INX game servers blog

In this tutorial we are going to go through the dos and don’ts of gaining technical help from the support team at INX Gaming.

Items covered in this tutorial:

The support desk
- How to find the support desk
- How to register
- Forgotten your password
- Still can’t login
- Submitting a ticket
- Viewing existing tickets
Forums
Live Chat

The support desk

INX Gaming has a simple and effective method of dealing with all requests for support. These requests range from something as simple as “how do i restart my server” to something potentially more complex such as “my server crashes when it reaches 9 players at 11:54pm”. Many other hosts claim to have 24/7 support by phone, email, text, Facebook, MSN, AIM, MySpace and any other means of communication that are available. Many of these hosts are generally telling a little porkie and will only offer support in their spare time between school and going to their mates for a game of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare on the xbox. Call of Duty on a console you say? Anywho, back to talking about support! The tickets are managed by dedicated support staff in a systematic order ensuring the best support for you (the customer) and the best tracking of faults for us (INX Gaming).

How to find the support desk

There are various ways of of accessing the support desk, of which each of these methods are shown below.

Direct URL
Google
INX Gaming website

Direct URL

This method is typing the link to the support desk directly into your favourite web browser. Simply type support.inx-network.com into your address bar. This will take you directly to the support desk in a jiffy. For future ease of use it is recommended that you add this address to your favourites/bookmarks.

Google

Just as you would search for the latest movie coming out at the cinema, or the best present for your other half… just search for INX Support. This will return the INX Gaming support desk for you to click at your ease.

INX Gaming Website

Dotted around the INX Gaming website and forum, there are numerous links back to the support desk. Under the ‘Contact’ tab will specify the working hours of the support desk. The support hours are 9am to 5pm – Monday to Friday excl public holidays. These hours are correct at the time of publishing.

How to register

To be able to use the support desk, you will need to have an account registered. This is a very brief process and will only take a matter of minutes to complete.

Firstly, you will need to navigate your way to the support desk (as shown above). Once you are there, click on ‘Register’.

Once you have click on register, you will be asked for a few basic details such as your name, email address and password. Please use the email address that you used for your MyINX account. If you use a different email address, your identity can’t be confirmed by matching email addresses and your support could be delayed.

Once you have entered all your details, click Submit. You will then receive a confirmation that your account has been created and give show you the details that you just entered.

Even though your account has been created successfully, you will need to verify your account. This is done by an automated email been sent to the address that you specified.

In the email is a link to activate your account. Simply click the link that is provided and your account will be activated and ready for use.

Forgotten your password

Have you been a n00b, or are you just having a senior moment and forgotten your password? Well, it is quick and simple to reset your password so you can get your much needed support.

Firstly, navigate your way to the support desk and click the ‘Lost Password’ link.

Once you have clicked the lost password link, you will be asked to enter your email address. This must be the email address that is used normally to access your support desk account. Once you have entered your email address, click ‘Submit’.

Once you have submitted your email address, an automated email will be sent to your account. This email will contain a password which you can use to access your account.

Still can’t login?

If you still can’t login to your account, you will need further assistance from the INX Gaming support team. This can be done by submitting an email to sales@inx-gaming.co.uk explaining your problem and providing details that may be pertinent to your problem. If you are receiving error messages, please state these errors within the email so that the issue can be identified and a solution brought to you promptly.

Submitting a ticket

If you have any issues, you will need to raise a support ticket to register your issue. This is so that INX Gaming can see that you have an issue and keep track on the progress. Again, this is a fairly simple process that will only take a matter of minutes.

Firstly, login to the support desk and click ‘Submit a Ticket’. Upon clicking the submit a ticket link, you will be asked to select a department for which your ticket relates to. In this instance, there is only one department that is available for you to select.

Select ‘Helpdesk’ and then click next.

Once you have selected your department, you are now able to enter all sorts of details relating to your problem/question. We are going to go through this screen in sections relating to the colours that are used to highlight the various sections.

Subject – Purple/lilac/mauve

This is where you enter a subject or a brief description of your problem or question. Try and make the subject relative to your ticket. Instead of saying “I have a problem”, say something like “Server crashes on map change”. This just makes life that little bit easier when looking through your tickets.

