NA DC Relocation Info 5/15/17-5/17/17

[Nisasi]

I'm honestly concerned how this will affect Australian players. The ping is already finicky to deal with..

[Kilieit]

This maintenance begins tomorrow/"tonight", depending on how late you usually play! (About 15 hours from now!)

 

Make sure you get all your weeklies done, because it effectively swallows reset. And make sure your plants are out of the ground.

[Shion]

So this is for 48 hours? Man, just as I subbed too! 

[Unnamed Mercenary]

So this is for 48 hours? Man, just as I subbed too! 

 

It is currently in progress. SE is giving people back one day of subscription, which is to account for the NA-only portions of downtime. All the servers will be offline a day, which is pretty normal for datacenter maintenance when SE does them.

[Shion]

So this is for 48 hours? Man, just as I subbed too! 

 

It is currently in progress. SE is giving people back one day of subscription, which is to account for the NA-only portions of downtime. All the servers will be offline a day, which is pretty normal for datacenter maintenance when SE does them.

That's good to hear! I've noticed Squenix is pretty good with customer relations. The Kingdom Hearts phone game for example has similar apologies to the players that other companies wouldn't do.

[Kage]

SE is giving people back one day of subscription, which is to account for the NA-only portions of downtime. All the servers will be offline a day, which is pretty normal for datacenter maintenance when SE does them.

It's semantics but it's actually a day of subscription for ALL players as all players are affected for the long period (24 hours) for what is an issue that is 'supposed' to only affect NA players.

[Aldotsk]

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/324829-New-Datacenter-Sacramento-CA

 

Supposedly this is the new Data Center by people's words.

 

But when I've tested the ping, this has made it worse as it is now 75 ms. That's pretty disgusting as heck. Why did they even bother to move it to Sacramento when they could have gone to somewhere like central ?

 

Pinging neolobby02.ffxiv.com [204.2.229.9] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 204.2.229.9: bytes=32 time=74ms TTL=57

Reply from 204.2.229.9: bytes=32 time=78ms TTL=57

Reply from 204.2.229.9: bytes=32 time=76ms TTL=57

Reply from 204.2.229.9: bytes=32 time=79ms TTL=57

 

Pinging neolobby04.ffxiv.com [204.2.229.10] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 204.2.229.10: bytes=32 time=88ms TTL=57

Reply from 204.2.229.10: bytes=32 time=92ms TTL=57

Reply from 204.2.229.10: bytes=32 time=90ms TTL=57

Reply from 204.2.229.10: bytes=32 time=89ms TTL=57

 

My Fios is 3 ms , 154 mbps download and 134 upload in East Coast (where I live).

[Kage]

You went from Montreal Canada to East Coast to Sacramento to East Coast. Yes the ping will be a tad worse.

 

3 ms to 75 ms? 75 ms is not that bad lol. Are you seriously complaining about 75ms?

 

Better servers, -newer- servers, better infrastructure.

 

Edit: if you thought the relocation was for pings, you need to re-read.

[Aldotsk]

You went from Montreal Canada to East Coast to Sacramento to East Coast. Yes the ping will be a tad worse.

 

3 ms to 75 ms? 75 ms is not that bad lol. Are you seriously complaining about 75ms?

 

Better servers, -newer- servers, better infrastructure.

 

Yeah. I am complaining about 75 ms. As a matter of fact, nothing should go from 75-96 ms, because there is a lot of delays.

 

"Better servers" "better infrastructure" is just an excuse. 

 

For California players, they'll be like "oh this is nothing. 75 ms, you shouldn't complain" But it is. When I originally had 32 ms pinging to their server and had some ping delays once in a while, what makes you think I won't have delays more through this?

 

When I play Overwatch, I can play with 20-30ms with no problem. If anything, 75+ ms for Competitive when you have 60 Hz monitor is already cringing. Just like this game, where some end games - you don't want to see a 75+ ms.

 

Edit: I don't need to reread. This is Data Center relocation based thread, which means the relocation of the place is also related to the thread.

[Unnamed Mercenary]

FINAL FANTASY XIV was designed to be played in an environment featuring ping times of 200 – 220 milliseconds or less. Even if players experience an increase in ping times due to the data center relocation, as long as their times remain below 200 ms, then they may rest easy, for there should be no discernable difference in gameplay.

 

Aside from the creators' words, I'd suggest waiting to actually play on the servers. FFXIV's problem was never ping. It was dropped packets because the datacenter couldn't cope with the number of connections by players. Especially on servers with larger populations.

