Server changes on the way

[Davross]

Just to keep everyone in the loop and make sure you dont just think Im sat here on my arse doing SFA, we have some changes on the way when the nice folks at BW have time to do them.

These include:
1) Only play each map twice - no more 2 hour marathons of 3 maps of El Alamein!
2) Some 24 player max. servers as per popular request.
3) Removing some of the pointless CTF and TDM servers.

We are also going to experiment with no auto-team balance on one of the servers and see if people are smart enough to balance the teams up sensibly.

Rotation changes are still on the cards, but we're going to hold-fire just a little longer yet - please be patient for the removal of Berlin

Dav

 

[.Cask]

I like Berlin

 

[xane]

Berlin is good, a change from quake-in-a-tank, only the brave choose not to be Assault.

 

[whipped]

I quite enjoyed the CTF servers. Ok, so I only played a couple of games on them and everyone was playing as though it was DM, but .... actually, get rid of them.

 

[xane]

Can I suggest instead of having two identical servers, you get a 16/24 player one with all the small short maps and a 32/48 player one with all the big maps ?

 

[Gumbo]

Good to know our suggestions are being listened to, and that the servers can evolve as we decide what we like/don't like.

GJ Davross, and other BW peeps.

 

[Burratha]

Pointless CTF???!?!?!?!?

This is one of the main reasons I'm trying to get members of my clan subscribed to BW........ Please leave them in

 

[ODEE1]

Please please can you have a server for bf1942 as a bookable, it is a nightmare trying to find servers for clan games.

 

[natrat]

lo chaps,

I've made the changes Davross requested today. There is now a 24 player Conquest server. As for TDM/CTF, we'll probably drop these but keep a CTF on in place of one of the FF on conquest
servers.

I'd love to run servers > 32 players, but with the current codebase they are simply too unstable. I've tested 40, 48 and 64 player servers and they crash too frequently to be viable. The info released so far re the next patch says it addresses some stability issues.

re map rotations, when Dav passes em on i'll sort it out for you.

enjoy!

 

[eLL Tee]

if BW put up a bookable will it be for subs only (ie on a subs port) as im sure there will be great demand for 1 if they do.

 

[Davross]

Sorry - I didn't make it clear in the above message what I asked for re. TDM and CTF.

I don't intend to get rid of both of them for the time being, just reduce the number of servers lying idle so we'll have one CTF and one DM or something like that

Thanks for the changes Nat - and for interpreting my dodgy instructions

Dav

 

[1tchy trigger]

Originally posted by Davross

We are also going to experiment with no auto-team balance on one of the servers

Dav [/B]

Yay - there's nothing worse than fighting flat out for King and Country for 20 minutes and help put your team in a winning position, only to be auto-swapped just at the moment of glory - happened to me many times.

 

[Summo]

Thanks, Nat. Much appreciated.

 

[*Kornholio*]

Re: Re: Server changes on the way

Originally posted by 1tchy trigger
Yay - there's nothing worse than fighting flat out for King and Country for 20 minutes and help put your team in a winning position, only to be auto-swapped just at the moment of glory - happened to me many times.

People don't seem to auto-balance it though... I've just played a couple of rounds with uneven teams... not much fun at all

 

[wildie]

well

well it wont be long before you see the mm1 spam of oi even the team its 7 v 16, ppl just dont want to join a losing side its that simple so expect the mm1 to be very active with even the teams and if they dont they just drop
me i like the odds why cos you get to kill more

 

[Summo]

Wow. You're the hero.

 

[Scooba Da Bass]

Be nice to have auto team off on one of the lesser used servers, if only because clans can have muck around games on without faffing around

 

[Davross]

Scoobs

I'll give it a week and see how the experiment continues to run. If its anything like tonight, a few cries of "oi teams" went off and everything settled down so it may well be suitable for use on all the servers. Id like to hope we were all mature enough for this to happen.

Dav

 

[Xantaro]

I'd recommend dumping the DM server and having 2 CTF.

 

[the_shiva]

Barryservers

Does anyone know when BF1942 will be available on the Barryservers? It seems odd that it has been running for a while now on the subs only servers but not on the one me and my clan pay for.

