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Master Server limit?

by cogmac · in Torque Game Engine · 03/15/2007 (4:32 pm) · 10 replies

I have read in other posts that there is no limit to the number of servers that can connect to the garage games master server. However, I am trying to run a lot of servers at once (50 total), and I find that only the first 20 get a response from the Master Server.

My dedicated servers repeatedly send heartbeats to the master, but the master never responds.

The first 20 servers work fine -- they send the heartbeat, and get a response.

I am running 10 servers on one machine, and 40 on another. Is there some limit to the number of dedicated servers sharing one IP address?
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Torque Owner cogmac
#1
03/15/2007 (4:36 pm)
More info: If I run another dedicated server on a 3rd machine, it does get a response from the master server.

So, it definitely seems like there is a limit of 10 dedicated servers per machine, as far as the master is concerned. Can anyone confirm of deny this?

So what I have is:
Machine_1 -- running 10 servers, all get a response
Machine_2 -- running 40 servers, only 10 get a response
Machine_3 -- running 1 servers, and it gets a response

Associate David Montgomery-Blake
David MontgomeryBlake
#2
03/15/2007 (4:56 pm)
They are probably throttling it on their end. I do not believe that there are limits imposed by the code of the master server so much as configuring throttling limits.

Torque Owner cogmac
#3
03/15/2007 (5:01 pm)
Is there a GarageGames employee that can confirm throttling a limit on the GG end, as David has suggested?

Torque 3D Owner Eric Armstrong
Bloody Tongue Games
#4
03/15/2007 (6:02 pm)
The GG master server is for testing only, and shouldn't be used for anything more than basic testing at that. It wouldn't surprise me if they did limit it. If you go production, or if you want to do the kind of load testing you're outlining above, you really should write your own...

Torque Owner cogmac
#5
03/15/2007 (7:55 pm)
You are probably right Eric, but I can't find that stated anywhere by GarageGames, and I can find posts like this one:
http://www.garagegames.com/mg/forums/result.thread.php?qt=25699

Where GG employees state that there are no limits.

Associate David Montgomery-Blake
David MontgomeryBlake
#6
03/15/2007 (9:45 pm)
They're exactly right in saying that. There are no hard coded limits. That doesn't mean that they have not limited it themselves or throttled the number of users/connections to optimize the usage on the current test server just like you would determine the load balancing capacity of your own master servers.

Torque Owner cogmac
#7
03/16/2007 (5:52 am)
Ok. Can anyone point me to a resource or binary for running my own master server?

Torque 3D Owner Eric Armstrong
Bloody Tongue Games
#8
03/16/2007 (7:05 am)
Here you go:

link

Torque Owner cogmac
#9
03/18/2007 (5:55 am)
Thanks Eric, I'll give it a try.

It seems that currently the GG master server is actually down! (Sunday 3/188/07)

Can clients point to multiple master servers (a list of several) so that if one is down, they find another?

Torque Owner cogmac
#10
03/18/2007 (2:25 pm)
I've answered some of my own questions, and thought others might find this info useful.

Clients and servers can point to multiple master servers, and clients will search until the get a response.

Regarding the limit of servers per IP address, it turns out I was hitting a limit on the number of ports assigned on one machine in server.cs/portInit(). Just change the 10 to something larger to allow more dedicated servers on the same IP:

function portInit(%port)
{
%failCount = 0;
while(%failCount < 10 && !setNetPort(%port)) {
echo("Port init failed on port " @ %port @ " trying next port.");
%port++; %failCount++;
}
}