I could never have agreed more, tbh.

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^.-
motherfuckin rabbits ejaculating sunshine

This sounds like a very good suggestion. Will pass it on to our dev team and make sure this will get implemented. Thanks for the suggestion!

Do we have too many servers in operation during quieter times?

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The stats below lie. I'm actually much much worse.

No, we see that the amount of servers provides the room which is required, as their pretty much all full all the time, if they just get a start-off. It greatly helps expanding the community.

Yeah, SaintK speaks true. Also, namelessone raises a valid point when it comes to idling.
I was discussing this thing on Mumble a while ago and the issue is a bit more complex. It's true that pure idling won't fill up the server BUT if somebody idles and e.g. another SpA member joins then we have 2 players on the server, not one and one of them is playing. If a random guy joins it's already 3 and so on. Idling doesn't fill servers all by itself but it helps fill them if you combine it with other methods.

e.g. Server #5 yesterday: empty for hours even though some people idled. One or two SpA members joined and it filled in several minutes and stayed full throughout the evening.

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War does not determine who is right - only who is left. - Bertrand Russell

I know notice the following.

In the past 2 weeks several school periods have begone again, which results in the following:
At 10 am at GMT + 1(where I am at) not all servers are crowded. In vacation period, there was more crowd.

When I go online after 5 pm (GMT + 1) I notice that the spa servers are... quite full because:
Germans, french, scandinavians, dutchies, etc. etc. are all back from school/work and are now at the servers relaxing.

Next week, when my vacation is over, the same thing will apply for me, mostly I will be back hom between 5 - 6 pm, have some food and from 7pm I check mail and go out and play, at which time the servers are mostly full.

This simply has to do with the fact that the server is located in the netherlands/UK and people who are like 8 hours(timezone) away from the server will not play on the server due to the fact that they have a bad ping on it due to distance.

I don't play on american servers for that reason. I mostly quit when I see things shaking, whch is mostly at a 80+ ping.

So the fact that your servers are not only full has nothing to do with the numbers, as in the evening when everyone chills out... they are all filled.

The issue here is that people try joining the same 1 - 2 servers rather then going to the others which are empty, which is a completely different issue.

And shutting down servers during quieter times, is not really any help.. as you need to start and stop and start and stop them, while this does not save anything to you and only costs addtional resources. I think the numbers are quit good as they are and if you are going to put up more servers I think that you should look at different games rather another TF2.

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"Why do it simple, when there is a hard way..."

By the way - I exchanged several words with an unbiased observer, Kaz, on Mumble and he kinda confirmed a theory of mine:

Should we reorder the servers a bit? I know that they are grouped according to the machines they are running on and the order in which they were set up but I think they should be ordered according to their settings...

E.g. Server #6 should clearly be Server #4 because it's configured like Servers #1-3. It doesn't make sense that the arena servers are split between Server #4 and Server #7 as well.

A simple "PR trick" might also be renaming the arena servers into e.g. SpecialAttack Arena Server #1 and #2. They are currently very unpopular. Even the Custom Map Server overtook Server #4 in the Gametracker rankings now...

You see - while showing the precise server number in its name is great for our e-peen people tend to join the first non-full normal-ish server they see on the list (Kaz confirmed that and hell, I'd do the same thing unless some friends of mine were playing on another server). The whole situation might become even worse with further servers. I do realize that Server #6 kind of disproves the theory but then again it is located in the UK which results in a "different audience" having good pings on it. =)

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War does not determine who is right - only who is left. - Bertrand Russell

I think you should give the popular servers a higher number.

If you see that 'this' is server #4, then you wonder if there are also 1, 2 or 3.

If the current for example is #2, you will only wonder about #1.

So giving servers with lots of people higher number, might trigger people in finding out if there are also #1, 2 and 3.

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"Why do it simple, when there is a hard way..."

Yeah, precisely. So Servers #1-3 stay as they are. Server #6 -> Server #4.
Of course this has again something to do with filling Server #5, which, currently is getting filled all by itself as well BUT there's this always-empty Server #4 between it and the most popular servers...
Since the arena servers feature a completely different gameplay mode this should be a bit more exposed as well. People won't join them "because other servers are full" but because they want to play in arena mode.
I find that the suggestion to change their name to SpecialAttack Arena Server #1 and #2 is perfectly reasonable.

