WotLK graphics changes

[LavCat]

Anyone else experiencing lower frame rates since the last patch? In a recent AV I was getting about 15 FPS. I have a Radeon 3870 and was getting reasonable frame rates previously.

Any other information on WotLK graphics changes would be welcome.

[Chesspiece_face]

Anyone else experiencing lower frame rates since the last patch? In a recent AV I was getting about 15 FPS. I have a Radeon 3870 and was getting reasonable frame rates previously.

Any other information on WotLK graphics changes would be welcome.

Yes. Frame rates have gone down for me as well. It also is taking forever to render characters when i land in a flight point/hearth stone/ or mount up.

The minimum and recommended requirements for WotLK are bumped up a bit and it appears that those requirements are a part of the patch not just the expansion. I don't think that the additional requirements are totally to blame for the frame rate issues. I think there are still some things that need to be ironed out with the changes made in the patch.

[Concillian]

dynamic shadows, eveen if they are just one tick higher than minimum seems to have a very significant impact on performance. Make sure this isn't changed unless you have a pretty significant video card.

I still use my A64 dual core (2.2 GHz) and 7800GT on my WoW machine and one tick of dynamic shadows was reasonably playable for solo stuff, but rates were in the realm of totally unplayably bad in Hyjal, even when I was healing with my back to everyone staring at the walls. I had to turn dynamic shadows fully down mid-raid during the first few trash waves.

On my newer machine (Core 2 Duo at 3+ GHz + ATi HD4850 + 4GB in Vista, still on the bench right now) running 1280x1024 with full dynamic shadows and 4xAA / 16xAF I would still see rates below 30 at times in Shatt. So it requires quite substantial hardware to run full quality options.

[Frag]

At least for my immersion enjoyment, the full shadows aren't even worth it. They only draw in a very small area and thus as I run are being rendered before my eyes, which I find rather annoying. This is with everything completely maxed. Still not seeing any fps below 60, so I'm not certain what's different as my configuration is very similar to Conc's, with the exception being two extra cores that WoW doesn't use.

YMMV,
~FragB)

[Concillian]

At least for my immersion enjoyment, the full shadows aren't even worth it. They only draw in a very small area and thus as I run are being rendered before my eyes, which I find rather annoying. This is with everything completely maxed. Still not seeing any fps below 60, so I'm not certain what's different as my configuration is very similar to Conc's, with the exception being two extra cores that WoW doesn't use.

YMMV,
~FragB)

Maybe 4xAA vs. none? I think I may have run some of the MSAA options in the CCC. I dunno I only checked for a little while. I

converted that machine for the server so I could update the OS hard drives in that machine. That's done and I swapped back, and just barely got Vista back on that machine, so still need to make the machine livable as an everyday machine, which means learning a lot about how to "deal with" (a.k.a. turn off) the Fisher Price Vista features and navigate through things quickly.

Luckily it seems that Vista still uses all the same keyboard shortcuts (like <win>-E and <ctrl> + <shift> + <esc>, so I don't have to totally re-learn the interface, just the start menu (I'm so used to just doing things like <ctrl>+<esc> <P>rograms <G>ames <W>ow to launch things, and that doesn't seem to work similarly in Vista.)

I haven't checked, but hopefully it doesn't take me 4 mouse cllicks to unmount my freaking USB drive in Vista. I always find that a major annoyance in Win2k / XP compared to one command in Ubuntu.

[RTM]

Draw distance was bumped up as well. This will have a pretty big impact in places like Terokkar with lots of dense trees.

[Concillian]

Draw distance was bumped up as well. This will have a pretty big impact in places like Terokkar with lots of dense trees.

For some reason, Terokkar doesn't give me problems. I have the worst solo frame rates if I stand near the Shatt flightmaster, a little towards A'dal and look in the general direction of the pack of guards doing drills. This is where I go to test frame rate because it's where I repeatedly get the worst performance (outside of Hyjal)

[NuurAbSaal]

The patch more or less "broke" WoW for me. Playing on a rather vintage 1.6GHz G5 with the standard graphics card (GeForce FX 5200, with a whopping 64MB RAM) my frame rates have always been low. Like, really low. Below 10fps. Places like #$%&rath (sorry...) are at or below 1fps. With all settings on lowest of course.

