Mouse sensitivity

(Lisjak) #1

So today I noticed that the mouse sensitivity in the main menu is different than the one in-game. In the menu I have it set to 2 while in game it’s at 2.8. Any thoughts on why it’s not the same value in both?

(Feley) #2

In the menu mouse sensitivity or I think every feature are with rounded numbers meaning there isn’t decimal behind them… Also I don’t know why is that but everyone recommends putting it to 5 or above… Something about Unreal Engine if I am correct :?

(kibloy) #3

In the main menu it only shows integers even if the sensitivity isn’t one. If you want to set it to a specific value, use the in-game menu (which is a lot closer) or set the exact value in ShooterInput.ini.

Oh, something else: apparently Unreal Engine 3 has pretty bad rounding errors with low sensitivites. You might notice the crosshair not moving with small, slow mouse movements. Setting the sensitivity to a value equal to or above 5 fixes that, but you’ll have to lower your mouse DPI accordingly. Maybe you don’t even experience it, but I thought I’d mention it seeing your low sensitivity.

(Lisjak) #4

Oh ok I see. Thank you guys. I’ll try the 5 setting just for the kicks.

(N8o) #5

[quote=“kibloy;86327”]In the main menu it only shows integers even if the sensitivity isn’t one. If you want to set it to a specific value, use the in-game menu (which is a lot closer) or set the exact value in ShooterInput.ini.

Oh, something else: apparently Unreal Engine 3 has pretty bad rounding errors with low sensitivites. You might notice the crosshair not moving with small, slow mouse movements. Setting the sensitivity to a value equal to or above 5 fixes that, but you’ll have to lower your mouse DPI accordingly. Maybe you don’t even experience it, but I thought I’d mention it seeing your low sensitivity.[/quote]

Is this actually true? Can we get a source on this or some evidence to back it up?

(Frogteam) #6

I haven’t noticed it and I’ve been playing at 1.6 sens for months, but I’m not particularly observant/knowledgeable/good so I can’t really say.

Though I generally don’t have too make really small shifts in aim, since everyone is always running around so I probably wouldn’t notice it anyways.

(kibloy) #7

[quote=“Kaneki;86687”][quote=“kibloy;86327”]In the main menu it only shows integers even if the sensitivity isn’t one. If you want to set it to a specific value, use the in-game menu (which is a lot closer) or set the exact value in ShooterInput.ini.

Oh, something else: apparently Unreal Engine 3 has pretty bad rounding errors with low sensitivites. You might notice the crosshair not moving with small, slow mouse movements. Setting the sensitivity to a value equal to or above 5 fixes that, but you’ll have to lower your mouse DPI accordingly. Maybe you don’t even experience it, but I thought I’d mention it seeing your low sensitivity.[/quote]

Is this actually true? Can we get a source on this or some evidence to back it up?[/quote]
This is as good a source as I can find (see ‘Sensitivity’):

I personally ran into that problem and it was really noticable at 4 sensitivity. So I doubled it and then halved my DPI on the mouse and it was gone.

(Amerika) #8

I ran into what felt like a latency iissue myself when I was using a sensitivity value of less than 2. I adjusted the in-game value up to 5 while lowering my DPI to compensate and I’ve been perfectly happy ever sense and haven’t thought about it.

(watsyurdeal) #9

I basically go like this

Native DPI only, so 400, 800, 1600, etc

If I lower my sens and it’s past 5, Iower the dpi.

This is a pretty simple way of doing things imo, if you’re playing at 1080p…

37 cm or higher, 800 dpi

38 cm or lower, 400 dpi

Bam

(Amerika) #10

I just do 180’s. BAM!

(watsyurdeal) #11

Well not all of us have a mouse that’s that good.

Even when I do 180 sometimes it feels off, probably human error or maybe there is a small amount of accel in the new sensor for the Deathadder Chroma.

