Hey folks,

 

As many of you know, on Tuesday Keith explained that in preparation for United Forces we moved all current west coast servers into our Virginia data center. Here’s some of the key questions we have received about the North American datacenter change:

 

Why not communicate this ahead of time?

We made the decision to not communicate this information ahead of time because we wanted you to have the ability to immediately login and determine the impact to your gameplay experience. This meant we could quickly start gathering feedback on what you were seeing in-game (more on this in the next question). However, we have seen posts from players who made specific decisions based on location (such as character transfers) and we will be in touch with them to discuss. To ensure there is no confusion about this update in-game, we adjusted the server selection screen to reflect that all NA servers are on the east coast.

 

My ping has gone up since the change and it is affecting my gameplay, what options do I have?

Please continue to report it! As Keith mentioned in his forum post this is something we are actively tracking and working with our network partners to address where possible. We will be working through this especially over the next two weeks as we ramp up to United Forces.

 

Could there be one data center in the Central US so that pings are more even for each coast?

Creating an entirely new datacenter is a daunting task, even above and beyond the substantial changes we have already made this year. This just isn’t something that was viable in the scope of the changes we made for United Forces.

 

Since all of NA is in one datacenter, shouldn’t we just have one server?

Moving all of NA together would create a very heavily populated server. This would introduce several challenges: 1) Players would likely experience queues accessing the server and 2) It would increase the chances for server instability and downtime. There are also a variety of other issues, but a key concern was combining all of North America would result in substantially more character name collisions.

 

We hope this answers some of your questions and lets you know what’s going to happen over the next couple weeks. Please remember, on November 8th we will move all players to their new servers during an extended maintenance (currently looking like 12 hours). We are also discussing starting a few hours earlier than usual (e.g., 2 or 3am CT), but will let you know a few days beforehand.

 

Thanks everyone.

 

-eric

A few questions:

When are you going to admit EA cannot change the laws of physics, and the APAC players are going to have increased pings from here on out?

Are you going to give refunds to all the APAC players who resubscribed or kept subscribing based on your communicating there would continue to be a West Coast server, who now can't play the game?

Are we going to get any kind of apology from EA not telling us the truth ahead of time?

We made the decision to not communicate this information ahead of time because we wanted you to have the ability to immediately login and determine the impact to your gameplay experience.

I'm not really sure I understand what you're saying... So you didn't communicate it to avoid players freaking out unnecessarily before they would even see the impact on their game?

Couldn't they have seen that before by immediately logging in/creating a char on an original East Coast server? And why the statement that it was just "discovered" on the 24th that the datacenters could be combined when it was obviously planned beforehand?

Hey folks,

 

As many of you know, on Tuesday Keith explained that in preparation for United Forces we moved all current west coast servers into our Virginia data center. Here’s some of the key questions we have received about the North American datacenter change:

 

Why not communicate this ahead of time?

We made the decision to not communicate this information ahead of time because we wanted you to have the ability to immediately login and determine the impact to your gameplay experience. This meant we could quickly start gathering feedback on what you were seeing in-game (more on this in the next question). However, we have seen posts from players who made specific decisions based on location (such as character transfers) and we will be in touch with them to discuss. To ensure there is no confusion about this update in-game, we adjusted the server selection screen to reflect that all NA servers are on the east coast.

 

My ping has gone up since the change and it is affecting my gameplay, what options do I have?

Please continue to report it! As Keith mentioned in his forum post this is something we are actively tracking and working with our network partners to address where possible. We will be working through this especially over the next two weeks as we ramp up to United Forces.

 

Could there be one data center in the Central US so that pings are more even for each coast?

Creating an entirely new datacenter is a daunting task, even above and beyond the substantial changes we have already made this year. This just isn’t something that was viable in the scope of the changes we made for United Forces.

 

Since all of NA is in one datacenter, shouldn’t we just have one server?

Moving all of NA together would create a very heavily populated server. This would introduce several challenges: 1) Players would likely experience queues accessing the server and 2) It would increase the chances for server instability and downtime. There are also a variety of other issues, but a key concern was combining all of North America would result in substantially more character name collisions.

