Iceland is still Europe. That might, with low possibility, be possible.Quote:
Originally Posted by Charisma
MMORPGs moving to 1-10 MS server side polling
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10-15-2014, 04:24 AMFornix
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10-15-2014, 04:57 AMTeryaaniTalking with someone like Level3 is not that easy. Providers like Level 3 (the cause of most of my game lag based on the tracerts I've run) don't talk to anyone that isn't one of their customers. Data center moves aren't cheap and carry risk of outage. It's not just FFXIV either. A good friend of mine had the same problem with SWTOR. If EA isn't going to get L3 to do something, neither is Square-Enix.Quote:
Originally Posted by Roris
Just to be clear, I'd like SE to make things better on their side where they can. I just don't think it will solve all the problems. The infrastructure between where I am in California and where the servers live in Monteal is complete crap and I'm not about to blame SE for that. -
10-15-2014, 05:01 AMTupsiIf 3rd party programs fixes your latency that's ...undeniable proof it's your connection's route. All 3rd party programs like battleping or whatever does is tunnel your connection around hiccups - nothing SE "can put into practice" because the connection is fine, the servers are fine...the route is not fine - SE doesn't own the route inbetween you and them.Quote:
Originally Posted by Roris
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10-15-2014, 05:11 AMRorisIf the route is bad then why not change the route and open up different data centers that have better routing for different players in different regions, i.e. why put all western servers even European servers in Canada in the first place?Quote:
Originally Posted by Tupsi
I'd blame them for putting all the servers in one place instead of investing on proper datacenters placed on key locations in the US/Europe. The excuse back then on release was that they didn't have the proper resources for it which was understandable to some point, now that the game has 2.5 million adventurer- I mean accounts created, they should start looking into improving and expanding their infrastructure with those resources and profits they've made.Quote:
Originally Posted by Teryaani
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10-15-2014, 05:21 AMTiggySquare can't control the route. That's controlled completely different companies. You can change the route by using programs like WTFast.Quote:
Originally Posted by Roris
Opening more data centers is possible but generally there isn't much good reason to have more than 1 for the same region. Normally server locations come down to a cost issue though. It's likely that data center had a good price and was able to hit two markets at once (Europe and America). This simplifies a lot of aspects of maintenance since it's all in the same building and the same crew. When connections are good most European and American customers have a good experience so the location isn't really a big deal unless you're in Australia. They probably do need a server imo.
Well technically there is a Japanese and American data center. So it's two places.Quote:
Originally Posted by Roris
Also, now that the game is at 2.5mil accounts it's even harder to start new data centers. You'd have to create new worlds with zero playerbase and economy from the start. On top of it you'd have to create a new cluster with multiple servers for the sake of duty finder. Filling those new servers quickly so that they actually can function is an incredible challenge. Anyone here on a low pop server can tell you how many extra headaches that adds.
So yes it was likely a decision made to limit how much it would cost at the beginning. Try to remember they didn't expect as much response from the American market as they actually got and the servers were woefully inadequate at launch. This is one of those things that's actually tougher to do once the game is more established. Players would riot if any plans popped up to shut servers down for a few weeks so that they could move them. After the move more other people would complain since the physical move now shifted the routing problems to other players who were previously unscathed. You can't make everyone happy. -
10-15-2014, 05:24 AMTeryaaniThey made a decision based on cost, which I won't defend them for. I'm going through a DC move right now at work caused by a similar decision making process and it sucks.Quote:
Originally Posted by Roris
That's not what was being argued by the OP and others (Blizzard is having faster server side polling, why aren't we?), the change mentioned at the start won't fix what many here think is the root cause of the lag. I'm not white-knighting SE. The single EU/NA data center is a stupid idea and it should have been distributed across 3-4 DCs. Faster server side polling would be nice to have, but it wouldn't fix most of the issue. -
10-15-2014, 05:34 AMApolloGenX
Trust me, guys - Even though you might not have these issues in any other games... and even though a much older game can pull off a much faster and superior polling rate - It's the internetz
Seriously? I don't really care if it's because of bad data center placement, badly coded telegraphing processes, or whatever - this game still has performance problems that are massively outperformed by a much older game.
