R1CH Profile Blog Joined May 2007 Netherlands 10027 Posts Last Edited: 2010-05-27 03:54:49 #1



Beyond the complete game drops that seem to be the result of a the game servers at Blizzard crashing, there still seems to be a high amount of in-game lag (slow unit response / minor freezing / random drop screens / etc) in Patch 13. I suspected this was the result of poorly implemented UDP networking code, so I wrote a program to test this theory.



By default, if SC2 detects you are able to send and receive UDP packets, it will default to the new UDP netcode in Patch 13. If your UDP is not usable, it reverts to TCP as in previous versions. By blocking UDP, you can force Starcraft II to use the old TCP code. After very early testing in a few 4v4s, this seems to have helped reduce the amount of in-game lag.



EDIT: Note that this won't magically fix all lag instantly, as other players in the game may still be using UDP. See



Use at your own risk, etc. Requires Visual C++ 2008 runtimes. Please post feedback whether this helps or not, it will be useful to know if this is actually the reason as I am not able to do enough testing by myself.



http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/R1CH/Sc2UDPBlocker.7z





UPDATE (May 26): My Starcraft II no longer seems to be using UDP (in very brief testing in FFA), so Blizzard may have disabled UDP use, rendering this program obsolete.Beyond the complete game drops that seem to be the result of a the game servers at Blizzard crashing, there still seems to be a high amount of in-game lag (slow unit response / minor freezing / random drop screens / etc) in Patch 13. I suspected this was the result of poorly implemented UDP networking code, so I wrote a program to test this theory.By default, if SC2 detects you are able to send and receive UDP packets, it will default to the new UDP netcode in Patch 13. If your UDP is not usable, it reverts to TCP as in previous versions. By blocking UDP, you can force Starcraft II to use the old TCP code. After very early testing in a few 4v4s, this seems to have helped reduce the amount of in-game lag.EDIT: Note that this won't magically fix all lag instantly, as other players in the game may still be using UDP. See this for more information. At best it prevents you from causing lag or dropping.Use at your own risk, etc. Requires Visual C++ 2008 runtimes. Please post feedback whether this helps or not, it will be useful to know if this is actually the reason as I am not able to do enough testing by myself. Administrator Twitter: @R1CH_TL

lowbright Profile Blog Joined March 2010 308 Posts #2 wow.

rich you really get it done. TeamLiquid CJ Entusman #49

LosingID8 Profile Blog Joined December 2006 NY 10795 Posts #3 i wish i could understand what you just said but regardless i'm sure you wizarded up is amazing lol



nice work! Moderator Resident K-POP Elitist

konadora Profile Blog Joined February 2009 Singapore 50092 Posts #4 haha that's pretty cool. Why isn't Blizzard thanking you yet? -.- POGGERS

FiBsTeR Profile Blog Joined February 2008 United States 415 Posts #5 Can you post a replay of your 4v4? I want to see you play. ^^



Oh and awesome wizarding, I'll give this a try tomorrow.

Megalisk Profile Blog Joined October 2008 United States 6095 Posts #6 haha that's pretty cool. Why isn't Blizzard hiring you yet and paying up the G's? -.- Tear stained american saints and dirty guitar dreams across a universe of desert and blue sky , gas station coffee love letters and two dollar pistol kisses from thirty five dollar hotel room stationary .

R1CH Profile Blog Joined May 2007 Netherlands 10027 Posts #7 I'm so terrible that I wasn't invited to the 4v4 team, but I heard success stories. Administrator Twitter: @R1CH_TL

zerglingsfolife Profile Blog Joined August 2009 United States 1694 Posts #8 <3 R1CH. You are amazing man. Night gathers, and now my watch begins. It shall not end until my death. I shall take no wife, hold no lands, father no children. I shall wear no crown and win no glory. I shall live and die at my post. I am the sword in the darkness.

StorrZerg Profile Blog Joined February 2008 United States 13508 Posts #9 On May 26 2010 13:52 R1CH wrote:

I'm so terrible that I wasn't invited to the 4v4 team, but I heard success stories.



thats terrible you should go on strike till you get a team together thats terribleyou should go on strike till you get a team together Hwaseung Oz fan for life. Swing out, always swing out.

TadH Profile Blog Joined February 2010 Canada 1821 Posts #10 Nice work man, really cool tool to have.

AssuredVacancy Profile Blog Joined September 2008 United States 1143 Posts #11 what if a player with UDP plays against a player with TCP? Doesn't bnet try to sync them up and so making the tcp player lag just as much as the udp player? We spend our youth attaining wealth, and our wealth attaining youth.

