FPS Killer 😓

[D-Brando]

Thank you for this great job, the campaign is fantastic.  unfortunately I noticed that in my case there is a very important drop in performance.  I guess it's due to the complexity of the missions.

[lax22]

Same for me.

I play in VR only and this campaign is unplayable for me due to bad performance.

First paid campaign I had this issue with.

[ChillNG]

2 hours ago, D-Brando said:

Thank you for this great job, the campaign is fantastic.  unfortunately I noticed that in my case there is a very important drop in performance.  I guess it's due to the complexity of the missions.

Thanks for the feedback!  The missions are quite complex but overall performance shouldn't be a major issue for most as far as I'm aware.  There is often a FPS drop at mission start, low FPS in hangers on the Syria map is a known issue.  This usually improves once you start taxiing and is certainly a lot better once airborne and away from Incirlik/Adana.

The number of units/complexity has even taken into account by only activating things like air defences when required, there are quite a few statics at Incirlik but again once away from the base things get much better.

47 minutes ago, lax22 said:

Same for me.

I play in VR only and this campaign is unplayable for me due to bad performance.

First paid campaign I had this issue with.

I guess I'd caveat that by saying its the first paid campaign on Syria, but unplayable suggests there may be more we could look into regarding your settings, this isn't typical behaviour (also check this is affecting all the campaign and not just in the Incirlik hangar).

For context, I also only fly in VR (G2 and Quest 2), the entire campaign has been tested this way and looking at your system specs in your signature, on a much less capable system.  My personal testing was on a Ryzen 2600, 32 GB and RTX 2080, my beta testers were on a range of system specs as well.  Steps were taken during testing to optimise missions where we felt performance was suffering and we all had decent performance across the whole campaign in testing.  I'm sure you've probably looked into steps you can take, but if not it might be worth exploring the settings you use on Syria to optimise things.  I can't recall the details but I've seen forum threads on Syria performance discussing a few things you can do...pre load radius comes to mind.  

If you're on a G2, could it be a WMR / steam VR issue, I know I'm not a fan of my G2 for this reason, as I find the software garbage, even though I love the headset itself.  I recently upgraded to a system similar to yours and get really good performance on the campaign on my Quest 2.

Anyway if I can be of any assistance please let me know, I'm no expert in these things but I'll do what I can to help, I very much appreciate the campaign purchase and want you to have a good experience with it, and like I said, it's perfectly playable in VR for others, myself included so I would hope it's something we can figure out.

 

Edited April 17, 2022 by ChillNG

[unlikely_spider]

4 minutes ago, ChillNG said:

There is often a FPS drop at mission start, low FPS in hangers on the Syria map is a known issue.  This usually improves once you start taxiing and is certainly a lot better once airborne and away from Incirlik/Adana.

Can confirm this matches my experience too.

[pixie]

Hi Chiling ! I have recently bought your campaign, but the very start of the mission is unplayable under VR. The frame rate is around 10 FPS under the hangar, and I can't start my plane without being really nauseous. A cold start at 10 FPS is beyond my strenght. So I'm stuck at the beginning of mission one and a bit disapointed to be honest. This mission start makes a really poor first impression. Which I believe is largely undeserved, since the attention to details of all the included reading materials is stunning !

FWIW I have a Ryzen 3600, RTX3060TI, 32GB and Quest 2, M2/SSD. It's a decent system in my view. Not terrific but that should handle a campaign.

If the hangar is notoriously bugged, could you modify the  mission start so we can quickly get the hell out of this FPS trap ?

 

 

 

[ChillNG]

6 hours ago, pixie said:

Hi Chiling ! I have recently bought your campaign, but the very start of the mission is unplayable under VR. The frame rate is around 10 FPS under the hangar, and I can't start my plane without being really nauseous. A cold start at 10 FPS is beyond my strenght. So I'm stuck at the beginning of mission one and a bit disapointed to be honest. This mission start makes a really poor first impression. Which I believe is largely undeserved, since the attention to details of all the included reading materials is stunning !