 

We hope this answers some of your questions and lets you know what’s going to happen over the next couple weeks. Please remember, on November 8th we will move all players to their new servers during an extended maintenance (currently looking like 12 hours). We are also discussing starting a few hours earlier than usual (e.g., 2 or 3am CT), but will let you know a few days beforehand.

 

Thanks everyone.

 

-eric

So, what about APAC players?.,.. none of what you said will address our issues of massive numbers in lag... there is no way you guys can mitigate it enough that it won’t impact us significantly...

If you have a plan for this... now is the time to explain it because I can tell you we are already leaving the game because most of us know you are unable to get out ping back to the 200ms we had on the west coast...

An extra 50-80 ms for US based players is playable... but adding that to 200-220 ping for APAC players... puts us into the range of unplayable...

I am being genuine here when I ask, do you have a plan that is going to be able to fix this because we can’t see how it’s realistically possible once connection leaves your data centre and travels across the country...

I implore you to give us the hard truth and just tell us... has the APAC community been deemed an acceptable lose?

If not, at what speeds do you realistically expect we should be playing at.

One last question, where are we supposed to be giving Keith this feed back data on our ping and performance issues? Do we just keep spamming the forums or do you have a system in place for us to send you the data?

So, what about APAC players?.,.. none of what you said will address our issues of massive numbers in lag... there is no way you guys can mitigate it enough that it won’t impact us significantly...

 

If you have a plan for this... now is the time to explain it because I can tell you we are already leaving the game because most of us know you are unable to get out ping back to the 200ms we had on the west coast...

An extra 50-80 ms for US based players is playable... but adding that to 200-220 ping for APAC players... puts us into the range of unplayable...

 

I am being genuine here when I ask, do you have a plan that is going to be able to fix this because we can’t see how it’s realistically possible once connection leaves your data centre and travels across the country...

I implore you to give us the hard truth and just tell us... has the APAC community been deemed an acceptable lose?

If not, at what speeds do you realistically expect we should be playing at.

 

One last question, where are we supposed to be giving Keith this feed back data on our ping and performance issues? Do we just keep spamming the forums or do you have a system in place for us to send you the data?

Well... you could PM Keith here on the forums.

We made the decision to not communicate this information ahead of time

You know, I've been sticking up for you guys about this.. But this.... this was a bad decision and it should never have been made. This should have been communicated in the United Forces update. Being in the tech industry I know this decision wasn't made and implemented over night. I know what it takes to make something like this happen. You knew well in advance of even posted the UF update that this was what in fact what was going to happen. (Well maybe not you specifically, but the people who were in on the decision certainly did).

Well... you could PM Keith here on the forums.

He is busy, he’s admitted it himself that he can’t look at all the PMs... a better solution would be to setup an official thread where we could post data

I appreciate the honesty here Eric...but damn man...not telling your customers ahead of time was LOW...you actually hid that information intentionally. I can't express how big of a mistake I believe that was.

And not even an apology

He is busy, he’s admitted it himself that he can’t look at all the PMs... a better solution would be to setup an official thread where we could post data

He has often responded to my PM's he does say he forwards every PM to another member of the dev team, so I am sure that if you send it his way through here it will end up somewhere where it is supposed to go at Bioware

RE: "I'm not really sure I understand what you're saying.."

He's admitting they lied. They said there would be an East Coast server and a West Coast server knowing there would *not* be a West Coast server at all.

They are liars, plain and simple. Unprofessional, untrustworthy liars.

He's admitting they lied.

Oh, I absolutely got that. What I didn't get is their stated motivation for the lie.^^

Moving all of NA together would create a very heavily populated server.

You seem to be making a pretty concerted effort to reduce that population.

Hey folks,

 

As many of you know, on Tuesday Keith explained that in preparation for United Forces we moved all current west coast servers into our Virginia data center. Here’s some of the key questions we have received about the North American datacenter change:

 

Why not communicate this ahead of time?

We made the decision to not communicate this information ahead of time because we wanted you to have the ability to immediately login and determine the impact to your gameplay experience. This meant we could quickly start gathering feedback on what you were seeing in-game (more on this in the next question). However, we have seen posts from players who made specific decisions based on location (such as character transfers) and we will be in touch with them to discuss. To ensure there is no confusion about this update in-game, we adjusted the server selection screen to reflect that all NA servers are on the east coast.

