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#4474848 - 05/20/19 04:45 PM OT: Graphics Settings: Memo to Self  
Joined: May 2003
Posts: 823
CaptSopwith Offline
Barmy WingNut
CaptSopwith  Offline
Barmy WingNut
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Joined: May 2003
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United States
Hi Gents,

Hope you are all doing well. I had an amusing moment last night and I felt the need to share it with the group and more importantly, with myself in case I forget (again) a few months from now.

So ever since getting my new video card, I've been dialing in my settings, tweaking aspects of the nVidia control panel as well as the workshop settings in WOFF:UE and WOTR. Much to my chagrin, both games seem to: 1) run smoothly 99% of the time, 2) occasionally hiccup or pause if things are getting particularly busy and 3) rarely but sometimes, stutter for one or two seconds. Over the last four years, I've tweaked just about every setting known to man in that control panel. Pre-rendered frames, vsync, power options, you name it, it's been ticked to one option or another in every single combination I could think of or source from online guides and message boards like ours.

I say this because my OCD has actually hampered my ability to enjoy the game. Rather than fire up a campaign mission and immersing myself, I'd load up test campaigns or quick scenarios designed to stress my settings, over and over and over again. One run through would be smooth and I'd be delighted. A second run through would cause a hiccup here and there. The next would be smooth. And each time, like a dog chasing its own tail, I'd go back and forth between my sim and the nVidia Control Panel and the sim Workshop settings in the vain attempt to remove all possible impediments to liquid smooth frame rates. And all while growing frustrated with my seeming inability to nail down a perfect solution.

And then last night, on a whim, I got fed up and hit reset on the nVidia Control Panel. Everything reverted to their default settings. I then loaded up my stress test scenarios, and what did I find?

That my sim ran smoothly 99% of the time, occasionally hiccuped or paused when things were particularly busy, and rarely but sometimes, stuttered for one or two seconds.

In other words, it ran seemingly the same or even slightly better than it had when I had agonized over dialing in my settings. My conclusion was this: providing the game doesn't have any major performance breaking issues with the fps (like consistent stutters or game ending pauses), one solution for a stutter in one scenario will likely cause a hiccup in another, and so on. In other words, one cure creates a side-effect whose treatment spawns another. It never ends.

So I walked out to the living room and told my spouse my findings (she's the patient sort that will listen to this kind of nonsense) and she said, "yeah, you did that a few months back too and said it did the same thing with your old card."

I was flabbergasted.

Not only did the default settings work fine, but I HAD ALREADY DONE THIS BEFORE!

When I think of all of the time I've spent "optimizing and testing" my settings, I could have probably shepherded a handful of pilots from hostilities to armistice by now. Even with a new card, I can run my settings far higher than ever before, and WOTR is now playable in a way it never was on my 745 GTX, but you know what? Both sims run smoothly 99% of the time, occasionally hiccup or pause if things are getting particularly busy and rarely but sometimes, stutter for one or two seconds.

Even my PS4 with Gran Turismo Sport will hiccup when things get busy. And Battlefield 1? The same, and these games aren't attempting anything as ambitious as rendering the entirety of Western Europe while populating it with hundreds of aircraft and NPC's.

So the lesson, ultimately, to myself more than anyone, is this: if the sim runs well enough, just enjoy it. Immerse yourself in the game and if it hiccups, so be it. I'd have weeks of my life back and my pilots would probably have several hundred more flight hours logged if I had just taken a deep breath, realized that PC's are not game consoles, and that I've gotten two wonderful games to run as smoothly as anyone can reasonably expect given the sheer magic they are attempting to produce. At the end of the day, tweaking is part of our hobby, but if it reaches the point where it's actively preventing you from enjoying the game, it's time for a rethink. As always, your mileage may vary.

Cheers guys - hope this helps with some perspective and if nothing else, provides a bit of a laugh. Hopefully I can "sticky" this in my brain the next time I get some bright ideas about customizing my settings. cheers

Last edited by CaptSopwith; 05/20/19 06:10 PM.
#4474889 - 05/20/19 10:14 PM Re: OT: Graphics Settings: Memo to Self [Re: CaptSopwith]  
Joined: Jun 2001
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rwatson Offline
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Posts: 5,751
New Concord, Ohio
Capt..Sometimes I find myself in a some what same state of affairs,,Adding mods,,maps,,missions and such and spend days adding tweaking and not doing the thing I started simming for and that's to FLY !! lly understand and agree with your post ,,get that puppy running and fly it That's what you bought it for,,And i don't think it's just you and I..


Russ
Semper Fi
#4474891 - 05/20/19 10:36 PM Re: OT: Graphics Settings: Memo to Self [Re: CaptSopwith]  
Joined: Dec 2012
Posts: 3,086
MFair Offline
Senior Member
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Posts: 3,086
Captain, my Father told me a long time ago, “son, your only going to be so happy in life. There ain’t no need in trying to get happier.” As you just described, after you quit trying to get happier, guess what? You got happier! Glad to hear you can enjoy it on a new level.


