// ==
// UAdminMod
// Version: 0.9.5 BETA
//
// Author: TBone
// Email: TBone(at)Fragskill.com
// Web: www.Fragskill.com
//
// Using this mutator as a base is PROHIBITED.
// Reworking and redistributing this mutator is PROHIBITED.
//
// Copyright (c) 2004.
// All rights reserved.
// ==
This release of UAdminMod is a public beta. There are no known
issues with any of the features, however, if you feel you have
found a bug, please email me as soon as possible so that it can
be investigated and resolved.
Ideas for features and feedback on current features is welcome
and highly encouraged. If you have something to say, please do
so in this thread at the Atari Server Administration forums:
[THREAD]
1. Description
2. Installation
3. Configuration (Includes Quickstart)
4. General Commands
5. Team Balancer
6. Reserved Slots
7. Server Messages
8. Automatic Login for Admins
9. Silent Admins
10. Name/Nick Filter
11. Reserved Nicks
12. Ping Watcher
13. Known Issues
14. Planned Features
15. Credits
1. Description
NOTE: RUNNING THIS MUTATOR WILL *NOT* DISQUALIFY YOUR SERVER
AS A "STANDARD SERVER"! DO NOT ADD THIS MUTATOR AS A SERVER
ACTOR! IT WILL NOT WORK PROPERLY IF YOU DO THAT!
Inspired by the orignal AdminMod from Half-Life, UAdminMod
was created to put the control of YOUR server back into
YOUR hands. UAdminMod provides Reserved Slot functionality,
a custom messaging system for displaying server messages,
a slew of commands to help keep your players "in line", a
team balancer, chat log, chat filter, nick/name filters, ping
watcher, silent administration, and even automatic admin login
when an admin joins the server. All of these features are
highly configurable and can easily be enabled/disabled.
All command usage, blocked nicks, etc, will be logged to
/UT2004/UserLogs/UAdminMod.log
NOTE: This mutator has a built-in feature to protect against
the Unreal Tournament 2004 server exploit detailed here: http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/9840/info/ . There is no
guarantee that UAdminMod will protect against this exploit.
2. Installation (Server Only)
NOTE: This mutator will not load in Single Player/Instant
Action. It's sole intended purpose is to be run on a UT2004
server (Listen or Dedicated).
To install this mutator, extract the following files to
UT2004's 'System' directory:
The UAdminModV095b.u.uz2 file is simply a compressed version
of the .u file. If you have a redirect server, place the
.uz2 file in the appropriate directory. Otherwise, discard
it. If you have absolutely no idea what I'm talking about,
discard it.
Next, you need to add the mutator to your ServerPackages.
Do this by opening your server's configuration file (usually
UT2004.ini) and finding the [Engine.GameEngine] section.
Somewhere in this section, add the following line:
ServerPackages=UAdminModV095b
Once you've done this, you need to tell your server to run
UAdminMod. This is just like running any other mutator. Add
it to your server's commandline and in the appropriate MapVote
settings (if you're using MapVote).
Commandline example:
ucc server CTF-Maul?game=xGame.xCTFGame?Mutator=UAdminModV095b.UAdminMod,DualAssaultRifles2k4.DualAssaultRifles log=server.log
Finally, you need to copy the contents of UAdminModV095bINI.txt
to your server's configuration file (UT2004.ini by default). If
you don't care about configuring UAdminMod at all, you can skip
this step; the settings will automatically be added to the file
the next time you start your server and UAdminMod will run with
its default settings.
3. Configuration (Server Only)
QUICKSTART:
Nothing *needs* to be configured. By default, all commands
will be available to admins and the balance teams command
will be available to all players. All command executions
will be logged to UT2004/UserLogs/UAdminMod.log, and the
rest of the features will be disabled.
SLOWSTART:
First off, each of the admin commands can be enabled or
disabled by setting bEnabled to true or false in their
respective section. This is pretty self-explanatory. For
instance, to disable the uam_slay command, go to the
section labeled [UAdminModV095b.UAMSlay] and change bEnabled
to false.
Some sections (ie, [UAdminModV095b.UAMBalanceTeams]) have
a setting called bAdminCmdOnly. When false, any user can
execute the command. When true, a user must be logged in
as an admin in order to execute the command. By default,
anyone can run the balance teams command, help command,
and players command. All other commands are restricted to
administrators only.
