topic Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile) in Gaming

Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

Gandalf — Sat, 07 Jul 2018 08:57:47 GMT

Hi all.

On the back of this thread we'd like to see if there are any other Path Of Exile players experiencing lag or other connectivity problems while gaming.

So far a couple of our customers have reported that using a VPN (Virtual Private Network) resolves the issue and they're able to game with no issues. With this in mind we'd like to investigate this, but we need your help.

If you think you're experiencing an issue similar to this and you've done the usual troubleshooting like plugging your PC into the router using an ethernet cable, please can you run a traceroute to the gaming server with and/or without the VPN?

WinMTR is a good free tool to do this.

Don't worry if you haven't tried a VPN, we still want to hear from you.

Just let us know you're having issues by replying to this thread and post up a traceroute.

In addition, do you experience the problem at any particular time of the day?

Also, if you do use a VPN can you go here: http://pingserverstatus.com/poe.php when the problem is particularly bad and let us know if the numbers change between the VPN off and on.

Cheers.

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

dvorak — Fri, 06 Jul 2018 16:26:15 GMT

Moderators Note.

Topic pinned

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

OldGamer — Mon, 16 Jul 2018 21:09:03 GMT

Hi,

I'm also getting intermittent latency issues with Path of Exile. Game runs fine 80% of the time but can lag (stutter) or freeze for a few seconds then recover (your character speeds up like crazy to perform the keyboard inputs from when the screen froze). You can still press F1 to access stats within the game, and if you move, use pots, etc, then the client catches up when the freeze is over. This is the only online game I have any issues with on Plusnet broadband.

Ethernet connection to hub, have tried disabling antivirus, closing all background apps, etc, but still get intermittent lag. The background apps (usually Youtube) continue to work fine whilst Path of Exile has has problems (have also checked other websites during freezes and internet is working fine at the time). Have checked all event logs, etc, but no issues and my PC is miles above minimum spec for Path of Exile (and works fine fine running it most of the time until the intermittent lag occurs).

Logged a support call with Plusnet (178876691) but was told nothing could be done. Ran WinMTR during latest lag/freezes to lon.login.pathofexile.com - copy below.

Host % Sent Recv Best Avrg Wrst Last

dsldevice.lan 0 251 251 0 1 5 1

No response from host 100 51 0 0 0 0 0

129.hiper04.sheff.dial.plus.net.uk 99 51 1 29 29 29 29

be3-3100.pcn-ir01.plus.net 0 251 251 10 11 35 11

core1-BE1.colindale.ukcore.bt.net 0 251 251 11 11 29 11

peer2-et-0-1-1.slough.ukcore.bt.net 0 251 251 11 13 33 12

No response from host 100 51 0 0 0 0 0

po96.net2.north.dc5.as20860.net 0 251 251 11 14 60 12

1718.g2.1ug.dc5.as20860.net 2 239 236 12 13 53 12

87.117.210.61 5 215 206 13 15 134 14

109.169.19.133 0 251 251 12 13 28 13

Any suggestions would be welcomed as I've run out of thinks to check/try with no luck.

Many thanks,

OldGamer.

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

OldGamer — Tue, 17 Jul 2018 17:19:12 GMT

Hi,

Worse lag/freezing today - 2nd WinMTR added for information (sorry for double post):-

Host % Sent Recv Best Avrg Wrst Last

dsldevice.lan 0 250 250 0 0 1 1

No response from host 100 51 0 0 0 0 0

129.hiper04.sheff.dial.plus.net.uk 99 51 1 0 12 12 12

be3-3100.pcn-ir01.plus.net 0 250 250 11 13 63 11

core1-BE1.colindale.ukcore.bt.net 0 250 250 11 12 64 11

peer2-et-0-1-1.slough.ukcore.bt.net 0 250 250 11 14 66 12

No response from host 100 51 0 0 0 0 0

po96.net2.north.dc5.as20860.net 0 250 250 11 18 190 12

1718.g2.1ug.dc5.as20860.net 1 242 240 12 15 73 12

87.117.210.61 3 230 225 13 16 114 13

109.169.19.133 0 250 250 12 14 65 13

This was mid-afternoon on 17/07 so not at peak hours. Have tried several other login servers also but I'm still getting intermittent lag on all those I've tried.

Regards,

OldGamer.

