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Are devs just ignoring the PC Technical Support forum now?

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Phoenixotica
Phoenixotica
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@ZOS_Kevin @ZOS_Bill

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/626423/se-asia-players-get-errors-108-200-334-and-increased-ping-on-pc-since-jan-25#latest

You have an issue literally preventing players from Southeast Asia playing a game they purchased that's been going on since January, and the best the "specialist support team" comes up with, after suggesting that drive optimization software might prevent you from accessing ZOS login servers is "talk to your ISP in the Philippines about fixing that server timeout in Los Angeles".

I've tagged you guys. Others have tagged you guys. The problem is still there. You have an entire section of the planet that can only access your game through a VPN which costs money and is a worse and often unplayable ping. Now I've been told that "the info has been submitted to the team and if there's any changes, they'll contact you". In laymen's terms, "don't call us, we'll call you".

If you can't provide the service we paid for, then refunds are due. We at least deserve that if we're not going to get priority attention on this issue (as in resolved within a day or two).
Edited by Phoenixotica on April 9, 2023 10:55PM
  • RevJJ
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    I’ve received the same response from customer service. How is a local ISP in SE Asia going to resolve a constant server timeout at a US location that is the last step before the ESO server? The “it’s not our problem” approach being taken here by ZOS gives a really poor impression of how they treat their players/customers.
  • Phoenixotica
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    The “it’s not our problem” approach being taken here by ZOS gives a really poor impression of how they treat their players/customers.

    Somehow, I don't think they would take this long to address the problem if the US was unable to login in without a VPN. So, by extension, in consideration of how long this problem has persisted, ZOS apparently has a bias against SE Asians. It's the only explanation that makes sense.

    Of course, they're welcome to come back with "Oops! We're so sorry we let this one slip. Here's some compensation, and we'll have the problem fixed within a day or two".

    Of course, I won't be holding my breath. I, instead, expect some pseudo excuse essentially saying "not our fault. nothing we can do. you're stuck with the problem. so sorry."

    Anyone care to place a bet which one will happen?
  • Stefirex
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    Phoenixotica wrote: »
    The “it’s not our problem” approach being taken here by ZOS gives a really poor impression of how they treat their players/customers.

    Somehow, I don't think they would take this long to address the problem if the US was unable to login in without a VPN. So, by extension, in consideration of how long this problem has persisted, ZOS apparently has a bias against SE Asians. It's the only explanation that makes sense.

    Of course, they're welcome to come back with "Oops! We're so sorry we let this one slip. Here's some compensation, and we'll have the problem fixed within a day or two".

    Of course, I won't be holding my breath. I, instead, expect some pseudo excuse essentially saying "not our fault. nothing we can do. you're stuck with the problem. so sorry."

    Anyone care to place a bet which one will happen?

    When the problem exists outside their servers, it quite literally Is NOT THEIR PROBLEM. Seriously!
  • RevJJ
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    Stefirex wrote: »
    Phoenixotica wrote: »
    The “it’s not our problem” approach being taken here by ZOS gives a really poor impression of how they treat their players/customers.

    Somehow, I don't think they would take this long to address the problem if the US was unable to login in without a VPN. So, by extension, in consideration of how long this problem has persisted, ZOS apparently has a bias against SE Asians. It's the only explanation that makes sense.

    Of course, they're welcome to come back with "Oops! We're so sorry we let this one slip. Here's some compensation, and we'll have the problem fixed within a day or two".

    Of course, I won't be holding my breath. I, instead, expect some pseudo excuse essentially saying "not our fault. nothing we can do. you're stuck with the problem. so sorry."

    Anyone care to place a bet which one will happen?

    When the problem exists outside their servers, it quite literally Is NOT THEIR PROBLEM. Seriously!

    If the timeout is always between the last step before the ESO server and the ESO server itself, how do you know it’s not an issue on the receiving end?
  • Phoenixotica
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    When the problem exists outside their servers, it quite literally Is NOT THEIR PROBLEM. Seriously![

    If I was a major gaming company with server farms, and specifically one section of the planet couldn't access my content that they payed for, I might be inclined to investigate and find an alternate solution for those paying customers. For nothing else than to avoid the optics of bias against that section of the planet. I wouldn't let the problem go on for months with no responses to it.

