Reserved Slots
slayer20
Killed a man once. Join Date: 2007-12-13 Member: 63157Members, Reinforced - Shadow
Killed a man once. Join Date: 2007-12-13 Member: 63157Members, Reinforced - Shadow
Does anyone else find servers with reserved slots to be incredibly annoying?
I can understand have one or two slots for admins if the server is full, but handing out slots for anyone is kind of annoying. Time and time again I get kicked from the server because of a reserved slot, or I get kicked instantly upon joining the server. And by instantly, I mean I make it to the ready room and as I'm about to join a team, a message pops up saying that they are reserving the last few slots for other players.
It's also incredibly annoying being kicked right in the middle of a firefight or something important. I can only imagine how much anger a Commander must feel if their player is ninja-ing a phase gate somewhere, only to be kicked in the process of building it.
I can understand have one or two slots for admins if the server is full, but handing out slots for anyone is kind of annoying. Time and time again I get kicked from the server because of a reserved slot, or I get kicked instantly upon joining the server. And by instantly, I mean I make it to the ready room and as I'm about to join a team, a message pops up saying that they are reserving the last few slots for other players.
It's also incredibly annoying being kicked right in the middle of a firefight or something important. I can only imagine how much anger a Commander must feel if their player is ninja-ing a phase gate somewhere, only to be kicked in the process of building it.
Comments
I prefer servers that have reserve slots, but they aren't counted with the available slots; so a 24 slot with 2 reserves shows up as a 22 slot. I dunno if this is possible in NS2.
While that may be an improvement, it does mean that if you want to join a 20 slot server it might have 4 "hidden" reserve slots and actually turn into a 24 man game while you are there which you don't want. That could be solved by listing the server as 20+4 in the browser, but it still means people looking for a 20man are disappointed when the reserves fill, and people looking for a 24 man are disappointed when those reserves are empty.
As far as I'm concerned the solution is to blacklist the lot of them. There are plenty of non-reserve slot servers for me to play on, provided I can keep track of which ones those are. What I would really like is a blacklist feature added to the server browser so I can mark the servers I wish to avoid. Could be as simple as a different symbol in the favorites column when you click an additional time.
There are plenty of servers without them, they get funded somehow. There are PLENTY of empty servers at all times, so I would not be sad to see the relatively small number of ones with reserve slots disappear completely, the players would just naturally migrate to the empties.
There are several downsides to reserved slots and no system can solve all of them. There's the downsides to being kicked. No matter when it happens, even in the best case if it was done before you loaded the server, it's still annoying. Worst case is when you are kicked mid-game, especially when you are enjoying yourself up to that point. The way to solve all of these is to disable joining in a clear and obvious way when the public slots are full, as was suggested via passwords.
The problem that cannot be solved is variable server size. I enjoy playing on exactly one size server: 20man. Anything more or less than that I do not like for pub play. If your server has 16 public slots and 4 reserves, that means that the majority of the time it will play as a 16man server. If you go the other way with 20pubs and 4 reserves I get an ideal size as long as the reserves are empty, but as soon as they start to fill I have an oversized game instead. This problem can be minimized, but it still means that no matter what, a server with reserved slots is worse than one without, so why ever join them?
If you truly want to show your dislike for reserved slots, then record which servers use them and don't join them. If enough people feel the same way and as strongly as you do about it, then nobody will join their server anymore, and they will have no choice but to change it.
I think they're a good idea in practice however they're implemented poorly in the NS2 world. Being a member of TeamInterrobang, their TF2 servers handle reserved slots like this.
The server is 24 slots and 24 slots can be filled by anyone. If someone with a reserve slot wants to join when the server is full, they would have to connect via console such as 'connect server.name.com' to get around the UI not letting you join (due to being full (24/24)). Using this method, it allows the server to be filled to capacity without people being kicked from spec/team select/ready room after they join which is the most frustrating part for me with NS2 res. slots.
So basically, it would find the last person who joined that did not have a slot and kick them with a reason of "Kicked for reserve slot". The thing that annoys me the most, as i pointed out earlier, is that when I join a server, I expect to play. If it lets me connect then kicks me after I get into a ready room just to leave an empty slot open, it annoys me. Let it kick me once someone wants to join that has a slot. Don't just leave an empty slot laying around.
Now granted the UI could use some improvement to help this along. Add server to favorites by IP, copy and paste into the UI and console, a way to force connect from the "Waiting for slot" queue window (with the possibility for the server to still reject the connection due to all of the slots actually being filled).
