Game is Unplayable Online

[David Trest]

Alright. I am rapidly approaching the loss of any desire to play Discovery online. Every time I do I cannot get anything done due to the way the game is acting.

When I go to play missions, the enemy NPC ships jink back and forth in completely unrealistic ways. I'm talking about rapid, sudden movement in around 20m each way. It just took me 30 minutes to kill two Outcast ships in a level 6 mission (and I was flying a Hawk, armed with 2x Vengeance MkIs) due to the behavior. Every time I'd get lined up for a shot they'd jerk back and forth, on all 3 axis', ruining any shot. It also becomes hard when one of them moves to flee, and as I pursue they suddenly snap to 2KM behind me.

I've also had two missions FAIL because the enemy NPCs fled, and somehow managed to move faster than I could with a Cruise Engine on (we're nowhere near a trade lane). That's not exactly fair, and I've never seen that happen in a single player game. I had to quit the last one in sheer frustration because of how ridiculous the fight was. Honestly, the fight should take 10 minutes tops for all 4 ships, not 30+ minutes just to knock out two.

I've also had the game show some kind of weird lag. I'll move up to a dockable object, with the docking computer on, and simply sit there. Doing nothing. For up to 5 minutes. Then, finally, the dock procedure will begin. No, the computer does not announce "entering queue", I simply sit there. I can switch to free flight and move around still. This has also happened while at a jump gate, and happened during the animation. At that point I couldn't cancel out, had to force-kill the game (as quitting to main menu locked it up). When I got back in, I found that I had lost all of my mines, countermeasures and cargo. For someone just starting, that's a very pricey loss. That's not including the losses in money and reputation that I suffered from the failed missions.

I do not suspect this is a connection issue. I have a throughput of approximately 6.72/0.96 Mb/s. My average latency (when connecting to the server) is <200ms, usually around 170-180. There are times when neither issue happens, but it's happening more and more. It's not local computer latency, I know what that looks like. I know the server's in Denmark (and I am in San Diego, California), but that's still a good connection time for such a distance. I have another friend playing on the same server and on the same location as I am (west coast of the US), with no issues.

I ran a pingtest to a nearby location (Malm?, SE, as the Denmark server wasn't up) and came up with a result of 173, about the same as I'm getting from the Discovery server. So if someone has any suggestions or ideas, I'd love to hear them, as I'm near my wit's end.

[Sprolf]

This is definitely lag of some sort, sorry.

Have you tried typing /ping while playing on the server?
It will give you lag, loss, and ping information. (You have to have had the game running online for a few minutes for it to work, it doesn't display anything if you activate it within a few moments of entering the game.)

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[tazuras]

Type /ping while on the server, what does it say?

Also give some character names so if there is any admin magic to be done the admins will know who to do it to.

Edit: Ninja'd...

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[Agmen of Eladesor]

I would suggest doing a traceroute to the server, so we can see what's going on.

I'm in Indiana, and a ping of 150 - 180 is quite normal and easily playable. /ping the server as well to check for packet loss. Also, if you're running something else - such as a torrent file - at the same time, that can REALLY screw up your game play.

And lastly - give us some character names to work with...

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Oh god... The end of days... Agmen agreed with me.

[Bobthemanofsteel]

Yep, sounds like when I was on Dial Up.

[Curios]

DO A BARREL ROLL


Seriously, try this:

open start-up menu, find for "Run..", use it, type cmd, enter and in opened window type:

tracert 87.72.29.113

So, if will get results, post em here and we'll see how its going. It can be two things: high ping or server lags when its ~200 players online.

So, the solution is to fight with NPCes at early morning when here is around 100 players online and they are just trading, at evening there is massive fights taking place usually, so lags are appers.

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[David Trest]

First, the traceroute:

