[VOSK]

Greetings,

I apologize for the longer-than-usual update, but we have been quite busy with other things. (Not to mention my motherboard was fried a while back.)
So without further delay...

Synergy version 11 is now available on Steam!
Please NOTE that Synergy REQUIRES "Half-Life 2" to function properly! If you do not have Half-Life 2 installed and fully updated, Synergy will not work.

This version of Synergy addresses issues and concerns braught up by the community and fixes some bugs.
It also adds new content - you are now able to play MINERVA: Metastasis online with your friends! (BIG thanks again to gmc.jimmy for his work with the EDTs.)

Some of the issues braught up by the community that have been corrected are:

* maps restarting when all players die,
* damage scales of player weapons being reduced,
* respawn times being too long,
* players pushing other players too hard (potentially pushing them off an edge)

Check the version 11 Change Log.

For the map restarting when all players are dead, we have plans of using an "auto-save" feature (using the "trigger_autosave" entity), much like the one that exists in the original Half-Life 2 game, then having the map restart to these auto-saves instead - but for now, the map restarting will be disabled.

The respawn times have been adjusted slightly, not a whole lot, but enough that you should notice a decrease is waiting time.
Also, I'd like to mention that while you're waiting to respawn, any teammates that die, will add more waiting time to your current time; some people haven't intuitively grasped that yet so I thought I would mention it.

There are plans to change the "floating avatars" as well. We're looking into some alternative options to this. The goal is to be able to find your teammates easily, without adding clutter to the screen and you can identify players somehow and see their current health.
If you have any suggestions for us in this matter, please feel free to post on our forums.

In addition, there are some unmentioned features that are being worked on too. One area of this is improving the effectiveness of the player healing (healthkit distribution) - increasing amount of health each kit gives and the speed at which it is given.

I hope you all enjoy the new version, any feedback you have please let us know by sending an email to [ synergymod@gmail.com ].
Have fun.

[Silikone]

Would it be possible to make URLs open in the Steam overlay?

[Nibbler]

Thanks for update
EDIT: Updated server now synergy dosn't work LOL
Join server, Client connected CRASH
Server produces a popup box

---------------------------
srcds.exe - Application Error
---------------------------
The exception unknown software exception (0xc0000005) occurred in the application at location 0x158f3f26.


Click on OK to terminate the program
---------------------------
OK
---------------------------

http://files.filefront.com/orangeboxrar/;1...;/fileinfo.html dumps of errors

[VOSK]

Thanks for update
EDIT: Updated server now synergy dosn't work LOL
Join server, Client connected CRASH
Server produces a popup box


http://files.filefront.com/orangeboxrar/;1...;/fileinfo.html dumps of errors

Which map, just any?

[Nibbler]

Which map, just any?

Found what it was, was the player limit remover
Can you fix this? People love my 20 slot server
I can send u .dll of player limit remover that I am using?

[Warnink]

Found what it was, was the player limit remover
Can you fix this? People love my 20 slot server
I can send u .dll of player limit remover that I am using?

I'm pretty sure thats the idea that you cant have more than 10 slots, seriously people that want to play on small servers will play on the small servers and vice versa, do you guy's not like the idea of people enjoying your mod? I really dont understand why you have to keep messing it up for those of us that like to play with more than 10 people, it's not like you have to play there.

[Demon#]

I'm pretty sure thats the idea that you cant have more than 10 slots, seriously people that want to play on small servers will play on the small servers and vice versa, do you guy's not like the idea of people enjoying your mod? I really dont understand why you have to keep messing it up for those of us that like to play with more than 10 people, it's not like you have to play there.

i totally agree, my two favorite servers, also used that plugin, our manager was also annoyed about it, but letted the servers run with 9 public slots, and 1 for admins, i dont get the point why there should be 10 ppl max, 32 ppl max, would be fair, but 10? comeon, its like when gta4 was released on the consoles, that was a 6 player limit in multi, but then came the pc port, with the ability to go with alot more, this mod has in all its existance, been for pc, pc's can handle more than 10 players, maybe some maps arent good with alot of ppl, but that should be the admins decision, not the mod makers.

[Meeps]

Theres several Ideas behind the 10 player limit.

For a start, theres the balancing issues without doing major changes to all the maps. The simplest method would be just to scale damage, etc so that all the players connected, can only do as well as a normal player would do in single player. If that was used though everyone would moan about dying too easily so the scaling isnt so harsh, but has to be made up else where such as the respawn times. In short:

• Simple Balancing = less work, less tweaking, everyone moaning about NPCs doing 10 times damage with 10 players
• Complex Balancing = more work, more tweaking, possible issues with larger numbers of players, everyone moaning about small server size

Another valid point is the network and CPU overhead of the mod itself. You can almost count NPCs as extra players in terms of network use - this is why originally maps such as "Blame" pair were so laggy on 1.1, the server was having to deal with basicly 16 players and 30-40 NPCs at a time. Fair enough on the NPC counts if you have a 4 player limit like Left 4 Dead. Technically, with this point, the Synergy Devs are doing everyone a favor by decreasing the maximum possible Network and CPU use on servers, meaning they are only a little bit more expensive compaired to say CS servers.

Now I ask those moaning about 10 players a question.... Why do I not see you moaning about Left 4 Dead with its 4 player limit for co-op? Even the versus has less with only 8 players...

p.s Breaking the coded max player limit WILL cause unexpected results and server instability. For example if there is a function expecting a number between 1-10 and it gets the number 12, what does it do? If you were to ask me for a number between 1-10 and I said 17, what would you do?


