League of Legends Ping

[LevonJay]

Hi,

Recently my league of legends ping has been hovering around 60+ms when it used to be around low-mid 40ms. I contacted Riot games support and submitted various tracert and WinMTR reports and they said to contact my ISP as it was a networking issue.

I have a VPN, just a regular one not specifically for gaming, and setting the server to Chicago (where the League of Legends servers are located) and playing through VPN brings my ping back down to mid 40ms.

There seems to be some sort of issue with Shaw routing for this traffic.

Below is the results of a WinMTR test with and without the VPN (first being with VPN, second being without)

[LevonJay]

Also this looks like a very similar problem from months back that was never resolved:

https://support.shaw.ca/t5/internet-discussions/on-behalf-of-the-league-of-legend-alberta-thank-you/... 

[mdk]

@LevonJay -- I prefer using the traceroute command in Windows, because it shows both IP-address and host-name.

So, here are some traces, for the IP-addresses that you cited.

__________________________________________

Tracing route to 199.116.115.158 over a maximum of 30 hops

  5 11 ms 12 ms 12 ms rc1wt-be40.wa.shawcable.net [66.163.68.18]
  6 33 ms 32 ms 34 ms rc3so-be82.cg.shawcable.net [66.163.76.10]
  7 63 ms 63 ms 65 ms rc4ec-be13.il.shawcable.net [66.163.65.18]
  8 62 ms 62 ms 64 ms eqix.chi02.as46562.net [208.115.136.224]
  9 61 ms 62 ms 62 ms 184.170.250.57
10 62 ms 71 ms 61 ms 199.116.115.158

Trace complete.

NOTE: the relatively-large times between CG (Calgary) and IL (Illinois).
This seems to be a "cross-border" long-haul route, i.e., very busy.
This "hop" is inside of Shaw's network, but probably would be "expensive" for Shaw to speed-up.

Physically, it's a 26 hour drive, at 100 Kph, from CG to IL -- just under 300 Km.
Driving at the speed of light (about 300 Km per millisecond), going 300 Km will take 1 millisecond, one way.
A round-trip, such as what PING does, would double the time. Add delays "inside" the router, as it routes other millions of packets per second, and 2 milliseconds expands greatly.

NOTE: I think that the "wa.shawcable.net" host-name is not reflective of where the router is physically located.

For example:

Name: rx0wt-korea-telecom.wa.shawcable.net
Address: 66.163.68.14

is on the same subnet (66.163.68.xxx) but it probably is NOT in KOREA.

Also:

Name: rx0wt-comcast.wa.shawcable.net
Address: 66.163.68.30

seems to be a "gateway" to COMCAST.
__________________________________________

Tracing route to 184.170.250.132 over a maximum of 30 hops

  5 11 ms   11 ms 17 ms rc1wt-be40.wa.shawcable.net [66.163.68.18]
  6 33 ms   34 ms 34 ms rc3so-be82.cg.shawcable.net [66.163.76.10]
  7 63 ms   64 ms 64 ms rc4ec-be13.il.shawcable.net [66.163.65.18]
  8 64 ms 104 ms 102 ms eqix.chi02.as46562.net [208.115.136.224]
  9 64 ms   63 ms 64 ms 184.170.250.135
10 63 ms 112 ms 96 ms 184.170.250.132

Trace complete.

NOTE: Again, CG to IL is "slow", and IL to "equix.chi" is slower.
That "hop" to "equix.chi" is outside of Shaw's control.

__________________________________________

Tracing route to 192.64.170.1 over a maximum of 30 hops

  5 12 ms 10 ms 11 ms rc1wt-be40.wa.shawcable.net [66.163.68.18]
  6 14 ms 11 ms 11 ms six.riotgames.com [206.81.81.42]
  7 12 ms 11 ms 11 ms 104.160.129.44
  8 *         61 ms 53 ms ae30-br01.chi01.riotdirect.net [104.160.159.10]
  9 51 ms 52 ms 52 ms 104.160.131.101
10 * * * Request timed out.

NOTE: A much-different, and faster, route from Vancouver (?) to "riotgames", but a slower "hop" into "riotdirect".
That "hop" between "games" and "direct" is outside of Shaw's control.

__________________________________________

So, if you are looking to "point fingers", most of your fingers point OUTSIDE of Shaw's network.