 

MMOs aren't twitch-dodge FPS games. Might as well throw in a flight simulator or a multiplayer tetris clone.

 

I believe Kage was suggesting you check out http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/321165-Important-Information-Regarding-North-American-Data-Center-Relocation for the official wording from Square Enix.

 

Pre-judging a connect before the servers are even up is just silly.

[Kage]

Edit: I don't need to reread. This is Data Center relocation based thread, which means the relocation of the place is also related to the thread.

Yes you do because I've quoted the opening post, of which are quotes from the official forums, about the topic of which you would know they do. not. accept. your. complaint. of. <100 ms. ping.

 

I'll do it again for you.

Changes to Ping* Times

In preparation for the move, we have conducted countless preliminary simulations and on-site verifications regarding ping times. However, due to the physical distance between the old and new data centers, players accessing the NA servers will most likely experience a change in their current ping times. While those who play FINAL FANTASY XIV closer to the new data center will see their ping time fall, those who are now further away from the servers may see those times increase.

 

FINAL FANTASY XIV was designed to be played in an environment featuring ping times of 200 – 220 milliseconds or less. Even if players experience an increase in ping times due to the data center relocation, as long as their times remain below 200 ms, then they may rest easy, for there should be no discernable difference in gameplay.

 

We expect that the players most likely to experience a significant increase in ping times will be those in Europe playing on an NA data center World. We will be working hard to minimize the anticipated increases, but there is the chance that based on their location, some players may be more severely affected by this relocation than others.

 

Good on you for having less than 100 ms ping. I had over 100 ms ping consistently even while raiding Savage. Not. An. Issue. I played Black Mage on Titan EX just fine. If you had issues, that was not the ping's fault.

[Aldotsk]

Edit: I don't need to reread. This is Data Center relocation based thread, which means the relocation of the place is also related to the thread.

Yes you do because I've quoted the opening post, of which are quotes from the official forums, about the topic of which you would know they do. not. accept. your. complaint. of. <100 ms. ping.

 

I'll do it again for you.

Changes to Ping* Times

In preparation for the move, we have conducted countless preliminary simulations and on-site verifications regarding ping times. However, due to the physical distance between the old and new data centers, players accessing the NA servers will most likely experience a change in their current ping times. While those who play FINAL FANTASY XIV closer to the new data center will see their ping time fall, those who are now further away from the servers may see those times increase.

 

FINAL FANTASY XIV was designed to be played in an environment featuring ping times of 200 – 220 milliseconds or less. Even if players experience an increase in ping times due to the data center relocation, as long as their times remain below 200 ms, then they may rest easy, for there should be no discernable difference in gameplay.

 

We expect that the players most likely to experience a significant increase in ping times will be those in Europe playing on an NA data center World. We will be working hard to minimize the anticipated increases, but there is the chance that based on their location, some players may be more severely affected by this relocation than others.

 

Good on you for having less than 100 ms ping. I had over 100 ms ping consistently even while raiding Savage. Not. An. Issue. I played Black Mage on Titan EX just fine. If you had issues, that was not the ping's fault.

 

Good on you for having over 100 ms ping to do Savage and not have an issue that you followed mechanics. But any type of ping that is considered over 100 to 220 is pretty bad anyways. They are only saying that because it's for the casuals who just regularly do basic 24 man raid dungeons, and regular contents from 2.0-3.56.

 

As you can see on that thread post I linked, people are already having same opinion as I do. I am glad to see there are supporters like yourself who'd defend and justify their decision. But there are people who don't see it that way. We can agree to disagree.

[Lydia Lightfoot]

I heard that having a mechanical keyboard is absolutely vital for timely tactile response when playing this MMO.

[Silmanos]

Honestly there was no way they were going to please everyone with this. It really also shouldn't surprise us they went with California. They most likely did extensive research on it, and the largest MMO still to date has its servers there as well. For all the shit we give it WoW never really was hated on for having their servers in California. That said my ping has plummeted. Before the move I was sitting anywhere between 500-1k MS and now I will be at 32 ms, granted I am on the West Coast as well. As others have stated the ping was never really the overall issue as much as the routing itself was.

[Unnamed Mercenary]

I heard that having a mechanical keyboard is absolutely vital for timely tactile response when playing this MMO.

 

I game on controller. Connected with bluetooth. Nothing in this game requires that amazing of reflexes. In all honesty, anyone who has under 100ms ping to the actual zone servers (not the lobby server that only handles selecting a character/character creation/zoning you into a map server) won't be able to see any differences. And most users are probably still fine up to 150ms before they'd even notice issues.