Some people will defend ANYTHING. (Or blame others) -
10-15-2014, 05:43 AMTiggySome people prefer to understand why so that they can blame the right people. Blaming square won't solve anything if 90% or more of the problems are caused between you and the server.Quote:
Originally Posted by ApolloGenX
Some people will refuse to understand ANYTHING. (Or just blame someone anyway) -
10-15-2014, 05:45 AMApolloGenXThere is absolutely no argument to be made for slower polling. To what degree it might help or not help players is another conversation. So, please feel free to deflect with the back and forth about impact (which I think we all know would vary greatly from player to player)... while ignoring the fundamental point that their methods are outdated and perform at an inferior level to a much older game.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tiggy
What I do think is fair to claim is that "that other" company thought the impact of faster polling to be worth the investment to improve their rates.
Yes, it is true that it might impact people more in that other game, since there might be fewer people suffering because of that companies badly placed datacenters that cause terrible data transmission.... but I am not sure why that would be the fault of players, either. To be fair - when that other game launched and there was massive lag, you had the same kind of people blaming it on people's internet connections and routing... but miraculously, the other company still managed to fix things.... -
10-15-2014, 06:01 AMTeryaaniIt was done to help alleviate performance issues on the servers themselves. So while there is no excuse for the hardware to be that bad, there was a reason for it. To Roris' point, SE should allocate resources to put better infrastructure in place. I completely agree with that.Quote:
Originally Posted by ApolloGenX
It's a pain to migrate, even so they need to, before the game gets more bogged down.
No, it's the main premise of the OP's post. It's the conversation we're having right now. The argument being had is that this would fix lag issues when largely it won't.Quote:
To what degree it might help or not help players is another conversation.
You are comparing an MMO that has been in place for ten years with a development and infrastructure team to match and which has a much smaller footprint than FF does with an MMO in it's first year (ARR is a nearly complete re-write of 1.0, so this is it's first year) which has a green infrastructure team.Quote:
What I do think is fair to claim is that "that other" company thought the impact of faster polling to be worth the investment to improve their rates.
They need to fix the problem, but we can't pretend that because Square made an MMO that resembles WoW that they are suddenly Activision/Blizzard.
also:
You chose to ignore this, but as others have said, this is happening in other games too. Not just FF.Quote:
Originally Posted by ApolloGenX
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10-15-2014, 06:06 AMTiggy
It's not the fault of the players. It's ISPs. Stop trying to act like everyone is blaming the players. We are blaming ISPs and backbone providers. Keep up.
Secondly, the game updates 10 times a second despite the OP pushing false 300ms information. It updates at 100ms a second. 10 times a second is plenty and it made a noticeable difference immediately. This was updated months ago. Keep up.
Lastly, you're cherry picking one game in one scenario largely ignoring many games who didn't have things go so smoothly. Also, It doesn't prove anything since it's a badly picked example. For you're reading comprehension here is a google search showing you all the level3 related lag problems people are talking about in WoW. https://www.google.com/search?q=leve...m=122&ie=UTF-8
Funny how this "other company still managed to fix things" yet still has issues with the SAME EXACT backbone provider that square does. Wow that's some nice poorly picked data you got there. It took me literally less than 5 seconds to google search this and see it was a problem in WoW as well. Doing research is hard because reasons. -
10-15-2014, 06:14 AMFornixCanada offers a much colder climate than east coast and west coast locations. For this reason more and more data centers are opening up there. It allows lower operation costs due to reduced cooling requirements. Temperatures can be more easily maintained at a lower level which allows for hardware better hardware longevity. And lastly heating produced by data centers can be recycled into city heating. This makes hosting in data centers in e.g. canada a much more environmentally sound choice. And are just a selection of the reasons why more and more companies do so. In Europe the Scandinavian countries likewise are getting an increased preference. Iceland is starting to build up more and more data centers as well. And there are even suggestions going around for setting up data centers in Greenland.Quote:
Originally Posted by Roris
Fact is, data centers in the future are going to be moving further and further away from the once all too popular east/west coast locations and European cities such as Paris, London or Frankfurt. Local deals in the colder countries may very easily play in on those decisions as well. For export of heating local governments may pay data centers. Reducing costs even further, and creating a scenario of benefit for both parties involved.