Idk, but I’m getting a Castor in the mail soon so…whatev :smiley:

(Amerika) #12

I’ve spent many hours practicing near perfect 180’s over the last decade and a half. It’s from a time when I competed at LAN events and you had to use their hardware/OS/setup and it was the only reliable way to figure out your sensitivity with the short amount of time you had to setup. Especially if you were competing in multiple games with vastly different setups. It’s also just a good way to practice mouse control as doing a quick 180 consistently is pretty useful in most games because you can see somebody behind you as you’re performing it and come up short or go further and you snap to a target easier in my experience.

But that’s a YMMV thing of course. Everyone has different routines and rituals.

(watsyurdeal) #13

Curse you work, now I wanna go home and practice it. :frowning:

(pumpkinmeerkat) #14

@Amerika OP :slight_smile:

(N8o) #15

[quote=“kibloy;86794”][quote=“Kaneki;86687”][quote=“kibloy;86327”]In the main menu it only shows integers even if the sensitivity isn’t one. If you want to set it to a specific value, use the in-game menu (which is a lot closer) or set the exact value in ShooterInput.ini.

Oh, something else: apparently Unreal Engine 3 has pretty bad rounding errors with low sensitivites. You might notice the crosshair not moving with small, slow mouse movements. Setting the sensitivity to a value equal to or above 5 fixes that, but you’ll have to lower your mouse DPI accordingly. Maybe you don’t even experience it, but I thought I’d mention it seeing your low sensitivity.[/quote]

Is this actually true? Can we get a source on this or some evidence to back it up?[/quote]
This is as good a source as I can find (see ‘Sensitivity’):

I personally ran into that problem and it was really noticable at 4 sensitivity. So I doubled it and then halved my DPI on the mouse and it was gone.[/quote]

Wow! Thanks a ton.
Very useful information.

(capriRocket) #16

ehh im at like 60cm/360 sens 3.8 at 800 dpi and my mouse cant go lower than 800.
guess ill go sens 5 on 800 then, idgaf.

(watsyurdeal) #17

[quote=“capriRocket;86944”]ehh im at like 60cm/360 sens 3.8 at 800 dpi and my mouse cant go lower than 800.
guess ill go sens 5 on 800 then, idgaf.[/quote]

I can’t help myself

“somebody snipe that guy”

“hold on let me turn…”

(Canucck) #18

[quote=“capriRocket;86944”]ehh im at like 60cm/360 sens 3.8 at 800 dpi and my mouse cant go lower than 800.
guess ill go sens 5 on 800 then, idgaf.[/quote]

5/800dpi is ~38cm/360. That’s a pretty big drop for you, there is probably software for your mouse to get below 800, don’t just rely on the sens button on the mouse.

(Sorotia) #19

I’m so lost when it comes to all of this talk about mouse settings lol…I’ve never really played any online games where your mouse settings really mattered.

(Cynix) #20

The actual mouse settings you use (in-game sensitivity, windows sensitivity, mouse dpi, polling rate, etc.) have a very minimal effect on your aiming ability in the game. What matters most is choosing a setup, practicing with it a lot, and sticking with it. Your muscle memory will adapt to your settings, whatever they end up being.

apparently Unreal Engine 3 has pretty bad rounding errors with low sensitivites. You might notice the crosshair not moving with small, slow mouse movements. Setting the sensitivity to a value equal to or above 5 fixes that, but you’ll have to lower your mouse DPI accordingly.

Regarding this:
https://forums.epicgames.com/threads/938178-Does-The-Unreal-Engine-3-Have-Rounding-Errors-For-Low-In-Game-Mouse-Sensitivity?s=62a34c47d0455d0ba875c109300cf9e0&p=30931546&viewfull=1#post30931546

I believe the conclusion reached by the poster of that post is incorrect.

The primary example given by the poster to prove their point is this:

Suppose two players want 1 inch of mouse movement to be 15 degrees of rotation. Player one has a 400dpi mouse and Player two has an 1800 dpi mouse. Player one sets his sensitivity to 6.82, and Player two sets his to 1.51.

