Battlefield 2 - Server Structure

Server Structure

Although EA sponsors a limited amount of servers, most of the games are actually played on private servers sponsored by individuals and/or groups of individuals who finance the hosting with private funds. Either way, there is no charge for the players to play on them. There are two types of servers to note: ranked and unranked. Ranked servers have to be hosted by an approved hosting company where as all of the statistics and points that are accumulated on that server are recorded via a main bank of EA servers, thereby counting towards the player's global statistics. Because of this many of the server settings such as time limits and player tickets are locked to certain settings to enable a level playing field while the players are accumulating their statistics. To share the cost of a ranked server, many players get together and chip in on a monthly basis to pay for it, at times naming after their gaming clan.

An unranked server, on the other hand, can be hosted by anybody on any private server thereby potentially being free to host. The settings on unranked servers can be changed for many features, such as respawn time, amount of damages, etc. The downside to an unranked server, which is a major factor for most players, is that the statistics and points accumulated are not recorded toward the player's global statistics. Because of this, and the fact that most unranked servers do not show up in the game's search engine, most of the player's are attracted to ranked servers.

Recently, several modders in the gaming community have found a way to have privately ranked servers. These servers have their own master server that records player statistics and functions similar to EA's master servers for global ranking and statistics. However, the players rank and statistics are only available on that specific group of servers.

This private ranking system can work with co-op mode servers where all the human players can play on the same team against computer controlled opponents. It can also work with servers that run one of the many mods of the Battlefield 2 game such as Project Reality or Allied Intent Xtended (AIX). This eliminated much of the "downside" that was part of servers for co-op mode or servers running mods of the game.