ACE2 Server problems

[Zeno~SPARTA~]

I am at a loss to understand why we are having these problems.

 

Problem

 

ACE2 (non tacdom) server crashes every couple of AOs, crash can be one of the random arma crashes or it can be an out of memory problem (when the server goes down in this way it will not automatically restart, requiring admin intervention at the server.

 

ACE2 (tacdom) does not exhibit these problems.

 

Moving the standard ace server to the UK did not resolve the issue (indeed it had an out of memory crash).

 

Differences

 

The standard ACE mission has fewer land armour elements.

Isle defence is turned off for tacdom

Side missions are turned off for tacdom

Tacdom does not use the opfor commander or snipers

 

Could any or some combination of these differences cause these crashes.

 

To eliminate these differences could I ask you to play on the tacdom server (I'll make the password the same as you currently use).

 

Please report problems in this thread only.

 

Cheers

Z

[peter~SPARTA~]

Zeno, im afraid you have not complete intel on TacDom server.

As AceDom crashes we often move to tacdom and it have same problems as regular acedom.

Opfor commander does not make difference. We played with and without opfor commander on both servers and it crash anyway.

Side missions obviously have no impact on server crashing same as size of AO.

Tac dom crashes on small infantry only AO's. But i have to admit it let us play longer on them then on large full of amour AO's. It crashes more often with larger number of players but we had one night this week while it sustain 10 players without problems for longer time.

 

I hate to admit that but i suspect air assets may be a factor in those crashes.

Biggest difference between last 2 versions is adding Apache.

I think A10 is not a issue since its added only on tacdom In regular acedom have to be earned and its not present all the time. Server was crashing with and without A10's

As i notice there is a difference in ways how enemy damaged or destroyed vehicles behave depends on settings allowing us to capture them. When access to enemy vehicles was open they are harder to kill and requires several missiles to get job done. I would suggest to restrict access to them for now. I know it was my idea to open them but in current situation i would suggest to disable this option for now.

Edited June 6, 2010 by peter~SPARTA~

[Zeno~SPARTA~]

Thanks for the input Peter

 

It is logical that the 2 types of ace servers exhibit the same issues since they are essentially the same mission. I thought the US server was less robust but that proved not to be the issue.

 

I have had a quick look at the next V1.2 update but dont immediately spot anything that will help.

 

I will set the UK server to a stock ACE2 map to see if that performs better.

 

I guess I am lucky because I dont recall a crash in tacdom, but accept that you guys have had this issue, maybe you should play more tactically, lol.

 

Do you want me to remove the apaches for now and restrict access to enemy armour and air assets. There are 3 ace servers running so you can hop between them until we isolate the problem.

 

I havent changed the tacdom password yet but you know the current password.

[peter~SPARTA~]

Probably guys will stab me in a back for saying that but yes.

I would limit air assets to one a10 and one cobra for now.

Anyway more then one laser designator in the AO working at the same time make interference and make targeting innacurate.

Also disable all enemy vessels and see whats happens.

However as default map i would suggest tacdom map, due to additional vehicles available.

Please live mission set to normal not veteran mode by default.

[Zeno~SPARTA~]

Lock enemy vehicles

1 A10

1 Cobra

 

There will be three variations on three seperate servers

 

UK ace server stock xeno domination

US ace server (sparta opfor modifed as indicated above)

US ace tacdom server (unchanged).

[peter~SPARTA~]

Sounds good, thank you Sir

[Zeno~SPARTA~]

I made the changes today. I saw the ace US server had the out of memory problem, lets see if these changes help.

[Lightspeed~SPARTA~]

thanx Zeno

[SirSmokalot]

Has anyone checked the .RPT files to see where the errors are coming from? These are key log files to figure out where certain issues come from.

 

Now fore warning....ACE produces alot of "entries" for some of the custom systems they have....and the number of log entries might be alarming. But some entries might clue into a certain object in the mission causing the issue.

 

Its helpful for mission editors to pay close attention to these log files in order to make their missions more stable server wise.

 

http://community.bistudio.com/wiki/Crash_Files

[peter~SPARTA~]

Zeno, looks like last changes are working for server stability . I have not experience any weird restarts.

We did experience server crash tonight after update to 1.2, as you know.

After we move to US ACEBigDOM several people had problem to log in due to version mismatch. I cannot find same mission on US server as we had in GB.

 

Anyway.

Could you change parachute time limit to zero please, default is 10 min.

[Zeno~SPARTA~]

The stock xeno map is only on the UK server as a test (to check out the features of the latest version of domination) so I didnt put it on the US server. I am making a couple of changes to this map. I can put it on both servers, but I would like Kalxen/MH6s mission to be the one we use, since a huge amount of time was put into it. If Operation Arrowhead wasnt coming out soon I would port OpForBigdom over, but its a lot of work for just a couple of weeks.

 

I am sure people are getting version mismatches because they overwrite the ace files. The US server runs a check to detect addon mismatches (independent of ACE), on the UK server we only run a superficial version check. The ACE guys change some file names so some files are not overwritten, so when the server checks against the key it is inconsistent. Overwriting was the biggest cause of problems on the last update. The allinone file will bypass this since each allinone will have a unique name,

 

I will reduce the parachute time to zero when I have some time.

 

Thanks for the helpful feedback