Information about lag... and out server Options

[FaG KillA]

This is mostly for MOBers since I know otheres won't or can't read. You guys get asked all the time on the server about lag and it is a very tricky thing to deal with so there is no real good answer. First I pay by user for our server. Based on the current number of paid users (20) we get a server with quad (4) Xeon processors and 4 gig of RAM. For those of you computer illiterates that is a really big ass server. It is running on an OC-48 internet connection which is the equivelent to about 1250 people putting their cable modems together! We share this server and line with two other groups so we have 1/3 of the horsepower available which is still 10 times more than most people have. That is why I pay a premiem price since most folks use another hosting company which is half the price of ours. Based on the horsepower we have there is NO WAY that 20 users is going to even think about stressing this server so it makes no difference in lag when we have 5, 10 or 20 people. I have been on when we have had 20 people and EVERYONES ping was under 75 so I know the box and line can handle it.

SO why then the lag? Simply the design of the game is such that users with high pings coming on to the server effect everyone. This is an inherent design flaw in the game and can not be changed so we have to find ways around it. The best I have found is Crow Kings autokick which is what I have running on a laptop 7x24 at my house monitoring the server. This program is customizable but I have found the BEST setting to be a top end ping of 150 and three passes of the scanner set to 15 seconds. With these settings we are kicking between 200 to 500 people a day which to me is unbelievable. The program does not kick one at a time and in fact I have seen it kick as many as 7 offenders at once if necessary since it scans all IP addresses at the same time, but you have 45 seconds to put up with lag which in the gaming world is a long time. SOP you say why not make it kick as soon as someone hits 150? well I have done quite a bit of monitoring on this and can tell you that it is not uncommon for 5 or six people on the server to spike up to 150 for 10 seconds or meaning any additional settings would cause us to kick probably 3 times as many people as we do now.

All of this long discussion leads me to a question to you all. Do you want me to change the tolerances even tighter? That would mean less lag, but also means some of YOU will get kicked. Comments......

I hope this helps you all understand lag....

[Oppression]

I can't speak for everyone but I have never been kicked before for high ping. And if you make it tighter, it will kick about 3 or 4 of the MOB members. Just remember that it's just a game and we are all here to have fun. Lag does however hinder that, but that goes with all the server. If it's going to lag, let it lag here.