Strange connectivity problems in the last few days. Does Homecoming depend on Google's services in some way?

[temnix]

Over the last week something strange has been happening in my browser: some websites open very slowly, others only in part or require reloading, or just fail. I have seen no clear reason and attributed this to something on my end, although I had changed no settings. One of the sites affected had been a Chinese A. I. generation site I use. It had been struck by some kind of amnesia all the times I logged in, forgetting my history, favorites, and just did not work at all. I thought again this was all my fault somehow, but the other day it was up and running properly with an explanation from the administration that Google had experienced technical problems with some services or mechanisms that site depends on, and that those problems had been resolved on the Google side.

 

I had not expected a Chinese website to rely on something from Google, but... Two days later the site is down again the same way. And all this time I have been having trouble logging in to CoH. I am currently stuck at "Retrieving character data from..." When I use my VPN, which might send the data through some different countries, rely on different providers along the way, I am able to get to the character list then, although everything is kind of laggy and loads in jerks and starts. On the web at large some familiar websites continue to open normally and quickly, others stopped, all of a sudden. Might this be due to some reliance on Google? Might CoH be dependent on its products too?

[MonteCarla]

I've had some incredibly bad lag all weekend on CoH, starting Friday night US time (Australian Saturday morning).

I've often got stuck at the "Retrieving Character data from..." screen after choosing a server. When I do get through, performance varies from decent to a surreal slideshow of characters teleporting around mid animation pose.

Nothing else has been affected, and other online games (eg Champions Online as a good control experiment) have played fine, so I doubt its anything on my end at this point. 

[Octogoat]

1 hour ago, MonteCarla said:

I've had some incredibly bad lag all weekend on CoH, starting Friday night US time (Australian Saturday morning).

I've often got stuck at the "Retrieving Character data from..." screen after choosing a server. When I do get through, performance varies from decent to a surreal slideshow of characters teleporting around mid animation pose.

Nothing else has been affected, and other online games (eg Champions Online as a good control experiment) have played fine, so I doubt its anything on my end at this point. 

Is CO any better since they got rid of kaiserin? I saw they haven't had any new content in quite awhile. 

[Psyonico]

I haven’t had any issues on my end this week, so I suspect it’s not the game.

 

what people tend to forget is that there is more to it than just player and server.  If any of the links between player and server are having issues, then you’ll also have an issue.  And these links will be different for different locations.  Since I read somewhere that both Google and Cloudflare have had issues this week, I’m thinking that’s the culprit.

[MonteCarla]

Agreed, Psyonico.
Everyone I've asked in game has been having normal service from CoH this weekend. I'm suspecting it's a location thing. 

[Ghost]

I’ve had no issues, therefore it’s most likely something on your end.

Your service provider is the most likely culprit. 

 

[lemming]

Every so often, DNS issues crop up, but with stuff going on in the world, there's probably some DOS attacks going on which can hit other areas that maybe using similar routes.

[Snarky]

8 hours ago, temnix said:

Over the last week something strange has been happening in my browser: some websites open very slowly, others only in part or require reloading, or just fail. I have seen no clear reason and attributed this to something on my end, although I had changed no settings. One of the sites affected had been a Chinese A. I. generation site I use. It had been struck by some kind of amnesia all the times I logged in, forgetting my history, favorites, and just did not work at all. I thought again this was all my fault somehow, but the other day it was up and running properly with an explanation from the administration that Google had experienced technical problems with some services or mechanisms that site depends on, and that those problems had been resolved on the Google side.

 

I had not expected a Chinese website to rely on something from Google, but... Two days later the site is down again the same way. And all this time I have been having trouble logging in to CoH. I am currently stuck at "Retrieving character data from..." When I use my VPN, which might send the data through some different countries, rely on different providers along the way, I am able to get to the character list then, although everything is kind of laggy and loads in jerks and starts. On the web at large some familiar websites continue to open normally and quickly, others stopped, all of a sudden. Might this be due to some reliance on Google? Might CoH be dependent on its products too?

1st) inspect your hardware connections.  it can be an easy fix if its just a wire.

[Captain Fabulous]

What VPN are you using and why? If things work fine without the VPN but crappy with it then there's your culprit.

[srmalloy]

2 hours ago, Snarky said:

1st) inspect your hardware connections.  it can be an easy fix if its just a wire.

Not if you have to break the wiring harness(es) to do it:

[kanga]

The missus and I have had weird issues lately, one moment all is clear and fine, the next, bam reds galore, sometimes switching zones brings it on, other times it gets rid of it, like its zone or mission specific.

Screenshot is inside 'Investigate Warrior Earth'

 

 

*edit* Just now ... with that netgraph, I oro'ed out, and its perfectly clear in oro, its also clear in atlas.

Edited June 16 by kanga
more info

[GM Crumpet]

58 minutes ago, kanga said:

The missus and I have had weird issues lately, one moment all is clear and fine, the next, bam reds galore, sometimes switching zones brings it on, other times it gets rid of it, like its zone or mission specific.

Screenshot is inside 'Investigate Warrior Earth'

 

 

*edit* Just now ... with that netgraph, I oro'ed out, and its perfectly clear in oro, its also clear in atlas.

That's......... not good.......

Have you tried the obvious of rebooting your router and seeing if a wired connection has the same problem? Then it's an ISP issue. Changing the channel you use for the wifi canhelp as the default can get congested with everyone else in your are.

 

I'm slightly worried that you've been on some dodgy web sites. (Not those, get your mind out of the gutter!! 😛 ). You might have a virus or spamware that's using your resources behind your back. If it's not the ISP or the wifi channel then doing a deep clean with a respectable antivirus and antimalware could help. 

I'm not an expert at all, just advice I've taken that's helped me and passed on to other players. 

[temnix]

My question was about problems recently and of the type I encountered: failures to reach the servers. It doesn't help using this topic to complain about every connection issue encountered with CoH. And I think I have the explanation in my case: a number of Internet providers here in Russia have been subjected to DDoS attacks from Ukrainian hackers. At least one, in Siberia, is known by name, but others are probably either taking in some protective measures or they have been forced to restrict services by the security agencies. Nobody tells us anything, and nobody cares about the impact on users. First it was the mobile Internet that drones allegedly use to home in on targets, but it looks like this has spread to home Internet. Without a VPN many sites simply won't open and I still can't get to the character list, with VPN I DO get to the list and can make a character, a costume, but get kicked out to the main menu when trying to play, possibly by security measures inside CoH itself. Google and Cloudflare's problems might have exacerbated this, and again there is no telling if they are over and if not, when.

 

What a civilization of shitheads.

[kanga]

22 hours ago, GM Crumpet said:

That's......... not good.......

Have you tried the obvious of rebooting your router and seeing if a wired connection has the same problem? Then it's an ISP issue. Changing the channel you use for the wifi canhelp as the default can get congested with everyone else in your are.

 

I'm slightly worried that you've been on some dodgy web sites. (Not those, get your mind out of the gutter!! 😛 ). You might have a virus or spamware that's using your resources behind your back. If it's not the ISP or the wifi channel then doing a deep clean with a respectable antivirus and antimalware could help. 

I'm not an expert at all, just advice I've taken that's helped me and passed on to other players. 

Yep, modem and router have both had their arse kicked, this is happening on multiple pc's here.

speed tests and browsing are fine.

[DoctorDitko]

I guess by now everyone is aware that both Google (bad config) and Cloudflare (record-setting DDOS) have had a rough week.

Just figured I'd add a note for posterity.