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

TheFerret — Tue, 17 Jul 2018 22:05:25 GMT

I been having this issue for a while now, more or less since moving in and going to plusnet, which is a shame as PoE is one of my favourite games.

Here is my WinMTR Stats from this afternoon for a little. The packet loss freezes are horrendous and sudden lag spikes.

Host                               %       Sent   Recv   Best   Avrg   Wrst   Last
RT-N66U-3238                       0       435       435       1       2       11       1
No response from host               100       88       0       0       0       0       0
No response from host               100       88       0       0       0       0       0
be3-3100.pcn-ir01.plus.net           0       435       435       11       13       64       12
core1-be1.colindale.ukcore.bt.net   0       435       435       11       13       65       13
peer2-et0-0-1.slough.ukcore.bt.net   0       435       435       12       15       67       12
No response from host               100       88       0       0       0       0       0
po95.net2.north.dc5.as20860.net       1       431       430       13       18       108       17
1718.g2.1ug.dc5.as20860.net           0       435       435       11       15       117       12
87.117.210.61                       3       392       381       12       17       119       15
109.169.19.133                       1       431       430       12       14       58       17

I did have a long test with ping plotter but the first hop to .plus.net failed with a very high packet loss, which continued every test I started on it.

Hopefully you can resolve!

Thanks

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

TheFerret — Wed, 18 Jul 2018 20:04:01 GMT

Another WinMTR from this afternoon, roughly from 17:00 to 17:30.

|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|

|                                      WinMTR statistics                                   |

|                       Host              -   % | Sent | Recv | Best | Avrg | Wrst | Last |

|------------------------------------------------|------|------|------|------|------|------|

|                            RT-N66U-3238 -    0 | 2193 | 2193 |    1 |    1 |   13 |    2 |

|                   No response from host - 100 | 440 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |

|                   No response from host - 100 | 440 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |

|              be3-3100.pcn-ir01.plus.net -    1 | 2182 | 2179 |   11 |   13 |   68 |   16 |

|       core1-be1.colindale.ukcore.bt.net -    0 | 2193 | 2193 |   10 |   13 |   69 |   12 |

|      peer2-et0-0-1.slough.ukcore.bt.net -    1 | 2178 | 2174 |   11 |   15 |   60 |   13 |

|                   No response from host - 100 | 440 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |

|         po95.net2.north.dc5.as20860.net -    0 | 2193 | 2193 |   13 |   19 | 267 |   14 |

|             1718.g2.1ug.dc5.as20860.net -    1 | 2156 | 2146 |   12 |   15 | 114 |   16 |

|                           87.117.210.61 -    4 | 1925 | 1857 |   12 |   17 | 149 |   16 |

|                          109.169.19.133 -    0 | 2193 | 2193 |   12 |   14 |   68 |   15 |

|________________________________________________|______|______|______|______|______|______|

I noticed on Monday, as I was not in work. It is fine until around 1pm and then as peak time comes around the issue worsens until it is unplayable.

Does anyone have any sort of idea on VPNs to use for this? As I didn't encounter a problem in the 5 years of playing PoE over 3 providers since Beta, but in less than a year on Plusnet, I have lost 5 characters to freezes and suddenly high latency.

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

Gandalf — Wed, 18 Jul 2018 20:14:22 GMT

Thanks for getting in touch with us here @OldGamer and @TheFerret

Apologies for the delayed response, and sorry to see you're experiencing connection problems when trying to play PoE.

There may be a number of reasons behind this, I'd like to investigate this further but would need to wait until tomorrow when I'm back in the office. I'll post back shortly.

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

OldGamer — Thu, 19 Jul 2018 18:30:47 GMT

Hi Gandalf,

Just to let you know that I've been using the Nord VPN free trial for the last 3 days and it does seem to fix 99% of the problems. Only had the screen freeze once (for about a second) and the lag/stuttering has been totally absent on the VPN sessions. Not sure why this is the case - theoretically a VPN should slow down performance as it adds more network hops plus the burden of encrypting and decrypting the traffic.

