In a surprising turn of events, it would appear that Blizzard has stealth-implemented Australian servers. At this stage, there is no official announcement, but upon logging into Diablo 3 in the past few hours, Australians and New Zealanders have been experiencing significantly lower ping.
LATENCY IS NO LONGER YOUR ENEMY
There's nothing worse than battling hordes of demonic hellspawn and then being confronted with the worst enemy of all; the dreaded "Red Ping Bars of Death". More often than not it means a quick jaunt from the nearest graveyard back to your corpse and a hefty repair bill, or significantly worse if you are a Hardcore player. Well fear this cruel mistress no longer, as Blizzard have just launched Australian servers for the Oceanic region!
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Q: Do I have to purchase Reaper of Souls to play on the Australian servers? A: All Diablo III players will be able to take advantage of the new local game servers right now, at no additional cost.
Q: Will I need to pay any fees, register to transfer characters, or level up from scratch? A: No! Because the local Diablo III game servers will be linked with the existing Americas region, all characters, gold, and experience will be unaffected. The introduction of Australian servers will be an immediate benefit to the player, providing a smoother, more responsive gameplay experience.
Q: Will I still be able to play with my friends who are on servers in the Americas? A: Absolutely! Because the Australian Diablo III game servers will communicate with the servers in the Americas, you will be able to seamlessly play with friends who have already started their adventures there. You will simply play on the server of the person who hosts the game, whether that be Australia or America.
Q: What about Hardcore characters? A: Playing Hardcore characters with high latency is frustrating, especially if this causes you to die. To maintain the quality of the experience, Hardcore characters from ANZ will only be allowed to play on the Australian game servers. In the event that the Australian Diablo game servers are at full capacity, you will be placed in a queue.
seems legit, but a little suspicious. i get around 80ms from Perth now, so that would indicate a sydney or melb server, but would be nicer to see closer to 60ms within my own country. I am still skeptical as there has been no announcement.
for those bitching, sc2 doesn't need this, we have sea servers in singapore which i get about the same ping to, 60-80ms, those of you over east will get a little worse but then again, you get much better to NA.
for those bitching, sc2 doesn't need this, we have sea servers in singapore which i get about the same ping to, 60-80ms, those of you over east will get a little worse but then again, you get much better to NA.
average ping for me in syd to sc2 sg is 200+. NA and KR is 250+. I dont know anyone on east coast who gets better than 150-170 to sg. To put this into perspective, when my larva pops, i cant select or use them for 2-3 in game secs because of the lag, nor can i inject.
Playing in slow mode vs faster I can max out a 30-40 sec faster simply because of lag induced macro damage. At least once a week I get supply blocked despite knowing that i built the overlord. Because im microing against a reaper or something at the time and was too distracted to wait to see the command was recieved before going back to microing.
"you will be placed in a queue"
That reminds me, used to have to queue D2 all the time. Never had to queue D3. So less popular or better server capacity you reckon?
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