VIP Changes

As the new Member+ rank now gets the items formally restricted to VIP rank I decided to add some new perks to VIP status as follows:

VIPs may request that an Admin 'landscapes' their region using WorldEdit, including flattening areas, basic terrain smoothing, mass tree & plant removal, mass tree replanting, filling of pools, lakes etc  with water or lava and more!

VIPs will also be given a Swiftwolf's Rending Gale & full set of Quantum Armour when they first become a VIP and further free items, such as HV Solar Arrays, every time they renew their VIP status.

Full details of VIP perks can be found here:

http://diggyminecraft.blogspot.co.uk/p/vip-benefits.html

Daily Backup Schedule Change

After looking at our player statistics I've decided to move the daily backup to the quietest time of day, meaning that the daily backup will now take place around 8am to 9am UK time (maybe slightly later at weekends).

This means that fewer players will be online when the server needs to restart and hence minimises the impact of the 2 minute downtime.

CoreProtect 2 Added To Server

I've added the latest version of CoreProtect 2 to the server this morning as the issues I was having with version Coreprotect 1.x clashing with other plugins have been fixed :)

It has increased memory usage per player but this shouldn't be enough to cause noticeable lag, even when the server is full, due to the daily restart & backup clearing the memory every 24 hours.

This will allow Admins & Moderators to better tackle griefers  but I would ask that players continue to 'do their bit' by protecting themselves with Protection Stones and Lockette to help keep incidents to a minimum.

I've also enabled three additional flags for both WorldGuard and Protection Stone regions as follows:

use - Prevents players using doors, levers, buttons etc in your region unless you give them permission.

chest-access - Prevents players opening chests in your region unless you give them permission.

entry - Prevents players from entering your region unless you give them permission.


See the World Commands page for further details of how to use these flags:

http://diggyminecraft.blogspot.co.uk/p/world-commands.html

Website Updated

I've updated the website to include a new 'Rank Info' section, this gives a brief description of all the ranks available on the Tekkit Classic server and how to attain them, including the new Member+ and Helper ranks.

Changes To Spawn

The signs at the Player Market & Spawn have been replaced with ComputerCraft screens, not only does it look nicer but it gives me more flexibility with the layout and makes them easier to update :)

They also include some details on the new ranks which are coming very soon!

Scheduled Maintenance & Server Downtime

Woke up this morning to find the server back down again and this update from our hosting company:

23:16 - ... still offline, but Cisco technician is currently looking into the issue onsite.

We are extremely sorry for the downtime that occurred today and we know that it was totally unacceptable for this to happen.

Best Regards,
Nitrous Networks LTD

Whatever the routing issue is seemingly the Cisco technician is still working on it now and around one third of the servers they host are currently down due to the connectivity issue, unfortunately we are in that one third.

I'll keep checking for new information and time-scales and update here, thanks for your patience.

UPDATE: 09:40 - Still waiting to hear from the hosting company.

UPDATE: 10:40 - Still waiting to hear from the hosting company.

UPDATE: 11:40 - Still waiting to hear from the hosting company.

UPDATE: 12:40 - Cisco are still working on the problem and our hosting company have offered a partial refund of the hosting fees as compensation, unfortunately no update on when the servers might be back up though.

UPDATE: 13:40 - Waiting to hear from the hosting company.

UPDATE: 15:00 - Still waiting to hear from the hosting company.

UPDATE: 16:05 - Hosting company hope to have servers back up today but can't specify a time.

UPDATE: 17:00 - Waiting to hear from the hosting company.

UPDATE: 17:30 - Our hosting companies managing director is saying that the servers should be back upin about an hour, fingers crossed!

UPDATE: 18:35 - No sign of the server coming up yet, waiting for an update.

UPDATE: 19:15 - Apparently the issues with the new hardware are now completely resolved and servers have been coming back online one by one over the last 20-25 minutes, we shouldn't have long to wait now. I'll be whitelisting for about 5 minutes just to check a few things.

UPDATE: 20:25 - Looks like our server is going to be one of the last to come back up, they are seemingly being manually connected one by one to check for any issues which is why it's taking so long.

UPDATE: 21:25 - Still waiting, but hopefully not for much longer! The servers that have come back up already seem stable now so looking good.

UPDATE: 21:40 - Server is back up! Whitelist is in place for a few minutes whilst I check things over.

UPDATE: 21:45 - Whitelist removed! The server is coming up now and seems stable.