a permanent spectator mode ?

[cage]

hello everyone,

I discovered armagetron a month ago and play way too much since then.
I particulary enjoy the Yellow Submarine server, the way it's (sometimes) more about the way you play than just winning/ killing. something like a samourai taste

I live with several roommates and thought I could have an "armagetron TV" in the living-room, to watch the fights while having a beer with friends for example. unfortunately the server kicks the inactive spectator after a while, and it's boring to re-connect; futhermore the logs shows in the chat and it could be annoying for players (?)

it there a way to connect to a server in "permanent spectator mode", even if it means you cannot play at all (to prevent any drunken people to bother the samurais )

and what about a special "applause" key - space for example, which could make the sky flashing, for a specialy great action for example. Or even a notation system, but this could be annoying too.

well that's my idea

-- this is my first post here, sorry if it's not the right section - and sorry if my english is bad, it's the morning here

anyway, thanks a lot for this amazing game !!!

[Jonathan]

I think it's because server resources are finite, and active players deserve to get them more than spectators.

[cage]

sure,
I thought about the brandwitch/ ping problem.

but:

- it seems spectators don't increase the general lag

- it would be no problem to have one or two seconds of latency for spectators

it would be also a great way to capture videos, allowing playing with the camera options around one or more players

[Tank Program]

It may not increase latency in your case, but in some cases it will. It still uses additional upload bandwidth on the server that a regular player could use to play. If someone wants to capture a video, they record while playing and make the video off the recording.

[epsy]

It's up to the server admin to turn idle kick on or off

[Paladin]

I'll mention this topic to noob13 if I see him on the grids today as he runs that server. I could turn it off temporarily, but I tend to agree with having it on.

There are other servers (similar settings/similar fighting ideals) that most likely do not have idle_kick on. I don't mean to discourage you away from playing there, but it would solve your watching issue if 13 decides not to turn it off.

As for the applause concept, the closest thing I can think of would be an instachat. You press one key and a chat phrase is created. The common use is in the game play of Fort for such things as 'Defense Down'. You could, of course, modify it to say something like "Great Fight" or anything of your choice. You could, most likely, modify your own version of the game to have the screen flash if you pressed 'space', but it wouldn't show on other people's screens thankfully.

[Concord]

yeah Cage, you should watch some fortress if you like spectating, particularly the Ladle Finals,

watch this video in fullscreen and highdefinition, its well worth it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7tolNjqwxo

[compguygene]

on the issue of spectating, and how it affects game performance.

In ladle 18, there were some netsplits happening that were affecting performance. Wild West played in the opening round in a server based in Germany. Two of our players are located on the West Coast of the United States, so their ping/network latency is very high to start with.

Near the end of the match, the server in question accumulated about 6 spectators. After the 3rd spectator joined, my west coast people started experiencing some serious sliding. Some of this has been addressed by having them upgrade their clients to the latest beta, which deals with lag much better!

But my point is, spectators do affect player performance. I also love the idea of someone watching it, like a tv channel!

If your looking to spectate, i would recommend looking for fortress matches taking place. These matches generally take place in servers that have enough slots for spectators.

[noob13]

@cage:

The auto-kick setting was implemented to prevent idlers from wasting space on the yellow submarine. I wasn't aware that someone (other than Paladin) would spectate for fun, until now. If i'm right, the idle kick feature only affects players who are truly away (= in spec mode, not pressing any keys). So, you can avoid getting kicked by pressing "0" once every 10 minutes.

We could remove the setting, increase max_clients to 14 and keep teams_max at 12. This would allow a few specs but i'm not convinced its necessary. For now i'll just increase the value of idle_kick_time - you'll have to reconnect/chat every 25 minutes.
Hope that works for ya! Have a good match!

[ivantis]

How about a server setting like that maximum bandwidth setting, but specifically for spectators, because them having lower bandwidth use limits wouldn't really matter because they won't be playing.