TPU (Tanks n Planes Unlimited)

Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to post or send messages of support during the recent shakeup. Those messages have warmed my heart and helped me to get past the feeling of being alone in this fight.

Sadly, I have also received several extremely negative communications about this. I just hope that the people who sent them will not bother coming back to TPU and other JDRGaming sites and servers.

Of course, I will happily welcome back any of those people who realize just how wrong they've been, and change their attitudes to embrace love, empathy, and understanding.

After consideration, I've decided to fire up TPU again. New policies are in effect as of 2025Feb14, but not retroactive.

Note: the following content is based on a brilliant post on rpg.net published not long after Trump's election in 2016. I hereby credit the authors of that post for both the inspiration of this post and much of its wording. Thank you.

New rule: Do not post, act, speak, or otherwise communicate in support of Musk, Trump or their administration. Doing so on the JDRGaming web site, in JDRGaming Discord, in JDRGaming Gametracker server chat, in chat on any JDRGaming game server, or in the form of player names, will result in an immediate and permanent ban and possible network blocking.

This policy announcement is the result of careful consideration. The decision is final. It will not be the subject of further debate. I have considered the possible downsides and ultimately decided I have to stay true to my values. I will not pretend that evil isn't evil, or that it becomes a legitimate difference of political opinion if you put a suit and tie on it.

I am banning support of Donald Trump and his administration on JDRGaming sites, servers, and services. This is because his public comments, policies, and the makeup of his administration are so wholly incompatible with my values that formal political neutrality is not tenable.

We can be welcoming to (for example) persons of every ethnicity who want to talk about games, or we can allow support for open white supremacy. Not both.

Support for elected hate groups is not welcome here. We can't save the world, but we can protect and care for the small patch that is JDRGaming.

You might object to this new policy. You might be thinking along these lines: "The problem I find with a lot of people who call themselves 'progressives' online is that they seem to think the only strategy worth doing is to 'ostracise people whose values are antithetical to their own' rather than discuss it with them or accept that some people just have different viewpoints. Sure, in some cases there's not much hope for changing anyone's minds, but to default at 'ostracise, humiliate, shun and berate' is not a good approach IMO."

To which my response is: "No. You know what? Fuck that noise. Ethnic cleansing is not a 'different viewpoint.' Racism is not a 'different viewpoint.' White nationalism is not a 'different viewpoint.' Dogwhistling that attacks against your political enemies will continue if the media doesn't stop saying things you don't like is not a 'different viewpoint.' Putting children in cages is not a 'different viewpoint.' A nazi salute is not a legitimate political expression. Misogyny is not a viewpoint, it's hatred. All bigotry is irrational and evil.

This is not an argument over tax rates or the proper role of government in education. This is an argument about who will be allowed to exist in America and beyond. If you don't like it, get the fuck off JDRGaming. And don't come back until you learn the meanings of words like compassion, empathy, fairness, and equality.

Policy Outline

(In effect starting February 14, 2025; not retroactive.)

JDRGaming sites, servers, and related services remain no-fly zones for political and religious discussion, with one exception: the #general channel on JDRGaming Discord.

1. We are banning expressions of support for the administration of President Trump. You can still post on JDRGaming sites and services even if you do in fact support the administration — you just can't bring your evil here.
2. Zero tolerance for anything supporting or defending Trump, Musk, nazis, fascism, white supremacy, or any other form of bigotry.
3. The penalty for ignoring this policy will depend on several factors, but may include loss of admin status, game server bans, deletion of user accounts, IP address blocking, or subnet/CIDR/provider blocking. We will not report your statements or actions to your Internet provider or to your employer unless the offense is particularly egregious.
4. We are not explicitly endorsing or banning any American political party.
5. We are not banning conservative politics, or anything on the spectrum of reasonable political viewpoints. We assert that fascism, hate groups and intolerance are categorically different from other types of political positions, and that confusing the two legitimizes bigotry and hatred.
6. We are not going to have a purge; we will not be banning people for past actions and speech. Although if your player name is 'MAGA', 'President Donald Trump', 'Commander Trump', or 'Kyle is still KING!!!', this might be a good time to change it.
7. We will not permit witch-hunts, progressive loyalty-testing, or attempting to bait another into admitting support for Trump or Musk in order to get them banned. I recently did this myself in JDRGaming Discord, with unfortunate results. Lesson learned.
8. It is not open season on conservatives, and revenge fantasies against Trump and Trump supporters are still against the rules.

It has come to my attention that the TPU server has a nazi bar problem.

All public JDRGaming game servers are down while I decide what to do about it. The private Minecraft and Valheim servers remain up, as they are invite-only.

It's possible that TPU will return as an invite-only, password-protected server. But that will only happen if I can find a reliable way to identify nazis and keep them out. So it's not likely.

Thank you all (except the nazis) for being fans of TPU.

DJ ErrorProned, who uses the player name 'ErrorProned', produces audio commentary for battles and events on TPU.

I've posted a few examples of his work on a new page on this web site, which you can access from the sidebar panel under 'TPU Stuff'.

DJ ErrorProned is busily refining his methods, and plans to produce more commentary. We are considering using his commentary if and when we have more special events on TPU, and we're also exploring options for adding his commentary to gameplay video.

Check out his stuff! You might even hear your player name mentioned, especially if you did something amusing on the battlefield.

For the last couple of weeks, I've been evaluating a Battlefield 1942 client tool called bf1942plus.

bf42plus inserts itself into the BF1942 process during startup, and its features can be controlled with a config file or using client console commands.

