Need advice for graphics tweaking in 'Rise of Tomb Raider'

[J.b091]

I just bought this game, started playing it with my rig (i7, 16GB RAM, GTX 1070 & 2560x1080 resolution monitor) & with almost ultra settings (Only AA is set with SMAA & Ambient Occlusion is - HBAO+) I'm having issues: In most areas I have stable 60 fps, but when I go outside, sometimes fps drops to 52, even 47 in some places, which causes lag. Before I process with my main question, I must say that I pay attention to graphics a lot and enjoy setting it as up as possible, but I also want to maintain stable 60 fps. So, I'm with this dilemma, sacrifice graphics or fps. So my main question is - can you recommend me graphics setup so that it doesn't degrade much (looks noticeably worse) in visuals, but I also maintain 60 fps even outside. I tried with few settings. First I tried shadows, set it to high from very high and fps increase was very minimum - 1 or 2, then tried medium, still it didn't give me big numbers, then low, but it was still below 60, at the end I turned it off at all, and only after that I got 60, but playing without shadows is big no no for me, so I don't know what settings to lower. I also noticed if I change HBAO+ to VXAO, I got even big fps drop, it's very demanding, so I left it back to HBAO+. I don't know what else to try. I'm so sad that even with high end card like GTX 1070 I still can't play Tomb Raider with stable 60 and I'm not even on 4k or even full 1440p

[Cereal5]

If you don't know what the settings does, turn it down to medium or low. All others can be one step below whatever the max option is. ROTTR is a very demanding game, and absolute max settings in almost any game can be hard to achieve at a playable frame rate.

[Paul Rudd]

10 hours ago, J.b091 said:

In most areas I have stable 60 fps, but when I go outside, sometimes fps drops to 52, even 47 in some places, which causes lag.

Set all your settings to low/OFF and see if this is still happening. If it is, you know it's the game itself. Open world games tend to do this and most benchmarks will show this. To maximize your fps in general, use this Rise of the Tomb Raider Guide. I can already tell you that VXAO will take away at least 10 fps using it and using SSAA 4x will take away at least 20 fps instead of using just FXAA. SSMA 2x is around a 14 fps difference than FXAA and Reshade SMAA is around just a 2 fps difference than FXAA so I'd probably go with the Reshade SMAA or just SMAA for around a 1 fps difference than FXAA. Follow the guide for every other individual setting and they provide pictures for you to distinguish the look of your personal preference.

 

Example: Shadow quality is a major fps hit, indicated in this picture.

The visual difference is very noticeable between each setting. It's all about personal preference and sacrifice. Personally, I'd go with High if you just have to make sure shadows look almost as good as ultra. However, for around another 6-7 fps, you may want to consider Medium. The difference visually is definitely noticeable but it could be worth the fps. Again, it's all about personal preference and sacrifice. Make the game look better, play better or a balance between the two.

 

Shadows High vs Medium

Shadows High vs Medium 2

 

As you can see in the next 2 pictures, the difference between Very High and High is not worth going with Very High. Imo the fps is more important than not seeing tiny jaggies(pic 2 below) or complete shadow(pic 1 below) in my shadows. High is basically the well balanced sacrifice but Medium needs to be considered for people looking to go above and beyond 60 fps basically.

 

Shadows Very High vs High

Shadows Very High vs High 2

 

The rest is up to you. There's guides at this same website that I also recommend for other games. GTA 5, Mass Effect Andromeda, The Division, Watch Dogs 2, etc. The games without guides you would think are the games that are tough to optimize. Like Ghost Recon Wildlands.

[J.b091]

12 hours ago, A Random Dude said:

Set all your settings to low/OFF and see if this is still happening. If it is, you know it's the game itself. Open world games tend to do this and most benchmarks will show this. To maximize your fps in general, use this Rise of the Tomb Raider Guide. I can already tell you that VXAO will take away at least 10 fps using it and using SSAA 4x will take away at least 20 fps instead of using just FXAA. SSMA 2x is around a 14 fps difference than FXAA and Reshade SMAA is around just a 2 fps difference than FXAA so I'd probably go with the Reshade SMAA or just SMAA for around a 1 fps difference than FXAA. Follow the guide for every other individual setting and they provide pictures for you to distinguish the look of your personal preference.

 

Example: Shadow quality is a major fps hit, indicated in this picture.

