Ping and EFT networking

June 26, 2020

From my understanding these ping kicks have been implemented to prevent primarily chinese hackers from playing on servers outside their regions however it has quite obviously had the effect of preventing many legitimate players from accessing the game, I just happen to be one of the latter. My lowest ping servers are west european and I usually have a ping of approximately 120-140 to such servers on other games and teamspeak, with very minor fluctuations usually in the +- 5 range. However when playing tarkov not only is my base ping considerably higher than in literally every other game on European servers but I experience significant ping fluctuations as well. Prior to these recent changes regarding ping limits I was well aware of EFT's networking issues however the game was more than playable. As of the 155 and now 165 ping limit EFT is nothing short of a frustrating experience of being kicked and reconnecting only to be kicked 2 minutes later.

Naturally I expected at least some of the issues to be on my end however after further interaction with friends and taking note of the servers I was placed on I've come to a few conclusions. I've found that even east coast american players have an unnaturally high ping to western European servers, these unnaturally high pings always result in an associated and absurd series of ping fluctuations and variation. There seems to be 'cursed' servers or server instances that seem particularly laggy with ai being brain dead etc but also having resultingly higher ping than instances in the same region . To elaborate on the latter, German servers quite often seem to be of a relatively poorer quality compared to other European servers (ai having their brains switched off, laggy looting interactions, extended beggining of game lag/teleporting/rubber-banding) however I would from time to time experience increased connection issues to the Strasbourg (im not sure which side of the border this server is located) and French servers, the majority of times an IP search and trace route confirm that I was being routed through Germany.

I'm not too sure what to make of my latter findings however what I can definitively state both from my findings and the various North American friends that I regularly play with is that as far as connecting to EFT goes; having a naturally high ping results in an even higher ping for tarkov servers by comparison to other games and applications and having any kind of high ping results in absurd ping fluctuations unique to EFT.

I understand the desire to prevent hackers from ruining the experience of players on other servers however I dont believe I just woke up from a coma into a world where anti-cheat applications don't exist. And to add insult to injury I can't say I've noticed a substantially lower amount of hackers during my extensive play this wipe, however if I were using a CRT monitor I would have had the connection quality message burnt into it by now. With networking and server quality issues that clearly reside with BSG why would an extremely punitive ping kick be introduced? I understand that my experience with hackers may and probably is vastly different from that of others, however has anyone noticed a significant decrease in the frequency of hackers since the lowering of the 240 ping limit?

Any clemency would be appreciated from BSG, I and others like me would like to play too.

Edited June 26, 2020 by ma-san

June 27, 2020

If the BSG servers were not crap maybe it would not be so bad. I keep an eye on my ping and watch it stay mostly in the green and jump up into the red just long enough to get kicked. About ready to quit.

June 27, 2020

On 6/26/2020 at 6:56 AM, ma-san said:

From my understanding these ping kicks have been implemented to prevent primarily chinese hackers from playing on servers outside their regions however it has quite obviously had the effect of preventing many legitimate players from accessing the game, I just happen to be one of the latter. My lowest ping servers are west european and I usually have a ping of approximately 120-140 to such servers on other games and teamspeak, with very minor fluctuations usually in the +- 5 range. However when playing tarkov not only is my base ping considerably higher than in literally every other game on European servers but I experience significant ping fluctuations as well. Prior to these recent changes regarding ping limits I was well aware of EFT's networking issues however the game was more than playable. As of the 155 and now 165 ping limit EFT is nothing short of a frustrating experience of being kicked and reconnecting only to be kicked 2 minutes later.

Naturally I expected at least some of the issues to be on my end however after further interaction with friends and taking note of the servers I was placed on I've come to a few conclusions. I've found that even east coast american players have an unnaturally high ping to western European servers, these unnaturally high pings always result in an associated and absurd series of ping fluctuations and variation. There seems to be 'cursed' servers or server instances that seem particularly laggy with ai being brain dead etc but also having resultingly higher ping than instances in the same region . To elaborate on the latter, German servers quite often seem to be of a relatively poorer quality compared to other European servers (ai having their brains switched off, laggy looting interactions, extended beggining of game lag/teleporting/rubber-banding) however I would from time to time experience increased connection issues to the Strasbourg (im not sure which side of the border this server is located) and French servers, the majority of times an IP search and trace route confirm that I was being routed through Germany.

I'm not too sure what to make of my latter findings however what I can definitively state both from my findings and the various North American friends that I regularly play with is that as far as connecting to EFT goes; having a naturally high ping results in an even higher ping for tarkov servers by comparison to other games and applications and having any kind of high ping results in absurd ping fluctuations unique to EFT.

I understand the desire to prevent hackers from ruining the experience of players on other servers however I dont believe I just woke up from a coma into a world where anti-cheat applications don't exist. And to add insult to injury I can't say I've noticed a substantially lower amount of hackers during my extensive play this wipe, however if I were using a CRT monitor I would have had the connection quality message burnt into it by now. With networking and server quality issues that clearly reside with BSG why would an extremely punitive ping kick be introduced? I understand that my experience with hackers may and probably is vastly different from that of others, however has anyone noticed a significant decrease in the frequency of hackers since the lowering of the 240 ping limit?

Any clemency would be appreciated from BSG, I and others like me would like to play too.

nikita 4 days ago talked about the ping limitation on podcast, if you searched it you may have found your answers.

