Latency Increase Alberta, CA

Technical Support
1

Recently in the past couple months I’ve experienced an increase in latency when connecting to blizzard servers. Before, I would get around 50-60 RTT and now I rarely get below 80. I’m aware this is still a reasonable RTT, but along with the increase came spikes in latency and in general the game feels worse to play. I’ve already opened a ticket and have been informed that the issue is in routing between my ISP, Shaw, and Blizzard servers. I’m posting a WinMTR to see if others are having the same issue, and they too can post theirs.

WinMTR Statistics

WinMTR statistics

Host % Sent Recv Best Avrg Wrst Last
hitronhub.home 72 7 2 2 2 3 2
No response from host 100 6 0 0 0 0 0
rc3ar-be109-1.ed.shawcable.net 0 26 26 11 17 31 13
66.163.70.129 0 26 26 11 17 31 12
rc3no-be6.cg.shawcable.net 0 26 26 17 21 33 17
rc2wt-be100.wa.shawcable.net 0 26 26 30 35 48 36
rc1wt-be18-1.wa.shawcable.net 0 26 26 32 36 48 35
eqix-se2.blizzardentertainment.com 0 26 26 30 35 46 35
ae1-br01-eqse2.blizzardonline.net 0 26 26 31 39 99 36
xe-0-0-0-1-br01-eqsv5.blizzardonline.net 0 26 26 48 58 172 53
xe-0-0-1-1-br02-eqla1.blizzardonline.net 0 26 26 61 79 218 64
No response from host 100 6 0 0 0 0 0
2

You think 80 is bad? Imagine 200-300 everyday. The game is unplayable right now to me.

3

If you look at his test (that looks identical to mine) on the last two hops, excluding the ‘no response’ it jumps to 200ms. Trust me having 80 ping with 200ms ping jumps is more than comparable to people with 200ms showing on in game. I constantly have double animations and some rubber banding at times with the identical ping as B72.

But yes B72 I have the identical issue (Alberta) with both Shaw and Telus. I’ve already confirmed with blizzard support that this issue is on their end somehow relating to ‘certain’ ISPs, which lets be real it seems like a really large chunk of the community is dealing with this. They told me there was no ETA for a fix…not really sure what kind of timeframe they have in mind.

1 Like
4

You have tried both Shaw and Telus? My solution was going to be switching ISPs if nothing else but if it’s an issue with both. And funny thing is that Blizzard support told me it was in no way on their end and there was nothing they could do about it. I’ve contacted Shaw about it (because Blizzard denies any involvement), and they pretty much said they don’t care. Pretty pathetic. I’m trying many VPNs but not a lot are set up well for better routing from Canada. I’ll let you know if I figure something out.

5

Yeah I have both ISPs, so don’t waste your money on that and if you sent that WinMTR to them and they told you it was your connection they’re fixating on the packet loss you have on the first hop. They are very aware of this problem and for obvious reasons they blame ISPs. Another one I’ve heard was ‘its just packet filtering’ which isn’t true either. They’re not going to openly disclose the problem especially considering they have no ETA on a fix.

They literally have a name for this issue and its ‘under investigation’ so I’m not sure why they’re bothering denying it in your case. When blizzard support told me about the problem they called it the ‘Equinix’ issue if you’ll notice the domain names of the two hops I mentioned: eqsv5, eqla1 both have ‘eq’. So I’m assuming there’s a third party for the routing named Equinix that’s been having issues.

So technically its not blizzard themselves, as they like to remind everyone (even though these routes say blizzard right on them). But it’s a third party that provides the servers for them. They can’t blame an ISP for this issue at all, the route only starts having issues when their servers have your connection.

If you’re still talking to blizzard support I’d mention ‘Equinix’ and see what they have to say about that.

Your connection does have one issue you need to fix though, you have packet loss on your Hitron. I don’t know if that’s something you’ve looked into but 72% packet loss is severe. This is most likely a result of the ‘Puma 6’ problem with that model of modem (I’ve had one before with shaw). You might want to ask Shaw to check the firmware on your modem as it should never be getting packet loss that high anymore, the firmware has been patched to mitigate most of the issues. My recommendation for you is to fix the packet loss on your connection first before you deal with blizzard support or they’ll fixate on that instead of the 200+ ping jumps at the bottom.

