Too high ping? (TF2)

[Uhura]

I started playing Team Fortress 2 about a month ago and have mainly stayed on European Valve servers. Recently I have started experimenting with other, non-Valve servers (trying to find one with zero furry-sprays and no kids screaming in the voice chat is surprisingly difficult) and have found a few US based servers that were ok. My problem is that apparently my ping is too high for those servers and people have now twice pointed it out in the chat. First time I got a complaint for having 170 ping, which I felt was a fair complaint. The second time I got a complaint for having 113 ping and that one confused me a bit. Is 113 ping really that high? I didn't notice any lagging during the game and managed to get on the MVP list too, so it's not like I was bringing the team down (the person who complained about the ping was on my team).

Am I missing something? Is 100+ ping awful? How high ping is too high? Help me out, I'm new to this stuff :/

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

eh 60-90 is roughly where I say "that's good", but 90-110 is starting to get a bit jumpy, especially depending on how consistent your connection is, you might not have noticed it but it doesn't mean it wasn't happening. I'll jump from 50-85 quite a bit, there have been times where it jumped above 100 and so I left and went to another server that was better.


That said, I'm not an expert on ping, just what I've experienced. I've never had anyone get kicked out or said "GTFO" for high ping, as we've had some pretty high pings sit in the servers I frequent. (two guys had 215 ping for a solid 10 minutes straight, twas madness)

 

[Zontar]

For TF2, ping tends to be inconsistent. I have had times where it was in the low 40s, then skyrocketed to 300 before coming back down. That isn't a problem. But for a consistent connection, you'll tend to want to keep it below the three digit mark. It may not seem like it, but it does effect your gameplay and that of those around you. Optimal is below the 50 mark, but I've never seen someone complain about one lower then 85.

 

[Bad Jim]

The second time I got a complaint for having 113 ping and that one confused me a bit. Is 113 ping really that high? I didn't notice any lagging during the game and managed to get on the MVP list too, so it's not like I was bringing the team down (the person who complained about the ping was on my team).

This person is an idiot. Results matter, not ping. What about all the people with 20 ping that pick sniper or spy and fail to score more than 3 points per game?

 

[Uhura]

90-110 is starting to get a bit jumpy, especially depending on how consistent your connection is, you might not have noticed it but it doesn't mean it wasn't happening.

For TF2, ping tends to be inconsistent. I have had times where it was in the low 40s, then skyrocketed to 300 before coming back down.

Yeah, I have noticed that on the European Valve servers my ping tends to fluctuate only a little but on the US servers the peaks are a bit more noticeable. In the case of the first complaint, my ping was 140 when I joined the game and the next time I checked it was 170. I guess it's possible there were even higher peaks during the game (and that would certainly explain why the person mentioned it to me).

I've never had anyone get kicked out or said "GTFO" for high ping, as we've had some pretty high pings sit in the servers I frequent. (two guys had 215 ping for a solid 10 minutes straight, twas madness)

I think one of the reasons I found the complaints so weird is that on the Valve servers where I usually play, it's really common to have people playing with 250+ pings for hours without any problems (as in, they seem to do well and people don't complain about lagging/jittering etc.).

This person is an idiot. Results matter, not ping. What about all the people with 20 ping that pick sniper or spy and fail to score more than 3 points per game?

Yeah, at first I thought he was a bit of a jackass too, but now I'm not so sure. Maybe I really was laggy. The top player in the opposing team had 110+ ping too and their team mates had not apparently complained about it (everyone else had sub 100 pings). I just get the feeling that I must have missed something. It's just weird to think someone would complain about something like that just out of spite.

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

90-110 is starting to get a bit jumpy, especially depending on how consistent your connection is, you might not have noticed it but it doesn't mean it wasn't happening.

I've never had anyone get kicked out or said "GTFO" for high ping, as we've had some pretty high pings sit in the servers I frequent. (two guys had 215 ping for a solid 10 minutes straight, twas madness)

I think one of the reasons I found the complaints so weird is that on the Valve servers where I usually play, it's really common to have people playing with 250+ pings for hours without any problems (as in, they seem to do well and people don't complain about lagging/jittering etc.).

well it all depends on relativity I would say. many of the servers I frequent have the majority of the players sitting around 25-60 range on ping, so when that doubles/triples/quadruples/etc...compared to the average, it is noticeable and can be a pain in the ass a bit. Not saying you weren't legitimately doing good and that you should've been booted in any case (the person probably was just finding a reason to whine, alot of competitive people will use ping as an excuse) but just explaining my logic with you.

