Cryptic doesn't use Verizon or Congent. This is a user end problem more so than Cryptic's problem.
That is to say, for instance, I travel through congent's ISP Network on my way to the Cryptic servers. They could up and move the servers anywhere and if you end up going through Congent's services you're still going to have the problem.
While at face value that may be true, it is not true from a practical standpoint. If you build a restaurant that can only be accessed via 2 bridges and one of those bridges goes out you stand to lose half your business. Replacing the bridge might not be your problem, but getting it replaced/fixed is in your best interest.
So these issues may be occurring outside the direct control of Cryptic, if it continues, they stand to lose a lot of customers.
I don't know the network topology, in terms of where Congent gets thrown into the mix, but the solution is to have more than one data center such that no one 3rd party company can affect your traffic.
And what will stop some company from throttling or creating a bottleneck in some other region?
A bad router at one hop can cause major packet loss and interruption.
I mean they could place the servers anywhere and I doubt they could win for everyone, because somewhere, somehow you would have bottlenecks the will effect part of the player population. It's basically a "damned if you do and damned if you don't" type of situation.
Even with a region server placed, it would still need to communicate with the master server for the shard system. Unless you are going to make region servers separate. And then that would defeat the purpose of the "mega" server. Add in, I doubt character transfers would be free.
It just doesn't seem to be a wise business move at the moment. If they had started out that way in the beginning, it would be different. To change gears now to accomplish that would not take place in the amount of time the current player base would be happy with.
Distance is mentioned as 'not a factor' by a green titled poster in this thread, and specifically China to Texas, which is why I referred to the China-Texas route.
A server in a place outside of cogents ability to throttle things would fix the situation for all the non-US posters that are having problems. Problem solved by Cryptic for them, and no more worries about net neutrality stuff.
Look at Cogent's map provided in this very thread. The likelihood that any regional server could be placed in an area that would NOT have to go through Cogent's network is extremely low. Cogent has quite a sizable reach in the EU as well, after all--their lines pass through many major EU hubs.
ROLL TIDE ROLL
Great Weapon Fighter: Because when is today not a good day to die?
PC and PS4 player. Proud Guildmaster for PS4 Team Fencebane. Rank 5 Officer for PC Team Fencebane. Visit us at http://fencebane.shivtr.com
0
zebularMember, Neverwinter Moderator, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 15,270Community Moderator
Distance is mentioned as 'not a factor' by a green titled poster in this thread, and specifically China to Texas, which is why I referred to the China-Texas route.
A server in a place outside of cogents ability to throttle things would fix the situation for all the non-US posters that are having problems. Problem solved by Cryptic for them, and no more worries about net neutrality stuff.
. . . I do have a name, you know. Furthermore, you're taking what I said out of context (from another thread entirely, mind you, where you tried to point that out before). To put it back in, "Distance is only a factor when hardware and software to not meet the requirements." What I said before stands true to what is happening with ISP's that throttle their users. These ISP relays are not meeting the requirements for the users, hence distance becomes a factor if you lay between such an ISP Relay and your destination.
Hi Guys, been lurking for a while but first post, so hello
I was a customer of Cryptic for nearly 7 years when I played their now closed game "City of Heroes".
I am still in my same location (UK) and by and large my same provider and equipment.
I used to play at all times of the day and night and never had any problems with disconnects/lag et cetera.
The lack of problems with Cryptic then was a major factor on me starting to play NW but am now, along with you others, plagued by unavailability to play, especially during our late night hours.
So what has changed with Cryptic? Wonder why they are not using the same stuff as they did way back?
Just curious really given that I know they used to be able to work around these problems.
Cheers
0
zebularMember, Neverwinter Moderator, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 15,270Community Moderator
So what has changed with Cryptic? Wonder why they are not using the same stuff as they did way back?
Just curious really given that I know they used to be able to work around these problems.
Cheers
. . . It's more that the ISP companies around the world have been changing, and not necessarily for the better, as is evident by the ongoing "Net-Neutrality" movement happening around the world. If you look at changes to ISPs that your connection gets relayed to, through, and from -- I'd be willing to bet that you'd be able to spot what has been going on. With such monopolies on the routes for the internet, some ISPs can almost do what they want with impunity, this makes it hard for internet-reliant companies (MMOs) to do anything regarding companies they have no legal or jurisdiction to file complaints. If they change companies, their internet traffic will still most likely have to go through these companies anyway for users that have to go through them and vice verse.