1 2 ms 2 ms <1 ms 192.168.1.1
2 8 ms 7 ms 9 ms 10.118.64.1
3 12 ms 8 ms 10 ms wcsdca1-gsr1-ge14-0-7.san.rr.com [24.25.193.81]
4 28 ms 15 ms 15 ms gig5-0-0.wcsdca1-gsr3.san.rr.com [24.25.192.14]
5 10 ms 10 ms 9 ms so-2-0-0-0.gar1.SanDiego1.Level3.net [4.79.36.9]
6 9 ms 10 ms 9 ms ae-24-24.car2.SanDiego1.Level3.net [4.69.142.78]
7 44 ms 51 ms 53 ms ae-4-4.ebr2.Dallas1.Level3.net [4.69.133.214]
8 42 ms 39 ms 49 ms ae-93-98.ebr3.Dallas1.Level3.net [4.69.146.92]
9 70 ms 76 ms 66 ms ae-7-7.ebr3.Atlanta2.Level3.net [4.69.134.22]
10 80 ms 78 ms 81 ms ae-2-2.ebr1.Washington1.Level3.net [4.69.132.86]
11 89 ms 76 ms 83 ms ae-91-91.csw4.Washington1.Level3.net [4.69.134.142]
12 87 ms 96 ms 82 ms ae-92-92.ebr2.Washington1.Level3.net [4.69.134.157]
13 176 ms 171 ms 172 ms ae-42-42.ebr2.Frankfurt1.Level3.net [4.69.137.53]
14 171 ms 168 ms 169 ms ae-2-2.ebr1.Dusseldorf1.Level3.net [4.69.132.137]
15 228 ms 247 ms 188 ms ae-1-7.bar1.Copenhagen1.Level3.net [4.69.142.169]
16 179 ms 179 ms 180 ms level3.dixcr1.cxnet.dk [213.242.108.22]
17 190 ms 196 ms 199 ms ve4022.albcr2.ip.cxnet.dk [87.72.99.81]
18 214 ms 188 ms 186 ms ve4002.ksvpr1.ip.cxnet.dk [87.72.98.18]
19 185 ms 183 ms 183 ms ve4006.ambpr1.ip.cxnet.dk [87.72.98.81]
20 187 ms 187 ms 185 ms bcu012a.cxnet.dk [82.211.224.167]
21 192 ms 194 ms 193 ms 87.72.29.113

Fairly normal, especially considering trans-Atlantic communications.

I also did the /ping in game, a few results varied from 250 to 350. I did some combat, as well, and no issues this time (although this was regular combat, not a mission).

My character name is David_Trest.

I also forgot to point out that I played under 4.84 online and had no issues.

[Curios]

Server is now moved to different location, so, 200-300 ms ping is little high for npc fighting.

mine trace is looks like this:


Трассировка маршрута к 87.72.29.113 с максимальным числом прыжков 30

1 <1 мс <1 мс <1 мс bras-ats77-6-lo-1.kis.ru [89.189.25.253]
2 <1 мс 1 ms 1 ms bb-gi-2-27.kis.ru [212.92.180.225]
3 1 ms <1 мс <1 мс pe-l.NNovgorod.gldn.net [212.44.133.37]
4 56 ms 49 ms 56 ms cat01.Frankfurt.gldn.net [194.186.80.126]
5 48 ms 48 ms 48 ms TenGigabitEthernet7-4.ar1.FRA4.gblx.net [64.208.
222.201]
6 73 ms 74 ms 74 ms COM-X-Networks.ae0.413.ar1.CPH1.gblx.net [208.48
.24.170]
7 77 ms 108 ms 65 ms ve4022.albcr2.ip.cxnet.dk [87.72.99.81]
8 90 ms 74 ms 114 ms ve4002.ksvpr1.ip.cxnet.dk [87.72.98.18]
9 66 ms 67 ms 70 ms ve4006.ambpr1.ip.cxnet.dk [87.72.98.81]
10 80 ms 74 ms 77 ms bcu012a.cxnet.dk [82.211.224.167]
11 65 ms 74 ms 100 ms 87.72.29.113

also:

12 87 ms 96 ms 82 ms ae-92-92.ebr2.Washington1.Level3.net [4.69.134.157]
13 176 ms 171 ms 172 ms ae-42-42.ebr2.Frankfurt1.Level3.net [4.69.137.53]

this part is going to be a problem, maybe its a real to change ISP or maybe to ask them to change your route, i don't know. I think here is people that playing well from America.

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[Cannon]

350 is very high for the US, I get a little less and I'm another 10000 km further away. 180-250 would be normal I think.

Are you on a wireless connection?

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Proud member of "the most paranoid group of people in the community"

Old Avatar #2 | Old Avatar #3

[David Trest]

I am no stranger to networking, particularly as that's what my degree is in, but asking my ISP to change a route? I'd have better luck solving peace in the Middle East. Assuming they even *have* the ability to change the route.

Changing ISPs is also not feasible. Due to the way they work with city developments, there's only one cable or DSL provider in each place. DSL down here is handled by SBC, and I do not want to use anything affiliated with AT&T.

ETA: Yes, wireless LAN. The router is 5 feet away from my computer. Strong signal there on a G connection. I can easily get over 500KB/s download on this computer.