So essentially what I’m saying is you have two separate issues to deal with, one modem/ISP related and a blizzard issue. What plan are you on with shaw? If you’re on 150mbps with a contract I’d recommend upgrading your modem to the XB6 as from what I’ve heard its much more reliable & stable when compared to the Hitron.

It doesn’t look like the packet loss is propagating down to the other hops so it wouldn’t be the problem (but its never good to have packet loss anyways). But until you fix that part blizzard support will keep telling you its your ISP. Fixing the packet loss issue won’t fix your ping…but at least it should get them to believe there’s more of an issue on their end.

EDIT: I should mention if you’re looking for a quick fix you should get shaw to put your Hitron in bridge mode and hook up another router. That should stop most of the packet loss you’re seeing. If any questions about it let me know…I’ve dealt with this issue before.

6

similar issue in NY. i usually have <60 ms lag, not i rarely get below 600!!! unplayable this weekend

7

Blizzard did actually tell me it was the ‘Equinix’ issue (After many ticket responses), however I said they denied any involvement because they basically told me it was out of their hands, and up to the ISPs to change.

And ya, I am actually aware of the Hitron packet loss with puma 6 chipsets. I haven’t gotten around to actually getting my own router and setting it all up, but it is on my to do list. I figure I should talk about it a little more as well because I did look into it.

If you have Shaw, they don’t have a SINGLE router that is not defective. It seems absurd, but every single router/modem they can provide has packet loss issues. I talked to support and confirmed that. If you want to get rid of packet loss with Shaw, you need to do exactly what you said and bridge their modem to a router you have to buy. Speaking of which, if anyone has any good router suggestions, I’m in the market.

Even if a person is not with Shaw, they should check this list to see if their router is affected: https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/topic/20752441321?page=1

As for the issue at hand, I really don’t know what to do. Seems like we aren’t getting the full story and if Blizzard says there is no ETA, I’m assuming that means it isn’t really being looked into until more people complain.

8

There’s absolutely no way its the ISPs responsibility. I really don’t understand why they keep saying that. I don’t ever see issues in any other game even remotely this bad.

And yeah Shaw for me has been an incredible disappointment. As soon as my contract expires I’m never going back to their service. They strung me along promising the new router would fix all the packet loss. They kept telling me “It’s coming out next month” and it came 1.5 years later.

That’s right, bridging is only a band-aid to the problem though, you’ll most likely get at least 2% packet loss from what I understand. With my Telus I at least get a packet loss free connection (other than Equinix).

I’m pretty bitter that they keep evading questions about the timeline to fix the Equinix issue after dropping so much money on a game from a multi-billion dollar company. I’ve had much faster response times to issues from small dev teams to fix an issue of this size.

At this point I’m moving away from playing this game. Even if I don’t want to…I literally have no choice as the game is unplayable with ping fluctuations. Can’t even call Overwatch ‘competitive’, apparently if you hit the routing lottery you get to climb through the ranks.

I’m honestly not too sure what routers would be good I currently have an Asus Dark Knight rt-n66u as my secondary router. A modern router that has decent reviews is the Asus RT-AC88U that I had been thinking about buying at one point.

Edit: The NETGEAR Nighthawk Pro XR500 is probably the highest rated router I’ve seen in a long time too if that price point is what you have in mind.

9

I asked for a completely truthful answer from support, and this is what they said:

"To directly answer your question, the short version is no. We do not have any way to control how the internet service provider routes their customer’s signals to our servers.

We can provide general information on what the problem is, why it’s happening, and who / how to contact for these cases. Though that is sadly the extend of what we can do directly here through the Technical Support department. "

So I guess if Shaw/Telus don’t feel like doing something we are SOL

10

Makes sense to a certain extent…other than the fact that this keeps happening every time they patch the game. Not to mention this is literally the only game that this keeps happening to…and its not just those two ISPs, plenty of people in the US have identical issues.