Here are a few of the features of bf42plus:

• Assign more and different colours to player names.
• Fix crash when the game is minimized.
• Fix other windows getting resized when the game is launched.
• Center kill message now shows who teamkilled you.
• Fix a loading screen crash caused by a bug in the game's memory allocator.
• Speed up reconnecting to servers on map change.
• Changing mod when joining a server from the serverlist is faster.
• Nametags are lowered when u get close to other players so you can see them more easily.
• Yellow server messages are immediatedly copied to the console so one isn't lost if it is overwritten by another.
• Message when someone connects to the server.
• Show player IDs in chat and/or in kill messages.
• Show player IDs in nametags.
• Show in the console who started a vote or voted.

There's now a link to bf42plus on the Files page on this site.

NOTE: this mod has some features that are considered cheats on some servers. I currently don't see any reason to ban its use on TPU.

Take a look! I'm finding the player name colour function to be particularly useful.

I just discovered a wealth of useful resources on the Battlefield 1942 Information web pages maintained by Eric Haines.

These pages in particular are extremely informative, and if you play BF1942, you should take a look:

• Frequently Asked Questions
• Annotated Maps - maps marked with vehicles, emplacements, ammo, medical, etc.
• Tips and Tactics
• Weapons Effects and Grid O' Death - paper vs. scissors vs. rock.

There's now a link to Eric's BF1942 pages on the How To page on this site. There's also a link to a local copy of Eric's pages on the JDRGaming server, because Battlefield 1942 is an 'old' game, and web sites about BF1942 tend to disappear.

Thanks to a group of dedicated fans on various sites and Discord channels, there's a new master server for Battlefield 1942: master.bf1942.org.

If you don't use the in-game server browser, you don't need to make any changes, and you can still connect directly to your favourite servers directly via IP address, or indirectly from web-based server lists.

However, if you depend on the in-game server list, you'll need to replace your Battlefield 1942 client binary with a new one that looks at the new master browser instead of the old, defunct one.

Here's a link to the new BF1942 client files: https://www.moddb.com/games/battlefield-1942/downloads/bf1942-masterbf1942org-patch. Extract the contents of the ZIP file into your Battlefield 1942 folder. You might want to consider making a backup first.

I've tested the new server and the new client, joining and playing on TPU successfully.

The new client binary provides the master server fix, but also includes some other useful fixes:

Battlefield 1942 v1.612 Retail patched by henk on 23-2-2022
version 2.1

Fixes:
~~~~~~
* No CD
* Portable
* Widescreen support - In game
* Widescreen support - In menu
* master.gamespy.com replaced with master.bf1942.org
* Increased accessible ram from 2gb to 4gb
* Removed this message from console:
	 Error: failed  to add player  to buddylist. Couldn't locate player.

The Tanks 'n Planes Unlimited server is now running a new version of the BF1942 server binary, which allows the server to report its status to the new master server. The new server binary includes several other useful fixes. Here's the full list:

Linux Binary version 23-2-2022 by henk

Modified to include:
- master.bf1942.org replacement for gamespy master
- Ignore client version and checksum (allow 1.61b and 1.612)
- Ignore CD key checks
- No longer sends player keyhashes to public queries
- Allows all console commands on remote and local console
- Fix assaultTeam typo. Defending team now wins if timer expires
- Allow 128 players
- Fix armor zombies generated by death bubble
- Fixes IP bans not taking effect

- Fixes segfault in dice::ref2::io::NetworkManager::getNetUpdate
- Fixes segfault in dice::ref2::world::ObjectManager::checkMessages
- Fixes segfault in dice::ref2::world::FireArms::Fire
- Fixes segfault in dice::ref2::io::NetworkManager::getNetUpdateDelta
- Fixes segfault in dice::ref2::world::BFSoldier::handleUpdate

Addresses the following vulnerabilities:
- BFE-200806.01
- BFE-201107.01
- BFE-201111.01
- BFE-201211.01
- BFE-201611.01
- BFE-201611.02
- BFE-201710.01
- BFE-201804.01

At about 1am Pacific time today (February 21), the unofficial master server for BF1942 stopped responding.

Because of this, your BF1942 client may hang when it starts. Even if it doesn't hang, the server list will not work.

You can still join the JDRGaming BF1942 server by connecting directly to its IP address: 184.71.170.154.

I've reached out on a few forums, asking if anyone knows what's going on. Stay tuned for updates.

Sisko sent me a video that shows someone camping at the uncaptureable Axis base on the Battle of Britain map:

The video was created using Bandicam in spectator view in a recent session on TPU. It's a good demonstration of the kind of base camping that some TPU players find objectionable.

TPU is a co-op vs. bots server, so human players should only ever attack bots. Since the object of any base camping should therefore only ever be to kill bots, and we needn't feel any empathy for bots, camping on TPU is technically allowed.

However, base camping can also be annoying to human teammates. In this example from Battle of Britain, the camping player is destroying Axis bombers before they can even take off, which means any players defending the factory and radar stations in England have nothing to do. Many players, including myself, enjoy dogfighting in a Spitfire over England, and this camping would reduce the potential for that kind of enjoyment.

The other problem with this kind of camping is that it's not very challenging. Sure, the Axis bots at their base will try to kill the camper, and the camper may not last long in that position, but while there, the camper can easily kill huge numbers of bots. So it's not much of an achievement, except for racking up kills. Padding stats like this can also be annoying for other players.

It's an interesting issue. I'm still not convinced that we need a rule against camping. Instead, I will continue to emphasize that: a) it's kind of lame; b) it's too easy; c) it's a simple way to pad stats; and d) other players may find it annoying. If a player is doing this kind of thing on TPU, and it bothers you, use the in-game chat to politely ask them to stop.

If you disagree, or have something to add to this discussion, contact me on the #tpu_server channel on the JDRGaming Discord server.