Jimmy
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Posts posted by Jimmy
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Hey folks,
We’ve just taken the servers down to apply some improvements, most of which are geared towards improving stability and achieving perfect balance between the shards. Let’s get to it!
Midweek XP Bonus
For the foreseeable future, we’re applying a +50% XP bonus on all shards during weekdays. This will be turned on at some point on Monday and turned off at some point on Friday. No specific schedule - it’ll just happen whenever the maintenance happens on those days.
The reasoning here is pretty simple - we fully expect the servers to be overloaded with long queues on the weekend, so we want to encourage anyone that can play during the week to do that instead.
Double XP on Everlasting & Indomitable
We are extending the Double XP bonus on Everlasting & Indomitable until at least Monday the 6th (again, it’ll be turned off during maintenance that day - no specific time). Over the weekend we will monitor the load balance between the servers, and it’s possible we may extend Double XP on one or both of these servers further if we aren’t yet happy with it.
To clarify: This means that until the weekend Everlasting and Indomitable will actually be set to 250% XP. Get levelling!
Architect Entertainment XP Reduction
Some of you may have noticed the AE server going up and down a bit - it’s getting hammered quite hard. We don’t want to disable it completely and remove the ability for anyone to play any AE content, but we need to discourage overuse for the moment.
As such, we’ve reduced the XP gained from Architect content by 50%. In the future, we're hoping to be able to flag a subset of content as ‘Dev Choice’ which will then be exempt from this limitation, but that’ll be happening a bit further down the road.
I know this may upset some of you, but we’re hoping the various other XP bonuses & Anniversary Badge bonus will make up for this.
Leveling Pacts
For a stability reasons we have had to completely disable leveling pacts. If you are currently in a levelling pact, it’s likely your character will not be able to earn any XP until they leave the pact. You can do so by opening the ‘Leveling Pact’ window (under ‘Friends’) and clicking ‘Leave Pact’.
Other Bits
We’ve also fixed a few small bugs. One allowed enterprising players to create Architect missions with enemies that actually healed you instead of damaging you. We also may or may not have fixed the bug that caused some of you to get multiple sets of the ‘Experienced’ power from the 15th Anniversary badge.
Everlasting: The Unofficial RP Server
Many of you requested that we name Everlasting the unofficial RP server. To clarify: This is an unofficial designation, it is not a requirement that you RP if you play on Everlasting. We’re just flagging it to allow our RP community to stay together.
Indomitable: The Unofficial PvP Server
As above, we had the same request about naming Indomitable as the unofficial PvP server. As above, this is an unofficial designation to allow the PvP community to stay together - you are not required to engage in PvP if you play on Indomitable.
We know many of you have already started on Torchbearer, but we’re hoping the additional XP bonuses we’ve mentioned above will make it easier to switch over. As it stands right now, we really need to spread the population away from Torchbearer to prevent the queues getting any more excessive.
Server Transfers
Since adding the new shards and naming Indomitable and everlasting as the unofficial PvP and RP shards, we’ve had a ton of requests for server transfers.
Right now, this isn’t something we an offer as it would require us to build an entirely new tool and thoroughly test that tool to ensure there’s no issues and it does not impact server stability.
What we can say is that if for whatever reason we end up shutting an individual shard down we should be able manually move all characters onto another shard. This is not a guarantee it’ll work, but it is a guarantee we will try our best. Obviously, renames may be required as part of this process.
As a reminder, please be sure to join the official City of Heroes: Homecoming Discord for all the latest updates (and an unending supply of terrible jokes when the servers are down)!
That’s all for today folks. Servers should be coming back shortly. When they do, be sure to… Go. Hunt. Kill Skuls.
- The Homecoming Team
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Feeling cute, may delete this later
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By law they've got to record chat channels, patriot act stuff.
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Hey folks,
It’s recently been brought to our attention that the server code we are running still has the same data collection enabled that the live (i24) build had. This includes:
- Messages sent over all chat channels
- Connection IP addresses
- Hardware specifications (including CPU, RAM, Graphics card and drivers)
This is the exact same data that was being collected when you played on the live version of the game, and the same data that’s collected by almost any online game you play. Regardless, we do not need or want this data.
We only discovered this was happening about 30 minutes ago, and we are now immediately taking steps to remedy it.
Our goal is to have a small patch deployed within the next 24 hours which should disable all logging, and at that point we will flush any data that has already been collected.
If you aren’t comfortable with the above, please do not play the game until we have deployed the patch. We will be making an announcement when that has happened.
Thank you for your understanding.
