Double Server Tick Rate (1Hz to 2Hz)

EVE Technology and Research Center Player Features & Ideas
1

Hi,

This is something that’s been on my mind for a while: Increase the tick rate from 1Hz to 2Hz to make the game feel more responsive and alive.

I’ll admit CCP did a great job of hiding the tick rate in the client simulation for the most part. However, the tick rate is still plainly visible when activating/deactivating modules, launching/commanding drones, aligning to points in space and beginning navigational maneuvers. The 1Hz tick rate makes these actions feel sluggish and unresponsive. Frequently I think the game didn’t respond to my commands only for them to play back later. This makes my actions as a player feel disconnected from what actually happens. It is as if I’m barking commands to a bridge crew instead of corporeally being my ship.

The feeling of being the ship on-screen I think is a huge part of what makes EVE, and many RPGs for that matter, so enthralling and addictive, so the game should be doing anything it can to keep that disguise up. I believe doubling the tick rate from 1Hz to 2Hz would be a great way to do that.

I think servers should have a “fast” or “low-latency” mode when CPU resources allow (i.e. no TiDi) that allow them to choose a 2Hz tickrate over a 1Hz rate. A 2Hz tick rate would, on average, reduce the amount of wait time for seeing an action play out on-screen by 250ms, and reduce the worst case by 499ms.

  • Won’t this make TiDi twice as bad?
    Since I’m proposing a dynamic tickrate, during TiDi, the previous 1Hz tick rate would be used as the target, and then TiDi would be applied to that.
  • Won’t this be expensive for CCP?
    Possibly not since the tickrate would be dynamic. If it’s possible to have a different tick-rate per grid, then small grids could have the fast tick rates while large grids (like jita undocks, stargates and massive battles) could have the slower “normal” tickrates.
  • What about insta-align/insta-lock balance?
    It’s likely true that the insta-align/insta-lock balance would be disrupted by the tick rate change (for those who don’t know: an interceptor with an align time of less than 2 ticks/seconds will always beat instalockers). I’d expect CCP to have to make changes if they intend to keep this balance identical.
2

A hunch tells me you’re just upset about travelceptors heh.

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The tick-rate would be the same for all systems (systems, not grids) running on that server. Increasing the tick-rate would melt the servers.

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So, for near insignificant game play changes that most players wont even notice, you want to waste DEV time making the change and on-going waste of computational power (i.e. money) implementing it.

Wasting money on barely noticeable changes instead of significant changes a lot more people will enjoy is not a good use of CCPs financial resources.

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The engine was originally written for Pentium 4 processors back in the late '90s. It’s overdue for a rewrite to take advantage of modern multi-core processors and there are hints this is now a priority. You’ll still be dealing with indivisible packets of time and I see no reason to reduce that from the current 1 second. We’re flying large, crewed spaceships - they aren’t going to be instantly responsive to commands!

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I’ve read that the 1hz tick rate is so embedded in all the code that it’s going to be a humongous task to change it. This may never happen, short of a ground up re-write for the game.

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OP’s idea is dumb for all the stated reasons… but to speak to the idea of a ground-up rewrite… I’m not sure that would be a bad idea anyways.

I mean ■■■■… they added navigational structures and it broke station docking. They could make a whole Italian person with all the spaghetti they’ve got in their existing code.

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Lol
This is now more than 5 characters

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