FWIW I have a Ryzen 3600, RTX3060TI, 32GB and Quest 2, M2/SSD. It's a decent system in my view. Not terrific but that should handle a campaign.

If the hangar is notoriously bugged, could you modify the  mission start so we can quickly get the hell out of this FPS trap ?

 

 

 

Hi sorry to hear that, a lot of time was spent on testing and balancing the performance but frustratingly DCS can be really peculiar when it comes to performance.  Your system sounds like it should be able to handle things acceptably, its fairly close to what I built and tested the campaign on (Ryzen 2600, 32GB RAM and a 2080, Quest 2 as well).  I only fly VR and I always had good performance (apart from in the hangars, but it was always playable).  For me I always ran Syria with low terrain textures, turned down the general textures, lowered visibility, pixel density etc.  Obviously I don't know what your settings are but perhaps there's more performance to be gained from there, personally I run a different set of graphics settings on Syria than on other maps, knowing that it's going to be quite taxing.  As for not starting in the hangars, it's a possibility, although there would be a few trigger issues to fix as well.  I'd say if you've not already done so, see what performance you can squeeze out the settings first, if after that you still think there's an issue I'd be happy to send you a test version, starting outside the hangar to see if it helps, and we can take it from there.

[pixie]

hi Chiling, thank you very much for taking the time to answer my question.

I have spent quite some time tweaking my settings in order to achieve a decent and stable framerate for my VR in most case.  There is nothing fancy on this side, textures are set to low , pixel density @1.0, VRperfkit and so on. I'm always trading eye candy for faster performance. And I believe my settings are quite modest so I always have some headroom for frame rate whatever scenario I'm throwing at it.

I think I will try an auto start sequence so I won't puke before my plane is able to exit the hangar. I will let you know how it's going while taxiing, and flying.

Looking forward to playing your campaign.

Cheers

[ChillNG]

2 hours ago, pixie said:

hi Chiling, thank you very much for taking the time to answer my question.

I have spent quite some time tweaking my settings in order to achieve a decent and stable framerate for my VR in most case.  There is nothing fancy on this side, textures are set to low , pixel density @1.0, VRperfkit and so on. I'm always trading eye candy for faster performance. And I believe my settings are quite modest so I always have some headroom for frame rate whatever scenario I'm throwing at it.

I think I will try an auto start sequence so I won't puke before my plane is able to exit the hangar. I will let you know how it's going while taxiing, and flying.

Looking forward to playing your campaign.

Cheers

OK thanks, be good to hear how you get on.  I'm really hoping when mulitcore and vulkan land we're going to see more consistency here.

[ChillNG]

Just had this shared on my discord, I always forget that Tacview can be a real performance hog.  With the complexity of the missions in OCN this could be having quite a big impact.  https://tacview.fandom.com/wiki/FPS_Loss_While_Recording_Your_Flight_in_DCS_World#Why_is_that?

 

[pixie]

Ah yes I haven't tried to kill the TACVIEW recording. This might help. Thank you for this piece of advice.

FWIW, once out of the hangar, and rolling things are improving. Not very smooth but far from the hangar performance which apparently is a FPS pit.

There is something wrong in the Syrian Hangar. Not your fault obviously.

I can still auto start my plane, take off the VR goggles, go back a few minutes later and get the f#### out of this hangar.

I can live with it,  but I suggest you consider modifying your mission start. in VR it's definitely a mood killer.

[ChillNG]

It's something I'll keep an eye on in the long term and look to do if we never get a fix or performance increase through updates.  Unfortunately it's not a simple case of just moving the player starting position as there are lot's of triggers tying into this particular hangar that the ATC system and AI movements around the base use.  The takeoff order of AI jets can also be an issue, it's a carefully choreographed performance around  the base a lot of the time.  This all means it will take quite a bit of time and any changes will need a lot of testing and tweaking to fix.

[Mistermann]

I picked up this campaign yesterday even after seeing this thread.  I fired up mission one and crossed my fingers that it would perform.  It was a slideshow.  

As a VR only guy, I was pretty bummed.  