Regardless of the financial aspect of it, the beneficial climate for data centers in these colder environments is luring in rather big names. Facebook not too long ago opened up a new data center in Lulea, Sweden. Google invested over 1 billion dollars in the creation of one of their biggest data centers in Hamina, Finland. And there's many, many others following suit. -
10-15-2014, 06:19 AMreality_checkFFXIV updates at 100 MS intervals in PVP and only in specific instances (coil & certain extreme.)Quote:
Originally Posted by Tiggy
Everywhere else in the world updates at 300 MS intervals. This information comes directly from what the developers have told us. -
10-15-2014, 06:34 AMTiggyDirect from patch 2.2 patch notes.Quote:
Originally Posted by reality_check
"Improvements made to the frequency with which player positioning is updated in patch 2.1 will now apply to all instances."
So yes it's not the whole game, but it's in every scenario where content actually would actually require it. Nothing in the open world requires that extra update rate at all. Most complaints stem from problems in dungeons, raids, or trials since that's where progress is actually hindered by lag.
The only time the servers actually have genuine trouble is when too many people congregate in one place. Specifically Odin/Behemoth/A and S rank hunts. That's not even a lag problem. That's the servers crapping themselves since they can't handle the sheer volume of people that showed up. Some games solve this problem with a person per zone limit, and others such as Eve solve it by doing time dilation. Every game is going to suffer when too many people are in once place. Square has surprisingly loose restrictions on people per zone considering how bad it can get at overcrowded S ranks. Thankfully this is one of those things that tends to get better as the game ages. All those tiny performance tweaks really add up over time as well as improved hardware.
Let's say we lived in a world where the servers were as close to ideal perfection as possible. The servers handled even more objects than today with even more concurrent people, and it did so with even less server power than today. I mean why not if this is a fantasy right so let's even say they have a way of certifiably proving the servers could be no better than that so we know without a shadow of a doubt that the servers are simply fantastic. If we were still using the same internet we have right now, even given the super awesomeness of those servers, we would still see most of these threads complaining about lag. People would still be dying and people would still be blaming square. -
10-15-2014, 07:36 AMGextiv
Come on guys, I can understand the deep affection and love towards SE; after all, they do provide us with the Final Fantasy franchise we all love and adore. But let us not be disillusioned that S.E shares no responsibility, fault , or control over the "lag" that a portion of the player base experiences.
I propose a solution, however! Complimentary VPN service to all players affected by the "lag", since VPNS seem an effective tool to combat the "lag".
@Fornix
In other words, they cut corners at the expense of the player base.
P.S PS3 limitations -
10-15-2014, 08:04 AMTeryaaniI can only speak for me, and I know I'm not going absolve them of their share in this.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gextiv
I think your point here:
Is completely right. The premise of this thread though (server polling rate ist uber alles!) isn't the right answer to the problem.Quote:
In other words, they cut corners at the expense of the player base.
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10-15-2014, 08:24 AMAlukahI don't know if you are familiar with GW2's "overflow" system (before they implemented the mega server system) but in the live letter previous to TGS they talked about implementing a system like that here in order to deal with congestion issues, and perhaps open a path for open world dungeons.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tiggy
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A: Kasuga: If Yoshida would like to do this then we'll think about it. However, after patch 2.35 North Shroud has been congested, and there are concerns that the same conditions would occur in other areas as well if we implemented open-world dungeons.Quote:
1:30:04
Q: Do you have plans to implement open-world dungeons like there were in 1.0?
Yoshida: Right now, due to the fact that North Shroud serves as the entrance point for the Second Coil of Bahamut as well as the location of the Ixali base it's extremely crowded. When it comes to field areas, we need to consider congestion when creating content. It wouldn't be impossible to design such a dungeon, but the really difficult part is reward balancing. Also, it would very likely be content you couldn't complete with a small amount of people, and conversely, it would be completed quite easily if more than the necessary amount of people were to attempt it. If we were to implement this, just one wouldn't be enough and we would have to implement multiple dungeons at the same time. This kind of content would turn into a massive raid with even more participants than the Crystal Tower, and, similar to the 80-player raids of first generation MMORPGs, it would be easy to find people when it's implemented, but after a while it would be really tough to get the right amount of people together.
