OK, this is getting really old

[ladyalchemist]

Yep, really really old. I am a returning player - been back just over a week. When I played the last time, lag was a serious problem, as it was the time I played before that. At the time, I thought it possible that it was at least partly on my end as I had a 6 year old computer. It finally bit the dust July of last year. Now I have returned with a brand new custom built gaming computer - the best that I could afford...

 

...and the problem still exists. Bad lag spikes all last week with occasional crashes. Two crashes last night with lag spikes occurring all day... and today 5 crashes. Tell me how a game that has been out this long hasn't fixed this problem already? This is seriously affecting ability to group for anything and seriously compromises immersion.

 

Big time annoying.

[Pscyon]

It's not the game. If it was the game, people would be reporting it all over the forum. If it was the game, I'd have these issues as my computer is older than yours and likely lower spec as a result. There can be any number of guilty parties when lag spikes are involved, but it's not directly the game in this case.

[fushnchips]

Well some more information on location, and stuff to see why you get these lag spikes + this game is full of memory leaks for example when you change servers the game crashes often they have failed to fix this for a very long time.

[Oreget]

I second that.The reason I quit playing for today.

Horrible lag mainly during evening hours.

[Elessara]

I rarely have lag when I play and the game almost never crashes. So ... *shrug*.

[Zerileth]

It's not the game. If it was the game, people would be reporting it all over the forum. If it was the game, I'd have these issues as my computer is older than yours and likely lower spec as a result. There can be any number of guilty parties when lag spikes are involved, but it's not directly the game in this case.

 

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=947570

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=947615

 

I've been getting lag the last 2 weeks in the early evening, west coast. Goes away by late evening say 9 or 10pm. Had very little lag until the last 2 weeks.

Edited April 14, 2018 by Zerileth

[MikeCobalt]

I get lag, at times it lasts long enough I sit back and wait (Not much though). I just don't complain because its (for me) always been here with this game, This is the Internet and I would consider it a generic thing.

[ladyalchemist]

Well it isn't the Internet... this is literally the ONLY OL game I play that has these issues. Doesn't occur with ANY other game I play OL.

[Sareeph]

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=947570

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=947615

 

I've been getting lag the last 2 weeks in the early evening, west coast. Goes away by late evening say 9 or 10pm. Had very little lag until the last 2 weeks.

 

I've noticed a similar issue. In the evenings like you but I also noticed that many times after it happens, when I log in to the forums, It asks me to chose a language before letting me view the types of forums. Like something is being reset or diverted.

[silenthc]

I've never had any problems with lag when it comes to SWTOR, except, albeit in short bursts, over the past week. So I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss it being a server-side issue. Darth Malgus server, most frequently between 11pm-3am GMT. Edited April 15, 2018 by silenthc

[BRKMSN]

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=947570

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=947615

 

I've been getting lag the last 2 weeks in the early evening, west coast. Goes away by late evening say 9 or 10pm. Had very little lag until the last 2 weeks.

 

There is someone reporting lag every week and people agreeing with that someone. Yet, every week, many other players are not getting the lag that the first player is complaining about. The assumption is always: "it must be the game." But if it was the game server, everybody would have the same issue.

 

I'm not saying it's never the game or that there aren't game related problems, but most of the accusations (we read here) are not accurate. If the problem a player is having is actually a local problem, it could last for several months. Even the OP is claiming that over the years, every time he / she tried to play, there was abnormal lag. Obviously, that hasn't been the problem for most of us, so why should we conclude now that it is the fault of SWTOR? The problem has always existed for that player. New computer ... same old problem. Well ... we can conclude it wasn't the computer.

 

If it's not the computer than it must be SWTOR. <-- False

My other games and Youtube work just fine, so it has to be SWTOR <-- False

[Mubrak]

"The internet" consists of hundreds of thousands of miles of fibre cable pluged into millions of hardware devices owned by thousands of different companies. The system is designed to preserve data integrity at the cost of travel times - when there is a problem on one route, the data packets make a detour and arrive late at their destination.

 

The analogy with a traffic system works quite well here, a free road in one direction doesn't mean there isn't a jam somewhere else, and people taking detours to avoid the jam may cause another one at the next bottleneck.

 

 

What does that mean for you? That other OL services run fine means it isn't you or your ISP. If it were Bioware or their ISP, everyone on the server would have the same problem. Since neither is the case, a third party somewhere between you and the game servers is responsible.

 

When the problem starts suddenly it will most likely go away "on it's own" within a few hours/days, as broken hardware is replaced or avoided by the other routers. When the problem starts regularly at certain times, one of the routers between you and the game servers may be overloaded (or throttling gaming traffic.). BW is in the same boat as you here. You can ask BW customer service to contact their ISP with as much data as possible, and you should do the same with your ISP.

 

A tracert may already help narrowing down the problem. Open the command prompt (Win+R and type CMD) and enter "tracert 159.153.92.28" for the NA servers or "tracert 159.153.72.252" for the EU. When one hop has very high times, this connection may be responsible. Give that information to your ISP and SWTOR customer service (but remember: although it's in BW's own interest to help fix the problem and keep you as a customer, your ISP is whom you pay for a working internet connection.)