So in my honest opinion its blizzards job to hassle these ISPs to fix it. They’re not going to listen to us if we mention it.

11

Hi there friends,

I know connection issues are never fun and cause all types of problems. I would like to try and gather some information on these reports to see what we can do to help. As a note, we do try and reach out to ISPs at time for large outages and connection issues. Once we reach out to them, not much more we can do. We have informed of a problem and have to hope they correct it.

With that said, lets go ahead and try and collect information here to try and fine the cause. To do this, we would love a WinMTR and a Looking Glass. These will let us see the connection from us to you and from you to us. With these, please also post what latency you are seeing on average and if you had any spikes while running the test in game.

We do want to help. Help us help you. :slight_smile:

/Nathardrick

12

Unable to currently, but I will try to do it ASAP.

13

Out of curiosity why is it that the ping is changing and getting worse only with Overwatch. Are you guys changing something about the servers/routes? I’m just wondering because I know my ISPs aren’t changing anything to cause the problem, mainly because lets face it ISPs want to do as little as possible.

In any case here’s my WinMTR test (predictably the Equinix routes are much higher latency overall with ping jumping on the fifth hop):

|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
|                                      WinMTR statistics                                   |
|                       Host              -   %  | Sent | Recv | Best | Avrg | Wrst | Last |
|------------------------------------------------|------|------|------|------|------|------|
|                           192.168.1.254 -    0 |  224 |  224 |    0 |    0 |    3 |    1 |
|                            10.145.148.1 -    0 |  224 |  224 |    4 |    8 |   26 |    9 |
|               STTLWAWBCI01.bb.telus.com -    0 |  224 |  224 |   22 |   23 |   29 |   23 |
|                  six.blizzardonline.net -    0 |  224 |  224 |   21 |   22 |   37 |   23 |
|       ae1-br01-eqse2.blizzardonline.net -    0 |  224 |  224 |   25 |   27 |  152 |   26 |
|                   No response from host -  100 |   45 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
|                   No response from host -  100 |   45 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
|       be2-pe02-eqla1.blizzardonline.net -    0 |  224 |  224 |   92 |   93 |   99 |   94 |
|                           24.105.30.129 -    0 |  224 |  224 |   93 |   94 |   99 |   94 |
|________________________________________________|______|______|______|______|______|______|
   WinMTR v0.92 GPL V2 by Appnor MSP - Fully Managed Hosting & Cloud Provider

Looking glass:

TRACEROUTE:
traceroute to 199.126.69.84 (199.126.69.84), 15 hops max, 60 byte packets
 1  10.56.70.56 (10.56.70.56)  0.318 ms  0.303 ms  0.301 ms
 2  37.244.22.3 (37.244.22.3)  1.111 ms  1.171 ms  1.240 ms
 3  24.105.30.158 (24.105.30.158)  0.915 ms  0.945 ms  1.011 ms
 4  137.221.66.0 (137.221.66.0)  1.640 ms  1.641 ms  1.696 ms
 5  137.221.68.70 (137.221.68.70)  1.604 ms  1.608 ms  1.609 ms
 6  137.221.65.5 (137.221.65.5)  51.456 ms  49.481 ms  49.453 ms
 7  137.221.65.9 (137.221.65.9)  68.804 ms  68.814 ms  68.821 ms
 8  137.221.71.32 (137.221.71.32)  68.124 ms  68.316 ms  68.290 ms
 9  TELUS.com (206.130.10.58)  68.220 ms  68.198 ms  68.305 ms
10  * * *
11  199.126.69.84 (199.126.69.84)  95.817 ms  96.144 ms  96.188 ms
12  199.126.69.84 (199.126.69.84)  97.532 ms  96.555 ms  96.618 ms