. . . I'm in the U.S. and thankfully I've never been hopped through any of these companies that throttle to get to Cryptic and I have also been a gamer of Cryptic's games since the CoH days and CO/STO betas and so forth. My connection has always been impeccable... but then again I have also had the same ISP since, which is one of - if not the biggest ISP company in the U.S. Long ago, with a DSL company I had, I used to get hopped all over the place just trying to connect from Florida to California but my connection from there to Australia was impeccable - which was really weird to me at the time before I got educated on how the internet works by my sister who is a Network Technician.
Hi Guys, been lurking for a while but first post, so hello
I was a customer of Cryptic for nearly 7 years when I played their now closed game "City of Heroes".
I am still in my same location (UK) and by and large my same provider and equipment.
I used to play at all times of the day and night and never had any problems with disconnects/lag et cetera.
The lack of problems with Cryptic then was a major factor on me starting to play NW but am now, along with you others, plagued by unavailability to play, especially during our late night hours.
So what has changed with Cryptic? Wonder why they are not using the same stuff as they did way back?
Just curious really given that I know they used to be able to work around these problems.
Cheers
Let's say ISP A owns a segment of the market which doesn't have many customers, but a lot of people do have to travel across their lines in order to get to a popular destination. They see an opportunity to "tax" those who want to go through them unimpeded, and increase their bottom line. It's a slippery slope, IMO, since before ISPs were supposed to simply allow traffic from all sources, equally.
<::::::::::::::)xxxo <::::::::::::::)xxxo <::::::::::::)xxxxxxxx(:::::::::::> oxxx(::::::::::::::> oxxx(::::::::::::::> "Is it better to be feared or respected? I say, is it too much to ask for both?" -Tony Stark Official NW_Legit_Community Forums
Soooo....
Making a Close up , we are ***** until the ISPS companies decide to provide a good service?
For worst, Im from Argentina, and my ISP is Arnet, they probably are connected to one of this ISPS you are mentioned before, its not secret that south america ISPS cables go to USA (And most are USA Companies camouflaged as National ISPS)
And today, just as mysteriously as it came, the lags and the disconnects left. I didn't change any settings on my pc, internet or graphic but, poof, perfect lag free gaming.
Guess someone took their hand off the internet's neck.
And today, just as mysteriously as it came, the lags and the disconnects left. I didn't change any settings on my pc, internet or graphic but, poof, perfect lag free gaming.
Guess someone took their hand off the internet's neck.
Or at least nothing detectable. I don't think "lag free" truly exists.
ROLL TIDE ROLL
Great Weapon Fighter: Because when is today not a good day to die?
PC and PS4 player. Proud Guildmaster for PS4 Team Fencebane. Rank 5 Officer for PC Team Fencebane. Visit us at http://fencebane.shivtr.com
And today, just as mysteriously as it came, the lags and the disconnects left. I didn't change any settings on my pc, internet or graphic but, poof, perfect lag free gaming.
Guess someone took their hand off the internet's neck.
Im going to check that out, hope you'r right!
PSD: Thx lewstelamon01 for correcting and editing my post's :P hahahaha
Putting a server in the EU would solve the issue for all the EU folks, and everyone else outside ths US if you want to take the position that the speed of China-Texas routing is no problem, since asia-EU is about the same distance.
Since Asia-EU is about the same distance, they should put the servers in Asia instead. That would benefit the Asians, Oceanic, and it won't be any worse for EU. Not because I live in SEA, but just sayin'
Anyway back on topic, this morning (GMT+8) I got in 1.5 hours of solid gaming with only an occasional slowdown (no SNR). Hope it stays this way...
During high traffic (lots of people on) hours I cannot play the game. Let me emphasize this more, I CANNOT play this game when I want to or have the time to. I have confirmed it is not my router, wifi, wired, modem, or lines to my local ISP. The tech just checked today. This has been going on since Thursday last week at 9pm CST. I log in and within a minute get disconnected. I log in during lower traffic times and there is never a problem, but come 9 - 12 pm CST, when I can play with my guild nonetheless; I CANNOT play. PWE, just pay them the money they want to give you priority or this Casher is going to leave all your games services.
