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Elite Dangerous starting IPv6 trials

mwerle
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Elite Dangerous starting IPv6 trials

So we're now at the stage where we're getting games starting to develop IPv6 clients and PlusNet is -still- dragging its heels over their IPv6 plans, let alone implementation. Instead they are deploying CGNAT (Carrier-grade NAT) to eke out the existing systems, which is even worse for gaming than the "standard" NAT most people have at home.

Gaming is a big sector these days and PlusNet risks losing out if they don't get themselves into gear. Gamers will always head to the best offering to gain competitive advantages.

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MrSilver
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Re: Elite Dangerous starting IPv6 trials

So what advantages do you get in Elite Dangerous using ipv6

 

when is plusnet rolling out cgnat?

SimonHobson
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Re: Elite Dangerous starting IPv6 trials

Not specific to that game ...

I imagine more reliable connections, lower latency, no problems running multiple clients on one network - and less work for the devs to make networking work (ie less effort on the "find out what [-Censored-] NAT is there and work around it"). For many clients, it'll also mean peer-peer will work rather than having to have a central server to deal with NAT problems - so again, reduced latency and less server infrastructure on the part of the dev.

At present, many NAT implementations are so [-Censored-] (Zyxel - have you fixed your "security trumps actually working" attitude yet ?) that the only way to make stuff work reliably is to have a gateway on the internet which accepts connections from the clients, works out the mapping between what the client things are the IP address and port it's using and what actually arrives in the packet headers, and takes care of "reverse mapping" that for all the traffic to the client. That's certainly the case with VoIP (SIP clients) where some NAT implementations make STUN useless and such a gateway is the only way to make things work.

 

I imagine CGNAT is already in use on some connections.

dvorak
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Re: Elite Dangerous starting IPv6 trials

there was a CGNAT trial, but I don't believe there was a decision to roll it out
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MrSilver
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Re: Elite Dangerous starting IPv6 trials

Pinging www.jogback.se [2a00:801:a:100::1:137] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 2a00:801:a:100::1:137: time=48ms
Reply from 2a00:801:a:100::1:137: time=45ms
Reply from 2a00:801:a:100::1:137: time=47ms
Reply from 2a00:801:a:100::1:137: time=45ms
Pinging www.jogback.se [192.165.82.137] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 192.165.82.137: bytes=32 time=45ms TTL=51
Reply from 192.165.82.137: bytes=32 time=46ms TTL=51
Reply from 192.165.82.137: bytes=32 time=47ms TTL=51
Reply from 192.165.82.137: bytes=32 time=47ms TTL=51

So latency is no different, so all us FPSers aren't goign to be leaving in droves if ther is no ipv6 launched.

 

Not seen anything that means IPv6 packets are more reliable than ipv4 packets either.

In terms of security - sure some NAT may have security holes in them, but ipv6 is a huge potential to screw security up! Every device is now directly scannable and addressable from the Internet, yikes lets hope people configure their firewalls correctly, but not so correctly they block ports the games want to use!

Pretty much every game I have played does not rely on gateways to get past NAT to play them, sure some games that require one of the users to host it have a central server to connect and establish the game then its peer to peer, so not much again on the reliability front that differs IMO.

The point about STUN is the problem NAT has with the unsolicited inbound UDP and not knowing where to forward it to, ipv6 gets around this as the sender knows exactly where to send it to, although the firewall you have to protect your end devices on the internet needs telling about the unsolicited inbound UDP stream unless you want a bunch of open firewall holes or hope the firewall can inspect the internals of the packets to work out where it thinks the traffic will come in.

 

Sure, I love ipv6 and I wish everyone had it, but at the end of the day back to your original post I dont think there is a mass market of gamers who will shun plusnet because they haven't rolled ipv6 to everyone. As plusnet havnt revealed their ipv6 plans we don't know they are dragging their heels they may have decided to wait until there is real demand before adding complexity into operations.

Imagine every packet loss or latency thread issue on here having to be diagnosed on v4 and v6 to see where the issues are etc. lots of complexity for not much benefit at the moment.

 

Gamers will always head to the best offering to gain competitive advantages.

True, traffic prioritisation of gaming  traffic over bulk file downloads so your latency doesnt spike is a pretty big advantage in a multi user house, usually much more than ipv6 so you don't have to go through NAT on your router (which at most is adding < 1ms latency)

mwerle
Grafter
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Re: Elite Dangerous starting IPv6 trials

No, there is no "mass of gamers" yet - because very few games currently support IPv6. My point is that this is starting to change, and for peer-to-peer games there is a huge benefit in not having to deal with NAT. NAT goes from simple to impossible to tunnel through (think several layers of CGNAT followed by "standard" home NAT").

The main interesting thing for me is that IPv6 multicast has the potential to significantly reduce bandwidth and load requirements for clients. Hopefully it will be better supported than IPv4 multicast was. When I did research into this a few years ago it sounded very promising but I haven't followed it so not sure what the current state is.

Regardless, currently I have a significant advantage as a gamer as I have multiple IPv4's and was able to allocate one to my gaming console, another to my gaming PC. I never have issues with hosting gaming sessions when the relevant gaming forums were full of people unable to connect to each other.

Athanasius
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Re: Elite Dangerous starting IPv6 trials


@MrSilver wrote:

So what advantages do you get in Elite Dangerous using ipv6

 

when is plusnet rolling out cgnat?


For Elite: Dangerous it might mean fewer issues with its P2P connectivity that currently has issues with certain NAT setups.  They go to great lengths to try and work around these, even running TURN relays, but being able to connect directly to other players would avoid much of that.

 

As for CGNAT, I bloody hope not.  If a company is thinking of going to the trouble of implementing CGNAT then I hope they instead consider implementing IPv6 and NAT64 gateways, for use where necessary, instead.