Servers: Difference between revisions

From Unofficial Homecoming Wiki
Jump to navigation Jump to search
imported>Sekoia
imported>Sekoia
(overhaul of page, will make note on talk page explaining)
Line 1: Line 1:
{{TOCright}}
== Overview ==
== Overview ==


There are fifteen publicly accessible servers that run the City of Heroes game. These servers are: Champion, Defiant, Freedom, Guardian, Infinity, Justice, Liberty, Pinnacle, Protector, Triumph, Union, Victory, Vigilance, Virtue and Zukunft (''[[wiktionary:future#Translations|future]]'').
There are fifteen publicly accessible servers that run the City of Heroes game. Eleven of these servers are hosted in the United States and are only accessible when using the US version of the game.<ref>[ftp://client.coh.com/US/CohUpdater.zip City of Heroes Updater, US Version]</ref> The remaining four servers are hosted in Europe and are only available through the EU version of the game.<ref>[ftp://client.coh.com/CohUpdater.EU.zip City of Heroes Updater, EU Version]</ref> Additionally, there are two test servers called the [[Training Room]] (one for US clients and one for EU clients) on which patches and other changes are tested before release on the live servers.


The US servers (Champion, Freedom, Guardian, Infinity, Justice, Liberty, Pinnacle, Protector, Triumph, Victory and Virtue) are only available when using the US version of the game[ftp://client.coh.com/US/CohUpdater.zip], and the EU servers (Union, Defiant, Zukunft and Vigilance) are only available when using the EU version.[ftp://client.coh.com/CohUpdater.EU.zip]
== Servers ==
 
In addition, there are two test servers called the [[Training Room]] (one for the US servers and one for the EU) in which patches and other changes are tested before being rolled out to the live servers.
__TOC__
== Geographic Division ==


=== U.S. Servers ===
=== U.S. Servers ===


Although any player may play on any server, the servers may be divided into geographic divisions based on where the servers are physically located. They are as follows:
Players using the US version of the game have access to eleven servers that are physically located in the United States. Six of these servers are located on the east coast, and the remaining five are located on the west coast.<ref>PlayNC FAQ Entry: [http://support.plaync.com/cgi-bin/plaync.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=884 Where are the servers located?]</ref> The US test server is also located on the west coast. Regardless of where the player lives, the US client enables access to all eleven servers.


==== East Coast Servers ====
==== East Coast Servers ====


The east coast servers are physically located in Virginia. They are:
The six east coast servers are physically located in Virginia.


* Freedom
; Freedom
* Infinity
: Freedom is typically the most populated US server. It is known to be a favorite server among French-American and French-Canadian players. Historically, this server was originally named Prime during the beta-test but was renamed upon release. Freedom is considered by many in the community to be the unofficial [[PvP]] server.
* Liberty
* Pinnacle
* Triumph
* Victory


==== West Coast Servers ====
; Infinity
: Infinity typically has a moderate level of activity in comparison to the other US servers.


The west coast servers are physically located in California. They are:
; Liberty
: Liberty is referred to by many in the community as an "unofficial friendly server", along with Triumph.


* Champion
; Pinnacle
* Guardian
: Historically, Pinnacle was often perceived to be the last server to come back up after updates, which lead its players to jokingly refer to it as "the drunk server". However, this no longer seems to be an issue.
* Justice
* Protector
* Virtue


The Training Room server is also located in California.
; Triumph
: Like Liberty, Triumph has a reputation in the community as "unofficial friendly server". Triumph is typically one of the least populated US servers.


=== European Servers ===
; Victory
: Victory has as a reputation in the community as "the unofficial Euro server" and "the unofficial GLBT server" because of perceptions that this server has the largest concentration of these two groups. It is also the server where the original beta-testers of City of Heroes were able to reserve their character names from the beta.


The European servers are physically located in Frankfurt, Germany.  Any European City of Heroes player may log into any of the four servers, but they are generally split by language as follows:
==== West Coast Servers ====


* Defiant, English
The five west coast servers are physically located in California. The training server is located in California as well.
* Union, English
* Vigilance, French
* Zukunft, German


== Server Differences ==
; Champion
: Referred to by many as the "community server" for its friendly atmosphere and active forums.


Within the U.S., the servers are functionally identical.  They all have the same maintenance schedule and their [http://www.cityofheroes.com/servers/index.html server statuses] are all listed together.
; Guardian
: Historically, Guardian suffered from frequent and allegedly unaddressed downtime that led some in the community to start referring to it as the "red-headed step-child server". However, this no longer seems to be an issue.