WinMTR log below from a VPN session on 19/07 at 6.45pm to lon.login.pathofexile.com:-

Host % Sent Recv Best Avrg Wrst Last

10.8.8.1 0 344 344 10 11 49 11

vlan40.bb1.lon7.uk.m247.com 0 344 344 10 13 57 11

xe-0-1-1-0.core1.lon2.uk.m247.com 0 343 343 11 12 49 11

eth-11-1-0.pni1.lon2.uk.m247.com 0 344 344 10 11 47 11

be20.asr01.thn.as20860.net 0 344 344 11 12 49 11

po112.net1.north.dc5.as20860.net 0 344 344 11 17 261 12

1717.g1.1ug.dc5.as20860.net 2 324 319 17 21 119 19

109.169.19.133 0 344 344 17 18 55 18

Hope this helps and good luck with finding a fix. I've actually signed up for the VPN service in the meantime just to avoid the frustration of suddenly lagging or freezing (which can often get your character killed in Path of Exile!), but I'll keep an eye on the thread.

OldGamer.

Edited because I can't spell.

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

Kelly — Thu, 19 Jul 2018 18:35:53 GMT

Hey.

That's an MTR to lon.login.pathofexile.com. Is that actually the server you connected to for the game? Or a login server which just handles the authentication.

It might be worth a netstat while you are connected and gaming and seeing what IP you are actually connect to?

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

OldGamer — Thu, 19 Jul 2018 21:45:45 GMT

Hi Kelly,

The "Consolidated Technical Issues and Guides" section of the PoE Support forums contains the only guide I could find regarding running WinMTR tests for PoE (https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/1377789), and this lists the login servers for performance testing, e.g. lon.login.pathofexile.com.

The game client does create a log (client.txt - snippet below) of the actual servers it creates your instance on, but always seems to refer back to the login server for the instance details:-

2018/07/19 21:37:51 779490031 c2b [DEBUG Client 2644] Got Instance Details from login server
2018/07/19 21:37:51 779490046 c48 [INFO Client 2644] Just before calling client instance session
2018/07/19 21:37:51 779490046 d3 [INFO Client 2644] Connecting to instance server at 87.117.247.141:6112
2018/07/19 21:37:51 779490062 15b [DEBUG Client 2644] Connect time to instance server was 0ms
2018/07/19 21:37:52 779490531 a34 [INFO Client 2644] : You have entered The Docks.
2018/07/19 21:39:39 779597562 c2b [DEBUG Client 2644] Got Instance Details from login server
2018/07/19 21:39:39 779597609 c48 [INFO Client 2644] Just before calling client instance session
2018/07/19 21:39:39 779597609 d3 [INFO Client 2644] Connecting to instance server at 78.129.140.131:6112
2018/07/19 21:39:39 779597640 15b [DEBUG Client 2644] Connect time to instance server was 16ms
2018/07/19 21:39:40 779598312 a34 [INFO Client 2644] : You have entered Enlightened Hideout.

I'm well out of my depth here, but it appears that the login server authenticates you then stays in the chain to provide instance details to the instance servers (presumably for load balancing). I'm guessing that's why the login servers are listed for WinMTR testing as they will remain constant, whilst the instance server you're connected to could change every few minutes (i.e. when you change zones, portal back to town to sell loot, etc)? As I say this is pure guesswork, so take it with a big pinch of salt as I could easily be 100% wrong!

OldGamer.

OldGamer

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

Gandalf — Fri, 20 Jul 2018 07:41:21 GMT

Hey @OldGamer

Trying something here by making a change to how your connection routes across our network, could you switch off your VPN and let us know how your next path of exile gaming sesh goes?

@TheFerret I've made the same change. Could you let us know too how it goes?

Cheers

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

Kelly — Fri, 20 Jul 2018 08:13:14 GMT

@OldGamer @TheFerret

Is the poor performance reliably happening at our evening peak? I.e. around 6-8pm (or a bit either side) with decent performance before or after then?

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

TheFerret — Fri, 20 Jul 2018 16:30:35 GMT

@Gandalf

Hi Gandalf,

I have just had a quick go, as I just got in from work and everything is looking really good for the 30 minutes that I played! Normally this would be a very bad time in terms of freezes/stutters and latency spiking all over the place but I have not seen any of this.

Hopefully this continues as I play over the weekend and let you know how it goes. Whatever you have done, seems to have worked so thank you so much!

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

Kelly — Fri, 20 Jul 2018 16:33:21 GMT

I've a suspicion that these PoE issues are caused by the issue we just fixed for WoW over on this thread: https://community.plus.net/t5/Gaming/Ongoing-World-of-Warcraft-issues/td-p/1551383

Did they start early June? Around the 10th?