During high traffic (lots of people on) hours I cannot play the game. Let me emphasize this more, I CANNOT play this game when I want to or have the time to. I have confirmed it is not my router, wifi, wired, modem, or lines to my local ISP. The tech just checked today. This has been going on since Thursday last week at 9pm CST. I log in and within a minute get disconnected. I log in during lower traffic times and there is never a problem, but come 9 - 12 pm CST, when I can play with my guild nonetheless; I CANNOT play. PWE, just pay them the money they want to give you priority or this Casher is going to leave all your games services.
Have you done a tracert?
A world to defend
A city to protect
innocents to save
"Why?" They ask "they hate you"
We're heroes it's what we do.
*patiently waiting on Paragon City*
Tracing route to patchserver.crypticstudios.com [208.95.185.41]
over a maximum of 30 hops:
1 2 ms <1 ms <1 ms 10.0.0.1
2 * * * Request timed out.
3 11 ms 9 ms 8 ms 24.144.1.89
4 11 ms 10 ms 9 ms 66-194-86-233.static.twtelecom.net [66.194.86.23
3]
5 23 ms 23 ms 23 ms 64-129-238-78.static.twtelecom.net [64.129.238.7
8]
6 36 ms 26 ms 23 ms 64.132.69.98
7 98 ms 95 ms 107 ms 207.88.13.242.ptr.us.xo.net [207.88.13.242]
8 87 ms 95 ms 95 ms te-3-2-0.rar3.chicago-il.us.xo.net [207.88.12.13
]
9 100 ms 91 ms 91 ms ae0d0.mcr2.cambridge-ma.us.xo.net [216.156.0.30]
10 67 ms 67 ms 65 ms 209.117.103.10
11 67 ms 71 ms 78 ms border11.te8-1-bbnet2.bsn.pnap.net [63.251.128.1
04]
12 72 ms 71 ms 74 ms perfectworldent-4.border11.bsn.pnap.net [216.52.
61.78]
13 85 ms 78 ms 78 ms patchserver2.crypticstudios.com [208.95.185.41]
Wow. No cogent.co in your route. Never seen that before - where are logging in from, if you don't mind disclosing..? Hops from 7 onward look a bit laggy though. At least in comparison.
I was on last night from about 9pm gmt+2 to 2am gmt+2, on both characters in both pvp and IWD areas. It was also pretty busy, so, number of instanced players is not a direct factor. Well, at least below x tipping point anyway.
Little Rock, Arkansas - Jonkoca
I use a local cable company who I thought used Comcast connectivity but now I'm not certain.
0
ambisinisterrMember, Neverwinter ModeratorPosts: 10,462Community Moderator
edited June 2014
I live in New York. The servers are in the Boston area. In a nutshell I am close to them. A lot closer than Zeb for instance without disclosing his location. However I recently switched to Verizon Fios and Verizon is partnered with Congent somehow, some way.
When I had Comcast I never got routed through Congent and thus never lagged. Now that I am using Verizon I can always tell when I get routed through Congent and every few months it actually reaches a state near unplayability.
But here's the thing and the reason why this is a user problem: your ISP chooses your route.
Cryptic can not choose the route and say they don't want their users going through Congent or any other crappy service.
And again I'm close to the servers. Crappy service is crappy service. If the service wasn't <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> the lag would not be noticeable whether you lived in China or in New York. They could put a server every hundred miles but a <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> internet provider will still provide <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> service to whoever has to go through that service to get there.
So really, truly, the only solution is to demand better service from ISP's and stop the suits from voting on changes to laws when it's clear the only opinion they listened to is from those who stood to gain from it. I mean, there are reasons why customer neutrality laws were put in to place for every industry years ago...
But as I have said for years....the government is seriously run by people who don't know a computer from a typewriter and are not qualified for the job anymore considering the majority of new laws have to consider digital trade.
I just heard a small newsreport on the radio yesterday that the FCC* is actually investigating ISP's (like Verizon and Cogent) due to the throttling/poor-gaming-performance that many users have been experiencing/complaining about. It seems that the ISPs are trying to "strong-arm" the gaming companies, like Cryptic/PWE into paying more for "special" higher speed networking.
*FCC - Federal Communications Commision for those outside of the US.
Aha, mystery solved. "Throttling your honour..? What throttling..? Us, nooooo, we'd never do that..."