When we started developing FFXIV: ARR, there was the question of whether or not we would make dungeons using open-world areas, but we decided to consider it at a later date since that kind of content wouldn't last two seconds if we implemented it without balanced rewards and participation.
Additionally, the congestion in North Shroud is quite rough, so we're currently looking into whether we should implement a system that has been adopted by other MMORPGs for making multiple instances of the same open-world area. The preparations have already been made and we've implemented this into the Chinese version of the game, so we do have some operative results. We'll be testing things up until the last minute to be sure that the concept of multiple open-world instances is clear for players who aren't used to this kind of system.
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10-15-2014, 08:40 AMAmberionTranslation: We plan to remove open world completely, and instead make everything instanced.Quote:
Additionally, the congestion in North Shroud is quite rough, so we're currently looking into whether we should implement a system that has been adopted by other MMORPGs for making multiple instances of the same open-world area. The preparations have already been made and we've implemented this into the Chinese version of the game, so we do have some operative results. We'll be testing things up until the last minute to be sure that the concept of multiple open-world instances is clear for players who aren't used to this kind of system.
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10-15-2014, 09:04 AMDwillSwing and a miss.Quote:
Originally Posted by Amberion
What this means is that they are trying to create a system where in case that a zone is being overcrowded (North Shroud as an example) and it starts affecting the whole server with performance issues, the server will instead create a second copy of North Shroud to redirect players to said copy so that the server doesn't take a performance hit. Another way this is done is by having the server create multiple copies of the same zones and let player switch between these copies. The former is the more likely option (in my opinion).
Next time, read what you quote and try to understand it. -
10-15-2014, 09:18 AMAmberionThat is instancing and not open world. Just because they want to go cheap on hardware doesn't remove that fact.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dwill
You have to remember that the only reason instancing in exists in the first place, is to not have to spend as much on server cost. And with how much they proclaim this game to be a huge success, they should not have to go that route.
Or making the game in a way that spreads people around and not clumping them together. -
10-15-2014, 09:29 AMDwillEvery zone by definition are already mini-instances dues to having to load between each of them. If it was a real open world, you would log in Gridania for example and you could travel between any Shroud without having to load between each of them. What they are doing is just making sure that there is no performance issue due to overcrowding. If the solution that they choose is similar to the first one I mentioned earlier on, most of you are never going to even notice a difference in your gameplay.Quote:
Originally Posted by Amberion
It is true that server cost is a big reason for instancing but is far from the only one. Instancing allows for multiple group to do dungeons and raids at the same time and this is another huge reason why instance exists in the first place.Quote:
Originally Posted by Amberion
I agree that Square Enix dropped the ball hard on the server aspect and that they could have had a much better insight on how many people this would attract. Though right now, adding new servers and data centers would be even harder, as it was explained earlier in the thread.Quote:
Originally Posted by Amberion
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10-15-2014, 09:43 AMElim
I have 85ms and I live in Canada, BC. lol
When I played SWTOR I had much better MS(and their servers are in the USA). Not to say my ping to FF14 is horrible...it's just not good.
Honestly, I'm not an expert on how these things work, just stating simple facts. -
10-15-2014, 09:46 AMAmberionNo, a zone isn't an instance. Instance has since the very beginning in '96 (I think it was created for the first time for MMORPGs then), meant that you made copies of a place/zone/whatever. A single occurrence of it doesn't make it instanced.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dwill
The server cost is actually the only reason it was created. At least from what I remember from when I studied it. BTW, not talking about this game, but from when it was actually first used.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dwill
Well, at least we agree on something. ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by Dwill
EDIT:The thing is, some are just better at masking lag. And SE is not good at it.Quote:
When I played SWTOR I had much better MS(and their servers are in the USA). Not to say my ping to FF14 is horrible...it's just not good.
