performance Freeroam #1 Update

[nex 416]

This update brings massive improvements to server performance (meaning less desync and server crashes!).

 

•  Added a new custom and performant queue system (by @nex & @logan)
  Players will only be put in a queue when the slot limit has been reached, or if there's an influx of players connecting in a short period.
  Queue priorities are not yet implemented, but we're working towards it in our large list of things to do.
   
•  Adjusted all punishment length displays to show the duration instead of raw date (by @nex & @logan)
  This should solve the confusion with player timezones and time differences (when determining how long is left on a ban for example).
   
•  Completely reworked our backend databases to properly support persistent player data (by @nex & @logan)
  The goal of this change is to support player-specific PvP stats, drift score, and more that can persist between servers.
  With this change also comes with a significant decrease of desync, as our old system wasn't very efficient and was quite outdated.
   
•  Vastly improved chat auto moderation. It's now smarter, faster, stronger... harder? (by @nex, @logan & @zee)
  We want to protect all of you that play on our servers, so we've made some much-needed improvements to our chat moderation filters.
  We also don't like it when you evade chat-mod filters either, so we made it recognise some of your loopholes too 
   
•  Added playtime and session tracking for all players (by @nex & @logan)
  Something that we've always wanted to do is to track and show players how much time they were spending on our servers.
  We now have this! And soon enough you'll be able to see it for yourself in various places around the server (or just a command, we haven't decided yet).
   
•  Big upgrades to server hardware for even more lag and desync reduction (by @nex)
  First of all, we've moved from a stock CPU that was thermal-throttling to a super-cooled and overclocked CPU. We've also went ahead and upgraded the storage for even faster server restarts (which now takes 5-10 seconds).
  
  The downside to these hardware upgrades is that the server is no longer located in North America, which means players in the NA region will have a higher ping due to the server now being located in London (UK). But, even with the ping increase, it'll be way more smoother than what it was before - that's how big these improvements are

 

Of course, this is a non-exhaustive list of changes. There's always minor tweaks that all add-up to improving various areas of the server in every update, and this one is definitely no exception!

 

There will also be bugs related to this update, but we're fully committed to working to solve them, and we've even employed some new and useful technologies to help us identify and solve them quicker. But as usual, if you come across any then please report it to us on our Discord server here 

The feedback we've gained this morning from testing and experimenting has been great, with most of you being surprised by how much desync we've managed to remove, which is always a good thing especially for drifting and PvP activities. Overall, we're happy with what we have achieved with this update, and it was well-worth the time and effort that we have put into it up to this point.

Expect some more updates coming soon for content, we have some interesting stuff coming up that we are sure that you'll like!

This update will be pushed to servers #2 and #3 soon.