Leo's Realistic Servers

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Leo's Realistic Servers are hosted in Germany by a dedicated server hosting company and pretty well known among the realistic Soldat community, among other thing because of the amount of admins which are constantly present thus making it practically hacker free- or at least ensuring that hackers will not continue their evil ways for long without a righteous retribution. The LRS servers include a couple of servers running different game styles, such CTF and Infiltration. While all the servers run as realistic, some of them combine it with advance and/or survival.

Contents

[edit] Creating a realistic community

Leo has always actively supported the development of Soldat and the realistic community in particular. Ever since his server was hosted by Selfkill, there were assorted forums to it. Initially, the number of users on forum was limited to a very small group of regular visitors to the server, but soon the word spread and more people arrived.

The forums had many different features making them a nice place to visit. There were picture galleries where players could submit their pictures, interesting Soldat screenshots or just other pictures they found amusing. This was an easy way to see the real life appearances of many players there. It was also a niche place for various .gif animated pictures detailing trivia from the servers. For example there was an animation of JwC wreaking havoc on an unsuspecting newb with his Spas, an animation of Mippe stoping bullets Matrix-style and different other, amusing things. Unfortunately, with the change of forums in June 2006, many of these were "lost in time, like tears in rain" (to quote Blade Runner the movie). The galleries on the new forums are trying to make up for that, with pictures being added from time to time.

The first forums also featured a host of minigames that you could play if you were not currently playing Soldat. Regular forum members would try to beat each others high-scores and brag about it in the chatbox.

The chatbox and a live chat were another feature of the forums. However, the live chat never really got off, as it was empty for most of the time and actually meeting anyone there was infinitesimally difficult - unless you sent out a message in the chatbox urging people to herd into the live chat. The feature finally died some time after the big move into IRC world was taken. The #lrs IRC channel was far more successful than the live chat and it is still very active today (with an average number of idlers at around 40+ during European nighttime and somewhere around 60 during European daytime).

Conforming with the LRS policy of custom maps (see below) was the part of forums where users could submit their own maps. Although most of them were far in quality from the experienced mappers at Soldat Forums or the Soldat Mapper's League, they still stood a chance of getting to the server. However, after a time too many people wanted to have their map on the server, regardless of its quality. Eventually, the trend died down, although a few maps do emerge now and then. In connection to this, the LRS forums are also a place for some of its users to present their own mods and weaponskins.

The old forums were also known for many discussions and disputes that were not restricted to couple-word posts on the boards. With a group of outspoken people like Jesus was Chinese!, B-Coat, Sure Shot, Leo and others, there were very serious discussions going from time to time. These usually concerned general Soldat topics, like spraying, camping or spawnkilling, or a specific situation that arose on the LRS servers (like the Complex9 abuse). Unfortunately, with the move to new forums, the riches of these discussions were lost. Moreover, the influx of new members, most of whom are underage, has ensured that the level of discussion held on LRS has fallen dramatically, resulting in spam-esque posts that contain little more than emoticons or just a couple of words of comment. This saw an introduction of a "card-system" for spammers (with yellow cards as a warning and a red card as an insta-ban), which has helped a little, but not removed the problem completely.

All in all, Demonic was not very far from the truth when he started his #Soldat.Realistic campaign (that was targeted at getting the realistic community to use IRC) on LRS forums and when he claimed that he did so, because "he saw it more or less as the anchor-point for the realistic community".

Quite clearly, running the forums and the servers can be a bit costly. This is why Leo splits the costs with lpzie. Others help with occassional donations - while Antwan has been quite a constant donor.

[edit] History

[edit] The Beginning

Few know that what is now a powerful community began as a dedicated server run from Leo's own computer. However, if he wanted to be serious about it, a new arrangement was needed. Thus, after the initial period, sometime in early June 2005 the server was hosted by a professional company. These were the days of 1.2.1 and the mix of players present on the server ensured that Ruger 77 and Spas were the dominant weapons. After it's first month of activity in June 2005, there were about 30 people registered on the forums and around 500 different players in the stats.