Another item to note is bUseAdminName. This only pertains
to punishment commands (slay, slap, llama, etc). It defaults
to true, which means that the server message broadcasted
will include the admin's name... ie, "Frogger froze TBone". If
false, the admin's name will not be revealed (though the log
of the command will have the admin's name)... ie, "an Admin
froze TBone".
Most sections and properties relating to UAdminMod are
pretty self-explanatory, but here are some details. The specific
sub-systems of UAdminMod are described in their respective
sections.
[UAdminModV095b.UAdminMod]
bNotifyOfUAM=true
If true, a message will be broadcast to your players that
the server is running UAdminMod. The frequency of this
broadcast is determined by iNotifyInterval.
iNotifyInterval=300
The frequency (in seconds) that users are notified that
your server is running UAdminMod. It is set to every
300 seconds by default.
[UAdminModV095b.UAMBroadcastHandler]
bLogChat=False
If true, all chat is logged to /UserLogs/UAdminMod.log.
bFilterChat=False
If true, chat will be filtered for the words you
specify.
BadWords=?
You can add a BadWords entry for every word you want
bleeped out of the chat. You can have up to 50 entries.
Adding a BadWords entry is just like a CustomMessages
entry or a ServerPackages entry.
[UAdminModV095b.UAMSlap]
iSlapDamage = 10
This is the amount of damage done to a target player
when slapped.
fSlapMomentum = 100000.000000
This is the amount of momentum the target player receives
from a slap. I do not recommend setting this higher than
100000.000000; otherwise, you're pushing people halfway
across the map.
[UAdminModV095b.UAMFreeze]
iMaxFreezeTime=20
This is the maximum amount of time a player will remain
frozen. Once this time has elapsed, they will be dealt
with in accordance to bDeathAfterFreeze...
bDeathAfterFreeze=true
If true, the player will be killed if iMaxFreezeTime
elapses before someone else kills them. If false, they
will be "unfrozen" without being killed at the end of
iMaxFreezeTime... but that's no fun, so leave it set to
true.
[UAdminModV095b.UAMGameRules]
bAllowFFAgainstFrozen=true
If true, frozen players can be hurt/killed by their team
for the duration of their freeze. I put this option in
since most times, an unscrupulous player is typically
hurting his own team rather than the enemy, so it's his
own team who should get the revenge. Setting this to
true will not prevent the other team from hurting or
killing him - it just also allows his own team to come
after him.
bAllowFrozenSuicide=false
When false, frozen players will not be allowed to suicide.
If you set this to true, frozen players will be allowed to
kill themselves if they are frozen. That sort of defeats
the purpose of being frozen, so I recommend leaving this
set to false.
[UAdminModV095b.UAMBalanceTeams]
bAdminCmdOnly=false
If false, any player can execute the command. If true,
players must be logged in as an admin to use it.
NOTE: bEnabled for UAMBalanceTeams only refers to the enabling
of the MUTATE UAM_TEAMS command. This setting is independant
from the rest of the UAMBalanceTeams options (aka, Team Balancer).
NOTE #2: UAdminMod no longer broadcasts the availability of the
balance teams command at a regular interval. The reason for this
is I decided that it was only necessary to inform players that
the command is even available is if someone is complaining about
the teams in the first place. So, if I say "even the stupid teams!"
in the chat area, UAdminMod will broadcast the availability of the
command to all players. Of course, if I just type "teams",
UAdminMod will attempt to balance the teams (if bEnabled is True and
bAdminCmdOnly is false; or if I'm an admin).
The rest of the configuration deals with each particular section. All
of them are disabled by default, so if you don't need/want them, you
are finished.
4. General Commands
When applicable, 'PlayerID' refers to the target player's unique
player ID. These IDs can be obtained by typing MUTATE UAM_PLAYERS
in your console, or UAM_PLAYERS into your chat. 'PlayerName' refers
to the player's name or part of his/her name. Executing a command
against 'bon' will match 'TBone', 'Ebony', and 'James_Bond'.
When specifying a command by player name, you must specify at least 3
characters of that player's name. Remember: anyone who's name
contains those 3 (or more) characters will receive the command.
Commands can be issued/executed in two ways: through the console or
through your chat.