Details – Blue

This is where you can enter all the details of your ticket. You can enter as much detail here as you wish. Just remember, the more detail or information that you can provide, the better. If you just say “my server crashes”, this isn’t going to give a lot of help to the person looking at the ticket. Instead, say “my server crashes when i change the map to de_dust but doesn’t crash when changing to any other map”.

This then helps out the support analysts when looking for a resolution to your problem. If you provide more information from the outset, you are more likely to get a faster resolution to your problem.

Knowledgebase Suggestions – Peach/tan

As you are typing out the details of your ticket the support desk will try and suggest solutions to the issue that you are having. It does this by looking at keywords in what you are typing and relating these words to the knowledgebase articles that are available. Some of these suggestions may help, but others may not.

If none of the suggestions shed any light onto your problem, then continue with raising your ticket.

Upload Files – Green

If you have any screen-shots of errors that you are having, you can attach these images to the ticket so that the support analysts can see the error that you are getting on your screen.

Viewing existing tickets

Once you have started to raise tickets, you will start to get a list available to look at. This is a very simple process. If you have chosen suitable subjects for your tickets, it makes browsing through this list of tickets that much easier. If you choose subjects such as “my server is broken” all the time, you will just see a list of tickets with that subject. It makes life very difficult in trying to locate a specific ticket. If you can make life easier… do it!

Login to the support desk and click ‘View Tickets’.

Once you have clicked view tickets, you will be shown a list of all tickets that you have raised. These tickets could be a few hours old, or a couple of years old.

Simply click on any of the tickets and you will be taken into the ticket to see all information relating to that issue.

Forums

INX Gaming has an active community of new, past and current customers all talking about various items that are on their mind. Whether it be how to install a mod on their server or the best way to butter toast… the questions are asked! As you have read, we have an active community of members. These members are not INX Gaming staff and are there to help others. This means that some of our members are not on the forum at all hours of the day and night, so please be patient if you are waiting for a reply to something. Along side this, some of the games that are hosted by INX Gaming are not as popular as games such as Counter Strike Source. This means that there won’t be as many users playing the same game as yourself. Again, in this instance we request you to be a little patient when you are waiting for a response for games that are a little less popular.

Live Chat

This method of communication between a GSP and its customers has its pros and cons. The pro of this tool is that you can get a quick answer for any sales query that you have. This could be a quote on a new game server, or on 8 servers.

Now a lot of GSP’s may offer live chat as a form of support for its customers. This is not a good method for many reasons. The short and sweet of this section is that live chat is not a support tool. DO NOT USE LIVE CHAT FOR SUPPORT!

I’m not sure if this can be made any clearer, but i think you get the idea If you have any support issues, please raise a ticket.

Last night an update was released for Left 4 Dead 2 game servers.

A required update for Left 4 Dead 2 is now available. Please run hldsupdatetool to receive the update. The specific changes include:

- Fixed all bot teams not leaving the starting area if sb_all_bot_team 1 was set
- Fixed a case where survivor bots would fail to rescue a friend from charger attacks
- Updated Thai translations
- Fixed an issue where servers wouldn’t relist after the master server was bounced
- Fixed Charger jumping exploit
- Fixed Spitter bug where spit could emit from a location several inches from the head, causing the spit to unexpectedly strike nearby objects and fall

Jason

As below, an update for TF2 servers & DODS servers has been released:

Required updates for Team Fortress 2 and Day of Defeat: Source are now available. Please run hldsupdatetool to receive them. The specific changes include:

Engine
Enabled Steam Cloud support for key bindings and custom spraypaint images
– Added Options->Multiplayer->Advanced option to toggle off/on: default is on

Team Fortress 2
Added new Highlander mode.
– 9 players allowed per team.
– Restricts each team to 1 of each class.
– Use mp_highlander (0/1) to toggle off/on: default is 0
Added “bots” to the server’s sv_tags convar if the server is running bots.
Fixed a weapon name localization issue.
Fixed the “tf_teamtalk” server convar not controlling text chat between living/dead teammates.
Updated the map CTF_DoubleCross
– Fixed the map not ending correctly when using mp_timelimit.
– Changed to prevent Engineers from building on top of the shack in each base.
Updated the map Arena_WatchTower
– Fixed a case where players could open and get stuck on the starting gates before the round start.
– Improved clipping to prevent people from getting out of the map.
– Optimized the map for better performance.

Jason

Here are a list of useful commands that can be used in-game in all versions of Call of Duty (excluding Modern Warfare 2).