If both players move their mice slowly, over an inch, to where every frame their mouse moves only one dot (MouseInputX = 1) Player one moves 13.18 degrees and Player two moves 9.88 degrees. That’s an error of 13.8% and 66% respectively.

However, the problem with this example is that it assumes player two is moving their mouse over 4 times slower (in terms of physical movement speed) than player one. It uses as the independent variable (fixed at 1) and movement speed as a dependent variable. In my opinion, this is backwards. Two players with the same total sensitivity (DPI * in-game sensitivity) should generally be moving their mouse at the same movement speed (ie: inches per second). So should be the dependent variable and movement speed should be independent (ie: both players would want to complete their 1 inch / 15 degree rotation in the same amount of time).

Note: The poster seems to imply UE’s input processing is locked to the framerate - which seems incorrect to me, although I actually have no idea - so I’m going to assume a rate of 100hz for input processing by the engine (because it makes the math easy). However, if that is true, then the movement speeds used in this example are also ludicrously slow. At 100hz, an 1800 dpi mouse moved at one dot per tick would take 15 seconds to move one inch.

If we change this example so that both players move their mouse at the same physical movement speed, the error between the different settings is almost non-existent. Consider this more realistic example:

  • Player 1 wants to move 15 degrees / 1 inch, and sets their mouse to 400 dpi / 6.826665 sensitivity

  • Player 2 wants to move 15 degrees / 1 inch, and sets their mouse to 3200 dpi / 0.853333125 sensitivity

  • Both players move their mouse at 1 inch per second (for a total time of 1s)

  • Both players process input at 100hz (for a total of 100 ticks)

  • Player 1’s mouse reports 4 dots per 1/100 second when moved at 1 inch per second

  • Player 2’s mouse reports 32 dots per 1/100 second when moved at 1 inch per second

  • The actual distance moved by player 1 is: sum [tick=1 -> 100] (floor(4 * 6.826665) * 0.00549316540360483) = 14.83154658973302 degrees

  • The actual distance moved by player 2 is: sum [tick=1 -> 100] (floor(32 * 0.853333125) * 0.00549316540360483) = 14.83154658973302 degrees

This gives an actual error of ~1.136% in both scenarios.

Mathematically this makes sense, because if both players have adjusted their DPI and sensitivity to correspond to the same number of degrees per inch, then when moving at the same physical movement speed, the value ( * ) is going to be nearly identical, and it’s still going to be identical even after it’s rounded down by the cast to an int.

Your mouse “rounds” the number of dots of movement it reports on each tick due to the physical properties of its sensor. For example, if you move a 400 DPI mouse 1/800 inch, 2/800 inch, 3/800 inch or 4/800 inch, it’s going to register all of those movements as either 1 or 2 dots. However, an 800 DPI mouse is going to register those same movements distances as 1, 2, 3, and 4 separately.

My best guess as to why some people report “rounding errors” at low sensitivity, high DPI, and slow movement speeds is due to human inconsistency. When a human is trying to test a mouse by making multiple similar movements at slow speed (ie: trying to replicate going the same distance at the same speed), the lower DPI has a smoothing effect on the movement. Because the human is less precise than the mouse, this will make it easier to replicate consistent results in these types of tests.

tldr, as far as I can tell:

  • UE3 can have significant rounding errors in mouse input if you move your mouse extremely slowly
  • neither your DPI nor your in-game sensitivity independently have a significant impact on the magnitude of the rounding errors
  • the magnitude of the rounding errors depends primarily on the physical speed of your mouse
  • at low movement speeds you may find a lower DPI more consistent due to smoothing

disclaimers:

  • I’m assuming the information in the original post I linked to is complete, correct, and actually relevant to DB
  • I don’t have UDK 3 and have not verified this
  • I play with an in-game sensitivity of 0.65
  • Please correct me if I’ve made an error

misc notes:

  • the magnitude of the error is affected by the tick rate
  • the magnitude of the error is also affected by the size of the data structure (which I don’t know for UDK 3) used for degrees moved in one tick
  • I’m assuming your mouse is actually capable of natively measuring at the DPI resolution it’s set to