Today was the saddest day of my 30 year Elite career

[Hypermaniak]

I am from the UK, and '84er like many of you reading this. I have waited for this reincarnation of the original for 30 years.

I had to move to Vietnam this year, where I have a less than illustrious internet connection.

Today, this happened:

Logged in, and dropped into a Nav Beacon in an Anarchy system.

Another player was there and as usual we flew with scanning distance of one another. I scanned him. He was obviously scanning me, but I received no 'scan report'....hmm, that's odd I thought, maybe a bug?

He already had hardpoints deployed, but didn't start firing. So I flew past him to go look for some pirates.

As I did so, he turned to follow and I thought...oh oh, looks like an attack run. There were no sound effects, nothing, and suddenly my 1st layer of shields were gone. Ok, lag I thought. He has fired on me so I pop a shield cell and boost some more. I boost several times and when I stop boosting he is so far out of range he is not even on my scanner.

I suddenly come to a halt - cannot boost - message 'Engines Disabled'. No shields and my hull is at 35%. So I wait for him to appear and finish me off, but he doesn't. Maybe he lost me, but I doubt it, he was right on my six the whole time. Did I just 'disconnect' from him perhaps? Whatever happened, it was totally out of whack. I don't mind getting killed, I can afford it. I WANT to fight other players, that's why I backed the game.

It made me really sad that I am clearly not going to be able to dogfight other players...and this is a 7MB ADSL connection with a 15ms ping to the ISP, so it's not THAT bad a connection.

That is some seriously bad network lag or network code or Peer 2 Peer something weird going on.

So now, for the first time, I have to commit a selfie.

 

[gamecat]

If this doesn't happen a lot it's was most probably network issues between the two of you.

I've had a similar situation before. But it's rare.

Your thread title suggests something more extreme, click bait?

 

[Cmdr Snuffler]

He was obviously scanning me, but I received no 'scan report'

Obviously?
How do you know.
They may have just been looking at your and inspecting your loadout.

 

[Hypermaniak]

I received no reports of anything. So granted maybe he didn't scan me, but:

No sound effects when I was shot at. No damage reports. Not even 'you are under attack'.

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If this doesn't happen a lot it's was most probably network issues between the two of you.

I've had a similar situation before. But it's rare.

Your thread title suggests something more extreme, click bait?

But it is the saddest day. If I cannot dogfight real players, then it's kind of 'Game Over' for me really.

 

[Bambi]

Online only. Not even once.

I'm not sure why frontier didn't look at the past 5 years of even the biggest companies in the business like blizzard, activision, ubisoft and EA botching launch after launch after launch and the backlash from always online, and learned from it that it just doesn't work.

 

[Irritant]

Online only. Not even once.

I'm not sure why frontier didn't look at the past 5 years of even the biggest companies in the business like blizzard, activision, ubisoft and EA botching launch after launch after launch and the backlash from always online, and learned from it that it just doesn't work.

While I completely agree with your sentiment, this is not the thread for it. The OP obviously wants to play online, but wants online to work properly after, rightly or wrongly, assuming it is online issues causing his woe.

 

[Hypermaniak]

While I completely agree with your sentiment, this is not the thread for it. The OP obviously wants to play online, but wants online to work properly after, rightly or wrongly, assuming it is online issues causing his woe.

Exactly.

I beta tested the original X-Box and it had problems with multiplayer, mostly because it was based on P2P (well not exactly, but games were 'hosted' on a player's XBox, not on a server). Microsoft abandoned that model for Live for obvious reasons.

Whilst I have what I would say is a half-decent connection, but maybe the 'upload' speeds for ADSL is just not good enough to support a P2P based game. I understand WHY they did it like this, but I still believe that maybe there is some way the netcode can be improved.

Why even put me in an instance with a player where the P2P is clearly not going to be up to the job? It's like deliberately setting me (and them) up to fail.

I am pretty sure he was as disappointed as I was since he didn't get a dogfight and did not even get to claim his kill (and I had a 150k bounty on my head, which is why I assume he scanned me and opened fire pretty pronto after that).

He got a lame duck experience, as did I.

 

[Riandor]

Online only. Not even once.

I'm not sure why frontier didn't look at the past 5 years of even the biggest companies in the business like blizzard, activision, ubisoft and EA botching launch after launch after launch and the backlash from always online, and learned from it that it just doesn't work.

Hmm don't remember WoW suffering, Hmmmm Diablo 3 does pretty ok too (most vitriol was directed at the real money auction House)... Not sure Blizzard are too distraught at this apparent disastrous decision.

ED needs people online to impact the Galaxy, it's story, its economy and its future.

I own and play a host of always online games, it really is no longer a big issue bar for an ever increasing minority.

 

[Kadaeux]

So now, for the first time, I have to commit a selfie.

Woah woah woah.

Sure it's bad, but there's no need to go that far.

Just call 1800 PUTTHE CAMERADOWN and they'll be able to help you.

 

[Hypermaniak]

Has anyone else experienced issues like this in a fight with a real player?

No 'you are under attack'.

No 'splash damage' lighting up your shields.

No sparks flying off your hud.

I mean absolutely NOTHING to indicate you are being attacked except you notice your sheilds go from blue to red one by one, then your hud is at some low dmg % and systems have failed, but you heard and saw nothing.

And although I'm an original 84er, no I am not yet deaf or blind.

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Woah woah woah.

