Playing from Australia

Is it worth investing in this game? WvW roaming looks like the most fun in this game but with 286ms just in the PvE world I'm kinda hesitant. I want to roam on any class that I enjoy playing while being competitive and on the same playing field with everyone else, but the skill delay is already ruining immersion for me. Are there any Pro Aussie roamers around that play with high ping? Or is it just not worth it for Australians to play this game at all really. Only MMO we can get an enjoyable experience from is WoW because it's the only game that is run by a company extravagant enough to buy Oceanic located servers :(.

I'm in Tassie with high ping. A friend of mine is in Brissie and he plays WvW pretty much exclusively. He's not a zerger either.

Make no mistake. You'll NEVER be on an even footing with anyone in the US. Not going to happen ever. Doesn't mean you can't be massively effective though. Given the situation, if two people of exact equal skill were to meet (not really possible, but pretend) the guy with the better ping will end up winning, because the ping is the only difference.

However, in this game isn't not just ping. It's build. It's technique. It's who you're roaming with...because WvW is a group event and roaming doesn't have to mean solo roaming. You can play with a small havoc group and do some great stuff. Helpful to your side and also fun as hell. Some of the most fun I've had playing is in a small havoc group, even though I'm predominantly a PvE'er.

So yes you'll never be on a completely even footing, but you can still play. Sometimes it means you might die when you didn't have to. It can happen. But there are plenty of times you're going to win as well.

You can be effective enough, but you can't beat someone who is equally effective with a lower ping. The good news is there are a lot of inexperienced players, and their ping won't save them. For the most you should be able to handle a lot of the situations. Hell, I even beat people when I'm rocking 3-4k lag spikes with avg of 500. Other times I die with a soft breeze. It is what it is. If you are able to (over time) just estimate what people will do and react accordingly you will do fine. A lot of the times it's just reading how they respond to your pokes or see how aggressive/defensive they play. Honestly 280 ping will do fine for what it's worth. You won't win all fights, but you won't lose all of them either.

I play in Tasmania as well and can comfortably roam. I have NBN so my ping is 250-260 in PvE and 270-280 in WvW, but stable and doesn't get much higher.For high ping, you may not always be able to instantly react to burst builds and 1shot deadeyes etc, so you may want to play more suvivable builds.Power DH is a lot of fun and I pulled off outnumbered fights successfully on it, as well as core ele, weaver, druid, spellbreaker, scourge and holo.Mirage and Thief are difficult to play on with high ping due to teleport-skill delays, that blink you forth, back (for 0.25s) then forth again (on the screens of anyone except you, it will appear normal for you but you're vulnerable to attacks), and the low armor/HP base on the meta power gank roaming builds.

I can say that there are times I often rage aloud like "fck woulda had that if it wasn't for 250 ping" when I miss a dodge by 0.1s, but it doesn't stop you from being able to roam. You will get used to the high ping and it won't affect you much, you just have to cast skills earlier, e.g. press 3 while 2 is halfway through casting, then you won't waste any time. And remember to dodge just before something hits you, as getting hit mid dodge means you dodge too late.

Western Australia here with a constant average of 320 ping with potato internet and I rarely ever have any issues.

Why would anyone in their right mind want to invest time into something that immediately puts them at a disadvantage by simply installing it from their location? I don't really care how or how not so effective i'll be, its the game-play experience that gets ruined. In a massively multiplayer online RPG, you expect your abilities to work as soon as you press them you shouldn't have to be predicting, waiting or hoping they go off... no, I'm sorry just no (especially when I know the other guy can press anything he wants, whenever he wants and it will work instantaneously for him). Imagine being in a Role Play guild, you'd always be known as the slow guy who was always behind on the conversation lol. When you're used to playing normal 50-100ms games the skill delay of 250ms+ just leads to an overall clunky and frustrating experience where nothing feels smooth and enjoyable. You guys saying you play at 300ms and have no issues (lmao) go play WoW at 50ms and see how much better of a player you are because you can actually react instantly to situations and everything runs smooth.

How come a 10 year old gaming company is still too stingy to invest in Oceanic servers? It's not all about the Europeans and the Yanks ya know, the Oceanic community of gamers is pretty friggen huge when you combine us... I think you'd attract a lot more people to the franchise.

9/10 game2/10 company for poor server location choices

No thank you.

Inside SMC (usually the laggiest place in wvw)... about 15 mins ago 5.50pm, 23/2/18. NBN... Im in Adelaide.

P.S. muahahahaaa we capped it :)

I'm also on NBN living in WA and that's standard ping for me anywhere in the game (even in the open PvE world or solo roaming). While a US player is probably having a much better time with a nice 100ms. I don't think its even worth putting any more time into it.

@Thunderdown.1436 said:I'm also on NBN living in WA and that's standard ping for me anywhere in the game (even in the open PvE world or solo roaming). While a US player is probably having a much better time with a nice 100ms. I don't think its even worth putting any more time into it.