 

My ping has gone up since the change and it is affecting my gameplay, what options do I have?

Please continue to report it! As Keith mentioned in his forum post this is something we are actively tracking and working with our network partners to address where possible. We will be working through this especially over the next two weeks as we ramp up to United Forces.

 

Could there be one data center in the Central US so that pings are more even for each coast?

Creating an entirely new datacenter is a daunting task, even above and beyond the substantial changes we have already made this year. This just isn’t something that was viable in the scope of the changes we made for United Forces.

 

Since all of NA is in one datacenter, shouldn’t we just have one server?

Moving all of NA together would create a very heavily populated server. This would introduce several challenges: 1) Players would likely experience queues accessing the server and 2) It would increase the chances for server instability and downtime. There are also a variety of other issues, but a key concern was combining all of North America would result in substantially more character name collisions.

 

We hope this answers some of your questions and lets you know what’s going to happen over the next couple weeks. Please remember, on November 8th we will move all players to their new servers during an extended maintenance (currently looking like 12 hours). We are also discussing starting a few hours earlier than usual (e.g., 2 or 3am CT), but will let you know a few days beforehand.

 

Thanks everyone.

 

-eric

Regarding:

"Moving all of NA together would create a very heavily populated server."

No problem, when you take into account the players you drove away already and the players who will quit when they lose their names, there will be lots of space on the 1 server.

Regarding:

"As Keith mentioned in his forum post this is something we are actively tracking and working with our network partners to address where possible"

When you find a shorter route across the Rockies and the Pacific Ocean lets us know. We are holding our breath waiting

He has often responded to my PM's he does say he forwards every PM to another member of the dev team, so I am sure that if you send it his way through here it will end up somewhere where it is supposed to go at Bioware

I’d prefer a standard setup or response from Eric on what the procedure is... I dont want to spam Keith with the amount of data I have and will have if they want actual data from Australia...

Why not communicate this ahead of time?

We made the decision to not communicate this information ahead of time because we wanted you to have the ability to immediately login and determine the impact to your gameplay experience.

No, Eric. Just no. You intentionally gave wrong information post-maintenance. You don't just "discover" that it would be better to combine server infrastructures. You don't just on a whim decide combine American datacenters without prior notice or negotiation with said datacenters. You knew, the datacenter knew.

You lied to your customers.

No, Eric. Just no. You intentionally gave wrong information post-maintenance. You don't just "discover" that it would be better to combine server infrastructures. You don't just on a whim decide combine American datacenters without prior notice or negotiation with said datacenters. You knew, the datacenter knew.

 

You lied to your customers.

+1

Translates too: We knew you would be pissed so we waited...

RE: "I'm not really sure I understand what you're saying.."

 

He's admitting they lied. They said there would be an East Coast server and a West Coast server knowing there would *not* be a West Coast server at all.

 

They are liars, plain and simple. Unprofessional, untrustworthy liars.

I called it and so did my friend and she got a forum ban for pointing out that it was fake news and a lie... go figure... she already had her hand on the unsub plug... but that was the last straw for her and she unsubbed straight away.

We made the decision to not communicate this information ahead of time ...

Because of all the times when not communicating ahead of time about big changes to the game that negatively impacted players went so well? Normally I try to edit snark out of my posts. But, honestly, not informing players about all NA servers moving to the east coast before it happened? Bad. Idea.

Players may not agree with game decisions, but do want to make informed decisions. That means not springing things like the server move after the fact. Would there have been threads about it, had it been announced ahead of time? Yes. However, I think the feeling of being duped would have lessened -- had players known about it in advanced. I'm not an APAC player, and not impacted negatively by the servers being on the east coast. However, I am a player who, in the future, is going to have doubts about what's said by devs concerning the game because of this situation.

It takes time to build trust. One action (or in this case, inaction) can undermine that trust.

No, Eric. Just no. You intentionally gave wrong information post-maintenance. You don't just "discover" that it would be better to combine server infrastructures. You don't just on a whim decide combine American datacenters without prior notice or negotiation with said datacenters. You knew, the datacenter knew.

 

You lied to your customers.

..... +1

I've created a translation for the latest yellow post:

Why not communicate this ahead of time?