Command: UAM_HELP
Description: Displays the list of UAdminMod commands in
the console.
Command: UAM_PLAYERS
Description: Displays a list of players and their player
IDs in the console.
Command: UAM_SWITCH <TARGET>
Description: Moves target to the other team.
Command: UAM_FREEZE <TARGET>
Description: Prevents target from moving until they respawn. How
long they are frozen depends on how you've configured
the command.
Command: UAM_LLAMA <TARGET> / UAM_UNLLAMA <TARGET>
Description Changes name to "Llama" and prevents them from speaking
coherently... Oorgle! Players will have the ability to
change their names back to whatever they please, but
they will not be able to speak "well" until you
uam_unllama them. There is a max of 25 entries in the
llama list. Once the list is full, the oldest entry is
removed to make room for a new entry. If/when you
unllama a player, their name will be changed back to
their original name.
Command: UAM_MUTE <TARGET> / UAM_UNLLAMA <TARGET>
Description Changes name to "Muted" and prevents them from speaking
at all. Players will have the ability to change their
names back to whatever they please, but they will not be
able to speak until you uam_unmute them. There is a max
of 25 entries in the mute list. Once the list is full,
the oldest entry is removed to make room for a new entry.
If/when you unmute a player, their name will be changed
back to their original name.
Command: UAM_RESETSCORE <TARGET>
Description: Resets their score to 0. Useful if someone is exploiting
a map or something of the like, and is just racking up
points.
Command: UAM_SLAP <TARGET>
Usage: [mutate|Say|TeamSay] uam_slap [PlayerID|PlayerName]
Description: Slaps them and detracts a small amount of health
(10 hit points by default).
Command: UAM_SLAY <TARGET>
Description: Kills them. Use with mercy. Between the deafening
thunder, the blinding lightning, and the Sphere of Death,
getting slayed really sucks.
Command: UAM_TEAMS
Description: Evens the teams. If one team has 2 or more players than
the other team, UAdminMod will begin shifting players over
to the shorthanded team, beginning with the newest player
to join. By default, this is a public command. You do not
need to be logged in as admin to use it, however, admins
can disable the public use of this and restrict it to
admins only.
Command: UAM_VOMIT <TARGET>
Description: Causes them to chuck all of his/her inventory. They will
not be able to pick up anything until they respawn.
Have some cool ideas for more commands? Let me know!!!
5. Team Balancer
Thanks to excellent community feedback, UAdminMod now has a VERY
robust set of features and options for keeping your teams even.
Locate the section [UAdminModV095b.UAMBalanceTeams] in your server's
configuration file.
bBalanceOnPlayerExit=False
When true, UAdminMod will examine the teams whenever someone
exits. If they are uneven, UAdminMod will balance the teams
according to the standard rules (moving the newest player on
the overloaded team over to the shorthanded team, wash rinse
repeat until teams are even).
bMonitorTeamSwitches=False
When true, UAdminMod will monitor team switches and take
various actions on them depending on the circumstances. What
actions are taken depend on bReportOnTeamSwitchesand
bUndoBadSwitches. See below;
bReportOnTeamSwitches=False
If bMonitorTeamSwitches is True and bReportOnTeamSwitches is
True, UAdminMod will broadcast team change events to other
players to make them aware of what's happened. For instance,
if someone changes from the winning team to the losing team,
a message will be broadcasted informing other players of his
good deed. If a player switches to the winning team, a
message will be broadcasted informing players of his treachery.
If a player switches teams in an effort to balance them, that
will also be broadcast on appropriately.
bUndoBadSwitches=False
(This is only applicable if bMonitorTeamSwitches is True) If
bUndoBadSwitches is True, then UAdminMod will undo team changes
that were considered "bad", such as switching to the winning
team or unevening the teams.
bEnabled=True
THIS OPTION ONLY REFERS TO THE AVAILABILITY OF THE UAM_TEAMS
COMMAND. IT IS INDEPENDANT OF EVERYTHING MENTIONED ABOVE.
bAdminCmdOnly=False
THIS OPTION ONLY REFERS TO THE AVAILABILITY OF THE UAM_TEAMS
COMMAND. IT IS INDEPENDANT OF EVERYTHING MENTIONED ABOVE.
bAdminsImmune=True
This option affects everything to do with team balancing,
whether it's the uam_teams command or the internal monitoring
system. When True, admins will not be evaluated by the system,
their switches will not be undone, and they will not be used
to help balance the teams.
