So, I am one of the guys that plays ArmA 3.
I also work in the server industry but not with game servers. Here is a post I made on the ws.arma.su forums in response to the insults and assumptions people were making on there after I offered the suggestion that increasing the server hardware level could allow for more available player slots. What do you think? Is the response I get from people on those forums normal?
Here is the response someone sent me followed by my latest response:
If you are not running Arma 3 or game servers for that matter. Why would you come in here and bash other servers? That is not okey. Frankly its a little bit disrespectful and insulting. Clearly you dont have a clue about Arma 3 servers and the amount of Work Inch and other Server Admins put into this. Also I dont think anyone assumed you ran a Arma 3 server. If you did Inch wouldn't, have slit the throat of each and every one of your arugments or "Pointers"
This is more of a case of "Every Hipster with A DSLR thinks he is a Photograpther"
For you that being changed to "Every Guy with a PC thinks he is a System Engineer / Hacker"
Yes, I do realize you have a bit more knowledge then the average guy considering you run Database Servers / Mail servers but thats like comparing Apple and Oranges.
Sorry about the rant, but I had to this get out.
And my response:
I am not bashing the other servers. I was offering an example of how to solve the problem one guys was having with the whole VIP slots thing. I suggested beefing up the server hardware to allow many more slots while still allowing the VIP slots. Then, everyone jumped down my throat.
Again with people assuming I am a "hipster with a DSLR believing he is a photographer" in the server world. You do realize my job involves building and setting up servers? I do this for a living hence suggesting beefing up the hardware to solve a slot problem???? or does no one read? I went to many different ArmA 3 hosting companies and went through the process of selecting a server with their max slots available but was not able to see what it was actually running on as far as the hardware goes. Then I went to the Arma 3 forums on Bohemia Interactive's site and read their server threads on issues with the servers, how to figure out how much CPU and RAM is necessary to handle X number of slots and the average bandwidth necessary to run a server. Then, I thought about and applied my work skills and industry standard certified college training to consider the different options for improving or building a server that could handle the massive load that the Wasteland mod is while providing the large amount of player slots and even possibly improving it. I am well aware of HC. I am also aware how much of a bitch it is to usually setup the first time. It is often times similar to teaming servers to handle one work load. Maybe you were unaware of the concept of daisy chaining (teaming) servers to handle a workload faster? Commonly found in the Motion picture industry? Makes rending video go much much faster because the load is being split across so many machines.
Seriously, how many of the servers do you know of running Wasteland have a 3+Ghz Xeon processor? I am going to guess that most of the machines are running a 2+Ghz processor. I could be wrong and all the machines are running ballin xeon procs but I am also assuming you are using a dedicated server host and paying monthly which would imply that you would not want to break the bank and would have to rely mainly on VIPs to pay the bills and therefor would get what you could afford which makes perfect logical sense and I am not faulting anyone for doing so. Again, it seems I have hit a nerve and I apologize but I am not here to try and bash servers but offer up constructive suggestions. Why would you not run a database on the same server you are hosting on? If you have the available space and resources as based on the previous responses, ArmA 3 servers don't come close to using the available resources. Often times having the Database server on the same machine can reduce any performance hits from latency between the server and the database. And why does it seem that from the responses people are implying that Wasteland servers don't use databases? I know a lot of servers use iniDB which is some kind of flat file database. I remember from the ArmA 2 days when I was a member of Survival Operations, often times the MSO server would have "lag" issues from the server not being able to access information from the iniDB database fast enough so on one of the servers we set up a MariaDB server. (MariaDB is a binary stand in for MySQL with many improvements). With the improved efficiency of running a MySQL-type database server, the issue with not being able to access data fast enough mostly disappeared. There was still the issue of the latency between the database server and the game server as the database was a remote hosted solution. Another aspect to keep in mind is the way your database is laid out but that is for another time and would take too much time to explain and most likely make people do the whole TL;DR. Next we have the whole idea that storage I/O has nothing to do with running a server and keeping up with the connected clients. If that is the case, next time my boss wants me to suggest a database or file server or better yet an HPC server configuration to a client, I will suggest a configuration that uses the SLOWEST drives possible with the MOST slowest possible RAID available.
My whole point is this, someone complains about the VIP slots because the 80 slot server has 69 or 70 slots full and 10 reserved slots left. Sure they could spam to join button. Or, depending on the server hardware, they could increase the available slots.