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10-15-2014, 10:03 AMDwillIt actually does. The zones are mini-instances, that much is easy to see by the fact you have to load in between each of them. Something more on the side of open world is like in World of Warcraft where one can just mount up and go from Orgrimmar straight to Thunder Bluff without single loading screen. What Square Enix is creating is just something that would toss people in North Shroud #2 instead of everyone clogging #1.Quote:
Originally Posted by Amberion
Actually, it was first created to allow multiple people to have access to the same content without people having to wait awhile (sometimes hours) to have a go at content. Then companies started noticing it could actually be used as to save on server cost and certain companies went way overboard with that (Age of Conan comes to mind).Quote:
Originally Posted by Amberion
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10-15-2014, 11:58 AMKore_HyperionI dunno what game you are playing. I haven't seen lag like that since, as you stated, beta or even alpha. So no, I don't agree that it's an accurate representation of the current state of the game.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fyrebrand
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10-15-2014, 01:16 PMChiramu
Nice to know they only state the connection to the servers for NA players. It would be nice if they stated the MS timer for everyone forced to play on NA servers who are not in NA.
The delay I get in FFXIV is better from Australia than in WoW. NA players think they are the sole people in the world again. -
10-15-2014, 02:25 PMAmiantosWow this is baseless hate for no reason. No one is forcing you to play NA servers. I'd think you would get better MS from a jp server.Quote:
Originally Posted by Chiramu
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10-15-2014, 02:26 PMAmiantosBefore I moved 85 was about normal for me and thats easily low enough to dodge most attacks.Quote:
Originally Posted by Elim
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10-15-2014, 05:26 PMAussirThis... I've had this happening too many times for my taste. Some tried to blame it on my net until I pointed out that I'm on 50Mbps Optic Fiber and I run regular speed/ping/tracert tests and found no bottlenecks.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fyrebrand
Also, I really doubt that it's people's internet connections all the time. Game servers have an internet provider as well and if their internet provider screws up, everyone will have issues connecting to the servers. -
10-15-2014, 05:34 PMFornixI don't agree on that assessment. The transfer of more and more data centers to the colder climates is a very environmentally sound decision. And I hope that more will follow, if need be through investments done on for example a EU level in case of Europe.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gextiv
In the past, latency would have been a limiting factor and made such transfers impossible. However, with minimal switches and routing, combined with high bandwidth fiber optic lines connecting to such data centers through the oceans a data center in e.g. iceland is very feasible. The delay to such locations often then also is not caused due to going overseas or by being on a relatively great distance. After all, 10.000 km's, a distance from Canada to Chile, only equates to an expected latency of a mere 100 ms.
The fact that on a smaller distance people are getting higher latency rates than that is not due to the servers being hosted in Canada, it's due to bad routing on the way there. And those issues are going to have to be resolved on an entirely different level. This is not something game publishers are going to be able to fix. Sure some servers may be hosted on a location prior to bad network segments, giving a good connection for you. However, those players at the other end of the route in that case will end up having the same problems.
Ultimately it's the responsibility of those who own the problematic networks to up their game and make the required fixes. Unfortunately more often than not these areas are left to degrade further and further. Some ISP's may take initiative themselves and simply reroute traffic in a different direction. Providing a general better experience for their customers without having to resort to third party services. However, ISP's are limited in what they can do as well. As they tend to own only a segment of national or international networks. Where your data goes once it travels over the network of their neighbour, is no longer up to them. The neighbour can still route you on to a terrible segment.
As for Yoshi's statement regarding the congestion in North Shroud and possible multiple instancing it as a solution:
Bear in mind that that's absolutely nothing new. And more often than not the motivation to introduce instancing here is due to the graphical lag created on the player's end more so than anything else. Server side handling isn't so much an issue in this game. Even on S-ranks, where over a 100 players may actively be casting and all there's still no delay in skill casts. EVE like proportions of failure due to a much greater number of players and interactions involved aren't met. Especially not when players are standing idle. However, fps drops are most apparent for many players. A lot of people then also complain about lag in the city hub in north shroud or during S-ranks. But this lag mainly comes down to nothing else than their fps dropping below 10.Quote:
Additionally, the congestion in North Shroud is quite rough, so we're currently looking into whether we should implement a system that has been adopted by other MMORPGs for making multiple instances of the same open-world area. The preparations have already been made and we've implemented this into the Chinese version of the game, so we do have some operative results. We'll be testing things up until the last minute to be sure that the concept of multiple open-world instances is clear for players who aren't used to this kind of system.