Recent server upgrade/server issues.

[Bruno_2MLG4CT]

You also forgot Vikingo matias

Vikingo is not online at this hours, he leaves me alone at 18 - 19 pm and goes to sleep, then im alone all night long, the one i forgot is branello   That guy is epic, but he leaves 1 or 2 hours after vikingo xD

I am leaving you nearly 2 AM. I can't stay longer for 2 main reasons. 1. It's too late and I am a little bit sleepy.
2. If my dad wake up and see me playing in 3 AM....

[Costel]

You also forgot Vikingo matias

Vikingo is not online at this hours, he leaves me alone at 18 - 19 pm and goes to sleep, then im alone all night long, the one i forgot is branello   That guy is epic, but he leaves 1 or 2 hours after vikingo xD

I am leaving you nearly 2 AM. I can't stay longer for 2 main reasons. 1. It's too late and I am a little bit sleepy.
2. If my dad wake up and see me playing in 3 AM....

if he do it you will die 
i'm online at night [ for eu players ] , well i was , now i'm in vacantion and will be in it until 26 august 2013

[Shake]

To be honest, I think staff issues are being discussed more because it's one of the things we can fix without mick. Most of the other problems we need mick there because he is the one who controls CT.


Anyways, we DO need a general upgrade on the server (and that includes some gamemode stuff, staff re-organization, host upgrades (yes, we still need to fix the lag, we can't forget about that. Once CT reaches 60+ players it lags horribly, then most of the people get desynced and get banned, thus Dobby's idea that players could check their own packetloss is a +1 from me), and some other stuff the server might need, but that's up to mick).


And continuing the staff discussion we were having, we need some staff to cover other timezones besides the ones we have right now, because if no admin is online at a certain time it's pure hell. People spamming they need admin help ingame, no one is there and then they come to forum asking for an admin. That shouldn't EVER be necessary because if we had staff that could cover up some timezones and other ones would join after, the server would always (or almost always) 1-2 admins online who could help the players ingame.

[Dobby]

To be honest, I think staff issues are being discussed more because it's one of the things we can fix without mick. Most of the other problems we need mick there because he is the one who controls CT.


Anyways, we DO need a general upgrade on the server (and that includes some gamemode stuff, staff re-organization, host upgrades (yes, we still need to fix the lag, we can't forget about that. Once CT reaches 60+ players it lags horribly, then most of the people get desynced and get banned, thus Dobby's idea that players could check their own packetloss is a +1 from me), and some other stuff the server might need, but that's up to mick).


And continuing the staff discussion we were having, we need some staff to cover other timezones besides the ones we have right now, because if no admin is online at a certain time it's pure hell. People spamming they need admin help ingame, no one is there and then they come to forum asking for an admin. That shouldn't EVER be necessary because if we had staff that could cover up some timezones and other ones would join after, the server would always (or almost always) 1-2 admins online who could help the players ingame.

Continuing on the suggestion. Add a suggestion to relog if the packetloss is too high. Or add a "Reconnect" button to the dialog:

Code Select Expand


ShowPlayerDialog(playerid,DIALOG_NETSTATS,DIALOG_STYLE_MSGBOX,"Network stats\nIf you have above 2.0 packetloss we suggest you click reconnect",string,"Ok","Reconnect");


For the reconnect, use the RCON Ban method to disconnect them, ban the IP then unban. You dont even have to use .ban default file a simple .txt should do the job.

Earlier on, there was a spammer, he'd advertise his server. constantly, obviously checking for admins, and the anti flood. Then when he'd figured it out. He'd do it every X seconds. Until the chat was full of his crappy soon-to-fail server. Having mods online all the time would be nice, especially since the hacker, we seem to have had an influx of new players recently too. Which is also nice. Which will mean more players getting stuck and the usual stuff admins have to deal with.

[iDarkRain]

To be honest, I think staff issues are being discussed more because it's one of the things we can fix without mick. Most of the other problems we need mick there because he is the one who controls CT.


Anyways, we DO need a general upgrade on the server (and that includes some gamemode stuff, staff re-organization, host upgrades (yes, we still need to fix the lag, we can't forget about that. Once CT reaches 60+ players it lags horribly, then most of the people get desynced and get banned, thus Dobby's idea that players could check their own packetloss is a +1 from me), and some other stuff the server might need, but that's up to mick).


And continuing the staff discussion we were having, we need some staff to cover other timezones besides the ones we have right now, because if no admin is online at a certain time it's pure hell. People spamming they need admin help ingame, no one is there and then they come to forum asking for an admin. That shouldn't EVER be necessary because if we had staff that could cover up some timezones and other ones would join after, the server would always (or almost always) 1-2 admins online who could help the players ingame.

Continuing on the suggestion. Add a suggestion to relog if the packetloss is too high. Or add a "Reconnect" button to the dialog:

Code Select Expand


ShowPlayerDialog(playerid,DIALOG_NETSTATS,DIALOG_STYLE_MSGBOX,"Network stats\nIf you have above 2.0 packetloss we suggest you click reconnect",string,"Ok","Reconnect");


For the reconnect, use the RCON Ban method to disconnect them, ban the IP then unban. You dont even have to use .ban default file a simple .txt should do the job.

