All of this applies if you have either a single monitor or more than one monitor.

This guide will go over how to setup a fullsreen script that both makes your FA run in windowed full screen (AKA: fake-fullscreen) and optimizes FA in order to gain a bit of performance.

There are multiple versions of the script depending on your monitor setup, and whether you just want the windowed fullscreen, the optimization, or both.

I’ll just give you the baseline and then step by step it so you can meet your needs.

(Single monitor (at any resolution) example first)

• run a test game of FA and go into graphic settings and set the resolution to « windowed » (you may now exit FA)
• download and install AutoHotkey (when it is done installing don't run, there's nothing to run. Just close the installer)
• hit Win+"R"
• type "shell:startup"
• in the folder that opens right click go to "New" -> "AutohotkeyScript" this should create a new ahk file. (You can name it fullscreenScript or something similar)

Open this file with notepad or notepad++ ( or equivalent basic text editor that can edit code)

(best version of this script : https://forum.faforever.com/topic/123/guide-fake-fullscreen-and-optimisation/27 )

paste this (this is the script you will have to adapt to suit your needs)

#NoEnv
SendMode Input
SetWorkingDir %A_ScriptDir%
#Persistent
procName := "ForgedAlliance.exe"
SetTimer, CheckProc, 2000
Return


CheckProc:
    If (!ProcessExist(procName))
        Return

    WinGet Style, Style, % "ahk_exe " procName
    If (Style & 0xC40000) 
        {
        WinSet, Style, -0xC40000, % "ahk_exe " procName
        WinMinimize , % "ahk_exe " procName
        WinMaximize, % "ahk_exe " procName
        Run, %comspec% /c process -a forgedalliance.exe 1110
        Run, %comspec% /c process -p forgedalliance.exe high
    }
    Return

ProcessExist(exeName)
{
   Process, Exist, %exeName%
   return !!ERRORLEVEL
}
return

The Run, %comspec% bit is the part you can remove (two lines) if you’re not interested in the optimization.

However, if you are interested, edit the 1110 on that line to fit your processor thread count. Mine has twelve so my number has twelve digits E.G. : 111111111110

• when you’re satisfied with your edits hit ctrl-S, then alt-F4 to exit your text editor.
• (if not interested in optimisation skip this) download this : https://github.com/tatsujb/Process.exe/raw/master/Process.exe and place this file (Process.exe) in c:\windows\system32
• You’re done! you can either restart the computer or double click the file
• (Optional although strongly recommended, especially if you have two monitors) add « UI Party » in the mod vault and enable it by hosting a test game with it (you’ll have to configure UI Party)

(Example with two 1080p monitors that are ordered left to right you’ll need to adapt the pixel sizes if your monitors are a different resolution than 1080p, note that FA is now a window so it can’t stretch it’s bottom border two different amounts, if you have different resolution monitors one of the two monitors will not be completely filled.)

#NoEnv
SendMode Input
SetWorkingDir %A_ScriptDir%
#Persistent


procName := "ForgedAlliance.exe"
SetTimer, CheckProc, 2000
Return

CheckProc:
    If (!ProcessExist(procName))
        Return
      
      
    WinGet Style, Style, % "ahk_exe " procName
    If (Style & 0xC40000) 
    {
        WinSet, Style, -0xC40000, % "ahk_exe " procName ; remove the titlebar and border(s)
        WinMove, % "ahk_exe " procName , , 0, 0, 3840, 1080 ; move the window to 0,0 and resize it to fit across 2 monitors.
        WinMaximize, % "ahk_exe " procName
        WinRestore, % "ahk_exe " procName
        Run, %comspec% /c process -a forgedalliance.exe 1110
        Run, %comspec% /c process -p forgedalliance.exe high
    }
    Return

ProcessExist(exeName)
{
   Process, Exist, %exeName%
   return !!ERRORLEVEL
}
return

Go here for full sets of examples : https://forums.faforever.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=9778

Here is an exe version : https://forums.faforever.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=9778&start=40#p154100

How to correctly handle two different sized screens : https://forums.faforever.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=9778&start=90#p185820

The breakdown, for those who like understanding the nuts and bolts of what they use :

I use autohotkey (AKA : AHK) as a scripting language here because AHK has absolutely no performance hit on your system especially in the case of this script and if it’s the only one.

