Motd

[Sphagnum Peat Moss 748]

Donors shouldn't be forced to have to click through any annoying messages/ads/etc when joining a server, or have to modify any settings on their end to avoid them, if Lotus servers are supposed to be as vanilla as possible. I have it blocked, so all that shows up is a blank gray screen anyway, but I still have to click through them until the timer runs down. If there's a way to disable such things myself, please enlighten me. Otherwise, it's a disincentive. Nobody likes waiting or being bombarded by things they don't care about, especially when they're paying to be there. That is all.

[IceSage 58]

Just disable HTML MOTD. Problem solved.

Additionally, I'm not sure if there's a way to determine who has donator or not to avoid the ads.

[Sphagnum Peat Moss 748]

HTML MOTD is already disabled. I still get the gray screens and a timer.

[Se7en 10,762]

Seeing how you donate to our servers means to me that you care and want to support them and try to help keeping them alive. I understand your frustration, but the MOTD is 5 seconds and it also helps a bit with server funding, so please do bare with us.

[Chez-Box 3,240]

nobody "pays to be there" as you put it, you offer Lotus a DONATION, some people forget that. It is a DONATION, to help fund the servers that you enjoy playing on... as a gesture of appreciation Lotus thanks donors with certain perks. Even with the perks you now receive, these aren't something you have "paid for". In fact, they were given to you, for free, as a thank-you for your DONATION...

[Sphagnum Peat Moss 748]

@Chez-Box: How many donors do you think would be retained if the donor perks were taken away? Call it a donation all you want, but the simple fact is that donors in this context are effectively customers. I pay three monthly donations so two of my friends who are broke can play on the same team with me without worrying about auto-balance and so we can join servers that are full. Without that benefit I would donate $0. Since every Lotus server posts a message about contacting them to let them know how to improve their servers, I offered my input about something I found irritating and that donors shouldn't be subjected to (since its purpose is to support the servers, which donors are already doing). Each player has their own threshold of what is tolerable. The MOTD took mine down a notch. Do with that info what you want, it's just feedback, no need to get defensive.

please do bare with us.

Not on the first date plz o.O

[Nano 7,892]

Try spacebar. Goes through them all in under 2 seconds.

[Mana 3,867]

HTML MOTD is already disabled. I still get the gray screens and a timer.

The timer was a test. It's not currently a requirement from the ad company. So really we don't need to have it enabled. As such I disabled it.

Seeing how you donate to our servers means to me that you care and want to support them and try to help keeping them alive. I understand your frustration, but the MOTD is 5 seconds and it also helps a bit with server funding, so please do bare with us.

A while back I tested a way to disable the first motd for donors completely. You would just see the team select menu. But there was a slight issue with it sometimes not letting you join a team.

Obviously it can be worked around by simply showing something else instead of an ad (for donors). It's been ready for a while but I always expect the ad provider to require the use of their plugin so I didn't put up.

Never the less as we're not required to use their plugin at this time, might as well go back to using ours.

t will be a day or two until it's fully ready though.

To elaborate:

I will first remove the current ad plugin

Upload our old plugin

Wait until the old plugin is gone from the servers (map changes, server restarts is when it happens)

Enable the command for donors to see a status page of their benefits instead of the ads.

[Sphagnum Peat Moss 748]

A while back I tested a way to disable the first motd for donors completely. You would just see the team select menu. But there was a slight issue with it sometimes not letting you join a team.

Not sure if it's related to anything you've done, but I get this issue almost 50% of the time I join Lotus servers where I get stuck and can't join a team unless I reconnect to the server. I've only seen it happen on Lotus servers, but I don't play any other servers nearly as frequently, so I can't say for sure if it's a Lotus thing or another buggy TF2 thing. In any case, thanks for your understanding.

[Mana 3,867]

Not sure if it's related to anything you've done, but I get this issue almost 50% of the time I join Lotus servers where I get stuck and can't join a team unless I reconnect to the server. I've only seen it happen on Lotus servers, but I don't play any other servers nearly as frequently, so I can't say for sure if it's a Lotus thing or another buggy TF2 thing. In any case, thanks for your understanding.

What do you when that happens? I never experienced it myself or actually heard reports about it. But it obviously shouldn't be happening. Could you elaborate as much as you can so I could try to look into this?

[- Mike - 2,728]

Not sure if it's related to anything you've done, but I get this issue almost 50% of the time I join Lotus servers where I get stuck and can't join a team unless I reconnect to the server. I've only seen it happen on Lotus servers, but I don't play any other servers nearly as frequently, so I can't say for sure if it's a Lotus thing or another buggy TF2 thing. In any case, thanks for your understanding.

You aren't the only one. At first I thought it was because I was choosing a team too quickly, but when I took my time it would still happen.

[Mana 3,867]

You aren't the only one. At first I thought it was because I was choosing a team too quickly, but when I took my time it would still happen.

