dandamanno.4136

> @"Joote.4081" said:

> Dx12 wrapper is in and framerate soared from 45 on the highest settings to my native 100. The graphics are better. My dpi seems to be behaving much better, textures are cleaner and clearer, mouse seems to be more responsive, and that horrible glow on everything has gone, thank goodness.

> Come on A-net. Brings us into the 21 century.

It works for many people, myself included. The wrapper has a cost that will affect everyone by a certain amount at all times. But if your system can take advantage of the DX12 benefits then in high draw scenarios you will overcome that wrapper cost easily.

Generally, the scenarios where the DX12 will have the biggest impact are the ones where you actually need the biggest impact, such as large number of players on screen, etc... Having a cost of a couple FPS in low usage scenarios hardly matters since you are probably not struggling for frames in those scenarios anyway.

> @"Astralporing.1957" said:

> > @"Joote.4081" said:

> > Yep. If they updated the graphics and performance which must be easy as the DX12 mod already does this

> It doesn't. First, it does _not_ update the graphics in any way. Second, the performance improvements are a bit of a mixed bag - the improvements are on a case-by case basis, and are very dependant on your system (on some rigs it can actually result in _worse_ performance). Third, it is not stable enough - even now, after many, many updates, it still very much can _make your game crash_ (or result in glitchy display). And that is a massive demerit - something that may be tolerated in a third party program, but is completely unacceptable in an official product.

Using the d912pxy for the last 6 months I can honestly say I havent had any crashing issues at all. Certainly possible, but seeing as how you can try it out then uninstall it if it causes problems it's worth a look. As for the visual glitches, those have all pretty much been worked out now. The only visual issues I see now are the conflict it has with GW2radial which causes a flicker when I hold the mount select key until I release it. Not a big deal for most people considering that is an optional addon itself.

Also, just like when the 64-bit client was introduced, if ANET did implement a DX12 build, they would run it concurrently with a DX9 client for a good long while. I mean even LotRO has a DX9, DX10 and DX11 client all at the same time. If you want to talk about a company with few resources to spare...

Keep gameplay in the game. As much as possible.

> @"Gyro.9182" said:

> > @"Nephalem.8921" said:

> > Graphics api is used for more than gaming. How many of the 14800 applications are games? How many are mobile games?

> While I can‘t speak for the 14,800 (Apple apparently lists it as 148,000, „as of June 2017“), you might check the list on Wikipedia here to see some examples including well-known (and not „small“) games like CIV VI, Dota 2, Quake 2, diverse Tomb Raider or Total War games, WoW, or Fortnite. URL for the lazy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metal_(API) (the list is probably neither complete nor very recent)..

https://www.gameinformer.com/2020

Here is a list of all games released in 2020.

Trying to find supported Mac games is like a needle in a haystack.

Most companies find it not worthwhile. Im not sure why people are surprised that Anet wouldn't be willing to support Mac going forward, now that extra time and expense would be required.

Apple is worth $2 Trillion dollars. NCSoft (which Anet is just a part of) is worth only $12 Billion.

Why do you find faultless one of the worlds richest companies who could very easily maintain compatibility with current games with a pittance of investment, and yet think that Anet, a small subsidiary, of an already smallish company should be tasked with this extra burden financially?

Apple doesn't care that you want to use their machines for gaming. That is clear by their actions.

Also, as a side note ESO put out basically the same letter as Anet. No support for Mac on ESO either. Same reasons too. Two much dev time and simply not enough people play on a Mac to justify it.

> @"Ashantara.8731" said:

> > @"Mack.3045" said:

> > I'd jump on the reshade discord channel and check there

>

> So you are telling me that everyone on here who is using ReShade is doing so _without_ a "Skip UI" option? :o The text labels are so blurry, it's unbearable to the eye.

This is a bit late but I made my own UIMask .PNG file and replaced the blank one inside the "reshade-shader/textures" folder. You can use a program like GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program, these forums block the acronym :s ) and import a screenshot from the game, and then paint over the areas that you use for your static UI elements in white, and the rest of the image in black (I may have the colours reversed). It was tricky but with some tutorials using GnuIMP I found online I got it done.

