Useful settings for playing on GTFO servers

[GTFO. al]

Note: You need the console to be enabled. To do this go to Options > Keyboard > Advanced > and check Enable Developer Console. Then access the console using the ~ key which is above tab and left of 1. On some keyboards it may be beside return/enter

In HL2 based games it is important to have your settings optimised not only for your hardware and internet connection but also so they are well matched with the settings allowed with the server you are playing on.

In game the 3 main commands that need to be looked at are:
rate which is the maximum amount of Bytes Per Second you will request from the server.
cl_cmdrate which is the maximum amount of updates per second you will send to the server
cl_updaterate which is the maximum amount of updates per second you will receive or request from the server

Unfortunately the defaults that Valve set suck. These are determined in the Settings > Internet section of your steam application. At the very least it is important that this is set close to the connection speed you use but I recommend using Cable/Fibre > 10Mbit if you have any sort of broadband connection however.

On GTFO servers there are a series of maximum and minimum settings allowed which are specified in the server configuration. For your information these are as follows:

sv_maxrate 30000. This means the maximum rate you can receive is 30000 even if you set it higher
sv_mincmdrate 40. This means the minimum cmdrate you can have is 40. If your setting is lower than this you will be forced to 40 regardless.
sv_maxcmdrate 66. This is the maximum cmdrate setting allowed and it matches the server tickrate which is 66
sv_minupdaterate 40. This means the minimum updaterate you can have is 40. If your setting is lower than this you will be forced to 40 regardless.
sv_maxupdaterate 66. This is the maximum updaterate setting allowed and it matches the server tickrate which is 66.

What settings should I use?
This depends a lot on your connection speed and whether you live in the UK or far away from it and to an extent how good your PC is. Having the settings correctly optimised will hopefully increase your hit registry, decrease any lag spikes or jumpy movements you notice.

For users with a decent broadband connection and up to date PC i'd recommend:

rate should be anywhere from 16000-30000
cl_cmdrate should be anywhere from 50-66
cl_updaterate should be anywhere from 50-66

If you live outside the UK or have a slower connection or older computer you may need to lower these slightly but it is just a case of trying different settings until you see 0 loss and low choke in net_graph 3 which will be explained further down this post.

How to use these settings
Simply open the console ingame using the ~ key and type in your desired settings. For example:

rate 20000 and hit enter
cl_cmdrate 60 and hit enter
cl_updaterate 60 and hit enter

- The best place to set cl_cmdrate and cl_updaterate is in your config.cfg file found in Steam\steamapps\your account\day of defeat source\dod\cfg on your hard disk
- Search (CTFL + F) for cl_cmdrate and cl_updaterate and change the settings. If one or both of those cannot be found add them manually at the bottom of the file.

How can I tell what my choke/loss is?

Using net_graph 3 in console you can see exactly what it is happening in relation to the above information.

You will get an output on your screen just like this one, which is my net_graph output:


The information is easy enough to follow. The bits we're interested in are Choke, Loss, Ping and the 2 numbers on the right hand side, in this instance 60.5/s and 59.4/s

Loss refers to lost packets due to Network problems, either with your computers connection to your ISP, your ISP, or the ISP that is hosting the Server or anywhere in between. It is good to have this number at 0 although occasional blips where it goes to 1 or 2 for a few seconds shouldn't be too much to worry about

Choke is quite simply the server wanting to send you data but cannot. Again you'll want this number to be as low as possible because if the server tries to send you information about where the enemy is located on the screen and you dont receive it then how are you going to shoot anything? Having the right rate, cl_cmdrate and cl_updaterate settings should help keep this number low.

Ping simply refers to the time, in milliseconds, taken for you to send information to the server and receive it back again. This should be as low as possible, preferably under 100ms

In the above example the 60.5/s refers to the average number of data updates you are receiving from the server. This is controlled by cl_updaterate. This number can never exceed 66 on GTFO servers because of our server settings and tickrate. Obviously, a higher number is best here. If your cl_updaterate is set high but this number is low it could indicate as issue with the server itself.

The 59.4/s refers to the average number of data updates you are sending to the server for the benefit of other players. This is controlled by cl_cmdrate. Again this can't exceed 66 and a higher number is better.

More info and useful tips
http://whisper.ausgamers.com/wiki/index.php/Tickrate

[aKa]

may i ask why cmd and updaterate are enforced to max 66 66, i no 100 101 are lan rates but when i lower em to 66 66 on gtfo they seem to make me lag :S weird i no...

if only everybody used the same rate, we wudnt have a problem

[GTFO. al]

may i ask why cmd and updaterate are enforced to max 66 66, i no 100 101 are lan rates but when i lower em to 66 66 on gtfo they seem to make me lag :S weird i no...

if only everybody used the same rate, we wudnt have a problem

tickrate is 66...so cmdrate and updaterate should be the same.