6. Reserved Slots
This system is implemented via UAdminMod's custom AccessControl.
This is derived from Unreal Tournament 2004's Advanced
Administration system and does not modify any existing
functionality; it ONLY adds the reserved slots functionality
and the ability for admins to be automatically logged in.
In order to use this feature, you must first tell your server
to use this AccessControl class instead of the default one.
Note that by doing this, you will inherently be using the Advanced
Administration system. If you do not want to use the Advanced
Administration system and only wish to use the Basic
Administration system, then ignore this entire section... but you
won't be able to use reserved slots or have admins automatically
logged in when they enter the server.
If you are unsure of which system your server uses, look under
the [Engine.GameInfo] section in your server's ini file. If
the AccessControlClass is set to Engine.AccessControl, then
your server uses the BASIC system. If it is set to
XAdmin.AccessControlIni, then your server uses the ADVANCED
system. Keep in mind that this can also be set in your
server's start-up commandline, and that will override the
setting in your ini file. If you find that UAdminMod's
access control is not being loaded, make sure you're not
overriding the ini setting in the start-up commandline.
So, without further ado...
Change the AccessControlClass under [Engine.GameInfo] to
UAdminModV095b.UAMAccessControlIni
If you did this properly, you'll see the following text in your
server's log/console at start-up:
You may see additional text inside the block, but that's okay.
As long as the block appears, you're good to go.
Next, locate the section [UAdminModV095b.UAMAccessControlIni]
Here are the settings and their default values:
bEnableReservedSlots=False
The reserved slots system is off by default. To turn it
on, change this to True.
bMakeRoomByKicking=True
When false, the server will make a reserved slot by adding
a slot to the server for the player joining. This new spot
will be eliminated automatically when someone leaves. The
server will create new slots as long as iMaxExpansion has
not been exceeded. Once iMaxExpansion has been reached,
even players with reserved slots will be unable to join.
If you set this to true, then the reserved slot will be
created by kicking the last player to join the server who
is not an admin and who does not posses a reserved slot.
Folks who rent their servers from a host are advised to
use this option to avoid exceeding their agreed upon player
limit. That is why True is the default value.
bUsePassword=True
When true, players will be prompted to enter a password in
order to access a reserved slot.
When false, reserved slots will only be given to players
who's player ID hash is listed in this section
(ie, ReservedHash=1234567890, see ReservedHash below if
you set this to False).
NOTE: When someone enters the server with a reserved slot
by entering a password, their hash will be stored to the
configuration file. This will prevent them from ever
being kicked off the server when other players with
reserved slots join.
iMaxExpansion=5
This is the max number of additional slots the server will
create for reserved slots. If bMakeRoomByKicking is true,
this setting is irrelevant.
sReservedSlotPW=
This is the password for accessing a reserved slot. For
your protection, the default value is an empty value and
if you don't set it but you set bUsePassword to True,
UAdminMod will disable the reserved slots system. If you
control access by using the password option
(bUsePassword=True), you MUST specify a password.
sOldReservedSlotPW=
Do not modify this. This is used internally to track
changes to sReservedSlotPW. For instance, if you have 10
player hashes in your config file and you want to change
sReservedSlotPW, then UAdminMod will detect the password
change and reset the ReservedHash values so that players
without the new password cannot join. Once they join with
the new password, their hash will be re-added to the list.
Now, if bUsePassword is false, this is ignored. If
bUsePassword is false, changing either of the password
values will have no effect.
ReservedHash=1234567890
You can add up to 25 ReservedHashes.
Adding a new reserved hash is just like adding a
ServerPackage: Simply create a new line in
[UAdminModV095b.UAMAccessControlIni]:
ReservedHashes=23s83s83kdfhfkg83484kdkfg3494
If bUsePassword is true, ReservedHash entries will be made
by UAdminMod to track players who have supplied the correct
reserved slot password. This ensures that they are never
kicked by another player accessing a reserved slot.
if bUsePassword is false, these lines are used by you to
enter the hashes of players who you want to have reserved
slot access.
To obtain your hash, open UT2004.log in your /UT2004/System
directory. Look for a line like "id=1212445lksdlsdfsfeee".
