Laggy gameplay

Let's discuss the lag on the site since the Migration. If there is somewhere else where we can bring up the problem of severe lag to the admins, let us know. We'll post there too. The lag during gameplay is sometimes really really bad. So much that sometimes it is hard to perform all your moves in the allotted time you have for your turn. Sametime mode is especially frustrating when lag hits. It comes and goes, and I'm not as concerned with the fact that there is lag - if it is fixable - but what's concerning is how the lag is about 10 times worse than anything I ever experienced before the site migration. Most of us still [u]love[/u] the site - it has the best maps and an awesome community. And I know the Migration was done to improve the security of the site, and I know developers are working on improvements to the site. But I've noticed that the unprecedented level of laggy behavior (especially during turns) is inhibiting the amount of enjoyment we all get from playing on this site. A lot of us voice our frustration with the lag in game chat and in lobby chat, but the developers don't hear it (at least in game chat). [quote][url=https://dominating12.com/user/39835]TheMachiavelli[/url] wrote ([url=https://dominating12.com/forums/6/suggestions-feedback/2510/migration-bug/post/40336#post-40336]post #197[/url]): I was wondering whether Cireon or Matty could comment on these: is the expectation that the lag and other laggy behaviour will eventually be conquered and eradicated? Or is some of this behaviour a side effect of the backend improvements? Or do we simply not know yet?[/quote] Here's one of today's favorites (said in lobby chat, after I beat him easily in a 4p sametime caps [url=https://dominating12.com/game/646152]game 646152[/url]): [quote]01 Jun, 21:24 [url=https://dominating12.com/user/35448]shadedflame00[/url]: this lag is retarded 01 Jun, 21:24 [url=https://dominating12.com/user/35448]shadedflame00[/url]: can we please have the old interface back? 01 Jun, 21:25 [url=https://dominating12.com/user/35448]shadedflame00[/url]: place troops :0 and move troops :0 are really really annoying[/quote] I didn't see an answer to TheMachiavelli's question from the admins down in that thread. Is there any offical answer to that question? Why is there so much lag now? Are the site's developers able to do anything about it? Or can we have the gameplay back to the way it was before? List your laggy experiences here. Let's see if can get some official answers from the devs and admins.

If I knew how to help in that area, and knew how to fix things, and had time, I would!. From an admin point of view, we can only let you know when we (admins) know. Admins and Programmers are different roles.

Official answers have been given to this. It's a continuous work in progress to improve the performance of this website. There are layers upon layers of systems to make sure the website is safe and bugfree. Some of these layers require expensive server calculations, and it is far from easy to just make those fast. On top of that the different systems interact with each other in ways that can be unpredictable, so we need to take care of a lot of cases. Add on top of that that Matty and I, the only developers currently actively working on the site, have a full-time job and a normal (read: social) life that take precedence as well, and you will see it is not just a matter of flipping a few switches. Everybody can help by being patient, and especially not spam-clicking buttons, because this swamps the server in requests which is actually a big reason for the huge lagspikes you will see on the site (we would love to disallow spam clicking but this would make a lot of people angry as well, so we have to implement a good alternative before doing that).

im guilty of spam clicking, but now that it has been brought to my attention, (i think i heard about somewhere before also), i will try to do it less

Yesterday we rolled out an update that fixes the issue with spam clicking. It will now no longer be possible for one player to completely block the server which should hopefully lead to a large performance boost during peak hours.

Yup, so spam click as much as you like :)

Oh wow, that's great news! Thanks Matty & Cireon!

lol.... i am super guilty of spam clicks, i make the error messages roll for accouple minutes. thanks for the fix guys!!

Not sure what's broken at the moment, but since around 2pm (plus minus an hour) server time there's been insane amount of lag. Unplayable (often not able to place reinforcements/do anything in 3 minutes). I suppose you guys know already, but just in case!

i played on my girlfriends macbook last night, i clicked attack once, next thing i see is i kill 1 lost 6? sure nothing is wrong with that anti spam click?

[quote=TheMachiavelli]Not sure what's broken at the moment, but since around 2pm (plus minus an hour) server time there's been insane amount of lag. Unplayable (often not able to place reinforcements/do anything in 3 minutes). I suppose you guys know already, but just in case![/quote] Difficult to say in hindsight I am afraid. We aren't big enough to gather all these statistics over time. It is probably a combination of factors, but it's a nearly impossible task to figure out which without witnessing it first-hand and even then it often goes over so quickly that it's hard to find out what's going on. [quote=Babudji]i played on my girlfriends macbook last night, i clicked attack once, next thing i see is i kill 1 lost 6? sure nothing is wrong with that anti spam click? [/quote] sure you didn't click multiple times? ;)

Another observation re the lag: it seems to be an almost binary thing. Today the site went from perfectly fine to horribly laggy in a few seconds. At around 13:20 server time. One minute everything is fine, the next we can't move. It feels like something breaks/gets stuck in the code somewhere. As opposed to getting increasingly slower as the number of people increases. Or maybe there was a huge war going on in some long term game at that time? There was nothing in the live games I could see that should have messed with the site (no large armies in any of them). It also seems to start at a similar time most days. And tends to last for several hours (usually 2pm to 9pm server time seem to be lag heavy). Another thing: it seems to affect some people before others. In our game, Bear was affected by the lag a few minutes before I was. Which seems weird, might make sense from a database point of view? I hope some of that is helpful in figuring out some of the causes for the lag.

I am planning on making some big changes this weekend that may help (but in this case it is never a certainty, since it's a very complex problem). The binary thing makes sense. There are multiple reasons why that could happen. My guess is that the database queue starts filling up, but there are other possibilities as well and we can only work on eliminating them one by one.

well one neat little trick ive found in case of lag as Mach referred to, (the one with not being able to attack/fortify for the allotted turn time). If i get stuck in one of these phases it helps to click my Turns option (essentially leaving the game shortly), and then reentereing same game from Turns page. So far, it always start working again...you might have to redo your movement specifications (and dont worry if it still says "attacking" in the little box, you can still redo) or it might have completed the action you specified before the lag. Ive never had trouble with this (except for loosing time on the clock.

Yes, this site is very laggy. I've talked to others that have the same problem. It's so bad that it costs people games that they should have won. During your turn you'll sometimes wait 2 or 3 minutes total for the site to respond. And get internal errors on top of it. That will cost a game when you're trying to conquer someone and you would normally have plenty of time to do it. But then run out of time because the site lags. Which then costs you the game.