Fire Rate On Semi-Autos Is Still Meaningless [Even In U10]

[Volt_Cruelerz]

As we all know, frame rate can affect RoF. But how bad, I don't think people understand.

It appears as though rate of fire is a meaningful statistic on automatic weapons. This is not the case for semi's. You see, every time you click, the game has to process that click. Now, if it's an automatic weapon, the game appears to just check every so often to make sure you're still holding LMB. If it's not though, the click gets processed... extensively apparently.

Here are a few relevant things about my computer. It's not the best out there, but it's by no means a bad machine and during all tests appeared to my eyes to be running at 60 FPS.

CPU: i7-2630QM @ 2.00 GHz (8 CPUs), ~2.0 GHz
GPU: NVidia GeForce GT 540M
RAM: 8 GB
Resolution: 1920 x 1080 (I play on an external monitor hooked up to my 1600x900 laptop)

If I play at max graphics and am firing my weapon away with a macro (I used both a custom autohotkey script and my Anansi's macro builder because of how surprised I was at the results, but they are in agreement), the Burston (unmodded) takes 10.1 seconds to unload, meaning a fire rate of 1.48, a fraction of the advertised 3.3 bursts/second (yes, for those of you who do not know, burst weapons have their rate listed as the number of bursts per second, not the number of bullets per second). Likewise with a Latron, I get a rate of 2.83, hardly the 4.2 I should be getting. Go to Akbolto where I get 6.8 out of the supposed 10. And the list goes on.

Now let's say I drop my computer to minimum graphics (all things turned off and res at 800x600). Aside from making everything horrible looking, the resolution will cause DPS to rise noticeably, in my case, taking that 1.5 rate Burston and making it a 2 rate Burston.

Fast Trigger isn't immune to this bug/oversight either. Rather than be the 60% boost it is supposed to be, it only boosts the rate (on max graphics again) from 1.48 to 1.75. Unfortunately however, 1.48*1.6 is 2.368, meaning you get less mileage, not just out of the gun by itself, but also the mod.

A lot of weapons are balanced by the numbers (Burston ought to deal only 8.7% less damage than the Braton for instance), but because of this problem, fail utterly to be remotely so.

This must be addressed ASAP, there is simply no way around it, else full-automatic weapons will completely dominate as they are not afflicted by this problem.

EDIT: also for anyone that wants to test independently to find the performance of their own machine, the link above goes to a download for the compiled script. Once running (should pop up in the sys tray), press the + on the numberpad to turn it on and the - on the numpad to deactivate it. Enter on the numpad will cause the script to exit. While active, holding down the mouse will result in spam clicks from the script. WARNING: can make navigating the UI difficult while running, even if deactivated. Source is available here.

EDIT 2: after update 8.13, there were some optimizations performed. I am now capable using my default settings of 2.3 bursts/second. This just further verifies that this is an issue.

EDIT 3: after update 9.1.3, I did more testing. With my standard settings (all things turned off and resolution at 1920x1080), I could unload the rate 5 Burston in 7 seconds. When I dropped the resolution to 800x600, I could unload it in 5.4 seconds. This translates into a rate of 2.14 and a rate of 2.778. In other words, this is still less than what the Burston was originally supposed to be.

EDIT 4: Speed Trigger with minimum settings while zoomed in at the floor, I was able to dump a Burston magazine in 4.8 seconds. Which means that despite a supposed 8 fire rate, I was actually getting a mere 3.125 rate, still less than what the previous supposed base rate is.

 

EDIT 5 [update 10 Multi-threading]: with 1920x1080, and my trusty Burston with just a maxed Speed Trigger mod with a few settings on, I emptied into the floor in around 4.4.  With everything on minimum, it is still around 4.4.  When firing off into the distance with those settings back on, it was around 5.3 seconds.  This corresponds to a rate of 3.4 and 2.8.  With Shred as well (and minimum settings into the floor) it took around 4.2 seconds which is a fire rate of 3.6.  As you can see, this is a significant improvement, but only further verifies the issues with fire rate.

Edited September 14, 2013 by Volt_Cruelerz

[Worira]

If DE doesn't want to do the simple thing and simply convert all weapons to fire at the max rate while the mouse button is held down, the next best thing would be to implement buffering of mouse inputs for semiautomatic weapons, similar to how melee works.

