Strange Connection Issues - Clients Having Trouble Connecting

[mrpresident]

Hey everyone, first let me say that I searched the forums and the internet for hours trying to find a solution before posting a new thread. Any help anyone can give me would be very appreciated.

[b]Issue:[/b]
Sometimes when players try to connect to my server they are disconnected from the server with some strange disconnect messages.
The only thing I have gathered is that is seems to happen right after the GM:InitPostEntity() hook is called as this is around the time the players get disconnected.
These issues really started happening a few weeks ago.

[b]Resources[/b]
Here is a list of console messages I've compiled that display when I was disconnected from my own server with the issue:

Compact freed 1085440 bytes
Server returned version 19208, expected 24.



Compact freed 475136 bytes
Disconnect: 
.
Disconnect: 
.



Compact freed 593920 bytes
Netchannel: unknown net message (48) from 216.245.209.84:27018.
Redownloading all lightmaps
Server returned version 384, expected 24.



Compact freed 524288 bytes
Server returned version 20652, expected 24.
Unknown command "#"



Compact freed 577536 bytes
Netchannel: failed reading message svc_CmdKeyValues from 216.245.209.84:27018.
Redownloading all lightmaps
Netchannel: unknown net message (40) from 216.245.209.84:27018.
DataTable warning: No matching RecvTable for SendTable 'íN���gms_tree3
dԡtr�!pF�@�[��P��pE��o��m��C!��CM
D�P�X����L���~'.
Host_EndGame: ProcessSendTable: RecvTable_RecvClassInfos failed.



Compact freed 831488 bytes
Netchannel: unknown net message (36) from 216.245.209.84:27018.
Redownloading all lightmaps
Netchannel: unknown net message (36) from 216.245.209.84:27018.
Disconnect: ����&�!A�x�AvZ1J%�n:�.
Disconnect: ����&�!A�x�AvZ1J%�n:�.



Compact freed 749568 bytes
Host_Error: String tables must be powers of two in size!, 21504 is not a power of 2

[b]Screenshots[/b]
Here are a couple screenshots of some strange disconnect messages I received.
[img]https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/5982978/ForumLinks/gmoddc1.png[/img]
[img]https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/5982978/ForumLinks/gmoddc2.png[/img]

Thanks again for any information anyone might have in helping me fix this. It's become quite the problem lately.

[mrpresident]

I gathered more information.

It seems that the disconnects happen almost 100% of the time if you try to join while someone else is joining at the same time.

I don't know if this will help.

[Rubat]

Could it be that you send a lot of net messages at spawn?

[mrpresident]

I thought that might be the issue, I was checking my net messages. There shouldn't be that many sent at spawn. The issue seems to multiply the longer the server has been up, but it will do it just hours after starting it too.

[mrpresident]

I tracked down the issue. Thanks Robotboy, turns out you were right.

I didn't think I was sending too many net messages, but when I started digging through my gamemode code, I was. And quite unnecessarily at that. I cleaned up the code, reduced the net messages and it fixed the issues.