i'm an absolute cheapskate. don't have a whole load of money, being a student. but even with that in mind.. I just don't get servers. Why do people run them? The people that own them pay rent to let other people have fun. Seriously I think it's amazing and great i just don't get it.
it's not exactly off topic is it. it's empires related. and it's general discussion. did i just get trolled or what
Stick around, I'm interested to hear what server owners have to say on this. I, too, am grateful to the guys that pay their money for my fun.
From my point of view hosting the ELC and EGC, i created those and run them with Shandy for the pure purpose of having a place for any empires players to have fun. Yes granted you get jackasses in there that want to ruin shit and that's their way of having fun and we try to take care of people like that. But in the end Shandy and I run those servers just so that people can have fun. Back when we ran the Nachos servers, those were competitive gaming community server going up against servers like G4TC and who ever was out there. I guess then it was more of had a bigger e-pennis, dunno. But that's a story from a server owner.
What I find even more unbelievable are the bunch of always seemingly empty servers. That has always been a mystery to me why someone would run one all day long when no one uses it.
A server uses 200-300mb memory and a tiny bit CPU when idle, so it isnt really a problem to have one running on a ded
if you own it, sure, but you seem to get tonnes of servers which i presume are rented and yet still sit around empty. i love server owners.
Napalm is a masochist. Also some places run them because they're big communities with many boxes, so they just shove empires on a spare one I guess.
Server owners are making a investment now in the future. If Empires some day gets really popular the server owners with names known by vetrans can cash in on all the new people by making VIP features, Reserved slots etc
They run the servers so that they and their friends can play the games they like together. If anyone else comes in and ruins it for anyone, fuck them, they get banned. Follow the house rules and whatever shit comes out of their mouths or leave. (no offense intended in the wording). Say I loved some FPS game, but there were no servers, and many people wanted to play. It might get to the point where I would pay for a place for everyone to play, or rent it out in my name and take donations to cover the cost. Donations would either be purely out of appreciation and have nothing to do with the actual cost of the server and go straight to my bank account, out of which the server bill comes, or I could set up a secondary account with only those funds to make sure that the community knows that the money is going back into the community. Thats really all I can think of tbh. No one runs a server to "Haz adminz and jooze it" or however the hell you type moronically. people like that tend to be cheap asses and would hardly pay money to get their lols. They end up being hackers or greifers. The only other type of server owner I can think of would be the type that somehow gets their name on the bill and then uses that to forceably take over the server and it's IP and configuration. Either offers to pay the bill on his card for a month or whatever. I've seen a couple of large CS servers where this has happened, and the communities were litterally split over those that didn't notice and those that were given admin rights to stay with the guy.
If it's a good server, it's usually so they can have somewhere to play which is admin'd properly and has the rules they like. It's also somewhere specifically for a clan or community (or bunch of friends) to play together. You may as well just ask why devs make a free mod, or why someone makes a tech tree resource for other people to use Yes, there are actually some nice people out there, even on the internet :p
From someone who WORKs on a server, I can say this. A lot of the time, you go on a server, and you have griefers, or some setting is shitty, or it doesn't have the maps you like, or a whole host of other shit. By owning/running a server, the experience can be done just how you like it. And chances are, if you're running a popular server where most people play, and that it's your settings, the majority of people agree with you and hence play there.
Also, some of use just like building community! But seriously, most server owners are doing it for two simple reasons. 1) They feel a need for a server with their exact specifications to their tailored needs and enjoy the company of those who have similar ideas of what makes the game enjoyable. 2) They need a private server for LAN parties/friends. Although yes, some do it just be feel like God with admin powers, but those guys are douches.
It's mostly so that you can have a map rotation, or house rules, jsut the way you like it. I personally plan to make an infantry-focused server in the future, if I can. Hopefully, it won't be too hard getting it to work...
