I don't know whether this is an pure server issue or client issue (or a combinaton of both), but for some unknown stupid reason NS2 sometimes increases your ping to a specific server.
It's not very consistent, but in either case it's a bug. Ping sometimes is higher then usual, and it becomes normal again as you restart NS2 (most of the time). Note that in such cases other servers do not seem to be affect.
So basically: same machine, same server, ping sometimes is 150ms, then you restart NS2, and it's 50 ms again. In terms of real ping outside of game it's the same *always*, so it's definetly a problem with NS2.
What's even better is that you can run 2 instances of the game on the same computer, and get two different pings (150ms + 50ms) at the same time.
It's not very consistent, but in either case it's a bug. Ping sometimes is higher then usual, and it becomes normal again as you restart NS2 (most of the time). Note that in such cases other servers do not seem to be affect.
So basically: same machine, same server, ping sometimes is 150ms, then you restart NS2, and it's 50 ms again. In terms of real ping outside of game it's the same *always*, so it's definetly a problem with NS2.
What's even better is that you can run 2 instances of the game on the same computer, and get two different pings (150ms + 50ms) at the same time.