The first couple lines set our variables namely the process name that we’re looking for (E.G. « ForgedAlliance.exe » . Yes, this does imply that simply by replacing this you can get the same full screen effect on any other game or app).

Then we tell it to disable the window border,

Then we tell it to minimize,

Then, in the first example I listed, to maximize (which when you don’t have a window border means the entire screen) ( in the second example I listed I set it to the combined dual monitor resolution)

That’s fake fullscreen.

The optimisation bit is something that works for FA for the following reasons :

• FA always starts on the first core/thread
• FA is mainly a single thread, single core app. It has a second thread for the user interface (which accounts for about 5% of FA’s cpu usage so it doesn’t really matter, it’s thread/core is generally very idle). The main thread/core however generally averages at 100% usage.
• windows boots and runs it’s main services on the first core/thread.

This combination of factors means that moving FA main thread to another thread, any other thread, yields overhead that you aren’t otherwise getting.

Right, so you could just open your task manager after launching a game, find FA in the details tab (not the processes tab) right click it and set core affinity and remove the checkmark on the first core and apply.

Well this was a popular thing to do by hand but I found it tedious so I automated it.

This was a bit tricky as normally no non-admin process could modify other threads in this way. But I found an old archaic Microsoft system32 tool, crudely named « Process » which you can pipe a process name to plus what you want it to do to it without requiring any privileges of any sort. Neat. #justwindowsthings

So I use process. Why do I place it in system32? Because that’s the equivalent on windows to adding it to the path suddenly when AHK makes a console call (Run) of that name (process) it is found. Perfect.

So what is this 1110, 111111111110 deal? Process takes ones and zeroes as arguments for its thread affinity parameter. One means « use thread » zero means « don’t use this thread  ». For whatever reason they are listed backwards, this is why the zero is last (we’re trying not to use the first thread). Ok so how many ones do I put? As many as you have threads on your CPU minus the last one where you’ll put a zero instead, an easy way to check is to open task manager and right click on the cpu graph and select « show logical cores » and count the graphs.

In the second line that calls process I do something else, what is that? Yes, I’m also setting FA’s process priority to high.

For 99% of apps this does ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. But for some reason FA is apparently not already getting a fair shake from window (8 and up (that means windows 10))’s task prioritizer. Weird, I know. We take those.

There now you understand the whole fullscreen/optimisation script.

AHK gets flagged as a hack/cheat/bot by Black Desert Online’s anti cheat software!

Uhm, if you’re letting rootkits onto your computer, you’re fucking yourself already, I can’t help there. Don’t play games that impose rootkit software as an anticheat, this needs to be intergrated into gamer culture. That these rootkits are « official » rootkits does not make it any better and it calling AHK « a cheat » is really the pot calling the kettle black considering rootkits are malware.

what’s the Linux step by step

Well the whole core optimisation thing is moot since Linux abstracts away threads and doesn’t « order » them or « start a process on a specific thread ». The overhead and prioritazation are also moot because you’re not emulating a full windows, just the parts you need, and lastly the windowed is moot because the emulation plus whatever DE you have basically kinda result in the same result. There’s only the multiple monitor thing I would be curious to know how to do.

Hope this helps thousands of people!

You need to make sure your audio is configured to stereo 16bit 44100MHz.

first set it to stereo, you do this by opening the old windows audio settings menu (go to configure) :

Now select Stereo :

Then you can set it to 44100 Hz in the "Advanced" tab :

there. you're now in stereo audio but there's a good chance this won't be enough if the first time you installed and ran FA, your computer was configured to use surround sound audio.

to persist these changes into FA, delete your Game.prefs file at (warning you'll loose your FA user config for example what mods are enabled, what settings you set, build templates) :

%LOCALAPPDATA%\Gas Powered Games\Supreme Commander Forged Alliance\Game.prefs

and re-create it by running Forged Alliance from steam and re-creating your username.

Now FA understands that it is in a stereo environment and audio will work.

You can remake your templates, and add your settings and ui mods back.

The bottom line is Forged Alliance and 5.1 or 7.1 surround sound are incompatible as FA was built before these techs were on the market so you have to choose.

however, in my experience. so long as FA is shut down when you switch your audio back to 5.1 or 7.1 and you switch your audio back to stereo before running FA again, everything works out.

Uh... hi!

do you like stats? I do!

