[Patch 10] Graphics Performance Discussion

**Ishan** · March 19, 2014, 01:52 PM

So i noticed that couple of posters have been blatantly trolling in the patch 10 main thread and claiming that graphics have gone horrendous after installing patch 10 update worse than RTW1. So use this thread to discuss the graphics performance post patch 10 and post graphical screenshots.

Initial posts from participants in this discussion must meet the following criteria:
1) Screenshot of a battlefield from your computer.
2) Screenshot of in-game settings being used. Like this:

Spoiler for My settings for example:

3) Your system specs.

Patch 10 claims following changes:
http://wiki.totalwar.com/w/Total_War_ROME_II:_Patch_10

Performance improvements:
General performance improvements:

Additional Support for AMD Crossfire multi-GPU configs.
Further improvements to GPU performance and reduction in CPU-bottlenecks for all configs.
Improved core Battle performance scenarios.
Implemented borderless window when running at desktop resolution in Windowed mode.
There is no longer an upper limit on the graphics settings that a user can select in the frontend. Previously if the game determined that a user’s machine was low-end then it would not allow them to select high graphics settings. This limitation is now gone. Note that selecting high graphics settings on low-end machines will negatively affect performance.
Improved consistency of reflections on shiny textures.

‘Unlimited Video Memory’ option improvements:

Unlimited Video Memory is now selectable for all integrated GPUs running on 64-bit operating systems from Windows Vista onward. Integrated GPUs use system memory as video memory at all times, as they have no dedicated video memory of their own. This code change now allows our integrated GPU customers to use all of their system memory as video memory. When Unlimited Video Memory is enabled, discrete GPUs use system memory as an extension of their dedicated GPU video memory, when their dedicated video memory is not enough to run at their chosen graphics quality settings. Please be advised that in both cases, using system memory as GPU video memory can impact performance as it is generally not as fast as dedicated GPU video memory. Also, if system memory runs low (or out), the user’s hard drive will be paged, resulting in reduced framerates.
For users running on an integrated GPU in 64-bit Windows (Vista onwards), with Unlimited Video Memory available but not selected, we have increased the amount of video memory that the game sees from 800MB to 1024MB.
Fixed an issue causing Unlimited Video Memory to be unavailable for users with certain discrete video cards.
Fixed an issue that was causing Unlimited Video Memory to become disabled on some multi-GPU configurations.

I've taken the points that affects graphics only. Graphics performance in a gist means increase of your average fps, do you see it in comparison to patch 9? Does this increase\decrease comes at a graphical cost? Discuss.

Any one liners that add nothing to this discussion will be deleted.

**Ishan** · March 21, 2014, 07:28 AM

New discussion created. OP updated please read before you post in this thread now.

**Joseph The Great** · March 21, 2014, 03:04 PM

Alright, coming from a lower rig person, I have noticed some improvement. The Framerate has increased, while at the same time fluctuating more. Almost as if the rendering has increased. As you'll see in my screenshot, there is a new and strange clumping of units going on when I pull units away from combat.

1)

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2)

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3) Asus Laptop i5 @2.4, Nvidia 540m 1Gb, 8Gbs ram

4) my question for you TW folks is whether or not I should click "unlimted memory". Will this help me in large battles, or just slow me down.

Thanks!

**Ishan** · March 22, 2014, 03:29 AM

Originally Posted by Joseph The Great

4) my question for you TW folks is whether or not I should click "unlimted memory". Will this help me in large battles, or just slow me down.

First of all +rep for posting in a constructive manner. It might set an example for other people to follow.

As for your original question. No, i wouldn't advise that since you're using a dedicated graphics card in your laptop which has a limited memory of 1GB. And Rome 2 is known to consume much more than that, so checking that option will degrade your performance. People using laptops that have integrated graphics can select this option though since integrated graphics uses system RAM not VRAM, although even here they have to ensure that they have more than 4GB of system RAM otherwise they will also notice performance downgrade when checking this option. CA has also clearly give us hints for every settings, which is really good of them:

**Ano2** · March 21, 2014, 03:49 PM

I wouldn't select it Jospeh, I'm running on a similiar laptop to you (i5 @2.5, nvidia 630M 2gb, 8gb ram) and I found it made the framerate a little worse.

**pyj99** · March 22, 2014, 04:07 AM

Hey

Huge performance increase with patch 10

fps in benchmark went up from ~ 32 to 45

my system

Alienware m18xR1
i7- 2820 QM

CF of 6970M

**Lugotorix** · March 22, 2014, 05:10 AM

Noted increase in performance beyond the patch notes. There seems to be a LoD improvement one thread starter mentioned, and actually complained about, where it renders more efficiently when zoomed in and out. Especially for unit detail this is exactly what I wanted. Altogether I'm very happy with the graphical changes and the new NVidia drivers don't seem to have hurt either. Naturally, UVM is out of the question. But I have noticed better fps across the board.

**IamOdysseus** · March 22, 2014, 08:02 AM

The performance isn't bad for me but graphics are bad despite I have everyhting on extreme.

Close unite details are not that bad.

I have a i7 3770, 8 GB RAM, GTX 650 2 GB.

**-iceblade^** · March 22, 2014, 09:36 AM

Originally Posted by Lugotorix

Noted increase in performance beyond the patch notes. There seems to be a LoD improvement one thread starter mentioned, and actually complained about, where it renders more efficiently when zoomed in and out. Especially for unit detail this is exactly what I wanted. Altogether I'm very happy with the graphical changes and the new NVidia drivers don't seem to have hurt either. Naturally, UVM is out of the question. But I have noticed better fps across the board.

Which drivers are you using? More importantly, are you running SLI as your screencap seems to indicate?

**Lugotorix** · March 23, 2014, 12:00 PM

Originally Posted by -iceblade^

Which drivers are you using? More importantly, are you running SLI as your screencap seems to indicate?

I'm running the 320.49. 335.23 is now available, but it's running so well, I'm hesitant to upgrade since it doesn't mention Rome II. About the SLI. I don't think I have two cards in there, but it is SLI compatible. I'm not sure why it's indicating that, it always has for Rome II. The 9800 GTX + is just a damn good older gen card imo. EDIT: It actually supports 3-way SLI, so I could really beef this sucker up, if so inclined, but the memory would still be deficient.

**-iceblade^** · March 23, 2014, 12:13 PM

Originally Posted by Lugotorix

I'm running the 320.49. 335.23 is now available, but it's running so well, I'm hesitant to upgrade since it doesn't mention Rome II. About the SLI. I don't think I have two cards in there, but it is SLI compatible. I'm not sure why it's indicating that, it always has for Rome II. The 9800 GTX + is just a damn good older gen card imo.

Ah okay, thanks... I think I might have figured out what the issue is - the card bing identified as a 9800GTX or 9800GTX+. They were a pretty good card from what I recall, though...

And yeah nVidia hasn't pushed out a driver that improves Rome II specificially, except for 334.89 which gave up to 5% increase for higher-end 7x0/Titan cards. I'm quite disappointed about that still.