Anyways, Its great to see the update is now up and running! I will have to try it tomorrow sometime

[Warnink]

Funny I never had a problem with my server running 12 players, I'd suggest you get some better hardware if you where having problems, we mostly play custom maps so your argument about the sp maps is pretty much moot, seems VOSK should never of released this mod to the public if all he wanted to do was play sp with his brother and he really should never of got to release it on steam if he is not willing to listen to the community that keeps this mod alive by spending alot of time and money on it, maybe thats why I see 40 servers and only 42 players these days.

[Demon#]

I'd suggest you get some better hardware if you where having problems.

i agree, bttr servers also play custom maps, and two variants, puzzlemaps, and syn maps, never had problems with that ammount of players, might crash often, but thats not due to all that crap he mentioned, its rather due to admins mostly, wich do something wrong with some kind of entity, it could happen anywhere. we almost always had full servers, we still have even though we only have 9 public slots on each server, if your server or, VOSK's cant handle that ammount of players, he should get an upgrade or two, and remove that shitty player limit, and wtf about balancing? havent you ever player the hl1 mod svencoop? i'd suggest you try it out, once the new version is out of beta, loads of coop mods havent got a shitty player limit, so its only a bad excuse, for lazyness, and maybe l4d has a limit too, so? its a valve made mod, not some 3rd party like this.

[Silikone]

and maybe l4d has a limit too, so? its a valve made mod, not some 3rd party like this.

L4D isn't a mod. It's an actual "paid" game, and VOSK can do whatever he wants with his free mod.

[Demon#]

L4D isn't a mod. It's an actual "paid" game, and VOSK can do whatever he wants with his free mod.

l4d uses source like syn does, so its a mod, just like cs and tf2, syn is a 3rd party mod, since valve didnt create it, and if VOSK wants donations for his mod, he should listen to the community, instead of being selfish.

[VOSK]

I wouldn't say I'm not listening to the community.

I said right from the start when we first announced Synergy on the OB engine that it will be completely different and will be focused on creating a cooperative singleplayer game first, THEN working on custom maps.

From the beginning, I initially wanted a 4 - 6 player limit. But server admins already made me bump it up to 10. It's too much. Gameplay is ruined with that many players. You can have some players sit back and do nothing at all while his teammates do all the work, or you get where players just run around like headless chickens.

You folks seem to think it's still the same game as it was back in the 1.1 days - it's not. The old Syn was not properly structured; no gameplay elements really. We're trying to change that, but also trying to keep singleplayer working as close as possible to the original Half-Life 2.

Drop the discussion please.

[BotoxBrain]

i dont get the point why there should be 10 ppl max, 32 ppl max, would be fair, but 10? comeon, its like when gta4 was released on the consoles, that was a 6 player limit in multi, but then came the pc port, with the ability to go with alot more, this mod has in all its existance, been for pc, pc's can handle more than 10 players, maybe some maps arent good with alot of ppl, but that should be the admins decision, not the mod makers.

I wouldn't have thought any hl2 map would be able to handle 32 players, not without being very boring and basic. The amount of npcs you would need to keep everyone busy would probably crash any server.. games that have 32 players or more usually are players against each other with no ai npcs..

I try to make my maps a bit of a challenge for 4 to 6 players, but 32 players

[Nibbler]

I wouldn't say I'm not listening to the community.

I said right from the start when we first announced Synergy on the OB engine that it will be completely different and will be focused on creating a cooperative singleplayer game first, THEN working on custom maps.

From the beginning, I initially wanted a 4 - 6 player limit. But server admins already made me bump it up to 10. It's too much. Gameplay is ruined with that many players. You can have some players sit back and do nothing at all while his teammates do all the work, or you get where players just run around like headless chickens.

You folks seem to think it's still the same game as it was back in the 1.1 days - it's not. The old Syn was not properly structured; no gameplay elements really. We're trying to change that, but also trying to keep singleplayer working as close as possible to the original Half-Life 2.

Drop the discussion please.

So? no more 10+ people? Many people that play on my server are also upset and not happy that its max 10
And restarting map when all death there a command to RE-enable that?!

[VOSK]

And restarting map when all death there a command to RE-enable that?!

...can't win. 8|

As I mentioned in my first post, there will be autosaves and restarts to those points during campaign maps. Possibly even an option for mappers to pick which style they want.

[Nibbler]

AI stops working on some maps for some reason and people all suicide (because they knew that restarted map) but they just respawn and no map restart :/

[VOSK]

When does AI stop working? Anything consistant happening?

[Nibbler]

ep2_outland_05 alyx ai dies if u dont stay with her when she stops to look at bridge to see the combine moving from right to left

ep2_outland_11b eli and alyx freeze (rare) for some reason

ep2_outland_02 (the 2nd part of map where u revive alyx) vort sometimes gets stuck under lift

Any news on fix for ep1_citadel_03?

[Demon#]

the freeze thing also happened on one of the hl2 sp maps, in the prison, when she got her dad (forgot map name) seen it dusins of times where she just freezes, and wont go on, have to restart map 2-3 times before she will go on, and in the mean time, ppl have left, also ive tried hard mode with hl2 campaign, where it was only 6 ppl, that was almost impossible to beat the game so my guess would be for like 6-10 ppl easy 10-15-16 medium, and 20 hard, then it would be a fair game, i think.