In a perfect world, yes...that is the only time that lag would occur. Problem is that between point A (your computer) and point B (the servers at SOE), there's this ugly monster called "The Internet".
I really wish I could remember where it was, but there was an article written by one of the developers who made Lucasarts' X-Wing Vs. TIE Fighter game (the first SW multiplayer flight-sim....had horrible lag issues, especially with the server side hit detection...if you played a duel, you did it with each hosting in turn) talking about how the Internet just plain sucks. You may not know it, but your lag may be caused by a janitor at some no name ISP that hits a power cord and unplugs a router for a split second. This causes a whole flurry of problems as the computers change routing and what not. Sometimes routers send things out on balanced loads, meaning your packets might not take the same path to their destination. Any number of variables goes on with the Internet to ensure that you're going to have tons of network lag no matter what. Since there's a lot going on in a big battle, there's lots of packets being sent out and sometimes the computers along the way (that SOE has no control over) are the ones causing the problems.
Lag is an omni-present monster for Internet gaming, because the Internet isn't controlled by anybody...which is how it should be damnit.
|