Do Costome Models Cause Lag?

[Marshmalo]

I've heard some talk in another thread about people not wanting to use costum models because they apparently cause lag but I don't understand how exactly? Surely if they have roughly the same amount of polygons as normal WC3 units then there shouldnt be any difference?

I'm worried cos my map has alot of costum models in and is pretty impossible for me to do what I want to without using costum models.

Edit: Do costum icons cause lag (aswell) ?

 

[Spyda Man]

if the overall data size of all your accumulated models get abit high, then yes it might lag. Even if your using models with the same poly count as the wc3 models, adding up alot of small kbs eventually gives a large amount of small kbs which = a large size

 

[Apheraz Lucent]

True, Spyda Man, more resources you have in your map, more time it takes to load in WC and WE, and it lags in both WC and WE more than it would lag without any custom resources. There are always icons and models in basics, not imported, that can fit your icons, models and rest. You just need to search for them.

Off-topic:
Triggers and custom units/abilities/buffs/ ... also increases your map's size. A trigger takes from 1 to 10kb, custom unit from 0.07 to 0.09 kb. That's quite small, but this is useful info.

 

[Marshmalo]

Thanks for the replies and sorry if I'm being a noob but I still don't understand, I know imported data increases load and download time but why would it make more ingame lag than a stock WC3 model?

Example; if I have say 100 footman models in game then why would I have more lag if I had 100 costum footman models loaded? The game still has to process roughly the same amount of polygons/texture sizes.

This worries me cos I can easily measure things like download and load time by how MBs my map uses but monitering ingame lag is realy hard :/

My map has about 1.5 MBs of imported model/texture data, is it likely to lag?

 

[En_Fuego]

Imports won't cause lag, they'll just increase download and load screen times.

What causes lag would be, say, using 50+ imports on the map at a time that all have really high poly counts. Basically the more polies on the screen at a time the more lag you'll have.

 

[El3mentGamer]

It depends on how many you use, and how big the file sizes are, and if you have a good computer. But the majority of the time you should be fine

 

[Softmints]

Basically the more polies on the screen at a time the more lag you'll have.

Seconded. You can check the polygon count of any model on the hive before you download it (use "Click here to display advanced details"). Most modellers will keep their models at reasonable levels.

Another thing to watch out for is texture animated particles. Some models emit particles which change texture as they move, the Flame Strike burning ground effect being a good example. Too many of these at once can lag heavily.

Any imports will increase the loading time of your map a bit, but other than that, things like icons or skins will be fine. Certainly don't rule out nice imports if you want to use them.

 

[Marshmalo]

ahh thanks for the clarification! I'll check the polygon counts of my imported data, thanks I get it now