Need help! For some reason I can't invade, see signs, not even messages!

That. For some reason I can't invade, I don't see summon signs or messages, and neither I get invaded. This started a few days ago, it sometimes happens, but it fixes itself after 1 day maximum. Now for some reason I'm stuck and I can't get any online action , it's annoying because it's pretty boring to make my builds without any online features, and also I won't be able to make it to the event if this persists...

Any help?

UPDATE: It seems that literally my game's online doesn't refresh, because I can still see messages and blood stains of other people, but they are ALWAYS the same, they never change, banish, and they are always on the same place, it's like the game can't connect to the server to refresh.

If you should still be able to get online at all, maybe your internet is just going too slow to even connect with anything at all. Downloading something?

Are you in body form?




















I'm sorry, I couldn't help myself. I hope it doesn't last long. DkS w/o online isn't really DkS imo.....I will pray for you...

ChizFreak wrote:That. For some reason I can't invade, I don't see summon signs or messages, and neither I get invaded. This started a few days ago, it sometimes happens, but it fixes itself after 1 day maximum. Now for some reason I'm stuck and I can't get any online action , it's annoying because it's pretty boring to make my builds without any online features, and also I won't be able to make it to the event if this persists...

Any help?

Must be something with the NAT chiz. Other than that no idea...

Is this happening with DkS only or every game? I hope you wont have to do big things like re download the patchs

DkS only, and Wyrm, I had NAT 3 a long time ago, then I fixed it to be NAT 2, a long time ago too (like early 2012), so I'm pretty sure it's not that.

I was going to say NAT also Chiz. Are you sure your router hasn't reset itself at all? It might be that in other games you can still match make with certain players because they have open NAT but you're set to strict, where as in DkS a strict NAT would likely block the online completely.

If it's not your router, maybe it's your PS3's network settings. I don't play on ps3 so I don't know how you configure your network, but just make sure that you've still got a static IP on your ps3, and that you have it's ip added to your reservations on your router.

If it's not that then I'm afraid I don't know, sorry.

Cabjoy wrote:I was going to say NAT also Chiz. Are you sure your router hasn't reset itself at all? It might be that in other games you can still match make with certain players because they have open NAT but you're set to strict, where as in DkS a strict NAT would likely block the online completely.

If it's not your router, maybe it's your PS3's network settings. I don't play on ps3 so I don't know how you configure your network, but just make sure that you've still got a static IP on your ps3, and that you have it's ip added to your reservations on your router.

If it's not that then I'm afraid I don't know, sorry.

No, my router is fine. Also I even tested the connection and it says NAT 2. Ironically, I can play Demon's Souls online without issues lol

Sometimes my DkS would break like that too, I don't know quite what the cause of it was, but it happened when other people were online in my house so I assumed it was a bandwidth problem.

Happens to me often, a few times every time I play. What works for me is to quit and reload. I do this a couple of times and everything works for me again.

Thread updated, I noticed something, check the main post.

On your PS3 check.

Signal Strength.

Connection Method.

Internet Connection.

Security.

Address Settings.

MTU.

Proxy Server.

And UPnP.

Tolvo wrote:On your PS3 check.

Signal Strength.

Connection Method.

Internet Connection.

Security.

Address Settings.

MTU.

Proxy Server.

And UPnP.

That's not the problem Tolvo, UPnP is to open ports as they are requested by a device, and I already have NAT 2 and all ports forwarded. I have my PS3 in a DMZ.

Have you tried completely disconnecting the system from the internet and playing dark souls? That may jolt it back into the state that it needs to be in.
Apart from that all I can think to do is just go offline for a couple of days(once again not connected to the internet in any way).

Avenger649 wrote:Have you tried completely disconnecting the system from the internet and playing dark souls? That may jolt it back into the state that it needs to be in.
Apart from that all I can think to do is just go offline for a couple of days(once again not connected to the internet in any way).

Interesting theory, I will try it out, thanks.

Man you still havin probs? That sucks, wish I could help...I will pray more...