Edited June 27, 2020 by behi09ma

June 17, 2021

Tried a trace route today and found why I may be having the disconnect "blinking items; infinite load wheel" bug that has been plaguing me since they recently "optimized" the servers... Wasn't an issue before then.

Tracing route to fleamarket.escapefromtarkov.com [92.204.166.67]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1    <1 ms    <1 ms    <1 ms 192.168.1.1
2     7 ms     7 ms     9 ms 142-254-191-097.inf.spectrum.com [142.254.191.97]
3    22 ms    20 ms    21 ms agg61.kanhhiad01h.hawaii.rr.com [24.25.232.233]
4     8 ms     8 ms     8 ms agg36.milnhixd01r.hawaii.rr.com [72.129.46.246]
5    55 ms    55 ms    53 ms agg31.lsancarc01r.socal.rr.com [72.129.45.0]
6    64 ms    62 ms    63 ms bu-ether26.lsancarc0yw-bcr00.tbone.rr.com [66.109.3.230]
7    67 ms    62 ms    68 ms bu-ether11.tustca4200w-bcr00.tbone.rr.com [66.109.6.5]
8     *        *        *     Request timed out.
9   198 ms   198 ms   198 ms ae-2-3202.ear2.Paris1.Level3.net [4.69.140.34]
10   210 ms   205 ms   207 ms ae19.cr-vega.sxb1.bb.godaddy.com [213.242.120.246]
11   204 ms   204 ms   205 ms gw-heg.curie.router.fr.velia.net [87.230.112.17]
12   231 ms   216 ms   215 ms sxb13alA.strasbourg.fr.velia.net [134.119.212.7]
13   213 ms   214 ms   212 ms 92.204.166.67

Trace complete.

C:\Users\Nikita>tracert fleamarket.escapefromtarkov.com

Tracing route to fleamarket.escapefromtarkov.com [92.204.166.67]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1    <1 ms    <1 ms    <1 ms 192.168.10.1
2     7 ms     8 ms     7 ms 142-254-191-097.inf.spectrum.com [142.254.191.97]
3    29 ms    25 ms    17 ms agg61.kanhhiad01h.hawaii.rr.com [24.25.232.233]
4     9 ms     8 ms     9 ms agg36.milnhixd01r.hawaii.rr.com [72.129.46.246]
5    54 ms    55 ms    54 ms agg31.lsancarc01r.socal.rr.com [72.129.45.0]
6    61 ms    62 ms    62 ms bu-ether26.lsancarc0yw-bcr00.tbone.rr.com [66.109.3.230]
7    62 ms    63 ms    63 ms bu-ether11.tustca4200w-bcr00.tbone.rr.com [66.109.6.5]
8     *        *        *     Request timed out.
9   198 ms   197 ms   198 ms ae-2-3202.ear2.Paris1.Level3.net [4.69.140.34]
10   221 ms   205 ms   204 ms ae19.cr-vega.sxb1.bb.godaddy.com [213.242.120.246]
11   204 ms   207 ms   204 ms gw-heg.curie.router.fr.velia.net [87.230.112.17]
12   216 ms   217 ms   216 ms sxb13alA.strasbourg.fr.velia.net [134.119.212.7]
13   213 ms   212 ms   213 ms 92.204.166.67

Trace complete.

C:\Users\God>tracert game.escapefromtarkov.com

Tracing route to game.escapefromtarkov.com [92.204.166.67]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1    <1 ms    <1 ms    <1 ms 192.168.10.1
2     8 ms     8 ms     7 ms 142-254-191-097.inf.spectrum.com [142.254.191.97]
3    19 ms    27 ms    20 ms agg61.kanhhiad01h.hawaii.rr.com [24.25.232.233]
4     9 ms     9 ms    14 ms agg36.milnhixd01r.hawaii.rr.com [72.129.46.246]
5    54 ms    54 ms    57 ms agg31.lsancarc01r.socal.rr.com [72.129.45.0]
6    63 ms    64 ms    63 ms bu-ether26.lsancarc0yw-bcr00.tbone.rr.com [66.109.3.230]
7    62 ms    63 ms    62 ms bu-ether11.tustca4200w-bcr00.tbone.rr.com [66.109.6.5]
8     *        *       57 ms 4.68.111.101
9     *      198 ms   197 ms ae-2-3202.ear2.Paris1.Level3.net [4.69.140.34]
10   205 ms   205 ms   205 ms ae19.cr-vega.sxb1.bb.godaddy.com [213.242.120.246]
11   204 ms   210 ms   203 ms gw-heg.curie.router.fr.velia.net [87.230.112.17]
12   215 ms   251 ms   216 ms sxb13alA.strasbourg.fr.velia.net [134.119.212.7]
13   213 ms   214 ms   213 ms 92.204.166.67

Trace complete.

Pinging 4.68.111.101 with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 4.68.111.101: bytes=32 time=58ms TTL=57
Reply from 4.68.111.101: bytes=32 time=58ms TTL=57
Reply from 4.68.111.101: bytes=32 time=57ms TTL=57
Reply from 4.68.111.101: bytes=32 time=57ms TTL=57

Ping statistics for 4.68.111.101:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 57ms, Maximum = 58ms, Average = 57ms

Appears that every command has to go from Hawaii to France and back... WOW

not sure about the hickup getting from US to EU there.