Never approach a bull from the front, a horse from the rear or a fool from either end.
BOC Member since....I can't remember!
#4474915 - 05/21/19 08:25 AM Re: OT: Graphics Settings: Memo to Self [Re: CaptSopwith]  
Joined: Mar 2003
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Polovski Offline
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Good lessons, and love that MFair what a great way to think of happiness.


Regards,

Polovski,
OBD Software, developers of immersive flight sims;
Wings Over Flanders Fields and Wings Over The Reich
http://www.overflandersfields.com
http://www.wingsoverthereich.com
#4474940 - 05/21/19 02:01 PM Re: OT: Graphics Settings: Memo to Self [Re: CaptSopwith]  
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RAF_Louvert Offline
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RAF_Louvert  Offline
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L'Etoile du Nord
.

I agree with Pol, well said MFair.

And CaptSopwith, I feel your pain when it comes to the settings tweaks. I've done precisely the same thing you have, and on numerous occasions. I am currently running stock settings on my SLI set-up and it works beautifully.

.

#4475094 - 05/22/19 08:55 PM Re: OT: Graphics Settings: Memo to Self [Re: CaptSopwith]  
Joined: May 2003
Posts: 823
CaptSopwith Offline
Barmy WingNut
CaptSopwith  Offline
Barmy WingNut
Member

Joined: May 2003
Posts: 823
United States
I'm glad I took the time to write up this post. I was hesitant at first, since I know that tweaking and modifying is part of the hobby and I certainly didn't want to sound like I was against that. I just know that in my case, the obsession with fixing had gone beyond what was productive... or healthy. mycomputer

And it's refreshing to hear you guys share similar experiences! It sounds like a lot of us have settled on letting the sim be, and to be happy with whatever settings we've dialed in thus far.

I came across this snippet in another thread and read through the Combatsim review of CFS3 to validate it. I think it nicely sums up the quirks of CFS: "Even then, I noticed some stutters here and there when around densely populated cities. These stutters were worse in the beta, but I didn't mention it because I thought they would get fixed by release. I guess they didn't, as this game has a tendency to bring my 1GHz Athlon, Radeon 8500 128, machine equipped with 768 megs of RAM to a crawl sometimes. I'm hoping its just my machine, but I don't really see these problems with other games. And yes, all my drivers are up to date within two weeks."

And that was in the 2002 review of the original game. So, I think I can say that I can accept the trade-offs and happily live with a game that occasionally has some frame rate issues in exchange for the most complete First World War flight sim I've ever played. And if anyone can continue to keep the game alive and improving, I know it'll be Pol, Winder, and Ankor chipping away at his DirectX 11 code.

I think the biggest epiphany moment came yesterday, when my spouse came in and for the first time, actually got caught up watching WOFF:UE at work. I had never really walked her through what the sim actually did (besides replicate WWI air combat) and as I used the observer mode to show her all of the flights that the sim renders, all of the missions being flown, the terrain as it changes from summertime farmland to blasted out craters, she nodded and said "wow, this is really impressive." She plays games like Skyrim and has an understanding of the massive amount of work that goes into a game like that and it reminded me, with a beginners mind, just how impressive WOFF really is under the hood. So many games can wow you with graphics and a great story line and those are amazing experiences, but WOFF is kind of out there on its own these days - replicating a real world from the past, and putting you, the player, into that world, tethered to no story-line except your own. I then switched over to WOTR and showed her the differences. I flew two full length missions in both (she got to watch Bruno Stachel get shot out of his Fokker DII by a marksman rear gunner in a Sopwith Strutter, much to my chagrin), and she kept watching and asking questions. It was a blast.

And you know what? Neither sim stuttered once. What can you do? hahaha

Cheers guys! Back to flying!

#4475109 - 05/22/19 10:07 PM Re: OT: Graphics Settings: Memo to Self [Re: CaptSopwith]  
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gaw1 Offline
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Well.......back to basics......CS was right. I put everything back to square one...(one does have to manage screen/game res)....why not....I've nothing but time.....and he's right. Both WOTR and WOFF play better "out of the box" on default settings than with all the hoops I've been tweaking to "make things faster". I'm dead sure there are finesse moves for FPS by those that "know"...but for the "set to defaults", straight out of the box settings that the Devs must have worked on for years....it can't be beat. Try it....Thx CS

#4476251 - 06/01/19 02:05 AM Re: OT: Graphics Settings: Memo to Self [Re: CaptSopwith]  
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ARUP Offline
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Kentucky
If you were 'computer illiterate' like me you are forced to just enjoy what ya got on the screen because there ain't nuthin' you can do about it anyway! LOL

#4491704 - 10/06/19 02:22 PM Re: OT: Graphics Settings: Memo to Self [Re: CaptSopwith]  
Joined: May 2003
Posts: 823
CaptSopwith Offline
Barmy WingNut
CaptSopwith  Offline
Barmy WingNut
Member

Joined: May 2003
Posts: 823
United States
Seems a good time to bump this... just went back down the nVidia Control Panel rabbit hole only to reset them to stock and notice how much smoother things get. I'm getting forgetful in my not-yet-old-age!


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