Hey Chizfreak,

Sorry just noticing this thread till today. So at the moment your having the same issue as i am. When you log in, it as if you are not on a server and you have the same messages from last game session and or no signs at all. This too has been happen to me for the past 4+ days. So how to find out if you are connected to a server? The main way that i do it is go to the forest with Sif still alive and just wait right at the entrance. If your entrance gate doesn't turn white at the entrance while human as soon as you enter, then your still not on a dks server. Personally for you me to get connected to a server, it takes about 5 to sometimes 20 minutes . But ya if you leave your guy just afk somewhere in a area where your boss is still alive, it the best way to know that you get connected. Other then that, on the 9th of the fc make sure you get on early to leave your character alive and afk till you get connected to a server. If you quit the game or turn off your system you will have to wait until you connect again. But ya sorry man hope this helps.

P.S At the moment certain people are having trouble connecting to other people as well since this problem. Example: Doing a trade with a trusted friend. Your friend puts down a white soap sign, and you see it. When you try to summon your friend, the friend doesn't see the "being summon message". This usually ends in taking a long time for the two to finally be able to connect, or they just can't connect at all.

But DkS doesn't have servers, it's all P2P. Either way if it works it doesn't matter lol.

It's P2P, so there is no server, but could there could be something similar to trackers for bittorent? A tracker is not a server made for hosting anything but it's a server assisting the transfers. I'm not specialist, but I think on PS3, PSN could be acting as a tracker.

When I used Bittorent (a long time ago), I often had issues like slow downloads, or difficulties to connect to peers. While I knew for sure there were a lot of peers, I could only connect to 1 to 5 max.
Those were almost allways rooter issues, and forwarding the ports was often the solution.
There were some cases though the problem came from the tracker. In that case, there is nothing you can do realy.
And rare other cases, it could be your Internet access provider, are you using something special?
In France, P2P like bittorent are severly monitored because of illegal download of movie and music and there was a question some years ago about simply completely blocking certain P2P protocols (I don't know how it's even possible). Fortunetly it didn't happen, but the surveillance is stronger than ever.

You said you forwarded the ports and that your PS3 is in DMZ. I think it's useless to do both at the same time. If your PS3 is in DMZ, it's like the transfers are made without going through the firewall, forwarding ports must be useless then.
I wonder if this kind of double configuration could be sometimes causing troubles.
I could be mistaking as I'm not a specialist at all in the subjects, those are things I read when I was trying to find solutions for my P2P issues.

For me, in Dks, it's the opposite. The online features didn't work very well, I managed to get some PvP/co-op action, but it was rare, and my everyday was "summonig failed" and "failed to invade".
Then 2-3 month ago it started working better without me doing anything new... I even wondered weither the last patch actualy corrected something... But seeing that other people still have problems, I guess not.

VaDoom wrote:It's P2P, so there is no server, but could there could be something similar to trackers for bittorent? A tracker is not a server made for hosting anything but it's a server assisting the transfers. I'm not specialist, but I think on PS3, PSN could be acting as a tracker.

That's actually very close to how it works. They have servers, the servers handle stuff like messages, signs, etc. When you connect to other players it goes into P2P mode.

Yeah it has severs, but servers instead of handling the connections they redirect you to players. They don't "create" the connection, they just tell you where to go.

Okay so I tried what you said guys and didn't worked, I left my character idle for like 30 minutes in the Forest while having Sif alive so I get invaded and nothing happened, then I played the game offline, and the old messages and bloodstains disappeared, then I relogged online and the same old messages and bloodstains re appeared. Now I'm trying to leave my character idle to see if something happens after I played offline once, but I guess it's not going work either.

If you have any alternate accounts it would be interesting to see what would happen if they went online, it may be interesting at least to see.
Apart from that there are no suggestions I can think of bar uninstalling and re-installing dark souls, of course you may just want to wait for a few days before doing anything drastic.

If it started recently then try to make a new character or a new account. Are your connection wireless btw?

I've just thought, the game only checks whether or not you're connected to PSN or not in the beginning, not whether or not you're connected to their servers. In fact I doubt they give any indication as to whether you're connected to their servers or not. Maybe your PS3 cached those signs and are loading those while you're not connecting to From's servers. I assume you can still connect to the PSN correctly?