Player memory issues with PFRPG modules

[turelus]

Just curious, is there a way to transfer the Core Rulebook and such without the GM client sending the information each time it's opened? I only have 1.2mb upload and five players.

Can this be done as like the campaign data where one person grabs the cache and shares it or is it more restricted due to copyright?

Sadly using the official stuff has been a nightmare for me and often causing players clients to break with run time errors and incorrect image size errors, only solutions we've found to it is them clearing cache if it happens.

Well it seems my players client are all getting memories errors on connect due to the Core Rulebook images, any ideas?

[ddavison]

Just curious, is there a way to transfer the Core Rulebook and such without the GM client sending the information each time it's opened? I only have 1.2mb upload and five players.


You should close and reopen it. Just leave it open within the campaign. It still has to send the necessary data the first time but will only need to send data again if the module changes or is updated.

[Trenloe]

I've moved this post to a new thread, so we can address your issues specifically.

You can create a copy of a player's cache and provide to other players as a baseline to get them going.

The Pathfinder Core Rules certainly takes up a chunk of memory on the player side, but shouldn't cause issues unless there's something else going on. Can you please provide more info on the errors the players are getting?

- Details of the errors messages.
- A list of modules you have shared with the players.
- How many images/maps have you shared with the players?
- Do you have any tokens in <FG app data>\tokens\shared ?
- What operating system/s are the players running? Are any of them 32-bit (as opposed to 64-bit)?
- Do you already have a lot of maps/images shared with the players from within the campaign? The GM can check by opening the "Images & Maps" window and clicking the "All" button in the bottom right so that is changes to "Shared".
- Are you running any extensions?
- Check the versions of CoreRPG, 3.5E and PFRPG in the chat window after loading the campaign - they should all show v3.3.0.

Can you provide more information/checks on the above please?

[turelus]

Thanks to you both for the answers, sorry for taking a few days to get back to this I saw it at work but kept forgetting to reply once home (and with the information at hand).

- Details of the errors messages.
Below is a quote of part of the errors, it seems to be a string of images from the Core Rulebook.

Runtime Error: Exception: bad allocation

Runtime Error: Unable to save file (images/Arcane Archer.jpg) to cache. Please restart Fantasy Grounds and reset cache on launch screen before rejoining game.
Runtime Error: Unable to save file (images/Assassin.jpg) to cache. Please restart Fantasy Grounds and reset cache on launch screen before rejoining game.
Runtime Error: Unable to save file (images/Bard.jpg) to cache. Please restart Fantasy Grounds and reset cache on launch screen before rejoining game.
Runtime Error: Unable to save file (images/Catapult.jpg) to cache. Please restart Fantasy Grounds and reset cache on launch screen before rejoining game.
Runtime Error: Unable to save file (images/Barbarian.jpg) to cache. Please restart Fantasy Grounds and reset cache on launch screen before rejoining game.

- A list of modules you have shared with the players.
3.5 - Pathfinder Effects Library, Calenders, PFRPG Archive Spells, PFPRG Classes, PFPRG Magic Items, PFRPG Paizo Magic Items, PFRPG Races, Pathfinder Advanced Players Guide, Pathfinder Core Rules, d20pfsrd Equipment, d20pfsrd Feats,d20pfsrd Traits.

- How many images/maps have you shared with the players?
Quite a few due to the slow connection issues mentioned before. I have started clearing some of these shares to cut down.

- Do you have any tokens in <FG app data>\tokens\shared ?
Nope, all custom tokens are in the GM only folder.

- What operating system/s are the players running? Are any of them 32-bit (as opposed to 64-bit)?
Two players with issues are both Windows 10 64-bit.

- Do you already have a lot of maps/images shared with the players from within the campaign? The GM can check by opening the "Images & Maps" window and clicking the "All" button in the bottom right so that is changes to "Shared".
As above yes there are a lot, mostly NPC faces and monsters (as we didn't have the bestiary pics before), I'll start unsharing a lot of these.

