feature request: filter servers from master's list

meriton · Post by **meriton** » Wed Mar 08, 2006 3:02 pm

I prefer playing fortress, sumo, or race to the standard free-for-all mode. So when I get the list of servers from the master, I am only interested in some game modes. It would be nice if the client could apply a filter to only display the servers running a given mode so I don't have to search by hand.

On a related note, a vast majority of the server's I get from the master server are unreachable. Could it be that master server entries decay too slowly?

Post by **dlh** » Wed Mar 08, 2006 3:07 pm

Change the server score using the +/- key. The default sorting key for the server-list is the score, so a server with a higher score will show up before one with a lower score.

The client knows nothing of what mode the server is running in (well, in the server-list, at-least), so right now this is the only way.

meriton · Post by **meriton** » Wed Mar 08, 2006 6:29 pm

The client knows nothing of what mode the server is running in

This is why I call it a feature request

I am using +/-, but that has a few shortcomings:

- the prefered servers are not pinged first
- I don't discover new servers featuring my preferred mode

Website · Post by **Z-Man** » Wed Mar 08, 2006 10:01 pm

Two problems:
a) we're running out of good keys to map in the server browser, and the current UI system does not offer drop-down boxes or anything else fancy
b) the server does not know which game mode it is running either

Sure, there is the last man standing/freestyle distinction, but that's all. It does not know about Race, Fortress or Sumo and has no way to find out on its own. A tag in the maps would be required, but some maps will be usable for different game modes.
So it may be a while before we can even think about adding it. Feel free to drop it on the feature request pile on SourceForge.

meriton · Post by **meriton** » Wed Mar 08, 2006 11:34 pm

a)
Won't the enum selector as used to select the camera mode do?

b)
I realize this requires some engineering, but I think that if armagetron becomes more popular and the game modes as diverse as the engine allows, this feature will become increasingly useful. Of course, we have more pressing concerns at the moment. I brought it up now so that this feature is taken into account when making design choices. I have filed the feature request.

Website · Post by **Z-Man** » Fri Mar 10, 2006 12:43 am

meriton wrote:a) Won't the enum selector as used to select the camera mode do?

An enum is not extensible remotely, a new game mode only know to the server would disturb the clients. And still, the server would not know which game mode is active, we'd need a tag for that in the maps (not a perfect solution), I guess.

meriton · Post by **meriton** » Fri Mar 10, 2006 1:32 am

Oh, sure. Didn't think about extensibility but you're right, we'd need that.

I guess that usually, a server will not switch game modes during map rotation, so a config item seems like a better data model to me.

wrtlprnft · Post by **wrtlprnft** » Fri Mar 10, 2006 1:39 am

Actually Lucifer's crack server does switch game modes, but you can set settings in the map file, so it could easily be contained there.

Post by **Lucifer** » Fri Mar 10, 2006 3:32 am

How about a simple categorization system and a setting that loads each one and populates a list?

CATEGORY /action/team/fortress/square
CATEGORY /action/team/fortress/maps
CATEGORY /puzzle/maze
CATEGORY /race/whatever

Then the server browser can be organized in that sort of hierarchical structure. The game server would transmit categories to the master server, which would in turn relay them to the client, and the client would refetch them when it pings the game server, that way if the game server changes, clients will get updates.

Website · Post by **Z-Man** » Sat Mar 11, 2006 12:15 am

Categorization could work, we could then even display the servers in a tree with accumulated player stats (23 players in action servers).

mkzelda · Post by **mkzelda** » Wed Mar 22, 2006 4:29 am

One problem I forsee with this is the case where a server rotates maps. If the server rotates maps of different style between matches or even rounds, the master server's information will be forced to update or be out of date. In this case you'd have to tag such servers as "other" and let the user figure it out.

n54 · Post by **n54** » Thu Mar 23, 2006 4:51 am

A simple solution could be to add
CATEGORY /any
or
CATEGORY /rotation
to use for for those servers that rotate between different types of gameplay

just my 2 zorkmids

edit: d'oh! multitasking = zerotasking for me, I didn't notice that mkzelda said just about exactly the same thing - sorry

Post by **Lucifer** » Thu Mar 23, 2006 4:58 am

Actually I ws thinking the server would be listed under all categories he's configured for, maybe with a star or something to mark that it's in other categories which tells the user that and also that the user will have to visit the server to find out why it's got multiple categories.