Sync debris between clients

[craggy topaz]

...i get killed countless times because someone blows a wall next to me and just shoots me because they apparently don't see the debris between us.

EDIT// and also sync smoke... please and thank you.

[weary sierra]

The fact that a lot of stuff is client side for some reason is… yeah, idk why. Debris and smokes are the most glaring examples as to why this isn’t a good idea

[craggy topaz]

Ohh.. yeah.. totally forgot smoke.. sometimes some players seem to not have smoke at all and just laserbeam perfectly like 4-5 people.. i also had games where i didnt see the smoke.. despite the smoke landing next to me.. the smoke just disappeared into the ground.. suuuuuuuper annoying

[frozen coral]

The debris can also be reduced, both the amount and how long it stays in the settings drastically, which doesnt make much it better even if the debris does show

[copper kayak]

Performance. It comes down to performance. I didnt make the game, and I can tell ya, its for performances sake

[frozen coral]

Not sure if the debris from others shows on higher settings but as someone who plays on very low settings, i dont think ive seen it actually happen

It just disappears unless its a larger object

Like scafolding or a crane

[copper kayak]

The issue with smokes is how the client communicates to the server. Smokes are not client side, their state is however desynced from the state thats consistently shared by the server. Based on client based observations*

[craggy topaz]

What setting do i need to make it disappear quickly..? Tried everything from low to ultra... 💀

[frozen coral]

I forgot which one it was but its somewhere

[craggy topaz]

Here is the neat part.. i can totally understand that they don't want to sync everything in addition of the current players positions and stuff... would make hitreg just horrible BUT... what if you have a finite state machine "calculating" the debris and smoke so it basically is identical on all clients and you just have to send one package for the debris initial spawn..

[copper kayak]

[craggy topaz]

Granted.. i personally only programed it for a 2D game which makes it much easier but it worked like a charm and reduced the amount of packets by a lot and gave me the option to make way more stuff destructible and still have it kinda synced... maybe i can still find the game somewhere... haven't played it since probably 4 years now...

[copper kayak]

That is in your game, this, is battlebit.

[craggy topaz]

Just saying that it is possible 😄

I honestly should start suggesting everything i have in mind tho... seems like i am hitting some good spots here 💀

[frozen coral]

Dunno how well it would work in a lobby with like 250+ people and a 3D, very destructible enviroment with already a lotta things to calculate and whatnot

But you do you i suppose

[craggy topaz]

Would help to know the sourcecode to check if it was possible and to check what gets calculated client-side and what not BUT... the smoke and debris already gets calculated clientside and a defined finite-state-machine should have roughly the same performance... so.. there would probably just be one additional packet to say "ok, here ie debris with that location and here are the vertices... do your stuff".. ok.. its probably not just one packet i guess... but still... shouldn't have a big impact on the server or the client.

deterministic.. state machine... damn

[copper kayak]

You identified a single underlying issue. The rest of this is

[craggy topaz]

Was looking for "deterministic" the whole time.. xD

[copper kayak]

You just off making some shit up

[craggy topaz]

Well... i am not the person who came up with that idea on how to do stuff like that... actually... other games did... 😄