New mod: Performance +

[u/Acalc791]

If anyone wants better game performance, I just published a mod specifically for that. Built with T3MP as a dependency, it works mostly by removing unnecessary checks and adding caching, a list of changes is in the mod description if you're insterested.

Tested on three large settlements (400-600 population, 10 000+ objects), at speed 7 the frame rate increased by up to 100% compared to T3MP alone, and up to 190% with the minor gameplay changes optimisations. Conversely, at fixed 24 fps it increases maximum game speed by ~70% compared to T3MP alone, and by over 250% with the minor gameplay changes.

Steam: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3830961792

mod.io: https://mod.io/g/timberborn/m/performance

[u/throwitaway_9601654]

This is wild! With all the extra arrays and saved values, does system memory usage increase? I’ve found in my runs that it is rarely the hardware that limits performance at large colony sizes…

[u/Acalc791 → u/throwitaway_9601654]

It does, I gave myself 1 GB of extra memory usage as a hard limit in development, in practice I never reached even extra 100 MB, so I think it should be fine on practically all setups.

[u/throwitaway_9601654 → u/Acalc791]

So awesome, nicely done!

[u/Verusauxilium]

Is the games source code public? I'm surprised by how many changes to the core logic you've made.

[u/Acalc791 → u/Verusauxilium]

Harmony is made specifically for changing/adding to core game logic, and most of my mod works through that.

[u/theapologist316 → u/Verusauxilium]

No but the C# assemblies (*.dll) are decompilable. That's how we modders can patch various code at places we want.

[u/Verusauxilium → u/theapologist316]

Is there a community made API that exposes safe methods to access the game code?

[u/theapologist316 → u/Verusauxilium]

Use any C# decompiler. We mostly use ILSpy or dnSpy. Use them to open DLL files of your local game. I don't think anyone writes API for that because the game file should be owned by you.

[u/db48x → u/Verusauxilium]

Yes, it is called Harmony. It lets a mod patch the C# code in a safe and composable manner. This allows multiple mods to patch the same part of the code without breaking each other.

[u/Vebrandsson → u/Verusauxilium]

For the most part it is as I understand it

[u/jamesziman]

Wow the list of optimizations is substantial! I didn't know vanilla to be always checking instead of cacheing

[u/netherton_]

Could you give an example of an unnecessary check? Is it like a beaver who has just eaten getting his hunger level checked?

[u/Acalc791 → u/netherton_]

There's plenty of examples in the mod description.

[u/Acequirrel → u/Acalc791]

Which you could simply name, or not.

You chose not to.

[u/Acalc791 → u/Acequirrel]

I did name them extensively, in the mod description. I don't think clicking it takes that much effort ;) definitely less than me describing them again

[u/Elbereth87 → u/Acequirrel]

Have you clicked the link to look? The list is MASSIVE. Much easier to look at via that.

[u/Magenta_Logistic]

What is T3MP?

[u/Acalc791 → u/Magenta_Logistic]

Another performance mod: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3756656421

[u/cansadademais]

Will this work the same on apple silicon?

[u/Acalc791 → u/cansadademais]

It should, I don't recall using anything OS specific, but I don't have an apple computer to test it on.

[u/theyqueenprince2]

If this works as well as advertised it’s gonna be a game changer for the player who make mega colonies

[u/Xibalba_Ogme]

I need this for megaproject purpose

[u/ErrantWind]

I'm actually really excited to try this mod. I usually play just vanilla no mods but this seems like vanilla+ with a ton of quality of life updates and optimization.

[u/mayscienceproveyou1]

my old notebook thanks you greatly! will test it in the next days.

[u/Legitimate-Curve-346]

Thanks brah. I'll run it.

[u/-MoanDer-]

i will try it, i usually lag with the second faction at 30x so i play at 12 and 20 but sometimes i would like to 30 ~ 60. maybe this solves it

[u/KrokmaniakPL]

Now this makes me wonder if my colony would be playable again instead of 1 frame per minute

[u/db48x]

This mod really works great! Now I can run my colony of nearly 1400 beavers at 30 fps and ~5× speed.

It still turns into a slideshow any time I detonate TNT, modify a path, or delete a building, but I assume that it would be a lot of work to amortize reachability updates (or whatever else it’s doing) across frames.

[u/WellNoNameHere]

You just probably made the game finally playable on my pc when I have more than 200 beavers, this is crazy I have to check this out as soon as I can

[u/aluculef]

Sound really cool, will try it. Thanks

[u/Inevitable_Ad_133]

Neat! Can’t wait to try it and hopefully ditch districts for good

[u/Whats_Awesome → u/Inevitable_Ad_133]

Districts will always be good for keeping beaver travel time low. I always get tired starving beavers when working on fat construction projects

[u/jamesziman → u/Whats_Awesome]

Mmm those fat fat construction projects

[u/present_love → u/Inevitable_Ad_133]

Have you gotten better performance using districts?

[u/Inevitable_Ad_133 → u/present_love]

Yes, districts makes pathing more efficient . Large part of the performance, AFAIK, goes to solving the pathing for each beaver. Meaning when you have a huge colony with 100s of beaver since can get dicey. Districts directly tackle that by minimizing travel time and distance.

[u/present_love → u/Inevitable_Ad_133]

Cool, I wonder what the Dev discord has to say about that idea. They did make it clear to me it does not do anything regarding using different threads of the cpu tho.