 

[Uhura]

well it all depends on relativity I would say. many of the servers I frequent have the majority of the players sitting around 25-60 range on ping, so when that doubles/triples/quadruples/etc...compared to the average, it is noticeable and can be a pain in the ass a bit.

Yeah, that's a good point. I just checked some of my tf2 screencaps and it seems that on the US servers I visited most players have pings in that 25-60 range and then there's me and one or two other poor saps with 100+ pings. Sigh. I guess I should try to find a passable server closer to home.

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

well it all depends on relativity I would say. many of the servers I frequent have the majority of the players sitting around 25-60 range on ping, so when that doubles/triples/quadruples/etc...compared to the average, it is noticeable and can be a pain in the ass a bit.

Yeah, that's a good point. I just checked some of my tf2 screencaps and it seems that on the US servers I visited most players have pings in that 25-60 range and then there's me and one or two other poor saps with 100+ pings. Sigh. I guess I should try to find a passable server closer to home.

Well if you can find some that don't mind your ping too much, then I'd stick with it, I have my favorites I've found so I'm content but when I first got them game it did kind of suck finding servers that I liked, which isn't your fault you can't find any in your ping range, so to speak.

 

[Maximum Bert]

I usually try and keep it to 100 or below in the games I play if possible but I will play up to about 200 ping after that it can get a bit silly.

In Darkstalker Resurrection it paired me up with someone who had a ping of over 2000 cant remember the exact number think it was something like 2550 I was struggling to select my character there was like a 4 second delay or something stupid and thats no exaggeration I had to back out usually I will play the match but that was literally unplayable I couldnt even move properly.

 

[Arfonious]

The ping is meassured in milliseconds so a ping of 100 means that your game is on a 0.1 second delay.

I'm not sure about Team Fortress but many games have taken the ping in consern for online play, for instance in Supreme Commander the game is programmed in a way that makes any ping less than 500 not matter.

It could also be that people tend to look more at the numbers than the game itself.

 

[Neverhoodian]

It kind of depends on the type of server as well as which class you are. You'll probably get called out for high ping (150+) on more competitive servers run by clans, but it's common on Valve servers to see players stuttering across the map like an epileptic turtle with 500-999+ ping. They're useless besides being a distraction at that point, but Valve servers have a reputation for useless teammates anyway, regardless of ping. As for classes, you'll probably get by as a Heavy, Engineer or Medic with higher ping counts, but it's not such a good idea to play more twich-based classes like Scout or Sniper.

Personally, I try to avoid anything near or over 100-125 ping, as things start to get a bit stuttery. Go higher than that and it has a noticeable detrimental effect on gameplay. Paradoxically, there have been times where extremely low ping (25 and under) seemed to cause problems, but that might have been some other issue on the server's side. Typically, anything between 30-80 ping is a good "sweet spot" for me.

When searching for servers, you can filter your results by ping and/or general location, which should help alleviate things. You may also want to add more criteria to find exactly what you're looking for, such as filtering by player count. When you find a server you like that has a fair amount of traffic, add it to your favorites. I've accumulated a decent list of favorite servers over the years, so there's usually little to no searching involved for me to find a decent match.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

I always order my server list by ping and try to find one that's below 50, or at a stretch 100. Anything higher and I really start noticing the difference.

Pretty much this.

I try to play on a server with less than 50 ping if I can, less than 80 ping if nothing better is available, and if the ping gets over 100 I usually don't even bother because I notice the choppiness immediately and it starts to really both me. Having said that, I wouldn't call someone out for having high ping, not unless their ping was over 200 and they were doing extremely poorly, at which point I would question why they can't find a server closer to them.

 

[OneCatch]

I always order my server list by ping and try to find one that's below 50, or at a stretch 100. Anything higher and I really start noticing the difference.