Raiding was possible, I maintanked everything from the first Giant pack in MC to Teron Gorefiend, mostly by doggedly keeping my rotations up 1 sec behind actual game events. Apart from the occasional death because Shield Wall or Last Stand didn't fire when I needed them, it worked. It wasn't "fun", but it worked.

Now I get freezes. I was designated Flame Tank for our first Illidan attempt (w00t, two kills so far, thank you patch!) but I bailed on that after I could barely see what was happening at Supremus. So the patch effectively robbed me of the chance to see one of the coolest events in the game. /murloc

Hmm, was there a point to my post? Oh yeah, graphics are definitely bufffed and definitely affect my frame rate.:o

/end whine

take care
Tarabulus

[Delc]

At least for my immersion enjoyment, the full shadows aren't even worth it.

If you get a chance try to get to Felmyst with the new shadows turned on. Seeing the shadow of a bone dragon on the ground as she flys over is really pretty cool.

[Concillian]

(GeForce FX 5200)

I shudder just seeing the name of this card in any context at all with the word gaming. This was the worst budget card in the history of gaming. previous gen 4200 was faster. The whole 5 series was pretty much a flop for nVidia.

But realistically, we're talking about 5 year old hardware and a new release. These are not things you'd really expect to match well together.

[Mavfin]

The patch more or less "broke" WoW for me. Playing on a rather vintage 1.6GHz G5 with the standard graphics card (GeForce FX 5200, with a whopping 64MB RAM) my frame rates have always been low. Like, really low. Below 10fps. Places like #$%&rath (sorry...) are at or below 1fps. With all settings on lowest of course.

Raiding was possible, I maintanked everything from the first Giant pack in MC to Teron Gorefiend, mostly by doggedly keeping my rotations up 1 sec behind actual game events. Apart from the occasional death because Shield Wall or Last Stand didn't fire when I needed them, it worked. It wasn't "fun", but it worked.

Now I get freezes. I was designated Flame Tank for our first Illidan attempt (w00t, two kills so far, thank you patch!) but I bailed on that after I could barely see what was happening at Supremus. So the patch effectively robbed me of the chance to see one of the coolest events in the game. /murloc

Hmm, was there a point to my post? Oh yeah, graphics are definitely bufffed and definitely affect my frame rate.:o

/end whine

take care
Tarabulus

Interesting. I'm running on a G4, not a 5, and I'm running fine after patch. 2 GB RAM, dual 1.2 G4, but I have upgraded the vid to a 9800 Pro 128 MB. I average 40 fps, which may sound low for the PC users, but it's smooth as can be on a Mac. Weird that your G5 is running that badly when my G4 is fine...

I am running 10.5.5, and it did help when I replaced 10.3.9....

But realistically, we're talking about 5 year old hardware and a new release. These are not things you'd really expect to match well together.

I have a feeling it's the card, not the rest of the box. I've got an upgraded vid, and my 6 year old system a model older than his runs fine...

[NuurAbSaal]

Well, I had an Ati Radeon 9800 Pro Special Edition with 256MB Ram in the same G5 and the game didn't really run any smoother, maybe 5 fps more on average (guesstimate). Not sure what clogs the inner workings of my comp but I suspect the processor is just some silly gnome doing calculations in his head. There IS the +intellect racial, but it's just not enough. Running the cursor over the Dock icons gets me to 50% CPU usage, according to Activity Monitor. WTF? :o

@ Conc: I'm well aware that I'm sitting on an old heap of junk, but it worked until now, and the upgrade made it go south. A new iMac should be incoming soonish, if I can scrounge the credits.

Of late there is some weird stuff going on on my comp, graphics glitches and freezes in WoW (as mentioned), movies not playing in VLC (with the comforting error message "blablabla computer too slow??", hehe?) and sound-in just stopping to work after a seemingly random amount of seconds have passed. So no TS fun, listen only is not really my kind of thing, as I am rather vocal:P.

In related news, my guildies decided to take me as a liability to Illidan so I get a chance at the shield, the only item I really "want" before WotLK hits. It's just a really cool and fitting piece of gear for a protection warrior for life™.

take care
Tarabulus

P.S.: Also running 10.5.5

[Concillian]

I'm not a mac person, but for what it's worth, I saw a really huge improvement with a dual core CPU. Even one of the worst current performing dual cores (A64x2 @ 2GHz) was a significant upgrade from a faster single core in terms of WoW performance. CPU seemed to be binding me a lot more than I thought in TBC.

