These forums have been archived and are now read-only.

The new forums are live and can be found at https://forums.eveonline.com/

EVE General Discussion

 
  • Topic is locked indefinitely.
123Next page
 

Collision detection - Does it have to be this bad?
Author
Previous Topic Next Topic
Multor Kaston
Doomheim
#1 - 2013-07-12 14:06:14 UTC  |  Edited by: Multor Kaston
Surprised I haven't seen more threads on this... is anyone else tired of getting stuck on invisible pieces of objects? I can understand when undocking, but the rest is damn frustrating. Is there a reason why it has to be this way?

Stations - Some parts you can travel directly through, other parts you'll bounce off when several ship lengths away.
Asteroids - Inconsistent. Sometimes you can pass right by them, other times you'll get stuck as above.
Structures in missions - UGH. I have gotten stuck while a good 2-3km from anything visually apparent.

What's the deeeeeeeeeal with EvE's collision detection?

"Fly better" - Thanks for being an idiot and/or a troll. Appreciate it.
Tron 3K
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#2 - 2013-07-12 14:12:21 UTC
Stay 4k away from things.. then no problem.. Easy fix I win! Oh and Fly better!
Whitehound
#3 - 2013-07-12 14:14:07 UTC
Collision detection is not what gets you stuck. You could have the best and finest collision detection and you would still get stuck on a hook or a gap.

Loss is meaningful. Therefore is the loss of meaning likewise meaningful. It is the source of all trolling.
Multor Kaston
Doomheim
#4 - 2013-07-12 14:16:43 UTC  |  Edited by: Multor Kaston
Tron 3K -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reading_comprehension
You win at sucking at that^. Being discussed is the collision detection itself, not how to work around it. At that, your suggestion isn't full-proof, as mission objects can be 30km in diameter yet it will say 0km distance from the object no matter where you're at.

Whitehound -
What do you mean?
Kaarous Aldurald
Black Hydra Consortium.
#5 - 2013-07-12 14:20:18 UTC
Tron 3K wrote:
Stay 4k away from things.. then no problem.. Easy fix I win! Oh and Fly better!


Seriously, though, stay 4k away from collidable objects is the right answer. That's just about the max distance that something like that can reach out and mess you up with their invisible hitboxes.

"Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws."

One of ours, ten of theirs.

Best Meltdown Ever.
Multor Kaston
Doomheim
#6 - 2013-07-12 14:25:06 UTC
Okay I will accept that perhaps I was not clear enough in the OP. Let me re-explain.

I am not asking for the best steps to avoid this issue. I am asking why this issue exists; I have played many other games and never seen collision detection like this.

"Does it have to be this bad?"
- NO! CCP are lazy! blah blah blah...
- YES! You see, the blah blah blah...

Hopefully if there is indeed no logical reason for it to still be like this, and if there's enough support for this to be fixed, CCP would get ahold of the thread and consider it. Of course I'm not holding my breathe on that, I realize most threads end up dead within a day or two :P.
mechtech
Ice Liberation Army
#7 - 2013-07-12 14:25:09 UTC
The collision system is one of those ancient systems that was built over a decade ago. Last time they had to tweak it (4ish years ago for desynch reasons I think) it took a ton of work for devs to dive into the system. It was written by a guy with a degree in chaos theory... on the other hand it's basically just a ball simulation. That in a nutshell is why it is so poor. Performance is good though, because it's such a simple system.

So the final answer is that it's poor because CCP would have to rip out the entire system and rewrite it from scratch, and then do massive amounts of tweaking and testing, not to mention redoing collision boxes for the extremely large amount of structures and ships in the game. Maybe someday, but CCP knows that players would appreciate putting that effort into graphics, more anti-lag, features, etc. It's just not a very sellable feature for the amount of effort it takes.
Multor Kaston
Doomheim
#8 - 2013-07-12 14:27:51 UTC  |  Edited by: Multor Kaston
mechtech wrote:
The collision system is one of those ancient systems that was built over a decade ago. Last time they had to tweak it (4ish years ago for desynch reasons I think) it took a ton of work for devs to dive into the system. It was written by a guy with a degree in chaos theory... on the other hand it's basically just a ball simulation. That in a nutshell is why it is so poor. Performance is good though, because it's such a simple system.