See if it still happens now. I made some changes.

[Sphagnum Peat Moss 748]

I can't say for sure what causes it, I can't narrow down any particular steps to reproduce the problem. As Mike said, at first I thought it might be from trying to choose my team too quickly, but it happened when I chose slowly too. I thought maybe it happens when I join at the end of a round and teams are about to switch, but that wasn't it either. The best I can do is take notes the next few times it happens and write down what was going on at the time I got stuck.

[- Mike - 2,728]

See if it still happens now. I made some changes.

It really is hit or miss when it happens and that is why I haven't figured out what causes it.

[Mana 3,867]

Just see if it happens from now on. If it doesn't then we can proceed with the no ads for donors idea.

If you still see it happen post here asap and tell me what server it happened on. This way I can look into the plugin logs to see if there's any errors.

[Sphagnum Peat Moss 748]

Happened just now to Muriate of Potash (he doesn't like posting things himself). Time and date was 00:40-00:41 today on KOTH stocks Chicago. He said he was clicking on a full team waiting to be able to join it. When he mentioned that, it reminded me that that's usually what I'm doing when it happens to me too. Could just be coincidence, but that's all the info I have.

hostname: LotusClan.com | KOTH Stocks | Chicago

version : 1.2.3.3/22 5079 secure

udp/ip : 67.212.160.117:27015 (public ip: 67.212.160.117)

account : logged in

map : koth_sawmill at: 0 x, 0 y, 0 z

players : 19 (33 max)

# userid name uniqueid connected ping loss state

# 660 "G@ngster vit@l9" STEAM_0:0:55584105 13:54 361 0 spawning

# 666 "sensu" STEAM_0:0:5401381 07:34 110 0 active

# 646 "SkylineOdeum" STEAM_0:1:29088532 32:04 52 0 active

# 664 "rpk3231" STEAM_0:1:47167904 11:05 76 0 active

# 659 "EHB The Demo_" STEAM_0:0:46393882 16:00 56 0 active

# 669 "Michael Jackson" STEAM_0:1:43700185 01:38 60 0 active

# 670 "sleepingiant91" STEAM_0:1:55080030 00:22 162 75 spawning

# 657 "Yolo Swaggins" STEAM_0:1:42734040 17:18 316 0 spawning

# 557 "Muriate of Potash" STEAM_0:0:152513 2:06:06 116 0 active

# 637 "Steakknife Autopsy" STEAM_0:0:42366688 44:14 61 0 active

# 571 "Sphagnum Peat Moss" STEAM_0:0:32029777 1:56:18 116 0 active

# 610 ".prion" STEAM_0:1:34050760 1:12:41 41 0 active

# 667 "Hak^RUS" STEAM_0:1:25037731 01:47 370 74 connecting

# 655 "[HG] paradox" STEAM_0:1:40802562 19:54 115 0 active

# 668 "Dancrafty" STEAM_0:1:40522808 01:42 56 0 active

# 658 "ISatOnZeus" STEAM_0:0:42079072 16:35 69 0 active

# 634 "Braiiinnns" STEAM_0:1:55765854 48:56 60 0 active

# 661 "AngryBastardNumbahTwo" STEAM_0:1:19435628 13:50 95 2 active

# 662 "AngryBastardIII" STEAM_0:1:56431254 13:43 91 0 active

[Harlequin 2,975]

I don't know if this helps, but I had the same issue in the past.

I always thought to my self that it is about "join team" spamming an already fully team.

I just do an auto join now, or wait if there is a free slot. So if the new map begins i don't spam "RED" anymore just because I want to join red;

I don't think it is an issue with the plugin (at least, this is what I thought).

Didn't face this problem anymore since I take care when joining a Team.

[Mana 3,867]

I don't know if this helps, but I had the same issue in the past.

I always thought to my self that it is about "join team" spamming an already fully team.

I just do an auto join now, or wait if there is a free slot. So if the new map begins i don't spam "RED" anymore just because I want to join red;

I don't think it is an issue with the plugin (at least, this is what I thought).

Didn't face this problem anymore since I take care when joining a Team.

Happened just now to Muriate of Potash (he doesn't like posting things himself). Time and date was 00:40-00:41 today on KOTH stocks Chicago. He said he was clicking on a full team waiting to be able to join it. When he mentioned that, it reminded me that that's usually what I'm doing when it happens to me too. Could just be coincidence, but that's all the info I have.

Oh yeah if you click on that too often there's some protection built in to the game. But it works weird...

That's nothing on our end though. I've seen it happen on Valve servers as well.

[JoinedSenses 559]

The issue you may be receiving regarding choosing teams may be due to alt+tabbing out of the game at the server connection screen.

When I tab out, my HUD will become disfigured. The solution is to run a refresh on it through the console. I ended up just binding it to 'O'.

Console Command: hud_reloadscheme

Optionally: bind 'o 'hud_reloadscheme'