Another one for the "maybe todo" list of the future

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mrgenie
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Another one for the "maybe todo" list of the future

Post by mrgenie »

I reported about the supply problems of the AI and how the AI NOT deals with lack of supplies in desert, permafrost, etc.

AI can't even get the supplies done properly by truck like in real world Russia and other countries do keep up the supplies.

Also I'm not sure if programming to have 1000 trucks running around is the way to go.

So here a few thoughts:

-1) transporting units over long distances over land is usually by railway. Currently a lot of units run out of supplies and can't continue, getting stuck.

So 1 idea is, that units gather at railway stations and there they get on the train and transported. animated trains should show this to the user.
Thus the transport is done by railway only and nothing would get stuck anyway since it would follow railway lines anyway.

-2 ) currently you have the main military hub and around it the depot, building facilities and others, but how about a general overhaul of this?
analog to "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depot"
- Regimental depot, the headquarters and training grounds of a regiment
- Main Operating Base, an overseas base for the US military
- Logistics center

first step when you build such a thing you only have a military logistics center which is very cheap and build in 10 days and cost just 50.000 a year with supply 25%
AI could easily build them cheap anywhere to keep forces going.

if your UPGRADE it to a main operating base you get 50% supplies AND you can build simple barracks, tank production facilities, etc. but no high tech weapons and this one already cost you 1.500.000 a year to maintain.
Further such bases give units basic protection from artillery, rockets, etc.. but only very minor.. few percentage..

if you upgrade it to regimental depot, as mentioned in wikipedia you can build anything up to modern armored units production, modern navy, modern air force.
Your planes and everything will be in bunkers and thus 99% protected from artillery, rockets, etc..

Upgrade able with rocket and missile defense systems, etc..

should be costly, 40.000.000 a year


just some thoughts how to handle supply for AI more properly without having the AI chocking on the costs while at the same time more
realism to the differences in military installations.

I haven't researched for accuracy though, I'm sure NOTHING I wrote will remain if you go digging for realism. It's just the thought about more complexity to represent realism.

Still playing this game in my 3770k at acceptable speed even after 40 years (started pre WWI)

So on a modern i7-8700k I can only imagine this game rocks.. and with upcoming AMD ZEN as well as intel 9700k with both 16 threading out of the box
at high Ghz I'm sure this game can handle a lot more complexity in future :)
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number47
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Re: Another one for the "maybe todo" list of the future

Post by number47 »

mrgenie wrote: So on a modern i7-8700k I can only imagine this game rocks.. and with upcoming AMD ZEN as well as intel 9700k with both 16 threading out of the box
at high Ghz I'm sure this game can handle a lot more complexity in future :)
I believe I remember George or someone else from BG saying SR can only utilize 4 cpu cores, so no benefit from new cpus with increased core count unless BG develops a new engine that could take advantage of new cores...and we all know when that will happen :wink:
"If everyone is thinking alike, someone isn't thinking."
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mrgenie
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Re: Another one for the "maybe todo" list of the future

Post by mrgenie »

number47 wrote:
mrgenie wrote: So on a modern i7-8700k I can only imagine this game rocks.. and with upcoming AMD ZEN as well as intel 9700k with both 16 threading out of the box
at high Ghz I'm sure this game can handle a lot more complexity in future :)
I believe I remember George or someone else from BG saying SR can only utilize 4 cpu cores, so no benefit from new cpus with increased core count unless BG develops a new engine that could take advantage of new cores...and we all know when that will happen :wink:
I don’t know what George or others said but on my computer SR opens at least 200 threads.
How the threads are distributed over the cores is usually not up to the user space running program but the operating system does that. Unless you program explicitly against an os handling the distribution of the threads over the cores, the limit comes from the os.

Windows has no problems handling 32 threads.
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evildari
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Re: Another one for the "maybe todo" list of the future

Post by evildari »

my wish would be that the game preloads all assets into the ram (make it maybe just an option to toggle, even if only in the options.ini)
(unless there is already such a thing - then please point me to the right direction)

..my graphics card memory alone could fill the complete game installation a few times, but then i see those 1K satellite imagery textures (avg. size 186KB on disk / 3MB in RAM) reloading in game while scrolling...
making the game feel quit sluggish especially if you are doing global operations.