Let's say you have a 20 slot server with 4 reserved slots. The server is full, but none of the reserved players are playing. On the server select screen it should be listed at 16/16. If you want to reserve a lot, a non-reservist should never be allowed in that slot ever. You can't be upset about being kicked if you were never allowed to join in the first place.
Think of it like having someone save a seat for you at an event. Your friend keeps that seat completely empty of all butts until you arrive. It would be a huge dick move to let a stranger sit there, then try to kick them out of the seat when you finally show up.
That said, some server operators will want a system that kicks non-res slotters for some reason or another (again, it's their call.)
Reserve slots do exist for a reason, not always financial. Some servers want to encourage the people we like to play with to keep coming back. Some want to run a server but don't have "angel's in their backpockets".
I am not an official member of OldF. I am a reserve slot holder and I have to say that they are one of the best communities in NS2, and I dare say that the game IP itself would not be as popular as it is if not for their servers. They are always fair, do not tolerate things like hackusations, and have a very laid back atmosphere. I applaud them, and when I am able (2poorfromschool) I plan to help support the servers financially. They have the right idea as far as reserve slots go as well, until better solutions are around.
Kudos to them and a big thank you for all the great years of amazing server hosting.
I am a hermit and hate people, and even I have become a regular there because of their attitude and quality of server. I have even made friends
I challange the nay sayers to try supporting one of these servers and see if they really like it. $9/month is cheap to avoid the headaches of other servers. People work together plan. We even do team captains games, where the captains are picking the teams.
It is awesome to look and know everyone playing on your server with a couple of guests.
so because a server runs a crappy reserved slots system and regularly fools multiple people into joining only to be kicked after loading it becomes our job to track these servers? Bust out the pen an paper and track the servers? Way to offload the burden to the casual player who will only become confused and frustrated AT NS2.
Use my favorites to track these servers? No thanks, I have favorites and these servers are not among them.
Maybe these servers should tag the front of their name with "R 16/20" or something.
The best solution is to allow servers with reserved slots to over fill as described above. ie 20/16.
Everyone is entitled to there opinion, while you might see other wise we are going with what the evidence shows us as the best way to run our server. Your complaints are actually proof how good of a server we are. If we were really bad, we would be like many of the other empty non-reserved slot servers.
Our regular base continues to grow as does our rank on game tracker. If you have a better way of doing it feel free to start your own server, seed it, and grow a community. This will only help the NS2 community.
Bottom line you can't have everything, though with what we have and our community, I think we have found a good balance. Like NS2 is not another CoD our server is just not another NS2 server.
Kind Regards,
Solarity
The flaw lies with the reserve system, not your desire to hold slots for your group. Hopefully it can be made better.
Till then, hope your servers are a blast.
Just one little thing. Does your system kick people mid game to make room?
We have a 16 person server that comes up as 20 to allow the supporting members to join. We have admins, supporting members, primers, and everyone else.
Primers are non supporting members that sign a forum post agree to the rules of our servers. They do get some perks.
One of the negative aspects is we have to kick to make room. Some people hate it never come back. Others like the community and joins.
The kick I think goes based of time played and points. Comms are immune if they dont jump out at the wrong time. Lately we have been so succesful at getting so many new members it is leaving little room for new comers as we have gone from the top 20 to the #4 US NS2 server in a couple of months.
Again once we can lie about the active player counts it will help with people connecting complaints. Though people being kicked to make room for admins will stay. Though with so many active members the mid games aren't as frequent as you think.
I have friends who don't play often enough to be a supporting member, so I will join a different server if need be to play with them, but they do play on TH most of the time when we play.
Much of the frustration I've seen in this thread is from their implementation in NS2, which can be quite disruptive to non-reserved slot players (kicked mid match, join only to be kicked, etc).
add reserved slots as a part of the NS2 functionality!
(most important part is to not let players without "reserved slot" actually join a server with all "regular slots" filled. Secondarily, the auto-join feature should join you when a "regular slot" frees up...)
Best thing I have heard all night
That's what I was suggesting, you didn't think you can change how the server browser works with mods did you? Displaying the numbers as <current number of pubs>+<current number of reserves>/<max pubs>+<max reserves> gives players all the information they would need. You know whether the server has reserved slots, you know how big that server can be with or without reserve players, and you know whether or not you can join if you are a pub or a reserve owner.
The last part, making the auto join queue work when the pub slots are full is probably going to be tricky because the server still has to know who you are in order to reject you as a pub. Unless reserved slots were registered officially somewhere so that the server browser knew whether or not you can join without the servers input I don't think that will happen.