Run Speed generally broken

[MrWaddles]

A LOT of players are reporting "odd" behavior in the game with regard to how run speed is being interpreted. Just in the last couple of days I've seen the following odd behavior, which seems to support there being some general problems in how the game is currently interpreting the "Run Speed" stat.

My MP normally has a run speed of around 77. Nothing spectacular, but not hideous for an Atrox. When I need to get somewhere quickly, until I can spend the IP to use my Kodiak, I usually get a run speed buff from a fixer.

Last night, I got "Hack Grid Vector" from a fixer, which increased my run speed to 267 (as shown on the stats display). Yet actually running did NOT appear to be substantially faster than I was doing at 77. I had a fairly long distance run (on roads) to check it out, and while I'd say there was a slight increase, it was barely perceptible.

I made a point of checking right as "Hack Grid Vector" wore off, and despite my run speed stat dropping back to 77, the speed decrease was indeed negligible back to my "normal" run speed rate. I did try stopping and starting again bost post-buff and post-buff-expiration. I also tried switching between walk/run mode at both transitions. None of it appeared to make a difference.

Considering that 267 is nearly 4x the run speed I normally have, I would expect a far more dramatic change (and recall the change being far more dramatic in the past). As it is, there's little point to even get the buff given how little practical difference it makes. And yes, friends with Kodiaks are also reporting similar problems with "ground speed" differences not yielding much actual difference.

Travel in the game gets more tedious and time-consuming by the day. Hidden nerfs/bugs breaking run speed buffs just make the game all that much more tedious. Onorous Vehicle skill requirements make the use of vehicles, 30000 years in the future, something restricted to an extremely exclusive set of people.

Please fix Run Speed buff problems. At the least, this would make things no more tedious than "usual", as right now things are a LOT worse.

Long-term, vehicle requirements need reduction. There is simply nothing to be gained by making ownership far more trivial than ability to use vehicles. Particularly when so many vehicles yield such "minimal" speed increases. If folks can BUY the vehicles, aside from perhaps somewhat-more-plausible higher air vehicle skill costs, there should be no reason they cannot USE the vehicles. The way the game works now is just wholly counter to how vehicles work in the real world.

The whole concept of "most should endure tedious, slow travel" is horrifically counter to "fun" in any practical sense, yet this game is mired in that concept.

It's awfully hard to believe that 30,000 years in the future, the use of vehicles (including motorized ground vehicles) will have returned to something resembling the very earliest days of "personal automotive transportation" in terms of accessibility and benefits.

[_______________spydr]

I think the problem with runspeed is in the formula they use for how runspeed actually affects real speed.

I have a su****ion that it's logrithmic.

I have ~100 runspeed, and my Kodiak adds around 200, making my inside vehicle speeds near 300. It doesn't noticably increase my speed. On long distance runs, I can barely tell the difference (From the OT outpost past Harry's to the SW mines - barely tell the difference). I think I am around half again as fast with the car on.

One time, I made the trip in alot less time. Confused, I checked my NCU, and a fixer had put a +~250 runspeed buff on me without me realizing it. So from my 120 runspeed, with the car and the buff, my runspeed was ~550. I'm pretty sure I made it in half the time I normally do.

What I wanna know is why I can almost run as fast as someone with my meager runspeed using a car? Just doesn't make sense.

[Coldstrike]

I'm pretty sure it makes a difference. Today I did a little test. I have 190 run speed myself, and someone in my team had close to 240. That person would have to stop and wait for me all the time, indicating that he was running faster than me.

[_______________Bjond]

The client display is also tied closely to runspeed. For instance, if you close your window, your character will run so fast he'll almost teleport (until you open it again -- kinda hard to stear with the window closed ). If you turn off "bobbing", you will run faster, etc. etc..

The same goes for fighting. The client controls much of the timing and your graphics frame rate controls much of the timing of the client (poor client design showing through there). This is why Yalmahas are so amazingly fast. They add less raw speed than a low level fixer runbuff (about +200), but they cut travel time to a tenth of even the best runbuff speed. When you're in the air, you don't bounce and the only thing the client needs to draw is the sky.

[Obit]

Bjond, I'm pretty sure that runspeed is handled on the server side. This is why you sometimes "rubberband", because the server cannot keep up with where you're going, so it sends you back where it last kept track of you.
It wasn't always server-side though. It used to be you could use a program called Gear that you could set so you ran across zones in less then a second. They fixed this a couple of months ago.

edit: a small typo

[Bauxite]

Heres something else to add, that I discovered with some friends.

Take two people with different runspeeds, we used someone with 150 and another with 80.

The 80 ran along, and the 150 ran along, obviously the 150 got ahead of him.

However, if the 150 used /follow, eventually the 80 could LOSE the 150, he was literally outrunning him and leaving him in the dust once he got 80m ahead or so. (whatever the max viewdist is)

We even stuck tank on the 80 to bring him down to <60, and used a general +30 to get the other guy to 180.

Guess what? Same results...

Now, if it was 50 run versus 500 run, you might get different results, but when its 60 versus 180 and this happens, sure makes you wonder WTF is going on eh?

I talked to a guy in my guild with two computers (and accounts) and he said he had noticed this awhile back. One of his chars would get in a yalmaha just so it wouldn't get 'left behind' on long treks, even though his other char was 30 levels and 100 run more.

Also, once you lose your /follow target, you keep running....quite annoying if your party is going to a far off camp and you need to graba quick snack, bathroom break etc...

[_______________Liloo]

Yes spydr that sounds about right.

When I was lower level I could blitz through missions easily with my runspeed buffs. But, now at my level I'm so fast I lag everytime I change rooms (1038 runspeed). The run buffs seem to be more pronounced the higher the runspeed is.

[MORB]

bjode: I think it's only a timing problem with the client, but it probably don't actually affect your run speed. The client extrapolate your position from the last received info from the server, and depending on the framerate, it does not do it properly I think.
In some place when running in reet form, I teleport forward every second or so, because of this I think.

And in /follow mode, you never run faster than your target, so your run speed is probably reduced to that of the target (if you're faster than it).

[______________Taelyn]

I've noticed it too. I have an adventurer with both the +100 and reet speed buffs (190). I can get a top speed of 550 or so. Despite this, I've noticed that the +100 buff alone seems to do absolutely nothing, its only when I put the reet buff on that I seem to actually move at a different rate.

Of course, this could be the form. In Leet form, everything looks fast. hehe.

[_______________Bjond]

You can try it and see. I run in Window mode all the time and often swap out to check e-mail and such while playing (or check AO while working -- depends ). If you minimize the window instead of just putting it in the backgroud while running, your runspeed goes sky-high. You can run *through* buildings and other solid obstacles if you don't watch out. It's pretty dangerous -- you can get stuck in the terrain very easily and sometimes it bugs up your character and you'll start rubber-banding all over like a flea on a hotplate until you log out. So, now I just don't minimize the window, it's way too buggy.