Dice won't roll for player

[3dartwork]

He is the only one in the group that has an issue with the dice rolling. I want to stress out inconsistent this problem happens.

Sometimes when we start, he has to click Roll of any random roll on his character sheet numerous times before it actually rolls. Sometimes he has to use the Dice Tower. Sometimes he has to physically throw the dice on the chat box to get it to work. Sometimes he can double click whatever button on his character sheet that makes a roll.

Neither the other player nor me experience this.

[Trenloe]

Something similar has been reported from another group recently.

What operating system is that player using? And is it 32-bit or 64-bit?

Would it be possible to get a video showing the issue from the player's side?

[3dartwork]

He's operating on a 32bit, I believe Win10. I doubt I can walk him through setting up a video recorder. The lack of seeing the dice rolling sometimes is on his side, sometimes it's just on the others' side. Sometimes it is at the beginning when we start, and other times it can be midway through they just stop rolling when he clicks.

We suspected it's a hardware issue, so we swapped his Google Hangouts to his iPad while he runs on his laptop, but that did not fix it. He has enough bandwidth for video conferencing and this so that's not an issue either.

However, I feel it is Fantasy Ground servers itself lagging. Even though I have zero problems in general with my speed and computer performance, I have experienced times where FG has lagged and dragged to a crawl on a few areas.

It just feels like it's a lag problem with the server because he can pick up and move the dice all over the screen freely and loosely, but rolling them sometimes yields nothing to him and other times just to him.

[Trenloe]

As he’s running on a 32-bit operating system then it could well be related to pushing the memory limits of FG. What ruleset are you using and what modules have been shared?

The next time you’re playing, get the player to open Windows Task Manager and have a look at how much memory FantasyGrounds.exe is using - if it’s above 1.6GB then that could well be contributing to, if not causing, the issue.

[Moon Wizard]

There are no FG servers that control your game once connected. It's all direct network messages from the player to the GM machine.

It's possible that something like this could happen if network packets were being dropped because the network on the player's side is "noisy". It seems like it would affect more things than just dice though. If he is running on a wireless network, you could also try having him move closer to the wireless access point, or plug into the network via a wire.

Regards,
JPG

[3dartwork]

As he’s running on a 32-bit operating system then it could well be related to pushing the memory limits of FG. What ruleset are you using and what modules have been shared?

The next time you’re playing, get the player to open Windows Task Manager and have a look at how much memory FantasyGrounds.exe is using - if it’s above 1.6GB then that could well be contributing to, if not causing, the issue.

We're using D&D 5e ruleset. I currently have Tales of the Yawning Portal module, but it is not shared to them as we aren't using it. We played for about 18 months without modules.


Funny you mentioned Task Manager. We all 3 did that last time thinking the same thing. His CPU and memory usage were way below the 3 of us. I will have to double check for a number, but I recall the three of eliminating that possibility based on the numbers he was reading. I had thought perhaps he was running out of memory, but he seems to be doing well still on it. He was in the MB I remember in usage.

[3dartwork]

There are no FG servers that control your game once connected. It's all direct network messages from the player to the GM machine.

It's possible that something like this could happen if network packets were being dropped because the network on the player's side is "noisy". It seems like it would affect more things than just dice though. If he is running on a wireless network, you could also try having him move closer to the wireless access point, or plug into the network via a wire.

Regards,
JPG

I know he is working on wireless with his iPad. I'm am pretty sure his laptop is as well, though his router runs well to handle both. I'll check to see if he's close, but he usually plays in his office, which I believe is where everything is at. Perhaps having him hardwire just to make sure and compare.

I was unaware FG doesn't have servers when we connect. If that is the case, then perhaps something on my end is causing him to see these strange occurrences. My other uncle has never had this problem, however.

And really it's just the dice rolls. We don't even care if the animation works - we just want to find a way where he clicks or manually rolls and a result pops up on the first time. So far it is very inconsistent. There are moments he will be okay for an hour or two then suddenly it'll act up. But what is most strange is the solution very often is him trying a different method of rolling the dice. If him clicking it doesn't work, then manually holding and rolling the dice works. Or the dice tower works when the others don't.

It's very odd and have been happening for well over a year.

[ddavison]

It is sometimes worth doing a screenshare. You'd be surprised what some players are actually doing compared to what they say they are doing.

[Trenloe]

His CPU and memory usage were way below the 3 of us. I will have to double check for a number, but I recall the three of eliminating that possibility based on the numbers he was reading. I had thought perhaps he was running out of memory, but he seems to be doing well still on it. He was in the MB I remember in usage.
Assuming the rest of you are on 64-bit windows, you can have double the memory use of FG to the player on 32-bit windows. It would be good to check the exact memory use out the next time you start running into issues. If nothing else than to eliminate it from the thought process.

The more you describe the issue, I'm inclined to agree with Moon Wizard. This sounds like the communication is not reliably getting through all the time - which would explain why sometimes just trying a different method of rolling may suddenly appear to work. This may be caused by packets getting dropped, or even by the player's instance of FG getting overloaded (memory wise, or processing wise).

[LordEntrails]

Funny you mentioned Task Manager. We all 3 did that last time thinking the same thing. His CPU and memory usage were way below the 3 of us. I will have to double check for a number, but I recall the three of eliminating that possibility based on the numbers he was reading. I had thought perhaps he was running out of memory, but he seems to be doing well still on it. He was in the MB I remember in usage.
Remember that if he is using 32-bit Windows (or windows emulator) then his process size limit will be much lower than those using a 64-bit Windows. (~1.3 GB versus over 3GB)