Mostly CPU binds cities and general instance performance, while graphics binds the anime explosion of blindingly annoying color we have on raid bosses as Blizzard went way overboard on spell effects. It's really annoying because you need spell detail high to see some boss effects, but then you can't see what the bosses are actually doing thanks to the laser light show player effect cause. And you can't turn down player effects, but leave boss effects high. All or nothing.

[Mavfin]

I'm not a mac person, but for what it's worth, I saw a really huge improvement with a dual core CPU. Even one of the worst current performing dual cores (A64x2 @ 2GHz) was a significant upgrade from a faster single core in terms of WoW performance. CPU seemed to be binding me a lot more than I thought in TBC.

Mostly CPU binds cities and general instance performance, while graphics binds the anime explosion of blindingly annoying color we have on raid bosses as Blizzard went way overboard on spell effects. It's really annoying because you need spell detail high to see some boss effects, but then you can't see what the bosses are actually doing thanks to the laser light show player effect cause. And you can't turn down player effects, but leave boss effects high. All or nothing.

Yeah, I suspect that. I suspect that one of my cores is doing video, and the other is doing 'game', which makes my 2 G4s better than his 1 G5.

[NuurAbSaal]

which makes my 2 G4s better than his 1 G5.

I find this extremely evil! I shake my fist in anger at you! Clearly it's all your fault!

;)

From experience I can back up Conc's assumption, cities and instances (especially BT and of course MH) are worst. Hopefully the cash for a new iMac will be quick in the coming.

take care
Tarabulus

P.S.: He didn't drop the Bulwark of course...

[Mavfin]

I find this extremely evil! I shake my fist in anger at you! Clearly it's all your fault!

;)

From experience I can back up Conc's assumption, cities and instances (especially BT and of course MH) are worst. Hopefully the cash for a new iMac will be quick in the coming.

take care
Tarabulus

P.S.: He didn't drop the Bulwark of course...

FWIW, I have settings turned way up to where stuff looks great out in the world and in instances, and framerates are good out there. In the cities, the CPU holds me up a little because of all the people, and I get some choppiness when I turn, for example, but, it's smooth otherwise. I'm ok with that. If I BGed a lot, I might have to back settings off for those, too.

[Concillian]

From experience I can back up Conc's assumption, cities and instances (especially BT and of course MH)

MH is the worst. You have 25 people, hoards of opponent NPCs and since that's not enough, you have craploads off friendly NPCs too. Add in all the AoE and associated spell effects and it's a complete recipe for buckling systems that perform adequately in literally every other location in the game.

It's a fun place, but overall not particularly good game design to have such a performance delta between encounters.

[Kevin]

MH is the worst. You have 25 people, hoards of opponent NPCs and since that's not enough, you have craploads off friendly NPCs too. Add in all the AoE and associated spell effects and it's a complete recipe for buckling systems that perform adequately in literally every other location in the game.

It's a fun place, but overall not particularly good game design to have such a performance delta between encounters.

See I'm trying to figure out why SSC had the worst framerates of any instance for me (this was pre 3.02 since I haven't raided in 3.0). MH was no worse than being out in the world for me most of the time, but SSC was typically a 2-4 FPS zone. Most other places were 15-20, 5 mans were usually in the 30+ area. But it still felt like and FPS does at 60+ with the exception of SSC. My guess is something with the water, but SSC was teh suck for FPS most of the time.

[Mavfin]

See I'm trying to figure out why SSC had the worst framerates of any instance for me (this was pre 3.02 since I haven't raided in 3.0). MH was no worse than being out in the world for me most of the time, but SSC was typically a 2-4 FPS zone. Most other places were 15-20, 5 mans were usually in the 30+ area. But it still felt like and FPS does at 60+ with the exception of SSC. My guess is something with the water, but SSC was teh suck for FPS most of the time.

Interesting. Just like 40-man days when people talked about BWL sucking for frames, the mac doesn't really change any. The only thing I had to turn down vid for in BWL was the AoE in front of the throne. Same with raiding in BC. Simply didn't change much between world/instance/raid. Only slowdown is in the cities with lots of people, so it's CPU holding up a bit in cities.