Trialling WTFast to see if connectivity improves anyone else used it and what's your experience?

ussvaliant2

So... giving WTFast a trial to see if tricking Cryptic's ISP with GPN will reduce my rubberbanding/freezing and general crappy experience with this game that's been ongoing since they started using Akamai about 4 years ago.

So far still getting some rubberbanding in the Dyson Battlezone and minor in CCA but according to WTFast my ping is 20% better.

I won't be using it after my 7 day trial ends as I refuse to pay a 3rd party to do what my ISP and Cryptic's ISP should be doing naturally and that's provide me with a reliable connection and acceptable playing experience.

Has anyone else used this service and what are is your experience?

ussvaliant2

keepcalmchiveon wrote: »

never heard of this company. can you offer comparisons of STO to WTFast traceroutes?

I will do later tonight. I'm interested to see the differences if any

They seem to have a good rating on Trust pilot 4.7 out of 5 from 953 reviews

I won't be paying a sub to them regardless of the results as my connection to Cryptic between 2011 and 2016/17 was absolutely fine so I refuse to pay extra for something my ISP and Cryptic's could in the past and should now be providing.

Its just a further attempt to reduce the hair ripping out frustration Cryptic are giving me

ussvaliant2

Ok games come back up before I have to go out for the afternoon here's the tracert generated via WTFast Software

2020-08-20 15:37:21
ttrouter.lan 1 0.00 59 59 0 0 6 0 0 0 0.90
—— 2 100.00 —— —— —— —— -1 —— —— —— 0.00
ae54-ner002.csm.as13285.net 3 0.00 59 59 8 9 16 9 0 0 1.18
ae54-scr101.loh.as13285.net 4 0.00 59 59 11 12 24 14 0 0 3.08
host-78-144-14-15.as13285.net 5 0.00 59 59 11 12 27 12 0 0 3.40
host-78-144-4-45.as13285.net 6 1.69 59 58 12 23 129 12 8 73 23.91
Target wtfast.com 7 0.00 59 59 11 11 15 12 0 0 0.54

Summary data file

Current game name: Star Trek Online
Active connections: 0
WTFast active svr: N/A
Total bytes rcv (B): 2759
Total bytes rcv (kB): 2.69
Total bytes snt (B): 4776
Total bytes snt (kB): 4.66
Connection time (min): 6.83

Live Stats
Ping average wtfast: 93
Ping average internet: 112
Ping spike % wtfast: 0.00%
Ping spike % internet: 0.00%
Ping flux wtfast: 0.52
Ping flux internet: 0.49
Ping lost % wtfast: 0.00%
Ping lost % internet: 0.00%
Ping average imp: 17%
Ping spike imp: 0%
Ping flux imp: 0%
Ping lost imp: 0%
Best overall imp: 17%

Session Summary
Session ping average wtfast: 92.84
Session ping average internet: 112.48
Session ping spike % wtfast: 0.00%
Session ping spike % internet: 0.00%
Session ping spike count wtfast: 0
Session ping spike count internet: 0
Session ping flux wtfast: 0.38
Session ping flux internet: 0.82
Session ping lost % wtfast: 0.00%
Session ping lost % internet: 0.00%
Session ping lost count wtfast: 0
Session ping lost count internet: 0
Session ping average imp: 17.46%
Session ping spike imp: 0.00%
Session ping flux imp: 53.50%
Session ping lost imp: 0.00%
Session best overall imp: 53.50%


And tracert using cmd command prompt and tracert patchserver.crypticstudios.com


1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms ttrouter [192.168.1.1]
2 * * * Request timed out.
3 9 ms 9 ms 9 ms ae54-ner002.csm.as13285.net [78.144.1.19]
4 12 ms 13 ms 14 ms ae54-scr101.loh.as13285.net [78.144.1.18]
5 13 ms 13 ms 13 ms akamai.prolexic.com [195.66.224.31]
6 12 ms 12 ms 12 ms po110.bs-b.sech-lon2.netarch.akamai.com [72.52.60.200]
7 13 ms 13 ms 13 ms a72-52-1-199.deploy.static.akamaitechnologies.com [72.52.1.199]
8 13 ms 13 ms 13 ms ae121.access-a.sech-lon2.netarch.akamai.com [72.52.60.205]
9 * * * Request timed out.
10 94 ms 93 ms 93 ms a209-200-171-102.deploy.static.akamaitechnologies.com [209.200.171.102]
11 110 ms 98 ms 96 ms 198.49.243.237
12 93 ms 93 ms 93 ms patchserver.crypticstudios.com [208.95.184.200]

ussvaliant2

Is the connection better using this workaround yes slightly.

Is it worth paying an extra $9.99 a month to improve a connection that Your and Cryptic's ISP's should be doing naturally and were doing naturally a few years back before Cryptic took measures against the Neverwinter Twit who was DDOS attacking them?

Answer is NO.

Dyson Battlezone is still subject to rubberbanding spikes and power tray misfires.
CCA still rubberbands
Had rubberbanding on New Romulus and DS9

So I'll stick around until the end of the year but if the issue hasn't been addressed which would take it over 4 years then I'm out and the game gets uninstalled.

