Welcome to this first edition of The Monthly Rant, a column where I, the webmaster, can speak my thoughts about the JK community, gaming, the latest mod, or pretty much anything else.  Of course, a new one will be posted every month, although I may change that to bi-weekly if interest increases.

This month's edition is about multiplayer JK, the Microsoft Gaming Zone, and TCP/IP.  Now I know most of the readers are either subscribed to or have been on the Zone.  When I log on, I usually proceed to the heaviest travelled room - Nar Shaddaa.  On average, there's anywhere from 100 to 240 people in the room at once.   People are constantly leaving and entering, so I have no problem getting in.   But once I do, things are bad.

The sysops do their jobs as they should, keeping language, sexual allusions, and the like out of the room.  However, nearly a 1/3 of the members I see (most of which are part of clans) can't keep the F-word out of their sentence.   Tempers are raised, the sysop intervenes, and both usually get kicked or muted.   This would be fine - IF it didn't happen so often.  I usually see people getting kicked for this kind of thing every 2 or 3 minutes.  Not only that, people get kicked for "flooding the main" (repeating your phrase(s) over and over without breaks) even more often.  This kind of thing keeps me out of the Zone - except for getting others to play TCP/IP.

TCP/IP is one of the transmission protocols on which the 'Net operates.   Many players use IP addresses to set up temporary servers from which games can be played.  This method can be MUCH less laggy than the Zone, and so is more enjoyable.   Also, as many people as the game supports can play over TCP/IP, compared to a maximum of four on the Zone.  However, IP games can be harder to set up, as you must know your IP address (simply type 'winipcfg' at the Run... menu on the Start button).   To get around this, dedicated servers are set up.  A dedicated server is basically a server set up to run a specific level continuously, 24-7.  This enables players to come in at any time of day and play the level, hopefully with other people that are there already.  The only drawback is that it takes a bit of time, money, and resources to set one up - the biggest of which is a dedicated line.  This could be anywhere from a K56Flex or Shotgun modem to a T1 line.  Needless to say, many gamers only set up a slow, cheap modem system.  This works for many people.

You may have seen Dedicated Server Now! buttons all over the place (The Skinners' site comes to mind...).  I am fully in support of this, and I run a temporary server for the Pick of the Week whenever I can (usually Friday/Saturday).  Because I use my personal computer and (one) phone line for it, I can't have it on all the time.  But meet me in the IFD game in the Canyon Oasis forum on the MGZ and we'll play!