12/06/2018 00:27:46 UTC
--------------------

TRACEROUTE:
traceroute to 199.126.69.84 (199.126.69.84), 15 hops max, 60 byte packets
 1  10.57.100.13 (10.57.100.13)  0.339 ms  0.328 ms  0.327 ms
 2  37.244.23.130 (37.244.23.130)  0.523 ms  0.566 ms  0.626 ms
 3  24.105.62.146 (24.105.62.146)  0.870 ms  0.909 ms  0.968 ms
 4  137.221.66.12 (137.221.66.12)  2.471 ms  2.504 ms  2.598 ms
 5  137.221.69.72 (137.221.69.72)  2.407 ms  2.424 ms  2.426 ms
 6  137.221.65.9 (137.221.65.9)  22.478 ms  22.430 ms  22.424 ms
 7  137.221.71.32 (137.221.71.32)  22.177 ms  22.504 ms  22.556 ms
 8  TELUS.com (206.130.10.58)  25.873 ms  25.088 ms  25.081 ms
 9  * * *
10  199.126.69.84 (199.126.69.84)  75.854 ms  75.523 ms  75.849 ms
11  199.126.69.84 (199.126.69.84)  76.190 ms  76.693 ms  76.079 ms


12/06/2018 00:27:46 UTC
--------------------

PING:
PING 199.126.69.84 (199.126.69.84) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from 199.126.69.84: icmp_seq=1 ttl=53 time=96.8 ms
64 bytes from 199.126.69.84: icmp_seq=2 ttl=53 time=97.1 ms
64 bytes from 199.126.69.84: icmp_seq=3 ttl=53 time=96.6 ms
64 bytes from 199.126.69.84: icmp_seq=4 ttl=53 time=97.2 ms

--- 199.126.69.84 ping statistics ---
4 packets transmitted, 4 received, 0% packet loss, time 2998ms
rtt min/avg/max/mdev = 96.657/96.975/97.243/0.392 ms


12/06/2018 00:27:46 UTC
--------------------

PING:
PING 199.126.69.84 (199.126.69.84) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from 199.126.69.84: icmp_seq=1 ttl=54 time=77.0 ms
64 bytes from 199.126.69.84: icmp_seq=2 ttl=54 time=76.7 ms
64 bytes from 199.126.69.84: icmp_seq=3 ttl=54 time=75.7 ms
64 bytes from 199.126.69.84: icmp_seq=4 ttl=54 time=76.5 ms

--- 199.126.69.84 ping statistics ---
4 packets transmitted, 4 received, 0% packet loss, time 2998ms
rtt min/avg/max/mdev = 75.736/76.508/77.071/0.526 ms


12/06/2018 00:27:46 UTC
--------------------

MTR:
Start: Tue Jun 12 00:27:46 2018
HOST: Blizzard Loss%   Snt   Last   Avg  Best  Wrst StDev
  1.|-- 10.56.100.81      0.0%    10    0.3   0.3   0.2   0.5   0.0
  2.|-- 37.244.22.131     0.0%    10    0.5   0.5   0.4   0.8   0.0
  3.|-- 24.105.30.158     0.0%    10    0.9   1.0   0.8   2.0   0.0
  4.|-- 137.221.66.4      0.0%    10    1.5   1.5   1.4   1.6   0.0
  5.|-- 137.221.68.72     0.0%    10    1.6   1.5   1.3   2.3   0.0
  6.|-- 137.221.65.5      0.0%    10   47.7  47.8  47.7  48.3   0.0
  7.|-- 137.221.65.9      0.0%    10   68.3  69.7  68.2  81.5   4.1
  8.|-- 137.221.71.32     0.0%    10   68.0  68.2  68.0  68.6   0.0
  9.|-- TELUS.com         0.0%    10   68.0  68.3  68.0  69.4   0.0
 10.|-- ???              100.0    10    0.0   0.0   0.0   0.0   0.0
 11.|-- 199.126.69.84     0.0%    10   96.9  96.1  95.5  96.9   0.0