    Also, you don't know if it's their server or not. It's hard to believe that some 3rd party server not run by ZOS is just blocking/timing out login requests from only one part of the planet to one specific game and nothing else that server handles is affected. Maybe ZOS can explain this in better detail

  • Reverb
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    The forum is for conversation and not support. The only Zeni employees monitoring the posts are the moderation team and the Community Management team, not the tech team of devs.

    Issues should be reported on the Support portal: https://help.elderscrollsonline.com/app/home?

    Thats what’s monitored by the support team, not the forums.

    Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you. ~Friedrich Nietzsche
  • Phoenixotica
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    Reverb wrote: »
    The forum is for conversation and not support. The only Zeni employees monitoring the posts are the moderation team and the Community Management team, not the tech team of devs.

    Issues should be reported on the Support portal: https://help.elderscrollsonline.com/app/home?

    Thats what’s monitored by the support team, not the forums.

    Aaaaannnddd....when the "support team" pulls a "we'll look into it...don't call us, we'll call you", what do you suggest people do? Hint, there are people that have waited months and gotten no response or update about this. So please enlighten us, as you seem to want to protect this problem.

    Oh, also, I'm not posting here (and I'm sure others aren't) without having first gone through the support ticket process and gotten such gems as "disable your motherboard software....drive optimization software may prevent you from connecting to our servers" and "talk to your ISP in your Southeast Asian country about how to get past time outs with a US based server." If you think that sounds like being given a runaround, then you have a sane, rational mind.

    So of course we're going to try to get attention from some kind of dev, as their support teams have clearly given up on the SE Asian player and resolving the issue.
    Edited by Phoenixotica on April 10, 2023 1:49AM
  • Amottica
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    RevJJ wrote: »
    Stefirex wrote: »
    Phoenixotica wrote: »
    The “it’s not our problem” approach being taken here by ZOS gives a really poor impression of how they treat their players/customers.

    Somehow, I don't think they would take this long to address the problem if the US was unable to login in without a VPN. So, by extension, in consideration of how long this problem has persisted, ZOS apparently has a bias against SE Asians. It's the only explanation that makes sense.

    Of course, they're welcome to come back with "Oops! We're so sorry we let this one slip. Here's some compensation, and we'll have the problem fixed within a day or two".

    Of course, I won't be holding my breath. I, instead, expect some pseudo excuse essentially saying "not our fault. nothing we can do. you're stuck with the problem. so sorry."

    Anyone care to place a bet which one will happen?

    When the problem exists outside their servers, it quite literally Is NOT THEIR PROBLEM. Seriously!

    If the timeout is always between the last step before the ESO server and the ESO server itself, how do you know it’s not an issue on the receiving end?

    We can come up with a lot of hypotheticals but that is a distraction. Even with the distraction, it would be odd that an issue on the ESO servers only affects those in Southeast Asia.
    Stefirex wrote: »
    Phoenixotica wrote: »
    The “it’s not our problem” approach being taken here by ZOS gives a really poor impression of how they treat their players/customers.

    Somehow, I don't think they would take this long to address the problem if the US was unable to login in without a VPN. So, by extension, in consideration of how long this problem has persisted, ZOS apparently has a bias against SE Asians. It's the only explanation that makes sense.

    Of course, they're welcome to come back with "Oops! We're so sorry we let this one slip. Here's some compensation, and we'll have the problem fixed within a day or two".

    Of course, I won't be holding my breath. I, instead, expect some pseudo excuse essentially saying "not our fault. nothing we can do. you're stuck with the problem. so sorry."

    Anyone care to place a bet which one will happen?

    When the problem exists outside their servers, it quite literally Is NOT THEIR PROBLEM. Seriously!