That is your hash. So, let's suppose your hash was
1234567890: You would then add the following line:
ReservedHash=1234567890
The existing ReservedHash=1234567890 in the file is just
an example line. You can change/delete it if you wish.
If you exceed 25 ReservedHashes, UAdminMod will begin
pruning the oldest entries from the list until it is
back to 25.
PrivClasses=XAdmin.xKickPrivs
PrivClasses=XAdmin.xGamePrivs
PrivClasses=XAdmin.xUserGroupPrivs
PrivClasses=XAdmin.xExtraPrivs
DO NOT MODIFY THESE!
bAutoAdminLogin=False
See Automatic Login for Admins for more information.
NOTE: If your server is already password protected, then the
Reserved Slots password will suffice as a game password. For
instance, if your server's password is 'abc' and your reserved
slots password is '123', then '123' will get you into the server
as a catch-all password IF IT'S FULL. If the server is not at
capacity, the reserved slot password will not work.
If there are additional features you would like added to the
reserved slots system, please let me know. I will entertain all
(reasonable) requests.
7. Server Messages
This feature allows you to set your server to broadcast up to 25
messages which rotate at a given interval. You can specify how
long they're displayed, their color, and their frequency.
To configure Server Messages (aka, Custom Messages), locate the
[UAdminModV095b.UAMCustomMessages] section of your server's
configuration file.
bEnabled=False
If True, server messages are enabled.
bDspInChat=False
If False, server messages will be displayed on their own line
just underneath the chat area. If set to True, server messages
will be broadcast just like chat messages are, so they will
blend in with chat/death messages. I recommend leaving this
at False, since your server messages are likely to be more
noticed this way. Plus, if you have UAdminMod treat your
server messages like regular chat messages, your fMsgDuration
and MsgColor settings will not take effect.
bMsgBeep=True
If True, players will hear a short beep when a server message
is displayed.
iMsgInterval=240
This is the interval at which server messages are broadcast.
fMsgDuration=10.0
If bDspInChat is False, this setting dictates how long a
server message is displayed.
MsgColor=(R=255,G=255,B=0,A=255)
If bDspInChat is False, this setting dictates the color of a
server message.
CustomMessages=You can add up to 25 of these.
These are the actual server messages. To add new messages,
just add another CustomMessages=EnterMessageHere line to this
section of your config. You can have up to 25 server messages.
If you exceed 25, UAdminMod will prune old messages until
you're back to 25.
8. Automatic Login for Admins
This system allows admins to have themselves automatically
logged in as admin whenever they join the server.
Just like the Reserved Slots sytem, Auto Login for Admins is also
dependant on UAdminModV095b.UAMAccessControlIni. Even if you don't
want to use Reserved Slots, you'll need to use this access control
class to use Auto Login for Admins. Even though the two features
are unrelated to eachother, both depend on this class. For
information on setting your server up to use this class, see
Reserved Slots.
So... assuming you've told your server to use UAdminMod's access
control class, setting up Automatic Login for Admins is cake.
Simply find the [UAdminModV095b.UAMAccessControlIni] section in
your server's config and set bAutoAdminLogin to True. This will
turn the system on. HOWEVER, a small change has been made to
this system in this version. Instead of automatically remembering
admins as soon as they log in, admins now have the OPTION of
having themselves automatically logged in the next time they
join. Make sure you tell your admins about this.
To have yourself automatically logged in the next time you join
the server:
1. Log in as admin like you normally would.
2. Enter MUTATE UAM_SAVE in your console (or just uam_save in
the chat area). You'll receive a confirmation.
To cancel the automatic login for yourself:
1. Make sure you're logged in as admin (you normally will be,
since it automatically logged you in, but in case you logged
yourself out, you'll need to log back in to issue the command).
2. Enter MUTATE UAM_FORGET in your console (or just uam_forget
in the chat area). You'll receive a confirmation.
UAdminMod will remember up to 25 admins' login info. If you
exceed 25 AdminRecords, UAdminMod will begin pruning the oldest
entries from the list until it is back to 25.
9. Silent Admins
This system relies on the UAMAccessControlIni class. If your
server does not use this class as its AccessControl, you cannot
use this feature. See Reserved Slots for more information
regarding this.
Silent Admins allows you to silently admin your server. When
on, players will not be notified when admins log in or log out.