However, there is one difference that rarely occurs: Changes that are triggered at a specific time are time-zone specific.  For example, when the [[Heart of Light Badge]] was triggered, players on the East Coast servers received the badge at 12:00 EST and players on the West Coast servers received the badges at 12:00 PST (three hours later).
; Justice
: During the beta-testing period, Australians coordinated to make this server the "unofficial Australian / New Zealand server." Consequently, Justice commonly sees more players active through until maintenance, as the timezones for New Zealand (UTC+12) and Australia (UTC+10) mean that the maintenance window happens locally around 11:30pm (Sydney time). As such it attracts Australian players for the last 5 hours of activity (6pm-11pm AEST). Because standard maintenance windows are announced by Admin message and a ''different'' message is broadcast for [[Issue]] and special event releases, Australian players are often the first to experience them.


Changes that are rolled out as part of maintenance patches are not affected by time zones; players all receive these changes as soon as their respective server comes back up.
; Protector
: Protector is referred to by some as "the lonely server" or "the unfriendly server" because of its large number of players who prefer to play solo, though teams and supergroups are still not difficult to find.


== Server Nicknames ==
; Virtue
Some of the servers have a reputation for having a majority of a certain type of people that play on them. These are informal nicknames for the servers, and in no way affect the gameplay mechanics.
: Virtue has typically been the second most populated US server since the launch of City of Villains. This server has a reputation as the "unofficial role-playing server."


===USA===
=== European Servers ===
* Freedom - The most populated American server and a favorite of French-American and French Canadian players. Historically, this server was originally named Prime during the beta-test and was renamed upon release. Freedom is also the unoffical PVP server.


* Virtue - The second most populated server since the launch of City of Villains. Also, this server has a reputation as "the unofficial role-playing server."
The European servers are physically located in Frankfurt, Germany.  Any European City of Heroes player may log into any of the four servers. However, the four servers are generally divided by language.


* Liberty - Shares the reputation of "unofficial friendly server" with Triumph.
; Defiant
: Defiant is intended for English-speaking players. The populations of Defiant and Union share something of a friendly rivalry with one another. However, the availability of only two English-language servers has resulted in many players having [[alt]]s on both of them.


* Pinnacle - Jokingly referred to by its players as "the drunk server," because it often used to come back up last after updates.
; Union
: Defiant is also intended for English-speaking players. It has a reputation in the community as being both the unofficial roleplay server as well as the unofficial PvP server. Union typically has the most player activity among the European servers.


* Triumph - Considered to have the smallest population of the eleven US servers and shares the reputation of "unofficial friendly server" with Liberty. Some also claim it has the highest proportion of themed supergroups.
; Vigilance
: This server is intended for French-speaking players. Vigilance has a very low player population.


* Victory - Has a reputation as "the unofficial Euro server" and "the unofficial GLBT server" because of perceptions that this server has the largest concentration of these two groups. Also the server where the original beta-testers of City of Heroes were able to reserve their character names from that period.
; Zukunft
: This server is intended for German-speaking players. Zukunft has a very low player population. Zukunft is German for "Freedom".<ref>Wiktionary: [[wiktionary:future#Translations|Translations for "Future"]]</ref>


* Justice - During the beta-testing period, Australians coordinated to make this server "the unofficial Australian / New Zealand server." As a byproduct of this decision, Justice commonly sees more players active through until maintenance, as the timezones for NZ (UTC+12) and Australia (UTC+10) mean that the maintenance window happens locally around 11:30pm (Sydney time). As such it attracts Australian players for the last 5 hours of activity (6pm-11pm AEST). Because standard maintenance windows are announced by Admin message and a ''different'' message is broadcast for [[Issue]] and special event releases, Australian players are often the first to experience them. Unfortunately, this usually results in very low initial attendance as the server maintenance window, usually used fully (2 hours?) results in 1:30am players and a high drop off rate.
== Server Differences ==


* Champion - Often known as the "community server" for its friendly atmosphere and active forums.
Within the U.S., the servers are functionally identical.  They all have the same maintenance schedule and their [http://www.cityofheroes.com/servers/index.html server statuses] are all listed together.


* Protector - Referred to by some as "the lonely server" or "the unfriendly server" because of its large number of players who prefer to play solo, though teams and supergroups are still not difficult to find.
However, there is one difference that rarely occurs: Changes that are triggered at a specific time are time-zone specific.  For example, when the [[Heart of Light Badge]] was triggered, players on the East Coast servers received the badge at 12:00 EST and players on the West Coast servers received the badges at 12:00 PST (three hours later).


* Guardian - Known as the "red-headed step-child server" due to its frequent down times that neglected to be brought to attention in the past. The server hasn't had a problem lately though.
Changes that are rolled out as part of maintenance patches are not affected by time zones; players all receive these changes as soon as their respective server comes back up.
 
===Europe===
* Union - The "unofficial roleplay... PVP... and well everything server".  The only EU server with significant activity.
 