    I would not say it is not their problem as all of us are their customers. However, if it is not within the area that Zenimax has control of or can influence then how can we expect them to solve the issue?
  • Phoenixotica
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    I would not say it is not their problem as all of us are their customers. However, if it is not within the area that Zenimax has control of or can influence then how can we expect them to solve the issue?


    That's exactly the point. Why are SE Asians needing a VPN to play, and not US customers, or EU customers? This is specifically affecting SE Asian customers, based on a connection to the IPs they provide. It's been going on since January, and no updates from them about the problem whatsoever, not even to say "nothing they can do". Meanwhile, money was spent on their game and their subscription. If, for reasons that are or are not their fault, they need to provide refunds if they can't fix it quickly.
  • RevJJ
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    Amottica wrote: »
    RevJJ wrote: »
    Stefirex wrote: »
    Phoenixotica wrote: »
    The “it’s not our problem” approach being taken here by ZOS gives a really poor impression of how they treat their players/customers.

    Somehow, I don't think they would take this long to address the problem if the US was unable to login in without a VPN. So, by extension, in consideration of how long this problem has persisted, ZOS apparently has a bias against SE Asians. It's the only explanation that makes sense.

    Of course, they're welcome to come back with "Oops! We're so sorry we let this one slip. Here's some compensation, and we'll have the problem fixed within a day or two".

    Of course, I won't be holding my breath. I, instead, expect some pseudo excuse essentially saying "not our fault. nothing we can do. you're stuck with the problem. so sorry."

    Anyone care to place a bet which one will happen?

    When the problem exists outside their servers, it quite literally Is NOT THEIR PROBLEM. Seriously!

    If the timeout is always between the last step before the ESO server and the ESO server itself, how do you know it’s not an issue on the receiving end?

    We can come up with a lot of hypotheticals but that is a distraction. Even with the distraction, it would be odd that an issue on the ESO servers only affects those in Southeast Asia.
    Stefirex wrote: »
    Phoenixotica wrote: »
    The “it’s not our problem” approach being taken here by ZOS gives a really poor impression of how they treat their players/customers.

    Somehow, I don't think they would take this long to address the problem if the US was unable to login in without a VPN. So, by extension, in consideration of how long this problem has persisted, ZOS apparently has a bias against SE Asians. It's the only explanation that makes sense.

    Of course, they're welcome to come back with "Oops! We're so sorry we let this one slip. Here's some compensation, and we'll have the problem fixed within a day or two".

    Of course, I won't be holding my breath. I, instead, expect some pseudo excuse essentially saying "not our fault. nothing we can do. you're stuck with the problem. so sorry."

    Anyone care to place a bet which one will happen?

    When the problem exists outside their servers, it quite literally Is NOT THEIR PROBLEM. Seriously!

    I would not say it is not their problem as all of us are their customers. However, if it is not within the area that Zenimax has control of or can influence then how can we expect them to solve the issue?

    It is not a hypothetical though. I have the IP address of the server (in the US) that always has a timeout in the step from there to the ESO server. I have multiple tracert logs trying different locations and every time the path goes through that specific server there is a timeout. I have provided all of these to the ZOS CS team.

    Would a big company with (allegedly) millions of customers not be in a better position to take a look at this in order to support a group of those customers than individual customers who are not even in the same country as where the bottleneck takes place?
  • Phoenixotica
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    It is not a hypothetical though. I have the IP address of the server (in the US) that always has a timeout in the step from there to the ESO server. I have multiple tracert logs trying different locations and every time the path goes through that specific server there is a timeout. I have provided all of these to the ZOS CS team.

    Would a big company with (allegedly) millions of customers not be in a better position to take a look at this in order to support a group of those customers than individual customers who are not even in the same country as where the bottleneck takes place?

    More importantly, there's the optics of this. This isn't a "this class isn't as good as that class" question. This is straight up discriminatory action, or lack thereof. I guarantee you that if the US player base had this issue, there would be a fix THAT DAY. Apparently, they don't care about customers outside of the US or EU, but they'll still sell you the game and subscription.