HOWEVER

When I looked at my VR settings I noticed I had the textures set to HIGH

Now, I've never really had any performance issues with this setting turned to High.  I ended up downgrading that setting to Medium.  I expected to have my VR experience turn to garbage, but I was pleasantly surprised that it didn't really impact anything that I noticed off the bat.  My FPS on base went from 9 to 20!  Still not great, but playable at this point.  Per @ChillNG, once I got away from Incirlik/Adana the performance went back to "normal".

Maybe this helps some other folks who might be in the same situation.

[ChillNG]

55 minutes ago, Mistermann said:

I picked up this campaign yesterday even after seeing this thread.  I fired up mission one and crossed my fingers that it would perform.  It was a slideshow.  

As a VR only guy, I was pretty bummed.  

HOWEVER

When I looked at my VR settings I noticed I had the textures set to HIGH

Now, I've never really had any performance issues with this setting turned to High.  I ended up downgrading that setting to Medium.  I expected to have my VR experience turn to garbage, but I was pleasantly surprised that it didn't really impact anything that I noticed off the bat.  My FPS on base went from 9 to 20!  Still not great, but playable at this point.  Per @ChillNG, once I got away from Incirlik/Adana the performance went back to "normal".

Maybe this helps some other folks who might be in the same situation.

Thanks for sharing!

[unlikely_spider]

I agree with @Mistermann

There are some assets that are not yet well optimized and hit the resources to a disproportionate degree. Not really the fault of the campaign creators.

Edited August 26, 2022 by unlikely_spider

[trama1983]

Bought the campaign a couple of months ago, and tried it today for the first time. Agree with the OP. It's unplayable in VR. Tried for 15 minutes the first mission (until I took off, just to see if it was way better high in the sky...).. completely stuttering. I tried to lowering my settings with not much benefit. The problem is the scripting... Ctrl+Pause shows almost 50% lua time in 1s mission ground... Little less in the air. But still numbers that shouldn't have been accepted before releasing this campaign. It's unplayable. period.

My specs 10700k, 64gb ram, 3080 (Reverb G2). I have paid for some other campaigns (pontus, raven one, serpeants head 2, rising squall, etc), and this is the first time I see something like this...

 

 

 

[ChillNG]

5 hours ago, trama1983 said:

Bought the campaign a couple of months ago, and tried it today for the first time. Agree with the OP. It's unplayable in VR. Tried for 15 minutes the first mission (until I took off, just to see if it was way better high in the sky...).. completely stuttering. I tried to lowering my settings with not much benefit. The problem is the scripting... Ctrl+Pause shows almost 50% lua time in 1s mission ground... Little less in the air. But still numbers that shouldn't have been accepted before releasing this campaign. It's unplayable. period.

My specs 10700k, 64gb ram, 3080 (Reverb G2). I have paid for some other campaigns (pontus, raven one, serpeants head 2, rising squall, etc), and this is the first time I see something like this...

 

 

 

Really sorry to hear this, again I can only reiterate the campaign was fully tested in VR, on lesser systems than yours and performance was completely playable.  It was one of the most important parts of testing for me and anywhere we felt performance suffered we made cuts to the  mission design.  There are actually zero scripts in the campaign so the issue can't be in the scripts as such, I guess more an issue in the code of DCS itself and how the data is processed.  Now if this is down to units numbers, trigger complexity or the Syria map itself I'm afraid that's still unclear, likewise I can't explain the big disparity in performance between users, I would expect to see these issues impact all users, but up to now I'm only aware of very small numbers with performance problems.  That said I'd like to get to the bottom of it and fix it if I can.

Do you run any mods that would use scripts in the background?  Tacview?  Winwing devices with scripts? Device Hotplug enabled?  Just a few of the things out there that can cause performance issues.  The campaign is certainly more complex than others and if you're only seeing issues in OCN there is clearly something in OCN causing an issue for you, I'm just wondering if there's something in all the complexity that's interacting poorly with your setup, Tacview hitting performance on big unit counts being a prime example.

Apologies again for your experience, if you have any further thoughts please let me know and I'll help as much as I'm able.