[edit] LRA & New Infiltration Server

Another cryptic fact about LRS is that initially the single CTF server was called LRA (for Leo's Realistic Arena). When an Infiltration server was added (around August/September 2005, initially with 12 players), it was known as the Leo's Infiltration Arena. This was also the time that a custom weaponmod was introduced, since people expressed dissatisfaction with the 1.3.0 weaponmod.

[edit] Growing Popularity

By October 2005, there were around 100 people on the forums and around 1400 players. People began to complain that it is becoming infinitesimally difficult to join a server, since it was most likely to be full all the time (and constant clicking of the 'join' button did not help, since there was a script banning people doing so [for 15 minutes]).

At that time, the costs began to be a bit heavy on Leo alone, so they were split with two more people, one of whom was Jesus was Chinese!. This is approximately the time that the name LRS was adopted.

[edit] Coming of Leo's Realistic Servers

Come Winter 2005, a solid base of fans was established, as was the LRS offer: two 16-slot servers, one CTF, one INF. There began to appear a third, 10 slot, server. It oscillated between HTF and DM, but despite a dedicated (if not niche) number of fans, Leo decided to scrap it, since it was not as popular as the CTF and INF were. Eventually, it settled on CTF with survival on - with its own choice mapcycle, what later lead to the Complex9 abuse (certain people voting the map over and over again, making it the only map played on the server). The time around Christmas 2005 was also the first run at introducing friendly fire, but lack of the control mechanisms we have today lead to a miserable failure of the idea, among much whining from people who couldn't adjust or were intentionally teamkilled.

[edit] Financial Problems

Early in 2006, financial problems (with one of the three people paying for the servers unable to continue his help), the feeling of being fed up with loads of hackers and noobs, host problems (mostly this, actually) and a general feeling of tiredness almost lead to ending the whole affair. There was - understandably - a great cryout and lots of people offered to pay. Luckily, the problems were solved and LRS continued to exist - although the third server had to go for a while.

[edit] Admin Recruitation

Sometime in March 2006, there was a great recruitation of admins and many people joined the ranks of admins (e.g. T00kie, MadCow, Penguin, Cory, Antwan), increasing the overall admin-coverage of the servers. This was necessary, as with the growing fame of LRS, more and more people came there exclusively to hack and cause trouble.

[edit] New Server

Late Winter and early Spring 2006 was a time of when a third server was to be reintroduced. In order to compensate the US players for their 150-ish pings on the Selfkill servers, there was much talk of finding something in the States. JwC went as far as proposing a server somewhere on the Atlantic ocean, preferably on the Canaries. He was to pack a suitcase-full of Icelandic dollars and go and bribe a fat Paco into renting the server for the rest of eternity. The whole idea was ditched and was not pursued further. Somehow, soon after that JwC disappeared, though it may have been connected with something entirely else.

[edit] New Admins (2007)

There has been a new round of Admin recruitment early in 2007, where 4 new admins were added to the staff (Feril, Vilho, Mr.Spoon, Ferocious), but on the other hand, the community lost two of it's most well known people, namely lpzie and A Thousand Deaths.

A short while after last recruitment, there was a poll among the admins of who would be good in the job. LRS-admins asked for few guys if they would like to get in moderating-team, and in the beginning of June 2007, X-Ray, Oxyd & Xeno Lupus joined the crew.

In December a chap named Caphriel managed to get the moderator status, because the servers needed an active American player to look after the servers when Europe is asleep.

[edit] LRS Now

Currently, there are five servers. The forums has 1065 registered members (albeit some are merely new accounts for those who could not log in), while ZitroStats lists over 47.000 nicks (with a total of over 3.000.000 frags) and 24 clans (some of which seem to play exclusively on LRS servers). The number of nicks is obviously exaggerated, with many people having several fake nicks, or a specialised nick for different weapons. Also, the number of nicks and frags is greater than it should be, since at the beginning the expiration time for Zitro was 30 days, now it is 60 (although requests to extend it to infinity or to create a separate All-Time Hall of Fame were not possible to grant).