With the current size textures the game would need around 4,3 GB RAM for a complete preload of all planet Earth textures (details+full outzoom Map).
With a mod that uses every plot with a same dimensions texture (like my MARS mod with the SatImages) the game would need around 7,9 GB of RAM to hold them.

just for stats 16GB RAM + 8GB Graphics Memory
my mods
http://www.bgforums.com/forums/viewtopi ... 79&t=25932 (even techs and units for everyone - AI will own you too)
http://www.bgforums.com/forums/viewtopi ... 79&t=29326 (MARSX2)
Nerei
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Re: Another one for the "maybe todo" list of the future

Post by Nerei »

Keep in mind this game is a 32-bit application so loading 4.3GB data or more into memory is going to cause an OOM crash. Rebuilding the engine to a 64-bit application is probably not going to happen simply due to cost.
A ramdisk might be an option though.


That said I like the idea of breaking up the production system as currently you can buy the license for T-14 Armata MBT's (or any other high-tech unit design) and go directly from handing out rifles to producing 4th gen MBT's. Yes that is an extreme case but that is how it currently works.
Maybe keep it so barracks can only produce simple infantry and a much more expensive, dedicated factory is needed to produce tanks. Maybe even have multiple tiers of factories that can handle different levels of advanced hardware.

For ships though I would say break shipyards up into different size categories based in general on the length of the slipways/dry docks. That way building the infrastructure required to be able to build large ocean-going battleships or aircraft carriers is harder than building small patrol boats. It would also mean countries with less developed can have shipbuilding without being able to field an advanced fleet just by buying a design or two.

Maybe add something like a complexity value to all units and production buildings indicating the complexity of the design and how complex designs a building can build.
For a start it can just be set to 0 for everything. I am sure modders can get some fun out of it and if something good comes of it BG can just use that as a template.
SGTscuba
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Re: Another one for the "maybe todo" list of the future

Post by SGTscuba »

Nerei wrote:Keep in mind this game is a 32-bit application so loading 4.3GB data or more into memory is going to cause an OOM crash. Rebuilding the engine to a 64-bit application is probably not going to happen simply due to cost.
A ramdisk might be an option though.


That said I like the idea of breaking up the production system as currently you can buy the license for T-14 Armata MBT's (or any other high-tech unit design) and go directly from handing out rifles to producing 4th gen MBT's. Yes that is an extreme case but that is how it currently works.
Maybe keep it so barracks can only produce simple infantry and a much more expensive, dedicated factory is needed to produce tanks. Maybe even have multiple tiers of factories that can handle different levels of advanced hardware.

For ships though I would say break shipyards up into different size categories based in general on the length of the slipways/dry docks. That way building the infrastructure required to be able to build large ocean-going battleships or aircraft carriers is harder than building small patrol boats. It would also mean countries with less developed can have shipbuilding without being able to field an advanced fleet just by buying a design or two.

Maybe add something like a complexity value to all units and production buildings indicating the complexity of the design and how complex designs a building can build.
For a start it can just be set to 0 for everything. I am sure modders can get some fun out of it and if something good comes of it BG can just use that as a template.
I'm going to say +1 to this part. Its pretty historical in the UK's case as ships such as the Flower and Swan classes had to be designed around fitting and being built in smaller, non-naval yards. The game would need some of the bigger slips removing and more smaller ones adding so the cap would go up, but I think it would make sense.
My SR:U Model Project, get the latest and post suggestions here:

http://www.bgforums.com/forums/viewtopi ... 79&t=28040
evildari
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Re: Another one for the "maybe todo" list of the future

Post by evildari »

Nerei wrote:Keep in mind this game is a 32-bit application so loading 4.3GB data or more into memory is going to cause an OOM crash. Rebuilding the engine to a 64-bit application is probably not going to happen simply due to cost.
A ramdisk might be an option though.


That said I like the idea of breaking up the production system as currently you can buy the license for T-14 Armata MBT's (or any other high-tech unit design) and go directly from handing out rifles to producing 4th gen MBT's. Yes that is an extreme case but that is how it currently works.
Maybe keep it so barracks can only produce simple infantry and a much more expensive, dedicated factory is needed to produce tanks. Maybe even have multiple tiers of factories that can handle different levels of advanced hardware.

