Thread: [634] (Absolutely useless) load balancing

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OSRS has worlds, and cap them at 2k players iirc.

I don't think what you're suggesting is even invented for RS or any private servers. You would need to write a server that can communicate with other instances of the server. Otherwise you'll also end up having separate worlds, which is probably the way to go about it.

However, realistically; you don't have to worry about this at all. If your server can't handle the amount of players you get, it's most likely due to shit code.

The more realistic question is how to load balance connections to prevent DDoS. Not entirely sure how to go about this, but I'd try reverse proxying the traffic. However, in most cases, using OVH should suffice for this as well.

Originally Posted by Nozemi

OSRS has worlds, and cap them at 2k players iirc.

I don't think what you're suggesting is even invented for RS or any private servers. You would need to write a server that can communicate with other instances of the server. Otherwise you'll also end up having separate worlds, which is probably the way to go about it.

However, realistically; you don't have to worry about this at all. If your server can't handle the amount of players you get, it's most likely due to shit code.

The more realistic question is how to load balance connections to prevent DDoS. Not entirely sure how to go about this, but I'd try reverse proxying the traffic. However, in most cases, using OVH should suffice for this as well.

Yes, I'm thinking of using a solution that would work in the case where I would have 2+ different game servers on 2+ different physical devices. Reverse proxy was a solution I thought about, but wouldn't that have the same original issue since it would still be a single server processing all the requests (at least until the user is actually logged ingame)? That's why I was looking at a way to distribute the traffic directly from the client by having the original server that the client connects to send back the details of which server to connect to next. I would still be using a reverse proxy, but it would only have to deal with the first packet from the client, instead of everything up to login (JS5, lobby, etc.)

What do you think? Does everything I say make sense?

Originally Posted by clem585

Yes, I'm thinking of using a solution that would work in the case where I would have 2+ different game servers on 2+ different physical devices. Reverse proxy was a solution I thought about, but wouldn't that have the same original issue since it would still be a single server processing all the requests (at least until the user is actually logged ingame)? That's why I was looking at a way to distribute the traffic directly from the client by having the original server that the client connects to send back the details of which server to connect to next. I would still be using a reverse proxy, but it would only have to deal with the first packet from the client, instead of everything up to login (JS5, lobby, etc.)

What do you think? Does everything I say make sense?

The reverse proxy has nothing to do with the hardware related load balancing. Not sure how much that even affects the ping, which could affect PvP quite a bit.

If you want two server instances on two separate physical servers, you'll need to re-design quite a bit. I'm not the right person to tell you how much work that is, but I can imagine it'd be A LOT of work, and quite difficult.

There was a discussion in Discord about RAM, and Ikov is allocated 512MB RAM, same is Eden. Not sure what kind of CPU they use, but I seriously doubt you'll ever have to worry about hardware, other than getting a beefier server for your RSPS.

Originally Posted by Nozemi

The reverse proxy has nothing to do with the hardware related load balancing.

What do you mean by that? Isn't the point of the reverse proxy to distribute the load between 2+ servers so more than one can process JS5/lobby packets?

Originally Posted by Nozemi

If you want two server instances on two separate physical servers, you'll need to re-design quite a bit. I'm not the right person to tell you how much work that is, but I can imagine it'd be A LOT of work, and quite difficult.

I'm using my own server which already supports that, that's the reason I'm interested in this idea.

Originally Posted by Nozemi

There was a discussion in Discord about RAM, and Ikov is allocated 512MB RAM, same is Eden. Not sure what kind of CPU they use, but I seriously doubt you'll ever have to worry about hardware, other than getting a beefier server for your RSPS.

I agree it's not something that will be needed for any RSPS, I was just researching how to do it in order to gain more knowledge about traffic balancing. Judging from the information you've given me, there doesn't seem to be an existing client-sided solution for what I'm trying to create.

Originally Posted by clem585

What do you mean by that? Isn't the point of the reverse proxy to distribute the load between 2+ servers so more than one can process JS5/lobby packets?

Yes, it would distribute the traffic, but it doesn't necessarily distribute it between different physical servers. Personally (given the fact that RS(PS) in most cases has one server instance per world), I would just do it to hide the actual IP, so if someone chose to DDoS my server, they'd hit offline a proxy.

Originally Posted by clem585

I'm using my own server which already supports that, that's the reason I'm interested in this idea.

I agree it's not something that will be needed for any RSPS, I was just researching how to do it in order to gain more knowledge about traffic balancing. Judging from the information you've given me, there doesn't seem to be an existing client-sided solution for what I'm trying to create.

Never done load balancing myself, so wouldn't really know the best practice. However, you could have your client ask a web service what server instances are listening for connections. Then choose the one with least load.

Though I'm fairly sure a load balancer will distribute the connections between the servers you have configured for it, so don't think the client really needs to have support for that. It just connects to a load balancer, then that balancer distributes the traffic where it needs to go.

I thought rs hosted 4 worlds per server. Idk where i got that info from could be wrong

Originally Posted by techdaan

I'm not sure about older game versions, but in RS3 the game configuration (jav_config.ws) contains the default hosts.

Unfortunately many clients and servers hardcode the startup parameters. If you load them from a website you can set the default host for js5, lobby et cetera. In RS3 the default world server is sent during lobby login.

The same goes for OSRS, and almost certainly the revision OP is using. You could change the default world depending on server load, round-robin, whatever lb-strategy you want.
You could also load balance the config script (with parameters etc) endpoint.