Furthermore, the text "ADMIN" will not be displayed on the
scoreboard. There will be no way for players to tell if any-
one is logged in as admin.
To turn this on, find the [UAdminModV095b.UAMAccessControlIni]
section of your server's configuration file, and set
bEnableSilentAdmin to True.
> See Known Issues for information regarding a possible bug in the
Silent Admin system.
10. Name/Nick Filter
UAdminMod has a feature that allows you to prevent players with
certain words/characters in their name from joining your server.
You can even set UAdminMod to ban such players.
This feature requires caution on your part. Be VERY careful
about the values you screen from your server. You don't want
to accidentally prevent half the players from entering your
server because you specified "elf" instead of "[Elf]" in your
blocked nicks list.
Find the [UAdminModV095b.UAdminMod] section and note these
settings:
bEnabled=False
This feature is off by default. Enable it by setting this
to True.
BlockedNicks=[Elf]
BlockedNicks=[ELF]
This is a list of blocked nicks. You can have up to
50 nicks in this list.
Adding a new nick is just like adding a ServerPackage:
Simply create a new line in [UAdminModV095b.UAdminMod]:
BlockedNicks=Value
Out of the gate, UAdminMod filters the tag [Elf] and [ELF].
If you do not wish to filter Elf members from your server,
remove these two lines. They exist as an example of how
to use this feature. Note that "[Elf]" and "[ELF]" are
not the same. These values are case-sensitive.
When entering new values, BE AS SPECIFIC AS POSSIBLE!
If you want to prevent a certain clan from entering your
server, make sure you enter their tag EXACTLY as they wear
it, including the brackets, case, etc. If your values are
too non-specific, you'll unintentionally prevent others from
entering your server. This is why I only recommend using this
feature if you have a very specific person or persons you
need to block, but you haven't yet had the chance to ban them.
bBanBadNicks=False
If False, players who's names match a value in your
BlockedNicks list will only be kicked from your server; they
will not be banned. They will receive a friendly message
explaining exactly why they were prevented from entering, and
they will receive the admin's email address.
If True, however, players who's names match a value in your
BlockedNicks list will be permanently banned from your
server. Due to a small bug in Unreal Tournament 2004's
ban system, I was unable to present banned players with a
custom message explaining why they were banned. As a result,
they will receive the generic ban message. However, if they
were kicked, they WILL receive the UAdminMod blocked-nick
message.
Due to the nature of this feature, I urge extreme caution using
it. I was very hesitant to include it, but it's here for the sake
of completeness.
11. Reserved Nicks
Reserved Nicks is similar to the Nick Filter, except now we're looking
for nicks that belong to specific player id's instead of ones that are
forbidden in general. This is really useful if you want to make sure
that only your clan members can wear your clan tag, or if you want to
make sure no one can impersonate an admin or respected community
member.
Players are scanned when they first join the game and at a given
interval (iScanFrequency) thereafter (to check for mid-game name
changes).
ReservedNicks=(PlayerHash="1234567890",PlayerNick="TBone")
This entry exists by default and is just an example. You can
remove it if you'd like. In this example, no one will be permitted
to have "TBone" as their nick or have it ANYWHERE IN THEIR NICK.
This means that TBone is reserved as well as UberTBone. As you may
guess, reserving "bob" or "me" would produce undesireable results.
ReservedNicks should be as specific as possible.
You can also use this to secure your clan tags. Each member of
your clan will need an entry. Let's suppose you want to lock down
clan {HTM} on your server AND lock down the master admin nick:
No one can use Frogger except abcdefg, and no one can use {HTM}
except abcdefg, 1234567, and 0987654.
You can have up to 50 entries in this list. Add the entry just like
you would a ServerPackage, ServerActor, or ReservedSlot.
iScanFrequency=120
This is the frequency, in seconds, that UAdminMod validates every-
one's nicks against the ReservedNicks list.
iWarnings=1
This is the number of warnings a player will get before they are
kicked. For instance, if I join Frogger's server as {HTM}TBone,
I will be warned immediately. If iWarnings is 1, I will receive
a warning and have iScanFrequency seconds to change it to something
else. If iWarnings is 2, I will have 360 seconds to change it and
will receive two warnings. Of course, if iWarnings is 0 (not
recommended), I'll be kicked as soon as I join.