===== UPDATE =====
We have now resolved this problem. Logging has been disabled, the chatserver has had it's logging functionality removed via binary patching, and all of our logs have been destroyed.
If you have an I25 server then get in touch with us and we will help you ensure that all logging is disabled in your server as well.
We respect the privacy of everyone in this community.
Here are our loglevels, note that the -2 means that it is disabled:
Here is our Chat server log directory (1 message is added to the file when the server boots up):
Here is our DB server log directory (note that deletion log just stores a backup of a deleted character for possible restoration and does not contain PII):
Here is our Map server log directory (same for all map servers):
- The Homecoming Team
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- Messages sent over all chat channels
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Hey folks!
Just a few quick updates for you.
State of the Servers
As of this morning, everything should be running fairly smoothly. We’ve added another two mapservers, for a total of 9. We’ve also capped the concurrent players to 1,500 per shard for the moment, but we will look at slowly increasing this until we start seeing stability issues.
We’ve also made a number of other small tweaks, including setting all zones to unload if they are empty. This means you may get an extended loading time if you try to enter a currently-empty zone.
Setup & Finances
We’ve had a bunch of questions regarding what the current setup is, where it is, and what it’s costing, so in the interest of transparency:
- 1x Auth Server (4 cores, 8GB RAM)
- 1x Web Server (4 cores, 8GB RAM)
- 4x DB Servers (6 cores, 16GB RAM) (One per shard)
- 5x Big Mapservers (32 cores, 64GB RAM)
- 4x Small Mapservers (16 cores, 32GB RAM)
It’s hosted in Amsterdam, and overall it’s costing around $4,700 per month.
Reconnecting
The previously-mentioned fix for allowing players to skip the login queue if they disconnect has been improved, and should now work under almost all circumstances. Please let us know if you continue to encounter issues with it.
And some quick stats: We’re on 31,500 accounts, 107,183 characters, and we currently have just under 3,000 people online.
That’s all for today. Please don’t hit the servers too hard!
Go. Hunt. Kill Skuls.
- The Homecoming Team
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- 1x Auth Server (4 cores, 8GB RAM)
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Hey guys! Thanks for the feedback.
Your best bet for up-to-date info is the Discord server: https://discord.gg/X4fWUDV (see the server updates channel).
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They said they had to reinstall much of the server software after a patch failed horribly, and I'm guessing that had been the default message.
Yup, that's what happened :)
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Should be resolved now! Thanks for all the reports everyone.
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Hey folks,
We’ve got some exciting news about an additional shard, the 15th anniversary of City of Heroes, and some Double XP headed your way.
Before we get to that, though, we’ve got more cool stats to share!
- Peak player count has increased to just over 3,500
- Over 22,000 accounts have been created
- Over 47,000 characters have been made
- 1,421,429,180 XP has been earned (that’s 38 million XP per hour the last 30 hours!)
- 1,541,311,910 influence is being held by characters (up just over 1.2B in 30 hours)
- There are a couple of people who have already reached level 50, that’s real dedication!
- Here are the origins you all have selected; Magic continues to dominate here:
- 13,612 Magic
- 10,174 Mutation
- 8,668 Natural
- 7,455 Technology (+1)
- 7,089 Science (-1)
[*]Here’s a rundown of the Archetypes people are playing; Widows still aren’t seeing much love =( :
- 6,340 Brutes (+1)
- 6,064 Masterminds (+1)
- 5,996 Blasters (-2)
- 5,413 Scrappers
- 4,177 Controllers
- 3,765 Tankers
- 3,296 Defenders
- 2,920 Corruptors
- 2,432 Sentinels
- 2,159 Dominators
- 1,702 Stalkers
- 777 Peacebringers
- 740 Arachnos Soldiers (+1)
- 709 Warshades (-1)
- 508 Arachnos Widows
- 13,612 Magic
The 15th Anniversary: Double XP & Events!
In order to help celebrate the Anniversary, double XP will be enabled on Saturday, April 27th and will continue to remain active until 12:00 AM (Midnight) PST on Monday.
Update: Unfortunately hosting the costume contests is not an option at this time due to instability.
We may decide to try this out again once things are working more smoothly but we cannot make any guarantees at this time.
Sorry about that!
We are planning to host costume contests at approx. 2 PM PST on Saturday, April 27th, on the Excelsior shard. Because of the amount of players we are expecting to have online over the weekend we cannot make this a guarantee but rest assured that it something that we want to do and will try our hardest to work out.
As it currently stands, we plan to host these costume contests in Kings Row at Freedom Plaza (next to Blue Steel). The GMs will be spreading out across the different Kings Row instances to organize and run each costume contest.
