I was going to give this a little more time, but it's getting frustrating and seems just as ill-fated as the Custom tab system was.
http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=721588 http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=721840 Those are two current threads in the TF2 forums right now. I feel their pain. I'm not sure what the lists rules are about posting server names and whatnot, so I won't, but I've been keeping a close eye on the servers I visit and taking notes on what they advertise compared to what is actually going on in their servers. Out of a sample of 20 servers, none of which advertise Insta/Short spawn times through tags or in the server name(the only tag I recall seeing at all on any of these servers was 'payload'), 14 of them actually have Insta/Short spawn times. And it's not just spawn times, but that's what I'm focusing on here. Hell, one server I've been to has insta-spawn for it's clan members and everyone else has normal spawn times. I noted how bad I thought this was and the server admin said, "Dude, that's how we roll here." Well...fine...but it'd be nice to know this before I actually join...because then I wouldn't join. I doubt many others would, either, but when you have normal spawn times, how do you even notice that certain 'select' players on that server have insta-spawn? The only reason I noticed was because I Dominated the clan's leader and, literally, seconds later he came back as Scout to get Revenge. Then I sat in my 20 second respawn wondering what the heck just happened. When I go to a server and notice after my first death that spawn times are shortened, upon respawn, I'll ask over voice, "So this server has short/insta-spawn?" To which people will usually respond, "Yes". Although it was a question that I already knew the answer to, I feel it necessary to point this out to people there. I'll usually end with a comment such as, "Don't you think that's something you should advertise or do you prefer to trick people into playing into your servers?" Then I disconnect in hopes of finding an honest server...and they are out there, just difficult to find. No tags should mean vanilla, right? Well what it really seems to stand for is that the server ops are using plug-ins that were created to circumvent the Custom tab system and haven't/won't be switching to newer/updated plug-ins. So then, if someone is using 'vanilla' as a tag, that should mean you're entering a Vanilla server, right? Sadly, no. It's getting even more frustrating than the Custom tab system was. At least with the Custom tab, I'd know that I'd have a slim chance of finding a Vanilla server. This new system, in theory, should be working better, but, just like with the Custom tab, server admins seem to know that people don't want to play on their poorly configured servers so they need to trick them into joining. The argument most commonly heard is that "my server stays full 24/7 and I have insta-spawn, so I'm going with what my playerbase wants." That's all fine and dandy if you're tagging your server(s) that way, but the majority of admins aren't tagging(or are tagging improperly), so what I think it comes down to is that people just want to play. I get to a certain point every night where I just deal with it and play because I'm sick of hopping around once I noticed something on a server that wasn't tagged. It's not that your server is uber-leet, it's that I'm tired of spending more time in the server browser than actually playing the game. Please, talk to other server admins. Make sure they know about the new system. I know there are honest server ops here on HLDS, so helping to spread the word to others you may know that don't participate here would be a big help. Would it be possible to petition "plug-in sites" to remove the old plug-ins that remove tags? Also, take a close read at those threads I linked to and realize that Valve will listen to their customers. The Custom tab was one chance, the new tagging system is another. If it keeps up like this, a lot of admins may soon find themselves black-listed by clients...or even worse, de-listed by Valve. As always, thanks for taking the time to read this. -Richard Eid On Thu, Aug 28, 2008 at 6:24 PM, Mike Stiehm <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Ya if you are going to use fakeclients don't be stupid about it > if you have 10 people and want to bump it to 15 ok fine. But if you > have 0 players and you make it look like you have 21 people in your > server that is just stupid. > _______________________________________________ > To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, > please visit: > http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlds > _______________________________________________ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlds
