Suggestions and focus for future updates

Brax

I'm probably just compounding on past voices from server administrators, but I have a few... Suggestions... That might make the jobs of server administrators easier in the future.

I've noticed that the server console tends to not be very chatty, error wise, and when it is it's usually non-informative lua errors. I got absolutely no word from the console today on which mod was preventing my server from starting completely, just useless and repetitive web admin console errors.

First, a huge overhaul of the mod system would probably be a godsend for us all... There are more issues than I can even begin to go into here, however, some could be fixed by simply adding a bit of version control to the moddb. The server could check the patch version the mod was last updated for, if the patch number does not match the server ignores the mod and does not load the mod.

Further it seems pretty insane to re-download a mod after every map change... Cache the mods when the server starts, or when the server is edited while live a single time, and until either a sync command is executed, or the server is restarted do not attempt to re-download/check for updates for mods.

Obviously multi-threading support for server systems is a huge request that I know has been ongoing for quite some time now...


Finally there is so very little communication that I've seen with server admins and the UWE/CDT, and when there is it's usually admins begging for fixes/features that have been around for quite a while, never truly getting a response.

With the dissolution of the NS2 "official" & Organized servers, players, and yes customers, rely on volunteers who host servers out of their own pocket and their own free time. I've seen several people on here request fixes on pretty big issues with very little response.


To keep the community growing and maintain or improve confidence in UWE you are going to NEED admins who are happy and feel like at least their requests and thoughts are considered. Instead of playing with cosmetic fixes or other minor bugs that aren't game breaking, perhaps some time, effort, or investment can be put forth involving a integral and extremely necessary and even required part of the system and community.


Finally, in regards to talking to/dealing with community admins. A little bit of this PR stuff I've been talking about... Rather than just throwing out
"We've also done some work on some experimental server config options. If you want to discuss these in more detail you can contact Ghoul (http://forums.unknownworlds.com/profile/184566/GhoulofGSG9)."

or basically telling us - "Oh hey we've got some interesting stuff going on with the server end, that might just help you guys out, but you know, we really aren't THAT interested in helping you guys out, so figure it out yourself, I guess'" at the end of an announcement as an afterthought. Instead, perhaps topic could be created in the server admins group or in the forum here regarding these potential improvements, what they mean for us, and how to implement them.



Games have been brought down by companies who didn't understand that Server Owners & Admins are just as important as players (and sometimes more considering we have more interaction with the end customer/user) in regards to peoples' perception of said company.


If there are no servers to play on, and no admins to manage servers then there are no players and no game. I understand the UWE team and CDT teams all put in a lot of work into making a great game that we all love and enjoy. I am very grateful for that. It would just be nice if they also understood that Administrators also put in quite a bit of time managing and maintaining servers, and that without us they would be just as without a game/community as we would be without them.

2cough

Brax wrote: »

Finally, in regards to talking to/dealing with community admins. A little bit of this PR stuff I've been talking about... Rather than just throwing out
"We've also done some work on some experimental server config options. If you want to discuss these in more detail you can contact Ghoul (http://forums.unknownworlds.com/profile/184566/GhoulofGSG9)."

or basically telling us - "Oh hey we've got some interesting stuff going on with the server end, that might just help you guys out, but you know, we really aren't THAT interested in helping you guys out, so figure it out yourself, I guess'" at the end of an announcement as an afterthought. Instead, perhaps topic could be created in the server admins group or in the forum here regarding these potential improvements, what they mean for us, and how to implement them.

I don't think that's the case at all. From this thread: http://forums.unknownworlds.com/discussion/135239/regarding-b267-server-changes-consistency-check-etc

@GhoulofGSG9‌ states:

GhoulofGSG9 wrote: »

Also those things are totally experimental, so even we don't know exactly how they affect the game performance and balance.

Using these commands in a wrong way can cause more issues than it can improve the performance using them correctly.

So it was decided that, as all those ppl who are so tech savy enought with ns2 and the spark engine to use them are either allready in contact with or will contact the cdt, to not publish them to the pubic for now.

We might publish something about those things to the public in the future after we gathered more data etc.

I believe what they're saying is that they've found some things that could potentially help, but have not yet had the time or data to fully test them. It's certainly not as though they

brax wrote: »

really aren't THAT interested in helping you guys out

rather they don't want to give information they can't yet confirm.

So if you're interested... maybe do as first suggested and contact Ghoul.

Also, nearly 2 years after release and w/ the UWE having moved on from NS2, there's going to be a limitation on their communication w/ us. CDT is the next-best thing, and personally, I feel like they're doing a better job with being open about what's going on. https://trello.com/b/91ApENY6/ns2-cdt-development-tracker

Anyways, never hurts to bring this up.

ZEROibis

Yea would be nice to finally see some sort of fix to the workshop problems especially as they have gotten worse over time. At least it appears that the CDT plans to focus on a server side update for performance like they did for the client side in the future and that has me excited.