12/06/2018 00:27:46 UTC
--------------------

MTR:
Start: Tue Jun 12 00:27:46 2018
HOST: Blizzard Loss%   Snt   Last   Avg  Best  Wrst StDev
  1.|-- 10.57.100.13      0.0%    10    0.3   0.3   0.2   0.5   0.0
  2.|-- 37.244.23.130     0.0%    10    0.5   0.5   0.4   0.5   0.0
  3.|-- 24.105.62.146     0.0%    10    0.9   1.2   0.7   2.4   0.5
  4.|-- 137.221.66.12     0.0%    10    2.5   2.6   2.3   2.9   0.0
  5.|-- 137.221.69.72     0.0%    10    2.4   2.3   2.2   2.4   0.0
  6.|-- 137.221.65.9      0.0%    10   22.3  23.8  22.3  36.1   4.3
  7.|-- 137.221.71.32     0.0%    10   22.2  22.3  22.2  22.8   0.0
  8.|-- TELUS.com         0.0%    10   23.0  22.3  22.1  23.0   0.0
  9.|-- ???              100.0    10    0.0   0.0   0.0   0.0   0.0
 10.|-- 199.126.69.84     0.0%    10   75.8  76.1  75.5  78.1   0.6


12/06/2018 00:27:46 UTC
--------------------

Edit: Updated looking glass test

14

Just want to chime in here as an Australian.

Something they did a few major patches ago has changed something, Guarantee it.

My friends and I all live within a couple of Kilometers from each other and would get 25-29ms ping, then magically after a major update our ping doubles and even triples, never going below about 50.

Refuse to believe a change with all our ISPs just happened to coincide with the 6 hr patch window.

3 Likes
15

I agree I know for a fact nothing on my ISPs end has changed. All my other games pings have remained stable and identical at their previous values. At this point I’ve had to quit playing blizzard games completely out of frustration and the sheer amount of shot delay/double animations that are occurring. The other ISP I have at my house behaves identically to the other.

The thing that bothers me is if they knew they were making changes to the routes or servers why didn’t they preemptively inform the ISPs of the changes if they did actually need changes to happen. And if they “couldn’t” get the ISPs to prepare for the changes then maybe its not a good idea to push them through seeing as people all over the world seem to be having issues.

All this really comes down to sadly is some quality control instead of just pushing patches through to add more money making content. Not to mention if there’s a change that breaks the game for a good portion of the community you can roll them back, that’s the entire point to a patch and having versioning in software/games.

1 Like
16

Looking Glass

TRACEROUTE:
traceroute to 68.150.133.154 (68.150.133.154), 15 hops max, 60 byte packets
 1  10.56.100.81 (10.56.100.81)  0.258 ms  0.246 ms  0.244 ms
 2  37.244.22.131 (37.244.22.131)  0.583 ms  0.668 ms  0.804 ms
 3  24.105.30.162 (24.105.30.162)  1.131 ms  1.261 ms  1.298 ms
 4  137.221.66.6 (137.221.66.6)  1.657 ms  1.707 ms  1.790 ms
 5  137.221.68.72 (137.221.68.72)  1.560 ms  1.572 ms  1.572 ms
 6  137.221.65.7 (137.221.65.7)  8.466 ms  8.438 ms  8.430 ms
 7  137.221.70.32 (137.221.70.32)  8.241 ms  8.296 ms  8.268 ms
 8  rt0sj-equinix.cl.shawcable.net (206.223.116.20)  12.180 ms  11.682 ms  11.665 ms
 9  rc4sj-tge0-8-0-0.cl.shawcable.net (66.163.67.122)  12.901 ms  12.910 ms  12.908 ms
10  rc2wt-be60.wa.shawcable.net (66.163.78.73)  28.247 ms  28.572 ms  28.577 ms
11  rc3no-be100.cg.shawcable.net (66.163.75.234)  42.187 ms  41.877 ms  42.309 ms
12  rc1we-be6.ed.shawcable.net (66.163.64.70)  45.980 ms  45.853 ms  45.861 ms
13  dx3sg-la1-s1.ed.int.shawcable.net (64.59.186.78)  46.711 ms  46.784 ms  46.774 ms
14  * * *
15  * * *


