Results of 2015 year

Less than one day left before new, 2016 year comes and we will traditionally summarize everything, that happened in 2015.

Events of the passing year:

There were a lot of important events this year, and here is a list of the main:

- We finished work on cross server arena and BG for Cataclysm.
- We opened new 4.3.4 Fun realm, that became popular.
- Cross BG and arena system successfully transferred from 4.3.4 core to 3.3.5a.
- Several cross server arena seasons were held on all sever versions.
- We added streamers page to our web site, also added arena statistics for all realms, that are included into cross system.
- We also launched cross server for MoP realm.
- Implemented a service of selling and buying characters in control panel.
- Vote system was improved, now it checks if you really voted, or just clicked a link.
- Logon2 realms were transferred to logon account database.
- 3.3.5a x100 and x300 realms have been merged and renamed into x100.
- We overcame 2 strong DDoS attacks, here is the description.
- 4.3.4 x10-x20 and x100 realms have been merged into one 4.3.4 x100 realm.
- We implemented Duel zone at logon.
- Most recourses have been moved to France, to OVH Data Center.
- We have done 16 major updates on 3 versions of client and sent more that 2500 commits to core repository.
- As a tradition, we started Christmas discounts.

That was a short summary of all events of past year, now we will focus main events in details.

Cross BG and arena helped to strongly improve PvP at our server, I think there is no analogue with such active BG and arena. At peak online there are about 500 players at BG and arena at the same time on Cataclysm, and about 1600 on Lich King and MoP, and it's more than the whole online of most servers.
For example on Lich King and MoP at peak online time about 70 battles at arena are held at the same time, and this is really a huge number. Cataclysm has lower amount, at about 20 battles, but our Cataclysm realms are probably the last servers that have online now.
Arena seasons, held by us stimulate arena activity, but they need to be improved, because requirements are too strict, but we are going to solve this problem next year.

We merged some realms during past year, because they had problems with online (Unfortunately this is a usual tendency for the last 2-3 years, all servers lose their online). We try not to lose online and sometimes we even manage to increase it, for example peak online of x100 is about 6500 players. Cataclysm did not get such boost, but x100 realm has stable 4000 players online and it makes this realm the most popular cataclysm server in the world.
Opening new realms attracts new players and it helps to hold online level of more than 50.000 players from all our realms in peak time. There is no unofficial server with such online level.

I would like to focus DDoS attacks, that damaged our server and some more servers. Other servers were attacked with a light attack and we were hit by a strong attack, I can't even remember an attack like that before.
The first attack was weak, and we resisted it by turning external filters on. After several weeks we turned them off and continued work, but the second attack was rather strong...
eServer data center, that we used during 2nd attack in the beginning of November, could do nothing to prevent attack, though it was not very strong (several gigabytes of syn flood). We tried to use our filters but than decided to move to another data center - MnogoByte, that could provide us with hardware protection without external filters. We moved with a hope that they can help us, we also had and agreement with manager, they gave us our personal DDoS protection specialist, unlimited channels, but it was no difference. Later we found out that they have no syn flood protection, but they filtered all other attacks.
They told that they have such a protection, there was such info at their web site. DDoS reached hardware, and we tried to filter attacks with the help of channels and powerful hardware, but attackers could just increase the power of DDoS and all our protection had no sense. Data center left us alone with channels and told they have no hardware to protect us from syn flood.
Some time later the attack focused data center, and it was even dropped once (there was an attack of about hundreds gigabytes) and if we had no contact with manager they would have stopped working with us because other clients struggled.
Later one of MnogoByte data center managers told that such strong attack was used when someone attacked web site of Sochi Olympics, and he haven't seen stronger attack in his life. I respect attackers for the magnitude and aspiration to achieve their goal, we stayed online on both sides: we defended and they changed attack type, and it lasted for more than a week. At last we solved this problem without data center after a conversation with attackers.
Now our hardware is in France, in OVH data center, that has hardware protection like in Russian DC but even better. Of course it can't protect from all of attacks, but it is not as easy to bypass this protection like MnogoByte one. Shame on them, they say they are one of the best data centers in Russia... They should not provide a service that can't be provided well. There were also problems with routes from different countries to this data center during a week or two, and that made us move to France.