The winner in each costume contest will be awarded with 10 million influence and a fancy golden title. The three runner-ups will each be awarded 2 million influence and a slightly less fancy golden title.
A Second Shard: Excelsior!
We have launched second shard named Excelsior! Over the past 48 hours we’ve been closely monitoring the servers, and while we’ve been able to address and resolve some of the problems, we’re at a point where any further improvements we make to Torchbearer will suffer from diminishing returns. We’re hoping that this new shard will help spread the load out a little so that we are able to continue to grow and handle all of the hugs you guys are giving the servers.
Here’s some information that we can provide about the shard right now:
- Global chat and Wentsworth's are shared cross-shard
- No character transfers will be available at this time, and this is unlikely to happen in the near future
- You will have the same Global name on both Torchbearer & Excelsior
- We cannot currently hard-cap a shard’s population. We’re going to try to keep everyone up to date on the population of the shards with the hope that the players will balance out the load between the two
- Note that a shard with a lower population is going to perform better; this should incentivize playing on the new shard
[*]This shard will be accessible in the same manner as Torchbearer. Simply log in with your existing account and it will show up in the list alongside Torchbearer
In order to encourage the playerbase to spread across the two servers, the 15th Anniversary double XP buff has been enabled early on Excelsior. You should have the buff as soon as you log into the Excelsior shard.
Permanence
The question of permanence of the servers and characters is being brought up again since Excelsior’s launch. The statement that we made on this topic yesterday still stands true for both shards; the short answer is that we do not know yet.
Our primary long-term goal is still to ensure that the community has a stable server that we can all enjoy together in perpetuity. Right now we cannot say if his server will be that, but we are not closed off to that possibility. If for whatever reason that primary goal requires us to shut this server down or wipe the character database, then we will do that.
Outside of fulfilling that goal, we don’t foresee any reason why a character wipe would need to occur.
As always… Go. Hunt. Kill Skuls.
- The Homecoming Team
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- Peak player count has increased to just over 3,500
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Defiant is the best server.
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Hey folks!
Hope you’ve all been enjoying yourselves thus far, it’s been a pretty incredible 24 hours!
Before we get started, we’d like to share a couple of stats. So as of a couple of hours ago:
- Peak player count was just over 3,300
- 16,839 accounts have been created
- 26,262 characters have been made
- 255,685,139 XP has been earned
- 293,306,562 influence held by characters
- The highest level player is Dacaleos, a level 39 Brute
- Origins:
- 7,475 Magic
- 5,647 Mutation
- 4,712 Natural
- 4,204 Science
- 4,136 Technology
[*]Archetypes:
- 3,482 Blasters
- 3,435 Brutes
- 3,350 Masterminds
- 3,123 Scrappers
- 2,263 Controllers
- 2,129 Tankers
- 1,823 Defenders
- 1,625 Corruptors
- 1,334 Sentinels
- 1,212 Dominators
- 935 Stalkers
- 436 Peacebringers
- 401 Warshades
- 394 Arachnos Soldiers
- 246 Arachnos Widows
- 7,475 Magic
The Homecoming Team
Who exactly is behind this server has been one of the biggest questions we’ve received. The project is being headed up by Cipher and Rigo, with assistance from Leo. There are several others involved in actually keeping the server online and running, but they all wish to remain behind the scenes at this time. We would like to clarify again, however, that the Homecoming team is not controlled by or affiliated with any current Discord server or The Titan Network.
Leandro
There have been many questions about Leandro’s involvement with this server. We want to make it clear that Leo is not directly involved in the administration/moderation of the server, he is only providing technical support. Without a lot of hard work from Leo there is no way this server would be online right now - he has been an incredible help to the team.
GameMasters
We’ve recruited a couple of GameMasters to ensure everyone is able to continue enjoying the game in a clean, respectful, and welcoming environment. What does that mean? Well, we are currently working on both a player and a GameMaster code of conduct, which we will hopefully be able to share with you soon.
In the meantime, a general rule of thumb should be “Would I have been able to get away with this on the live server?” If not, then don’t do it!
We would like to thank our GM team for all of the work they have put in so far; they have done a fantastic job and we look forward to continuing to work with them.
- GM ArachnosPhobia
- GM-Naysmith
- GM Widower
- GM Reliquary
- GM Jimmy
- GM Bio
- GM Dredd
- GM Xellx
If you see any of them around, please feel free to say hi! Please be aware that they’re still currently learning how to use their powers, and are awaiting the admins to unlock further powers when everything calms down.