* Defiant - Shares friendly rivalry with Union, though again, people generally have alts on both servers due to lack of English-speaking servers.
 
* Vigilant
 
* Zukunft
 
== External Links ==


* The [http://support.plaync.com/cgi-bin/plaync.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=884 FAQ entry] on the City of Heroes support site that gives the locations of the U.S. servers
== Notes and References ==
<references />


[[Category:Game Client]]
[[Category:Game Client]]

Revision as of 08:13, 7 February 2008

Overview

There are fifteen publicly accessible servers that run the City of Heroes game. Eleven of these servers are hosted in the United States and are only accessible when using the US version of the game.[1] The remaining four servers are hosted in Europe and are only available through the EU version of the game.[2] Additionally, there are two test servers called the Training Room (one for US clients and one for EU clients) on which patches and other changes are tested before release on the live servers.

Servers

U.S. Servers

Players using the US version of the game have access to eleven servers that are physically located in the United States. Six of these servers are located on the east coast, and the remaining five are located on the west coast.[3] The US test server is also located on the west coast. Regardless of where the player lives, the US client enables access to all eleven servers.

East Coast Servers

The six east coast servers are physically located in Virginia.

Freedom
Freedom is typically the most populated US server. It is known to be a favorite server among French-American and French-Canadian players. Historically, this server was originally named Prime during the beta-test but was renamed upon release. Freedom is considered by many in the community to be the unofficial PvP server.
Infinity
Infinity typically has a moderate level of activity in comparison to the other US servers.
Liberty
Liberty is referred to by many in the community as an "unofficial friendly server", along with Triumph.
Pinnacle
Historically, Pinnacle was often perceived to be the last server to come back up after updates, which lead its players to jokingly refer to it as "the drunk server". However, this no longer seems to be an issue.
Triumph
Like Liberty, Triumph has a reputation in the community as "unofficial friendly server". Triumph is typically one of the least populated US servers.
Victory
Victory has as a reputation in the community as "the unofficial Euro server" and "the unofficial GLBT server" because of perceptions that this server has the largest concentration of these two groups. It is also the server where the original beta-testers of City of Heroes were able to reserve their character names from the beta.

West Coast Servers

The five west coast servers are physically located in California. The training server is located in California as well.

Champion
Referred to by many as the "community server" for its friendly atmosphere and active forums.
Guardian
Historically, Guardian suffered from frequent and allegedly unaddressed downtime that led some in the community to start referring to it as the "red-headed step-child server". However, this no longer seems to be an issue.
Justice
During the beta-testing period, Australians coordinated to make this server the "unofficial Australian / New Zealand server." Consequently, Justice commonly sees more players active through until maintenance, as the timezones for New Zealand (UTC+12) and Australia (UTC+10) mean that the maintenance window happens locally around 11:30pm (Sydney time). As such it attracts Australian players for the last 5 hours of activity (6pm-11pm AEST). Because standard maintenance windows are announced by Admin message and a different message is broadcast for Issue and special event releases, Australian players are often the first to experience them.
Protector
Protector is referred to by some as "the lonely server" or "the unfriendly server" because of its large number of players who prefer to play solo, though teams and supergroups are still not difficult to find.
Virtue
Virtue has typically been the second most populated US server since the launch of City of Villains. This server has a reputation as the "unofficial role-playing server."

European Servers

The European servers are physically located in Frankfurt, Germany. Any European City of Heroes player may log into any of the four servers. However, the four servers are generally divided by language.

Defiant
Defiant is intended for English-speaking players. The populations of Defiant and Union share something of a friendly rivalry with one another. However, the availability of only two English-language servers has resulted in many players having alts on both of them.
Union
Defiant is also intended for English-speaking players. It has a reputation in the community as being both the unofficial roleplay server as well as the unofficial PvP server. Union typically has the most player activity among the European servers.
Vigilance
This server is intended for French-speaking players. Vigilance has a very low player population.
Zukunft
This server is intended for German-speaking players. Zukunft has a very low player population. Zukunft is German for "Freedom".[4]

Server Differences

Within the U.S., the servers are functionally identical. They all have the same maintenance schedule and their server statuses are all listed together.

However, there is one difference that rarely occurs: Changes that are triggered at a specific time are time-zone specific. For example, when the Heart of Light Badge was triggered, players on the East Coast servers received the badge at 12:00 EST and players on the West Coast servers received the badges at 12:00 PST (three hours later).

Changes that are rolled out as part of maintenance patches are not affected by time zones; players all receive these changes as soon as their respective server comes back up.

Notes and References

  1. City of Heroes Updater, US Version
  2. City of Heroes Updater, EU Version
  3. PlayNC FAQ Entry: Where are the servers located?
  4. Wiktionary: Translations for "Future"