Using VPN to change regions to play with international friend

Question

Hello, I'm a longtime Battlefield player (BF2142, Bad Company 2, BF3, BF4, BF Hardline, and BF2042), and have a question regarding VPN usage. I discussed this with EA's help team already, and they suggested I get confirmation from the answers.ea support team, which is why I'm here posting.

I recently got a longtime friend from India to purchase and play 2042. I live on the US West Coast. Unfortunately, when he and I queue into games together, one or both of us have extremely high ping (300+); this doesn't happen in any other multiplayer game we play. We had tried all conventional solutions to mitigate the bad ping, but nothing worked. A couple days ago, he suggested we use VPNs to find a middle ground server location equidistant from our locations (India/West US). I had never used a VPN before but purchased one, and we tried locations such as United Kingdom and Japan. Both improved the ping dramatically (around ~150ms for each of us, so not perfect, but playable).

However, soon after testing this, I became concerned over the using VPNs to region switch for better connection with international friends - I didn't want an innocuous thing like that to get flagged as suspicious behavior. I've never cheated in BF games (or any multiplayer game), nor done any manipulation of software to gain an advantage. And I wanted to confirm this usage of a VPN is within EA's TOS.

Again, I was informed by EA's help.ea.com support team (via email and phone) that this usage is permissible, but they suggested to contact answers.ea.com, so here I am.

I hope this is enough information for my situation, and someone can confirm EA's policy, thank you.

jd_w0lf · Answer

Granted this won't work for "middle ground" servers like you want... but if you or your friend wants to bite the bullet and deal with the ping manually you can do what me and a friend do... my friend is in Oceania and I'm in US West. They don't mind the 200+ ping as much as I do, so I:Start a party in gameDON'T have them join yetStart matchmakingThe MOMENT it finds a game and chimes at you &gt; hit invite on your friendIt keeps the USW server it found and your friend loads into the loading screen fine to start the game together

direct3r · Answer

@aceace33333without reading the TOS, a vpn in general is something that is really common today and moreover usually games can't tell the difference without extra measurements if you even use one.

So I wouldn't be that concerned about using one, some people do it to play in less populated regions to get easier opponents and some do it for the purpose like you to play with friends.

bfb-praetorian · Answer

@aceace33333 Not sure if it's illegal, but could you and your mate keep your 150 plus ping out of the UK servers. The netcode is held together with blu tac as it is 👍

aceace33333 · Answer

funny enough, my friend from India and I have used that same exact process too. Prob will just go back to that... too bad this game has such terrible ping bloat when playing with international friends.

I can play other pvp/multiplayer games with that same friend from India and - while the ping isn't great, it's no-where near as bad as 2042's is (300+). Dunno what the deal is.

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Using VPN to change regions to play with international friend

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