(Quick flunky A, turn off the throttling !!!)
No idea what my toon is now.
0
mircalla83Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Knight of the Feywild UsersPosts: 36
edited June 2014
Personally, I'd think it will end up with the ISPs getting their way anyway. Since why would a Commission smite down on the people that create a reason for the Commissions' existance in the first place. If they would take their job seriously, the pseudomonopoly the US ISPs have by neatly splitting up the country wouldn't exist in the first place.
Tracing route to patchserver.crypticstudios.com [208.95.185.41]
over a maximum of 30 hops:
1 2 ms <1 ms <1 ms 10.0.0.1 2 * * * Request timed out. 3 11 ms 9 ms 8 ms 24.144.1.89
4 11 ms 10 ms 9 ms 66-194-86-233.static.twtelecom.net [66.194.86.23
3]
5 23 ms 23 ms 23 ms 64-129-238-78.static.twtelecom.net [64.129.238.7
8]
6 36 ms 26 ms 23 ms 64.132.69.98
7 98 ms 95 ms 107 ms 207.88.13.242.ptr.us.xo.net [207.88.13.242]
8 87 ms 95 ms 95 ms te-3-2-0.rar3.chicago-il.us.xo.net [207.88.12.13
]
9 100 ms 91 ms 91 ms ae0d0.mcr2.cambridge-ma.us.xo.net [216.156.0.30]
10 67 ms 67 ms 65 ms 209.117.103.10
11 67 ms 71 ms 78 ms border11.te8-1-bbnet2.bsn.pnap.net [63.251.128.1
04]
12 72 ms 71 ms 74 ms perfectworldent-4.border11.bsn.pnap.net [216.52.
61.78]
13 85 ms 78 ms 78 ms patchserver2.crypticstudios.com [208.95.185.41]
Trace complete.
That 2nd hop could be your problem - have you tried running traceroute several times to see if you can get a consistent name/address for that hop? It could be your immediate ISP throttling you directly.
That 2nd hop could be your problem - have you tried running traceroute several times to see if you can get a consistent name/address for that hop? It could be your immediate ISP throttling you directly.
The 2nd hop is most likely their router - a firewall or node that does not respond to anonymous ping request will return a "request timed out" response. It's not an issue in and of itself.
<::::::::::::::)xxxo <::::::::::::::)xxxo <::::::::::::)xxxxxxxx(:::::::::::> oxxx(::::::::::::::> oxxx(::::::::::::::> "Is it better to be feared or respected? I say, is it too much to ask for both?" -Tony Stark Official NW_Legit_Community Forums
0
mircalla83Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Knight of the Feywild UsersPosts: 36
edited June 2014
The 'Router denies Ping' is to my knowledge the default setting these days, since it can discourage or distract 'Script Kiddies' running blanketed Portscans. First scan the IP via Ping, and log the IPs that gave a reply, then scan those for open ports on the general open areas (21, 80, 6667-6669 (IRC) and so on). Thats a very rough summary, but I have not dug deeply into that in over 10 years.
I just heard a small newsreport on the radio yesterday that the FCC* is actually investigating ISP's (like Verizon and Cogent) due to the throttling/poor-gaming-performance that many users have been experiencing/complaining about. It seems that the ISPs are trying to "strong-arm" the gaming companies, like Cryptic/PWE into paying more for "special" higher speed networking.
*FCC - Federal Communications Commision for those outside of the US.
This is an example of when I can connect without issues of disconnecting like at this very moment.
Tracing route to patchserver.crypticstudios.com [208.95.185.41]
over a maximum of 30 hops:
1 2 ms <1 ms <1 ms 10.0.0.1
2 * * * Request timed out.
3 11 ms 9 ms 8 ms 24.144.1.89
4 11 ms 10 ms 9 ms 66-194-86-233.static.twtelecom.net [66.194.86.23
3]
5 23 ms 23 ms 23 ms 64-129-238-78.static.twtelecom.net [64.129.238.7
8]
6 36 ms 26 ms 23 ms 64.132.69.98
7 98 ms 95 ms 107 ms 207.88.13.242.ptr.us.xo.net [207.88.13.242]
8 87 ms 95 ms 95 ms te-3-2-0.rar3.chicago-il.us.xo.net [207.88.12.13
]
9 100 ms 91 ms 91 ms ae0d0.mcr2.cambridge-ma.us.xo.net [216.156.0.30]
10 67 ms 67 ms 65 ms 209.117.103.10
11 67 ms 71 ms 78 ms border11.te8-1-bbnet2.bsn.pnap.net [63.251.128.1
04]
12 72 ms 71 ms 74 ms perfectworldent-4.border11.bsn.pnap.net [216.52.
