Spring RTS Engine

I've seen a frigging lot of players claiming that they spec kick to keep the lag down in game. Simply put, that's a bunch of crap, its to the point of being virtually technically impossible. If a spectator is going to cause lag to your upload stream it won't happen until well into the game when the stream of unit updates becomes too high for the hosts update rate to handle. Ya, sure, at that point kick the specs, most likely it won't matter due to the fact that 99% of the time a player's PC will bottleneck before spring's network code will. But sure try it. That being said, it's incredibly disrespectful to kick a player for no reason at all, and that standard doesn't change for a spectator, especially in the beginning of a game before you even know if their PC is going to bottleneck on you. A player is just as likely to be the problem as a spec, so why do specs get the bad rap?

The problem here is more a universal standard of disrespect and poor management of game hosts. Spring isn't starcraft where there is a billion players at any given point and time and if you kick someone you will never in the existence of your account see that player again. Our playing community is somewhere in the range of 500-1000 regular players at max, and I really can't support you just treating people like crap. Those players are going to have hard feelings, they are going to see you in the lobby every day, and we're going to have way more unnecessary drama than we need.

So if you're a habitual game host, just FFS keep this stuff in mind. You do have responsibility and obligation to some semblance of respect for the players of your game, both for spring as a community and for your own reputation. If you have to kick someone have a good reason, and unless they are being a real asshole to you, tell them why they are being kicked first. Spectators aren't going to cause you lag, and if they do you have tonnes of time to troubleshoot that problem while in game, chances are most specs if they know they are lagging a game will leave anyways. I do. It's just sort of universal spec etiquette. If you're just self conscious about people watching you play, say so, or title the game "no specs" or something. At least people know what to expect before hand.

It's just a really scummy thing to do to have a game open, let people join, and then kick everyone who isn't playing a moment before you start. If they didn't want to spec the game they would leave before hand, you're screwing up someone else's day and the responsibility is yours to diffuse the situation. You wouldn't like it if spring admins started arbitrarily power tripping on you, so have the respect for other players not to do the same.

its too long, i didnt read it

As soon as I detect a slight amount of lag I start random kicking specs

Spoken like a habitual spectator

I whole-heartedly agree with you SwiftSpear. On many occasions I have waited 10 minutes for a game to start only to be arbitrarily kicked seconds before launch simply because I was spec. There's no warning, no indication at all that spec's aren't welcome - just a kick. It extremely rude and selfish IMO.

If a host doesn't want spec's in the game - for whatever reason (even if they are dubious) - then I'll respect that and leave but I would prefer to be asked or at the very least be given some warning or an explanation. And why wait 10 minutes before doing so? That, as far as I'm concerned, is just being deliberately antagonistic and should not be allowed.

KICK the kickers - that's what I say.

Ishach wrote:its too long, i didnt read it

Go away. Is that short enough for you?

As somebody who specs pretty much all the time I agree.

I kick specs. But I kick everyone. The only time I play spring is if I'm making screenshots/epic moviees!

if i could host i would kick specs

Are you talking about kicking specs before game starts or ingame if their cpus slow down the entire game?

A couple thoughts:

1) Sometimes kicking specs is because they have crappy machines and will slow the game down if allowed to remain. This is especially true because the specs see everything and have a larger CPU/GPU load AFAIK.

2) Hosts should and do have the right to restrict who may be in their game.

3) On the other hand, the polite thing to do is to put "NO SPECS" in the game title. You're completely justified in kicking specs if you do this. It is sort of asshole to kick specs 10 seconds before game start without even saying anything.

4) As Swifty said, specs don't have as much of an impact in Spring as they do in other games. About the only time specs will be a problem is if they have the slowest computer in the game.

5) Sort of related: if you want to have a private game, making it and then kicking anyone who joins uninvited is not the way to do it. Passwording the game and then sharing the password with your friends is.

