Suggestion to bis about mission downloading

[JustinCase 0]

why not start the download of a mission in the lobby if the player doesn't have the mission?

It's not a huge improvement, but as it is now, it often takes ages untill everyone is ready in the lobby. That's often enough time to download the whole mission...

This would speed up multiplayer gaming I think...

[Lt_Damage 0]

Because you are in the lobby between selecting missions and that would mean when the server reassigns and goes to the next map in rotation all players start downloading the mission when the admin means to select another mission from mission list.

[JustinCase 0]

So? All clients stop downloading as soon as another map is chosen by the admin and they start downloading that one.

The bit that was already downloaded can be thrown away or if the map was complete saved...

I don't see any technical problems with that system. Just a separate thread that does the download and get's stopped if the map changes.

You have to admit, it would save time on public servers, no?

[Lt_Damage 0]

I've noticed the behaviour when players are downloading the mission file, and if there is a #reassign done during that, most players finish downloading before the return to role selection screen.

This would make automatic downloading of the mission file when it is selected from map list not really workable.

Sometimes we decide on a map only to have 5-10 more people arrive and render that map too small, then we need to select another. This would mean players are still downloading the mission we were going to do rather than the new one.

[JustinCase 0]

I wasn't really taking lost bandwith into account, but I can see that it can be a problem for server hosts...

I'm just frustrated that it quite often takes more than 10 minutes to start a game that more than often ends up crappy...

I guess I should look out for private servers :-)

[Lt_Damage 0]

Dedicated servers with a good admin will get the next game running in under 2 minutes. This is the case on GP most of the time.

[Lt_Dan_Sweden 0]

Great suggestion JustinCase.

Im a good admin ;-) but still understand the gains we could make in time. Yes IF an admin switches maps to often, he will have to wait longer, due to the reassign-finish-download effect, but we can relearn.

My experince is that most servers spend more time in the SETUP screen than in the MAP screen, so why not let the download start during the SETUP (where you choose side and roll during a map)

Regards

Lt_Dan_Sweden

[Lt_Damage 0]

Most people know what would happen if missions started downloading every time a map was selected. It simply isn't workable and most admins of a dedicated server will understand this.

[Lt_Dan_Sweden 0]

Enlighten me, as an ignorant server admin since late 2001.

;-)