    Right this moment, the Asian version of Steam has the game on a free week. Now, wouldn't getting people to download an unplayable game be considered fraud, and wouldn't ZOS do their best to avoid the appearance of that? We can know by how soon they get off their backsides and finally address this issue one way or the other.
  • vsrs_au
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    Reverb wrote: »
    The forum is for conversation and not support. The only Zeni employees monitoring the posts are the moderation team and the Community Management team, not the tech team of devs.

    Issues should be reported on the Support portal: https://help.elderscrollsonline.com/app/home?

    Thats what’s monitored by the support team, not the forums.
    The thread "Guidelines for Bug Support Forum" pinned to the top of the "Bug Reports" subforum says otherwise. It says that subforum exists for the support team to have more information on bugs which will help them fix issues faster.
    PC(Steam) / EU / play from Melbourne, Australia / avg ping 390
  • SeaGtGruff
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    When you say "SE Asia," what is that? Which countries does it include? Because I'm in a guild with someone from S Korea who can log in and play the game.

    Is the problem happening for everyone in SE Asia, or just for everyone who is using a particular ISP?
    I've fought mudcrabs more fearsome than me!
  • Phoenixotica
    Phoenixotica
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    vsrs_au wrote: »
    Reverb wrote: »
    The forum is for conversation and not support. The only Zeni employees monitoring the posts are the moderation team and the Community Management team, not the tech team of devs.

    Issues should be reported on the Support portal: https://help.elderscrollsonline.com/app/home?

    Thats what’s monitored by the support team, not the forums.
    The thread "Guidelines for Bug Support Forum" pinned to the top of the "Bug Reports" sub forum says otherwise. It says that sub forum exists for the support team to have more information on bugs which will help them fix issues faster.

    Filing a support ticket supersedes that forum, as "Specialist teams" are supposedly assigned to look at your case specifically. More importantly, this is a thread about this problem being ignored by ZOS since last January. This isn't simply a bug. This is a "I purchased the game, the per-order, the subscription, and even crates, and now I can't use any of it.

    Big difference versus "this outfit doesn't align right on my wood elf", don't you think?

    This thread is also about how ineffective the support team is, as their suggestions of removing motherboard software and somehow getting your ISP to fix a problem on a foreign based server are beyond the pale, and speak of bot scripting. Most importantly, this is about bias against the SE Asian community that they happily took the money from, but who they can't be bothered to support after the sale.
  • Phoenixotica
    Phoenixotica
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    SeaGtGruff wrote: »
    When you say "SE Asia," what is that? Which countries does it include? Because I'm in a guild with someone from S Korea who can log in and play the game.

    Is the problem happening for everyone in SE Asia, or just for everyone who is using a particular ISP?

    SE Asia would be countries like the Philippines, Malaysia, Siingapore. S. Korea is considered more "first world", like Japan is considered. S. Korea also has the highest internet speed in the world based on testing.

    Also keep in mind that this is rather a "creeping problem", insomuch that some in SE Asia had problems well before I did, but it did start to affect me eventually.
  • vsrs_au
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    Phoenixotica wrote: »
    vsrs_au wrote: »
    Reverb wrote: »
    The forum is for conversation and not support. The only Zeni employees monitoring the posts are the moderation team and the Community Management team, not the tech team of devs.

    Issues should be reported on the Support portal: https://help.elderscrollsonline.com/app/home?

    Thats what’s monitored by the support team, not the forums.
    The thread "Guidelines for Bug Support Forum" pinned to the top of the "Bug Reports" sub forum says otherwise. It says that sub forum exists for the support team to have more information on bugs which will help them fix issues faster.

    Filing a support ticket supersedes that forum, as "Specialist teams" are supposedly assigned to look at your case specifically. More importantly, this is a thread about this problem being ignored by ZOS since last January. This isn't simply a bug. This is a "I purchased the game, the per-order, the subscription, and even crates, and now I can't use any of it.

    Big difference versus "this outfit doesn't align right on my wood elf", don't you think?