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War does not determine who is right - only who is left. - Bertrand Russell

yesterday i filled the #2 server all by my own . I accept spa-points or real money by paypal

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"I have come to shut this thread down. If I see anybody posting in here from now on, I will kill them.
In cold blood.
Thank you for your co-operation."
[SpA]DrMcMoist

So rename it to "UK #1"...
Precisely what? Didn't DoubeJ proposed to do this the other way round? So rename #1 to #28 so that ppl are looking for the other 27 servers if even 28 is so crowded? o_O

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SaintK: I'm completely lost

I think emphasis needs to placed on ensuring that potential players know about SpA's other servers.

As mentioned previously, some people only have server #1 and #2 bookmarked and are totally oblivious to the other 4 servers.

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Ah LOL - I misread the "higher number" part and understood it as "higher place" or something. ^^

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War does not determine who is right - only who is left. - Bertrand Russell

that is exactly what I mean. Give the most popular server, which is at this point server 1, number 7.

I think this will not get the attention of a lot of people but at least of some.

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"Why do it simple, when there is a hard way..."

it will be exactly the same... but now its just another server that gets filled... i think most regulars have all our servers(maybe exception of arena servers) in their list. so they will still join the server with most ppl in it(that's our problem), but its just another server.. the problem still is there. we need to find an solution for ppl joining empty servers.. renaming the servers will just move players too another server. but the problem will still be there

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Sebas the avenging zebra's sidekick! <3

people not knowing about the other servers? don't they read the MOTD?

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DISCLAIMER: If you find a posting or message from me offensive, inappropriate, or disruptive, please ignore it. If you don't know how to ignore a posting, complain to
me and I will be only too happy to demonstrate...

nobody reads the motd.

i do~ xD

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...:::~*We Can't Be Adults! We're Steadily Growing!!*~:::...

haha, ok. Some don't read it. I know I never read it before when just joining a server for some quick playing. And from what I've seen of my friends they too just click continue instantly.

Maybe I should start reading it.

Believe me, most people don't. You notice this especially on servers with their rules in the motd.

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and you expect then that they will read the name of the server? and notice that there must be more servers? well, we can try ofcourse, but let's wait for saint to come back.

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DISCLAIMER: If you find a posting or message from me offensive, inappropriate, or disruptive, please ignore it. If you don't know how to ignore a posting, complain to
me and I will be only too happy to demonstrate...

Nope, I didn't say that, I was just pointing out that most people just click through the motd so they can start playing. Sad but true.

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Nah - they won't read the name of the server either. I know that because I get people on Server #5 who wonder that a custom map is coming up all the time. I tell them to look at the server's name and they go like "Oh!". ;-)

The thing is that a renaming of the servers would simply reorder them in the server browser - people won't read their names but Steam will. ^^

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War does not determine who is right - only who is left. - Bertrand Russell

Make a promise to everybody that on the upper servers, at any time, I could appear.

I swear, all the servers will be chock a block 24/7.

Futari and me found a way to empty the servers. Futari = soldier and Crovax = medic+kritzieg. It got server 6 from being full to having only 12 players real fast tbh. Oh and insane k/d ratio's for Futari as well

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Da boyz need themselves a Nob they do

Haha... epic fail on filling the servers...

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SaintK: I'm completely lost

how about people playing on the servers that are filled up get a message once some other server start gets players, so that spa users know that other servers have people waiting for the server to fill up ?
also telling them what map is on would be cool.

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.:My Website:. "The objective of Team Fortress 2 is not to die for your team, but to make the other bastard die for his." -George S.Patton (adapted, kind of)

I've actually once seen a CS 1.6 server for a long long long time ago, that automaticly directed you to one of the other of the communities servers, if the server you were trying to join was full. Was annoying as fuck when you tried to join the server, but it may work. And to make it really work, we have to show the reserved spots.

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^.-
motherfuckin rabbits ejaculating sunshine

We used to have that on CS 1.6, these systems are now blocked by VAVLe.

yeah the round robin plugin was the most annoying shite in the world, how ever its handy to have when a server is full

Ive not seen it on TF2

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"Destiny finds those who listen, fate finds the rest"