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Does Diablo 3 still run like crap on PC?

I've been thinking of downloading this game again for months now. I just can't bring myself to do it because somewhere along the way, Blizzard put out a patch that busted performance at certain points/areas of the game. Outside of some network/online issues, the game ran great for the first 6 months it was out. This was on a GTX 570 coupled with a 2600K at the time. Again, I'm not sure what happened, but the performance bounced around all over the place after a number of patches. I upgraded to a 4GB 770 in mid 2013 only to find that it didn't matter and the performance was still ass. I'm now on a 4690K/980 Ti and I'm wondering if I should even bother.
 

Ryan_MSF

Member
I've been thinking of downloading this game again for months now. I just can't bring myself to do it because somewhere along the way, Blizzard put out a patch that busted performance at certain points/areas of the game. Outside of some network/online issues, the game ran great for the first 6 months it was out. This was on a GTX 570 coupled with a 2600K at the time. Again, I'm not sure what happened, but the performance bounced around all over the place after a number of patches. I upgraded to a 4GB 770 in mid 2013 only to find that it didn't matter and the performance was still ass. I'm now on a 4690K/980 Ti and I'm wondering if I should even bother.

Your specs are similar to my own and I destroy Diablo 3, you'll be fine OP.
 

Syf

Banned
I had the performance issues you're talking about and they went away. Game runs great for me in all areas now.
 

Athreous

Member
It still does.

My friend has a sli gtx 970, i7 4790k at 4.4ghz 16gb ddr4 ram and the game can't hold 60 fps with 4 players on screen.

The fps can go from 100 to 20 easy.
 

Easy_D

never left the stone age
Blizzard graced us with an engine that doesn't really support multithreading all that well, which is funny because both Diablo 3 and Star Craft 2 deals with large number of enemies at once. It was a stupid thing to not include in their engine when Wings of Liberty released and it was an even stupider thing to omit when Diablo 3 came out, but that's the reality of it all.
 
I still get strange hitching issues. I know they converted to a new file system after 2.0 launched and lots of folks, myself included, have had these issues since. I played last about 6 weeks ago and it was still an issue. And the Bridge in act 3 just bogs when flames are on screen.
 

KKRT00

Member
It still doesnt run that great, but generally much better than it used to, especially if You run it from SSD.

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Blizzard graced us with an engine that doesn't really support multithreading all that well, which is funny because both Diablo 3 and Star Craft 2 deals with large number of enemies at once. It was a stupid thing to not include in their engine when Wings of Liberty released and it was an even stupider thing to omit when Diablo 3 came out, but that's the reality of it all.
Their engines are generally shit due their strange CPU utilization, even Overwatch has performance problems.
 
If it's stuttering, Blizzard has a habit of jumping back and forth between loading ALL assets from the get go (longer loads) to streaming them in and what you were most likely experiencing is data loading for the first time as you play the game. It's not like that anymore.

Otherwise, I really havn't had any fps problems for the longest time on my rig.
 

Sky87

Member
I'm now on a 4690K/980 Ti and I'm wondering if I should even bother.

You'll be fine. I'm on a 4700k/780ti and i don't have any issues. I think they even fixed the stuttering that happened in some maps (rakkis crossing for example).

With Season 5 starting January 15th it's a great time to get back into it and re-learning the ropes.
 
I'm running a i5 4670, 8gb of ram, 560 ti, with the game installed on a Samsung SSD and while my gpu is a little long in the tooth diablo 3 runs great and I've never had any performance issues with D3. Really have no idea why you guys with far far better gpu's are having such issues.
 

V_Arnold

Member
Diablo III Vanilla ran like SHIT.
Luckily, most of the console optimizations were carried over to Reaper of Souls, so even my bad pc were able to run it perfectly fine.

I'm running a i5 4670, 8gb of ram, 560 ti, with the game installed on a Samsung SSD and while my gpu is a little long in the tooth diablo 3 runs great and I've never had any performance issues with D3. Really have no idea why you guys with far far better gpu's are having such issues.

