DedCon servers

[torig]

Just wondering if all dedcon server owners would be so kind to post here. It would be nice to have a quick overview of the number of dedcon servers running, and what modes are essentially offered by all of us, and what hardware/OSes we're using all.

Tell us the number of servers you are running, perhaps some info on their configuration and connectivity, and obviously, what modes you are offering.

Mine is running on a dedicated debian stable box. The server itself is hosted in a server room in Dallas, USA (while I am European. 8 years ago the cheapest hosting was there ; now I would just go to hetzner.de if I had to start over again).
The machine is a P2 266Mhz with 128MB of RAM and is basically running my personal domain gov-fbi.net and my professional one cqr.cc (pronounce secure) for my InfoSec consultancy company.

I'm running a dedcon in default mode, with the Meditterranean locations blacklisted. The population is set to 200 mill, which really is the only change.
The minimum number of players required to be able to launch is 4.
Auto-speeding of RTing clients is enabled with the default values enabled.

I just set it up, so I'l see what feedback I get and how the game plays, and tweak it as necessary. Also, I'm open to user requests really.

edit: just spotted in my logs that someone was wondering if the server couldn't be made to start (there were only 2 people connected).
and hello shiny & zjoere

EDIT: Just an idea, but perhaps different server owners could come up with a global low-priv moderator account and share the password amongst eachother?
That way chances are someone is ALWAYS available to moderate the server and kick/ban abuse users as necessary? (Just an idea, don't shoot me or anything I know if we aren't carefull this can be abused...)

[shinygerbil]

hey there

I've got a server that I'll occasionally run, but my machine isn't dedicated, so the connection isn't amazing. Hence, it's not running all that often. (Just saw a game though, didn't realise people actually played Defcon at this hour ) Mine's basically default settings, with the following settings:

35 cities
200 population
75 minute victory timer
Min players:3, max:6

..and that's about it. I've also included the 1.43 config file's naval blacklists. I've also cut the number of spectators to 2, because they seem to cause a lot of connection problems while they're joining, especially if they join once the server has been going for a while. (Damn sharing my connection with porn-loving housemates!)

[zjoere]

yeah i just played one of your servers shiny and had connection problems for 2 times and some high (can't remember the name but it appears on the upper left corner)
for the rest of this topic i have no idea what you guys are talking about

[cuplex]

Well i'm running "the pwnzone" from my home ubuntu feisty box connected to 25Mbits. usualy 24/7.

Mode:
ServerName = Dedicated pwnzone
MaxTeams = 6
PopulationPerTerritory = 200
Gamemode = Default
CitiesPerTerritory = 25
CityPopulations = Totally Random
RandomTerritories = yes
MaxSpectators = 4
GameSpeed = Slowest Requested
Botname = pwnbot

[torig]

Talking of user request...
I've added an Orgazmo mode server to my list.

Perhaps going to change it into a Suicide orgazmo server.

[creator]

Is anyone hosting a 2vs2 server?

[torig]

Is anyone hosting a 2vs2 server?

Hmm, I'm not sure you can force teams with a dedcon server. Rather sure you can't actually (but I'll ask bert confirmation, although judging by his answer in the orgazmo mode thread of radiant caligula, I'm pretty sure it's unfeasable.).

But on my default server, which is set to start with 4 players minimum, you COULD ask players to switch teams, and launch it as a 2v2.

Come to think about it, you and I should prolly have a discussion over PM sometime to see if we can come up with some sort of 2v2/teams ladder

[Ace Rimmer]

Is anyone hosting a 2vs2 server?

Hmm, I'm not sure you can force teams with a dedcon server. Rather sure you can't actually (but I'll ask bert confirmation, although judging by his answer in the orgazmo mode thread of radiant caligula, I'm pretty sure it's unfeasable.).

But on my default server, which is set to start with 4 players minimum, you COULD ask players to switch teams, and launch it as a 2v2.

Come to think about it, you and I should prolly have a discussion over PM sometime to see if we can come up with some sort of 2v2/teams ladder

I highly doubt you could get a 2v2 going, all of the 1v1 seem to have trouble or limp along with only a few players really staying with it for long period of time. Heh, the unofficial tournament is still lacking two games with only six people involved for the last round.