- Are you running any extensions?
Fantasy Language Fonts, FG v3.x Move Dice Tower, Remove Effect Tag, then just the new core theme and extra desktop decals.

- Check the versions of CoreRPG, 3.5E and PFRPG in the chat window after loading the campaign - they should all show v3.3.0.
All are 3.3.0

[Moon Wizard]

You can use /flushdb in the chat entry box to clear all shared records in a campaign at once.

You can probably close some of the modules and unshare.
* Calendars - Only used for initial population of calendar, and only useful on GM.
* Standard PFRPG OGL modules - Replaced by official Paizo modules.

Regards,
JPG

[turelus]

Thanks Moon Wizard I will try a /flushdb. Is this whilst players are connected or something I do any time on my own?

I've been closing the modules which the official Paizo ones have already replaced but a couple of my players are playing advanced classes or drawing from books not yet released, as they come out I will switch over to the official material (as it's truly beautiful work).

I did do some testing with one of the players facing issues last night and we had him connect to my test campaign (no images shared) and it went much smoother so looks like it was my large collection of images pre-shared then trying to open the additional content from the new books on top of that. Hopefully killing some of those shares off makes the game run smoother.

A couple of quick questions as well as even after years of use with the program I feel like a newbie using it sometimes.

If I create a cache file and share it to them (share a lot of maps, dropbox it, then let them download it) does this still push their memory use up any time they're connected, or is it only the transfer of files which normally creates issues?

If I have modules open on my end like Tome of Horrors, the CotCT campaign at a later date, will any of this effect my players or is this just my own client which would be using additional memory.

Thanks again for all the support with this, looking forward to maybe meeting some of you and attending the talks at GenCon this year.

[Moon Wizard]

* /flushdb will work at any time, but probably best to do when nobody connected to minimize all the network client synchronization.

* The player memory usage is primarily affected by which images are shared in the campaign (either main campaign or from GM modules) and tokens shared. Additionally, images viewed from player modules also incrementally increase memory usage.

* The only time that your GM-only modules will affect the players is if you specifically share a record with them. You will do this many times throughout a campaign for maps, handouts, etc., and is expected. If you clean up as you go along (unsharing campaign images no longer used, and unloading modules no longer used), then this will keep the player cache cleaned up as well.

We're looking forward to Gencon as well, though I am on the hook to help put together the talks. ;)

Regards,
JPG

[turelus]

So quick follow up question as I am a little confused still.

If I shared images, they download them into the cache then I unshare or flush DB. I still won't have to send the file my internet again correct? It also won't be active and using memory on clients machines?

[Moon Wizard]

For images
If you are using the image, then make sure it is shared. If it's an old map or image, then you can unshare to prevent it from being updated again. Once an image is downloaded to a client, it is saved in the cache, so it won't have to be sent again. However, the client currently requires all images shared to be loaded into memory, which is why we discussed unsharing some.

For modules
If you share a module, then the whole file is available for download to the player. I believe that it doesn't even download to the client, unless the player requests to open the module. However, any images in the shared module will be loaded into memory on the client. Again, the more modules you share with lots of images, this can affect their load.

For GM machine
On the GM side, the loading is a little more intelligent because it doesn't need to ensure that the assets are downloaded and available. (i.e. the GM never gets modules/images from players)

Let me know if I can help explain any further. This is one area where we are specifically focusing for our new architecture that's slowly being developed in tandem.

Regards,
JPG

[turelus]

Thanks again Moon Wizard, that answers and confirms what I now understood from the troubleshooting of this thread.

Going to make the games I run much smoother now I am not running with all the images shared! Wish I had reached out earlier as I would have had a much easier time running Rise of the Runelords (so many big maps!) knowing all this.

Looking forward to FGU and will be more than happy to help support it if you decide to run any crowed funding for it.