Two reasons for Vanilla D3 performance issues:
1) Constant asset streaming - VERY bad unless you ran the game on a flashstick or an SSD
2) Blizzard's horrible optimization for multicore CPU's: even if you have a 6-core or an 8-core AMD, it is worse than a 2-core intel where an individual core is able to perform well enough.
 
Diablo III Vanilla ran like SHIT.
Luckily, most of the console optimizations were carried over to Reaper of Souls, so even my bad pc were able to run it perfectly fine.



Two reasons for Vanilla D3 performance issues:
1) Constant asset streaming - VERY bad unless you ran the game on a flashstick or an SSD
2) Blizzard's horrible optimization for multicore CPU's: even if you have a 6-core or an 8-core AMD, it is worse than a 2-core intel where an individual core is able to perform well enough.

I had no issues until they rolled out a few patches. 60FPS solid and it didn't matter how much action was happening in the game.
 
this is the first time i heard that vanilla diablo ran like shit. i had a toaster at that time and got great performance on it.
i even ran it on my MBA.
 

Human_me

Member
It still does.

My friend has a sli gtx 970, i7 4790k at 4.4ghz 16gb ddr4 ram and the game can't hold 60 fps with 4 players on screen.

The fps can go from 100 to 20 easy.

What?!
I have a single 970 and an i7 4790k at 4.4 with 16gb DDR3 ram and 850 SSD and it has held 60fps with 4 players @ 1080p just fine.
I don't believe i've experienced a single drop in gameplay at all.
 

Addnan

Member
The game runs fine. Really depends what you want to to. If you have a pack of 100+mobs and running pain enhancer it will cripple the game, but outside of that very little performance issues.
 

TSM

Member
It still has the same issues. It runs great until it doesn't and then the frame rate tanks. Generally it's only in certain areas or when you are playing multiplayer. Unless you are playing hardcore it's not a deal breaker though.
 
I never, in my entire time, figured out how to fix my micro stutter problem.

Ended up switching to console versions cause of that.
 
I don't know if I can bring myself to buy the console version. It's like I'm rewarding them for "hey, blizzard, thanks for not making the PC version run properly!"
 

epmode

Member
That microstutter while the game streamed in new content was fucking AWFUL. It didn't clear up for me until the expansion was released.

Now everything's better.
 

Intru

Member
Game runs great if you run it off an ssd, and you turn off sound effects.

Seriously. Disable sound effects and the game runs a whole lot better when you're grouped with 3 others, and a couple of them are witch doctors.

The framerate would randomly tank unless I did this.

Using i7 5820k & gtx 970
 

Easy_D

never left the stone age
It still doesnt run that great, but generally much better than it used to, especially if You run it from SSD.

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Their engines are generally shit due their strange CPU utilization, even Overwatch has performance problems.

RIP my dream of playing Overwatch on my FX6300 then, it relies heavily on game engines that utilize multiple cores well.
 

KKRT00

Member
RIP my dream of playing Overwatch on my FX6300 then, it relies heavily on game engines that utilize multiple cores well.
I had frequent drops in combat in alpha below 100fps on i5 2500k on the lowest settings possible ;/


Diablo III Vanilla ran like SHIT.
Luckily, most of the console optimizations were carried over to Reaper of Souls, so even my bad pc were able to run it perfectly fine.

It still drops fps beyond levels it should. I just run it in 4 player group (i5 2500k@4ghz + GTX 970, on SSD):
KeDb.png

JeDb.png


As You can see i have still both CPU and GPU time to spare and fps limit is set to 100.
And this was not a rift with very high mob density or builds that are clusterfuck effects heavy.

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Game runs great if you run it off an ssd, and you turn off sound effects
Hmm, i'll check it in the moment.
 
Game runs great if you run it off an ssd, and you turn off sound effects.

Seriously. Disable sound effects and the game runs a whole lot better when you're grouped with 3 others, and a couple of them are witch doctors.

