Ridiculous Lag

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Originally Posted by Raist

If I remember correctly, that user posted there were signs of issues with the backbone, not just SE's ISP. Their ISP can lean on their partner though--the trick is getting them enough evidence so they have some proof there is a problem that needs to be investigated. With piecemeal reporting showing up here, it simply may not be getting where it needs to be fast enough--people need to be opening support tickets with both their ISP and SE, submitting these samples to them so the process eventually gets started.

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You're correct. Posting a thread here regarding lag should be followed shortly with submitting a ticket to Squeenix support with the same information.

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Originally Posted by Raist

Like many have been posting, you appear to be fighting high congestion coming across and getting out of California--bolded sections show a wide variance in response times. While a litle variance is normal, what you are seeing there (swings anywhere from +20% to +200% delay) is far beyond the normal. The trick will be convincing Comcast to look into the issues on their last segments before handing off to their routing partners--and then communicating effectively with those routing partners to investigate things on their end.

Notice the variance is happening early in your route, and not towards the endpoint when you are hitting SE's servers and their ISP's. Those hops at SE's ISP (Ormuco) are actually showing the normal variance you would expect. The increased ping time isn't that out of whack either, you're talking around 1/7th a second in delay with that response time---not hardly game breaking there, especially considering you are crossing into Canada.

The bigger concern is the wide variances in the delays at the same hops. This signifies a router is either overloaded or approaching an overloaded state, so one of two groups need to step in: the one that is forwarding you to the troubled router, or the ones managing the troubled router. Ultimately, one of two things needs to happen: the congestion is somehow relieved at the sight (this is why ISP's throttle--a byproduct of traffic shaping to control congestion), or you are re-routed to a different router to avoid the congestion.

This is something that will be difficult for you to manage--your ISP and SE will be your best advocates here. The best course of action would be to open a support ticket with both your ISP and SE, including the sample traces. This gives them a roadmap for where you are coming from, going to, how you are getting there--and gives some clues as to where the route is running into issues. They may not be able to act on it right away--but if they get enough reports exhibiting similar signs, it will eventually become actionable and they <should> take action. The trick is getting enough people to report these kinds of findings to them.

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Thanks for the reply. In the 2nd tracert, you're saying there's problems, but I notice zero issues when I'm playing WoW. I've never lagged for 10 straight seconds during a boss fight where I'm unable to do anything only to have the server "catch up" and find myself dead on the floor. I've never seen someone go rapidly ice skating across the screen after they've frozen in place for several seconds. I very rarely have any noticeable lag. My ping to the server is around 70ms whereas my s/r in FFXIV (if it's the same thing) varies from 0s 400r, to 400s 3000r and all other combinations in between. And to top it off, if I actually did have a problem with WoW, I could post on their tech forums and get a response from someone at Blizzard who ACTUALLY WORKS ON THESE PROBLEMS! Whodathunkit? Customer service matters in a service based industry, but I digress.

I play a lot of online games i.e. LoL, WoW, GW2, D3, SC2 etc. They all work fine. Why doesn't XIV work? I've played a lot of online games at one point or another, and I've very rarely had a problem as persistent and pervasive as this one. I'm sure there's a lot of variables, but surely some of the blame falls squarely in SE's lap.

It's looking like this is not going to be an easy fix, and is something that will persist for a good while with no recourse on my end. I am not inclined to battle with Comcast and SE for hours/days/weeks/months to try and resolve this. I don't get paid to sit here and talk with ISP's and companies to try and resolve messed up servers or whatever. Posting a thread with pertinent information on official forums in the section specifically dedicated to such issues is my due diligence IMO. SE can do with it as they please. I will not be paying them beyond what I've paid for the box as their product does not work properly for me.

I said it a few times already. SE is 100% at fault here for thinking they could have all the servers in a single location. This is just plain stupid, and now everyone knows why.

I have started to get repeated error 90,000 today, about 8 or 9 times so far. would this be related to what you are all chatting about? noticed lag too, i.e. i hit sprint, and then after 3-4 seconds my character will start to sprint

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Originally Posted by Blarp

Thanks for the reply. In the 2nd tracert, you're saying there's problems, but I notice zero issues when I'm playing WoW. I've never lagged for 10 straight seconds during a boss fight where I'm unable to do anything only to have the server "catch up" and find myself dead on the floor. I've never seen someone go rapidly ice skating across the screen after they've frozen in place for several seconds. I very rarely have any noticeable lag. My ping to the server is around 70ms whereas my s/r in FFXIV (if it's the same thing) varies from 0s 400r, to 400s 3000r and all other combinations in between. And to top it off, if I actually did have a problem with WoW, I could post on their tech forums and get a response from someone at Blizzard who ACTUALLY WORKS ON THESE PROBLEMS! Whodathunkit? Customer service matters in a service based industry, but I digress.

I play a lot of online games i.e. LoL, WoW, GW2, D3, SC2 etc. They all work fine. Why doesn't XIV work? I've played a lot of online games at one point or another, and I've very rarely had a problem as persistent and pervasive as this one. I'm sure there's a lot of variables, but surely some of the blame falls squarely in SE's lap.

It's looking like this is not going to be an easy fix, and is something that will persist for a good while with no recourse on my end. I am not inclined to battle with Comcast and SE for hours/days/weeks/months to try and resolve this. I don't get paid to sit here and talk with ISP's and companies to try and resolve messed up servers or whatever. Posting a thread with pertinent information on official forums in the section specifically dedicated to such issues is my due diligence IMO. SE can do with it as they please. I will not be paying them beyond what I've paid for the box as their product does not work properly for me.

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For starters, you're dealing with servers much closer to you with less than half the latency (it is registered to San Diego btw, and managed on an AT&T network), and as noted Blizzard likely has a much tighter grip on their load balancing and server optimizations. The games may be using different protocols too, idk--never played WoW, so not up to speed on all their needs.

Again, as stated earlier, it is a multi-level problem. The problems stack. Server lag stacks with latency spiking, which further stacks with high packet loss and high retransmits. What we can't prove for certain from our end just how bad the server lag is. We know it exists... it always does by design, we just can't measure it or even reasonably estimate it. One thing we can measure though, and report , and try to get someone to correct is instability in our routing. This has an almost exponential effect on that server lag. Even just 25% loss on a moderate level of traffic can have a profound impact on the delays. If you are already sitting at almost a half second round trip between latency spikes and server based lag, and then you have to resend 25% of your packets you may have nearly doubled that delay.

And that's just moderate to light traffic. When everyone is running around, spamming actions, getting hit by mobs.... your traffic can ramp up pretty quick. While a lot of the reporting has been up to 33% losses, we've seen many reports hitting 50% and even as high as 80% at some segments during peak times.

Regardless, this is your best way of getting much needed information to the people that can do something about it. You aren't just popping in and saying "it's broke... fix it." You are giving them specific data relevant to your connection, it's delays, and telling them when/what/where to look to find answers for your specific problem. Important elements in ANY support request.

Greetings,

It seems that there have not been any further posts about this concern being an ongoing issue. Because of this, we are considering it to be resolved. If this does continue to be a concern, please create another thread to further discuss resolutions or contact the Support Center at support.na.square-enix.com for assistance.