Unexpected disconnection (with months of trying to fix it)

https://pastebin.com/PdsP4Fe2


For context: I have more than 4600 hours logged on this game. I never had more than a few VERY rare connection issues up until the day 3.9 launched and can't remember ever having had a crash, but since 3.9 I've been getting regular latency spikes (or at least that's what it seems like) that often result in getting disconnected. As of 3.9.2c I now also crash out of the game to the desktop whenever I get disconnected, or if I go from the game to the character selection screen, about 4 out of 5 times.
It's getting increasingly frustrating to play POE.
To give some perspective on the regularity of disconnects and crashes: I'm almost unable to make it through a lab and when I do it's an "OMG" moment. Good luck getting a character into endgame like this.
And I'm not experiencing any connection issues with other games.

Nothing had changed on my side other than 3.9 launching (and now 3.9.2c), but since the disconnections began, I have been trying everything I could think of to fix this but nothing has worked.

I have...

- Uninstalled the game entirely and downloaded the 24.9gb file anew. Ran the "verify integrity of game files" function in Steam.
- Bought a blazingly fast NVMe M.2 SSD harddrisk and moved the game onto this drive that now holds nothing apart from games.
- Updated all my drivers though most were already up to date. Also updated the motherboard firmware.
- Turned off my router, unplugged it from the wall and then connected it again. Rebooted it. Set it to favour gaming for bandwidth. Made sure that there's only one unit logged into the router. Updated the firmware on it.
- Switched between 2.4G and 5G network. No difference.
- Flushed my DNS cache (I think it's called).
- Run the game with no browser or email clients open. Closed anything running in the background that wasn't needed including processes in Task Manager.
- Set all fans to hurricane power making CPU and GPU really chill.
- Modded my graphics card with a huge heatsinke and a couple of 120mm fans be get it extra cool.
- Tried to switch the mouse as the disconnects seem to often occur when clicking and moving/attacking and rarely when just standing around. Changed nothing. Also tried running them on different USB ports also without any improvements.
- Tried Fullscreen Windowed Mode as well as Fullscreen Mode. Tried setting all graphics settings to minimum values.
- Updated my lootfilter (FilterBlade). Tried running without a loot filter.
- Upgraded my internet connection to a 100/100mbit.
- Called my ISP to talk to them about the issue. They say it's not on their end.
- Went into my production_Config.ini file and set all the sounds/music/voices/effects to a value of false making the game entirely silent. Wasn't it.
- Bumped my resolution way down. Wasn't it.
- Tried turning off all MXT. Wasn't it.
- Ordered a static public IP for my router.
- Went into Steam settings and forced the game to launch in 32bit mode. Nope.
- Oh and I also tried not using wireless internet and with several different cables.
- Went into the router settings and tried disabling the firewall. Horrible idea but it has to be ruled out I guess.




From the Client.txt file:


2020/01/27 15:07:11 2904078 ac9 [INFO Client 13692] : You have entered Aspirant's Trial.
2020/01/27 15:07:12 2905625 ac9 [INFO Client 13692] Izaro: An aspirant can afford to be promising. An emperor must keep those promises.
2020/01/27 15:09:37 3049984 7d6 [INFO Client 13692] Abnormal disconnect: An unexpected disconnection occurred.


Crashing as I'm about to click on the door to the final boss fight in the labyrinth.
That was my last attempt to get through a lab until all this gets resolved.

From the WinMTR


ae6.cbs02.eq01.ams02.networklayer.com - 36


What is this particular networklayer address and are there any ideas as to why 36% of the pings sent turn into loss?

Here's a WinMTR pastebin of facebook for comparison.

https://pastebin.com/gxCcCwhm

I saw somewhere here on the boards that a VPN might help, if it was my ISP blocking something, so I got PrivateVPN who had a server a few miles from my home.
It just made my latency a bit worse and after playing for 15 minutes the game crashed again.

Oh and here's a pastebin using the VPN:

https://pastebin.com/NTkGbSCZ


Back to the drawing board I guess.

From your last trace. Packet loss starts at your router/modem. Power cycle them both. Turn them off and unplug em for at least a minute. Rerun the MTR.

If power cycling doesn't help and you are still getting PL, then really the only way to get rid of it is by going wired.

That 36 you saw at network layer means nothing. That's that node dropping the ping requests for more important data. It isn't true packet loss. PL will start at a node and carry all the way through.

"

Aragorn14 wrote:

From your last trace. Packet loss starts at your router/modem. Power cycle them both. Turn them off and unplug em for at least a minute. Rerun the MTR.

If power cycling doesn't help and you are still getting PL, then really the only way to get rid of it is by going wired.

That 36 you saw at network layer means nothing. That's that node dropping the ping requests for more important data. It isn't true packet loss. PL will start at a node and carry all the way through.

(That last WinMTR was while using a VPN that tanked my connection.)

So I spent a few more days testing out WIFI/wired connections on additional routers. All reset and set up from scratch.
Even wired I'm getting some horrid latency spikes every now and then. Everything stops, then I either get kicked from the game or everything speeds up really fast to catch up. It's about 50/50.
It makes no difference between what router I'm using or if I use WIFI or cabled connection.

https://pastebin.com/Pa5q2xLk:

|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| WinMTR statistics |
| Host - % | Sent | Recv | Best | Avrg | Wrst | Last |
|------------------------------------------------|------|------|------|------|------|------|
| RT-AC68U-8CA8 - 0 | 557 | 557 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 81.161.154.33 - 1 | 554 | 553 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| ve4031.hor2-cr6.ip.cxnet.dk - 1 | 554 | 553 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 1 |
|62.61.140.118.generic-hostname.danskkabeltv.dk - 1 | 554 | 553 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 1 |
| softlayer.equinix-am1.nl-ix.net - 1 | 550 | 548 | 14 | 14 | 41 | 14 |
| ae6.cbs02.eq01.ams02.networklayer.com - 1 | 550 | 548 | 15 | 15 | 20 | 15 |
| ae6.dar01.ams01.networklayer.com - 1 | 550 | 548 | 14 | 14 | 40 | 14 |
| po1.fcr01.sr01.ams01.networklayer.com - 2 | 530 | 523 | 14 | 17 | 162 | 14 |
| speedtest.ams01.softlayer.com - 1 | 550 | 548 | 14 | 14 | 15 | 15 |
|________________________________________________|______|______|______|______|______|______|
WinMTR v0.92 GPL V2 by Appnor MSP - Fully Managed Hosting & Cloud Provider


Does GGG have a list of graphics drivers that are tested and known to be rock solid? I'm using the newest one from Nvidia.
I'm trying to think of anything that could have changed on my end on exactly the day 3.9 launched but I'm running out of ideas.

Dynamic resolution makes no difference.

Amsterdam: https://pastebin.com/Q680caej
Frankfurt: https://pastebin.com/uR61H1ED
London: https://pastebin.com/L4Q7yr0f
Paris: https://pastebin.com/LTXTSVJS
Milan: https://pastebin.com/VRxU8kmq

Seems like the other European servers route through Amsterdam to some extent.

I think I'll have another word with my ISP as a select few packets seem to get genuinely lost at them and the whole way down. Not sure so few lost packets is supposed to be able to give POE all these issues, but I guess it is worth a try.

So I spent the last 10 days in talks with my ISP and had them monitor my connection and run tests. Wasn't the problem.

And I'm still getting loads of disconnections. It's... so... tiring.

Disabled Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS) and OneDrive.
Still looking for a reason why this game gives me huge spikes and disconnects me as this didn't work either.

maybe the packet loss on hop 2?