One of my squadmates has sent me a very short film on a strange incidence he noticed.
At first look, I saw nothing out of ordinary - minor lag incidence as seen in any server, any game...
However, as I examined it more carefully, I met a need to explain this phenomenon more carefully, and I found out with my limited knowledge on how net lag works, this was something I could not explain.
The situation transpired in a H2H room.
As explained by my squad mate Boro, he was in an auto climb. Examining the P-38 nearby, I notice the two planes have roughly the same climb rates, and is in same speed, which leads to the conclusion that the P-38 nearby is also in auto climb.
Then, as the film progresses, the other P-38 initiates a number of warps and jumps forward.
......
Now, in my understanding, warps caused by lags, is due to disparity in updating the plane location in one's FE. For instance, if a faster plane is behind me, and a lag occurs, the location of the plane behind me is not updated on my FE. But the other FE of that faster plane still calculates the position travelled, and as soon as the lag is over, the 'new' location is updated to the correct place. Thus, the 'warp'.
A common instance is seeing a fast travelling plane warp around in certain intervals. However, when a keen eye looks upon the enemy plane and has any rough estimate on its speed, it can be confirmed that despite the lag, the new update positions - aka 'warp' - does not differ from how one expects it to be. For instance, if someone sees a plane travelling straight going into lag, it warps in several intervals and it can be seen that with each warp the plane is 'moving along the path'.
When lags occur during wild maneuvering contests, the enemy seems to move all around you, but it can be explained that this is due to the fact that on his FE, he was maneuvering into a wide variety of positions, and with each lagged update, he zips around like a mouse. However, even in this case, one can notice the enemy is not far from you. For example, if two Zeroes are in a hot dogfight, and one goes into lag, after the update, his 'bearing' maybe totally different, but his 'distance' is within a range that can be explained.
......
That is roughly my understanding on lags and warps.
However, in this film, is a case I've never thought about - what would happen when a plane behind you, same in speed, moving in same direction, meets a lag??
Lag and warp, new 'update' there may be, but the physics of the two moving planes, plus my understanding on lags and warps, would suggest that if some plane slower than you moving in the same direction as you meets a lag, when its position is newly calculated, he would still be behind you.
For instance, two planes moving in the same speed, plane 'B' 500 yards distance behind plane 'A'. When 'B' meets a lag, on A's FE he would see 'B' falling behind, with the distance growing larger, and then 'B' would suddenly warp back to 500 yards.
...
In the film, the two P-38s have roughly the same heading, both engaged in auto-climb. All through the lag, New's P-38L retains 183mph speed, and so does Boro's P-38 - exactly stable at 183. However, New's P-38 warps in about 400 yard intervals continuously, and sets apart the distance and jumps forward, when he is still at 183 mph stabilized speed.
......
Does this not suggest that New's P-38 FE, somehow has calculated more travel distance in a certain interval when he is in the same speed as Boro's P-38?
What could be the explanation for this? To put a bit more background info on this situation, Boro's has clearly stated that his P-38 was already in the air, and New's P-38 just took off from a field. After take off(and probably engaged in auto-climb), Boro states that the P-38 continuously warped in small intervals. He thought this was strange, and by the time he started filming it, New's P-38 pushed, literally jumped forward, leaving Boro's 38 in the dust.
When two planes are moving at the same speed, same direction and same pitch angle, but one side's FE calculates that he has travelled more distance than the other.. what could be the reason?
The only explanations I can seem to think of, is that it was Boro who was in fact getting lag, and not only lag, but his entire information concerning calculated travelled distance got dumped and was not updated. So relatively, that would make New's P-38 move more distance despite same heading, pitch and speed.
However, Boro also states 'New' was the only guy he saw was warping around. If Boro was the one getting lag, and lag big enough for certain packets of info to get totally lost, every plane should have looked like warping around him.
The only other explanation, is an unpleasant one.
This 'New' guy's FE is calculating travelled distance separately from the current speed of his aircraft.
...
I would be interested what some of you people who have much more expert experiences in net coding and management, think.
Film attached below:
