Turn on prediction by default

[DDMJ]

Use the new toggle command I committed to trunk:

/console toggle predict_objects

That's neat, too bad it's on the trunk and not 0.2.8 (sorry for whining!)

[Carnage]

What exactly does prediction do? I turned it off because from what I understood from the description, if the enemy player turned during the time prediction gets into action, it would still like the cycle is moving forward. Is that right?

And how come turning off Prediction in the Network Setup menu doesn't turn off predict_walls? Also, what does predict_walls do?

btw, these are fun smiley faces

[Tobe]

Predict walls show the predicted time the walls will disperse. I dont this i use this setting before It should help with breaking a defense.

[Z-Man]

Umm, no PREDICT_WALLS is responsible for extrapolating walls up to the current time even if cycles are not. It's only useful (and only has an effect) on the server, where collisions with extrapolated wall segments are used to predict collisions.

Carnage: I don't understand your detail question, sorry. But generally, if prediction is off, cycles will be shown at the last position they are pretty much guaranteed to have been a while ago, long ago enough so that turns don't make them jump around. With prediction enabled, they are shown where they would be now if they continued to drive straight.

[Carnage]

With prediction enabled, they are shown where they would be now if they continued to drive straight.

Yeah it was hard for me to explain. What I meant was: If they didn't drive straight, but turned, while prediction was enabled, would it still show the enemy cycle driving straight, even though they turned?

[sinewav]

What I meant was: If they didn't drive straight, but turned, while prediction was enabled, would it still show the enemy cycle driving straight, even though they turned?

Yes, that's exactly what it would do. When new information arrives, the client updates and the cycle will "jump" to the last known location. It's really only problem on higher ping servers; the jumping can be quite severe and disturbing (and looks bad on "wiggle" servers too). But, prediction helps if you're someone like me who tends to focus more on the cycle and not the lag-o-meter.

The more I think of it, the more I like the idea of prediction on when playing and off when spectating (automatically).

[Cosmic Dolphin]

I agree with Sinewave there. The only place i find it does not help is racing (my most popular form of Armagetron). Or, if you are a really weird person playing on a super-computer on the world's fastest internet...

[Lucifer]

I'm not going to argue one way or the other, I don't like prediction but I don't care what the default setting is.

I prefer a jedi approach to determining the other cycles' positions anyway. Don't accept that where they are on your screen is where they are now, you have to live in the moment ahead of the action on your screen. That action is just a visual aid. Ideally, you should be able to play without cycles at all, without the lagometer, without any of those cockpit things, etc. Put your mind into the wires.

[Z-Man]

You're just saying that so others try it and you can pwn them better.

[sinewav]

I agree, and also would like to suggest some middle ground: prediction on while playing yourself and off while spectating. I find myself constantly toggling between the two.

Yes, I would like prediction to toggle on/off automatically when playing/spectating. I also toggle them constantly, but often forget (it's such a huge pain in the arse).

If I wasn't unemployed, I would immediately pay someone for a client that does this. Maybe I can sell some stuff...

[gawdzilla]

No, on by default is a very bad idea. It looks so weird in spec and when you're playing, lag_o_meter 1 is a lot easier to understand for me.

So, no.

[Goodygumdrops]

Predict walls show the predicted time the walls will disperse. I dont this i use this setting before It should help with breaking a defense.

it really doesn't make any difference gameplay wise, but there will always be newbies like donkey and this guy who think attacking is easier with prediction turned on

voted no because tron looks nicer without jumping cycles

[Phytotron]

Against. Reasons, in no particular order:

1) A minority of players use it (and presumably find it useful), as it is.

2) I've never found prediction the least bit practical, whatever the pings involved. In fact, I've always found it counterproductive. I would rather have a 250ms ping differential with neither prediction nor the lag-o-meter enabled and use the wired Jedi technique.

3) A true and non-trivial point, it's not the least bit aesthetically or play-ably pleasing. Herky-jerky, ugly, ridiculous movement that doesn't make sense, and looks similar to or worse than lag jumps or warps or redraw. Yeah, I wanna play this game! Leading to the next point....

4) Contrary to epsy's contention, it's plainly unintuitive to the novice and average player, and a great deal more so than the lag-o-meter. We've all encountered plenty of new players who ask questions along the lines of, "hey, what's that triangle thing around your bikes? How do I get one?" Make prediction default, and I guarantee you those sorts of questions—not to mention bitching about a glitchy, buggy game—will go up ten-fold. You don't want to deal with complaints that the menus are too complicated? How about a flood of forum posts complaining that there's a bug that's making the cycles jump around all weird. And not only is the behaviour more unintuitive, but so are the results with respect to understanding how you just got core dumped, again, contrary to epsy's contention.


No, this is just a bad idea. If someone wants to enable prediction because they find (or believe) that it gives them some sort of technical, practical advantage as a "hardcore" Arma gamer ("lagmeter 4 gayweaks i pwn u @ fortress w mah predikshun n00b! lrn2predikt!"), then fine, it's right there in the menu to be used. It's not hidden. But it should not be the default for new users.

[sinewav]

But how about a feature where, when prediction is enabled, that switches automatically to disabled when spectating (after you've been eliminated)? I'm hesitant to start a new thread about this since it was mentioned here, but can anyone see a disadvantage to this?

[Titanoboa]

(@sine) Certainly sounds like a good feature to me.