Development and updates of realms:

Will start with 3.3.5a fixes. Lich King got 4 major updates during past year, more than 700 commits with bug fixes were sent to core repository, nearly a half of them were done during last 3 months when we found more Wotlk developers.
At the beginning of the year we had only 1 Wotlk developer, Leyota, and Pelf who worked on cross server. Leyotas activity was sometimes bad and when autumn came he left. In a month we transferred Pelf and Barbarian from MoP to Wotlk and at the beginning of October thing went better. In November we recruited new developer of Wotlk, Animagus, who, as it turned out, does his works and performs tasks given to him well. Barbarian and Pelf are going to work on Wotlk till the end of the year and than they will return to MoP development.

4.3.4 also had 4 major updates, and about 500 commits with bug fixes were sent to core repository.
During all the year Leyota was the only one, who worked on Cataclysm, Pelf also did some cross and PvE content fixes, but their activity was lower than at Lich King.
From the mid October, as it was told before, Leyota left and I asked Pelf to watch cataclysm bug tracker and fix PvE content, but no global tasks were done.
From the beginning of November Skiv, Burning Crusade developer, started working on Cataclysm and arena logs, and after a half of a month we found one more developer, Intruder, and together they have done more than 150 core fixes during last 1,5 month.

5.48 had more updates - 6 (every 2 months and updatepack was published), more than 1200 commits with bug fixes were sent to core repository.
We held nice development tempo and we could easily finish work on PvE by the end of the year, but we did not manage to do this. After summer Pelfs activity reduced (he worked on PvE content) and we can't increase it, and for the last 1,5 months he and Barbarian worked on Wotlk 3.3.5a. After New Year holidays Pelf and Barbarian will work on MoP full time, development tempo should increase and be like at the beginning of 2015 or even better, because we now have a french partner - firestorm project developers.

I would like to highlight some of our developers:

Barbarian, who worked much during past year. At the beginning his work tempo was not so fast, but from the middle of the year he did much, worked on MoP and for the last 1,5 months on Wotlk. Thanks to him Lich King realms can now hold 7000 players online.
Pelf started his year in nice tempo, thanks to him MoP has PvE content, and than his activity decreased and some mistakes (he knows about them) were made. Those mistakes left some negative impression, but if not Pelf, our server would not have much working content, and I hope his activity will increase in the following year.
DB_KiLLeR, one of most criticized by users developer, but he works alone on databases of all our wow expansions, he can have distinctive answers and thoughts, but he does his work well. Now, when we have developers of every wow expansion, he won't decline reports, that need core scripting, because now we have people to deal with it. You can write reports about blizzlike AI for quests for example, and we will work on it, especially on Wotlk and Cata.
Skiv worked on Burning Crusade for a half of past year, but BC couldn't survive. He didn't work very active and effectively, but he worked and checked logs. For the last 2 months he showed his work on Cataclysm and had a good progress, sometimes code is not perfect (hacks, disputable decisions), but it works and work well.
In November we recruited 2 new developers: Animagus (Wotlk) and Intruder (Cataclysm). They started very active, amount of fixes is rather big, Animagus worked a bit better, but Intruder works well, and he also started work later than Animagus. They give positive impressions, and if they work as active as before we will achieve serious results.
We thank firestorm and pandawow/wodempire developers team for help in 5.4.8 and 6.2.3 development, we can achieve even better results together.

Report on past year promises:

A year before I wrote a thread to summarize the past year, let us watch what plans have been made and what haven't:

- We planned to work on attracting foreign players during all the year long but the main step was made close to the end of a year, I mean moving servers to Europe, and we will continue work after the New Year holidays. +
- We planned to implement transfer service inside our server and from other servers, but we refused to use this method and developed a service of selling and buying characters in control panel, that is close in functionality. Every player can come and choose a character not to start from the very beginning, also our players can switch realm by choosing a character in CP. +
- Unfortunately we did not update the design, to tell the truth we forgot about it. Our web site is okay, but the control panel has design problems. -
- We launched Draenor on time, but we were waiting for 6.2.3 that's why we did not release it earlier. Now 6.2.3 was launched and we have and OBT. +

About realms:

- Unfortunately we could not save Burning Crusade, the online decreased before summer. We tried to change core, but it was not successfull, and players did not want to play on the old one. That is why 2.4.3 servers disappeared from our project. It may be a minus for us.
- We planned to launch cross server arena and bg system at lich king. That was done and now this system works well on every logon realm. We also planned to do path finding at arena-bg with blizzlike refresh timers and invisibility - done. We did updatepacks during the year and in the end of it, when we got new developers - development process became faster. We have done everything, that was planned for Wotlk.
- We have done path finding for Cataclysm. We planned to work on PvE content, both actual and old, everything done and we continue working on it. We have launched Fun server as it was planned. We have a plus for Cataclysm.
- Not so good about Mists of Pandaria. We planned to finish work on PvE content by 10th update, we have done the update but we have full Throne of Thunder (not fully correct) and 4 bosses in Siege of Orgrimmar, we hope we will finish everything fast in 2016. We have done everything that we planned in PvP content: we launched cross server arena-bg system, fixed a lot of bugs. But our realm is PvE, so it should be a minus for us.

In total: we haven't completed only two promises - web design update and PvE content at MoP, other promises were kept.

Statistics

I offer you to learn some statistics of the past year, for the whole project and logon/mop in detailes:

- During past year 762.041 unique players visited logon/mop from differen IP addresses and accounts.
- 471.753 new accounts have been created.
- Maximum peak online was in the middle of January 2015 and it was about 56.000 players, I think that launch of x3 at logon3 and x2 Draenor realm will help us to achieve this online again and show stability, against the background of our competitors.
- Our web resources have 380k unique visitors average per month and they make 10,5 millions views every month.
- Maximum online of control panel users was achieved several days ago when christmas discounts started. More than 5000 users enter control panel at the same time, web server was loaded for 90%, it lasted for 2 hours, our old hardware would not overcome this.

Plans for 2016

In the end we want to tell you our plans for 2016:

Web resources:

- Like in the past year we plan to update the design of web site and control panel. We have a deal with a designer and he will start working after New Year holidays, Wotlk and Cata CP will also have its own design, the same for MoP and Wod.
- We will update arena ladder, we also plan to make detailed statistics of every battle.
- We will start full support of english speaking players, and if you know English as a mother tongue, can prove this in a voice conversation and wants to help us with correct translation and moderation of english forum, you can write to me and we will find you some paid work.

Realms:

Wotlk:

- We plan to fix all known bugs, described in bug tracker. At this moment about 200-250 actual reports left, most of which are difficult to fix and need more than just a day of work, but we can easily solve those problems during 2016 year even if only one developer will work on Wotlk. By the end of 2016 all bugs, found in 2015, should be fixed, if we have no problems with our developers.
- We were also often criticized for not blizzlike quest realization, kill to complete. As I wrote before we are ready to rework every aspect of the game blizzlike, so you can write reports about quest scripts, we are going to work on it during all year long.
- I think we also will continue working on core optimization to implement mobs path finding and visibility timers without increasing server delay, and it will finish blizzlike improvement of Wotlk content.

Cataclysm:

- We have more reports at Cataslysm, that's why we can't promise to fix everything, but Cataclysm now has 2 developers, and the process of development will be faster.
- By the end of the year we plan to fix all bugs of actual PvE content and work on blizzlike quests and items scripting. You could notice that we have done a lot of blizzlike AI for quests and items, that worked with the help of hack before or even did not work.
- We will do LFR system, we tried alpha version of it in autumn, but it was not successfull, but in the following year we will finish and install the correct version.
- We also plan to transfer optimization fixes from Wotlk to implement mobs path finding and visibility timers without increasing server delay, and it will finish blizzlike improvement of Wotlk content.

Mists of Pandaria:

- We plan to work on both PvP and PvE content. Working on PvE means working on Throne of Thunder and Siege of Orgrimmar, we must finish this before summer, and after that we will work on other instances of MoP and older expansions.
- We also plan to transfer optimization fixes from Wotlk, because MoP server delay is the highest of all expansions, that we have. We need to lower it at least in 2 times and we will work on it in the beginningof the following year, we will also try to implement path finding at arena-bg.

Warlords of Draenor:

We haven't opened a realm of Wod, but we have already started OBT. You can see all our plans in the News section, it is difficult to tell about our plans now, but we will try to work over PvE content and complete it by the end of the following year, including full Hellfire Citadel raid, to start working on Legion in autumn.