(TF2's pretty much the only real-time online game I play)

See I never really notice lag in-game - I'll just start playing crap at whatever, realise that I'm doing terribly, look at my ping and go "Ah, right, that explains it!".
Which is weird because I really notice changes in raw FPS - anything below ~45 and I struggle with shooters, below 30 and I literally can't play - and I'll notice even a 5FPS drop immediately.

 

[Auninteligentname]

It's been a while since I played but here is my tips around the ping:

- 0-80 in ping should be unoticable.
- around 100 in ping is liveable, but not ideal. If you don't notice it, then it doesn't really matter.
- over 150 in ping is unplayable. Trust me on this : P

Also, I'll recommend the Rocketblast servers. Those were pretty good, back when I played. A bit unsure wheter they're still up, or not. And if you get on a server with too many screamer kids, there is a mute option, to mute the specific screamers.

 

[Lil_Rimmy]

Wow @ all these people saying 3 digits is too high.

Maybe it's just Australia, but for me, if I can't get an Auzzie server with ping in the 50-100 (really good), then it goes from 100(good)-200(not that great) and if it's above 200, unless it's a slower game (ala ArmA etc) no.

I don't know about anyone else, but to me, either I have lag or I don't. I really don't get degrees of lag, especially with TF2. And I can't NEVER notice the difference in my play from 50-150 ping. 200 I start to notice the lag of other players, but from 200 up is the actual lag.

It's kind of funny, playing CS:GO recently I have met the same people in random games many times. Hell, I've even played with a guy, gone back 30 minutes later and then played in a totally different game with him. The Auzzie gaming community is pretty tight nit and filled with just Auzzies, because the next best ping is up in Asia, then America.

I legit met people on my friends list just at random in games of GO, and my friends list is tiny. Like, 3 friends that play GO.

 

[Ieyke]

My ping tends to be around 30. 30-110 seems fairly normal.

I don't feel like ping is particularly high until it goes into the 300-700 range. Then it's time to fix something.

I've played for hours on end with ~170ping just absolutely dominating the other team as per usual.
Never really noticed aside from seeing my ping on the scoreboard.
*shrug*

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

To be perfectly honest, if you can maintain a consistent ping that is below about 150ms you will probably be fine. The catch, though, is that most people with a ping in that range have an inconsistent connection which causes a host of issues that people would call "lag" (even though this is not particularly related to lag). At 150ms or below the delay is slight enough that it would rarely adversely affect you in a meaningful way (in TF2 at least).

Of course, I played games for years with a ping that was somewhere between 250 (Team Fortress mod for Quake played on a 28.8k modem) and 450 (Tribes on a 56k) and I can tell you that you can learn to deal with fairly high amounts of lag so long as it remains consistent.

 

[EvilRoy]

Eh, as a guy who has spent waaaay too much time on TF2 (4 digits) I can see why you're getting inconsistent complaints.

Valve servers (which are relatively new) are typically for new players or people who just don't care - they go there to bug about and have a good time, but nobody is taking the game too too seriously. You can have any ping and any FPS you want on a valve server. I've played on 600 ping there and not heard boo - something I haven't experienced since enemy territory.

On a privately run server you tend to get people who care a bit more about the game, and usually these guys have all been playing together on this server for ages. So while they may forgive Mike from Australia for his ping because they've been playing together so long, you may not get the same consideration. TF2 also has a particular quirk - this may be unique or not, I don't know - called lag compensation. If you've ever gotten killed with the ubersaw at what appears to be 3 m distance, then you've seen it in action. Basically it is supposed to account for disparate latency between players, but the worse the ping or ping difference the wonkier it acts.

There is also this:

Spoiler

The comic is about the sniping issues, but it works this way for every hitscan weapon. Projectile weapons can be worse though, since you they may jitter and jump on screen.

 

[Zac Jovanovic]

30-35 is my sweet spot,incidentally that's what I get on German based servers.
It wildly depends on the game though, most of the time anything under 120sh is OK for me.

Problem is, on some shittier hit detection systems a high ping would give you an advantage over players that are not lagging, making a pinglimit mandatory.
For example in Black Ops 1 if I connect to a AUS based server (300-350ms) I become practically unkillable as long as I don't stand still. My kills detect with a delay, but they all count. It's really fucked up.