Well it happened :(

[Jtbrig7390]

Psst, he was using heavy sarcasm

5:25am and no sleep so I mite not have noticed if so mybad.

[Zogarth]

Lag is lag and when you know that there can be lag which will kill you, you change the way you play to counter that.

Lost my first HC character in act 1 hell due to slow loading of the level. I entered a cave and when it was loaded I was already killed by an elite pack that was right at the entrance.

To counter that I bought a SSD and don't go into caves and dungeons anymore if I don't have to. Second character died in act 2 normal because of lag. Kited an elite pack and had a little lag spike and an exploding flower killed me. Couldn't do anything about it and it was probably my fault for rushing as fast as possible through the acts to continue where I died with my first character.

To counter lag spikes I again changed the way I play and play more defensively. Lots and lots of stamina and grind some levels. My demon hunter has so much stamina that he can survive 2 hits from Belial. Also I use the paladin as follower for his healing and greater survivability.

Also as a tip for everyone who wants to do a HC character. Start a witchdoctor. They have a passive that when you die, you get reborn immediately and run away to heal yourself and all. It's almost unfair that you're allowed to die once in a while as a witchdoctor and do good damage with shitty gear combined with good cc and your pets that also do a good amount of damage and protect you.

I find it sad how you are required to change your playstyles due to bad servers

[Jtbrig7390]

I find it sad how you are required to change your playstyles due to bad servers

Like I said it kinda sucks the Ps3 is getting the version I want to play.

If I get it I'm going to roll a HC toon from the start.

I rather lose a HC toon due to me fucking up and not because the Lag RNG gods are not on my side.

[abijax]

And i got 60/60 so it was not my own internet either. Blizzard servers just fail sometimes

Your internet speed is irrelevant unless you are directly connected with Blizzard's servers. There can be many many reasons why you lag that have NOTHING to do with the quality of your ISP or Blizzard.
BenBoss is off the reservation anyway and the really sad thing is he might even tell the truth about being a network administrator. So much in this world you can accomplish being a loudmouthed ignorant.

Mod Edit: No need for the personal dig at another user.

[Jtbrig7390]

Your internet speed is irrelevant unless you are directly connected with Blizzard's servers. There can be many many reasons why you lag that have NOTHING to do with the quality of your ISP or Blizzard.
BenBoss is off the reservation anyway and the really sad thing is he might even tell the truth about being a network administrator. So much in this world you can accomplish being a loudmouthed ignorant.

Ya but blizzard themselves have posted a few times that it is on there end a good amount and they are working on fixing it.

It was awhile ago that it was said but they have said it.

What I though was stupid was the 500$ walmart comment but ill end it there because a mod already said no more on it.

[Henako]

Why would you want to play Hardcore if is wasnt online? If it was offline you could just hack your way to max and no1 would belive you have any skill. Hardcore has allways been online. Its funny how people act like there a nobody can reach the top hardcore because of lag and other stupid reasons. Go look on diablo progess. Cause there seems to be 1000's doing very well on hardcore.

Just because you get a lag spike dont mean its the server. Most common gamers that are playing are using wal-mart junk computers and basic internet but are too proud to blame that. You see it all the time in MP games. people rubber-bands etc all the time. Its not the game, its people on junk rigs and shitty internet.

You're right. Nobody does anything for personal achievement, or to test themselves. Why should anybody be upset when a feature nobody asked for ruins massive amounts of progress every so often? Come on guys, grow up. It's the future.

[Rinoa]

I just started playing Hardcore again yesterday, leveled a monk and now I'm Paragon 10. Hit me up if you want to come play - Red#2506. :-) EU.

[Grindfactor]

Im on US or i would join you! But my net may not be the greatest but i figured eh stuff happens! I already got a witchdoctor to lvl 36 so working my way back up and im really glad they did the monster power so it makes leveling easier :3 And about the whole Blizzard only online ordeal with the game i can see how its them trying to protect their games but it can be frustrating :/ But its something we gotta deal with now it seems

[crazypineapple5]

I don't play hardcore for that reason. A little bit of lag and you lose everything :/

[Bane Falcon]

I think I lost a 13 or so Barbarian to something like this... My roommates' router/modem likes to throw temper tantrums and randomly drop, so I died to the internet crashing. Haven't quite gotten back around to playing Hardcore, though, as much as I'd like to!

[nightshark]

honestly if you die in hardcore to a tiny lag spike, you were playing wrong to begin with. it's reasonable that your character might die to a pack of elites if you dc but you shouldn't be playing that far out of your means where a tiny lag spike causes death.

many hc players play so overgeared that they could survive elite packs when dcing.

[StaeleAilar]

Once again, always online is harming the gameplay experience. Deaths in HC mode are things that should be down to player input; If you make a bad move, you pay for it.