61.78]
13 85 ms 78 ms 78 ms patchserver2.crypticstudios.com [208.95.185.41]
Trace complete.
It doesn't appear much different to me, so yes I'm going to be hounding my ISP for a bit now.
There's a reason why cogent is so cheap and most ISPs avoid them except as a backup line. They're notorious for selling far more bandwidth than they actually have available with the hope that their customers will never actually use all the bandwidth that they're paying for. With cogent it's usually not an issue with throttling. It's them selling 100 gigabits in an area where there's only 50 gigabits available. All ISPs do it to some extent, but cogent is one of the worst when it comes to overselling.
0
zebularMember, Neverwinter Moderator, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 15,270Community Moderator
I live in New York. The servers are in the Boston area. In a nutshell I am close to them. A lot closer than Zeb for instance without disclosing his location. However I recently switched to Verizon Fios and Verizon is partnered with Congent somehow, some way.
When I had Comcast I never got routed through Congent and thus never lagged. Now that I am using Verizon I can always tell when I get routed through Congent and every few months it actually reaches a state near unplayability.
. . . No worries, I am in Michigan (I've said it a few times, so its no secret). I have been a loyal and happy customer of Comcast's for many years now. The only times I have any real connection issues to complain about is when the power goes out, and even then it's not Comcast's fault. Thankfully Comcast is massive in the U.S. and can pull a lot of weight to keep their customers happy and they actually seem like they want to make their customers happy, despite being a bit expensive. Comcast even does non-profit community building work all across the U.S. Heck, Comcast even now owns Universal Studios, Paramount, and NBC... If ever I did start noticing me being routed through Cogent to connect within the U.S. - you'd be able to win a bet that I'd call Comcast and complain immediately as well as whatever channels I need to go through to continue my support of the Net-Neutrality - something Comcast appears to support also.
Comments
While at face value that may be true, it is not true from a practical standpoint. If you build a restaurant that can only be accessed via 2 bridges and one of those bridges goes out you stand to lose half your business. Replacing the bridge might not be your problem, but getting it replaced/fixed is in your best interest.
So these issues may be occurring outside the direct control of Cryptic, if it continues, they stand to lose a lot of customers.
I don't know the network topology, in terms of where Congent gets thrown into the mix, but the solution is to have more than one data center such that no one 3rd party company can affect your traffic.
A bad router at one hop can cause major packet loss and interruption.
I mean they could place the servers anywhere and I doubt they could win for everyone, because somewhere, somehow you would have bottlenecks the will effect part of the player population. It's basically a "damned if you do and damned if you don't" type of situation.
Even with a region server placed, it would still need to communicate with the master server for the shard system. Unless you are going to make region servers separate. And then that would defeat the purpose of the "mega" server. Add in, I doubt character transfers would be free.
It just doesn't seem to be a wise business move at the moment. If they had started out that way in the beginning, it would be different. To change gears now to accomplish that would not take place in the amount of time the current player base would be happy with.
Netflix packets being dropped every day because Verizon wants more money
Verizon wants to be paid by consumers and Cogent, but Cogent refuses to pay.
Look at Cogent's map provided in this very thread. The likelihood that any regional server could be placed in an area that would NOT have to go through Cogent's network is extremely low. Cogent has quite a sizable reach in the EU as well, after all--their lines pass through many major EU hubs.
Great Weapon Fighter: Because when is today not a good day to die?
PC and PS4 player. Proud Guildmaster for PS4 Team Fencebane. Rank 5 Officer for PC Team Fencebane. Visit us at http://fencebane.shivtr.com
[ Support Center • Rules & Policies and Guidelines • ARC ToS • Guild Recruitment Guidelines | FR DM Since 1993 ]
I was a customer of Cryptic for nearly 7 years when I played their now closed game "City of Heroes".
I am still in my same location (UK) and by and large my same provider and equipment.
I used to play at all times of the day and night and never had any problems with disconnects/lag et cetera.