 

You can also try a gaming VPN service like WTFast, Pingzapper or Battleping. They have free trials. By chosing one of their servers as a waypoint, you can enforce a different route. Being able to tell that routing over a certain server (city) solves the problem, may help the ISPs to fix the issue (or you can just swallow the pill and pay the VPN services)

Edited April 15, 2018 by Mubrak

[Ardrossan]

It happens a lot to me. It could be the computer, which is an old laptop, and it could be the internet, which is wifi and not really the best setup for gaming. I've heard similar stories about this game...the fake west coast server being the latest source of problems. Trouble is, my knowledge of computers in this regard isn't good enough to conclusively pick one.

 

I might try a VPN. I always figured I'd just put up with it since VPNs [good ones] cost money, but I also always figured I'd never sub for this game and here I am. Times change.

[CrazyCT]

{I was driving around recently and noticed a lot of potholes around my town. I instantly contacted Ford to ask them what they are going to do about it. Still haven't heard back from them for some reason....}

[Sareeph]

{I was driving around recently and noticed a lot of potholes around my town. I instantly contacted Ford to ask them what they are going to do about it. Still haven't heard back from them for some reason....}

 

Did those potholes start appearing as soon as Ford performed maintenance on your vehicle? Do they appear around the same time every day? Do others on your driving team that use different brands of vehicles and live in differing states and countries also experience those potholes at the same time?

 

People in the guild I am in, that use different IP's and live in different countries with different routes to the game, started experiencing greater latency issues to the "game only" since 5.8a was introduced. It also starts appearing around the time that would be Prime Time server time. The world is complicated but when people start having the same issue doing the exact same thing at the same time from different points around the world starting on the same date, people tend to find the common denominator and point towards it.

[CrazyCT]

Did those potholes start appearing as soon as Ford performed maintenance on your vehicle? Do they appear around the same time every day? Do others on your driving team that use different brands of vehicles and live in differing states and countries also experience those potholes at the same time?

 

People in the guild I am in, that use different IP's and live in different countries with different routes to the game, started experiencing greater latency issues to the "game only" since 5.8a was introduced. It also starts appearing around the time that would be Prime Time server time. The world is complicated but when people start having the same issue doing the exact same thing at the same time from different points around the world starting on the same date, people tend to find the common denominator and point towards it.

 

Yes..

[AlrikFassbauer]

We have one member in the guild constantly crashing because of her router. Last time she changed that router everything worked better for her.

[Seireeni]

I've had 0 issues with lag lately. I guess this means European servers are fine. But seriously speaking, what Mubrak said. If it's not something everyone is experiencing (and sometimes it is, I've had times in another game where the game suddenly freezes on everyone or pretty much everyone), and it's not just you, then the problem is probably between you and SWTOR servers. It sucks, but SWTOR can't do anything about it.

[xordevoreaux]

Lag Cure:

 

1. Place 4 bottles of your favorite 100 Proof (50% alcohol) beverage in front of you.

2. Fill one glass (minimum 4-dram capacity) with above beverage.

3. For each experience of a lag spike, apparent lag spike, or ability delay, drink.

4. Repeat process until 1st bottle is gone.

 

You are now as slow as the game. Presto! No lag!

 

The remaining bottles are for each countered bug over 1 year old yet to be fixed.

 

Enjoy!

[BRKMSN]

Did those potholes start appearing as soon as Ford performed maintenance on your vehicle? Do they appear around the same time every day? Do others on your driving team that use different brands of vehicles and live in differing states and countries also experience those potholes at the same time?

 

People in the guild I am in, that use different IP's and live in different countries with different routes to the game, started experiencing greater latency issues to the "game only" since 5.8a was introduced. It also starts appearing around the time that would be Prime Time server time. The world is complicated but when people start having the same issue doing the exact same thing at the same time from different points around the world starting on the same date, people tend to find the common denominator and point towards it.

So ... are 100% of the drivers experiencing the same exact potholes now? In other words, is your sample size (you and a few guldies from different regions, using different ISPs) large enough to represent the entire player base and their experience?

 

I'm a west coast guy. My latency increased significantly after the server relocation (from about 25 ms to 85 ms at best). I notice more variation than before, but it stands to reason my "path" to the server is much longer now and more likely to find snags along the way. The weather lately hasn't been stable and the release of patches often happens to coincide with a significant weather event this time of year.

 

There are so many possible factors that can contribute that I just don't see how people regularly want to blame the game servers for all of it. I prefer to blame people that feel the need to bog down the internet with pictures of their latest meal.

[ItzProficient]

Im seeing a lot of speculation and finger pointing in wrong places. Just wanted to let you all know this problem STARTED WITH PATCH 5.8. Week before patch - fine. Day before patch - fine. Hours before patch - fine. Day of patch? - lagfest. Day after patch - stil lagfest. Last night - stil laggy asf. The common denominator with this problem that a lot of people are having is PATCH 5.8. Why is it that the ping, compatibility, and packet flow were all effected once PATCH 5.8 launched. That is the only thing that changed.