NicolBolas Profile Blog Joined March 2009 United States 1387 Posts #12 On May 26 2010 13:50 Megalisk wrote:

haha that's pretty cool. Why isn't Blizzard hiring you yet and paying up the G's? -.-



Because this doesn't actually fix the problem. It just forces the game to use the already existing TCP.



If Blizzard wanted to force TCP, they could have easily released a patch 13.1 to do that. They don't because they want to fix UDP. To do that, they need people playing with UDP so they can see where the bugs are. Shutting off UDP works against this. Because this doesn't actually fix the problem. It just forces the game to use the already existing TCP.If Blizzard wanted to force TCP, they could have easily released a patch 13.1 to do that. They don't because they want to. To do that, they need peoplewith UDP so they can see where the bugs are. Shutting off UDP worksthis. So you know, cats are interesting. They are kind of like girls. If they come up and talk to you, it's great. But if you try to talk to them, it doesn't always go so well. - Shigeru Miyamoto

R1CH Profile Blog Joined May 2007 Netherlands 10027 Posts Last Edited: 2010-05-26 05:07:41 #13 On May 26 2010 14:02 AssuredVacancy wrote:

what if a player with UDP plays against a player with TCP? Doesn't bnet try to sync them up and so making the tcp player lag just as much as the udp player?

Bnet sends the same information to everyone, just with different protocols. If someone is using UDP it seems they have a higher risk of lagging, so the whole game will still stall when they lag for sync reasons. So the benefit of using this in a 4v4 is pretty low when there is still a chance 7 other players could lag, unless you're on a team and have your allies using it too. Bnet sends the same information to everyone, just with different protocols. If someone is using UDP it seems they have a higher risk of lagging, so the whole game will still stall when they lag for sync reasons. So the benefit of using this in a 4v4 is pretty low when there is still a chance 7 other players could lag, unless you're on a team and have your allies using it too. Administrator Twitter: @R1CH_TL

R1CH Profile Blog Joined May 2007 Netherlands 10027 Posts Last Edited: 2010-05-26 05:10:12 #14 On May 26 2010 14:05 NicolBolas wrote:

Show nested quote +

On May 26 2010 13:50 Megalisk wrote:

haha that's pretty cool. Why isn't Blizzard hiring you yet and paying up the G's? -.-



Because this doesn't actually fix the problem. It just forces the game to use the already existing TCP.



If Blizzard wanted to force TCP, they could have easily released a patch 13.1 to do that. They don't because they want to fix UDP. To do that, they need people playing with UDP so they can see where the bugs are. Shutting off UDP works against this. Because this doesn't actually fix the problem. It just forces the game to use the already existing TCP.If Blizzard wanted to force TCP, they could have easily released a patch 13.1 to do that. They don't because they want to. To do that, they need peoplewith UDP so they can see where the bugs are. Shutting off UDP worksthis.

I'm sure Blizzard has plenty of data to work with after four days of lagging games. It's not hard to spot the deficiencies in the protocol, releasing a patch and QA is what takes time, and a minor hotfix is still very costly since it requires bnet downtime and another gig of space on each players machine at the very minimum.



Although they can probably turn off UDP server side too thinking about it, that would be a pretty simple way to hotfix it. I'm sure Blizzard has plenty of data to work with after four days of lagging games. It's not hard to spot the deficiencies in the protocol, releasing a patch and QA is what takes time, and a minor hotfix is still very costly since it requires bnet downtime and another gig of space on each players machine at the very minimum.Although they can probably turn off UDP server side too thinking about it, that would be a pretty simple way to hotfix it. Administrator Twitter: @R1CH_TL

CKSide Profile Blog Joined March 2010 United States 223 Posts #15 r1ch you are the most amazing person evar. dling and trying it now. Check

DeathByMonkeys Profile Blog Joined March 2008 United States 742 Posts #16 R1CH man you're awesome, I don't even have SC2 installed, but I can appreciate what you do. As a fellow "computer guy" working on his degree I aspire to be like you some day

Polar_Nada Profile Blog Joined June 2008 United States 1547 Posts #17 Blizzard needs R1ch. nuf said. [ReD]NaDa and fnaticMSI.SEn fighting~! ::POlar @ UC Irvine::

QuothTheRaven Profile Joined December 2008 United States 5512 Posts #18 Thank you R1CH, now I can ladder again! . . . nevermore

Salv Profile Blog Joined December 2007 Canada 3076 Posts #19 R1CH, you don't get enough credit, and I am saying this as a person unaware of the amount of work you probably are doing behind the scenes. Thanks for the assistance on this matter!

OmgIRok Profile Blog Joined June 2008 Taiwan 2699 Posts #20 my question is why isn't this front-paged yet "Wanna join my [combo] clan?" "We play turret d competitively"

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