 

I'm just hoping for less dropped packets so that on bad days, I don't see everything freeze up in the game because the server has to send battle and battle animation packets for everything.

[Virella]

173 ping to new (rumoured) data center. Was 128 before. Not the end of the world, but not great either. (From the lands of tullips, windmills and weed.)

 

That said with 128 I could notice the difference. US folk can tempt fate and walk in back in the boss attack at the split tiny last millisecond of the castbar. But that's about it.

 

Just hope it ain't too bad.

 

I'm just happy this ain't GW1, nor am I PvPing in that game. I'd scream with anything over 40.

[Lydia Lightfoot]

I heard that having a mechanical keyboard is absolutely vital for timely tactile response when playing this MMO.

 

I game on controller. Connected with bluetooth. Nothing in this game requires that amazing of reflexes. In all honesty, anyone who has under 100ms ping to the actual zone servers (not the lobby server that only handles selecting a character/character creation/zoning you into a map server) won't be able to see any differences. And most users are probably still fine up to 150ms before they'd even notice issues.

 

I'm just hoping for less dropped packets so that on bad days, I don't see everything freeze up in the game because the server has to send battle and battle animation packets for everything.

 

I was mostly just cracking wise. :3 Everybody's gonna be just fine, for sure.

[Haven's Fox]

New datacenter hype! No more level3 backbone issues for all we hope...

 

Old location I was hitting anywhere from 30 to 50 from what I remember across the various times I've pinged the server. Though level3 being pretty sketchy over the last few years for more than just the game itself with the lost/dropped packets along that way made it feel much worse at times.

 

The new locations I'm sitting at a 65 yo 75ms~ average as of right now. Will be interesting to check when the west coast goes into prime time hours to see if any slow downs happen.

 

One interesting thing I did end up reading for the switch was the backbone provider the new data centers are using. One commenter pointed out that SE went with NTT, the same backbone apparently used in Japan. Maybe this had a big part in selecting the Sacramento location with a good priced NTT server hub.

 

A bit of whats what. Internet backbone providers are the few groups that provide and sell connections to the internet web itself to the ISP companies we all loathe and barely love. Level3 and NTT being two of those backbone connection providers.

 

Being in the US south east it used to take be about 25 hops across the web net hubs to reach the servers in Canada. Now it takes me only 15 to head to the new servers locations. This is with nearly 2/3rds more in distance for the new location. Less chances for something to go wrong along the way I hope with no more level3.

[Erah'sae]

I heard that having a mechanical keyboard is absolutely vital for timely tactile response when playing this MMO.

 

Having a good mechanical keyboard with switches that match your typing style is -awesome- for roleplay in this MMO.

 

Back on topic though....

 

The .9 and .10 are the data center lobby servers (authentication servers).

It looks like Balmung's actual server is 204.2.229.83

 

It's still off of NTT's Sacramento nodes so ping shouldn't change much, however. (1ms deviation between .9 and .83 for me)

 

On a good note I've been had a client open to .83 and am monitoring the traffic and am seeing far less packet loss then against the old servers.  Less then 0.1% thus far.

[Unnamed Mercenary]

Yes. The packet loss is a lot better in this new datacenter, which really makes more of a difference than a two digit latency number.

 

I'd been having issues in Alexander (just the normal modes) where battle packets were getting lost and characters would freeze up on the screen. I'd still be sending packet after packet, but receiving none of them. ...then I'd get my packets and see the entire battle play out in about 20 seconds of sped-up animations with me usually dead on the floor. ...sometimes I survived because I tend to just start heal-spamming when that would happen.

[Erah'sae]

Yes. The packet loss is a lot better in this new datacenter, which really makes more of a difference than a two digit latency number.

 

I'd been having issues in Alexander (just the normal modes) where battle packets were getting lost and characters would freeze up on the screen. I'd still be sending packet after packet, but receiving none of them. ...then I'd get my packets and see the entire battle play out in about 20 seconds of sped-up animations with me usually dead on the floor. ...sometimes I survived because I tend to just start heal-spamming when that would happen.

 

I'm going to test some more tonight when I've got all three accounts going (Nefzen's, mine, and the kiddo's [though she's locked out of Balmung... grrr...]) on the same ip address.  That's when the connectivity really used to bottom out.  The old datacenter's hardware didn't handle NAT to multiple devices on the same external IP on the same server very well at all.