Firstly you might need to enable the option to show the console in-game. This is found in the options which are specific to each game. You will then need your RCON password to hand if you don’t already know it. If you have forgotten your RCON password, this can be found in your rankedserver.cfg file which is available to view using the File Editor of the Control Panel.

Please note: The items coloured in red are variables and you will need to amend these areas to suit the command.

If there are any commands that are missing which can be used in all versions of Call of Duty (excluding Modern Warfare 2), please leave a comment and they can be added to the list.

With thanks to meanman for the list of commands

This tutorial is also available in a video. Click here to view it.

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There are some things that you just cant do without the aid of an FTP client. I have tried many FTP clients over the time and found one that i am quite happy with. It is simple to use and is not too confusing when you look at it.

I bring you FileZilla!

Items covered in this tutorial

Downloading FileZilla

Firstly you will need to install the software on your computer. When looking at the FileZilla website you will be able to see various downloads for the same piece of software. You will need to pay close attention to the operating system that each of these downloads relate to.

For example, in the image below the downloads highlighted in yellow are for a Windows based system. The ones highlighted in blue are for a Linux based system and the ones in green are for an OS X based system. These links will always have the latest most stable version of the software for you to download. Please note that the versions shown in the image below were correct at the time of writing this.

Once you have identified the version that will suit your operating system, simply click the link. When you have clicked the link you will be taken to another page where it will prepare your download. You will see a small counter that is counting down from three. Once it has reached zero you will be prompted with a pop-up asking what you want to do with the download. Save the file on your computer so that you can access it in a few moments.

If for any reason that you are not prompted (like above) you can manually start the download. There are many reasons why the download may not start straight away but this is mainly down to security settings within your browser. We are not going to go and click all sorts of buttons to get this working automatically as we can just manually start the download. To do this, click the ‘Click Here’ link as highlighted below. When you click this link, you will be presented with a pop-up similar to the one above (depending on your browser).

Installing FileZilla

Now we have downloaded the installation package, there is not really much to the installation. Install the software using all of the default settings that it provides for you. If you are comfortable with changing things like the location of the installation or what parts of the software to install, then by all means go ahead and make these modifications.

Getting to know FileZilla

I think the easiest way to look at the program, is to break it down into sections and we can cover each of the sections one by one. I have highlighted each section in a colour which will correspond to a description below.

Yellow Area

This is the area that you will enter login credentials to be able to access your server. These details will be available from your control panel and can be changed at any time. Once you have successfully logged into a server, it will be stored in your ‘Quickconnect’ menu for speedy access. You simply select the server you want from the drop down list and it connects. Please bear in mind that if you have changed your FTP password, the quick connect option will not work as it will be attempting to connect using your old password. Simply re-enter your details and your away again.

Grey Area

This area you will not need to worry about too much. As you are using FileZilla, information will be scrolling through this area. It will log every command/action that has taken place. If there is an error of any description, whether it be a login failure or an upload failure, it will be in this area giving you an idea as to why this command/action has failed.

Blue Area

This area is to browse files & folders on your local computer. This is where you can locate files (for example) from My Documents to upload to your server. You may look at the root of your C drive using Windows and only see a few directories. If you then look at the same location using FileZilla, you may see more files and directories that you would not normally see using Windows. That is because these files are hidden from normal view, however FileZilla can see hidden files on your local computer.

Green Area

The green area is nearly the same as the blue area. The difference being is that the green area shows all files and folders on the remote server. This would be either your webhosting or your game server etc. This is the location that you have connected to by entering login credentials above. By default this area will not show hidden files and folders, but this can be enabled and we will go through that later on.

Pink Area

Finally, the pink area will show the current queue for either uploading or downloading. If you are uploading a new plugin for your server, you will see a list of all the files that are going to be uploaded and the progress of each of the files. There is a default limit for the maximum amount of concurrent transfers which is set quite low. This number can be changed, but we will go through this later on.

Enable hidden files

You may connect to a server and find that you can’t find a file or folder that you know should be there. This can be very confusing and pretty annoying if you know its meant to be there and clearly isn’t. One of the most common reasons for this is that the file or folder you are trying to locate is hidden. By default FileZilla does not show hidden files. To turn this feature on open the ‘Server’ drop down located at the top of the application and then tick the ‘force showing hidden files’ option.