[edit] The avant-garde of Soldat stuff and the experimentations

Leo has never shied away from implementing various novelties on his servers.

[edit] Custom Maps

Custom maps have always been a feature of LRS, because "only default maps were boring" (Leo). Therefore, Leo is on a daily lookout for new maps and the mapcycles get updated quite often with interesting additions. This is certainly one of the key features of the servers, and one of the very few places where mappers can see their maps in action.

[edit] ARSSE

Leo has worked with KeFear on improvements to ARSSE, asking for various features and finding bugs which KeFear would later fix. The Teamkilling-kick we know today was partly thanks to LRS needs.

[edit] Friendly Fire

Currently, FF on is a standard on these servers. This co-incided with the FF on in SRL1, helping to forge a new tradition for the realistic mode. Many people have complained about the TK-kick, but apart from its primary role of stopping teamkillers, it serves a side-role of creating free places on the servers (helping people join even in peak-times).

[edit] TeamSpeak

LRS has had its TeamSpeak server for quite a long time. It came and went, but nowadays its a solid - if rarely used - feature.

[edit] Testing-paradise

LRS has been a testing grounds for new versions (the v2.5.1 beta) of the dedicated server by EnEsCe, helping to create a better Soldat experience for all the players in the world. Presently, we await the development of private slots - slots allowing people to join even if a server is full, although this apparently works for admins at least

[edit] Dedicated Realistic Weaponmod

LRS has always posited for a dedicated realistic weaponmod. This is due to the fact that the standard mod was seen as a bit unbalanced. There have been numerous experimentations, based off on the 1.2.1 Soldat version mod and various discussion threads on the LRS forums. Notable features included: increased knife speed, increased grenade speed, changes to almost all weapons. Moreover, with minigun seen as almost completely unpractical and lag-creating, its slot was replaced with first an auto-shotgun, currently with an M-60 machinegun. The weaponmod itself was reverted to the standard mod, granting the wishes of many clan players, who demanded a uniform playing environment.

[edit] Beta-testing

As of October 2006, LRS have become a beta-testing place. Bugs reported to LRS forums would later be relayed - it is presumed - to MM.


[edit] Events

[edit] February 2006: LRS Realistic Tournament

LRS Realistic Tournament, a small tournament organised mainly by B-Coat. Contestants included: Damned Necromancers (1st place), Retired Serial Killers (2nd place), Western Gunners, Uber Sexy Beasts, KillCompanyClan and some other clans that are not active anymore.

[edit] League-Dreaming

There were also plans for a whole league - it was proposed earlier, but it would only happen on the condition that the LRS Realistic Tournament was a success (which it was). The league sadly never materialised.

[edit] LRS Non-Clan Competition

September-October 2006: LRS Non-Clan Competition. This was a tournament that was meant to be played by teams of friends - in order to avoid the predictability of a clan tournament. Unfortunately, this never quite got off, as only three games were played. The rest of the teams failed to arrange games and after a month's waiting, Leo cancelled the whole thing.

[edit] The Death of LRS

In February 2008 Leo announced that LRS would come to its end on 20th of February. This was very tough news for the regulars who had played in the servers for long time, and the news even made some people to stop playing. Even though LRS died, Leo only froze the forums, giving his "customers" hope of a new coming, sooner or much later.

[edit] The Resurrection of LRS

Exactly one month after the servers closed, in March 2008 Leo announced that LRS would return. Soon after the announcement all of the servers started running again.

[edit] Admins

List of current admins of LRS.

[edit] Administrators

[edit] Moderators

[edit] Currently lost in depths of time

[edit] Links and contact

[edit] Server adresses

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