Have u even gone into wvw? wvw is pretty much all I do and I do fine... that pic shows the epic fun we have and btw Im dying coz I was taking screenshots not from lag. To say its not worth putting more time into it just coz wow has 50ms is pretty defeatist. This isnt wow and people from Australia play it just fine.... and if someone in the game is experiencing lag we understand nobody is judged.... apparently unlike wow?

Yes, it’s definitely worth it! I roam WvW on EU server from Brisbane - average ping around 380 (using WTFast). And I don’t completely suck. Play a ranged class and keep your distance as much as you can. NA server ping is definitely better tho.

@Lady Sapphirah.6234 said:

@Thunderdown.1436 said:I'm also on NBN living in WA and that's standard ping for me anywhere in the game (even in the open PvE world or solo roaming). While a US player is probably having a much better time with a nice 100ms. I don't think its even worth putting any more time into it.

Uhhh. Did you not read a single thing I said? I want to solo roam but how can I If all my skills are delayed compared to the person I'm fighting against. Bit of a waste of time really when I'm trying to 1v1 someone that automatically has an advantage.. Following the zerg is nothing,its easy, anyone can do that on 10000ping... I don't know what type of player you are but I get really immersed into combat in games and its like I am pretty much in the game living it. So when my skills take half a second to activate I really fucking notice it. Stop getting defensive because I mentioned WoW and no the thing is we don't lag in WoW lol because they have a server in Sydney! The game runs perfectly and the experience is amazing,unlike this game.

How can I tell if you were even having "an epic time" from a still picture lol. I've been in plenty of zergs like that in the past and its just a c l u st e r f u c k and connection does not matter. I want to refine my skills and head out into the wilderness of solo roaming and camp capturing but the delay is just not gona allow me to enjoy it for very long.

Queensland here with ping ranging from 248-280ish in WvW if it's busy. I'm not with NBN since it hasn't been rolled out in my area. I mostly solo roam, small scale and zerg if there's a tag out there and I tend to do just fine! I definitely recommend it, but make sure you pick NA servers. My EU account has 400+ ping and it is literally unplayable.

EDIT: The "laggiest" places if you're wondering are generally massive fights in SMC on any given day, reset day is also painful with ping spikes of 600+. Hope that helps.

Sunny coast and it's mostly good. I'm mostly a roamer because the lag is a bit much on massive zerg fights but that's during NA prime, so it's rare for me to make that anyway.

Some things are a little hard, like landing a Backstab on Thief or Sword Weaver but otherwise there's no noticeable difference in PvP/WvW.

Also a picture for the other Ozzies out there: I know you guys know what I mean :wink:

I've been playing WvW for about a year with a good number of OCX players from across AUS & NZ, and none of them are known as 'the slow guy,' or useless in a fight. Also, I am in the Eastern US, and even I get cruddy ping occasionally. Will, on average, your ping be worse than my ping? Yep. Will it ruin all your fun or turn you into a useless noob? Nope.

EDIT - SMC is known to be horrible, though. A three way in the lord's room will mean slow motion for me and a slideshow for some of the OCX players. That is a game limitation, sadly.

I log in from Sydney and it was pretty good before the servers changed. I used to get 210ms to 230ms in WvW.Since Amazon servers, i'm sitting at 255ms to 300ms.Worst is felt at around SMC or sometimes near massive blobs. Its almost certain death due to skill delay.Greatsword warrior issue i see if when you press 3 and character just spins near one place or 5 when the long dash doesn't travel the full distance.More issues are with guardian gs as well when say you press 3, 4 then 2. 3 will fire off, 4 won't and 2 will fire off.Playing thief can be difficult when it lags.When these things happen, i just log on to a ranged class and play that.Otherwise wvw is fine if there is no lag.

**Btw my isp now is MyRepublic, might change from them soon as they seems very/over congested.7pm to 12am gameplay time in Aust is ridiculous.

@"Thunderdown.1436" said:How can I tell if you were even having "an epic time" from a still picture lol. I've been in plenty of zergs like that in the past and its just a c l u st e r f u c k and connection does not matter. I want to refine my skills and head out into the wilderness of solo roaming and camp capturing but the delay is just not gona allow me to enjoy it for very long.

Roaming is still doable and fun. You have to be a better player by anticipating and positioning than someone with low ping. Ping is probably less of a bother for roaming than is the current state of roaming tbh. Many servers "roaming" means running with 6-10 players....which is 5-8 more players than I consider to be roaming.

@"Lady Sapphirah.6234" said:Inside SMC (usually the laggiest place in wvw)... about 15 mins ago 5.50pm, 23/2/18. NBN... Im in Adelaide.

P.S. muahahahaaa we capped it :)

SMC is laggy but then it is the same for everyone....