Now when looking at your server, you should be able to see files that you couldn’t see before.

Change maximum concurrent transfers

There is a default limit set for the maximum concurrent file transfers. This means that only a certain number of files can be wither uploaded or downloaded at the same time. If this option is set to 3, you can upload or download 3 files at the same time. If it’s set to 7 you can upload or download 7 files at the same time… you get the idea. You can change this number to anything between 1 and 10. Bear in mind that if you have a slower connection to the internet, having this set at 10 will severely decrease the speed in which each of the files are transferring at; so you will need to adjust this number to suit your connection.

Uploading a file

Now we have gone over the basics of FileZilla, we can go through uploading some items. This is a very simple process and you should pick it up pretty quickly.

Login to the server that you wish to upload the content to. Firstly you will need to locate the contents to upload to your server. This is done by locating the file in the blue highlighted area as shown in a previous section of this tutorial.

After we have located the file or folder you wish to upload, you need to find somewhere to upload the files to. Cast your eyes to the remote server area which we highlighted green earlier and find the location to upload the file.

Now the next part can’t be any simpler! Right-click on the file to be uploaded or double click the file.

When you have selected upload it will add the selected file or files to the transfer queue which will look something similar to this.

Your file will not be uploaded to the remote server ready for use.

Downloading a file

Downloading a file is also very simple. It is pretty much the same as above, but in reverse. You need to find the file you want to download in the remote server section and then find the destination for the file in the local computer section. Once you have found these two locations simply right click on the file to download and select ‘Download’. Again, the file will be added to the transfer queue the same as above and will be downloaded to the location you selected.

Changing file permissions

One of the things that you may come across when using an FTP client to upload files is amending the file permissions. This will be come more prevalent when uploading to your web space, but may be used when uploading to game servers. This is again a very simple and quick process.

As you are reading your documentation it may ask you to change the file permissions on a file and will give you some numbers such as 644 or 777. These numbers represent who or what can access the file and what they can do to the file. To set this you need to locate the file on the remote server and right click on the file and select ‘File Permissions’.

You will be shown the current permissions for the selected file. As you can see from the image below, the current permissions are set to 644.

To amend the permissions, simply type in the new permissions into the ‘Numeric Value’ box. You will see the tick boxes change according to the numbers that you have entered. I am going to change this particular files permissions to 777.

Once you have clicked OK, the permissions will be set. Depending on how many files you have selected will depend on how long this take, but this is not normally longer than a few seconds.

The following update was release for Left 4 Dead 2 servers late last night. Please run the update button to apply this update.

–

A required update for Left 4 Dead 2 is now available. Please run hldsupdatetool to receive the update. The specific changes include:

Gameplay:
- Fixed where last round of upgraded ammo didn’t have upgrade effect
- Jockeyed survivor now glows for infected team in all cases
- Fixed exploit that allowed Jockey players to get instant recharge of their ability
- Fixed Charger ability timer not resetting when killing a survivor with low health on their third strike
- Charger now applies a small amount of damage when charging through physic props

Match Making:
- Changed how requests are made to master server for group servers
- Fixed sorting on group servers UI
- Reduced update work on group servers UI

Miscellaneous:
- Made the water shader support splitscreen on the PC
- Miscellaneous fixes in the subtitles
- Updated system tray icon
- Fixed Survival timer issue caused when voting for round restart

SDK/L4D2-LD/Hammer changes:
- When browsing for a func_instance filename, the proper path relative to the current bsp will be returned. This allows level designers to use instances from the base game in dlc maps without having to manually fix up the filename
- Changed base.fgd default skybox to one that exists in L4D2
- Added env_instructor_hint to fgd, as well as content/game icon images
- Deadline URL fix
- Added missing vmt for env_instructor_hint
- L4D Addon Support – restored missing delivery van modified VMT
- L4D Addon Support – restored missing shelves metal 3
- L4D Addon Support – restored floodlight generator switch
- L4D Addon Support – restored missing airliner content
- Updated vbsp to correctly handle instances within instances
- Fixed the fullscreen engine changing the Hammer views, requiring a restart of Hammer

Jason

To add bots to your Counter Strike Source server, you will need to add the following code to the end of your server.cfg which can be located in the ‘File Editor’ of the control panel. Adjust the variables below where needed:

bot_prefix {Clan Tag}
bot_quota 4
bot_quota_match 0
bot_quota_mode fill
bot_join_after_player 0
bot_difficulty 1
bot_defer_to_human 1
bot_chatter off
bot_auto_vacate 4

Once added to your server.cfg, you will need to reboot your server before these settings will take effect. Note we allow a maximum of 4 bots per server. Please do not add anymore as it spoils the quality of your server, and others.

