I'm playing from Ukraine and as you can guess my ping is far from perfect (min 180ms, max 500ms, avg 250-300ms). I was wondering if using a VPN service can improve it since I'd like to join PvP at some point (although I've heard that some people are successfully doing PvP with ~300ms ping). I'm currently testing multiple VPN services, some of which are paid, but so far the results are inconclusive. Anyway, I have a few questions to the community: 1. Does anyone play through VPN to decrease ping? Where do you live, what's your original ping vs VPN ping, which VPN service are you using and what's the location of VPN server you're connected to? 2. Where's the UOR game server located? http://geomaplookup.net/?ip=login.uorenaissance.com says it's in Delaware, but I've heard it's in Utah/California. 3. Are there some more advanced techniques for testing in-game latency other than "-ping" command in uo razor? 4. To people who understand internet traffic routing: is it actually possible to decrease latency with VPN? Any special recommendations? Regards, Twister
The answer to #4 is a conditional yes. I mean using any VPN should clearly affect your ping for better or worse. That is easy to prove. If you can get to the "fast" VPN network quicker or less jumps than through your regular connection then you would see your ping improve.
1. I use BattlePing from Australia and it greatly increases the playability of the game. I work with networks as a trade, so was massively sceptical but gave it a go and the differences are quite stark. I can keep up with people in the US and don't notice any lag at all when using it. (i ping 200+ to the server and its almost the same user experience as when i pinged 15ms to Oceania back in OSI days) I PVP'ed extensively on another player run server for years located in east coast US and had no troubles with lag, keeping up or being competitive at all. 2. Server is located west coast I believe, could be wrong (east coast). 3. Not really. Just run around on a horse, that'll tell you if its working better or not. 4. Its not doing any magic as light/electricity has to travel between you and the server regardless, but there are tricks that can be done to the traffic to ensure smoother transfer and the minimisation of path diversification/redundancy/error-checking/etc. in the data transmission (and the latency that they all bring). To anyone thinking they don't do anything and its all marketing FUD I understand, I used to say the same thing fervently for ages until I just tried it out and was pleasantly surprised. Give it a go (free trials exist) and test it yourself. Cheers - Patek
Thanks a lot for this suggestion, it really does seem like this service improves my connection. My min ping did not drop below 180ms, but avg and max are now down from 270 and 380 to 210 and 240. Also, I'm getting occasional disconnects when not using proxy (it's really weird, often just one of three connected chars receives connlost), but it never happened when I'm on BattlePing. Worth 5$/month! Other services I've tried did not give me any noticeable boost (PureVPN, VyprVPN, NordVPN)
I recently found a pretty good alternative to BattlePing - Mudfish. It charges you for traffic and seems that in the end it will be even cheaper than BattlePing (which is already 5$ a month). Ping improvement is pretty much the same. Downside - it is somewhat technical which might be an issue for those of us who are not power users.
