Known bugs in the "R23" (current) version of BFBC2

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Edge100x
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Known bugs in the "R23" (current) version of BFBC2

Post by Edge100x »

These are confirmed bugs and limitations in the current build of BF:BC2, that have come up many times through our support here. DICE is aware of these bugs and is working on fixes for them.

- Servers crash/freeze or drop players occasionally, due to routing issues with the EA authentication back-end. Our system will auto-restart them when this happens.
- In-game pings are inaccurate and sometimes show much higher than they actually are.
- Switching to Hardcore mode requires a map change.
- The autobalancer does not always do a good job.
- In-game VOIP has some limitations and problems.
- Showing many in-game messages (such as through pbucon or server utilities that use rcon) will cause clients to warp/spike. Additionally, PB may cause spikes sometimes, especially when screen shots are used.
- PB screen shots do not usually record anything but a blank screen.
- These rcon commands don't work:

reservedSlots.configFile
mapList.configFile

The most significant limitation in BC2 is that the game is coded such that if there is a problem with Plasma (the EA stats back-end/authentication service), the server forcibly drops all players. There is unfortunately no way around this, and it seems to happen to all servers occasionally.
Last edited by Edge100x on Mon Oct 25, 2010 9:57 am, edited 12 times in total.
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Re: Known bugs in the "R5" (current) version of BFBC2

Post by Edge100x »

Edit: Updated for R5, which tries to fix some disconnection / unlock problems. Other bugs all still remain.
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Re: Known bugs in the "R6" (current) version of BFBC2

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Edit: Updated for R6, which was released to take care of kicks related to "PB INIT" failures.
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Re: Known bugs in the "R6" (current) version of BFBC2

Post by Edge100x »

Edit:

Removed this section about client browser problems:

- The client browser doesn't always show all the servers and sometimes it takes multiple refreshes to see a particular server. Also, client favorites don't always work (which may be alleviated by removing the beta); the server list is very slow to load; filters clear every time "search" is clicked; it's not possible to connect to a server by IP address; sometimes the ping shows as "--" instead of a real number; server banners don't always show correctly and improperly formatted ones can make clients crash; and search is case sensitive.
- Setting a server (join) password prevents anyone from being able to connect to it, even if they know the password (due to a client-side timeout).

Most of these should have been fixed with the new client patch: http://forums.electronicarts.co.uk/batt ... pdate.html. If you still have problems with any of them, please let us know!
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Re: Known bugs in the "R7" (current) version of BFBC2

Post by Edge100x »

Edit: Updated for version R7 (build 524160)

Version R7 changed a lot of little things that weren't mentioned in this thread. It has:

* Fixes for some types of crashes
* The ability for PB to send commands (so pb_sv_task can now run admin.yell, etc)
* PB GUIDs based on EA account IDs, meaning that someone would need to buy a new copy of the game to get around a PB ban
* Veteran-rank handling corrections
* Higher performance
* Better recovery from Plasma back-end problems
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Re: Known bugs in the "R7" (current) version of BFBC2

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Edit for R8 (build 525292):

DICE says R8 includes the following fixes/improvements:

* Workaround for the "player manages to join server twice" crash. Now the server detects this and refuses the player entry. Client might hang but it will not take down the server as well.
* Workaround for the "cannot join player to any team" crash. Teams might get uneven, most notably SQDM sessions with 5v3 players, but the server should no longer crash.
* Game sends PB output to pbucon (so pb webtool can be used to run PB commands and see their results)
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Re: Known bugs in the "R5" (current) version of BFBC2

Post by Edge100x »

Updated for R9 (build 527791):
* admin.say command implemented
- the output currently looks a bit funky on the game client, like so: Player: [Server]: <text>
but with the next game client it will look like: Server: <text>
* admin.yell to squad has changed (you need to specify both team and squad)
* squad numbering has changed – the “no squad” squad has ID 0, and real squads are 1 and up.
* Autobalance improved, it shuffles people both during and between rounds now, and does a better job
- Currently there is no way to turn it off
* mapList* commands reworked
* banList* commands reworked
* listPlayers command added
* admin.listPlayers command reworked (GUID, kills, deaths, ping and score added)
* Players have non-PB GUIDs now (these are distinct from PB GUIDs)
* onChat event reworked
- now it specifies target player subset as well
- shows text before profanity filtering
- client-originated chat messages starting with “/” make it to the server, and broadcast via onChat, but are not broadcast to other game clients
- use “/!<command>” if you want to be able to send commands to your homemade rcon tools without showing the commands to other players
* player.onAuthenticated added (it’s triggered when a player receives GUID)
* player.onSquadChange, player.onTeamChange implemented
* Couple of crash fixes
* Support for server-side “region” setting (not yet used by the game client)
* Ranked ON forces game-password OFF
* Ranked and PunkBuster settings can only be changed during server startup
* A server is marked as "hardcore" either when Friendly Fire is enabled, or when all the typical hardcore settings (hardcore killcam minimap etc) have been flipped
* exposed number of rounds per maps in maplist.txt, and via the remote admin commands
Edit: R9 also introduces a bug with vars.friendlyFire -- if it's specified in Startup.txt, it's ignored, and any lines after it are also ignored.
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Re: Known bugs in the "R11" (current) version of BFBC2

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Updated for R10 (530203) and then R11 (530204):

R10:
* Punkbuster is required ON for ranked servers
* Ranked servers cannot be started with a password
* Autobalance message goes to text-chat instead of in the middle of the screen
* Added weapon balance tweaks to a number of weapons – we are eagerly awaiting feedback!
R11:
1) SQDM and SQRUSH levels are no longer automatically classified as Hardcore.
The reason why they were classified as such, is that the game's autobalance is inactive in those two gamemodes. This caused the server browser's new hardcore-icon logic to always consider those servers to run in hardcore mode.

2) Favorites handling has been restored.
Some R10 servers made people's favorites' list show the same server in all entries. This is corrected with server R11. Once server R11 has been properly deployed, some people will have to rebuild their favorites list. I don't have any statistics on how many people are affected.
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Re: Known bugs in the "R17" (current) version of BFBC2

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Updated for version R17, which led me to remove the following bits:
- A real player slot is dedicated to each of the players specified in the reserved slot list, preventing anyone else from using it. This differs from the intended behavior of allowing players with reservations to join and kicking another player.
- Server variables like hardcore mode sometimes are forgotten/ignored during map changes.
- Changing the server name requires a restart (by design).
- Specifying vars.friendlyFire in Startup.txt does not work, and lines after it in that file are are ignored. (We continue to put it in the file now, but at the end.)
As far as we know, these were addressed.
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