When a player is kicked by the Reserved Nicks system, they will receive
the reason in the kick message.
12. Ping Watcher
PingWatch scans all players' pings every iScanFrequency seconds.
For reference:
HPB - High Ping Bastard. These are players who's pings are
considered high relative to the other players on the server.
In some cases, an HPB (or a few of them together) can cause lag
for the whole server.
LPB - Low Ping Bastard. These are players who's pings are considered
really low relative to the other players on the server. Server/
Client netspeeds aside, they don't lag the server... but some feel
that they have an unfair advantage. The option is here for the sake
of completeness.
For any given player, their current ping is stored and an average is
established based on the number of scans that have been done for them
individually. Once iMinScansForAction has been reached for that player,
their average ping is evaluated for being too high or too low. If their
AVERAGE ping breaches a threshold, they are kicked (short spikes will
not count against them). If they are kicked, the event is logged
(/UserLogs/UAdminMod.log) and they are shown a message explaining why
they were kicked.
Note that if bCheckForServerLag is True (which I highly recommend), the
average ping on the server will be taken into account before reviewing
anyone's pings. If UAdminMod determines that the server is lagging, the
event will be logged and the current scan will be aborted.
Lastly, in any given scan, any player with a ping of 999 or 0 will be
ignored since 0 or 999 represents other things going on rather than a
poor connection. Also, scans will not take place prior to match start or
after the match has ended.
The settings for Ping Watcher are described below, but aside from setting
iMaxPing, I recommend leaving them alone. The defaults have been heavily
tested and offer the most accurate calculations on a given player's ping
over the course of a game. They've been tweaked to all but eliminate a
player from being unfairly kicked while still keeping the pings on your
server within a reasonable level. Remember: leaving iMaxPing at 999
effectively disables any checking for high pings, while leaving iMinPing
at 0 effectively disables any checking for low pings. I recommend
leaving iMinPing at 0 and setting iMaxPing somewhere between 250 and 300.
bEnabled=False
If True, the utility is enabled. Shocking, I know.
bCheckForServerLag=True
If True, PingWatch will make sure the server isn't lagging
(and thus responsible for players' high pings) before it validates
pings. The way it does this is somewhat crude (but effective): It
checks everyone's pings, and if the average ping on the server is
greater than iMaxPing, it aborts the current scan. I would NEVER
set this to False unless you want to be REALLY strict and are
POSITIVE your server will never be the cause of lag.
bIgnoreHighAndLow=True
Similar to bCheckForServerLag, this is a measure designed to prevent
people from being kicked when their ping average isn't entirely
accurate due to a short spike on their line. By leaving this on,
players' high ping and low ping will be removed from their ping
average. This results in a more accurate ping average over time.
bAdminsImmune=True
Self-explanatory.
iMaxPing=999
This is the threshold for kicking HPB's. Leaving it at 999
disables checking for HPB's. If you want to enable this, here is
a basic set of guidelines:
If it were my server, I'd probably set it somewhere between 225
and 300, but that's just me.
iMinPing=0
This is the threshold for kicking LPB's. Leaving it at 0
essentially disables checking for LPB's.
Setting this at all makes no sense to me, so do I can't really
offer any guidelines here.
iScanFrequency=20
This is the frequency, in seconds, that PingWatch scans players'
pings.
iMinScansForAction=4 & iWarnings=1
This is the minimum number of scans on a given player before
action is taken on them for AVERAGING a too high/low ping. If
you leave these two settings at 4 and 1 respectively, then no
one player will be kicked until the SIXTH scan. That's 4
scans + 1 warning = 5 scans. After the fifth scan, they are
fair game. Let's suppose their average ping doesn't climb
above iMaxPing until the 20th scan, but they've had no warnings.
Well, they'll receive a warning on the 21st scan and, if their
ping hasn't dropped by the 22nd scan, they'll be booted on the
22nd scan.
iMinPlayers=4
This is the minimum number of players that need to be on the
server before Ping Watcher will begin scanning and tracking
pings. If you have a large server (say, 10+ players) and
decent bandwidth, you may not care to start scanning unless
the player count reaches a certain percentage of that. If
my server had a capacity of 16 players, I probably wouldn't
start scanning pings until it reached 8 players. Why?
