If you have played competitive online Red Alert on CnCNet then you will no doubt have encountered the horrible disease known as LAG.
Picture the scenario. It's 630pm, you have just worked 11 gruelling hours and had a quick dinner. You want to relax and pwn some TA or WP members to unwind. You identify a Goldrush 4v4 room in the CnCNet lobby which has a few pro player names in the game room so you think it looks quite fun and decide to join... You select your colour and your faction and the host launches... You then build your power plant and barracks and the game abruptly freezes. A sudden feeling of dread comes over you and makes your buttocks muscles clench. It is your worst fear. It is LAG. An innocent teammate of yours then identifies the lagger in chat "fu AF-Uzi fix conn u lag". The suspicion is confirmed when the "Waiting for... AF-Uzi" message appears in the chat line. Red player gets frustrated and aborts. 2 more follow. That 4v4 Goldrush game you were looking forward to playing has been cancelled and you are left naked in the lobby feeling disappointed, anxious and frustrated. To makes matters worse you try to join abacus' 2v2 ribbon room so you can flex your pro Q but the game room is already closed. Because of the lagger you now wait 30 minutes before you can get a game.
We've all been there in the pit of despair of being a victim of lag. I truly sympathise if you suffer from this illness. It can attack your immune system in various ways.
Another lethal symptom of LAG disease is its unfortunate viral ability to discredit your wins. Imagine grinding out a 2 hour p4 game in which you are finally getting on top after withstanding a barrage of helis and chronospheres and victory is within reach, when suddenly lag afflicts a player within the game. The game disconnects due to server time out and your opponents dispute your adamant claims of "never mind we were going to win ez anyway, we had it for sure". Your opponents' reluctance to accept defeat in such a scenario shall likely induce hospital level stress levels resulting in grade 3 hair loss.
While there is no outright vaccine to prevent LAG in games, there are some protocols which can help keep this disease at bay:
- Avoid playing with players from a far away geographical locus. For example, avoid games with South Americans or Chinese if you are in Europe.
- Avoid known laggers who have shit conn, examples; Uzi, Siri, M3, Diga etc.
- Avoid 4v4 games with an assortment of players whom you do not recognise. No doubt at least 1 of them will have shit conn.
- Invest in extra pr0 int3rn3tz so you can ensure that you yourself do not spread LAG. This has the added benefit of allowing you to peacock your Pro ping to other players and cement your place as an alpha male and true pwnz0r.
- Choose 1v1 games over team games if they are available as the latency between 2 players will be minimal. Even people with the absolute shittest conn can be bearable to play with in 1v1.
- Type !Spec to coldheartedly banish spectators from the game if there are any signs of impending lag.
- Identify any known laggers to the game room host prior to game launch in order that they may kick that shit to fuck and stop the room from becoming LAG infected. If you are the game host then ban as quickly as possible to suppress the virus.
- Most importantly, inform an infected person that they are a lagging cunt and tell them to fuck off and reset router and stay away from your games. Protect your fellow players to suppress this disease.
If we work together and maintain safe social distancing and follow the advice given here we can beat this LAG virus. Together we can overcome this and life will get better.
Please keep your games LAG free and make your Uncle Crushy a happy little PonyBoo.
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