    This thread is also about how ineffective the support team is, as their suggestions of removing motherboard software and somehow getting your ISP to fix a problem on a foreign based server are beyond the pale, and speak of bot scripting. Most importantly, this is about bias against the SE Asian community that they happily took the money from, but who they can't be bothered to support after the sale.
    OK then, I won't post anything more in this thread. I was just correcting the other post which incorrectly claimed this forum is not for support.
    Edited by vsrs_au on April 10, 2023 5:39AM
    PC(Steam) / EU / play from Melbourne, Australia / avg ping 390
  • Phoenixotica
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    OK then, I won't post anything more in this thread.

    That is your choice. Hopefully you're leaving with some positive understanding.
  • RevJJ
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    SeaGtGruff wrote: »
    When you say "SE Asia," what is that? Which countries does it include? Because I'm in a guild with someone from S Korea who can log in and play the game.

    Is the problem happening for everyone in SE Asia, or just for everyone who is using a particular ISP?

    I have heard from players in Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and now Philippines who are all having the same issue.

    Incidentally, if I set my VPN to Seoul then the route is such that the server that seems to be causing the issues is not part of the path because of different routing. Doing that gives me a higher general latency though and some of the steps in between are not always stable (but not consistently unstable).
  • Phoenixotica
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    I have heard from players in Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and now Philippines who are all having the same issue.

    Incidentally, if I set my VPN to Seoul then the route is such that the server that seems to be causing the issues is not part of the path because of different routing. Doing that gives me a higher general latency though and some of the steps in between are not always stable (but not consistently unstable).

    I tried using a VPN to route from locations in the US such as Dallas and even Los Angeles. Pings go from 400ms upwards to 999+ms. Completely unplayable.
  • N00BxV1
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    Sorry to hear of this problem.

    If it's of any consolation -- I live in the South-Eastern US and for years I've been having a problem where between the hours of 12am and 4am I get disconnected with just a "An error has occurred" message but no error code. I've even changed my ISP but still like clockwork every single night I get disconnected at least 2 or 3 times just between those hours. It's not my internet either because I always watch a stream or something on my second monitor and it doesn't lag or disconnect at all. This game just kicks me for some reason but then lets me back in immediately. And I don't know what to do about it because by the time I do a tracert the game is already working again...

    I kinda remember years ago people were having connection problems and were posting their tracerts on the forums. The common problem back then seemed to be Akamai (or a hop right before the ESO servers). This isn't the first game that I've played that had problems with that service either so I highly suspect that to be the problem...
  • Phoenixotica
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    I kinda remember years ago people were having connection problems and were posting their tracerts on the forums. The common problem back then seemed to be Akamai (or a hop right before the ESO servers). This isn't the first game that I've played that had problems with that service either so I highly suspect that to be the problem..

    That seems to track logically, which means that it would be in ZOS's purview, as they would have a contract with that service. Did you do a support ticket on this? How long has it been going on since you notified them?
  • N00BxV1
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    Phoenixotica wrote: »
    I kinda remember years ago people were having connection problems and were posting their tracerts on the forums. The common problem back then seemed to be Akamai (or a hop right before the ESO servers). This isn't the first game that I've played that had problems with that service either so I highly suspect that to be the problem..

    That seems to track logically, which means that it would be in ZOS's purview, as they would have a contract with that service. Did you do a support ticket on this? How long has it been going on since you notified them?

    No support ticket. I don't like dealing with support (of any company) nor do I have any other information to give them. So I just try to avoid playing the game during those problem hours... or kick and scream when it inevitably happens. But if I wasn't able to connect at all then yes I'd file with support and deal with that headache.
  • Phoenixotica
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    No support ticket. I don't like dealing with support (of any company) nor do I have any other information to give them. So I just try to avoid playing the game during those problem hours... or kick and scream when it inevitably happens. But if I wasn't able to connect at all then yes I'd file with support and deal with that headache.

    That's understandable, and if you read earlier in this thread, you'll see that tech support thinks your ISP can troubleshoot another company's server and that hard drive optimization software can block access to their login servers.

    But it is interesting that, once again, Akami is a common factor. ZOS needs to explain it's relationship with Akami and how able they are to troubleshoot these issues with them.
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