You can estimate your ping before you buy a flight, and the estimate is usually close enough to decide. Distance to the game server sets the floor. Everything else, from your ISP to the building's wifi, only makes it worse.
The distance rule
Light in fibre covers about 200 km per millisecond, so each 1,000 km between you and the server adds at least 10 ms to your round trip. Real routes aren't straight lines, so expect more than that. This is why no connection, however fast, will give you a good ping from Bangkok to a server in Frankfurt.
What to expect from Southeast Asia
- Servers in Singapore or the region: about 5 to 30 ms. Ranked play is fine.
- EU West: about 150 to 200 ms or more. Co-op works, competitive shooters hurt.
- US East: about 200 to 250 ms or more. Casual play only.
These are typical ranges, not promises. Your ISP and even your building can move them by 30 ms either way.
How to check a specific city
- Find out where your game hosts its servers, and whether it allows you to pick a region.
- Ask in the city's nomad or gaming groups what ping people actually get on your game.
- Once you land, test on day one against the servers you play on, using the in-game display rather than a generic speed test.
- Test at peak evening hours, since that's when you'll be playing and when shared lines get crowded.
The trap of your home region
Your friends are probably on servers near home, and that's the real constraint. If they're in Europe and you're in Asia, you have three honest options: play slower games together, move your base closer, or find a new local group. Finding other nomad gamers is more work than changing a server, and I think it pays off more.
Wifi makes it worse
Ping spikes usually come from the last few metres. Use a wired connection if your rental has an Ethernet socket, sit close to the router otherwise, and avoid peak hours for ranked games. For cloud gaming, you want a stable 25 Mbps or more, and the gamer nomad guide covers when it's worth relying on.