Not that you couldn't try, but getting players to stay in for the long haul seems difficult if not impossible.

[torig]

Is anyone hosting a 2vs2 server?

Hmm, I'm not sure you can force teams with a dedcon server. Rather sure you can't actually (but I'll ask bert confirmation, although judging by his answer in the orgazmo mode thread of radiant caligula, I'm pretty sure it's unfeasable.).

But on my default server, which is set to start with 4 players minimum, you COULD ask players to switch teams, and launch it as a 2v2.

Come to think about it, you and I should prolly have a discussion over PM sometime to see if we can come up with some sort of 2v2/teams ladder

I highly doubt you could get a 2v2 going, all of the 1v1 seem to have trouble or limp along with only a few players really staying with it for long period of time. Heh, the unofficial tournament is still lacking two games with only six people involved for the last round.

Not that you couldn't try, but getting players to stay in for the long haul seems difficult if not impossible.

True, but even though I actively particpate in 1v1....too much of it is too much sometimes.
I also think 1v1 is one of those game modes you can get fed up with the fastest.
Either you win, or you lose. Either you are rewarded, or punished. Someone who's lost 4 matches 'recently' and still plays with the same motivation is someone to be respected, really.

In 2v2 while losing, you can get satisfaction in having aided your ally nicely, distracted the enemy, killed the most, ...
There just are more options.

And between the full blown 6 player games and 1v1, there is a lot of unexplored terrain.
Like 2v2 with 2 territories per team. Now that's also refreshing

I should add that IMHO (or IMNSHO) seeing two good players in perfect synergy, aligning their tactics...that would be a new artform, surely

[bert_the_turtle]

It's not currently possible to force people into alliances except for the diplomacy style alliance. But it would be feasible to do scenarios with randomly assigned roles. The server admin selects the territories and which territory is allied with which other territory, and players get distributed to the territories randomly by the server. Or the players select the alliances and get distributed randomly to the admin-determined territories that are allied. And of course the scenarios could be randomly selected, too. If there is demand for such a thing. It would be actual work

[torig]

Here is my Extreme Orgazmo mode config, which I cleaned up a bit today.
It's not entirely "clean" (= comment-free) because I like to keep some of those in there so I could eventually change some multi-variable options without needing to look them up in another config file first.

torig@imunrah:~/dedcon-i686-pc-linux-gnu-0.5$ cat Orgazmo.sample
ServerName Torig's Dedcon:Orgazmo Mode Server
AdvertiseOnInternet 1
GameMode 0
# The possilbe values are:
# 0 for Default
# 1 for Office Mode : real time speed only
# 2 for Speed Defcon : 20x speed only
# 3 for Diplomacy : survivor scoring, everyone starts in the same alliance
# 4 for BigWorld : double unit counts
# 5 for Tournament : Default with a minimum of 10 allowed spectators and more locked settings
# 6 for Custom : All settings unlocked

MaxTeams 6
TerritoriesPerTeam 1
CitiesPerTerritory 25
CityPopulations 0
# Values
# 0 for Default: take populations from rough real world data
# 1 for Equalised: every city gets the same amount of people
# 2 for Random: people are distributed randomly around the first cities in the database
# 3 for TotallyRandom: like Random, but the cities picked will also be random

RandomTerritories 1
PermitDefection 1

# How radar coverage is shared between players.
RadarSharing 1
# 0 for AlwaysOff: no radar sharing ever
# 1 for Alliance: automatically share radar with all allies
# 2 for Selective: pick your own friends
# 3 for AlwaysOn: see everything all of the time

GameSpeed 0
# 0 for Slowest Requested
# 1 for Real Time
# 2 for 5x Real Time
# 3 for 10x Real Time
# 4 for 20x Real Time

# if the speed is set to "Slowest Requested", set the slowest allowed speed here.
SlowestSpeed 2
# 0 for Pause
# 1 for Real Time
# 2 for 5x Real Time
# 3 for 10x Real Time
# 4 for 20x Real Time
# 5 for 50x Real Time (only with CheckLimits off)
# 6 for 100x Real Time (only with CheckLimits off)
# anything larger: 255, beware, speed factors > 100 will make nukes "miss" their target.
# The values avove 5 are very dangerous and need to be set after the game has started. If you do it
# earlier and people check out the advanced options, their game crashes.