What EA/BioWare said:

We made the decision to not communicate this information ahead of time because we wanted you to have the ability to immediately login and determine the impact to your gameplay experience.

Translation:

We flat out lied by omission. Some of us crossed our fingers and hoped you wouldn’t notice. Others knew there would be posters telling you your experience was wrong, excusable, different from theirs, etc.

What EA/BioWare said:

This meant we could quickly start gathering feedback on what you were seeing in-game (more on this in the next question).

Translation:

We knew the forums would explode, and we could wait a couple days to see if it would die down. Also, we could ignore tickets and posts in the Technical forums because we already knew what the problem was.

What EA/BioWare said:

However, we have seen posts from players who made specific decisions based on location (such as character transfers) and we will be in touch with them to discuss.

Translation:

We could reasonably foresee this by reading forum posts before the switch, but will pretend to be surprised anyway and offer some lip service to the squeakier wheels.

What EA/BioWare said:

To ensure there is no confusion about this update in-game, we adjusted the server selection screen to reflect that all NA servers are on the east coast.

Translation:

Now that the cat is out of the bag, we’ll be honest about where the servers are.

My ping has gone up since the change and it is affecting my gameplay, what options do I have?

What EA/BioWare said:

Please continue to report it!

Translation:

Nothing.

What EA/BioWare said:

As Keith mentioned in his forum post this is something we are actively tracking and working with our network partners to address where possible. We will be working through this especially over the next two weeks as we ramp up to United Forces.

Translaiton:

And neither can we.

Could there be one data center in the Central US so that pings are more even for each coast?

What EA/BioWare said:

Creating an entirely new datacenter is a daunting task, even above and beyond the substantial changes we have already made this year. This just isn’t something that was viable in the scope of the changes we made for United Forces.

Translation:

No. Because $$. Not that we don’t have any, just that we are only engaging in cost saving maneuvers.

Since all of NA is in one datacenter, shouldn’t we just have one server?

What EA/BioWare said:

Moving all of NA together would create a very heavily populated server.

Translation:

Not yet.

What EA/BioWare said:

This would introduce several challenges: 1) Players would likely experience queues accessing the server and 2) It would increase the chances for server instability and downtime. There are also a variety of other issues, but a key concern was combining all of North America would result in substantially more character name collisions.

Translation:

After we hemorrhage players from this maneuver, most of those ‘problems’ we created will solve themselves and we can do it. Probably 2Q 2018.

I called it and so did my friend and she got a forum ban for pointing out that it was fake news and a lie... go figure... she already had her hand on the unsub plug... but that was the last straw for her and she unsubbed straight away.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I think it's because of the "fake news" part. I said that once and got an infraction for it as it's something political. Sortta.

First and foremost, thank you for the reply as this is an issue for those of us who live west coast or much worse those in the Pacific.

I'm not going to address my opinion on not telling people ahead of time. What happened, has happened, now it's time to address it.

I have admitted I know little about it, but I have had replies that there is only so much you can do about location based lag (or high ping times). So my conclusion is that while network / hardware changes may be able to help myself and others from the west coast (current ping 85-120 ms as of last night), it will only be marginal at best for people in the Pacific.

I hate to draw this conclusion because I highly doubt there is any way to change your decision at this stage, but I feel closing the west coast server was a mistake. I will he positively thrikled to be proven wrong. Obviously for me the game is perfectly playable, so I won't be going anywhere

Our testing showed no impact on the gameplay experience...

 

...we wanted you to have the ability to immediately login and determine the impact to your gameplay experience.

 

If you're going to lie to us, at least lie better. ****.

regards,

guy whose ping has literally tripled.

+1

 

Translates too: We knew you would be pissed so we waited...

Or it translates to,,, we wanted to keep you all subbed for as long as we could because we knew you would unsub after we told you...

This way we got you to pay or use all your cc’s to transfer to servers that will be in the same place

This way we can charge more when people want to swap servers

We got people to resub because we told them there would be a server in each region and we wanted to get the last bit of milk out of the APAC players before we shafted them....

I want to yell and scream and rage... but the will has been knocked out of me... it’s obvious they do not care that they lied to us because they decided in advance to lie.... anything we say to them will be ignore and probably laughed at...

The jokes on us... we all got trolled hard...