Sadly for you, there is nothing that you can "improve". I think that RIOT needs to "man up", and upgrade their network, rather than deflecting the issue to Shaw.

Finally, note that PING and TRACEROUTE traffic is sometimes treated as "low-priority" traffic inside a router, and "real-life" traffic through the router gets the higher priority.

Indeed, some routers do not respond to PING/TRACEROUTE -- you get the "timed out" message.

[LevonJay]

I sent them another message with this response to see what they say.

Why is it not by default using the fastest route?

Why does a VPN, with all the overhead involved with a VPN, still result is a 30% improvement over regular routing to the same endpoint?

I'm confused as to how an extra layer of encryption and sending it through a VPN would ever result in a significant performance gain. That seems like it should never be the case.

This was their response last time regarding this issue:

[mdk]

@LevonJay wrote:

> Why is it not by default using the fastest route?

There is no "default" within any router on the Internet, except to not do ANY routing ("factory default").

Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) is a routing protocol used to transfer data and information between different host gateways, the Internet or autonomous systems. BGP is a Path Vector Protocol (PVP), which maintains paths to different hosts, networks and gateway routers and determines the routing decision based on that.

RIOT publishes BGP information for all its routers, and every router on the Internet uses that information for routing, along with other BGP information published by other companies (Shaw, Telus, Bell, Sprint, et cetera).

Compare to using a GPS in your automobile, to suggest the "best" path to a destination -- if there is a traffic accident on one of the suggested roads, that "best" route either cannot be used, or is delayed (flag-person directing 1-lane access) or you must take a slower detour.

Or, compare to driving from Vancouver to Chicago -- you might pass Calgary and Winnipeg and Fargo (North Dakota), or you might pass Seattle and Bismarck (North Dakota) and Fargo (North Dakota), on your way to Chicago.  Which route is "faster"? At any instant, you don't know about delays due to roadwork, nor road-blocking avalanches in the Rocky Mountains.

> Why does a VPN, with all the overhead involved with a VPN, still result is a 30% improvement over regular routing to the same endpoint?

The Internet was designed for "redundancy" -- multiple routes everywhere. If you are in Kamloops, and want to drive to Red Deer (AB), do you take Highway #1 to Calgary, and then go north? Or, BC #5 to BC #93 to AB #11, going east? Or, BC #5 to BC #16 to AB #16, and then south? Which route will be "fastest" ?

By forcing your traffic through a VPN-server, you are selecting a route that gets you somewhat close to your destination. Sometimes, your computer --> VPN-server --> RIOT is faster than your computer -> BGP-based routing-decisions -> RIOT. Sometimes, not faster.

> ping has been hovering around 60+ms when it used to be around low-mid 40ms.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, is there more traffic on the Internet (and less automobile traffic on the roads) than before COVID-19 ?

[shaw-tony]

@LevonJay upstream signal from your modem is a bit off-spec which may be causing the longer pings. I'd recommend reseating your coax cable connection from the wall outlet to the modem and ensuring there are no kinks in the cable. When reconnecting them, ensure they are finger-tight. If you continue to notice issues, touch base with our technical support team go over more troubleshooting steps.

[LevonJay]

Sorry for the long delay. Was on a long vacation. I've tried reseating it multiple times, moved it to different connections and then went as close as possible to where the coax enters the house to connect it there and there has been no noticeable difference.

The status of the issue is pretty much exactly how it was back in June

[shaw-tony]

@LevonJay no worries. Hope you had some good time off! Yeah, the signal is still a bit off-spec. Since it's the same issue as before, I'd recommend scheduling a service technician over to check your connections outside. 

[LevonJay]

I reached out to schedule a service technician and they said my internet connection was fine. They said to try to move the modem connection further up the chain (remove any splitters and connect right to the place it comes into the house) so I will try doing that.

I found a better application to monitor my connections so I tried that with riot and google ip addresses. The first and last image are the riot servers. The second is google.ca and the third is the google DNS server (8.8.8.8). They seem pretty consistent in the fact that there are ping spikes about every 15 seconds to an additional 20% - 50% of the stable ping.

[LevonJay]

I've but the cable modem as close as possible, without any splitters, to the entry point of the coaxial cable to my house and it seems to have gotten worse. Maybe the modem is defective?