[Sareeph]

So ... are 100% of the drivers experiencing the same exact potholes now? In other words, is your sample size (you and a few guldies from different regions, using different ISPs) large enough to represent the entire player base and their experience?

 

I'm a west coast guy. My latency increased significantly after the server relocation (from about 25 ms to 85 ms at best). I notice more variation than before, but it stands to reason my "path" to the server is much longer now and more likely to find snags along the way. The weather lately hasn't been stable and the release of patches often happens to coincide with a significant weather event this time of year.

 

There are so many possible factors that can contribute that I just don't see how people regularly want to blame the game servers for all of it. I prefer to blame people that feel the need to bog down the internet with pictures of their latest meal.

 

I have toons in multiple guilds and one of those is one of the largest in the game (approaching 400 unique accounts). It has multiple members from each of the many outlying regions. ( Australia, Germany, Russia, Ireland to name a few). I believe it is a sufficient microcosm of the game for this discussion. Many in that guild have mentioned the sudden spikes around server prime (as well as the other guilds I am in). Some living in Virginia and surrounding areas with pings in or below the 30's that suddenly spike to the infamous red X. I just find it hard to explain away, that people from all over the world using differing ISP's and routes, consistently start having the same issue at the same time (both date and times) because of something like weather or food pics.

 

Yeah I've been getting random bouts of lag spikes since the patch. I ran a wireshark trace while it was happening once and there are a bunch of dropped/delayed packets ("TCP previous segment not captured" and a bunch of dup ACKs) from 159.153.65.232 which is the EA IP.

 

It's not a constant thing usually I'm only at like 20-40 ms but then it seems randomly I'll have bouts of constant lag spikes and sometimes it stays in the 100s for a bit.

 

Two threads going on about lag. Just posting this here in case one thread stops going.

 

Ran a tracert

 

Here is what I see between 6-11

 

6 14ms 13ms 13ms 4.68.71.133

7 * * * Request timed out

8 20ms 21ms 18ms 4.79.23.202

9 91ms 87ms 89ms 159.153.92.10

10 110ms 107ms 108ms 159.153.92.86

11 87ms 91ms 93ms 159.153.65.228

 

These are a couple posts from the multiple threads about this issue.

[BRKMSN]

So I should be having noticeably worse lag too, right ... and everybody else?

 

You don't think that there's any possibility whatsoever that something else could have occurred on the same Tuesday that could contribute to the problems?

[Sareeph]

So I should be having noticeably worse lag too, right ... and everybody else?

 

You don't think that there's any possibility whatsoever that something else could have occurred on the same Tuesday that could contribute to the problems?

 

Look at the IP's in those. Some are definately the Server Ip's. Just because some people do not have the problem doesn't mean it has to be something other than the servers. Also, this problem has been going since the patch, not a specific day or couple days.

[Andryah]

Im seeing a lot of speculation and finger pointing in wrong places. Just wanted to let you all know this problem STARTED WITH PATCH 5.8. Week before patch - fine. Day before patch - fine. Hours before patch - fine. Day of patch? - lagfest. Day after patch - stil lagfest. Last night - stil laggy asf. The common denominator with this problem that a lot of people are having is PATCH 5.8. Why is it that the ping, compatibility, and packet flow were all effected once PATCH 5.8 launched. That is the only thing that changed.

 

Except all you have demonstrated here is a coincidence. You actually have no idea if patching to 5.8 is the only thing that changed.

 

Keep in mind.. for it to be the servers.. then literally every player would be reporting the same issue and the forums would be melting under the force of complaints. Yet.. what we see is scattered reports.. and there is some indication it is Comcast customers that are having the majority of issues.

 

There are exactly 3 players in my guild reporting this issue (out of more then 60)... and guess what.. we checked and they each are Comcast customers. Yet we also have other members who use Comcast and report no issues. One of the 3 reset their Comcast router (per Comcast Customer Support suggestion) and restarted their computer and has not had issues since. The other 2 have tried this and apparently it did not work.

 

Please note: I am not saying there is no issue.. only that A) it's not affecting everyone.. so it cannot be something as simple as it being the servers. B) there are multiple reports that tend to correlate the issue with being a Comcast customer.

 

It is possible that with patch 5.8, something was changed with the client that may have exposed a weakness in either hardware, drivers, router, gateway, etc... for some users. But as far as I can tell.. there is no clear evidence of this... however I have in fact seen this sort of thing happen with other software applications over the years.. where somehow the TCPIP stack on my computer gets corrupted... and yet when I reset everything it clears up and never returns.

 

It is also possible it is something else completely. And my main point I posting here is to encourage players to get a free copy of pingplotter and actually run some time based audits of their route to/from the server and their PC to see if you can localize where exactly the problem is occurring. Absent doing this.. you are really just throwing spaghetti at the wall to see what sticks. Stop guessing and accusing and actually do some actual troubleshooting.

Edited April 15, 2018 by Andryah