[[DE]Steve]

Yes, those stats are misleading for semi-auto. They are sanity caps for macroing. We actually do a bit of buffering of mouse inputs for semi-auto.

[Volt_Cruelerz]

Yes, those stats are misleading for semi-auto. They are sanity caps for macroing. We actually do a bit of buffering of mouse inputs for semi-auto.

 

But even if they're just there to prevent people from binding fire to the scroll wheel or making a macro, that doesn't explain why framerate has such a huge impact on RoF.  Or am I missing something here?

Edited June 4, 2013 by Volt_Cruelerz

[Caliocerion]

Akboltos have a faster fire rate than Boltors, I should be able to fire stock akboltos faster than a stock boltor if I spam the button.

[Volt_Cruelerz]

Akboltos have a faster fire rate than Boltors, I should be able to fire stock akboltos faster than a stock boltor if I spam the button.

But more than likely you won't be able to because of frame rate unless you have some beast of a machine.

[UncommonUnicorn]

Get a Lex.

Fire it without gunslinger.

Put gunslinger on it.

Fire it again.

 

It definitely helps.

Going from 1.1 to ~1.6 is quite a big thing with Lex.

[Volt_Cruelerz]

Get a Lex.

Fire it without gunslinger.

Put gunslinger on it.

Fire it again.

 

It definitely helps.

Going from 1.1 to ~1.6 is quite a big thing with Lex.

I'm not saying that the rate mods don't help, I'm saying that things don't work as advertised by a huge margin because of how absurdly sensitive they are to frame rate.

[UncommonUnicorn]

I'm saying that it is a huge margin in case of Lex.

[Volt_Cruelerz]

On your computer :P

 

There is a ton of variability from one computer to the next in performance of these weapons which should not be the case.

[Meltina]

Yes, those stats are misleading for semi-auto. They are sanity caps for macroing. We actually do a bit of buffering of mouse inputs for semi-auto.

Is that why some weapons you can fire faster by timing your clicks than spamming?

 

I'm guessing the buffering slows you down before the cap actualy stops you from firing. So there is a sweet spot you are firing just faster than the buffered fire rate but slow enough not to buffer your shots.

[elindred]

Nice work on the testing. +1 for the quality post.

[ClarkGriswold]

Something needs to change for these semi outos.

I get a cramp in my finger when I'm going to town with my Akboltos.

[1un4cy]

It's quite true, I'm trying to fire my akbolto with some lag and I'm only getting about 2-3 shots per second.  Once ALL the lag clears up I can get up near 8 shots a second.

[Tombei]

I have crappy computer Pentium Dual Core 3.2, 3GB RAM, HD4650 my FPS drops a lot here and there and i can clearly see and feel my Rate of Fire in any weapon slowed down when the action is on. Melee too gets slowed down.

[Volt_Cruelerz]

Is that why some weapons you can fire faster by timing your clicks than spamming?

 

I'm guessing the buffering slows you down before the cap actualy stops you from firing. So there is a sweet spot you are firing just faster than the buffered fire rate but slow enough not to buffer your shots.

Doesn't look that way.  I created another macro which tested for the Burston's max rate of fire with an extra few ms thrown in here and there.  It did not speed up the firing rate at all.

[Fleischkloppa]

My Latron fires much faster with speed trigger than without, so I dont get your point.You just need to klick faster.

[Volt_Cruelerz]

My Latron fires much faster with speed trigger than without, so I dont get your point.You just need to klick faster.

If this is your response, you have completely missed the point of the OP and completely misunderstood what I said.  Speed trigger does help things, of course it does, but you won't get +60% on a semi-automatic unless you've got a really nice computer.  It just doesn't happen.  Semi-automatic rate of fire is heavily affected by framerate.  Sure, you'll get a boost: in my case, I get an 18% increase at max rank which you can definitely feel, but that is not the advertised +60% which is my point.  Frame rate drags it down stupidly.  Heck, the two shouldn't even be connected!

 

Also, if you think I need to click faster, you must not know what a macro is.  It's a program that performs a task automatically.  In this case, that task was clicking every millisecond.  You can't click faster than that which shows that it's a game problem, not a me problem.

[LazyKnight]

It seems to me they should just make all weapons have auto fire and balance the fire rate and reload times. I am not sure this is something they can fix easily without doing this. This looks like a technical problem  that makes this game to sensitive to this Frame rate issue . If I am wrong ignore me.

