Universal Lag - Poor coding, or network?

[Critical Gaming]

Since roughly a year and a half ago, this game has felt choppier, laggier, and overall less responsive.

It doesn't seem to be a spotty type of lag. It's very consistent, and players like to call it "server-side" because it's universal.

This is a lot more noticeable when there is a lot going on on your screen.

Someone had mentioned that they personally had to quit after the last hurricane season (due to choppiness), which makes me think that its a router close to the ATL boxes that's picking a high metric in its routing protocol. I've noticed a spike near the data center in traceroutes (possible congestion?)

We could also have poorly written code either server or client that manifests as lag rather than crashes. I mean, my client still crashes ALL THE TIME so this can't be written off as a possibility.
__________________

Anyways, it seems like everyone I've asked about this has also been experiencing the same "lag" for the same amount of time (year and a half or so)

Can anyone else here confirm? Would be really nice to get this addressed ASAP.

.:Edit:.

When I get home I can run some traceroutes. If anyone else can, please post your traceroute reports here.

 

[Tazar]

I can't say that I have noticed anything with lag over the last year or more - except for large-scale EM Events and that's not unexpected on Atlantic.

 

[TooFastForYew]

Ever since the hurricanes in America I have had lag on most servers.

 

[Spiritless]

CC or EC? If the latter I think that's par for the course.

 

[Woodsman]

We could also have poorly written code either server or client that manifests as lag rather than crashes. I mean, my client still crashes ALL THE TIME so this can't be written off as a possibility.

A year ago, if you were on the EC, I would say switch to the CC if it was crashing, but whatever they've done recently, the EC has handled big EM events for me without dying. The EC used to choke on that stuff, and I suspected it was poor network handling, maybe somehow the client was being overwhelmed, but it has improved noticeably this year.

 

[MalagAste]

I'm guessing it's either your ISP or the net itself one of the hops in between you and the server.

 

[PlayerSkillFTW]

Yeah, i've noticed some serious lag as well. Some days it's not so bad, other days it's just plain brutal, and makes the game unplayable. Sometimes it's so bad, it reminds me of the infamous Lag Monster that used to emerge from it's den and terrorize the lands back in the day when too many players were on at once.
I play on Napa Valley. Even my friend who lives in Napa Valley, California, get's brutal lag sometimes to the Napa Valley server.

 

[Mapper]

CC or EC? If the latter I think that's par for the course.

I'd be more inclined to say the opposite from my experience.

 

[Samaira]

Do I even need to say that Oceania has issues? Heh. The other day I almost got pwned by a vampire bat. Honestly. A vampire bat. *sighs* What is the world coming to?

 

[Critical Gaming]

Ah, sorry I should have mentioned that I use only the classic 2d client.

I forgot to run trace routes last night. Will try to get to it tonight. Work blocks outbound ICMP and RDP requests so I can't do it from here.

 

[Petra Fyde]

I can't help feeling that whatever kicked all comcast customers out last night is going to be related to this.
my hubby and I can play for hours with neither of us experiencing a single crash, he uses cc, I use ec. EC only crashes if I run around a lot - such as looking for honesty items. Nor have either of us experienced significant lag recently

 

[Storm]

I'm on Comcast and having terrible problems with lag lately

 

[SpyderBite]

I can't help feeling that whatever kicked all comcast customers out last night is going to be related to this.
my hubby and I can play for hours with neither of us experiencing a single crash, he uses cc, I use ec. EC only crashes if I run around a lot - such as looking for honesty items. Nor have either of us experienced significant lag recently

I had issues last night via Comcast too. However it was just UO that was affected. Netflix via the PS3 and services in our iPads & work pcs weren't affected.

So I'm hesitant to blame Comcast exclusively. But it wouldn't surprise me if one there hubs here on the east coast might be whacky. We'll see later today when I login.

 

[Critical Gaming]

*is also comcast*

 

[Critical Gaming]

ping report:

Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=32ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=32ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=29ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=63ms TTL=48
Request timed out.
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=93ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=43ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=28ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=46ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=36ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=28ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=44ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=29ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=29ms TTL=48
Request timed out.
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=29ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=31ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=30ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=28ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=27ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=30ms TTL=48
Request timed out.
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=87ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=43ms TTL=48
Request timed out.
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=45ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=30ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=32ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=29ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=35ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=47ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=29ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=30ms TTL=48
Request timed out.
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=29ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=67ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=29ms TTL=48
Request timed out.
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=88ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=28ms TTL=48
Reply from 63.117.27.136: bytes=32 time=29ms TTL=48

Ping statistics for 63.117.27.136:
Packets: Sent = 76, Received = 70, Lost = 6 (7% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 27ms, Maximum = 93ms, Average = 36ms
Control-C
____________________


15 32 ms 31 ms 28 ms 206.112.176.58
16 33 ms 93 ms 31 ms 206.112.184.37
17 29 ms 30 ms 28 ms atlantic [63.117.27.136]

15 * * 81 ms 206.112.176.58
16 29 ms 28 ms 30 ms 206.112.184.37
17 28 ms 28 ms 28 ms atlantic [63.117.27.136]

I eventually got some full blown timeouts on 206.112.184.37. Nothing else seemed to be problematic. Not quite sure what that network is. I'd assume its global seeing as how that's the last hop before ATL. Might be unnoticeable if you don't pvp, though.

If anyone else experiencing lag:

tracert -w 100 -d 63.117.27.136
ping -t 63.117.27.136

I'd run the trace at least 10 times, and let the ping run for a few minutes.

 

[Crysta]

It has nothing to do with connections; i'd say its been since they converted the file formats over for the classic client. Something about the game engine and new formats don't mix well and seem to cause excessive slowdown when large groups of people or NPCs/Monsters are moving at once.

Basically, what the OP said is true.. the more is going on at once, the worse it gets.

 

[Critical Gaming]

Ahhh, yeah that makes sense.

Perhaps we can get some developer attention?

 

[Angel of Sonoma]

here's my unscientific observation: i live on the east coast and attended the exodus EM event on 2 shards. on chesapeake, i only crashed twice. on sonoma, (a less populated shard,) i crashed, oh say, 20+ times. this leads me to believe the issues are network related.

 

[Critical Gaming]

I think its a combination. Crysta had an awesome hypothesis. There is no doubt in my mind that there are network problems though. I verified with several people in vent last night and they all got similar or WORSE results on traces/pings.

I mean, there's nothing WE can do except for switch to the enhanced client and accept that UO is laggy now, haha. (Wow, that's depressing.)

Hopefully a dev reads this thread.

 

[Varrius]

http://i47.***********/25sxwe0.png

 

[Varrius]

bump

 

[silent]

Pinging 160+ to chessy used to ping around 40ish. I haven't been playing for a while but was thinking of logging back in and I was greeted with unplayable lag.