Advanced bot cvars

These can be executed via an rcon command, or added to server.cfg.

bot_add
‘bot_add’ is a value itself. Adding this to your server configuration will enable bots

bot_quota <1-4>
Amount of bots to add. Adding many bots will use more cpu. Start with a few bots, then add more if needed.

bot_quota_mode
If ‘Fill’, the server will adjust bots to keep # players in the game, where # is bot_quota (from above) Default: Normal

bot_difficulty <0/1/2/3>
Skill of bots. Values are: 0=easy, 1=normal, 2=hard, 3=expert. Default: 0

bot_chatter
Control how bots talk. Values: ‘off’, ‘radio’, ‘minimal’, or ‘normal’. Default: Normal

bot_auto_follow <0/1>
Allow bots to automatically follow a human player. Default: 1

bot_auto_vacate <0/1>
Kick bots to automatically make room for human players. Default: 1

bot_join_after_player <0/1>
Bots must wait for a people to join before joining? If No, bots will play without people. Default: 1

bot_defer_to_human <0/1>
Can bots complete objectives if there are humans on a team? Default: 0

bot_prefix
Prefix for bot names. A prefix is a tag that bots will have in front of their name. you can enter your clan tag or leave blank.

bot_allow_rogues <0/1>
bots may occasionally go ‘rogue’. Rogue bots do not obey radio commands, nor pursue scenario goals.. Default: 0

bot_walk <0/1>
The speed at which bots can move. 0=walk+run, 1=walk Default: 0

bot_join_team
What teams are bots allowed to join? Default: any

bot_eco_limit <0-16000>
Bots will not buy if their money falls below this amount. Default: 2000

Bot Weapon Restriction

bot_all_weapons
Allow bots to use all weapons. ‘bot_all_weapons’ is the value.

bot_knives_only
Allow bots to use only knives. ‘bot_knives_only’ is the value.

bot_pistols_only
Allow bots to use only pistols. ‘bot_pistols_only’ is the value.

bot_snipers_only
Allow bots to use only sniper rifles. ‘bot_snipers_only’ is the value.

bot_allow_grenades <0/1>
Allow bots to use grenades. Default: 1

bot_allow_pistols <0/1>
Allow bots to use pistols. Default: 1

bot_allow_sub_machine_guns <0/1>
Allow bots to use sub machine guns. Default: 1

bot_allow_shotguns <0/1>
Allow bots to use shotguns. Default: 1

bot_allow_rifles <0/1>
Allow bots to use rifles. Default: 1

bot_allow_snipers <0/1>
Allow bots to use sniper rifles. Default: 1

bot_allow_machine_guns <0/1>
Allow bots to use machine guns. Default: 1

Instead of searching for the various commands that you can use on your server, i am going to compile a list of useful commands all in one place.

I am aware that this may not be an exhaustive list of the commands, but if you know of any others that are not on the list, let me know and i will happily add it to the list. Here goes…

As you can see, this is a long list and may be a little difficult to find exactly what you are looking for. What i would suggest is using your find function and searching for key words (e.g. search for ban) which will highlight items that are related to your search.

Instead of searching for the various commands that you can use when you have Mani Admin installed on your server, i am going to compile a list of useful commands all in one place.

I am aware that this may not be an exhaustive list of the commands, but if you know of any others that are not on the list, let me know and i will happily add it to the list. Here goes…

As you can see, this is a long list and may be a little difficult to find exactly what you are looking for. What i would suggest is using your find function and searching for key words (e.g. search for ban) which will highlight items that are related to your search.

Instead of searching for the various commands that you can use when you have Sourcemod installed on your server, i am going to compile a list of useful commands all in one place.

I am aware that this may not be an exhaustive list of the commands, but if you know of any others that are not on the list, let me know and i will happily add it to the list. Here goes…

As you can see, this is a long list and may be a little difficult to find exactly what you are looking for. What i would suggest is using your find function and searching for key words (e.g. search for ban) which will highlight items that are related to your search.

Basic Commands

Vote Commands