Flickering tribbles on Federation fleet starbase

frtoaster

The tribbles on the Federation fleet starbase flicker when Lighting 2.0 is turned off. The flickering is visible from some angles and distances, but not others. It does not occur when Lighting 2.0 is turned on. Reflection quality has no effect on the flickering.

Video

Note that the flickering is faster in-game than shown in this video. I think that's because not all frames were captured.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcXeyBZH8ho

Steps to reproduce

1. Log on to a Federation character in a fleet that has completed the project "Tribbles & Targs".
2. Visit the fleet starbase.
3. Turn Lighting 2.0 on.
4. Repeat step 5 below with the following settings for "Reflection quality": "High", "Low", and "Off".
5. Look at the tribbles from different angles and distances until you see flickering.
6. Turn Lighting 2.0 off.
7. Notice that the tribbles no longer flicker.

Graphics Settings

Tribble 09/15/2017
https://i.imgur.com/Rv1Vy0o.png
https://i.imgur.com/Ce2u8L7.png
https://i.imgur.com/5eGf2j1.png

System Information

OS: Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit), Service Pack 1
CPU: Intel Core i7-4700MQ
RAM: 12 GB
Video card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 765M (2 GB GDDR5)


EDIT: Changed formatting. Vanilla, don't eat this post.

where2r1

Screen snips from Tribble Fed Fleet Starbase....
Sorry, about the quality there....gonna have to stop using that Windows 10 snipping tool.

You should be able to recreate this by looking at the Tribbles on the Fed Fleet Starbase and toggle Lighting 2.0 on and off.

The Tribbles unlocked for Fleet Starbases on the Fed side along with flickering when is Lighting 2.0 OFF...lose all color when Lighting 2.0 is ON.

Lighting 2.0 -- ON


Lighting 2.0 -- OFF


The flickering has something to do with shadows, shading and reflections connected to individual items. I can stand in one spot with the smallest sliver of a shadow and rotate the camera, that change in angle of light reflection and shading will cause certain items to flicker.

(NOTE: interestingly, while on this Fed Starbase map, the Tribbles flicker in time to the ground weapons that are having the same issue.... See this ticket here:
http://forum.arcgames.com/startrekonline/discussion/1234536/flickering-ground-weapons)

frtoaster

where2r1 wrote: »

Screen snips from Tribble Fed Fleet Starbase....
Sorry, about the quality there....gonna have to stop using that Windows 10 snipping tool.

You should be able to recreate this by looking at the Tribbles on the Fed Fleet Starbase and toggle Lighting 2.0 on and off.

The Tribbles unlocked for Fleet Starbases on the Fed side along with flickering when is Lighting 2.0 OFF...lose all color when Lighting 2.0 is ON.

Lighting 2.0 -- ON


Lighting 2.0 -- OFF


The flickering has something to do with shadows, shading and reflections connected to individual items. I can stand in one spot with the smallest sliver of a shadow and rotate the camera, that change in angle of light reflection and shading will cause certain items to flicker.

(NOTE: interestingly, while on this Fed Starbase map, the Tribbles flicker in time to the ground weapons that are having the same issue.... See this ticket here:
http://forum.arcgames.com/startrekonline/discussion/1234536/flickering-ground-weapons)

I checked this again on Tribble tonight, and the same problems are still occurring:

1. Flickering tribbles when Lighting 2.0 is off.
2. Dark tribbles when Lighting 2.0 is on.

Similar problems with ground weapons are still occurring as well.

Flickering ground weapons

frtoaster wrote: »

I agree the bug is somehow related to lighting (that would explain the differences due to camera angle and distance I was seeing), but exactly what aspect of lighting, I'm not sure.

To any devs who might be reading this, there are two problems:

1. When Lighting 2.0 is off, some ground weapons tend to flicker.

2. When the ground weapons don't flicker, they may appear too dark. This usually happens when Lighting 2.0 is on, but can also happen when Lighting 2.0 is off in some environments.

Both of these problems are affected by camera angle and lighting. I had trouble reproducing the flickering on ESD and the Dranuur Colony. On ESD, when Lighting 2.0 is off, the ground weapons appear too dark in certain spots. Small movements back and forth or to the left and right can drastically change the brightness of the weapon.

Both of these problems, the flickering and the darkness, also affect the tribbles on the Federation starbase.

Flickering tribbles on Federation fleet starbase

frtoaster

Two updates from the thread on flickering ground weapons:

http://forum.arcgames.com/startrekonline/discussion/comment/13356678/#Comment_13356678

frtoaster wrote: »

frtoaster wrote: »

To any devs who might be reading this, there are two problems:

1. When Lighting 2.0 is off, some ground weapons tend to flicker.

2. When the ground weapons don't flicker, they may appear too dark. This usually happens when Lighting 2.0 is on, but can also happen when Lighting 2.0 is off in some environments.

Both of these problems are affected by camera angle and lighting. I had trouble reproducing the flickering on ESD and the Dranuur Colony. On ESD, when Lighting 2.0 is off, the ground weapons appear too dark in certain spots. Small movements back and forth or to the left and right can drastically change the brightness of the weapon.

Both of these problems, the flickering and the darkness, also affect the tribbles on the Federation starbase.

Flickering tribbles on Federation fleet starbase

An Update

When I tested this on Tribble before Season 14, ground weapons did not flicker on ESD. Now, they do, and it happens on both Holodeck and Tribble. Considering that ESD is one of the most frequently visited maps in the game, this may explain why we saw an increase in reports of flickering at the start of Season 14.5.

I want to emphasize once again that Lighting 2.0 isn't working correctly either. Movable objects like ground weapons and tribbles often appear too dark; there's something wrong with how they're lit. Look at how dark ground weapons look on DS9:

https://i.imgur.com/zCscALl.jpg (MACO Phaser Battle Rifle)
https://i.imgur.com/s5GXdC5.jpg (Adapted MACO Phaser Pulsewave Rifle)
https://i.imgur.com/Ysr0zge.jpg (Antiproton Sniper Rifle)

Lastly, this is may be unrelated, but the lighting on ESD has changed. When I turn on Lighting 2.0, it's darker now than it was before. I don't see the glaring bright spots on Tribble that I do on Holodeck.

http://forum.arcgames.com/startrekonline/discussion/comment/13362327/#Comment_13362327

frtoaster wrote: »

Update 2

Having stared at this bug for over half a year, I would like to explain what I currently believe is causing it. First of all, the bug affects what I would classify as "movable objects". This includes everything from ground weapons to tribbles to mugs. Even though some mugs are fixed in place, the graphics code treats them the same as their movable brethren.

Lighting 2.0 On

When Lighting 2.0 is on, movable objects often appear too dark or too light. If the object is lit from one side, the side facing the light is too bright and the opposite side is too dark. The gradient is way too steep; there shouldn't be such a sharp transition from light to dark. Furthermore, if the object is lit from two opposite sides, then contrary to expectation, both sides appear dark. So surrounding a movable object with lights makes the whole thing appear dark.

Lighting 2.0 Off

When Lighting 2.0 is off, movable objects tend to flicker. This doesn't happen on every map, but it happens on most ground maps — Starfleet Academy, the Federation fleet starbase, Drozana, Klingon Academy, and First City, just to name a few. (The Dranuur Colony is an exception.) In my judgment, the flickering has the same root cause as the Lighting 2.0 bug described above. The game can't decide whether the object should be light or dark, so it keeps alternating between two states.

EDIT: Fixed quote. Vanilla, please don't eat this post.