Disclaimer : I didn't make ANY of these graphs and charts. The associated text are also mostly direct quotes so "I" in this thread does not mean "tatsu", I'll have a link below each, crediting source. You can check within who was speaking and creating the graphs. a majority of these were made by Sofltes. I don't make stats so I'll just be reposting everything relevant from the previous forum but there are rules for this thread: please only post stats. no debating. use other threads for that (feel free to hotlink a stat from this thread.)

Ideally post using :
https://plot.ly

this allows to continuously have up to date data.

I selected the latest ones and for those that had a plot.ly link I regenerated them. I ran through these and made them dark theme compatible.

this first one is actually from this forum :

Note: A "player" is defined as a person that plays at least a single game during said month using the client's services. Every data point is a month during that year.

Source : https://forum.faforever.com/topic/287/is-faf-growing

Here's what I wanna do, categorize the difficulties of AIs so that hopefully one day we have a simple non-confusing drop down for AIs including not only all AI mods but all AI mods sorted by difficulty and not only that, but an auto-matchmake AI option.

AND NOT ONLY THAT, but that same auto-matchmake AI (which is basically vs AI from starcraft where it ramps up or down the difficulty depending on your win or losses against it and you start against the easiest ((it's really really really well done in starcraft)) )
...would be used for the first 15 (or 20?) placement matches in matchmaking.

thereby providing at long last a potential solution to the "bar of entry" problem that newer players face with matchmaking AKA ladder.

with good metrics about what AIs are worth we would replace the current :

A seesaw of randomness during fifteen matches where first match you get placed vs Keyser, second match vs some -600, third match you're against Blackheart and that's about when you decide you've had enough.

with this:

first match is vs and AI easy, You actually loose so you get matched vs it again. you win this time, third match is vs an AI normal, you loose, you get placed vs it again, you win....

(at the end of this process the ladder rates you at about 300. insert obligatory "not great, not terrible")

but the experience and end result is clearly way better.

now.
I admit that even vs a uveso AIx (3.0 cheat modifier) most ladder players would do fine and that wont teach useful things to new ladder players but that's the keyword here NEW.

I don't think at the level of ladder I'm currently playing at (750), that any of my opponents could beat an uveso AIx (3.0 cheat modifier).

this serves the NEW players first and foremost who need this. And [us thousand plus played games] we're not about to go through placement matches right now, so we should focus on what the experience should be like for NEW players, that we want to see stay in the community and get better at the game.

I'm pretty sure that there are very good value lessons that this kind of AI is dishing out already without being too much of a detriment to fun or too much of a challenge.

To this end I'm asking for your help to categorize AIs, this won't take up much of your time

there are six AI mods worth downloading to my knowledge :

• "AI-Uveso" (a common mod for all AI mods)
• "AI-Swarm"
• "Nutcracker AI"
• "Dilli AI"
• "RNG AI"
• "micro AI"

add these and enable them in lobby (yes, they are inter-compatible)

test at least four of the 44 (yeah...) AI choices you'll have as a result and draft down your observations here :

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1GRkWb0x0PcvwdN5kgaXOl83qEOZ5EmUvvAc8Zrttwp0/edit#gid=0

thanks you all! It takes groundwork like this for years later a good mod to emerge. let's make history!

@BlackYps said in Graphic Artist Wanted:

We plan to show small icons in the matchmaking tab, so they should be 20 pixels high and no more than 40 pixels wide. five tiers with five subdivisions (I-V) each and then one top tier that has no subdivisions.

T1 :

T2 :

T3 :

T4 :

T5 :

Final Tier :

rejected ideas :

We also want to show a big version in a new leaderboard tab. The design there is not finished yet, but I estimate that there will be around 150-200 pixels of height available. You can see a first idea for the new leaderboard below. The big division graphic goes where the empty rectangle is.

big version pending approval of small version...

(two options, I could either redraw them in 400 x 200 beat for beat or I could start fresh on a 400 x 200 canvas, preserve the colors, but replace the numbers with icons and try to find something that works to communicate that subdivision )

I can't say it better than it's already been said by all the people in this thread, but here goes

I like the scale in particular,

from the outside looking in, the scale is daunting and then, once you try it and become accustomed to it, it's hard to imagine being without.

the immersion is another big one.

a majority of our awareness of the simulation happens subconsciously, it's something appreciated as a whole rather than as one particular interaction to point to, and yet pointing to the single interaction is the only way you can show someone else it's there, but the reason it matters is for the general feel.