11/06/2018 19:13:22 UTC
--------------------

TRACEROUTE:
traceroute to 68.150.133.154 (68.150.133.154), 15 hops max, 60 byte packets
 1  10.57.68.13 (10.57.68.13)  0.359 ms  0.341 ms  0.338 ms
 2  37.244.23.2 (37.244.23.2)  0.956 ms  0.958 ms  0.958 ms
 3  24.105.62.150 (24.105.62.150)  1.164 ms  1.167 ms  1.252 ms
 4  137.221.66.10 (137.221.66.10)  3.866 ms  3.873 ms  3.874 ms
 5  137.221.69.70 (137.221.69.70)  3.852 ms  3.852 ms  3.858 ms
 6  137.221.69.34 (137.221.69.34)  3.829 ms  2.835 ms  2.858 ms
 7  rt1ec-equinix.il.shawcable.net (208.115.136.20)  4.026 ms  2.550 ms  2.517 ms
 8  rc3sc-be25-1.wp.shawcable.net (66.163.75.133)  17.420 ms  17.796 ms  17.775 ms
 9  66.163.70.78 (66.163.70.78)  51.661 ms  51.692 ms  51.693 ms
10  dx3sg-la0-s1.ed.int.shawcable.net (64.59.186.74)  52.991 ms  52.985 ms  52.966 ms
11  * * *
12  * * *
13  * * *
14  * * *
15  * * *


11/06/2018 19:13:22 UTC
--------------------

MTR:
Start: Mon Jun 11 19:13:22 2018
HOST: Blizzard                  Loss%   Snt   Last   Avg  Best  Wrst StDev
  1.|-- 10.57.100.13                       0.0%    10    0.2   0.3   0.2   0.6   0.0
  2.|-- 37.244.23.130                      0.0%    10    0.5   0.8   0.4   2.4   0.5
  3.|-- 24.105.62.150                      0.0%    10    1.5   1.4   1.1   2.4   0.0
  4.|-- 137.221.66.14                      0.0%    10    2.0   2.1   1.9   2.5   0.0
  5.|-- 137.221.69.68                      0.0%    10    3.7   5.3   1.8  33.3   9.8
  6.|-- 137.221.69.32                      0.0%    10    1.4   2.4   1.2  10.9   3.0
  7.|-- rt1ec-equinix.il.shawcable.net     0.0%    10    2.2   2.1   1.7   2.4   0.0
  8.|-- rc3sc-be25-1.wp.shawcable.net      0.0%    10   16.8  16.9  16.6  17.3   0.0
  9.|-- 66.163.70.78                       0.0%    10   50.7  50.8  50.5  51.0   0.0
 10.|-- dx3sg-la0-s1.ed.int.shawcable.net  0.0%    10   51.9 102.1  51.9 553.1 158.5
 11.|-- ???                               100.0    10    0.0   0.0   0.0   0.0   0.0


11/06/2018 19:13:22 UTC
--------------------

MTR:
Start: Mon Jun 11 19:13:22 2018
HOST: Blizzard                  Loss%   Snt   Last   Avg  Best  Wrst StDev
  1.|-- 10.56.100.81                       0.0%    10    0.2   0.3   0.2   0.3   0.0
  2.|-- 37.244.22.131                      0.0%    10    0.5   0.6   0.4   1.3   0.0
  3.|-- 24.105.30.162                      0.0%    10    1.2   1.0   0.7   2.0   0.0
  4.|-- 137.221.66.6                       0.0%    10    1.6   1.7   1.4   2.1   0.0
  5.|-- 137.221.68.72                      0.0%    10    1.4   1.4   1.3   1.8   0.0
  6.|-- 137.221.65.7                       0.0%    10    8.5  10.0   8.4  23.8   4.8
  7.|-- 137.221.70.32                      0.0%    10    8.3   9.7   8.2  22.8   4.5
  8.|-- rt0sj-equinix.cl.shawcable.net     0.0%    10    8.6  10.5   8.6  11.9   0.9
  9.|-- rc4sj-tge0-8-0-0.cl.shawcable.net  0.0%    10   11.4  11.0   9.7  12.9   0.8
 10.|-- rc2wt-be60.wa.shawcable.net        0.0%    10   26.9  27.0  26.8  27.3   0.0
 11.|-- rc3no-be100.cg.shawcable.net       0.0%    10   42.1  42.2  41.9  42.7   0.0
 12.|-- rc1we-be6.ed.shawcable.net         0.0%    10   46.1  46.0  45.8  46.4   0.0
 13.|-- dx3sg-la1-s1.ed.int.shawcable.net  0.0%    10   48.1  78.3  46.7 360.2  99.0
 14.|-- ???                               100.0    10    0.0   0.0   0.0   0.0   0.0