[GTFO. OneManAndHisGun]

Can I just check - the numbers shouldn't be contained in quote marks, like this - cl_updaterate "66" but like this - cl_updaterate 66.

Is that right?

[GTFO. al]

if you type the command in console then leave out the ""

if you view your config.cfg you'll notice they do have ""

[Echelon]

I live in Norway (not that far away), and usually have around 50-60 ping. I have a 6/1 mbit connection.

What settings should i use? More spesificly?

[Lindo]

i use 20,000 101. 101........i think

[GTFO. al]

I live in Norway (not that far away), and usually have around 50-60 ping. I have a 6/1 mbit connection.

What settings should i use? More spesificly?

just play about until you see less choke and loss in net_graph 3

everyone will have different "best settings" due to all the variables like PC, net connection, and stuff like that.

[The Warden]

I have been playing around

No Loss with the right settings, but I seem to get variable amounts of choke. Whats is a realistic target for this? do you guys really get it running at 0?

Mine is sitting at 0 for the most part, but then shooting up to 20 or so every so often.

[GTFO. G]

When there's lots of stuff going on there are choke spikes, this is generally unavoidable.

If you ahve 0 loss, and 0 choke for the most part - then you're 'optimally configured'

[The Warden]

Sorry just to add this is on Team fortress 2, where the action can be particularly intense, is that a likely factor?

I get the best results on highest settings, 30000 66 66

But still on a busy dustbowl spam firing section my choke shoots up to about 40

No on screen lag noticeable though, action seems smooth and fire seems to connect.

EDIT

I replied before I'd seen your reply G.

thanks I think i'm doing OK then.

[Tyro]

Funny thing: I used the net_graph 3 command, and now I can't close it!

Please help a noob out.

[GTFO. ObscuredByCows]

Funny thing: I used the net_graph 3 command, and now I can't close it!

Please help a noob out.

net_graph 0 will turn it off
net_graph 1 & net_graph 2 will show you some of the information in net_graph 3

[GTFO. G]

It's also worth mentioning, you can try rate up to rate 65000 ... rate 65000 got rid of a lot of choke for me on TF2.

[Echelon]

Does this also count for HL2dm?

[Joesoef]

I'll try to sort out my best settings for the GTFO servers. Since DoD_Donner is about the only server I play on. Sometimes it gives me horrible reg. Especially annoying when playing with weapons like the Kar (which happens to be my favourite). Let's see if lowering my CMD_Rate and CMD_Updaterate will do the trick.

[GTFO. SiR-ROUND]

Will these settings stick or do I need a script or add to the .exe as in TFC back in the day?

Cheers.

EDIT: Nevermind...

- The best place to set cl_cmdrate and cl_updaterate is in your config.cfg file found in Steam\steamapps\your account\day of defeat source\dod\cfg on your hard disk
- Search (CTFL + F) for cl_cmdrate and cl_updaterate and change the settings. If one or both of those cannot be found add them manually at the bottom of the file.

[GTFO. kk20]

read here to interpret your netgraph http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki ... work_Graph

[canokay666]

hi,till 1 month when ever ı enter gtfo fortress hlzdm server,on the top left it says 'time left:00''and then it starts lagging and again it is written on the top left'we recommend cl_cmdrate 66 and cl_updaterate 66 but no use..ı write to console and in my configcfg file it is already written...my choke is never under 60 and fps starts with 100 and ıt turns to 10 or 15...also in my console ''performance warning:mark bone valve.bim.attacment combine soldier is being used in qc ''with red letters...???what should ı do???any one can help me????

[GTFO. kk20]

choke is a measure of how much "backlog" your computer has in a queue. CL_CMDRATE is the setting that requests information from the server. FPS is the amount of data that is being displayed on your screen.

Here are a couple of basic generalisations. If you have choke and:

FPS > CL_CMDRATE then your graphics card is good but your CPU is crap or overloaded.
CL_CMDRATE > FPS then the server is sending you too much information for your puny system to cope with. Either get a better PC or lower your CL_CMDRATE. This often happens in big maps that have lots of concentrated action such as badwater, goldrush, dustbowl stage 2 etc etc - you can do little about this.

personally if your FPS is averaging 10-15 "in action" then i'd lower your CL_CMDRATE to 30 and leave your CL_UPDATERATE at 66.

Unfortuntately this is the fault of shitty netcode and 32 player server. Thats a lot of info that your PC has to cope with!

