DontCamp.com

[Super Wabbit]

So it has been difficult fully populating the server. Time for another discussion! let me describe the current situation and then I need your help to help identify the cause(s) of the issue and what we can do to fix it!

TL:DR

Questions:

• Why aren't players joining our server?
  
• Why is our player retention so low?
  
• What are other popular servers doing that we're not and should we try to mimic them (things like maplists, server plugins/messages, admin plugins/settings)?
  
  My humble ideas to fix the issue (which may suck):
  
• Option 1: Get more people involved in seeding during dinner time.
  
• Option 2: Reduce the server back to 32 and run Rush (and possibly Obliteration or other smaller map sizes).

==============================================================
Too Long Version:

Battlefield 4 has done more to re-grow this community than any other previous game. I think there are still many BF players that would be a great fit for the community and it is worth pursuing them, somehow. This is the reason I want to put in so much effort into making our server popular(again).

Anecdotal, semi-empirical data and observations:

Looking at the population numbers, we get up to about 20 players just around 6pm Eastern. As soon as dinner time hits the real players leave. Consequently, once prime time starts to ramp up, 8pm or so, our server is no longer "attractive" enough for players due to the low population count. My new schedule for the next couple of months means I won't be on until very late (or at all) during more than half the week. It "feels" like every night that I'm not on playing before 8 or 8:30 means that we won't get the server populated. Even if I get on and actually play (not seed) it seems like we never come close to having enough pop for a large game.
• Does this coincide with everyone else's experience as of late?


We recently switched to a 64 player server ($$$$) running (mostly) all conquest large map types. This initially worked great, we had 2 weeks of solid 64 player games during prime time often having to wait in the queue. The map list hasn't changed all that much. We've added a couple of (what I thought was popular) CTF and obliteration maps. Seems hard to believe that the addition of these modes has caused a drop in population.
• Do you guys think that the maplist is part of the problem?

Additionally, during the day we see one or two people join and promptly leave because of the 4 seeders we have. Let's hold off on the seeding debate and rational for another post. One thought is that if we had more seeders we could "trick" more people into joining at once. If we have enough people joining at once, they will be less likely to leave due to idle players. Would increasing the seeder count to 6 or 8 cause more people to join at once? How many seeders do we need to populate a 64 player server anyways? 4 may not be enough. We know that large seeding programs work for other communities like U Rock who we've seen have up to 12 seeders on in the mornings just to keep their server populated.

Is it possible some of our current admin settings are too aggressive? Can we ease up a bit, so to speak, while maintaining the spirit of Dontcamp.com? Examples include: Should we enable a progression of a warning, then kick, and finally a ban? Is the hackusation muter/kicker too aggressive?

I don't play on any other servers regularly. How are the other populated servers you guys play on setup differently than ours? Do you think if we mimicked that setup we could attract more players?

Having people seed 24/7 is impractical and silly. Would it still be impractical to ask the community to seed for just a couple hours a day during the dinner hours? I'm thinking we have everyone log in for a couple hours prior to prime time. If possible, simply help seed while your having dinner and no one is using the computer.

Regarding Rush:
From what I see and hear, there are few Rush servers out there and the ones that are populated are 64 players which not a lot of people actually like to play on them (unless grinding/whoring). We may be able to take advantage of the lack of 32 player Rush servers and promote us as a dedicated small count server. What do you think?

This is my current line of thinking. Please let me know if you have other options that we haven't considered. If you need data from the server, such as player counts over time, let me know and I'll get it to you.[/list]

[MTLMortis]

I'd do a test run on 32 player capacity. I'm sure a lot of the time people are still stuck in the "32-player max" and select that as server size in the server search list.
_________________
[MTL]Mortis - "No one says you have to fight a war with your pants on..."

http://www.cultofzal.com
http://www.twitch.tv/cultofzal
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[Super Wabbit]

[NTolerance]

Any changes to the server config (player count, whatever) are moot unless we can get dinner time seeders.

[NTolerance]

[NTolerance]

How about a calendar-driven seeder plan? For example, every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday everyone in the community seeds from 6PM EST to 8PM EST.

[Super Wabbit]

[Super Wabbit]

Remember guys, this is a community server. You all have direct input into how we run the server and I want to hear it!

[Super Wabbit]

Here is the server player count for Monday 02-02-15. This is typical from what we see each night. You'll notice we get up to 13 players during the 6pm EST (1800) hour. Our theory is that if we can get as many people to seed starting at that 6pm EST time slot then we can reach a critical mass of players that will sustain us through dinner hours and into the times that we normally play.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1E1J4Mkcg0ms0a767z1Jg6bYUWT50jHGg8CLZ-7fSdXs/edit?usp=sharing

[Super Wabbit]

We've switched over to 32p but I would still like to hear everyone's thoughts. We still need the seeders regardless of server config.

[Super Wabbit]

So I've heard nothing from anyone if they are willing to help seed during dinner time. I don't know if people are uninterested or unable to seed or if the post is simply not being seen by the community members.

If you are unable to help seed, please let me know by posting a reply in this thread. I you are willing to seed let me know and I'll walk you through setting that up. If you have questions about seeding, i want to hear them.

So yeah, please acknowledge if you've at least read this.

[JoeSwindell]

Cat

[MTLMortis]

dogs

I can help, I just keep forgetting to turn on the puter in the morning.
_________________
[MTL]Mortis - "No one says you have to fight a war with your pants on..."

http://www.cultofzal.com
http://www.twitch.tv/cultofzal
http://www.youtube.com/cultofzal

[NTolerance]

[MTLMortis]

I know, I don't get home till 7:30 or so that's why I need to start it in the morning.
_________________
[MTL]Mortis - "No one says you have to fight a war with your pants on..."

http://www.cultofzal.com
http://www.twitch.tv/cultofzal
http://www.youtube.com/cultofzal

[Super Wabbit]

[NTolerance]

[NTolerance]

This thread sucks.


Since I enjoy wasting my time, here's another idea:

Find some web page service thing where you can post some text and then have users "sign" the post. Put the link to this in TeamSpeak and mention it on TeamSpeak. The post will contain some basic info about seeding. The idea here is to raise awareness. It must be done outside of this forum.

Edit: I'm probably thinking of a petition site. We could create a new petition named something like "Petition to understand how to populate a BF4 server".