11/06/2018 19:13:22 UTC
--------------------

WinMTR

|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
|                                      WinMTR statistics                                   |
|                       Host              -   %  | Sent | Recv | Best | Avrg | Wrst | Last |
|------------------------------------------------|------|------|------|------|------|------|
|                          hitronhub.home -    0 |   40 |   40 |    4 |   15 |   51 |   14 |
|                            68.150.128.1 -    0 |   40 |   40 |    9 |   15 |   50 |   14 |
|          rc3ar-be109-1.ed.shawcable.net -    0 |   40 |   40 |   12 |   19 |   49 |   15 |
|                           66.163.70.129 -    0 |   40 |   40 |   12 |   18 |   64 |   16 |
|              rc3no-be6.cg.shawcable.net -    0 |   40 |   40 |   14 |   21 |   53 |   16 |
|            rc2wt-be100.wa.shawcable.net -    0 |   40 |   40 |   31 |   37 |   56 |   36 |
|           rc1wt-be18-1.wa.shawcable.net -    0 |   40 |   40 |   31 |   37 |   54 |   35 |
|      eqix-se2.blizzardentertainment.com -    0 |   40 |   40 |   30 |   36 |   54 |   34 |
|       ae1-br01-eqse2.blizzardonline.net -    0 |   40 |   40 |   32 |   37 |   53 |   34 |
|xe-0-0-0-1-br01-eqsv5.blizzardonline.net -    0 |   40 |   40 |   50 |   55 |   66 |   55 |
|xe-0-0-1-1-br02-eqla1.blizzardonline.net -    0 |   40 |   40 |   59 |   71 |  106 |   78 |
17

Hey folks,

I checked out these tests as well as information on your accounts’ average ping to games lately. They both seem pretty close to expected values for the route you’re taking to our servers through the peers we use for your ISPs in Alberta. You’re hovering about 10 MS from what we expect for you across our peers specifically, and B72’s test was so short we can’t be sure the results aren’t skewed by some of those brief spikes in the test. I can’t say for sure why the ping increased, but I can say that at least what you’re seeing on our networks at least for now SEEMS normal.

As part of my investigation in our tools, I also did a search for both of your ISPs and it looks like you’re both very close to what others on your ISPs are getting as well. As a result, I don’t think there’s anything to be done routing-wise for you. We should instead focus on the spikes you mentioned in the OP, B72, unless we get some more WinMTRs with glaring problems with routing.

Unfortunately with the tools I have on my end I can’t see the ‘spikes’ you’re talking about, just your averages. I did see one instance for each of you in the last week where you were on an unexpected server.

B72 - you ended up on a France server, but you were logged into EU when that happened.

VeiledFlame - you wound up on a Brazilian server, I’m unsure why this happened. You may have been partied with a friend from near those servers or taken a very obscene spike latency spike while the matchmaker was testing your connection to the LA servers. That may have made the servers temporarily think that Brazil was the best connection option at the time.

These were single issues, however, and shouldn’t be confused with your normal connection changes. VeiledFlame - you did your test to the login servers, not the game servers. This isn’t going to be indicative of your in game ping as a result. So, here’s what I need you two to do to look into the spikes you reported a bit more.

In the WinMTR article is a process to get your game server IP from the in game network graph (Ctrl+Shift+N).

Follow this process at the beginning of a game and run your WinMTR for that whole game. If you see a situation where you’re getting several bad spikes, save that test and upload the results here. If you get nothing, repeat this until you catch a game with some spikes in it. I also need you to grab some screenshots of your network graph when things get nasty for you. If you can upload those to imgur or a similar website and link it here, we can check that for options. Place your link between two ` marks if you get a link error while posting. It’ll look like this:

link goes here

Thanks for the info and patience. Hopefully with this data we can get a better look at what’s going on for you.

18

Dystilled,

You’re in Australia, unfortunately this isn’t going to be the same problem as these two players are mentioning. I’m pretty sure you’re noticing the change from latency to RTT we did back in march. If this isn’t the case, you’ll want to create your own thread.

19

Before I even begin to talk about the issue there is something about that WinMTR article that always bothered me. For Overwatch, it firsts tells you to get the ip for the server you will play on by joining the practice range and using ctrl+shift+n. This is weird because the practice range will always put you on the least busy server (usually asia?) Sounds like you would get a lot of WinMTRs from servers the user isn’t even playing on.

Anyways…

Yes, that’s the issue. Latency is much higher than before (couple months ago), due to routing. Unless I am misunderstanding what you are saying here.

Again, that’s kind of the whole issue. Of course we are getting similar latency to everyone else on our ISP, because everyone on our ISPs (Telus, Shaw) is affected by this routing issue. It’s not like we want better latency then everyone else, we just want the latency we used to be getting with our ISPs.

This was on purpose just to test something. I know the issue I am having and wouldn’t mistake it for being put on the wrong server.

I shouldn’t have used the word ‘Spike’, that was my mistake. I should have said fluctuations. Before this routing issue, I used to get around 57RTT flat. It would stay there all day. Now, my RTT fluctuates from 75 - 85 constantly changing. Obviously, not groundbreaking, but it was a symptom I noticed.

I can tell you for sure that this issue isn’t ‘normal’ and I won’t let it be passed off as such. I’ve played fps games for quite a while, I’ve been top500 NA in Overwatch on a couple accounts. I know the game and I know the latency I used to, and should be getting.

I think many people, including myself, whose ISPs are Shaw or Telus would appreciate if you continued to look into the matter. I’ll be back with a longer WinMTR, as you requested.

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20

@Drakuloth ‘Normal’ pings don’t hit 95ms…you can’t begin to claim that’s a typical ping, there’s a bigger issue obviously since everyone seems to be having close to double their ping. So technically you’re correct, these are ‘normal’ values for the new lower standards you guys are setting for ping. I used to have 40ms (50ms with the patch that changed how the ping is displayed) on my shaw connection, now it jumps to 75-85 exactly like B72 said; the connection I have with Telus to your servers aren’t a stable 95ms, it keeps slingshotting back and forth. I’ve had non-stop double animations every 2nd or 3rd shot which is indicative of a problem even without the need to test. Though don’t get me wrong I understand the need for proof on the matter, however if you browse the forums every 2nd topic is about ping issues. And I know you’re aware of the other topics since a good portion of them I see you’re the one asking for WinMTRs. If that alone doesn’t set an alarm off of a bigger issue I don’t know what will.

Also in response about being on a brazilian server: I never test my ping with a friend. There’s no reason I should be routed to a brazilian server and I have no earthly idea why its routing me there. Why would a latency spike cause the servers to ‘think’ I want to be on a brazilian server, are these not based on a geo-location & the fact I picked US servers in the blizzard launcher? This has been happening ever since you guys patched the game and for example I go in the practice range I get put on a foreign server that has 250ms+. Its been happing for a year at least but its much worse now. To fix that issue I have to keep leaving the practice range and rejoining until it puts me on a US server. I have to do that about 3 or 4 times before it corrects itself. This happens on both of my ISPs Shaw and Telus.

Furthermore the netgraph doesn’t show ping spikes. Like B72 said above, the issue is the general increase in ping. Since the increase of ping has happened I’ve seen plenty of complaints about rubber-banding, delayed shots, and double animations.

I will say I don’t like being told a 30ms ping increase is a ‘typical & normal’ result. Yes we know everyone using the ISPs are getting the same results, that’s the problem. Blizzard support already confirmed the issues, it’s not really a question of if they exist its a question on how & when you guys intend to fix them. The Equinix issue that blizzard support kindly told me about is what I’m assuming is the cause.

All that being said, I’d be happy to run more WinMTRs this evening on my Telus connection and if I have time on my Shaw connection. I’ll run my tests in the practice range, Quick Play, & Competitive (though playing in competitive is just asking to lower your rank at this point).

1 Like