Then while in game you set "UIMask-Top" at the top of the active effects you don't want to affect your UI, and UIMask-Bottom after said effects.

https://github.com/crosire/reshade-shaders/blob/master/Shaders/UIMask.fx

In mmo's bugs that "block progress" are usually top priority, and rightly so. Anet shouldn't be backburning this issue. Many solutions have been suggested in regards to how they can work around the problem without needing to "fix" it necessarily, such as more checkpoints during long, cutscene rich storyline instances. If they just updated one or two instances per patch it could be mitigated greatly within a year.

> @"maddoctor.2738" said:

> > @"coso.9173" said:

> > i wonder why people who don't even work for ANET have managed to do this, and the people who work in there don't do a similar thing, if it improves the game substantially.

>

> Because the game (core and heart of thorns) still lists Windows XP SP3 as the minimum requirement. The developers have always been reluctant towards upgrading the core game in any way, that goes for graphics too. Now it's either because they have the hardware data and there are a lot of players using potatoes to run this game, the team doesn't want to mess with existing engine code and instead pile new things on top of it, or simply they don't see any engine improvements as a worthwhile investment.

At this point, trying to keep the game compatible with XP would be more work than just dropping the support for it altogether. According to the steam hardware survey 96% of OS's out there are non-XP anyway.

I mean they dropped 32-bit support completely. Actually, now that I think about it, XP SP3 only came in 32-bit flavor. The 64- bit was only up to SP2. This means that Anet not supporting 32-bit anymore indirectly no longer supports XP SP3.

Original Lions Arch. Gone but not forgotten. Cool hodgepodge of architecture, had real flavor. Fun to explore.

> @"Cragga the Eighty Third.6015" said:

> People are mentioning a lot of maps I love. ^^ Spent a lot of time farming geodes and quartz on Dry Top, and I'm still fond of it.

>

> I hated the PoF desert maps...all of them. Big, flat, empty, boring, undistinctive, and you could not stand still long enough to look at the map without things oozing out of the sand to kill you, could not harvest a tree or ore node without finding it booby-trapped with sand eels and lions.

>

> I hated Draconis Mons at the time I played it, but keep meaning to give it another chance now with the mounts. I have a feeling Skyscale will make it a lot better.

I liked the desert maps!


> @"Darrack.4069" said:

> > @"Inculpatus cedo.9234" said:

> > > @"Darrack.4069" said:

> > > Greetings all, hope you are all well?

> > >

> > > Sooooo i have recently returned to the game after leaving during HOT (sorry it drove me mad!), ive spent the last years in ESO but am disillusioned with the way that game is now going.

> > > The game is amazing and i now realise what ive been missing, i love open world PvP and as a soloer the WvW here is really fun.

> > >

> > > BUT, to unlock stuff, mounts, etc you need to progress the story and so i have been putting a lot of time into catching up.

> > > Im stuck in both living world and this stupid Departing bug.

> > > I am shocked that this has been going on for so long and folks here just accept it? for all its faults ive never come across a bug in ESO that stopped progression.

> > > I really want to recommend this game and bring my guild here from ESO (some 60+ players) but how can i with this current issue?

> > > Why is there no official response from the bugs team? Do they have one?

> > > Im an old gamer (really old), if this could be fixed my end trust me it would be done but this is clearly a programming issue.

> > >

> > > I like many others would really appreciate a response to this thread and i am really hoping Anet have better respect for their player base than what we have to put up with in ESO.

> > >

> > > Be Safe

> >

> > Probably won't get any response, other than the one already posted in this thread.

> > You can try any one of the plethora of tips/workarounds found in this thread.

> >

> > Good luck.

>

> That's what im afraid of, its sad that game breaking issues are not dealt with.

> Sadly i will probably just stick to WVW and not buy any story content (like many folks i have spoken to), this must be costing them a fortune.

> Anyway best not dwell, i was well known for moaning in ESO and my forum bans were considerable!

>

> Be Safe

The only solution in this thread that I have not tested thoroughly is the - clientport 443 command line argument suggested on the last page, mainly because I have not been doing the storyline atm.

The poster seems knowledable though so it's worth a shot.

I would think that Anet would take notice and implement a permanent solution if any of these seem likely to be the fix, but I think they're no longer paying attention. Also if it is an isp or internet routing issue they would not be able to reproduce it easily.

