Direct X 11 API Port Postponement

Are other people seeing textures show up in black like this with the DX11 client?



I even see it on the character select screen:

Yes

Just turn it off and forget it exists.

If you set your texure quality to low (3), you need to set it to high (1). Can only access in the options editor or eqclient.ini.

~10/21 DX11 Beta Update Issues (Antialiasing and Framerates)

Over the weekend of 10/21 (around Saturday), a DX11 update was pushed to beta by the developers. I'm able to confirm issues with the DX11 push/update/changes, due to anti-aliasing overriding not working anymore (on Windows 10 and Windows 11), along with framerates on Windows 11 being significantly decreased in a legal boxing program.

• Specifically, on the Nvidia RTX series (2000 and 4000), on Windows 10/11, full-screen antialiasing 2X to 8X is not able to be overridden anymore into Everquest beta (DX11). This was previously working. FXAA is able to be utilized, however it's garbage quality (blurring) on Everquest and not something anyone should be using. Specifically: Multisampling and supersampling, and standard antialiasing is now borked.
• Framerates have also dropped to 40 or less on a legal program under Windows 11. It's unplayable. This is only an issue on EQ beta since the weekend of 10/21. I'm unable to confirm whether this is also an issue on Windows 10 or not; however it is an issue on Windows 11. This is on a RTX 4090 OC'd to 3.1ghz (normally runs 165fps).

Something detrimental was changed over this particular weekend with graphics (I'm assuming DX11), and devs should revert or further investigate the changes that were made. Antialiasing being impacted is a clear indicator that other underlying technical elements of DX11 are also likely impacted (the symptoms are all there).

Thanks for your feedback.

We continue to work on the DX11 port and push changes to the Beta server with as few regressions as possible. We're still in the mode of "get it working" and performance tuning is a lower priority, so please bear with us. Our recent changes added or modified shaders, swap chains, and the back buffer. We expect to see more changes in these areas going forward.

Unfortunately, the EQ client has never featured antialiasing in its rendering engine (DX9 or DX11 port). Any driver level overrides to force antialiasing are subject to several limiting factors and DX11 has very restrictive support for those overrides. It's a coincidence that driver level antialiasing overrides could have any effect on this DX11 port I'm afraid. We'll take this feature under consideration.

If it is ever considered or implemented, hopefully it would be along with DLSS/FSR/XeSS

Thanks Cairbrae! I'm glad to hear you're able to corroborate and correlate potential decreases in performance with the ~10/21 push. Frankly, my biggest concern is with the decrease to FPS and it being capped at approx. ~40 under certain legal program(s) with the most recent ~10/21 DX11 push (seems to be a GPU/CPU underutilization issue), along with the pre-existing memory/FPS/hitching. Of course the underutilization could be driven by any of the changes you mentioned, or others not mentioned. Anti-aliasing should be handled as a tertiary concern after these other two. Appreciate the update.

Even the most basic multisample MSAA standard would be entirely adequate.

Just wanted to post an update/reminder for the devs as it pertains to DX11. A lot of other beta initiatives (personas, etc.) are getting attention now, and didn't want this critical issue to be overlooked in a premature push of DX11 to live.

What must not be overlooked is the framerate hitching with DX11. If anything, DX11 should be identical or an improvement in terms of hard drive/memory load-in speed and stabilization, resulting in less framerate hitching. Currently on a T700 PCIE 5.0 SSD and OC'd DDR5-7000 CAS28 memory, hitching is substantially more noticeable across DX11 vs DX9. In running through a zone (especially Plane of Knowledge, detailed Palatial Guild Halls, etc.), framerates continually micro-stutter due to players/environmental variables having to be repeatedly reloaded. Textures/models essentially never stabilize in memory even after being in the same zone for an extended period. The hitching continues as you run from one end of the zone and back.

This is the one aspect of Daybreak's implementation of DX11 that could be overlooked, or not addressed before being pushed to live. This absolutely must be addressed, since it's such a detrimental downgrade in playability for many players vs DX9.

I am seeing the same thing Lodestar notes here. Much higher incidence of memory fluctuations. Could be some old-school optimization in place that DX11 is fighting with. Textures constantly being swapped in and out of memory. Could be a potential cause of hitches and stuttering?

Thanks that's great news Angeliana! We'll appreciate seeing polish and tangible improvements before it's pushed. No reason for it to be rushed otherwise.

We'll also continue to provide feedback on DX11 improvements that are still pending, as noted by Cairbrae (developer) in the below thread pertaining to slow texture loading.

https://forums.daybreakgames.com/eq/index.php?threads/performance-issues.293100/

Quick update on some key takeaways of quickly reviewing the new DX11 enhancements from 11/28 (RTX 4090 3.1ghz OC, T700 PCIE 5.0 SSD, 7950X 5.9ghz OC):

• Hitching has improved only slightly (~25-35% of the way to reaching DX9 Live memory/texture/hitching performance). PC and NPC models/elements continue to cause noticeable hitching beyond DX9, but a slight improvement is tangible.
• FPS has not improved as much as one would expect from other similar ports that have happened (e.g., Guild Wars 2). FPS is still slightly below DX9. With other ports, performance is at least identical or in GW2's case significantly increased.
• GPU memory utilization is significantly lower on DX11 vs. DX9. This may be as much a function of DX11 efficiency, however my next bullet gives me concern that GPU underutilization could relate to decreased performance. Specifically, running 2 instances of EQ at uncapped FPS uses ~70% GPU resources on DX9, vs only 20% on DX11.
• GPU clock boosting is not occurring on DX11. I remain at 2.5ghz when running 2 instances. However on DX9, this boosts to my full 3.1ghz OC. So I'd have concerns that the decreased FPS performance could relate to GPU underutilization of core clock boosting under DX11. Mem clock is not an issue, and runs full OC within the OS regardless of application used.

So much this- Postponements are viewed sometimes as some sort of failure internally. Pushing broken content is the fail point. Postponement to get it right is not failing, it's failure prevention doing it's job.

/cheer