EDIT: Apparently this post was moved. It was intended for a different forum and a different demographic of TG. I wouldn't have used this form of post as an introduction to the "general" side of TG, sorry for the abruptness.



If anyone's ever dealt with tech support, they'll appreciate this.

Originally Posted by Me

Alright look, last week I spent 50 bucks on the Prophecies content to your game. I sit down to play it today at least 3 different times (many hours in between sessions) and the game is literally un-playable (by this, I don't mean "frustrating" I mean it can't be played.) because of lag. I can't attack, I can't zone, I can't even get my quest log to talk to my client some of the time.

I'm really trying to be reasonable here - but come on - why did I pay your company for content I can't use?

I play FPS games with good connectivity, and as I see it, they are FAR more demanding than an MMO like GW. I scan regularly. This is not a spyware problem. This is not a virus problem. This is in all likelihood not a hardware problem, but it could be. If it's hardware, then I fail to see why I'm able to render your game's visuals but unable to move around in them because my character is frozen in place because your servers won't give me my damn packets.


I'm sorry if this came off like a rant, but honestly, it seems ridiculous that I've paid for a product I can't use - and all I can figure out is that your servers are overloaded. And on my end, I can't see anything being done about it.

Is there anything I can do on my end to reduce this lag? Is there anything being done on your network guys' end, that I'm not seeing, that will fix this problem in the near future?

Thanks for your time.

Originally Posted by NCSoft

Response (Carlos) 09/27/2006 09:15 AM
Hello Customer,

Thank you for contacting Guild Wars Technical Support.

I would like to get more information regarding the status of your connection so that I may better investigate the cause. Guild Wars has a built-in network diagnostic utility. We ask that if you are using a router, hub, or switch, to first disconnect this device and connect directly to your modem before running this utility. You may have to reboot your modem and/or computer to reestablish your Internet connection.

Please perform the following steps.

1. Click Start and then click Run.

2. Click Browse and select your gw.exe program. It will be in "C:\Program Files\Guild Wars" by default. You can reach this through "My Computer" > "Local Disk C:" > "Program Files" > "Guild Wars".

3. The Run window should now read:

"C:\Program Files\Guild Wars\Gw.exe"

Modify the line in the Run window to read:

"C:\Program Files\Guild Wars\Gw.exe" -diag

4. Press OK to run the test.

You will see a small window that gives the status of the testing. Please wait for all of the tests to finish. When it is done, click Close. The test will create a new file in your Guild Wars folder (again, by default this is "C:\Program Files\Guild Wars") called NetworkDiag.log. Please update your incident and send us the NetworkDiag.log file as an attachment.

In the meantime we look forward to your response.

Thank you,
Guild Wars Technical Support

Originally Posted by Me

Nice troubleshooting app. I've taken the results that seemed anomolous and compiled them below. I'd rather not send you the whole app log (nothing personal, it's just a very exhaustive|intrusive app).

Before we worry about anything else in the log, can you please help me understand how to fix the following?

(Abridged Results of gw.exe -diag "NetworkDiag.txt")

========================
= Checking server connectivity
========================

// About 100 lines of concisely compiled timeouts listed here

Originally Posted by NCSoft

Thank you again for contacting Guild Wars Technical Support. Unfortunately we did not receive all of the previously requested information. Please try to the best of your ability to provide us with as much as the previously requested information as possible. This will allow us to better assist you with this issue.

Regards,
Guild Wars Technical Support

Originally Posted by Me

You know, you might try actually answering my questions instead of sending me through a dozen layers of protocol.

The problem is resolved today with no changes on my end. This leads me to believe it was a problem with your servers that my second message would have diagnosed if you hadn't disregarded it.

Thank you Carlos, Dan and whoever it is reading this message now for your time in working to resolve this issue.

Originally Posted by NCSoft

Thank you for updating us. We are pleased that the problem has been solved. Feel free to contact us if you have any further problems with our game.

It's like talking to a #$%^& robot.