Earlier on, there was a spammer, he'd advertise his server. constantly, obviously checking for admins, and the anti flood. Then when he'd figured it out. He'd do it every X seconds. Until the chat was full of his crappy soon-to-fail server. Having mods online all the time would be nice, especially since the hacker, we seem to have had an influx of new players recently too. Which is also nice. Which will mean more players getting stuck and the usual stuff admins have to deal with.

You can't use "Network stats\nIf you have above 2.0 packetloss we suggest you click reconnect" as dialog title

[Dobby]

No, but you can format it into a string want the working code?

[Dobby]

Just to let everyone know. I will be tidying this topic soon. Such as moving all the main discussion points to the main page from everybody. On the hope Mick see's this, and at least he doesn't have to search the entire 10+ thread pages. Keep the opinions coming guys

About my last post. The working code has been posted in the relevant suggestion topic. If you want to see it. Go take a look. I use it on my own server. It does work, and no doubt CT uses the same way. Click here to go directly to the wikipedia page if you're starting out in Pawn and want to know about it.

[Hobo]

Theres gonna be a huge change at CT soon. I dont know if i can tell about it but its a positive change!  

[Konali]

Theres gonna be a huge change at CT soon. I dont know if i can tell about it but its a positive change!  

Well i should believe him if i where you:) hes speaking the truth. What the determination for ''soon'' might be is another discussion rofl

[Dobby]

We should continue it here

Jokes. As long as it's a positive improvement, im not fussed. Does this mean you're back off your holiday now?

[Konali]

Im back home now yes:) but i slept out late lol.
I will be ingame this evening or tommorow and then back again:)

[Shake]

We should continue it here

Jokes. As long as it's a positive improvement, im not fussed. Does this mean you're back off your holiday now?

Better have improvements soon™ than to never get them. :p

[Konali]

As i promised i would explain some things or atleast give some info about it.
If i read carefully the following points of discussion got highlighted in this topic:

   
• No gamemode updates
• Host/ amount of players above X number = laggy
• Club base/ Club issues
• Inactive staff members/ gaps without staff on regular basis at certain times.
• Server issues as in : lag/desyncing/ping spikes
• House evictions

Gamemode Updates
For the CT player that has been here around for awhile now have clearly noticed, no recent changes where made to the gamemode.
This has 2 simple reasons, Mick doesnt/ didnt had time to script the past months due to job insecurity/college and private life things. And because he in his mind pretty much completed the gamemode.
As some players said, the gamemode is never complete as there is always room for new stuff or improvements.
Personally i have an great idea that requires no scripting at all, but would transform CT back into the 2010-2011 status and its better than more useless achievements. ( my opinion )
If you ask an old trucker like Rahail or Marccc or Vado, all of them probably will agree with me that the thing what made CT fucking awesome was the 40+ player convoys, players shouting LINE!!! hold the LINE!!!, and that is what we need again, convoys is what CT made special.
Achievements are cool, but i see it more as, it can be done on the side for those who dont feel like convoying that day.


Host/ X players= laggy server
Obviously there is nothing we can do about this, untill CT has a default player online base of 25 or the host gets changed. I have been away for almost an month due to ilness and vacation, so i have no up to date information regarding this topic. If we are still with the same host, its fucking damn expensive and like scripting, mick doesnt have time to check out other hosts/ move things around.


Club base/club issues
To be honest, we Admins dont have a system to prevend clubs with bases from getting inactive and do something like the house system.
We can monitor them, and where it really really obvious its a club breaking many rules, we can evict them or give them a warning.
But once again, let me be honest, usually we admins just dont have time to check all those things, and we eventually only take action if its very very obvious its a private club.
Some sentences all of you should take into consideration before making remarks about private clubs

   
• Just because an club founder is inactive, or the leaders, doesnt mean the club has paying/donating club members that use the base.
• Aslong as a club has a fair amount of donating members, its a legitimate club. But it still should accept players from time to time.

In the end, yes we can do something about this, but mostly we can see things you guys can't. Hence why it may look for you that we dont take any action to inactive clubs, but not everything is visible for you guys thus your point of view cant be really objective. But i agree, we could be somehow stricter with it, but that would mean CT becomes more and more a job instead of a game. In the end its a game and we shouldnt let players play X amount of days a month of donate strictly every month or the club gets deleted.


For the leaders without a base, every now and then some bases come available, we have i believe 28 bases at the moment, and thats quite alot. I believe when finished, the max amount will be around 34 bases, more is just asking for trouble.


