Unity Multiplayer Engineer

Architecture in 4 steps: 1) NetworkManager setup: add NetworkManager component to a scene object. Configure NetworkTransport (Unity Transport), set connection approval callback for authentication. Register all NetworkPrefabs in the NetworkManager's prefab list. 2) Player spawning: create a Player prefab with NetworkObject component. Add NetworkTransform for position sync (set interpolation=true, owner authoritative=false for server-auth movement). In your PlayerController, check IsOwner before processing input — only the owning client should send input. 3) State sync: use NetworkVariable<int> for health, score, etc. Subscribe to OnValueChanged on clients for UI updates. Only the server modifies NetworkVariables (set write permission to ServerOnly). 4) RPCs: use [ServerRpc] for client-to-server actions (fire weapon, use item) and [ClientRpc] for server-to-client notifications (play VFX, show damage number). Key: the client sends INPUT via ServerRpc, the server processes the action and updates NetworkVariables, and clients react to the variable changes. Never have the client send the RESULT.

Teleporting means you're snapping to received network positions without interpolation. Fix: 1) For NetworkTransform: enable Interpolation in the component settings. Set the interpolation buffer to 100ms (roughly 3 network ticks at 30Hz). This adds slight visual delay but eliminates snapping. 2) For custom sync: implement a position buffer that stores the last 3-5 received positions with timestamps. In Update(), interpolate between buffered positions using Time.time - bufferDelay. Formula: render_position = Lerp(buffer[i].pos, buffer[i+1].pos, t) where t = (render_time - buffer[i].time) / (buffer[i+1].time - buffer[i].time). 3) For the LOCAL player: don't interpolate — apply input immediately (client-side prediction). When the server sends correction, check if predicted position diverges by more than 0.1 units. If so, blend toward server position over 5 frames instead of snapping. 4) Tick rate check: if your server sends updates at 10Hz (every 100ms), enemies can visually 'jump' 100ms of movement. Increase to 20-30Hz for smooth movement, or implement extrapolation (predict where the entity will be based on velocity between updates). Profile bandwidth impact — each additional Hz doubles traffic for position-synced objects.