Technical Support

[Xev]

Ok so I've been watching my pings to the world and the game and my game pings are still just way out there while my 'world' pings (to Google f/x) are generally under 50ms, I even have some 30ms periods. Never goes above 50's. Game pings can be counted in non-fractional seconds at times..

So, finally I break down and go to send Tech Support a message and all I get is... "This page can't be displayed"

Lol?

Oh yeah and before I forget again.. anyone had a problem with taking screenies that all come up blank? I've tried all the command line options as well as the default hotkey. They all take blanks except the one(s) that include(s) the interface. The prob started some months back. Before that, worked fine.

[General Idiot]

Sounds like something's fouled up between your computer and theirs. Try using a proxy - google will find you plenty of them and most of the better ones offer a limited free service so you can at least see before paying anything - and seeing if that helps.

Alternately, if you downloaded the game directly from PWE instead of from Steam, the PWE installer also installs a peer to peer thing that the game uses to make the on demand patching go faster. Pundo something, I think it's called. But that may be killing your connection as well. It's perfectly safe to remove it entirely (Do so from the control panel, I think it shows up there) and unless you reinstall the game it shouldn't get automatically reinstalled.

If you DO reinstall the game, install it through Steam. Aside from not getting p2p bloatware installed along with it, you also get the ability to buy Zen through Steam Wallet and thus not have to deal with PWE's terrible billing system.

[Xev]

Ugh a proxy server.. Not my favorite procedure in the world but a valid thing to try, especially when I get more PC time or if the problem just gets unbearable.

I have big lag on every server connection, now. When I load the launcher it's not uncommon to see a couple timeouts first. Every connection after that has lag until I get logged in and then I can see the huge pings exactly with the in-game lag-o-meter /netgraph. Well, and I can't even contact Tech Support. Ha..! Is that just me or do they actually have none like people report in Zone?

Since I started playing 4 months or so ago until now there hasn't even been a hiccup with my CO connection that I can remember.

Glad you weren't going to tell me to re-install the p2p stuff... Got rid of that a lil while back due to it sucking my precious little bandwidth  *Hi Verizon* even as I just sat there in the Create screen costume-fiddling.

Thx for the advice and Steam info.  I might give the proxy idea a try.

EDIT: Hey, there is a Proxy Server connection option within the launcher. I'd noticed it before but always assumed I had to have an address to give it if enabling the option but whadda ya know, apparently the launcher itself offers an alternate connection to the game.

Maybe it's random luck but so far since enabling the proxy server connection option in the launcher I'm not having any major lag spikes. Ran a few alarts, loaded a few different toons and ran them around some.  Pings are still a lil high in the 200ish-ms range but yeah, no rubberbanding,  no major spikes yet.

Crossing fingers!

[General Idiot]

Good to hear it's working better, if not perfectly. Though I didn't know the launcher had a proxy built into it, that's odd. Makes me wonder if that's a big enough problem that they did that because of it.

[Xev]

There's a proxy server option for patching as well as playing in Options in the Launcher. Seemed to work for me then later on I got on and had problems again. It was a mess. For example, every time I'd log a toon in he'd try to partially materialize under the world and then rise up to ground level and at that point the graphics would start to normalize from wireframe as people were teleport-stepping around me, I'd get "[Null Message]" next to alerts, and the lag spikes were so bad that I would seem to be running up to a fight while actually everyone else had already finished it and was on to the next one. You'd have not wanted me as your healer at that point.. hah. There were intermittent patches of decent connection during this period is the only reason I stuck with it for awhile before giving up.

I ran 3 hours worth of alerts (been saving Patil mishes up) and some various goofing off before that without too much trouble.

There were people in Texas complaining about a bad server hop that was ruining their connection in a long thread (stickied?) on the forums from awhile back. Maybe that's what prompted them to add the proxy option to the launcher.

Just a lil update.. The first thunderstorm here in years knocked out electricity this morning. This time of year is pretty busy for me and I was pretty beat this weekend so I put off deciding which hideout to buy (while the 10% sale is going on) and was going to buy one this morning. Wouldn't you know it I don't get a chance to log on until the sale is just finishing.. Took me a few minutes to log in and as I was standing there with 1 HP (this happens now too when I log in sometimes and it can't be healed until I zone) with the red low hp screenflash going on with no shiny new first hideout and imagining another summer of little enjoyable online gaming, I was not a happy camper. I can't even take a screenie anymore except if I use the option to include the interface.

I'm pretty sure the problem is that I was enjoying the game entirely too much and The Universe has decided to put things back into balance.