EDIT: Ive just noticed that a minimum CL_CMDRATE of 40 is enforced. I was unaware of that, perhaps a lowering to 30 could be done on the 32 player server Al/G? 40 is a harsh mistress for some - 40fps is a hard target to attain on most 32 player maps. At least the computer will be sending the server as many packets as it can (to avoid updaterate cheating)?

[GTFO. G]

I think our min rates are 30 actually.

[GTFO. SiR-ROUND]

Maybe KK20's thoughts on LERP can also be Xplained here?

What I still don't get is that my FPS on the new rig seems to stay @70+, not lower not higher...

Is it limited by GTFO?

[GTFO. kk20]

I was going to write a guide as LERP is a bit more complex as we found out tweaking yours. FPS is not limited by the server, usually fps_max is the limiter but I think we set yours to 100 - cant remember now.

[GTFO. G]

regardin lerp, this is a post I made in our members only forum regarding the matter:

http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki ... work_Graph

Been reading that, and if I understand it correctly, interpolation comes into play when you are experiencing choke. When the server is unable to give you the amount of packets you're requesting you start to choke - and interpolation attempts smooth this out. So, if you can achieve 0 choke, you inherently have 0 interpolation... You can also force 0 interpolation and you will probably have a bit of uneven play during high choke times.

After reading this, and trying to understand it, I've played around with my rates...

I am now using:

rate 20000
cl_cmdrate 50
cl_updaterate 40
cl_interp 0
cl_interp_ratio 0

As you can see I have specified 0 interpolation, I dont want the game to generate data for choked packets.

With these settings, my hit reg improved almost instantly, and lerp (linear interpolation) value on net_graph 3 was constant 0

So, I think interpolation has it's pros and cons - you can have the game generate data when you're choking - the data predicted could be correct in which case you may kill someone (they will think you are suspiciously fast) or someone will kill you based on interp on their side (you will think they are suspiciously fast) or incorrect interpolation could take place, and you infact behave differently than predicted and still get killed (you think hax) and vice versa...

[naknA]

Interesting... I've read alot of comments from people that hated the new engine because it removed the command to force interpolate to 0.

Apparently "setinfo" could be exploited to force interpolate but it got fixed for some reason. Gotta try to play around with my rates tomorrow.

[GTFO. kk20]

in essence INTERP is the amount of data the game engine predicts. Unless you are sat on the server no person can get a perfect picture of the current game so the source engine predicts what a player is doing based on the data received.

GTFO servers are locked at a tick rate of 66. This means that the maximum you can both send to the server and receive from the server is 66 packets of information per second. These packets of information also take time to get to your PC, then get processed by your PC and finally a response sent back to the server - which also takes time.

I.E. <server> -> data -> <your PC> -> response -> <server>

This happens for each player. PING is the time it takes for a packet to get to your PC, cl_cmdrate is the amount of packets per second you *want* to send to the server from your PC and cl_updaterate is the amount of information you are *requesting* from the server.

Note the emphasis, these are not guaranteed - you are merely requesting the data. There is a third setting cl_rate which governs the actual maximum datarate that can pass between server and client. This datarate is a combination of packet sizes and updates.

Example 1) on a 6x6 server there not be as much action as a 32x32 server. If you send information to the server that you have detonated 8 crit stickies on 16 people this will saturate your rate on your cl_updaterate. This means that you wont send 66 packets of information on that tick - this means that it is *possible* that one of your 16 people will have moved away from your sticky and not kill them. Fix? Up your rate.

Now for the signs of necessary tweaking. FPS is the key factor to everything. Low FPS will be bad for gaming. If you cannot display all the information being shown then your game will lag, you wont get information on where people are so the models will skip. You will miss shots and most likely die from random fashions. Why? Just because *you* cant move because of your low FPS it doesnt mean others cant. You are still sending cl_cmdrate to the server and GTFO enforce a minimum amount to stop cheaters (if you were sending low information to the servers then noone would hit you!).

It is also pointless requesting 66 packets from the server if you can only process 30 of them i.e. your average fps is 30. This will only saturate your RATE (remember! Rate governs how much data you can get at one time regardless of the updates) meaning you will lag more and miss even more of your precious 30fps. If your average fps is only 30 then set your cl_updaterate to 30, maybe 35 for good measure.