If you see anyone else sporting a ‘GM’ name, they are not actual GMs. Please shun them and report them to an online GM. We are working on a solution to allow players to anonymously report false GMs and problematic players.
Donations
We’re currently investigating how the community is able to financially support this server in a way that doesn’t put us in any legal jeopardy. The server is currently costing around $2100 per month, but there’s a reasonable chance we may have to scale up further for stability. In order to sustain the load from last night without major issues, the cost would likely go up to around $2700 a month.
Can’t say much more on this right now though, so stay tuned!
Permanence
Many of you have been asking how long this server will be around, and if there will be a character wipe at some point. The short answer to both of those questions is that we do not know yet.
Our primary long-term goal is to ensure that the community has a stable server that we can all enjoy together in perpetuity. Right now we cannot say if his server will be that, but we are not closed off to that possibility. If for whatever reason that primary goal requires us to shut this server down or wipe the character database, then we will do that.
Outside of fulfilling that goal, we don’t foresee any reason why a character wipe would need to occur.
Stability
The amount of load on the servers means that we’ll probably need to restart the server regularly and sometimes unexpectedly. Crashes and short rollbacks are likely to happen in the event of an unexpected restart or problem. We are actively working to address this but it does take time. In the meantime we will continue to communicate when we’re aware of ongoing problems and impending restarts.
Going Forwards
We’ll continue to post updates every couple of days until things calm down. We’re going to work on improving our communication channels as well in order to get news and information out to all of you in a much smoother manner.
In the meantime… Go. Hunt. Kill Skuls.
- The Homecoming Team
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- Peak player count was just over 3,300
Homecoming Server Update: Super Packs
in Announcements
Posted
Hey folks,
We’ve got a couple of exciting things to discuss today!
Super Packs
We’ve just made 3 types of Super Packs available for purchase at the Auction House. Before I get into more details, I’d like to make a few things clear:
Super Pack: Heroes and Villains
Super Pack: Rogues and Vigilantes
Super Pack: Lords of Winter
Full details on the drop rates will be added to the post below at some point soon™.
Server Balance & XP Bonuses
Everlasting shot up to 2nd place fairly quickly after being designated as the RP server, with Excelsior and Indomitable now being the two quieter servers.
As such, on Monday we will be making the following changes to the XP boosts:
Architect Entertainment
As mentioned above, the AE XP reduction will be remaining in place for the foreseeable future. Soon, however, we will be making a change to allow any arcs flagged as ‘Dev Choice’ to give full XP like any other non-AE mission.
To reiterate, the primary reason for the XP reduction is that the traditional farm maps used by many players put an incredibly high strain on the server’s CPU (this isn’t related to any memory leaks as some have suggested). It was causing everyone to have a degraded experience, which just isn’t fair.
In addition, some of you may have experienced issues editing and updating AE arcs you uploaded in the first week or so of the servers being online. This was caused by the AE databases not being shared by the different shards when we first brought Excelsior online. We’ve since rectified this issue and all new AE arcs are now fully accessible across all shards, but there are some older arcs that have been stuck in limbo.
We’re looking at various options for fixing this and aren’t completely certain on which route we’ll take first, but we would like to request that everyone make frequent offline backups of their AE content for the time being, as we may need to wipe some or all of the AE database in order to fully resolve this issue. If a wipe is required, we will give you a minimum of 3 days notice.
Rumours & Clarifications
This is a rather unfortunate topic, but one we need to tackle. Certain members of various groups have been spreading misinformation about the Homecoming servers, i25, and the Homecoming team, so we’d like to quickly clarify a few things.
Coming Soon...
Finally, a quick heads-up on what’s happening over the next week.
Patches
We intend to push out a client update at some point in the next few days with some fixes. We’ll be posting another announcement when the patch is ready, but we just wanted to make you all aware so you weren’t surprised by a sudden download!
As always, until Sunrise is released we recommend everyone sticks with Tequila & Island Rum. The patch should download and apply fine if you’re using other launchers, but we can’t guarantee it’ll work.
Server Changes
As you may have noticed we’ve had a couple of unstable periods and unscheduled maintenance windows lately. These have primarily been down to us experimenting with different configurations options to increase the performance and cost-efficiency of our set-up.
These are likely to continue for at least a couple more days, so apologies in advance for the inconvenience!
Stats
We are aware you guys want more stats in these posts. We’re working on a way to make stats easier for us to gather (doing it across 4 servers is a bit of a pain!) to satisfy your deepest statistical desires for future news posts.
That’s all for today! When the servers come up, be sure to… Go. Hunt. Kill Skuls.
- The Homecoming Team