IWD2, is my multiplayer issue slow PC or internet lag?

[techwanabe]

I'm playing IWD2 with 3 other folks online in multiplayer mode. My computer is Pentium III 1.33 ghz with 512 mb RAM and a Radeon 32DDR video card. The other PC's in the game are 2.4 ghz Penitum 4 computers.

In IWD2, during battles, often the other players comment that my avatar is still fighting after the battle is over. On my screen I still see enemies attacking. Basically, it appears that my computer thinks the battle is still going on when it is over on the other computers. The other players think the reason why my game is "behind" theirs is because my computer is "too slow". However, 1.33 Ghz is well over (more than double) the recommended spec listed by Black Isle for IWD2. This leads me to believe the problem is interent lag. I pinged the host and was getting average latencies of 500 ms. I, of course, have dial up and typically connect at 44 kbps. Two of the players are on a home LAN. The other two, which include myself connect to the host, one of the LAN PC's, via dial up.

Anyone have any idea where the bottleneck is? I'd hate to spend $400+ to upgrade to a 2+ ghz P4 only to find out that my present PC is fast enough and the problem was really internet bandwidth or lag. What do y'all think?

 

[styrafoam]

I would think it is your connection, 500ms is a very high ping. With two of the other players being networked together they probably see no lag at all, and since the host is one of them the fight is already played out on their end by the time you get the info and you computer translates it into the battle. Your computer is more than adequate to play IWD2.

 

[techwanabe]

Styrofoam,

Thanks. Your explanation is completely logical. I was already arguing this point with the folks who are hosting the game - they are the ones with 2 PC's on the home LAN.

Ok... so lets take this a step further. EVERYONE is connecting via dialup/modems, including the folks on the home LAN. Oviously those two computers would have fast communication so there would be no lag between the host and the other home lan PC joining the game. However, they both connect to the internet with dial up. So... even if I were to get cable/hi speed, wouldn't there still be a bottle neck at there internet connection? Maybe things would improve a little, but not night and day - make sense?

As for ping, I was getting between 450 and 550 ms last night... that is actually good for me... in the past when I played BG2 and IWD1, and NWN, my ping would generally be between 550 and 800, sometimes higher! That would cause problems obviously, but it did work.

Funny thing is the game generally worked good in NWN... some lag, but playable and generally the battles were ok. But in IWD, I often would be in battle and would see that I am not doing any damage to the enemies in the feedback window. It is pretty frustrating and I am one of the "tanks' in the game too.

 

[BlueWeasel]

Refresh my memory again........IWD2?

 

[styrafoam]

IWD2 = Icewind Dale 2.

If you were to get broadband then you might see some improvement, but I think the problem lies in the fact that the host cant send data fast enough for a smooth game for the clients. Does the fourth person(not on lan, but connecting to host like you) have similar issues and a similar ping? I would say as a generalization that the person on broadband should always host if the others are on dial-up. A dial-up connection is usually just adequate for a single client connection. Trying to serve 2 clients through a dial-up line is deffinitly going to saturate it.
Were you playing NWN, BG2 etc with the same people? I cant really speak as to the differences in multiplayer performance between them, but I do know that NWN was designed to be multiplayer from the start and the BG/IWD games all use the same basic engine and have never been considered very friendly for internet multiplay.

 

[techwanabe]

Originally posted by: styrafoam
IWD2 = Icewind Dale 2.

If you were to get broadband then you might see some improvement, but I think the problem lies in the fact that the host cant send data fast enough for a smooth game for the clients. Does the fourth person(not on lan, but connecting to host like you) have similar issues and a similar ping? I would say as a generalization that the person on broadband should always host if the others are on dial-up. A dial-up connection is usually just adequate for a single client connection. Trying to serve 2 clients through a dial-up line is deffinitly going to saturate it.
Were you playing NWN, BG2 etc with the same people? I cant really speak as to the differences in multiplayer performance between them, but I do know that NWN was designed to be multiplayer from the start and the BG/IWD games all use the same basic engine and have never been considered very friendly for internet multiplay.

No one in the circle of folks I'm playing with has broadband. We are all local to Syracuse NY. The 2nd person out on the internet got alot less "battle delay" than I did supposedly. Apparently he too noticed the battle over, yet my character still engaged in "phantom" attacking as I was still in battle on my computer. His connection is slightly faster at 50 kbps and he has a 2.4 ghz machine too. I'm also looking into some issues with my PC like making sure my HD is defragmented, AIM is not running in the background nor any other TSRs.

I did play NWN and BG2 with the same folks... I end up up playing much of BG2 with one person via modem direct rather than internet connection - that helped some since there was not router latency issues. I would agree that the Infinity Engine games are not that internet friendly... I'm not sure why, but they don't seem to have an efficient multiplayer code. You really notice the lag in BG/BG2/IWD/IWD2 games.