LERP. Source is good to you. It has a get out clause. Value soon figured that people on dialup had nochance at all against someone on ADSL. Likewise someone on ISDN has no chance against someone on fibre. The reason? They will get more updates from you, move away from where you shot etc etc. So valve added a prediciton engine. This predicts where the action will happen based on the information you are getting. The killer? LERP wins. That is why you can die a hundreth of a second after you kill someone - ever find that odd? This may seen cheaty but it isnt if you think about it. It evens the playing field and also compensated for lag. BUT! If you have a *good* connection then LERP hinders you. Your updates will override LERP so if you can handle 66 updates per second then LERP will be forever re-calculating and giving you crap info. You will shoot where the person is but LERP may change that at the last 100ms.

This means that you can alter LERP to stop predicting. There are checks in the source engine. LERP is loosely based on an inverse cl_updaterate. Have a low cl_updaterate and LERP is naturally higher - even though it says 0ms. Have a high cl_updaterate and LERP *can* be lower if requested or can be higher. This was patched by valve to stop people having 0 LERP on fantastic connections - contested by many on steam forums.

LERP helps on crappy connections, LERP hinders on better connections. LERP smooths out choke.

Choke is the simplist of all explanations but is often overlooked. Choke is simply a backlog of data that your PC cannot handle. This data is the key to playing the game. LERP will not override *bad* choke (more than 30 choke and you are losing half of the data the server can handle per tick!) as even LERP has a timelimit to its data (thats why you dont die mroe than 1 second later, only 100ms-500ms). Choke is either cl_updaterate too high for your fps. crap rate meaning you cannot send enough information out to meet your cl_cmdrate. Rubbish CPU and uber gfx card meaning you can display the information you have (high fps) but cannot process the information.

edit: LOSS I forgot to mention loss. Loss happens when either you are sent packets and they dont arrive (or dont get processed) or you send date to the server and it doesnt arrive. Loss is generally caused by a much to high cl_cmdrate or cl_updaterate but more often caused by poor net connection or too high a 'rate'. This is one area where network gurus can tweak their MTU to accept bigger packets and thus have a higher rate. (continued....)

[GTFO. kk20]

On to tweaking. net_graph 3 is your friend when tweaking.

This is assuming a reasonably stable connection and PC. If you connection wildy swings then you will be chasing arrows.

Firstly find action - this cannot be done in spawn (it helps if you dont piss the team off too much by standing about. Find another persons server who has similar ping to GTFO and guess a little)

FPS and CHOKE. The key to all is keep fps high and choke low. You will need an average of 30fps to warrant tweaking. And by average I mean in action, not in the spawn. Dustbowl will see you drop to 10fps in some cases but no doubt most players will too (expect SiR Rounds PC which I hated him for yesterday with his 70-fps at dustbowl choke point!) If your choke exceeds the tick rate of the server then you are so far behind that you're missing entire updates.

start with cl_cmdrate. There is no reason why this shouldnt be 66 unless you have a rubbish upload like 64k or 128k. In which case 50 is adequate.

rate start at 30000

cl_updaterate set at 66 and monitor your choke. Hopefully your fps wont be plummeting too much. Odds are your choke is 10-20 in action this is fine. If you can keep 0 choke in heavy action then good for you! start dropping your cl_updaterate from 66 until your choke is <30 in heavy action.

start increasing your rate up to 65000, if the models start to jump, skip or your game suddenly lerches then you have hit a slight wall. Back off your rate a little. If you are a network guru then you can tweak you MTU a little to get better rates but dont google MTU if you dont know what it is.

Onto LERP! default values for cl_interp is 0.1 and default for cl_interp_ratio is 2 if things go screwy. To find baseline LERP we can use Valves own minimum setting which is 2 * (1/cl_updaterate) so for a cl_updaterate of 66 we get a cl_interp of 0.03 which is about 33ms of prediction. cl_interp_ratio is a buffer so to speak. Sometimes we get lag so we need a boost of interp. I set cl_interp_ratio to 1.5 some people prefer 1.25 very few can get 1.

If the LERP text and number is white then you can tweak it more. The colours are RED - LERP is ineffective and harming your current viewing (models will skip and jump a lot unless you have an UBER connection). Yellow - LERP is displaying bad data (models may skip and jump). Orange LERP is having a slightly bad headache - most people say the ideal state. White - no problems.

Orange is ok. Yellow/red bad. Flashes of yellow ok, flashes of red bad. Keep increasing your cl_interp by 0.05 (take care of the decimal points) till is stabilises.

All of this is *very* objective though. Remember that for a stable connection LERP wins. However, for a stable fast connection LERP hinders you. Personally I prefer a lerp of 33ms to 100ms, I can snipe better as what I see is a headshot usually is and a miss is my fault. At 100ms I have more "thought that was a shot" more than 33ms. Is this cheating? Some may say it is. However, would you play with default rate of 100? cl_cmdrate of 20? cl_updaterate of 20? LERP is defaulted to the cl_cmdrate of 20 therefore 0.1 so why not change cl_interp?