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

OldGamer — Fri, 20 Jul 2018 16:55:50 GMT

Hi Kelly,

Wow - just played non-VPN for nearly 1.5 hours and performance was the best I've ever had - no lag or freezing and silky smooth animations/movement. Unfortunately I didn't save the the WinMTR logs (clicked close by mistake - doh!), but the in-game latency monitor was around 6 to 8ms most of the time (and the lowest I've ever seen it) and "spikes" were 100ms at most (I've seen 1-4k spikes previously) I'll play again later and post a WinMTR, but it really feels like you've nailed it.

Many thanks and have a great weekend. 🙂

OldGamer.

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

Kelly — Fri, 20 Jul 2018 17:11:55 GMT

@OldGamer That's great news.

You are still on a static IP though, meaning you are skipping the piece of kit we think we've fixed. Are you around for the next 30 mins and willing to test if it works without it?

Edit: Don't worry, I'll look at this next week!

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

OldGamer — Fri, 20 Jul 2018 18:03:35 GMT

Hi Kelly,

Sorry - had logged off for Friday night takeaway! If you can tell me how to get back to a dynamic IP address though I'd be happy to re-test.

OldGamer.

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

jtdjtd — Fri, 20 Jul 2018 22:23:42 GMT

Hi getting the same issue here, without VPN:

|                       Host              -   % | Sent | Recv | Best | Avrg | Wrst | Last |

|------------------------------------------------|------|------|------|------|------|------|

|                           dsldevice.lan -    0 | 102 | 102 |    0 |    1 |    2 |    1 |

|                   No response from host - 100 | 102 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |

|                         195.166.143.133 -   90 | 102 |   11 |   12 |   12 |   12 |   12 |

|              be3-3102.pcn-ir02.plus.net -    0 | 101 | 101 |   13 |   13 |   16 |   13 |

|                          195.99.125.144 -    0 | 101 | 101 |   11 |   12 |   13 |   12 |

|     peer2-et-0-0-4.slough.ukcore.bt.net -    0 | 101 | 101 |   14 |   14 |   28 |   14 |

|                   No response from host - 100 | 101 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |

|         po96.net2.north.dc5.as20860.net -    0 | 101 | 101 |   13 |   18 |   81 |   14 |

|             1718.g2.1ug.dc5.as20860.net -    0 | 101 | 101 |   14 |   17 | 103 |   14 |

|                           87.117.210.61 -    3 | 101 |   98 |   14 |   17 |   62 |   15 |

|                          109.169.19.133 -    0 | 101 | 101 |   14 |   14 |   16 |   15 |

|________________________________________________|______|______|______|______|______|______|

Gameplay freezes often, being oro's flicker its just aweful. However with VPN game play was flawless, spike rarely, ping is generally flat, gameplay stable:

|                       Host              -   % | Sent | Recv | Best | Avrg | Wrst | Last |

|------------------------------------------------|------|------|------|------|------|------|

|                           46.101.72.156 -    0 | 108 | 108 |   12 |   13 |   45 |   12 |

|                           46.101.72.253 -    0 | 108 | 108 |   12 |   15 |   41 |   20 |

|                         138.197.249.248 -    0 | 108 | 108 |   12 |   17 |   57 |   13 |

|              be20.asr01.ld5.as20860.net -    0 | 107 | 107 |   13 |   16 |   58 |   14 |

|         po96.net2.north.dc5.as20860.net -    0 | 107 | 107 |   13 |   18 |   73 |   15 |

|             1718.g2.1ug.dc5.as20860.net -    1 | 107 | 106 |   13 |   16 |   81 |   14 |

|                           87.117.210.61 -    3 | 107 | 104 |   14 |   18 |   70 |   14 |

|                          109.169.19.133 -    0 | 107 | 107 |   13 |   16 |   61 |   14 |

|________________________________________________|______|______|______|______|______|______|

I'm available for testing if needed.

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

Gandalf — Sat, 21 Jul 2018 19:10:44 GMT

Hey @OldGamer

About to log off now for the night, but if you're around tomorrow and fancy testing I'll be able to put you back onto a dynamic IP at around 10 am tomorrow morning?

Re: Latency issues whilst Gaming (Path Of Exile)

OldGamer — Sat, 21 Jul 2018 21:42:12 GMT

Hi Gandalf,

That will be fine - I'll test it after 10am tomorrow (Sunday) without using the VPN client and will let you know.

OldGamer