Any indication of when this is gonna happen would be appreciated.

 

[natrat]

Because of severe limitations of the way bf1942 runs (as is able to be managed), we are currently unable to provide bookables or barryservers. both ourselves and other GSP's have been in touch with EA and are waiting on a patch to address these issues.

 

[Panda On Smack]

im eating a drumstick

 

[the_shiva]

Originally posted by natrat
Because of severe limitations of the way bf1942 runs (as is able to be managed), we are currently unable to provide bookables or barryservers. both ourselves and other GSP's have been in touch with EA and are waiting on a patch to address these issues.

I could understand this if you weren't offering servers to your subscribers. Just seems odd to offer them in one place but not in another, still fee-paying, place.

Any ETA on the patch?

 

[kinetic-uk]

Originally posted by natrat
Because of severe limitations of the way bf1942 runs (as is able to be managed), we are currently unable to provide bookables or barryservers. both ourselves and other GSP's have been in touch with EA and are waiting on a patch to address these issues.

no offence nat but thats complete b0ll0x,ur basicly saying ohh sorry we cant offer barryservers or bookable servers coz BF1942 uses to much resourses..so WHY u running sub payers servers??

sorry if im stupid and ill informed on this but aint u running the EXACT same game on those pub servers??

make ur f*ckin minds up

what is the difference between the public and clan servers?

maybe with publics u run 2 games to a box and the clan servers 4 games to a box?

as u can tell this is really getting on my nerves and alot of other ppls too,it wouldnt be so bad if our noses wasnt getting rubbed in the sh!t by seeing the game running on public *pay* servers

 

[Summo]

Kinetic, Natrat makes it clear in his post what the problem is. He doesn't say anything about resources, he only refers to the way BF1942 can (or more accuratly, can't) be managed by an automated booking system. Kind of essential to run a bookable server. Obviously the straight public servers are not affected by that.

Now stop blithering.

 

[natrat]

Quite right. You have totally misread what i typed. Its not to do with resources, i said due to severe limitations of the *way it runs*. It is this that prevents us from implementing it in a managed automated environment (essential for any bookable services). You'll notice bugger all other GSP's have got bf1942 bookables or clan servers - i expect they have run into similar issues as we have. We hope to have a cludge together soon which should hopefully see us able to run it.

 

[Will]

I think natrat has something in place which detects his name being typed.

Yeah, this seems to be a big thing holding the game back. None of the big companies (yes, in this context, this includes BW) can run BF1942 on their automated systems, and sneaking a BF 1942 server into work, given the CPU time and bandwidth required, isn't likely. This is going to be a big stumbling block for the game.

 

[Davross]

Not wanting to steal Nat's fire, but wanting to resolve the issue of upset customers quickly - let me briefly explain the situation.

Nat did not say it was down to the resources of the game - he said it was down to the way it is managed. For a server to be a clan or bookable server it must run under BW's server management tool - this allows either the booking system or the clan running the server to configure it themselves!

Not only does the management tool allow configuration, it also looks after server stability - any server that fails will be noticed by the server manager and restarted automatically after a short period of time.

Because of the way Dice designed the rcon system on this game, in its present state '42 does not fit into this management system and is difficult to make to fit (although I know BW staff are working very hard to find a work around for this).

Before you shout "What about the public servers?", the reason we have public servers is because servers can be started manually by the staff - the downfall of this is that every change to configuration requires manual changes to some files for every server and whenever a server falls over, it has to be first noticed, then reported to staff and then someone has to manually restart it.

So simply put, you are not being denied servers because of hardware resources, you are being denied them because someone in the design team of Dice failed to consider how the 3rd party companies that run the servers for their games (which in turn makes them popular and sells more) were going to manage it.

I hope this clarifies the situation - and I hope 1.2 patch resolves it - I want bookables to

Dav

 

[Davross]

/me thinks Nat has monitoring software as well

In the time it took me to read the post and reply, 3 other people had jumped in.... note to self, must type faster

 

[Panda On Smack]

I have finished my drumstick by the way.