The lack of problems with Cryptic then was a major factor on me starting to play NW but am now, along with you others, plagued by unavailability to play, especially during our late night hours.
So what has changed with Cryptic? Wonder why they are not using the same stuff as they did way back?
Just curious really given that I know they used to be able to work around these problems.
Cheers
. . . I'm in the U.S. and thankfully I've never been hopped through any of these companies that throttle to get to Cryptic and I have also been a gamer of Cryptic's games since the CoH days and CO/STO betas and so forth. My connection has always been impeccable... but then again I have also had the same ISP since, which is one of - if not the biggest ISP company in the U.S. Long ago, with a DSL company I had, I used to get hopped all over the place just trying to connect from Florida to California but my connection from there to Australia was impeccable - which was really weird to me at the time before I got educated on how the internet works by my sister who is a Network Technician.
[ Support Center • Rules & Policies and Guidelines • ARC ToS • Guild Recruitment Guidelines | FR DM Since 1993 ]
Let's say ISP A owns a segment of the market which doesn't have many customers, but a lot of people do have to travel across their lines in order to get to a popular destination. They see an opportunity to "tax" those who want to go through them unimpeded, and increase their bottom line. It's a slippery slope, IMO, since before ISPs were supposed to simply allow traffic from all sources, equally.
"Is it better to be feared or respected? I say, is it too much to ask for both?" -Tony Stark
Official NW_Legit_Community Forums
Making a Close up , we are ***** until the ISPS companies decide to provide a good service?
For worst, Im from Argentina, and my ISP is Arnet, they probably are connected to one of this ISPS you are mentioned before, its not secret that south america ISPS cables go to USA (And most are USA Companies camouflaged as National ISPS)
Guess someone took their hand off the internet's neck.
Or at least nothing detectable. I don't think "lag free" truly exists.
Great Weapon Fighter: Because when is today not a good day to die?
PC and PS4 player. Proud Guildmaster for PS4 Team Fencebane. Rank 5 Officer for PC Team Fencebane. Visit us at http://fencebane.shivtr.com
Im going to check that out, hope you'r right!
PSD: Thx lewstelamon01 for correcting and editing my post's :P hahahaha
Since Asia-EU is about the same distance, they should put the servers in Asia instead. That would benefit the Asians, Oceanic, and it won't be any worse for EU. Not because I live in SEA, but just sayin'
Anyway back on topic, this morning (GMT+8) I got in 1.5 hours of solid gaming with only an occasional slowdown (no SNR). Hope it stays this way...
The rest still up-and-coming!
Have you done a tracert?
A city to protect
innocents to save
"Why?" They ask "they hate you"
We're heroes it's what we do.
*patiently waiting on Paragon City*
EDIT: here's one !
Tracing route to patchserver.crypticstudios.com [208.95.185.41]
over a maximum of 30 hops:
1 2 ms <1 ms <1 ms 10.0.0.1
2 * * * Request timed out.
3 11 ms 9 ms 8 ms 24.144.1.89
4 11 ms 10 ms 9 ms 66-194-86-233.static.twtelecom.net [66.194.86.23
3]
5 23 ms 23 ms 23 ms 64-129-238-78.static.twtelecom.net [64.129.238.7
8]
6 36 ms 26 ms 23 ms 64.132.69.98
7 98 ms 95 ms 107 ms 207.88.13.242.ptr.us.xo.net [207.88.13.242]
8 87 ms 95 ms 95 ms te-3-2-0.rar3.chicago-il.us.xo.net [207.88.12.13
]
9 100 ms 91 ms 91 ms ae0d0.mcr2.cambridge-ma.us.xo.net [216.156.0.30]
10 67 ms 67 ms 65 ms 209.117.103.10
11 67 ms 71 ms 78 ms border11.te8-1-bbnet2.bsn.pnap.net [63.251.128.1
04]
12 72 ms 71 ms 74 ms perfectworldent-4.border11.bsn.pnap.net [216.52.
61.78]
13 85 ms 78 ms 78 ms patchserver2.crypticstudios.com [208.95.185.41]
Trace complete.
I was on last night from about 9pm gmt+2 to 2am gmt+2, on both characters in both pvp and IWD areas. It was also pretty busy, so, number of instanced players is not a direct factor. Well, at least below x tipping point anyway.
I use a local cable company who I thought used Comcast connectivity but now I'm not certain.