People probably initially play them for the "Warrior/Paladin" style of class. They probably keep playing them because they are a very strong, well-rounded and valuable team member in all game modes.

They are, in my opinion, the most boring class to play, but you simply won't find a class that is as well adapted to the way this games combat plays.

> @"ShadowCatz.8437" said:

> So what you are claiming is that ANet and NCsoft Inc. should magically optimize an MMO to the latest and greatest DX 12 and all problem should have been solved?

Errr, pretty sure that's not what he said, lol. That is a fabulous example of a strawman argument though. Should link that to the wikipedia definition.

ESO's main issue is that the game has no cooldowns on any skills, which leads to an unprecedented level of skill spam (specifically highly taxing AoE skill spam). In fact starting August 24th they are "testing" global AoE cooldowns in their WvW area just to confirm what we already know, that AoE spam causes massive server-side calculations that bring the game to its knees.

> @"sitarskee.5738" said:

> Every year people re-discover same thing - gambling or loot boxes aren't profitable. (insert always have been meme)

Aren't profitable *for the player* that is. The house always wins, as they say.

> @"KrHome.1920" said:

> > @"StainedSilva.1726" said:

> > I just learnt that the game is using DX9 still, which explains a lot about the poor optimization?

> It actually does not. The game would not run better in DX11 and would only run better in some scenarios in DX12.

>

> What causes some of the performance issues is how the game handles draw calls. But this can not be called poor optimization as other ways of handling draw calls would cause other issues. D912PXY reorganizes draw calls, but doing so kills a lot of GPU performance (more than 20%) and requires some extensive shader compiling causing graphics glitches. That's not necessary something you can call a polished product ready for shipment to a big number of customers.

>

> Other performance issues are simply a result of the huge amount of game logic in large scale fights. This would not improve under DX12.

>

Dx912pxy seems to off-load some CPU cycles over to the GPU. So your GPU usage does go up (around 10-20% like you say) but your CPU usage goes down (around 20% is what I see when doing comparisons). I did several comparisons when I first installed the program to see if I could notice any difference.

Generally this game is CPU bound, so leveraging GPU power to free up CPU power is a pretty good trade off in nearly all scenarios. I had a hard time finding any scenario that yielded worse FPS results using d912pxy.

I find it pretty impressive that a DX12 ad-hoc program can have descent results with the only drawback being 1-2 minute shader compiling upon first launch, and strange character portraits on the character select screen.

Especially when my initial reaction when I first read about d912pxy was a solid "Pfttththhh!".

> @"Danger Ferret.6342" said:

> I'm finding this extremely frustrating as well. I've disabled my AV and my firewall, rebooted my cable modem/router. Nothing solves the problem. At this point, I'm ready to give up. Games are supposed to be fun, and having to fight not just the game monsters, but the code bugs and disconnects just ... isn't.

Search for the "Storyline Disconnects-Merged" thread. The latest "fix" (there are many supposed fixes, but the random nature of the problem can make it hard to pin down) is to add the command line argument "-clientport 443" to the gw2.exe target through a shortcut to the program.

Does it work? Who knows! But it's worth a try right?

> @"tomshreds.1745" said:

> Are you using D912PXY? If yes, it is known to cause such issues on the character selection screen.

This.

Also, if you are, the author has put out a fix for it.

Imagine how the mobs in the game feel. Slaughtered by the millions by unkillable PC's that easily take them on 10:1, while dealing massive AoE damage and healing constantly and even if you manage to down them they can be rezzed by a friend or even rez themselves!

Hmmm... I never found any part of the story lines to be too hard. Some parts are a bit challenging but mostly you just need to figure out strategy and then it becomes pretty easy.

To me the slight challenge is what prevents it from being boring. Not the other way around.

Why not group up with your BF to complete the harder stuff?

All rendering is done client side, so graphics quality are not affected by network speed (with perhaps the exception of FPS which can be lag in disguise sometimes). The "game client unable to access etc...) is pretty common and there is a thing here : https://help.guildwars2.com/hc/en-us/articles/115015860488. I recently port triggered ports 80, 443 and 6112 on my router so maybe it will fix it. Ask your brother for more help if you don't know how to do it. It is not hard once you know how.