For ships though I would say break shipyards up into different size categories based in general on the length of the slipways/dry docks. That way building the infrastructure required to be able to build large ocean-going battleships or aircraft carriers is harder than building small patrol boats. It would also mean countries with less developed can have shipbuilding without being able to field an advanced fleet just by buying a design or two.

Maybe add something like a complexity value to all units and production buildings indicating the complexity of the design and how complex designs a building can build.
For a start it can just be set to 0 for everything. I am sure modders can get some fun out of it and if something good comes of it BG can just use that as a template.
..i already beaten that dead horse - well just another kick: affordable consumer-class 64bit CPU and windows OS for it (WIN XP 64bit) were available since around 2003...now its 2018

lets face it: i would rather pay for SRU 64bit version that uses most of todays available ressources to good use than another worldwar DLC

At least for unit types you can set dedicated production centers:
check out the .unit files "uBuildClassMask" entry there you can set a bitmask containing up to 22 unit types - ie you can set your town to produce infantry (though i guess they would need a barrack - unless the barracks functionality is merged to the town that is able to produce that.
Tried that with barracks able to produce infantry only - the only issue i got was a weird worldstat entry on page 2 with the number of production facilities.

I fear that for a more complex system to be usable, the ai have to learn how to use it ...
my mods
http://www.bgforums.com/forums/viewtopi ... 79&t=25932 (even techs and units for everyone - AI will own you too)
http://www.bgforums.com/forums/viewtopi ... 79&t=29326 (MARSX2)
Nerei
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Re: Another one for the "maybe todo" list of the future

Post by Nerei »

Feel free to beat the horse but the horse you want to beat is stabled with Microsoft.
What matters when it comes to Operating Systems is what people actually use.
The first iteration of this game was released in 2008. The dominant OS back then was Windows XP home edition. As a developer you make software for the computers people own and in this case the majority owned computers running a 32bit OS. Making a 64 bit game in 2008 would pretty much be stupid and make no sense from an economic perspective as you are by design excluding a large part of the market from using your product.
It was not until mid 2009 that Microsoft actually managed to release a 64bit OS that managed to get any significant traction among the wider user-base and even then 32 bit XP would make up a significant part of the market for several years yet.

You can add that the majority 10 years ago did not have 4GB memory either so if you used that much which would be a prime example of the benefits of 64 bit applications you are doing something wrong as the game will run horrible for the majority of people.

So yes it would be good to have a 64bit version and yes 64 bit is objectively better but you cannot blame BG for making a 32 bit engine back when they did.


As for making a 64 bit version that is probably not a cheap project and according to mr Geczy not feasible. Considering how long Unity Technologies used to get the 64bit windows version to work remotely decent I guess he is right in that it would be an expensive project.

That said I agree I would prefer engine upgrades to a great war scenario but I doubt the majority of people will agree considering as I doubt the majority even gets what the difference is. A new starting date is far easier to sell.
evildari
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Re: Another one for the "maybe todo" list of the future

Post by evildari »

I guess you are right - but i think SRU is slighlty more actual than 2008.
Just hope that the day MS drops wow (that 32 bit emulation layer) will be far in the future.

For a new starting date we are running out of world wars..
my mods
http://www.bgforums.com/forums/viewtopi ... 79&t=25932 (even techs and units for everyone - AI will own you too)
http://www.bgforums.com/forums/viewtopi ... 79&t=29326 (MARSX2)
mrgenie
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Re: Another one for the "maybe todo" list of the future

Post by mrgenie »

I ported several open source projects from 32bit to 64 bit.

It's really just handling pointers and address mapping properly.

for some software this was done in less than a day and others took me a week.

I doubt SR would take more than a month to do it.

I doubt however you see really noticeable game performance increase just because you can load 4+ GB

My son now has a computer with a M.2 2GB that loads around 3.2GB per second.
I still have an old SSD doing 240MB per second.

he definitely loads textures as if there were no delay times (of course there are) but I mean from the
point of how you as user feel it.