Edited September 4, 2022 by ChillNG

[trama1983]

Hi @ChillNG,

First of all ... I am really sorry for my previous post. I was totally wrong, and the bad performance was NOT related with the campaign, but on my side... probably the winwing script or the tactivew... Not sure which one of both was the main problem. Or if it was a combination of the two, because I have deactivated both (either way I tend to think it's probably more related with the tacview. more info at the end of the post). Thank you very much for your feedback, because that pointed me in the right direction to check things.

Now that I have been able to flight your campaign a little more, and have a look at the incredible documentation attached to it, I must say  that you did an ASTONISHING WORK. I haven't seen in other top campaigns this level of detail for example in ground procedures, etc.... Amazing. I will need to study the documentation to make the most of it. Congrats.

------

Let me recap what I did, just in case someone else have the same problem and it can help.

What I did is:

1) WINWING: Delete winwing script from exports.lua. I have also removed their application for good. This is the second time I have problems with it.... And there won't be a third one.

2) TACVIEW. I leave the tacview script active in exports.lua (previous screenshot), but I disabled it from menu options. I'am not sure, but maybe the problem was related to having it enabled via export.lua, but not having the "tacview module enlabed" checked in menu options..    Either way it's really strange because I was able to do multiplayer missions, and other missions with no problems... who knows.

What I did is:

     - Check the box "tacview module enabled"

     - Unchecked the box "enabled" below the "flight data recording"

3) I tried again with these two changes and now the performance is perfect. 45fps in the hangar with my previous high settings for VR. I don't usually get more than 45, because I am using opencomposite (openxr) without reprojection. So this figures are top for me.

Best Regards

Thank you once again!

 

Edited September 4, 2022 by trama1983

[ChillNG]

33 minutes ago, trama1983 said:

Hi @ChillNG,

First of all ... I am really sorry for my previous post. I was totally wrong, and the bad performance was NOT related with the campaign, but on my side... probably the winwing script or the tactivew... Not sure which one of both was the main problem. Or if it was a combination of the two, because I have deactivated both (either way I tend to think it's probably more related with the tacview. more info at the end of the post). Thank you very much for your feedback, because that pointed me in the right direction to check things.

Now that I have been able to flight your campaign a little more, and have a look at the incredible documentation attached to it, I must say  that you did an ASTONISHING WORK. I haven't seen in other top campaigns this level of detail for example in ground procedures, etc.... Amazing. I will need to study the documentation to make the most of it. Congrats.

------

Let me recap what I did, just in case someone else have the same problem and it can help.

What I did is:

1) WINWING: Delete winwing script from exports.lua. I have also removed their application for good. This is the second time I have problems with it.... And there won't be a third one.

2) TACVIEW. I leave the tacview script active in exports.lua (previous screenshot), but I disabled it from menu options. I'am not sure, but maybe the problem was related to having it enabled via export.lua, but not having the "tacview module enlabed" checked in menu options..    Either way it's really strange because I was able to do multiplayer missions, and other missions with no problems... who knows.

What I did is:

     - Check the box "tacview module enabled"

     - Unchecked the box "enabled" below the "flight data recording"

3) I tried again with these two changes and now the performance is perfect. 45fps in the hangar with my previous high settings for VR. I don't usually get more than 45, because I am using opencomposite (openxr) without reprojection. So this figures are top for me.

Best Regards

Thank you once again!

 

 

That's great to hear, and no apology necessary.  I think the main issue is that the campaign is pretty complex and in every mission there's a lot going on, a lot of statics, a lot of air defences and a lot of stuff to make the world feel alive, this is a manageable workload for most systems I think, and certainly the testing process helps tune it to be so.  I suspect though that when the campaign meets another performance heavy element and VR then things get a bit more dicey and it starts to overwhelming our over worked single cores.  Hopefully what you've posted here will help anyone else who runs into a similar issue, thanks for sharing!

[Steel Jaw]

I would like to buy and play this but is there any way to release the first mission for free so I can ensure my system is going to run it acceptably in VR?  My initial experience with your test mission was not encouraging for me.

[FMBluecher]

43 minutes ago, Steel Jaw said:

I would like to buy and play this but is there any way to release the first mission for free so I can ensure my system is going to run it acceptably in VR?  My initial experience with your test mission was not encouraging for me.