So I guess I have 4 months to look for a new favourite game to play as Cryptic will not do anything.

nixie50

you know I ran across this today, and it's fitting.. It's about PvP in Pokemon go.
the company is not the issue, the topic is not.. it's HOW this "rant" was written...

https://www.stadiumgaming.gg/post/an-open-letter-to-niantic-the-pvp-community

spiritborn

Theres some things we need to remember Cryptic doesn't and most likely cannot tell us everything happening in their offices, second these things take a lot of time changing an ISP is expensive and slow process for a company, third it's highly likely that performance issues survey is there so Cryptic has evidence that there is a problem and they not trying to get a better deal.

ussvaliant2

spiritborn wrote: »

Theres some things we need to remember Cryptic doesn't and most likely cannot tell us everything happening in their offices, second these things take a lot of time changing an ISP is expensive and slow process for a company, third it's highly likely that performance issues survey is there so Cryptic has evidence that there is a problem and they not trying to get a better deal.

How many more years would Cryptic like? its coming up to 4 now

ussvaliant2

keepcalmchiveon wrote: »

more than 4.

and thanks for the details.

as far as who, what, etc, for the IP, akima, blah blah...they can so do something about it. they choose not to.

Your welcome and precisely they CAN do something about it. There was rubber banding/lag and all these issues before they took action to protect themselves from DDOS attacks but for me personally it was like a where's Waldo book, it was very rare to experience it. I had great connection to the game between 2011 on my old iMac and new iMac until early 2016 when it was around that time I believe PWE did those long backend upgrades and my connection hasn't been the same since and has progressively this year just got worse. Yes I'm still using a iMac on bootcamp with Windows 10 if I could and this iMac supported it I'd revert to Win 7 in a heartbeat as upgrading to Win 10 also seems to coincide with issues. (I've removed and reinstalled the partition several times over the years to refresh)

trennan

4 years of rubberbanding?


Sorry... sorry.. had a moment there. The rubber banding has been around since I started playing in 2012.

ussvaliant2

trennan wrote: »

4 years of rubberbanding?


Sorry... sorry.. had a moment there. The rubber banding has been around since I started playing in 2012.

My last post I acknowledged it's been around longer than 4 years, but for others experiencing it I may have downplayed it as it wasn't a significant issue for me before Cryptic/PWE did their upgrades.

ussvaliant2

sirsitsalot wrote: »

What you seem to be expecting is akin to expecting a city in one state to do something about traffic problems in a city in state that is between them and a city in yet another state.

Cryptic choose this ISP and security measures back in 2016 and they can always choose a different ISP that doesn't use Akamai.
So yes they can do something about it maybe at a cost to them due to contracts etc

rattler2

That doesn't guarantee anything. They could switch ISPs, but the fact remains that the path our computers take to the server may pass through a node that uses Akami. It is not a direct pipeline from our computers to the server. Its basically like city streets. And any one of the intersections on the way could use Akami.

phoenixc

Akami isn't an ISP that Cryptic hired, it is a CDN which is a lot higher level than an ISP, a sort of web within the web. Cryptic could switch ISPs or even hosting services and still things could route though Akami, it is that pervasive nowadays.

The backend stuff that corresponded with increased rubberbanding was probably the higher resolution graphics and lighting 2.0 improvements, those take some extra bandwidth, and CDNs like Akami tend to cache files like that in various places where the traffic of those particular files flows the most. Unfortunately, when they are cached you get files that may not be quite current so your home machine gets out of sync with the game server and when that happens a correction is made, the rubberband effect.

On top of that, Akami uses traffic shaping to give precedence to streaming services and shopping websites (their main clients), games do not directly generate sales so they get pushed further back in line when the preferred traffic starts filling the pipes too far. Years ago the FCC tried to ban that kind of traffic shaping, but they got overruled on the matter as lobbyists poured money into congress to muzzle the FCC.

So gaming in general has suffered and it is not Cryptic being lazy or any of the rest of the nonsense, it is hitting every game to some extent. ESO has been hit just as hard, so is ArcheAge (in fact in ArcheAge your DPS is hit badly along with the rubberbanding because of the way combat is coded). I have half a dozen games that I play a at loose casual level and not a single one of them is completely free of rubberbanding though with a few it is slightly less noticeable (but only slightly). One game that I play relitively often has even reduced the maximum number of players per instance to TEN and still there is some rubberbanding and other throttling problems even with that few people.

Seriously, instead of just complaining about Cryptic you should be writing your congressperson about fixing the web infrastructure and riding herd on the throttling nonsense.

baudl

But why isn't Cryptic making an announcement and explaining the problem to the users? Their silence is infuriating, and asking the users to send in their data, when apparently they already know the problem even more so.

nixie50

everyone says, just change ISPs.. This isn't you and AT&T folks you can't just say I'm cancelling. there is probably a multi- year contract that locks them to akami. Since it has been 4 years I would guess that it's either been renewed and we have 2 more years of it (3 years is common), or 1 more, (5 years) or if they were not thinking long term, 8 or 10 years

spiritborn

nixie50 wrote: »

everyone says, just change ISPs.. This isn't you and AT&T folks you can't just say I'm cancelling. there is probably a multi- year contract that locks them to akami. Since it has been 4 years I would guess that it's either been renewed and we have 2 more years of it (3 years is common), or 1 more, (5 years) or if they were not thinking long term, 8 or 10 years

Well as said Akami isn't the ISP that Cryptic uses or ISP at all still, changing an ISP for a company is a multiyear process and will cost more money then most of us make in a year.

And that's assuming there's a viable option for Cryptic to change to, it could be possible that all ISP in that region use Akami's services thus changing ISP would not change anything. The surveys about performance are most likely there so that Cryptic can go to their ISP or to Akami and say "this is causing us problems and here's the proof, this isn't some local or temporary blip, it's constant and it's hurting our business could you please fix that".

ltminns

As I said in another Thread, Lord of the Rings Online is also based on Servers in Boston 'protected' by Akamai. Lag there as well.