So the final answer is that it's poor because CCP would have to rip out the entire system and rewrite it from scratch, and then do massive amounts of tweaking and testing, not to mention redoing collision boxes for the extremely large amount of structures and ships in the game. Maybe someday, but CCP knows that players would appreciate putting that effort into graphics, more anti-lag, features, etc. It's just not a very sellable feature for the amount of effort it takes.
Nice response, thanks.

Sucks that it would take so long to fix it then, because I agree, not really worth countless hours if they could add half a title update worth of features in that same time.

Another possible solution though, not sure how you guys would feel about this:
Remove collision detection from certain objects.
I'd imagine they could load up each structure 1 by 1 and easily see the borders of this bubble/ball. It shouldn't take too long then to determine which structures are most adversely affected by this due to the stucture's shape. Now obviously some things need the collision detection. Ships of course, and most stations. Smaller objects like containers, not even worth the effort. However I think with asteroids they could just say F it, and with the mission structures that basically ruin the missions by making it impossible to determine if you have 2km or 10km of space to move around (I've read of large groups of NPCs getting stuck on more than one occasion).
Miilla
Hulkageddon Orphanage
#9 - 2013-07-12 14:28:00 UTC
mechtech wrote:
The collision system is one of those ancient systems that was built over a decade ago. Last time they had to tweak it (4ish years ago for desynch reasons I think) it took a ton of work for devs to dive into the system. It was written by a guy with a degree in chaos theory... on the other hand it's basically just a ball simulation. That in a nutshell is why it is so poor. Performance is good though, because it's such a simple system.

So the final answer is that it's poor because CCP would have to rip out the entire system and rewrite it from scratch, and then do massive amounts of tweaking and testing, not to mention redoing collision boxes for the extremely large amount of structures and ships in the game. Maybe someday, but CCP knows that players would appreciate putting that effort into graphics, more anti-lag, features, etc. It's just not a very sellable feature for the amount of effort it takes.



Citation please (Dev blog for example).
Whitehound
#10 - 2013-07-12 14:53:38 UTC  |  Edited by: Whitehound
Multor Kaston wrote:
Whitehound -
What do you mean?

Imagine we had a detail level and a collision detection that was so fine that one could shove a stick up someone's butt. You would still be able to get stuck on it.

A coarse collision detection actually helps players to get unstuck and leads less often to players being completely stuck.

Loss is meaningful. Therefore is the loss of meaning likewise meaningful. It is the source of all trolling.
Jonny Monroe
Unlicensed Medical Professionals
#11 - 2013-07-12 14:54:00 UTC
Loosely related: NPC pathfinding.

I go into a mission and there's a bunch of NPC ship groups, one of which is 180km away behind a static object. After klilling all other groups, I now have to drift 90km over to them to kill them then 90km back to the acceleration gate. If that static object wasn't there, they would have come to me while I was fighting the other groups. As it is, the entire group spends the 20minutes+ bumping their spaceships into an object in space. I can only imagine the pirate captains of these ship raging at unfair universe for putting an object there and giving them no tools to go around it. They look pretty damned stupid either way, just hitting their heads against a wall because they can't figure out to go around.

If you don't want to put at least basic pathfinding on your NPCs, you could at least do them a favour and not put objects in their way.

Immersion = killed.
Whitehound
#12 - 2013-07-12 15:02:45 UTC
Jonny Monroe wrote:
I can only imagine the pirate captains of these ship raging at unfair universe ...

Immersion = killed.

I imagine these pirate captains being utterly drunk and sucking at some girls **** while piloting their ships into space junk.

Immersion = awesome.

Loss is meaningful. Therefore is the loss of meaning likewise meaningful. It is the source of all trolling.
Johan Toralen
IIIJIIIITIIII
#13 - 2013-07-12 15:13:31 UTC
I made a picture not long ago demonstrating what's wrong with Eve's colission. It's because of single convex colission hulls. Probably was a decent enough technical solution 10 years ago but not anymore. Separating the colission models at least into some parts shouldn't be that much more expensive on the hardware. It's not like Eve is a game with thousands of props sitting around in the environment like some other games.

http://i.imgur.com/7vzXngA.jpg
Klandi
Consortium of stella Technologies
#14 - 2013-07-12 15:27:31 UTC
This issue is why someone (could have been me) suggested that on undocking you appeared 4km away from the station in a random spot (same mechanics as the gates) which would negate any problems like this. I think I even added it to "the little things" thread because a fix like this would be a small adjustment.