Edited June 5, 2013 by LazyKnight

[Toom1275]

It's always a big difference when I get to use my Brother's computer instead of mine to play Warframe. It's hard to get used to the fact that the fire rate of my weapons is supposed to be so good. With the dual ethers, when we're both in one session, when I spam the melee button to swing them as fast as possible, on his machine, it looks like I swing once and resheath. Both melee and semiauto weapons are still heavily hobbled by less-than-perfect FPS. I'd understand if it were limited to one shot per frame, or something, but it doesn't do that.

[Volt_Cruelerz]

It seems to me they should just make all weapons have auto fire and balance the fire rate and reload times. I am not sure this is something they can fix easily without doing this. This looks like a technical problem  that makes this game to sensitive to this Frame rate issue . If I am wrong ignore me.

That would be one heck of a bandaid fix, but yes, it would help things.  I'd much rather they just separated the systems.  Maybe they need to make input a unique thread?  They said they were working on performance and currently working on threading the host code IIRC, so maybe this code could be the next stop?  The game just doesn't perform as advertised for so many users and that's a dreadful problem that really needs to be addressed.  We've known for a while that having frame rate drops (such as when everything around you is exploding) reduces RoF, but just how much lower than advertised while having no perceptible lag at all the fire rate of weapons can be is atrocious and really needs to be fixed ASAP.

[Fleischkloppa]

If this is your response, you have completely missed the point of the OP and completely misunderstood what I said.  Speed trigger does help things, of course it does, but you won't get +60% on a semi-automatic unless you've got a really nice computer.  It just doesn't happen.  Semi-automatic rate of fire is heavily affected by framerate.  Sure, you'll get a boost: in my case, I get an 18% increase at max rank which you can definitely feel, but that is not the advertised +60% which is my point.  Frame rate drags it down stupidly.  Heck, the two shouldn't even be connected!

 

Also, if you think I need to click faster, you must not know what a macro is.  It's a program that performs a task automatically.  In this case, that task was clicking every millisecond.  You can't click faster than that which shows that it's a game problem, not a me problem.

 

 

Thanks for explaining.Well, I guess if that´s true, this needs to be reworked.

Although from the feel of it, , my Latron seems to be firing 50% faster when speed trigger says it fires 50% faster.

[Doremonhg]

Get a Lex.

Fire it without gunslinger.

Put gunslinger on it.

Fire it again.

 

It definitely helps.

Going from 1.1 to ~1.6 is quite a big thing with Lex.

Last time i checked, Gunslinger is 72% speed. Take that with 1.1, you got around 1.9 fire rate.

[Caliocerion]

Thanks for explaining.Well, I guess if that´s true, this needs to be reworked.

Although from the feel of it, , my Latron seems to be firing 50% faster when speed trigger says it fires 50% faster.

Your Latron is a slow weapon, if you tried that on Aklatos or Akboltos, then you would get less than satisfactory results.

[FullSupport]

The burston was a horrible example for this experiment, I'll quote myself from another thread:

 

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Burston's displayed fire rate is indeed mistaken.

I have taken data of my own and found out the following:

 

Recording with fraps at 60 fps, emptying the clip with perfect timing (macro assisted):

 

It takes ~6.8 seconds to completely empty the burston. That's 45 shots / 6.8 seconds = actual fire rate ~6.6

 

With a max fire rate mod:

It takes ~5.3 seconds to to completely empty the burston. That's 45 shots / 5.3 seconds = actual fire rate ~8.5

this isn't even a 60% fire rate increase like the mod claims to be, likely because of burst firing.

 

Out of curiosity, the braton is indeed roughly 11.3 shots per second, meaning burston falls extremely short in damage.

20*11.3 = 226 compared to 21*6.6 = 138.6

This means that burston would need to do about 34 damage per shot to be close to the braton. (62% damage increase or a 72% increase in fire rate.)

 

Additional data:

Burst delay is about 0.35 seconds, 0.25 seconds with max fire rate mod.

A burst takes 0.1 seconds to fire with and without max fire rate mod.

 

All these values were taken using sony vegas.

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It's not only about fps but about semi-autos in general.

In fact I have recently tried out akbolto and it doesn't even reach the advertized fire rate, however it does reach about 10 shots per second with max gunslinger.