We were talking in OOC last night and figured that most of the posts about the server issues came off like bitching or there were the few that said they just logged in one toon and was ok. So I figured Akka or Hate may not know how bad off the server really is.
Things I have noticed:
1. When the server population reaches around 300, a lag bomb hits hard getting high latency spikes, upwards of 20k. You know its coming when you see the toons around you start to blink in and out. Just prepare for the impending lag. This lag subsides after around 2 minutes but the server still reacts slower in general.
Some things that occur during this lag bomb. All zoning stops dead in its tracks, the client locks up for up to 5 minutes still trying to zone. If you had a massive pull you may get disconnected and booted to char select if lucky. I think this ties into when the lag subsides, I feel like the lag occurs when more than a few toons get logged on at the same time and locks the server up trying to load them. I think it goes away when the toons finally get in or stop trying. This may be why there are lag waves as groups of boxers start to load their bot army in.
2. Random bot characters experience higher latency than others in same zone. you can zone in 12 characters and a random character will zone in with 5k latency. Its usually fixed by zoning that character out and back in. This is separate from the lag bomb where you get stuck zoning and can occur at any time and to any toon randomly.
3. Some instanced zones have only high latency. I made 3 ToFS instances and my guild was good, my other toons guild was bad as in 2500+ every time I zoned in there.
Now looking at the 1st 2 above items together, it seems like there is some issue with where characters are loaded when you zone or log in. If you are on the fringes of what ever problem is affecting the server you get bit by the lag monster.
So this week has been rough to say the least, to combat the lag you need to have no more than 6 toons in the zone or logged in. Those that have a UW of higher levels seems to be faring better as we can solo content but have to dramatically lessen pull size. For example, T5 has dbl loot activated but I cant pull at the same pace in there effectively increasing my pull time to dbl if not more. This cancels out the benefits of the dbl loot for me but could still be ok for someone farming the zone for advancement I suppose.
Those that don't have UW are forced to rely on all their toons and killing is much slower. If you zone a lot or zone hop to farm, that's been killed by the zoning problems and disconnects so where ever you are hunting, you need to find a zone that you can stay in that has low latency and stick with it.
P.S. DBL loot is not on in every zone, would be nice to get that fixed and turned on in Halloween zone please
Hope this helps