For reference, I dont have an uber system, I play on two systems, an AMD 8850x3 phenom with ATI 3850 and a 2.2 dual core intel with an 8500gt (!!) both with ADSL. My settings are:
AMD/ATI INTEL/nVidia
rate 55000 rate 40000
cl_updaterate 55 cl_updaterate 38
cl_cmdrate 66 cl_cmdrate 66
cl_interp 0.033 cl_interp 0.042
cl_interp_ratio 1.25 cl_interp_ratio 1.5

Happy tweaking!

[GTFO. SiR-ROUND]

Many, many thanks. All this makes perfect sense, great tutorial.

I will finally incorporate this into my cnfg file. I lost the settings we tried with chat. But they were very good eh?

[GTFO. kk20]

oh, I can remember your settings off by heart because your constant fps of 70 and 0 choke made me jealous

cl_updaterate 66
cl_cmdrate 66
rate 45000
cl_interp 0.04
cl_interp_ratio 1.5

[Doobah]

This thread is awesome!

I had no knowledge about those kinds of in-game settings in tf2, so I have been having lag and stuttering for ages on the gtfo servers.

But thanks to the info from this thread I discovered that I had over 50 choking regularly, and was able to lower that to between 0 and 15 depending on the amount of action.

AND in addition, I discovered the cl_interp settings and how it affected aim, my kill ratio when playing a scout has never been as high as it was today XD

If/when I see someone mentioning the lag on gtfo servers I will immediatly refer them to this thread :3

[Malteserr]

Is my connection the only reason for loss or is there anything I can tweak on my end?

Look at the terrible red lines on the graph in the bottom middle, which I think are for loss

[Selkino]

off topic, but how do you get your aim when sniper unscoped ?

on: do u think routers has a bad effect on these numbers at all ? (I mean wired routers)

[Malteserr]

off topic, but how do you get your aim when sniper unscoped ?

crosshair settings in options menu multiplayer....

[Selkino]

off topic, but how do you get your aim when sniper unscoped ?

crosshair settings in options menu multiplayer....

there's no aim on default, but ok, I just set up a custom one than.

[-NanoCorp- CyberPower]

crosshair settings in options menu multiplayer....

there's no aim on default, but ok, I just set up a custom one than.

Valve tried to stop it from being a no-scope weapon, so they removed the crosshair and they gave it the charge so you can't run around getting no-scope headshots. You also can't get headshots while un-scoped.

[Selkino]

allright I think I just messed up my settings nice.
I try to shoot rockets and I see the rocket by at least a half second later.
ping is around 50.
loss: 0 choke 40-50 in action.
fps: 80-120

I set
rate: 200000
cl_cmdrate: 30
cl_updaterate: 30
cl_interp 2
cl_interp_ratio 2

I was trying
rate: 20000, 30000
cl_cmdrate: 20, 40, 50, 66
cl_updaterate: 20, 40, 50, 66
cl_interp: 0.050, 1, 2
cl_interp_ratio: 0.050, 1, 2

just got worse

any ideas? hope I didn't mess it up for good

anyone knows valve's default?
I think cl_cmdrate was 30, updaterate was 20.

i want to set them back to normal to start overth whole thing, but I don't know deafults of these:
rate: ?
interp: ?
interp_ratio: ?

[Selkino]

ok, I was reading in a little, so the defaults are for cl_interp is 0.1....
I'll go experiment a little and see how does it go.

[-NanoCorp- CyberPower]

rate 10000
cl_cmdreate 30
cl_updaterate 20
cl_interp_ratio 2
cl_interp 0.1

[Selkino]

ok, this is how it looks now:
rate 50000
cl_cmdreate 60
cl_updaterate 34
cl_interp_ratio 0.0588*
cl_interp 0.15*
with an avarage ping of 55-60 in action:
Choke: under 20, mostly even under 10
FPS: 38-48
LERP: went up to a fixed 150.0 ms from 100.0 ms.. and it's white. is it just

it seems I should upgradea my PC a little.

*I know I mixed it up. actually it worked better than the default. I go back and change it to the way it should be.. maybe LERP will go under a 100ms this time

update:
managed to get LERP 44.45ms with
rate 65000
cmdrate 66
updaterate 45
loss 0
choke <15
FPS 35-80

so this is probably gonna be a new GPU.

[Selkino]

some new results:
30.28ms
choke less than 10
loss is zero.
fps 50+

I know this will sound ridiculous, but it's like I got my sight back. I can actually be a scout and kill someone with my shotgun. it's a fnckin miracle.