EDIT: So after setting up Port Triggering for the above ports I still get the same "login server unavailable" message as before. No difference.

As to your graphics, the first thing that came to mind was what Inculpus above says. I would go one step further and disable your on-board graphics card so it isn't even available for your system to use. Your new 1080 will blow whatever it is out of the water anyway so why have your crummy on-board card keep butting in accidentally.

> @"Sparts.5302" said:

> What the heck is up with the connection issues?

>

> The auction house constantly gives errors, sometimes accidentally resulting in buying multiple copies of an item, and there are frequent random disconnects throughout the game... These especially suck when they happen towards the end of a story mission, and they always have this snooty message suggesting it’s your firewall (it’s not!)

>

> I’ve really been enjoying being back after 6 years but jeez you would think these things would be fixed by now.

>

> Anyway that’s it, the new expansions have been great. Hope everyone is having a nice day.

If you are disconnecting during Storyline sequences, you better get used to it. It's been a problem since HoT and there is a huge thread on the issue called "Storyline Disconnects" over in the Game Bug area.

You will find lots of pseudo-solutions and placebo effect responses, but at the end of the day there is no solid, permanent fix for it.

> @"kharmin.7683" said:

> > @"CazzT.1870" said:

>

> > Subs are not outdated. In fact, they're on the rise because the F2P model has proven to be even more greedy than subs with cash shops are. Case in point, this entire topic.

> Strange. I've been playing for well over 6 years now, and haven't had to pay more than the price of the expansions. I don't find that greedy. /shrug

>

The Gem to Gold conversion ability means that is entirely possible. If you enjoy grinding out gold in this game (I mean that in a good way, like it is actually fun for you) then playing games like this is a real dream since you can convert everything to gems and get everything you want for "just playing the game".

Of course, if grinding for gold is less fun for you, then that becomes a bad experience and it feels like the game is charging you for everything, lol.

In that case though, I would just leave.

> @"CazzT.1870" said:

> > @"dandamanno.4136" said:

> > ESO is around $70 ($50 on sale right now) for all expansions right now, then a sub will unlock all the smaller content patches like Clockwork City etc, as well as huge QoL stuff like crafting bag etc.

> ESO, you can make an account right now, subscribe, and have access to 100% of the content, including the expansions. You don't have to buy them, just subscribe monthly. It's an interesting approach, and one I'm interested to see how it will hold up long term. I think they're losing out on money by not requiring players to buy the expansion, but ZeniMax (bethesda's parent company) isn't exactly hurting for money, so they can easily afford to run with this model.

I didn't know that. This must be pretty recent since I took a break in November and haven't been back since. Not having to buy any expansion and just a sub for all content is pretty insane considering many people like myself already subbed for the perks alone.

Was there not a huge outcry from people who already bought the expansion(s)? I would be kind of ticked off if I bought it and the next day it was free with a sub.

EDIT: I found it now. It's only until August 19, during Quakecon. So just a promo thing for new players. Cool, but not the same as a permanent choice.

Gw2 is rather generous content wise if you actually tally up the cost for a new player to jump in with all content unlocked. $30 for HoT/PoF combo and around another $30-$40 to unlock all the 2,3 and 4 LW seasons. Early Icebrood would probably be a few extra dollars on top of that.

ESO is around $70 ($50 on sale right now) for all expansions right now, then a sub will unlock all the smaller content patches like Clockwork City etc, as well as huge QoL stuff like crafting bag etc.

Whether you prefer the sub to unlock loads of stuff that micro transactions would give you over here is a matter of preference.

The main problem is that the LW mechanic includes tonnes of contiguous story that is actually required if you want to experience the story entirely and that mechanic is not well explained during point of purchase.

ANET could do better in that respect.

Without getting into skills or traits, 'cause I'm just too lazy to form an opinion (other than the overall idea seems fun), the thing I like most about your idea is that without any clones running around as distraction/agro it has a built in tradeoff already compared to other specs.

Also, the Main hand skill names are perfect as is, do not revise ever.

> @"Johnmaci.1590" said:

> How do i do that? I dont think i have anything that alters the settings somehow, or do i? The nvidia xperience?

If you have to ask if you have anything like that, then it is likely you don't, since you need to purposely install these things. In your case I think you can safely ignore my advice.