I am aware of my own ignorance and have checked my emotional quotient - thanks for asking
Kult Altol
The Safe Space
#15 - 2013-07-12 15:48:55 UTC
lol poor op, trying to have a serious discussion in the sea of trolls. good luck.

I agree though CD, sucks.

[u]Can't wait untill when Eve online is Freemium.[/u] WiS only 10$, SP booster for one month 15$, DPS Boost 2$, EHP Boost 2$ Real money trading hub! Cosmeitic ship skins 15$ --> If you don't [u]pay **[/u]for a product, you ARE the [u]**product[/u].

Ace Uoweme
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#16 - 2013-07-12 15:54:34 UTC
Tron 3K wrote:
Stay 4k away from things.. then no problem.. Easy fix I win! Oh and Fly better!


Can't do it, especially in missions when the ships are on launch pads.

Got stuck INSIDE a launch pad because my ship got stuck on it when trying to retrieve the item in the ship on the launch pad.

When I tried to warp out of this mess, it turned my ship into the hole in the platform and it bounced for minutes...as I was trying to find something in the system to align the ship to get out.

It's b-a-d and can't be avoided even.

_"In a world of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act." _ ~George Orwell
Kult Altol
The Safe Space
#17 - 2013-07-12 16:10:50 UTC
Its not that I get stuck on stuff (well it is) its that my ship is flipping full re tard. and keeps trying to hug the object.

[u]Can't wait untill when Eve online is Freemium.[/u] WiS only 10$, SP booster for one month 15$, DPS Boost 2$, EHP Boost 2$ Real money trading hub! Cosmeitic ship skins 15$ --> If you don't [u]pay **[/u]for a product, you ARE the [u]**product[/u].

Verunae Caseti
Viziam
Amarr Empire
#18 - 2013-07-12 16:45:40 UTC  |  Edited by: Verunae Caseti
Johan Toralen wrote:
I made a picture not long ago demonstrating what's wrong with Eve's colission. It's because of single convex colission hulls. Probably was a decent enough technical solution 10 years ago but not anymore. Separating the colission models at least into some parts shouldn't be that much more expensive on the hardware. It's not like Eve is a game with thousands of props sitting around in the environment like some other games.

http://i.imgur.com/7vzXngA.jpg



Hey, neat picture, but it grossly oversimplifies the fix.

The red collision box is ugly, yes, but guess what is missing from your picture? Spawning that item takes 1 call with 1 coordinate location to spawn the object. spaw(gurista_com_tower,x,y,z);

Your green collision boxes now require five (5) objects to be placed in space in VERY specific positions relative to one another which the object spawning system is probably not prepared to do out of the box.

So you're either looking at rewriting the code to spawn objects, adding a rather complex parent/child object relationship such that certain objects can be spawned in positions relative to a parent object or reference point, or manually updating every script that spawns that object and calculating offsets precisely understanding that any mistake will result in that object spawning improperly.
Ace Uoweme
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#19 - 2013-07-12 16:57:08 UTC
Kult Altol wrote:
Its not that I get stuck on stuff (well it is) its that my ship is flipping full re tard. and keeps trying to hug the object.


It gets stuck on the objects, as the object box is so huge in itself.

It's the same problem seen in Battlefield and it's objects (1.0 size, when 0.5 would do). Bump and snag on objects despite clearly not even near them. Shoot through that box, get suicided, too (which then players glitch to use it to fire through and not get shot themselves). Roll

_"In a world of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act." _ ~George Orwell
Milan Nantucket
Doomheim
#20 - 2013-07-12 17:03:09 UTC
Multor Kaston wrote:
Tron 3K -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reading_comprehension
You win at sucking at that^. Being discussed is the collision detection itself, not how to work around it. At that, your suggestion isn't full-proof, as mission objects can be 30km in diameter yet it will say 0km distance from the object no matter where you're at.

Whitehound -
What do you mean?


You win at not reading the your own link above. Full-Proof is non-existant meaning in order for someone to comprehend what your typing then learn how to spell.

Maybe fool proof... or dumby proof or idiot proof.
http://oxforddictionaries.com/words/spelling
123Next page