Because even if someone is lagging, I want them on my server
to help attract more players. When more players arrive, then
we can let him/her go! If you want to disable this option,
just set it to 0.
iScanDelay=90
I strongly recommend not altering this setting. This is the
amount of time a player can play on a server before they'll
be included in the ping scans. Because a lot of information
is pushed down to the client when they first connect (this is
AFTER they've received any mutators and/or maps), their pings
are higher for a short while (30 seconds or less usually)
after connecting. This delays scanning them until all of that
stuff has been pushed down to them. If you're running a 1-on-1
DM server, you can probably set this to 20 or 30 seconds. For
large ONS servers, leave it at 90.
A few notes:
a. Players are evaluated based on their average ping over time...
not one specific ping. For instance, if the server's maximum
allowable ping is 200 and I have 6 scans done on myself that found
pings of 50, 65, 70, 45, 250 (spike on my ISP), and 60 respectively,
my AVERAGE ping would be 90 - I will not be kicked or warned.
b. bCheckForServerLag is important. I seriously recommend leaving
this alone. Let's take an extreme example: Suppose over the course
of 6 scans I have pings of 50, 65, 750, 630, 65, 70... but on the
third and forth scans (750 and 630), half of the server's players had
similar pings. Well, assuming the server's maximum allowable ping is
still set at 200, I might be concerned about getting kicked. Wrong.
Those third and forth scans would be completely discarded for everyone,
since it's pretty apparent that it was server lag that caused my pings
to shoot through the roof. HOWEVER, if the server had disabled
bCheckForServerLag, those two scans would be factored in and half the
server's players would have artifically inflated average pings (mine
would be 272), and we would be kicked if those two scans pushed our
averages above the threshold. Now, that's an extreme example... scans
take place every 20 seconds by default, so one or two high scans aren't
going to impact the average much, but it still helps to keep this
option on.
c. bIgnoreHighAndLow can be set to false to make your server a little
more strict. Setting this to false won't have the landslide negative
effects that setting bCheckForServerLag to false could... it just
tightens things up a little. To explain how it works, lets use the
following example:
Suppose I've been on a server for 3 minutes. If iScanFrequency is
set at 30 seconds, I will have had 6 scans by now. Here are the
results of those scans:
1. 60ms
2. 100ms
3. 70ms
4. 80ms
5. 850ms
6. 75ms
AVG: 206ms
It's obvious that I had a little spike on my line during the 5th
scan, and most server admins probably wouldn't want to have me
kicked, even if their threshold is set at 200ms (which, by the
way, is a little strict). Well, if you toss out the 1st and 5th
scan (remember, both the high and the low are thrown out with this
option on), my average is now 81ms - which is a far more accurate
representation of my connection than 206ms is. I'm now far from
getting kicked.
13. Known Issues
There *might* be a bug in the silent admin system that can cause a
General Protection Fault (GPF) on client machines (not the server).
The testers and myself have not been able to reproduce this on more
than one server, let alone at will. Three servers ran fine with no
issues, while one server caused clients to experience the GPF. Because
of this, I have not been able to determine the origin of the bug, or
even determine if the bug is a result of UAM or a configuration setting
on the server that experienced it.
If you are concerned about this and do not wish to be a guinea pig,
simply leave bSilentAdmin set to FALSE. If the bug is in fact due
to UAdminMod, leaving bSilentAdmin set to false will bypass it.
I would be grateful to anyone who chooses to turn this feature on in
order to help determine if this is a bug in UAdminMod. If you decide
to turn it on, please email me and let me know the results. I've been
unable to duplicate the problem on my own server or three out of four
of our beta testers' servers. Additional input from you would be very
beneficial to the development of this feature.
Other than that, there are no known issues.
14. Planned Features
a. Issue commands from server console/web admin.
b. Menu system for quick command execution.
c. Optional auto-demorec.
d. uam_clan TeamID Tag: This will move everyone with Tag over
to team TeamID, and the rest of the server to the other team.
Calling this command will automatically disable team balancing,
since the teams will likely be thrown out the window when this
command is issued.
e. Web Admin interface for all configurable options.
f. Have an idea? Email me! I will cater to any request that is
applicable to the majority of servers/admins.
15. Credits
Frogger, Nihilist, and J4K0BYT3 for assisting with the closed BETA
testing.
Zielbetrag