Specs don't have any more CPU load; everyone calculates everything. GPU doesn't lag games.

You should never just kick soemone without asking them to leave first unless they start rejoining repeatedly. At which point a moderator should be involved.

ps, too many times have i abused teamspeak lolololol

no specs in my games

Why kick spects? Unleash they do something bad, there is no reason at all...

Being a host in spring is the only thing in life that gives some people power over others. Hence the spect kickers...

LordMatt wrote:Being a host in spring is the only thing in life that gives some people power over others. Hence the spect kickers...

POWER OVERWHELMING!

LordMatt wrote:Being a host in spring is the only thing in life that gives some people power over others. Hence the spect kickers...

That would be a nice teory if the first affirmation wasnt utterly sarcastic (I hope) and false :)

Felix the Cat wrote:A couple thoughts:

1) Sometimes kicking specs is because they have crappy machines and will slow the game down if allowed to remain. This is especially true because the specs see everything and have a larger CPU/GPU load AFAIK.

Every player's PC sees everything in terms of CPU usage. FPS aren't related to game performance of other players, if a specs' FPS drops to 1fps, no other player will notice unless it also corresponds with CPU lag. Additionally, CPU lag is nearly ALWAYS our bottleneck, and like I already stated, a spec has exactly the same likelihood for CPU lag as a player.

2) Hosts should and do have the right to restrict who may be in their game.

Fair enough, they also have the obligation to be fair and honest about it though. It's a manner of disrespect, if someone's going to sit and wait 10 minutes to spec your game and you kick them in the last second without any previous indication that you didn't want spectators, you're just being an asshole, and I feel pretty justified in treating you like an asshole.

3) On the other hand, the polite thing to do is to put "NO SPECS" in the game title. You're completely justified in kicking specs if you do this. It is sort of asshole to kick specs 10 seconds before game start without even saying anything.

Yup, there are legitimate reasons to kick specs sometimes. Like I say, even if you're just self conscious about your playing, fair enough. That doesn't waive your obligation to not be an asshole to other spring players. If this is the case however, stop being ignorant and claiming you are countering lag. You're not.

4) As Swifty said, specs don't have as much of an impact in Spring as they do in other games. About the only time specs will be a problem is if they have the slowest computer in the game.

Ya, in which case the ingame screen reports CPU usage with .info enabled and allows the host to monitor who is causing game lag and who is not. This just reiterates the point, there is very few valid reasons to kick specs before a game has started. If it turns out they are causing lag? well, no one can really complain then, can they?

5) Sort of related: if you want to have a private game, making it and then kicking anyone who joins uninvited is not the way to do it. Passwording the game and then sharing the password with your friends is.

Another good point.


I also want to dispel another concern. Someone at some point claimed that specs caused desyncs. This is flat out impossible. Spec's don't return calculation data to the server, they just verify server checksums. A desync happens when one player's computer starts reporting simulation calculations different from another computer. While it's possible for a spec to separately desync from the game, it's not possible for a spec to cause a player or host to desync from everyone else. If a spec begins to desync, the only effect on the rest of the game is that the annoying desync message will play, at which point fine, kick the spec, he's not really watching the game anyways, since his calculation is different. But kicking a spec before hand because a desync may happen is just rude. People wouldn't be very pleased if I kicked everyone on the spring server who was playing speedmetal because I saw it as a waste of time. It's not your place to decide how another springer spends their time is worthwhile or not, we're all just basically wasting time on video games anyways.

iamacup wrote:ps, too many times have i abused teamspeak lolololol

no specs in my games

Ya, fine, that's a legitimate concern. Just communicate that to the player wanting to spec before hand if you think the issue is large enough.

That being said, it's really bad form on the spec's part to abuse teamspeak or in general to give away game information to other players. If you're caught doing it, it's considered intentional ruining of games, and quite likely will result in a spring ban.

Yeah I'm not surprised cup cheats with TS.