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709
¡Damned!
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Purgatory
 
2013-12-21, 00:14

Still a few glitches in 1.7 to iron out. Apparently, fences drop frame rates like they're hot, and ~50,000 of them in one spot (my park) makes a black hole where all frames per second will be sucked in. So, some tests were done to calculate FPS with different blocks.

The idea honestly hurt me. I took the time to place every single one of those fucking fences while straddling what felt like the short edge of a sheet of paper, and if my idea for an old-school wooden rollercoaster is not going to work, what could the majicks gods do that would fix that?



Well, you'd be surprised:



Given, not the initial plan, but fuck if the glass isn't nice. I only wish I would've thought of it first.

So it goes.

Last edited by 709 : 2013-12-21 at 00:33.
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kscherer
Which way is up?
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Boyzeee
 
2013-12-21, 00:46

Nice. Now get some rail on that beast so's we's can take her for a spin.

P.S. I want your powers!
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Brad
Selfish Heathen
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Zone of Pain
 
2013-12-21, 02:02

Quote:
Originally Posted by 709 View Post
Still a few glitches in 1.7 to iron out. Apparently, fences drop frame rates like they're hot, and ~50,000 of them in one spot (my park) makes a black hole where all frames per second will be sucked in. So, some tests were done to calculate FPS with different blocks.
FWIW, this isn't a 1.7 issue, and I don't think 1.7 made it any worse. The park had been gradually chipping away at my FPS for months while I was working next door on the white house. I just didn't want to say anything because I knew...

Quote:
Originally Posted by 709 View Post
The idea honestly hurt me.
...that this would be the result.

I'm glad you're cool with the shiny new glass look, though! It's still not smooooth for me, but performance is at least better than when it was all fences. Hopefully it's a little better for others who, like me, are also playing on a few years old hardware.

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709
¡Damned!
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Purgatory
 
2013-12-21, 09:56

Huh. I wonder if it's just a fence problem then, since there's still plenty of the nether version making up the ferris wheel.

It can't be a "big build" thing, otherwise those people who rebuild entire areas (the Game of Thrones community build comes to mind) would just be in pain all the time. Maybe they ban certain blocks?

So it goes.
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RowdyScot
Ice Arrow Sniper
 
Join Date: Apr 2005
Location: Great Bay Temple
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2013-12-21, 12:05

I may be an awful human for suggesting this, but would it be worth checking to see how stained glass would look? It looks awesome with the clear glass, but I'm wondering if it may look closer to the original intended design with brown stained glass or something like that. Just pondering.

Authentic Nova Scotia bagpipe innards
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drewprops
Space Pirate
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Atlanta
 
2013-12-21, 12:11

How about a mural of a topless Jennifer Aniston?
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Brad
Selfish Heathen
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Zone of Pain
 
2013-12-21, 13:18

Quote:
Originally Posted by 709 View Post
Huh. I wonder if it's just a fence problem then, since there's still plenty of the nether version making up the ferris wheel.
I described the following as a likely possibility in-game last night, but I did a little more searching just now to verify that, yes, this is probably simply an issue with the fences having more to render. Blocks have touching faces and backfaces (normals pointed away from you, or the "backs" of the object) that the software culls from the render. (Backface culling is a common, fast, standard thing you do in any 3D rendering software.) Two side-by-side stone blocks do not render the two faces adjoining them on their touching side, but they do render the faces that are visible to you. Fences have a lot more faces to render and many of those faces are still visible (not culled) when touching another block.

https://twitter.com/Vechs/status/243055162376192000
Quote:
@Vechs

16x16x256 chunk of: Stone=250 FPS. Fence=20 FPS. Iron Bars=110 FPS.

Confirmed: Fences destroy your performance.

11:37 AM - 4 Sep 12

I found that I'm not the first to point out this issue, and one redditor (in response to Vechs' tweet) had generated the following images a year ago to further illustrate:




These are massive blocks of stone, fence, and iron bars. To get the second image, he issued a command to render faces with only polygon edges. This shows how much is actually being rendered.

See how the block of opaque solids has all but the front and side faces culled? That's because their geometry is ridiculously simple and all the interior touching faces and backfaces go away. The block of fences is not nearly so lucky because a significantly larger proportion of faces cannot be culled. The iron bars are also bad for the same reason but not as bad because an iron bars block has fewer faces to start with.