The framerate would randomly tank unless I did this.

Using i7 5820k & gtx 970

I think this is a first I've heard of the turning off sound effects. I'll give that a go!
 
My understanding is the stutters are a networking choke and nothing else.

Yeah this is a problem too. This game is definitely based on network flow. Latest big issue is that the servers can't handle all the new things they've recently introduced and fighting big crowds of mobs will render the game in a "paused" state as it's calculating but on your computer, you can run around but nothing is happening.

edit: actually more precisely is something is happening but it's server side, stuff you can't see as you havn't recieved it yet so yeah it's pretty bad.
 
So the PS4 and Xbox One versions of the game contain no stuttering or FPS drops of any kind? Not even with four players and 30+ enemies?
 

HF2014

Member
Tried it like last month with my alienware with a gt650m, and imo, it nowhere close to the performance im getting with my PS4 version. Th console version is the best for me, if you can spare not having seasons if its your thing.
 
I'm still using a 570 on a 2500k (but on SSD) and the only time I even have noticeable drops was pushing high level four man grifts. The hyperbole is strong in this thread.
 

Vegito

Banned
you sure its not your connection? diablo 3 relies heavily on your connection. Even during launch week I was getting very playable frame rates with minor stutter due to connection on my fx 4100 and 6870.
 
Tried it like last month with my alienware with a gt650m, and imo, it nowhere close to the performance im getting with my PS4 version. Th console version is the best for me, if you can spare not having seasons if its your thing.

The 650m desktop equivalent is something similar to the 640 which is not even entry level for gaming (less than that). Of course you are getting better performance on a ps4.
 

KKRT00

Member
Game runs great if you run it off an ssd, and you turn off sound effects.

Seriously. Disable sound effects and the game runs a whole lot better when you're grouped with 3 others, and a couple of them are witch doctors.

The framerate would randomly tank unless I did this.

Using i7 5820k & gtx 970

Checked it + low fx, it helped slightly, but it still dropped a lot. I got down to 51fps and it far from the shit You sometimes encounter, especially in greater rifts.

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It runs fine on my 5 year old pc. Just turn on vysync and I run it 60 fps locked.
Yeah, it will not run in stable 60fps.
 

Animal

Banned
Yeah this is a problem too. This game is definitely based on network flow. Latest big issue is that the servers can't handle all the new things they've recently introduced and fighting big crowds of mobs will render the game in a "paused" state as it's calculating but on your computer, you can run around but nothing is happening.

edit: actually more precisely is something is happening but it's server side, stuff you can't see as you haven't received it yet so yeah it's pretty bad.

Whether it is a (intentional or not) client bottleneck, server bottleneck or a bug has not been disclosed by Blizzard as far as I know. I remember a patch that attempted to address the issue that had some reported positive effects but users were still complaining.

If the issue is still around, it is likely a nasty bug. An example would be the server and client are blocking trying to compensate for networking anomalies but never actually recover properly until networking anomalies have vanished. In this case they wouldn't be interpolating to try and make things smooth but are actually requiring full game frame sync between client and server at all times.
 

TetsujinZ

Member
Any of you guys with fast refresh rate monitors try running D3 at > 60hz? I was thinking of picking up a 144hz monitor and am wondering if there is any benefit with this game.
 

KKRT00

Member
Any of you guys with fast refresh rate monitors try running D3 at > 60hz? I was thinking of picking up a 144hz monitor and am wondering if there is any benefit with this game.

I have 144hz Gsync, i run it in borderless window, because it additionally stutters in fullscreen mode, additionally game drops below 60 frequently in heavier scenarios and doesnt look at much better in high refresh rate.
I actually limited fps to 100fps, to has less big drops in fps, because they add additional stutter.
 

Doikor

Member
Problem really isn't having fps on the client side the problem is that the servers can't keep up and this appears as horrible lag to the player (game updating once a second maybe on your screen if you are lucky if a player uses certain skills vs a large group of enemies)
 
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