can an 'official' server go private?

[Red_Ensign 990]

dayz la 4-001, gone now from my favorites list, and now a private server is showing up (and I haven't favorited any private servers)

 

I have considerable private an public camps there... what the fuck

[Etherious 907]

Not that I know. I am more than sure they don't change.

[Red_Ensign 990]

Not that I know. I am more than sure they don't change.

 

one (dayz la 4-012) changed from 3pp to 1pp without warning, giving my 3pp gear to my 1pp character

[stonecutter357 17]

there are no official servers .

[Rags! 1966]

Only Zuul.

[Etherious 907]

one (dayz la 4-012) changed from 3pp to 1pp without warning, giving my 3pp gear to my 1pp character

Well, I mean from public to private. 

[Mookie (original) 799]

Red - my commiserations. As discussed a lot recently, this is a bit of a problem for the whole persistence project....

[NickyN 1]

OP what happened to you is retarded. Similiar thing happened to me though. One of the supposedly official servers just up and died with no warning or reason. Along with my whole stash of several barrels stuffed with various things like suppressors, grenades and so on. Seems like we're back to the point in time when only gear that is on you is somewhat safe.

[mercules 1290]

If it was a public server it probably shut down and the host gave the space to a new server, this one private, that uses the same IP address so comes up in your favorites. 

[Komalt 27]

Yes it absolutely can.  Just as Mercules has just said before me, this happens.  It deletes your old camps and it is a shame.  I hope the developers at Bohemia Interactive see this post because it is a problem that happens, and when it happens to new players it is extremely discouraging.  There needs to be REAL official servers that can never change hands and will always keep the same persistence up.  For the sake of the game,  I mean if every server can go down even the supposed "official" ones then where is the longevity?  It is not an exaggeration to say the biggest risk to losing your camp is not a player finding it in game, but from a server going down due to someone buying a server from a server provider.

 

 I hope this will be fixed this as development progresses. This can't happen especially when basebuilding makes it in the game, all your work can just disappear without any warning, what kind of 'MMO' is this? (Of course DayZ is not a real MMO but it is marketed as such, at the very least you could provide dedicated servers that won't delete your work at any moment)

 

The server providers can still do what they do now but these servers should be clearly designated that they are able to change hands at a moments notice when someone buys one of their servers. 

Edited January 14, 2016 by Komalt

[yazar8 584]

It is funny how Bohemia forces GSPs to host official servers but those GSPs can not keep hold of them.

[boneboys 7988]

It is funny how Bohemia forces GSPs to host official servers but those GSPs can not keep hold of them.

:facepalm:

 

Really, I don't think GSP's were forced into anything that was not agreed and signed without reading the _{^{small print}}.

[yazar8 584]

:facepalm:

 

Really, I don't think GSP's were forced into anything that was not agreed and signed without reading the _{^{small print}}.

 

I heard that each GSP has to host a fixed amount of official servers first in order them to rent servers to real customers.

 

Otherwise why do we have official servers at the first place?

[ColdAtrophy 1850]

I have had two public servers on my favorites list switch over to private servers since the beginning of .59. 

[q.S Sachiel 470]

To clarify, is there any confusion about continuity of official vs public servers?  I don't rely too heavily on 'persistance' outside of gear, so wouldn't know if things change. The distinction however is important and has been an issue in other threads / conversations rgs: DayZ servers however.

 

It seems like the distinction is made in 'Scope' and 'Introduction' just wanted to be sure...

Edited January 15, 2016 by q.S Sachiel

[bingo_fuel 205]

I agree! The official servers are hard to find and remembering a long generic name to know what server has your camp is also annoying.

Imho the official server situation should be improved before mod support comes in. Otherwise it will be really hard to find vanilla dayz servers.

[SMoss 2101]

There's some good feedback here which can be taken into account going forwards. It is of course important that continuity is upheld later on, but for now, there is still so much work being conducted on DayZ that progression is not guaranteed.

[boneboys 7988]

@Observer71

To find your content go to Profile and select My Content.
Deleting your previous post will only result in infractions points as will spamming.
Use the Search Function before making another Topic.
 
Merged...(x2).

https://forums.dayzgame.com/index.php?/topic/153786-forum-rules-roles-and-guidelines/#entry1542144

[Red_Ensign 990]

There's some good feedback here which can be taken into account going forwards. It is of course important that continuity is upheld later on, but for now, there is still so much work being conducted on DayZ that progression is not guaranteed.

 

a day's notice in the server's messages would have made this no problem.  I could've just moved if that one thing had been done.

[Komalt 27]

 

I.  Introduction

There is a major problem affecting official servers. Some server instances go offline permanently and without warning, or otherwise permanently discard their persistence files. This means that players can lose access to the persistence files that represent all of their progress. Therefore, it is important for official server instances to meet a condition I will call continuity: the instance should remain online, preferably with the same hostname and IP address, and maintain the same persistence file.

There are reasons why an official server instance may be taken offline. The game service providers (GSPs) are the ones who host these servers, and their contractual obligations to host are limited to whatever is in the agreements between them and Bohemia. This discussion will include what is known about those contracts, and make recommendations as to what kind of commitments Bohemia should gain from the GSPs (namely, that continuity of official instances should be guaranteed under some conditions).

 

 

II.  Scope

It should be made clear what is meant by the term official servers: those server instances which the GSPs provide to the public and which do not have administrative rights rented out to some other party. Official servers are on the public hives, but not all servers on the public hives are official. Servers that have administrative rights rented out to some other party are not considered official for the purposes of this discussion, even if they are on the public hive (whether or not this should even be allowed, and under what conditions, will not be considered here).