IIRC ChillNG already released the first mission for free. Search around and you should find it.

[Steel Jaw]

3 minutes ago, FMBluecher said:

IIRC ChillNG already released the first mission for free. Search around and you should find it.

It was but he recalled it andso thats why I am asking, cheers.

 

 

[FMBluecher]

9 minutes ago, Steel Jaw said:

It was but he recalled it andso thats why I am asking, cheers.

Ah, sorry, didn't realize he did that!

[ChillNG]

Yeah I took it down after the WP switch bug broke everyone's campaigns for a week or so.  @Steel Jaw my pc is packed away for the next week as I'm redecorating but soon as its back out I'll get you a test version sorted out.

[WMundstock]

I bought the campaign and spent good time reading the great briefings and other materials.

It was a bit sad when I finally launched DCS and noticed a very low framerate.

I was playing on Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4770K CPU @ 3.50GHz, 3501 Mhz / 32GB Ram / GTX 1080 HoF 8GB / Running QHD Resolution.

I thought my video card was maxed (at this resolution) so I decided it was time to upgrade. Upgraded to a 3080TI with 12GB, and Good Lord! DCS is a completely new game for me, I can play with everything in high settings on this resolution, enabling some MSAA and other cool stuff seem to yield even better framerates. 

Unfortunately that wasn't the case on this campaign .  I won't say this campaign is unplayable, but it is really fun-killer to have to startup the plane and maneuver with 15-18 fps. 

I am thinking it is a combo of Syria scenario and the campaign itself. I did not make note, but the campaign running make task manager show 97% memory usage. That might be it. 

If I just run the game on a blank scenario, on the same airfield it is definitely slower than average, but better than while on the campaign. 

Could this be some setting that I am missing here? I will test more the new video card, but so far it is running solid for me on other scenarios.

Any advice is welcome!

Disclaimer: I just tested this for a day with the new setup. I will test more and post the results as I find out more. 
 

 

Edited November 8, 2023 by WMundstock

[ChillNG]

6 hours ago, WMundstock said:

I bought the campaign and spent good time reading the great briefings and other materials.

It was a bit sad when I finally launched DCS and noticed a very low framerate.

I was playing on Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4770K CPU @ 3.50GHz, 3501 Mhz / 32GB Ram / GTX 1080 HoF 8GB / Running QHD Resolution.

I thought my video card was maxed (at this resolution) so I decided it was time to upgrade. Upgraded to a 3080TI with 12GB, and Good Lord! DCS is a completely new game for me, I can play with everything in high settings on this resolution, enabling some MSAA and other cool stuff seem to yield even better framerates. 

Unfortunately that wasn't the case on this campaign .  I won't say this campaign is unplayable, but it is really fun-killer to have to startup the plane and maneuver with 15-18 fps. 

I am thinking it is a combo of Syria scenario and the campaign itself. I did not make note, but the campaign running make task manager show 97% memory usage. That might be it. 

If I just run the game on a blank scenario, on the same airfield it is definitely slower than average, but better than while on the campaign. 

Could this be some setting that I am missing here? I will test more the new video card, but so far it is running solid for me on other scenarios.

Any advice is welcome!

Disclaimer: I just tested this for a day with the new setup. I will test more and post the results as I find out more. 
 

 

 

The campaign is fairly heavy in performance demand as it's very detailed, but having said that it sounds like you're having a bigger impact than most, most issues I'm aware of (pre multi threading) were in VR. 

Few things worth mentioning to check and be aware of.  Incirlik, especially the shelters, are not a great area for performance...that's just a Syria map thing.  Once away from the base things settle down a lot more.

Hopefully you're running the multi threading version, if not I would advise to do so as the high unit counts in the campaign benefit from this.

If you use TACVIEW then try disabling it, TACVIEW takes CPU resources and this is made worse with the amount of things it has to track in the campaign.

Finally if you have any Win-wing devices then disable the scripts they use in DCS as these are real performance hogs.

 

 

Edited November 8, 2023 by ChillNG