When I had Comcast I never got routed through Congent and thus never lagged. Now that I am using Verizon I can always tell when I get routed through Congent and every few months it actually reaches a state near unplayability.
But here's the thing and the reason why this is a user problem: your ISP chooses your route.
Cryptic can not choose the route and say they don't want their users going through Congent or any other crappy service.
And again I'm close to the servers. Crappy service is crappy service. If the service wasn't <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> the lag would not be noticeable whether you lived in China or in New York. They could put a server every hundred miles but a <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> internet provider will still provide <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> service to whoever has to go through that service to get there.
So really, truly, the only solution is to demand better service from ISP's and stop the suits from voting on changes to laws when it's clear the only opinion they listened to is from those who stood to gain from it. I mean, there are reasons why customer neutrality laws were put in to place for every industry years ago...
But as I have said for years....the government is seriously run by people who don't know a computer from a typewriter and are not qualified for the job anymore considering the majority of new laws have to consider digital trade.
I just heard a small newsreport on the radio yesterday that the FCC* is actually investigating ISP's (like Verizon and Cogent) due to the throttling/poor-gaming-performance that many users have been experiencing/complaining about. It seems that the ISPs are trying to "strong-arm" the gaming companies, like Cryptic/PWE into paying more for "special" higher speed networking.
*FCC - Federal Communications Commision for those outside of the US.
Encounter Matrix | Advanced Foundry Topics
(Quick flunky A, turn off the throttling !!!)
In that case I'm sorry, but I've no idea. Hope it clears up soon. I'm on nvo right now, gmt+2 11am, and everything is fine.
That 2nd hop could be your problem - have you tried running traceroute several times to see if you can get a consistent name/address for that hop? It could be your immediate ISP throttling you directly.
Encounter Matrix | Advanced Foundry Topics
The 2nd hop is most likely their router - a firewall or node that does not respond to anonymous ping request will return a "request timed out" response. It's not an issue in and of itself.
"Is it better to be feared or respected? I say, is it too much to ask for both?" -Tony Stark
Official NW_Legit_Community Forums
ok, that explains a lot of things.
Tracing route to patchserver.crypticstudios.com [208.95.185.41]
over a maximum of 30 hops:
1 2 ms <1 ms <1 ms 10.0.0.1
2 * * * Request timed out.
3 11 ms 9 ms 8 ms 24.144.1.89
4 11 ms 10 ms 9 ms 66-194-86-233.static.twtelecom.net [66.194.86.23
3]
5 23 ms 23 ms 23 ms 64-129-238-78.static.twtelecom.net [64.129.238.7
8]
6 36 ms 26 ms 23 ms 64.132.69.98
7 98 ms 95 ms 107 ms 207.88.13.242.ptr.us.xo.net [207.88.13.242]
8 87 ms 95 ms 95 ms te-3-2-0.rar3.chicago-il.us.xo.net [207.88.12.13
]
9 100 ms 91 ms 91 ms ae0d0.mcr2.cambridge-ma.us.xo.net [216.156.0.30]
10 67 ms 67 ms 65 ms 209.117.103.10
11 67 ms 71 ms 78 ms border11.te8-1-bbnet2.bsn.pnap.net [63.251.128.1
04]
12 72 ms 71 ms 74 ms perfectworldent-4.border11.bsn.pnap.net [216.52.
61.78]
13 85 ms 78 ms 78 ms patchserver2.crypticstudios.com [208.95.185.41]
Trace complete.
It doesn't appear much different to me, so yes I'm going to be hounding my ISP for a bit now.
. . . No worries, I am in Michigan (I've said it a few times, so its no secret). I have been a loyal and happy customer of Comcast's for many years now. The only times I have any real connection issues to complain about is when the power goes out, and even then it's not Comcast's fault. Thankfully Comcast is massive in the U.S. and can pull a lot of weight to keep their customers happy and they actually seem like they want to make their customers happy, despite being a bit expensive. Comcast even does non-profit community building work all across the U.S. Heck, Comcast even now owns Universal Studios, Paramount, and NBC... If ever I did start noticing me being routed through Cogent to connect within the U.S. - you'd be able to win a bet that I'd call Comcast and complain immediately as well as whatever channels I need to go through to continue my support of the Net-Neutrality - something Comcast appears to support also.
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