 

 

III.  Number of Official Instances Decreasing

It is believed that one contractual obligation of the GSPs is to host some number of official instances, but that number may change over time based on some other factors. Presumably this is one reason why official instances sometimes go offline.

From the perspective of the players who use official servers, there are some important things to be considered here. Ideally, the players would simply want the servers to be continuous forever and unconditionally. Since running instances costs scarce resources, the GSPs will likely want to shut down instances when they are no longer obligated to run them.

In order to provide the best product for its customers, Bohemia should arrange for continuity as long as is possible, but if conditions dictate that some official instances will be taken offline, then there should be as much warning provided as possible before it is done.

At the present stage in development, the developers periodically wipe the character database and all persistence files. Presumably this will no longer be true at some time in the future, or at least the frequency of these wipes will be greatly reduced, but for the present time this provides a possible arrangement to address the continuity issue. Any changes that need to be made to the number of official instances being run can be made at a time when such wipes are done. If the frequency of these wipes is not high enough to satisfy the GSPs (or a stage of development when such wipes no longer occur arrives), another prearranged periodic time frame can be figured out with Bohemia so that any upcoming changes can be publicized in advance, and users will at least have the opportunity to decide how to act if some of the servers they use are condemned.

 

 

IV.  Renters Displacing Official Instances

There is another type of event that will apparently cause some official instances to go offline: the renting of an instance by some other party. There have been many observations at various GSPs of the instance found at a particular IP address changing from an official instance to one rented and configured by another party. This is especially problematic for several reasons.

First, the process GSPs use to carry this out is probably automated, so this means that official servers can be subject to entirely arbitrary actions by any random party at any time that can cause the deletion, or least abandonment or movement, of their persistence files.

Second, it is believed that one of the factors that determines the number of official instances a GSP is obligated to host is the number of instances that that GSP rents out – but the numbers are supposedly positively proportional. Thus it does not make sense that an increase in the number of rented instances should result in a decrease in the number of official instances. It is possible that for some reason the newly rented instance gets the IP address of an existing official instance and then an even greater number of official instances are launched at some other addresses, but this would be bizarre and reckless behavior as it unnecessarily violates continuity. It is also possible that the GSP does not even launch a greater number of official instances elsewhere – which would constitute a violation of its contractual obligations if that clause is correctly understood here. Whatever is going on here, Bohemia should rectify the situation to ensure continuity as this severely affects the quality of service its customers are receiving.

 

 

V.  Identification of Official Instances

Another tangential problem is that of identifying official servers in the first place. Bohemia has not publicized, or at least not very well, a good way for players to identify official servers as opposed to servers that may have had administrative rights rented out to a potentially interested player-party (who may even intentionally delete the persistence file). The only vague recommendation I recall seeing from an official source [https://feedback.dayz.com/view.php?id=28178] has been to look for hostnames that look like they are formatted in a particular way. No rigorous description of the format was given, and non-official servers can be configured to imitate such a format anyway.

There is supposedly a rule that binds renters of instances not to imitate official servers, but it seems that that rule is not enforced: I have observed multiple servers with hostnames in a seemingly official format but which seemed to be implying false information upon closer inspection. It cannot be expected for players to report such violations in order to have action taken, since most players are likely unaware of the rule in general, and furthermore the whole problem is that it is difficult to definitively identify whether or not a server truly is official to begin with.

Displaying a badge or other kind of certification that indicates official status in the server browser would be far better for players rather than depending on vague formatting guidelines.

 

 

VI.  Conclusion

Bohemia arranges for the provision of official servers presumably because it is in their interest as a business to offer the best possible canonical game experience for their customers. The GSPs accept the obligation of hosting some official instances presumably because they believe they can earn more by renting out some other instances of the game server. Bohemia must ensure that official servers are continuous to the maximum extent feasible in order to provide their customers with service that enables all aspects of the game as they designed it to be enjoyed. If Bohemia does not want to use a first-party hosting model, it should get a contractual commitment from the GSPs to guarantee continuity where possible and sufficient forewarning otherwise.
 

 

Wow what a detailed post by Observer there.  Thats the most well thought out and clear laying out of what the problem is with official servers I've seen.  One thing I would add is I think server providers should designate a certain amount of servers with a clear designation in there title that they will never go down or switch hands to a private server.   There should be at least a small percentage of their servers that are like this, for the benefit of the users.  

 

Past few days there have been a handful of topics of users complaining there camp is gone due to these problems.  Thats hundreds of hours that people are playing to make these sort of basecamps and it all just disappears, not even because of another player finding it.

Edited January 15, 2016 by Komalt

[Deranged Pineapple 8]

 

 

 

 

Wow what a detailed post by Observer there.  Thats the most well thought out and clear laying out of what the problem is with official servers I've seen.  One thing I would add is I think server providers should designate a certain amount of servers with a clear designation in there title that they will never go down or switch hands to a private server.   There should be at least a small percentage of their servers that are like this, for the benefit of the users.  

 

Past few days there have been a handful of topics of users complaining there camp is gone due to these problems.  Thats hundreds of hours that people are playing to make these sort of basecamps and it all just disappears, not even because of another player finding it.

 

 

There really needs to be some certainty with official server even though we are still in alpha. We just lost our stashes and couple of cars when one official server wen't offline apparently which is not really a big deal, just annoying to start over again. How ever it really discourages to start again,even for testing purposes only, every time official server gets reassigned.

 

Like they say, nothing is guaranteed while the game is still in development so start over we must :)

[boneboys 7988]

He (Observer71) removed his post for the 2nd time, apparently he does not wish to follow Rules & Guidelines.

MrMoss has answered concerns in a most reasonable manner.
 

There's some good feedback here which can be taken into account going forwards. It is of course important that continuity is upheld later on, but for now, there is still so much work being conducted on DayZ that progression is not guaranteed.