What even is this thread anymore?
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Social democrat.
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I’ll try and bring it back on track. So with this new challenge out, I reinstalled the game because I actually want the Black Phantom skins. So I did one SR and did maybe 10 KOTH and it didn’t take me long to find matches. Maybe at most 1-1/2 mins. Had 3 lobbies dissolve and that was it.
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Good to hear.
They can’t fix the garbage connections people are using to play online.
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Before players had just high ping but after the last update that’s when the ping fluctuations started.
Ping fluctuations have been there since day 1.
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Never had experienced it until last update occurred, I must of got extremely lucky the past 2 years. Even the group I play with had the same experience as me.
I have had these issues with high fluctuation players since the day this game came out. The way the game handles them is simply put terrible and hopefully in Gears 5 it’s fixed.
My biggest issue is that if I play on Europe servers with a 90ms ping I’m at a disadvantage due to the higher ping. When I play on US servers with a 15-50ms ping I’m also at a disadvantage because the high pings aren’t stable and the whole game breaks down right in front of my eyes.
I can’t win the ping lottery. I’m either behind in time due to a high ping or I’m ahead but constantly having glitching issues to high fluctuation players. 
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Strange because you couldn’t see pings when the game came out,
So you have to understand what was happening when pings were obviously Fluctuating or you wouldn’t have noticed / understood,
The update has nothing to do with people having poor internet.
My ping has never fluctuated more then a couple of ms.
I have my internet locked down and only used for one device at a time.
I’ve even got it in Modem Only mode now.
But I take these extra steps that the average gamer isn’t.
Others don’t really care or are happy with the advantage it gives them due to the game being coded that way and TC thinking a 250ms Ping is acceptable.
But either way,
Bad connections = Fluctuating Ping.
Multiple Users on one connection = Fluctuating Ping.
Wireless Setups (are more vulnerable to) = Fluctuating Pings.
Some people abuse the game and make sure they have = Fluctuating Ping.
So it definitely did not just start happening after the last update.
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I just find it too coincidental that after the last update this happened. For me I’m wired and also have a designated modem for my gaming. I have definitely noticed over time I have not been playing locally. Very well possible I did’t pay as much attention to it before because the fluctuation was not as bad, to me it seems worse than ever.
Here’s a thread I made back in June 2018.
Worth a read:
TL:DR
Players with Fluctuating Pings cause inconsistency and issues for players on stable pings.
They affect Gears more than any other game I’ve played.
If you were on any other game - me at 5ms and let’s say a Fluctuating Ping Player on 80-100-120-150-200-250-300+
You simply wouldn’t be able to even compete.
On this game = opposite.
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There’s another issue he’s talking about and though I don’t get it consistently, I’ve seen it many times. It’s almost as if the lobby gets put on a different server mid-match. Everyone’s ping will rise by anywhere from 40 to 100ms, then usually go back down eventually, but not always. IDK if that’s a feature the azure servers use to occasionally handle situations that would otherwise cause a lobby to crash due to a server issue, or if the servers just do this while in a saturated state, but it happens occasionally and I’ve never seen it due to just one laggy player. When I’ve observed it, everyone has been relatively stable aside from everyone’s ping going up and down together.
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I’ve never seen this myself.
The only thing similar to that is when a player or two suddenly spike so bad that it actually causes everyone to spike for a couple of seconds.
This is extremely rare though and it is caused by someone else Fluctuating so bad that it causes the server an issue.
The ones that fluctuate consistently, like 40, 80, 45, 90, 50, 120, 45, 49, 49, 87, 150 and so on cause issues.
Then there are the ones that start at 90-150 and do the same thing but much higher fluctuations.
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You described what I’ve been experiencing right on the money.
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I suspect the “dedicated servers” are acting more like a switch and managing the game by redirecting everyone in the match to a peer-host rather than being the central hub we all join into.
i.e. Gus 1-9 are being routed over through Joe Blow’s machine but he doesn’t have enough bandwidth to accommodate that much traffic. One-eyed Azure Server with glaucoma says everything is fine, then the game starts to stutter, Azure Server finally takes a peek then shoves everyone over to Gus 3’s machine for a bit to see if that fixes the problem.
This will be dismissed as anecdotal but it’s apparent in games where I can’t seem to get a single shot to register and our entire team gets demolished the first round. Second round, roles reverse, high pings shift to other players in the lobby, and we plow through the other team like butter. Third round we’re back to shooting foam BBs out of elephant guns. The aim is horrendous and the shots do little damage.
This isn’t the case.
Or else I wouldn’t always have my 5ms solid ping on EU servers every time I’m on those servers.
Same for US East. Always 55-65ms Ping.
This has 100% been my theory since Gears 3’s “dedicated servers”. It’s just really well-coordinated P2P facilitated by dedicated servers to keep games from dropping entirely when the host leaves. Only high IQ people see the pattern though so congrats
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It’s definitely on the Azure serves or I wouldn’t have exactly the same ping every time I connect to the same server.