Inactive staff/gaps of no staff

As stated before i have tracked alot of staff over the last months, and alot of staff (85%) achieved their thresholds of hours every week/month.
In the end that would mean we have 3-5 inactive staff members, and i think that a fair conclusion from what i have noticed myself.
First the admins,
I have read somewhere that admins are required to be online as much as moderators, well just no lol. Simply because what we do behind the scenes, is already a big part of moderating the server. TheSandman is the most forum active admin if im correct, and he does the most of the reports/appeals etc. Ethan comes next and then me, as i said, i havent been active lately due to my sickness/vacation. Hobo was really active too. I think every admin spends atleast 3-8 hours a day on CT.Whether its ingame or combined.
Obviously, they have to be ingame too from time to time, but since they do alot of work behind the scenes, we have moderators that moderate the server.


About the moderators, i see them as my team, since i gathered / decided on everyone of them except marccc since i wasnt admin then yet xD
When someone gets moderator, he or she is very active and proud and plays alot. But for those that are here longer it becomes more and more a routine thing, and most of the time, there is almost no gratitude for that what they do.


Players that fuck up by driving bad, or breaking the rules, always blaim the staff for not helping or punishing. So when staff sorta gets attacked i feel it as my role to protect them, simply because unless you have been staff here, you would know what your talking about.
This doesnt mean the staff members are allowed to stay inactive long periods of time obviously.
to come to an conclusion, its easy to point fingers if you dont fully know whats going on.

About a gap of no staff, i did expect this when hobo would leave, but lets keep in mind when we have 25 staff members at that moment,  with 50 slots, its not needed to have more staff as in numbers. Activitity was something else, but keep this in mind, summer vacations and exam periods are different all over the world. So where the Americans had an early vacation period and Australians too, EU comes a bit later.
And probably 10 staff members had final exams, or just exams this year and thats alot:) but we gotta respect that they have school and parttime jobs.


My point kinda is, yes we can demote, refresh and hire new members, but quite honestly, there will never be a guaranteed X amount of hours online on X part of the day. Everything is based on the goodwill of the mods, and the peak hours zone ( EU) has the most mods because of that.  USA has about 5 staff members that can do that zone, but if there clearly is such a big gap, we will see what will be wise to do.


Server issues/desyncs/lags


As stated before, this host is expensive. I think we should be gratefull for the fact we can play and the server isnt down as much as with Volt.
I agree lag or desyncing makes the game no fun, but im quite sure that eventually when mick does have alot of free time, things will get improved. For now there isnt much we can do lol.


House evictions


Happens from time to time, but not regularly. But Joshy made a super system for it, and every now and then admins will do something about inactive players with a house more than 2 slots. The only thing you guys can do to speed this progress up is report them in the correct board/topic and then let us gather info and when the time comes that we have enough info, we will take action.
It takes alot alot of time for Admins to come to a proper list of names everytime , and we cant afford to make any mistakes so we rather collect 1 month extra of inf, instead of making bad decisions.
================================================================================================


Well i have said alot, i hope with this that i could make some things clear.
there is much more news i could tell you but im not allowed to, the only thing i ask from you guys, there is always room for positive feedback, but please remember everyone of this does this on a no-pay basis and we put alot of time in this with only one goal and that is to help you guys. I see hardly any gratitude these days and thats also one of the reasons why some staff has dropped their activity.


Konali

[TheSandman]

@Konali.
TAKE ALL MY COOKIES. Couldnt have said it better.

[Shake]

Thanks for the explanation on some topics, Konali. I'm just waiting for the updates (or whatever you'd like to call them) to come, and see if CT gets back on its feet like it was before.


About staff, it's not always rainbows and pretty flowers around them. I have proof of some staff who rage at players and act like a regular player, without any sort of respect to the other player(s). Some do their job properly, others don't. Easy as that. I'm not the only one who saw some staff acting horribly wrong without any sort of respect towards the players, like they don't even know what their job is and what they have to do. I will not point fingers at anyone because I don't like to do it, but it's sad to see people (specially staff, which have the job to keep the server active with all the players happy) acting like (sorry for the word) retards.


About the gamemode/lag; it is really annoying to play with that amount of lag. Sometimes it's bearable to play with it, some times it just isn't. Yesterday we had a big convoy with PinkPanther as the leader, and due to the amounts of lag we all had to take different paths and different roads while driving, and even then we'd flip and crash on other players due to the supreme amounts of lag.
I'm also sure the gamemode won't be like this forever, but updates would be nice to have. Some bug fixes at first would do the trick, since we do have some bugs that really need to be fixed, else we can't do our missions properly, or go to some places without crashing (Me, Dobby and Benny have already been testing the places, trying to figure out what the problem is and we've probably figured out what the problem is).


Club bases/club issues; I don't have anything to say about that, since club bases don't bother me. Other people might.


House evictions; we really need to evict hella' lot of people. Me and Dobby got screens of a player who admitted he just logs and does one or two missions to keep the house every week/month. Is that really how it should work? No. A lot of people also need 2+ slots, and they just log to keep it, being selfish bastards, without giving the other players any chance to own a specific house.




Anyways, this is my honest opinion about all the issues you mentioned there.