ScoreMode 0
# 0 for Default: +2 for kills, -1 for deaths
# 1 Survivor: +1 for survivors
# 2 Genocide: +2 for kills

VictoryTrigger 100
VictoryTimer 85
MaxGameRealTime 0
VariableUnitCounts 0
WorldScale 100
MaxSpectators 8
SpectatorChatChannel 1
TeamSwitching 0

MinTeams 4
# You can exclude the Mediterranean Sea, which shouldn't be reachable according
# to sailable.bmp, with this:
NavalBlacklist 17 19 35 37
# For more examples, see ConfigVersion-1.43-beta1.

ServerVersion 1.42

#DemoRestricted 0

MinVersion 1.42
MaxVersion

HostName [Bot]Torig
KicksToSpectator 2
KicktsToBan 3
IdleTime 300
IdleTimeGlobal 36000 # Had set this to 7200 before which proved too short to discuss the game afterwards. 10 min frankly should be enough.
ChatsPerMinute 12

Admin torig~yourID~0~yourpassword
DemoPlayerMessage Sorry, too many demo players already in the game, you can't join. Please support IV and buy the game though.
# You can ban players by IP:
#BanIP <ip>
# or by their keyID (as found in the server logs)
BanKeyID 233146 #known spammer
LogLevel 2
ErrFile dedcon-orgazmo-err.log
OutFile dedcon-orgazmo.log
# This overrides a previous ErrFile setting.
KickLog dedcon-kick-orgazmo.log
QuitLog dedcon-quiters-orgazmo.log
# Early quits only get logged if they happen earlier than the following percentage
# of the total game time:
EearlyQuit 20

ServerKey <enter your key>
ServerPort 5011 # Should really not be set for others, but as I'm running multiple servers, I do need to specify another port than the default.
GhostProtection 2
# Values:
# 0 for do nothing, no action is taken.
# 1 for report, ghosting suspicions are reported to all players.
# 2 for kick, kick the spectators with the same IPs as players. This is the default.

ServerGame Defcon
CheckLimits 0
PopulationPerTerritory 400
PacketOverhead 40
MaxPacketSize 500
MaxResendPacketSize 200
SeqIDMaxAhead 300
SeqIDMaxQueue 300
MetaServer metaserver.introversion.co.uk
MetaServerPort 5008
WaitClient
Say Welcome to Torig's Dedcon:Extreme Orgazmo mode Defcon server.i
Say Feel free to start a game any time.
Say This server will only allow you to start when at least 4 players have joined.
Say Orgazmo mode was originally coined by Radiant Caligula from the forums. For more information you should check the boards, really but this is his short description.
Say Orgazmo mode is a fast paced game with a timer set to 100%/85mins and 5x speed. No need to hold your nukes back!!
Say It's a total blast - and the player who manages to throw the most extravagant offense usually wins. GO BERSERK! ;-D
Say Extreme Orgzmo has the population for each territory set to 400 millon, something standard defcon servers do not support.
Say Raising the population that high isn't supported by IV and could break *something* *somewhere*. If you experience crashes..too bad really.
Say Note that the server will not allow ships to sail the Meditteranean Sea, which is a bug and will be fixed in the official 1.43 release.
Say Until then, a specific "hack" on the server just disallows this behaviour, fixing it effectively.
Say Anti-griefing options of the server have been enabled. A player who doesn't issue commands for 300s while using real-time will be forced to speed up.
WaitStart
Say Enjoy the game!!

[zjoere]

bert, your radar defence one is having connection problems again

the second time it happened to me (although the problem doesn't lie here)

[bert_the_turtle]

Yeah, sorry, my internet connection has had various drops over the past 24 hours. I'm shutting the servers down and will wait for better weather.

[bert_the_turtle]

Yeah, sorry, my internet connection has had various drops over the past 24 hours. I'm shutting the servers down and will wait for better weather.

[Radiant Caligula]

I was in your Orgazmo dedicated last night and a player took a seat and refused to click ready when we were full. He started insulting everyone and we used the /ignore feature. The moron began communicating through name changes and he effictively crippled the game since he refused to ready up or leave. We need a /kick command. Either the first to enter will "rule" the server or a majority /kick vote...