Openfield things are abit different, it all depends which timezone you play tbh. Playing OCX timezone alot of people are in the same boat ping wise so it levels out but playing as an OCX in NA timezone....it's doable but you are at a disadvantage, positioning and anticipation have to be spot on so we have to play better than an NA player cos we won't see things until sometimes too late. I realised how much of a disadvantage ping above 250ms is when I recently played GW2 wvw from the States at 80ms. Totally easymode in comparison to playing from ocx. Don't get me wrong wvw is still all that I play pretty much and I find it great fun with my NA guild but players from OCX will always be at a disadvantage.

As for roaming, I roam with an NA friend in voice comms so she sees things before they are visible to me but we do ok and have good fun.

I am on ADSL 1 and regularly have a connection speed of below 3 mbps. My PING normally sits arround the 250 -300 point. The only time I have issues is on larger fights, or when I try and play during NA Prime.You should not have any issues with havoc or roaming. If you playing during OCX then most of the people you will be playing will have fairly comparable PING's anyway.

As a west coast NA'er who works until around 9 PST every night, I mostly run PST and OCX.Thus I'm in an OCX fights oriented wvw guild with quite a few Aussies, (and a Brit, not sure how that happened). Ping is a bit of an issue for them, but generally not enough to detract from the experience or noticeably degrade their gameplay. When we lose a fight it isn't usually due to their lag, (either we got outplayed or the enemy had greater numbers). Its definitely a bit of a hindrance, but it won't gut the experience.

~ Kovu

solo roaming is pretty much out of the question, unless you play some face roll build or spam ranged. you can be effective with a good build and a good team. I use battleping. I haven't had any problems with it or anet yet, and it makes my connection 10x better. its free to try and I definitely recommend trying it out.

@Thunderdown.1436 said:Why would anyone in their right mind want to invest time into something that immediately puts them at a disadvantage by simply installing it from their location? I don't really care how or how not so effective i'll be, its the game-play experience that gets ruined. In a massively multiplayer online RPG, you expect your abilities to work as soon as you press them you shouldn't have to be predicting, waiting or hoping they go off... no, I'm sorry just no (especially when I know the other guy can press anything he wants, whenever he wants and it will work instantaneously for him). Imagine being in a Role Play guild, you'd always be known as the slow guy who was always behind on the conversation lol. When you're used to playing normal 50-100ms games the skill delay of 250ms+ just leads to an overall clunky and frustrating experience where nothing feels smooth and enjoyable. You guys saying you play at 300ms and have no issues (lmao) go play WoW at 50ms and see how much better of a player you are because you can actually react instantly to situations and everything runs smooth.

How come a 10 year old gaming company is still too stingy to invest in Oceanic servers? It's not all about the Europeans and the Yanks ya know, the Oceanic community of gamers is pretty friggen huge when you combine us... I think you'd attract a lot more people to the franchise.

9/10 game2/10 company for poor server location choices

No thank you.

A ten year old game company with one single IP is not Blizzard. You'd need enough Australians playing to fill 3 servers. We know that only 30% of the population predominantly plays WvW and only 10% PvP. There wouldn't be enough Australians playing the game to fill three servers.

Then you'd have people complaining that there's no reason to play the game if you're in Australia because the Australian servers are dead and the company would have wasted quite a lot of money setting up a server park that served no purpose.

There are lots of people who do play from Australia, not just this game, but many games that don't have Aussie servers. If you can't take that limitation don't play the game. But that doesn't make the company a bad company for not opening servers here. It's expensive and you have to justify that cost. There's not enough population here to do it.

@Thunderdown.1436 said:

@Lady Sapphirah.6234 said:

@Thunderdown.1436 said:I'm also on NBN living in WA and that's standard ping for me anywhere in the game (even in the open PvE world or solo roaming). While a US player is probably having a much better time with a nice 100ms. I don't think its even worth putting any more time into it.

First of all, not everyone has no lag even if they're in the US. Depends on how many people are on the map, internet conditions, a whole host of things. You haven't tried and so you don't know. I've played from the states when I visited the states and sometimes got lag their too. So your basic assumption is unjustified.

Most of my skills operate when I press the most of the time.

I have played from China since release, and ping ranges from between 220 and 280. I hardly ever die in any scenario due to ping.I do relatively frequently die due to lag spikes. But when it's stable, no problem.

Also, seeing as you already know your ping from pve, we can assume you already have the game installed, so why not just go into wvw and see how it feels?

Regardless of any of the comments above, this game still offers a unique experience which I find thoroughly enjoyable, even with a worse ping than others.

Hello, Australian playing from NSW (NA server)... Thought to drop some of my roaming here https://m.twitch.tv/videos/207428412 (FPS/ping) shown in the bottom-right next to mini-map. Granted it tends to be frustrating at times when you know you could've pulled something clutch if you had the 100ms, however roaming with the avg. 300-350ping is NOT that terrible.