Well, I went checking the forums today finally to see if anyone else has noticed this issue.
It seems that lag has gotten worse over the past few weeks but has been going downhill since the release of Unrest. The spell/CA lag you are getting is very common, especially among raiders. My guild is no exception to this so I will be posting on their behalf.
It seems that the servers are either in need of software or hardware patching. I know that this lag is not client side due to a few different factors:
1. I am well versed in computer setup (I do this for a living) and have all the proper software updates and a system with enough muscle to play any game on the market with medium to high settings. I run anti-virus and firewall software that I tightly monitor but I have ALL ports forwarded on my router and within my security software. I will not post my system specs because I know that this issue is being caused server side and will not even begin to entertain devs to that idea.
2. Most, if not all of the members in the raid experience this lag and at the same time. This is a cause of packet loss from the server and the time that it takes for everything to "resynch" is the time that you see 2-3 or 3-4 seconds of spell/CA freezing. Having most if not everyone in the raid having this issue at the same time rules out 2 things.... (a.) That the issue is client side due to improper software or hardware settings and (b.) It is a local ISP issue.
3. Many changes to the game have seemed to create more lag and zone or client crashes. The addition of Unrest seemed to create a few more problems but.... the new card game and subsequent patches (I dont care [I cannot control my vocabulary] it is called) have seemed to cause the greatest problems. There have also been various combat and spell changes where tons of content has either been changed or updated. I can't make any direct connections between these patches and the lag but I'm not sure I have to. It seems to me that with all these changes, and the coinciding lag, that this is more that coincidence.
I'm surprised that more people haven't spoken out about these issues and they really do effect gameplay. Being a swash, I need to time CAs in between my auto attacks to be viable dps. This simple task becomes nearly impossible with the increasing problems with server lag and I can't even imagine how healers must be pulling out their hair =/
This is actually my first post to point out any flaws in this great game. I haven't been happy with some of the combat changes recently or in the past but I understood them as necessary to save the integrity of the game. I have been playing EQ2 since release and am proud to say that I played EQ1 when it was in its glory days. All that I ask from SOE as a devoted fan and paying customer since November 2004, is to look into the issue. You don't have to reply to my post or release updates within the forums on a separate post (although me asking you to do so wouldn't be out of the question as a dedicated, paying customer). All that I ask is to get this game back to running the way that it was and the way that it should be. I don't want to log in one day to find that all of your resources have been focused at creating new content just to make more money from us. This game needs to keep its status as one of the top MMOs in the industry and I fear that if changes are not made soon... it will go the way of Vanguard when other, better, and newer MMOs hit the shelves in the future.
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