Sure it's bad, but there's no need to go that far.

Just call 1800 PUTTHE CAMERADOWN and they'll be able to help you.

Thanks for making me laugh.

 

[zorianarki]

Has anyone else experienced issues like this in a fight with a real player?

No 'you are under attack'.

No 'splash damage' lighting up your shields.

No sparks flying off your hud.

I mean absolutely NOTHING to indicate you are being attacked except you notice your sheilds go from blue to red one by one, then your hud is at some low dmg % and systems have failed, but you heard and saw nothing.

And although I'm an original 84er, no I am not yet deaf or blind.

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Thanks for making me laugh.

It sounds like the matchmaking server messed up and connected you to someone that made the p2p connection really really horrible. I don't think it is widespread but it is probably bound to happen now and then with this sort of networking structure in the game as opposed to actual servers.

 

[Count Iblis]

Like two ships passing in the night...

 

[Armante]

I also think there is an element at play due to your location on the planet. I'm in New Zealand and hardly see other players. When I do, they often ping about the place rather than flying in a smooth line.
I've managed to play online shooters okay, using dedicated servers, so maybe it's the use of p2p as well? :/

 

[Calico Jack]

I had some PvP issues in the Beta with invisible enemies from other instances, could this be some sort of instancing thing?

 

[RustyNailed]

Has anyone else experienced issues like this in a fight with a real player?

Not yet, but I'm currently on a blisteringly fast (cable) connection. Come mid-January I'll be moving to a less well served location, and have to drop back down to DSL at (best case) 16Mbps down and 1Mbps up. Will be interesting to see if that affects performance much, will try to remember to post back if I can.

Cheers
R

 

[delaney]

I also think there is an element at play due to your location on the planet. I'm in New Zealand and hardly see other players. When I do, they often ping about the place rather than flying in a smooth line.
I've managed to play online shooters okay, using dedicated servers, so maybe it's the use of p2p as well? :/

True I suspect, I am sure dedicated servers have shorter quicker routes between players, but there is no technical reason I can see for P2P to be much more problematic, in theory it should even be faster as its a direct route between players, no middle man...

 

[Hypermaniak]

I also think there is an element at play due to your location on the planet. I'm in New Zealand and hardly see other players. When I do, they often ping about the place rather than flying in a smooth line.
I've managed to play online shooters okay, using dedicated servers, so maybe it's the use of p2p as well? :/

That's what I wonder - my location on the planet. I have seen that 'pinging about' too - rubberbanding I think the kids call it.

What I don't get is that online shooters, where ping is critical, seem to be fine (as they are for you) ... which is why I cannot help but look in the corner at the P2P kid with the 'Dunce' cap on his head.

Although don't we connect to the Singapore Amazon cluster? So maybe the other player was connected to EU Amazon server or even West US - so we can blame the connections between Amazon data centers perhaps?

 

[sgurr]

Hey hypermaniak, I recently played on a 3Mb connection and on launch night at lave station could see a dozen players in the same instance, I don't think your connection will be the problem. I am in the uk and regularly see players from all over Europe and the states.
However, I did get problems like you describe very early in the beta.

Maybe worth getting on a chat channel with others and coordinating a meet up to test? The lave radio one is friendly and plenty of others to choose from in the groups thread. I won't be back online till next week but if you friend me in game we can try meeting up and testing.

Good luck.

 

[Hexen]

I think OP exaggerating. There's always "good" and "bad" opponents in PvP. There's no ideal netcode, there always will be lag. You just stick to those opponents who don't lag on you and have some fun while doing so. Expecting a game to be THAT ideal as not having any lag at all? Wow. That's big. Just find some group of likeminded players that live not far from you and offer friendly challenge to them. Should be decent ping in that case. My problem - there is no guarantee of meeting them. Game can't do that at the moment. You might meet your opponent but also you might be thrown to a different instances. But this theme is for another topic.

Sure there are some issues worth mention. Like lag relating to specific action, lag due to lack of optimization and so on. But what OP described hardly fall under such category.

 

[Hypermaniak]

I think OP exaggerating. There's always "good" and "bad" opponents in PvP. There's no ideal netcode, there always will be lag. You just stick to those opponents who don't lag on you and have some fun while doing so. Expecting a game to be THAT ideal as not having any lag at all? Wow. That's big. Just find some group of likeminded players that live not far from you and offer friendly challenge to them. Should be decent ping in that case. My problem - there is no guarantee of meeting them. Game can't do that at the moment. You might meet your opponent but also you might be thrown to a different instances. But this theme is for another topic.

Sure there are some issues worth mention. Like lag relating to specific action, lag due to lack of optimization and so on. But what OP described hardly fall under such category.

Sorry Hexen but I am not exaggerating. What possible reason could I have to do that?

I expect lag. I coded a space combat multiplayer game on a UK military system (that was in 1990) so I know what I am talking about. I even coded in C a radar tracking system (for a Defence company) that was kind of like the radar we have in this game. I am sorry to bring this up, but I know what netcode is and I know what lag is.

This was way more than lag. The game reported absolutely nothing to my PC about the attack. That is not lag, that is a failure in the network code; either the client, the server or the P2P comms.

If it was not that, and simply that I was matched with a player on - what, a 3200 baud modem? - then we should never have been matched in the same instance.

Maybe it was just that proverbial 'ghost in the machine' and will never happen again; I will try to remain optimistic about that. Kinda hard though.