Introducing Divibox, a new BZFlag server!

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divi
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Introducing Divibox, a new BZFlag server!

Post by divi »

Divibox

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It is the great pleasure of the Divi team to introduce the all-new Divibox BZFlag server! A lot of work has been put into making this launch possible, and the Divibox team is very happy to present you with the fruit of their labors.

This server features a 2-3 hour semi-random rotation (similar to the classic Silvercat rotation) with the following maps:

City of Mayhem by DucatiWannabe
DodgeBall by Winny
Linbox by Zelgadis
Warhead X500 by DucatiWannabe
Xtr3me CTF by Winny

A map selection plugin is in use, so maps may be selected as "next in the rotation" or changed to immediately by any admin. Maps that are not in the rotation, but selectable by admins, are:

Overlord by Dutchrai
Fantom Chaos by TangenT
Tunnels by Constitution

We aim for this server to be readily enjoyable by all players by selecting maps of the highest quality, playability, and universal appeal. We have perused a great number of maps to find the ones we have selected. We will strive to administer this server with a view to bringing the best possible gaming experience, and we will try our best to listen eagerly and respond readily to honest questions, constructive comments, and legitimate concerns. We will also carefully select admins who will help us keep close to these ideals.

In our efforts to maintain a player-friendly atmosphere, we will of course have low toleration for those who would like to wreck the game for others. Cheaters, spammers, cursers, etc. will be dealt with in the quickest and most efficient way we can. We have taken pains to ensure that we are well-equipped to deal with issues as they arise.

Features that are works-in-progress include a public replay server for all games (currently functional) and more advanced player statistics (partially implemented; see our web site). Although much content is yet to come, please check out the current features of our web site at http://divi.fairserve.net. You can also check in with us on our IRC channel on the Freenode network: #divi.

Server resources are provided by the Fairserve project (http://fairserve.bzflag.org).

The server is live at this moment. However, to celebrate the kick-off of this new server, we invite you to join us this evening at 6:00 PM PST (Sat. 1:00 AM GMT) for our official kick-off game, which will be played on the Xtr3me CTF map by Winny. This will be followed by City of Mayhem by DucatiWannabe, after which the randomized rotation will kick in. We are greatly looking forward to your comments about how we can improve the server, especially in the early days.

Thank you for your attention, and we're looking forward to seeing you on the field!
meeba
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Post by meeba »

To everyone who showed up, thank you much! It was fun testing out the server for real, and fun was had by all (well, this is what I assume, I know I had fun). Everyone's always welcome, any time of day.

If you have any suggestions, please let Constitution or me know, and we'll see what we can do.

Enjoy the Box, guys!
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trainee
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Great time!

Post by trainee »

It was great to play Overlord last night (and tonight, too!).

Thank you divi, Constitution, TangenT, et al.

I had just returned from a week in Cali helping my little brother and hadn't been able to play BZ. (I was tethering my Treo's EDVO for an internet connection on my MacBookPro, and the lag was terrible when I tried to connect, even though it was still faster than the hotel's wi-fi.)

Anyway, I arrived home from the airport, eventually put the kids to bed, fired up my iMac, and ... Overlord!
Stij
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Post by Stij »

Man, I was playing City of Mayhem last night and there were at least 30 people on...awesome...
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Green Manalishi
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Post by Green Manalishi »

dodgeball by winny was fun too.. thanks for the server guys.
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gnu-sense
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A plug, for the replay server plug-in

Post by gnu-sense »

I just want to put in a friendly plug for the replay server.

I had a problem that stemmed from an in-play confusion on July 9 (you can look it up if you want to see what it was). At the time, I did not know about the replay server, and I tried to save my own message stream to review it. Unfortunately, the look-back in the buffer did not go back far enough, so I had already lost the information that would have clarified my confusion.

I just happened on the replay server by accident today, and with a little looking, I was able to locate the relevant file and play it. By observing from different perspectives, I was able to figure out the error that led to my confusion and misunderstanding.

I can't say what Really Good Thing I think this replay server is. FWIW, I think all frequented servers should record all their games and host them on replay servers this way. It could prove invaluable in detecting and sanctioning cheaters, and in dispute resolution. It's also a valuable teaching tool for tactics, when you can observe a game you've been part of from a perspective other than your own.

Kudos to the divi team for their decision to implement the replay feature on a public server!

gnu-sense, maybe getting sense after all.
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macsforme
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Post by macsforme »

Glad to hear that it's being used. As I think I mentioned earlier, we're still ironing out a few issues with it. For one, Divibox generates about 150MB worth of replays a week, and that will fill up our disk fast. We are working on a scheduled compression and archive mechanism for this. The other is that for some reason, specifying the -recbuf option makes our recording plugin behave extremely erratically, so right now we're limited to the default 16MB recording buffer (this is fine for a 4 v.s 4. game over an hour and a half or so, but with >15 players on it it doesn't capture the whole game. Also, the large number of replays makes it difficult to browse them, so we're trying to find a better way of keeping them organized.

We will keep y'all posted as we make progress. Thanks for playing!
meeba
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Post by meeba »

Another update for you mayhem lovers out there... DiviBox is now thoroughly excited to bring you an all-new kind of CTF war. It's Missile War v4 (thank you Ducatiwannabe for making this new revision, you are a genius), specially adapted for the single rogue spot we offer on the original DiviBox server.

Keep in mind that this is NOT the original Missile War, nor is it a replacement for the brilliantly-run Missile War being hosted by lodxcol and tadd. DiviBox is only offering this as an opportunity to spice up the classic Divi play, and with such a map as this, it was an opportunity we could not pass up.

Also, your stats on this new server will count towards your ranking on the official Divibox stats and ranking on the website.

If you guys have any questions, please feel more than welcome to let me know, or let any other Divi administrator know (if you aim your spitballs at Winny, he's our designated spitball-receiving department).

Oh, and one last thing (certainly the most important)... the Missile War v4 server is running at divi.fairserve.net on port 5155.

Enjoy, guys!
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