The amount of situational turnaround in a typical game, the variety in gameplay and the sheer quantity of emergent gameplay and strategy.

I've been pulling back from the forum (forums are usually someplace I'm quite active) recently because the level of constant vitriol just drains my motivation to do so.

The discord? forget it. I'm with nine on this, this has to stop.

I'm trying to get people to come onto FAF. I keep recommending the forum and the discord, but there's always this nagging thought in the back of my head that it's a bad recommendation.

I hate that. I wish I could just recommend both with a clear head and no lingering thoughts of doubt.

I keep reminiscing about the GPG days and early to mid FAF days. I remember back then my experience of the online community made me think : "wow! people here have really built something special, where you can feel like a community!"

I legitimately thought there were very few if any nicer gamer communities on earth.

...

I understand that there's a realistic level we can aspire to today and that level isn't the early FAF days.

But we've got to start doing something.

We've got to have Some standards. rather than the none that we have right now.

In no other gaming community would it be acceptable for representatives of said community to be odious, vitriolic or use ad hominem attacks on a constant basis ....why is it tolerated on FAF?

This should not be the appearance we/FAF give off.

I made a recap of the differences on arqade, dunno how helpful it is : https://gaming.stackexchange.com/questions/130147/how-does-a-forged-alliance-player-learn-to-play-fa-forever/353014#353014

@DrWrongpipes

Is there a Discord for people to learn? Where higher level players could coach newbies to learn and chat? Because our only option is watching Gyle's casts which just covers the first two factories built by COMS and then hops round the map watching fights. There's barely any info out there on eco, base setup or unit composition that isn't being played or run through by someone at Heaven's level of speed and modded UI, which is almost impossible to follow.

That's a good question! this discord channel of the official FAF server serves this exact purpose : https://discord.gg/eUQdmppkMp

this guide is also quite useful : https://docs.google.com/document/d/13S4nBDfcBK4WmFtykXGKNmvIPe9L2nbiriISpHNgE4U/edit

The "Tutorials" Tab of FAF is utterly amazing.

playing through the four missions (and trying each mission's many choices) is absolutely vital.

And yeah Heaven is great once you actually start understanding what he's talking about.

but before you get to him :

The Dualist is a recently 1100 rated (so pretty low-to-average) player and his videos are quite educational : https://youtu.be/NK-LvGL9HKc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mAMIaYfSEBg

Decent is 500 and (so really much much more educational for newer players) : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWWRgX6BCIM&list=PLF2T-nFgLhNAcMlujh4oqKsTqhTTpLhd3

Recently Brnk started making tutorials as well and they're top-notch IMO : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvMnSDvHV-U&list=PL8njGw0L9GCMmWuVXUix1t_0rQ5phYRU1

Gyle does a series where he learns to play the game with pros : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NHG6xs7DuA&list=PLghkifCs4DHOOSdrpE6yNjCcYLkh-gixM

and Medicraze really high production-values tutorials : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZymQ--z-lzo&list=PLfoxTfv2F6On8zyb7IvN-_xEQTjHmXvoj

Speed made and excellent tutorial playlist of his own : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_uPjOxCTEng&list=PLTEDjzjPnGIoh43j6c2jNIYINPxgJnzoh&index=2

Somewhat outdated in terms of balance but most thorough and great for noobs TheForgedAllianceColonel's tutorials : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QhM7oC-t7U&list=PLWe0mYs3ObwL36zemynMh5G4b-3s5vol0

I personally find Jagged Appliance highly educational to watch, his commentary is a bit higher level but honestly not the technical level Heaven is on, he's really clear and I feel like he's easy to understand and it really helps that he really really knows what he's talking about : https://www.youtube.com/c/JaggedAppliance/videos

On another note I have an idea to maybe help combat the effect of players feeling outmatched. I posted about it before :

https://forum.faforever.com/topic/309/ai-megathread

The idea is that Starcraft 2 allows players to gradually ease themselves into ladder by having a vs AI mode that functions like a ladder.

where loosing a couple matches will place you against an AI that doesn't leave it's base as much and that is worse in economy and build order but the more you win the tougher (and more resemblent to a human) the AI gets. sometimes going as far as employing cheese strat rushes.

Doing something like this in for FAF would really help cushion the giant pit of spikes of doom that is switching from playing Forged Alliance/SupCom AI-Bash or FAF survival maps / co-op campaign to trying out PVP in any form on FAF.

Most people don't know what they're doing and a lot of that comes from forming terrible habits of "waiting while I build up" with the frankly not revolutionary SsupCom & FA campaigns. (although on the plus side apparently the Seraphim Campaign and the Nomads campaign took a turn for the better in that regard.)

But even the AI in FA specifically encourages turtling for newer players.

Now I'm not saying that skill gap is the only problem, but I certainly believe that helping bridging the gap will help newer players face less animosity.

As for the lobby antics (greys, pings, rating, game count) these sort of things just don't matter when you just click queue for TMM (Team Match Maker).

you play, you win or you loose, who cares it's gg's all round anyways. and it's then the FAF matchmaking bot's job to balance you so you don't have to worry about how good or bad you are, it'll eventually place you with players like you and you'll be able to progress.

Which is why I humbly believe that if we sorted AIs by difficulty and created an "AI competitive ladder" that could serve as a stepping stone for getting to TMM, this would remove a lot of the fear.

Also we need to make nomads campaign native. it shouldn't have to be installed separately.

So yeah newer players, head on to here: https://forum.faforever.com/topic/309/ai-megathread and rate the AI. yes, we want your appreciation of them. it would really help. (the AI mods not the vanilla AI.)

@humanpotatoe said in Why would you have left FAF?:

the only way to rank up for my new account was to play endless toxic gap games

the ... ONLY ... way?

how?
You can host your own games.

and when you do you can pick any other map.

and when you do, trust you me, it'll fill. not in a billionth of a second... ok... but it'll fill... at worst in a minute, on average in 25 seconds.

I'm just trying to help here.

We think gap is a plague, you think gap is a plague. good. let's get you out of there.

@macdeffy if you don't delete Forged Alliance's config file in between each change there's no reason for your changes to have any effect on Forged Alliance.
deleting the Forged Alliance's config file is part of the fix it's a non-optional step.

@Gzack I have no idea what you're doing or why you're having this experience.
using FAF on linux is easy. you just do this:

(in this video where java 14 is mentioned just do java 17 instead) :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rv3ZXA4FNFk

@angrydeli said in Up to date thread of good casters:

You should defintely add Paralon https://www.youtube.com/c/ParalonFAF

done.

@jip said in Game Councilor:

A 10x10 Desert themed map

god that's gorgeous.

@spikeynoob https://forum.faforever.com/topic/12/linux-support/156

@buzalbash no this is exactly what this script accomplishes.

@zorglub It really doesn't take long at all. the steam download of itself isn't very long.

@thecore said in [Guide] : fake-fullscreen and optimisation:

Also i am working on an interface in python

nice!

yuck python, but nice anyways!

let me know once it's done

actually you and @io_nox should be collaborating and making something together.

@zorglub yes it is indeed because you installed the flatpack version of steam. I recommend you delete that and any leftover steam files

(do not attempt to have a flatpak steam simultaneously with a native steam that is a terrible idea)

if you want to avoid redownloding the games you downloaded, you can take the folder in : steam called "common" that is under "steamapps" (if you right-click on the game in the steam library you can open the folder where the game is installed, then by going up one folder you'll have the "common" folder.) you can move that folder to another place, (say Documents) and then delete steam flatpak and install steam as a native.

when you are here : https://store.steampowered.com/about/ it gives you the right file.

you can run it by right clicking in empty space in the folder you downloaded steam to then selecting "open in terminal" and in the window that pops up, type in :
(I'm assuming you're on Pop_OS, ubuntu, mint, kubuntu, Zorin,... basically debian based. if not and you're on Manjaro or something like that, you'll have to do something else like sudo pacman -S steam )

sudo dpkg -i steam_latest.deb

(you'll need to type in your password)

then follow the steps and then you'll be able to run steam from your start menu.
make sure to enable proton for all games in the options (steam was completely reinstalled so you need to do everything again)

then you can close steam, move your "common" folder to :
"~/.steam/steam/steamapps"

then start steam back up and start the download for the games you previously had installed.

steam will recognize the games are already in the right folder and simply "discover" them instead and then they'll be installed.

then you can try again by giving steam the run arguments I talk about in my video
run FA once from steam, go fetch the run file and put it in your FAF install dir and point to that in the FAF options.

and you should be good to go.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rv3ZXA4FNFk

@esthetics of what? I don't know what you're talking about. FA is 32bit.