On my computer it sometimes stutters while scrolling.
My son can scroll all across all kinds of games high res loading textures from the M.2 no issues.
the pre-loading of any textures for an amount of range outside of the visible display on your
monitor runs so fast on an M.2 that you don't notice the delay of the M.2 because it loads faster
than you can possibly scroll or click on any point within any game.

He runs also a lot of 3D games which are still 32bit.

So I really doubt 32bit -> 64 bit is going to be a lot of improvement.

I rather have them invest the time in fixing patching bugs that still exist and getting smarter AI when
it comes to upgrading country infrastructure and self sufficiency or the release of open source
SDK so we can rewrite AI country building ourselves. So we can add more resources, more
complexity etc.

I think from any open source SDK, they shouldn't release the AI combat code.
that's too advanced for most modders and will take too much time to get into.

But it's a lot of work of course to split up the code, have 1 part in an dll you expose as open source
and keep everything modders wouldn't need in closed source.

that's really a big one if you haven't worked on this from the beginning.

so I hope they can do that one time in future and mostly just that part of the code that
we're going to need to add additional resources, complexity on manufacturing, adding not just railroads and roads but also
simple mud roads, single laned paved roads, highways
to add really something like a whole complex of industries you need to build and research for all kinds of weapons systems
and of course exposing the AI code on this matter so we can tell the AI what to do with newly added stuff.

This ain't gonna be easy to expose that to an SDK, more work than just switch to 64bit pointers.

But I think that'll add more to the game than just going to 64bit.

just my opinion. Not saying going to 64bit is a waste!!! Just think it's really low priority as customers switching
to M.2 will practically make 64bit useless if it only serves to putting textures in the memory.
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evildari
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Re: Another one for the "maybe todo" list of the future

Post by evildari »

on my 2nd system (Intel 4790 - 16GB RAM - nvidia 970 - M.2 SSD) i can also see the loading and placing of the textures in SRU after scrolling or clickin in worldmap to another location
it is placed from left to right next line.. like reading a book.. so my wish was just to preload them into available RAM - and Nerei pointed out that wouldnt be possible since its not a 64bit application. And we are not talking about fractions of a second for the whole screen but fractions of a second per tile, on my (rather large monitor) it takes several seconds until all satellite images are updated to the new location.
(and both of my systems can play even recent games like ghost recon wildlands without problems, even planetary mapping tools work well, so maybe SRU itself is not that optimized)

Of course i like to see removing bugs (though iam almost considering this choppy loading as an issue) - a higher priority.
And of course i would like to see the AI not break on low supply areas, or able to compete in longer term games.
But the basic things like a smooth scrolling with a decent system should be already atained.
And considering the Meltdown and Spectre updates , having a less I/O heavy system would also be better for in-game performance.
my mods
http://www.bgforums.com/forums/viewtopi ... 79&t=25932 (even techs and units for everyone - AI will own you too)
http://www.bgforums.com/forums/viewtopi ... 79&t=29326 (MARSX2)
mrgenie
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Re: Another one for the "maybe todo" list of the future

Post by mrgenie »

Very strange!

I honestly never seen such a thing. Seconds per texture from left to right and top to bottom?
My old 3770k with a 960gtx doesn’t have that.

When I scroll or completely click somewhere else it’s like 300-400ms to load everything.
Barely noticeable unless you focus on it.

My son renders it on his 7700k and gtx1080 in dunno, absolutely not noticeable.

You should check settings in your bios, windows installation, etc as this what you describe hasn’t anything to do with the game.

Even if other games don’t have it, a lot would still guess it’s a setting issue.
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evildari
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Re: Another one for the "maybe todo" list of the future

Post by evildari »

Placed the game in a 4GB Ramdisk - the loading or maybe rather the rendering times are quite the same as if run from my SSD:
at 3440x1440 resolution : Earth around 3 seconds after loading game (insider build) - in my marsmod (where all tiles are used, and maybe higher quality compression) it takes 4+ seconds
I have to guess its really a rendering issue (that is more cpu-bound since its not 3d), and ram is way faster than ssd - even if it has to load from RAMdisk to the program space.
my mods
http://www.bgforums.com/forums/viewtopi ... 79&t=25932 (even techs and units for everyone - AI will own you too)
http://www.bgforums.com/forums/viewtopi ... 79&t=29326 (MARSX2)
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