Of course, there's always going to be the odd cock-up. Stuff like power going out or your system crashing etc, but Blizzard just added more ways for those cock-ups to happen.

I never did HC mode, but I got fed up of having latency issues in single player. I can only imagine how frustrating unnecessary latency problems must be when perma-death is a factor.

I'm in the same boat, i think i got to like level 30 and i just couldn't tolerate it anymore. it was hard enough killing the things in normal where if i died i just respawned. HC with the terrible servers and connection issues Blizzard has with this game.. no thanks.

[bbr]

I haven't played this game in ages, but i was under the impression that blizzard will restore hardcore characters if lag kills them?

Hah, no,. they don't.
They never have and never will.

That's the risk of Hardcore.

[Deleted]

Dont see why ppl whine. If u do HC isnt for you. I have cleared inferno with some characters and I have yet to actually get a lag or freeze lag. The ppl that complain about blizzards servers, are you guys sure its not your own internet connection?

[BenBos]

Dont see why ppl whine. If u do HC isnt for you. I have cleared inferno with some characters and I have yet to actually get a lag or freeze lag. The ppl that complain about blizzards servers, are you guys sure its not your own internet connection?

Likewise. And for the tens of thousands of others that have Paragon levels in HC it simply shows it is personal connection that counts first, then the internet providor quality, then the wider country conditions and only in the last resort there is a Blizzard server.

----

The problem is simple: flat tires in a race DO happen, so if you don't like them, stop racing. The only hic up I had in 13 months of D3 was my monitor that went suddenly blank... Perhaps I should now avoid all games involving a monitor... Or a hard disk crash, or a mouse battery that broke ...

Of course somewhere in this world there sure have been several players out of those 13 million that have had a broken hard disk...

Good that Blizzard has their avatars on servers then ...

[Aydinx2]

So basically what you're suggesting is lie and try to exploit the system?

Are you implying that cheating blizzard is a bad thing?

[florestan]

I find it sad how you are required to change your playstyles due to bad servers

How the hell do you distinguish between a lag spike that is caused server-side and one that is, e.g. caused by a routing problem?

[Radio]

Lag spikes can occur from:
- issues with your systems network hardware
- issues with your local cabling
- issues with your modem/router
- too much bandwidth use in your household
- issues with your homes internal cabling
- issues with the area exchanges/nodes that you connect to
- issues with the cabling between your area exchange/node and your home
- scheduled downtime at your area exchange/node
- (for international users, See: Australia) issues with international links
- issues with the any point of the overall route that your connection takes to reach the blizzard servers, can depend on ISP
- issues at Blizzards end

If anything, I'd say that issues at Blizzard's end are by far the least likely ACTUAL reason for each case of lag experienced in Diablo 3, there are just too many variables to consider. Blizzards aim is to make these lag spikes less detrimental to your gameplay through changes to the way their client-server system handles commands, and the fact that there are thousands of players who don't experience any form of lag spike just makes it even less likely that it is an issue at Blizzard's end.

Example: At my mum's place, latency to american video game servers is 500ms total, random disconnects / spikes can be expected every hour or two and internet gaming is basically frustrating. This is with a solid router and a very expensive computer, and new internal wiring and a new neighbourhood with good wiring.

Now, at my own place 40 mins away, latency to american video game servers is 180-200ms (Australia woo), disconnects are only experienced very late at night once every few months when they're doing work to my node, no spikes or lag beyond my 200ms is experienced whatsoever and internet gaming is very smooth in general. This is with a very solid router and the exact same very expensive computer being used, with brand new internal wiring and such.

Primary differences I can state off the top of my head:
- ISP at mum's is Telstra, ISP at mine is Internode, Telstra and Internode use different international links and optimisations where Internode is far more capable at handling international gaming traffic as a result
- Mum's internet plan is an ADSL2+ connection (roughly 20/1) while mine is a fibre optic connection (100/50), mum's house is also 3km from her ADSL exchange

Apart from that, same games, same computer, quality routers, new wiring, same part of the world, etc etc etc.

If Blizzard's servers were absolutely the issue we'd probably see a lot less people at 100 paragon hardcore.

[florestan]

@Zogarth Maybe I am unfair but my impression is that you seem to think that your modem is hooked up directly to one of Blizzard's server farms.

I remember very well an outrage about "bad servers" which caused lag spikes and connections drops in another MMO I play - in the end it became clear that under certain conditions packages were routed through the network of some ISP that was too cheap to pay for a peering agreement with either of the two tier3 networks the MMO company peered with. The MMO company contacted the ISP to no avail and that was the end of the story. What else are they supposed to do?

[dragonstrainer]

Prob why Hardcore mode isn't popular due to the risk