This is why when we tested last night, replacing with opaque solid blocks (cobblestone) doubled the frame rate for me and Elysium; our GPUs had less to work and could render more frames per second.

Quote:
Originally Posted by 709 View Post
It can't be a "big build" thing, otherwise those people who rebuild entire areas (the Game of Thrones community build comes to mind) would just be in pain all the time. Maybe they ban certain blocks?
There are a couple of things here. First, these builds probably aren't made up largely of high-poly blocks like the fence. Second, some of the youtubers who work on and record those "big builds" in Minecraft do so either professionally (Yogscast makes enough YouTube ad money to employ a staff of a dozen people, for example) or are already serious gaming enthusiasts. They almost certainly have beefy hardware and expensive GPUs in their rigs to allow them a lot more leeway. If my GPU was better than a mid-range one from three years ago, I also probably wouldn't notice the frame drop. It would still happen, but I'd be cruising so high over 60 FPS that it wouldn't be visible.

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billybobsky
BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope.
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Inner Swabia. If you have to ask twice, don't.
 
2013-12-21, 14:28

Yes it is obvious that increasing the number of faces needing to be rendered has long been a problem. Remember the signs and the incumbent frame rate drop with the BP mob farm v3 or was it v4... Same problem, just far far worse...
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Brad
Selfish Heathen
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Zone of Pain
 
2013-12-21, 14:54

This talk about performance makes me think that I need to go and wipe out my underground tunnel mines which use this basic design:



Now that I think of it, that technique exposes a lot of faces when you have a lot of long branches (which I do).

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709
¡Damned!
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Purgatory
 
2013-12-21, 16:35

!!!

Um… I have a ton of those below my house. Maybe that's part of the problem as well?
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turtle
Lord of the Rant.
Formerly turtle2472
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Upstate South Carolina
 
2013-12-21, 17:06

Hey, my "clear crop" mining style is paying off for me then. I just take everything out then I mine. Not fast, but better for my system it seems.
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RowdyScot
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2013-12-21, 22:55

You posted a Vetches tweet! <3 Vetches (mostly for his evil in his map creation). The amount of things I've learned about the mechanics of the game from watching both him and several of the FTB crew play is enormous.

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turtle
Lord of the Rant.
Formerly turtle2472
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Upstate South Carolina
 
2013-12-22, 12:23

So on the note of things rendering and killing the GPU, what about things that aren't visible? Like my chicken coop. What if I move it blow ground (which I'm already going to do) so it's not visible at all? Would those be part of the GPU workload since they are not visible.

Same applies for fence behind stone, etc.

Louis L'Amour, “To make democracy work, we must be a nation of participants, not simply observers. One who does not vote has no right to complain.”
Visit our archived Minecraft world! | Maybe someday I'll proof read, until then deal with it.
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billybobsky
BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope.
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Inner Swabia. If you have to ask twice, don't.
 
2013-12-22, 12:26

No turtle... Unfortuately, minecraft renders all front faces, which means merely moving things behind blocks or underground does nothing for performance.
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turtle
Lord of the Rant.
Formerly turtle2472
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Upstate South Carolina
 
2013-12-22, 12:29

Ok, I get the picture now. The stone blocks "meld into one block" where the other stuff doesn't. Makes sense to me now. Thanks.
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billybobsky
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2013-12-22, 15:11

Quote:
Originally Posted by turtle View Post
Ok, I get the picture now. The stone blocks "meld into one block" where the other stuff doesn't. Makes sense to me now. Thanks.
It's not block type specific though -- basically anything that is next to an air block and in your line of sight whether behind a block or not is rendered. This is why if you do use an x-ray texture that you can see mobs and tunnels below ground. This has nothing to do with the texture pack, the same mobs and tunnels are being rendered with a normal texture pack, it's just that you cannot see them.
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turtle
Lord of the Rant.
Formerly turtle2472
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Upstate South Carolina
 
2013-12-22, 15:22

Even better explanation, thanks. I got it now.
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kscherer
Which way is up?
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Boyzeee
 
2013-12-23, 10:45

That makes sense. Sometimes, the near-surfaces don't all render in, and you can "see through them" into the depths. I always wondered why I could see lava and caverns deep below the ocean while swimming along. :/

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