up with bookshelfs. A placable wall that I could cover up the doorway would be perfect, could you tell me the path in the toolset on where to find these???

Thanks Mate

under custom

Civilized, extrerior -> buildings -> walls and fences

I think.

While we're on the topic of placeables, how do non-static ones compare to the static as far as server performance goes? Read somewhere that static are the least server intensive, with anything useable being much more so...This is due to any scripts that might be used I assume.

It depends on what happens around them.

If you throw a fireball into the middle of a whole heap of static placeables, nothing will happen. If you do the same to non static (doesn't matter if they are useable or not) then the spell scripts have to start calulating damage to all the placeables.

There really is no fixed answer with lag. It is a multitude of things all interacting with each other. However the more systems something can interact with, the more potential it has to cause lag.

Bioware once wrote, a maximum of 3 or 4 placeables per tile was alright, more will cause lag, the area files will get bigger, takes more time to load, pathfinding will be harder etc.
Also don't place placeables on tile seams, that will cause lag as well, was their recommendation.

Alustriel wrote:Bioware once wrote, a maximum of 3 or 4 placeables per tile was alright, more will cause lag, the area files will get bigger, takes more time to load, pathfinding will be harder etc.
Also don't place placeables on tile seams, that will cause lag as well, was their recommendation.

That's good information to know.

3-4 per tile?..... Ugh

well in Avlis we use a lot more once in a while, a carpet, a table a few chairs etc. Just use common sense, don't overdo it, sometimes it looks a lot nicer when it is not so full, meaning it must have something to add. A hundred scorch marks serve the same purpose as ten. Also a small area can handle more placables an 16*16 area is different.

I have been working on my own mod just for fun and to get a chance to DM on NWN every once in a while and I have never seen any real lag problems when playing with about half a dozen people. More players seem to cause more lag but I might be wrong about that... also wouldn't sounds and such cause a great deal of the lag?