The visual difference is very noticeable between each setting. It's all about personal preference and sacrifice. Personally, I'd go with High if you just have to make sure shadows look almost as good as ultra. However, for around another 6-7 fps, you may want to consider Medium. The difference visually is definitely noticeable but it could be worth the fps. Again, it's all about personal preference and sacrifice. Make the game look better, play better or a balance between the two.

 

Shadows High vs Medium

Shadows High vs Medium 2

 

As you can see in the next 2 pictures, the difference between Very High and High is not worth going with Very High. Imo the fps is more important than not seeing tiny jaggies(pic 2 below) or complete shadow(pic 1 below) in my shadows. High is basically the well balanced sacrifice but Medium needs to be considered for people looking to go above and beyond 60 fps basically.

 

Shadows Very High vs High

Shadows Very High vs High 2

 

The rest is up to you. There's guides at this same website that I also recommend for other games. GTA 5, Mass Effect Andromeda, The Division, Watch Dogs 2, etc. The games without guides you would think are the games that are tough to optimize. Like Ghost Recon Wildlands.

Thx for reply. I tried DX12 mode and surprisingly I got better results (gained more fps). Now game stays almost 60 (58-56) with everything maxed out except Ambient occlusion which is on HBAO+ & AA is set on SMAA. I still thinking to exchange my card with GTX 1080 from me adding additional money, or maybe downgrade my monitor to normal 1920x1080 24 inch monitor...

[Paul Rudd]

9 hours ago, J.b091 said:

I still thinking to exchange my card with GTX 1080 from me adding additional money, or maybe downgrade my monitor to normal 1920x1080 24 inch monitor...

No reason to get a 1080, it won't make much of a difference in this game if you only have a 60Hz monitor. 60 fps is the highest your monitor will go. Downgrading to a normal 1080p monitor would be the better move and it also makes a lot of sense to get one with more hertz so it will show more than 60 fps. That i7/1070 combo is perfect for it.

 

You just missed major sales on monitors but there is still decent prices that won't exactly break the bank. There's a 24" 75Hz LG monitor for $110 right now at B&H or Bestbuy. 27" Dell 1080p 75Hz for $120. If 60Hz is all you want then it's only $80-$100 for 24" 1080p monitors at Bestbuy. They were literally $60 on Black Friday.

[Mira Yurizaki]

10 hours ago, J.b091 said:

Thx for reply. I tried DX12 mode and surprisingly I got better results (gained more fps). Now game stays almost 60 (58-56) with everything maxed out except Ambient occlusion which is on HBAO+ & AA is set on SMAA. I still thinking to exchange my card with GTX 1080 from me adding additional money, or maybe downgrade my monitor to normal 1920x1080 24 inch monitor...

Instead of downgrading the monitor, just play at 1920x1080 and in the NVIDIA control panel have the GPU do the scaling. You can either do 1:1 or keep the aspect ratio and it'll look fine on your monitor, just with black borders on either side.

[J.b091]

16 hours ago, M.Yurizaki said:

Instead of downgrading the monitor, just play at 1920x1080 and in the NVIDIA control panel have the GPU do the scaling. You can either do 1:1 or keep the aspect ratio and it'll look fine on your monitor, just with black borders on either side.

No no, I don't want black borders, neither GPU scaled image.

[J.b091]

16 hours ago, A Random Dude said:

No reason to get a 1080, it won't make much of a difference in this game if you only have a 60Hz monitor. 60 fps is the highest your monitor will go. Downgrading to a normal 1080p monitor would be the better move and it also makes a lot of sense to get one with more hertz so it will show more than 60 fps. That i7/1070 combo is perfect for it.

 

You just missed major sales on monitors but there is still decent prices that won't exactly break the bank. There's a 24" 75Hz LG monitor for $110 right now at B&H or Bestbuy. 27" Dell 1080p 75Hz for $120. If 60Hz is all you want then it's only $80-$100 for 24" 1080p monitors at Bestbuy. They were literally $60 on Black Friday.

I think you're right and downgrading to normal 1080p monitor is a better idea, especially it won't worth me a penny as I can exchange my monitor to my wife's 24 inch monitor, I will only need to buy VGA to DIsplay port adapter. Plus cutscenes look cropped on my 29 ultrawide monitor in most games, including Rise of tomb raider. I'm tired from it, think going back to normal 1080p will be better. 

Just, bought that adapter this morning.