v0.57.14 - Save Recovery, Music Shop, Discord Stats & Login Events

Save Listing and Load-Path Resilience

Player report (Lin, single-player Steam): loaded the game and her saves were gone from the slot list. The save files were fine on disk (%APPDATA%\UsurperReloaded\saves\Lin.json at 73 MB, plus Lin_backup.json and five recent autosaves), but the load screen showed "Existing Save Slots:" with nothing underneath. The save was there; the game just couldn't see it.

Two compounding bugs in the save subsystem:

Silent listing failure. FileSaveBackend.GetAllSaves() iterates every .json in the saves folder, calls File.ReadAllText(file) (pulls the whole file into memory as a UTF-16 string — a 73 MB JSON file becomes ~146 MB allocated), then runs JsonSerializer.Deserialize<SaveGameData> on the lot. Any exception in that chain — OutOfMemoryException, JsonException, anything — was swallowed by catch (Exception ex) { DebugLogger.Log(Debug, ...) }. The save vanished from the list. The player had no way to know it was still there.

Silent load failure. FileSaveBackend.ReadGameDataByFileName had the same shape: catch (Exception ex) { return null; } (ex unused, no logging). GameEngine.LoadSaveByFileName saw null and printed a generic "Load failed — save may be corrupted" line, then returned straight to the menu. No path, no error detail, no recovery suggestion. From the player's perspective, identical to "save doesn't exist."

Fix, two layers:

Listing side (FileSaveBackend.GetAllSaves): each file's deserialize is wrapped in its own try/catch with a fallback branch. If the full deserialize works, use it (same as before). If it throws, log the specific exception at Warning level and still include the file in the list — populating PlayerName from Path.GetFileNameWithoutExtension and SaveTime from the file's LastWriteTime. The slot appears; the player can select it; the load path handles whatever's next. Also skips obvious non-character files up front (*_autosave_*.json, *_backup.json, emergency_*.json) so the slot list stays clean.

Load side (FileSaveBackend.ReadGameDataByFileNameWithError → SaveSystem.LoadSaveByFileNameWithError → GameEngine.LoadSaveByFileName): new error-returning load method. On failure it returns a specific human-readable message distinguishing between:

• File not found (with full path)
• IO error (file locked by another process, permission denied)
• Out-of-memory during read or deserialize (with file size in MB)
• JSON parse error (with line/position from the JsonException)
• Version too old (with the numbers)
• Unexpected deserializer output

GameEngine.LoadSaveByFileName now routes failures through a new ShowLoadFailureWithRecovery method that:

1. Prints the specific error.
2. Shows the full save folder path.
3. Scans for recovery files alongside the broken save — <name>_backup.json, up to three most-recent <name>_autosave_*.json files, and emergency_autosave.json — listing each with its LastWriteTime.
4. Offers numbered options to load a recovery file (which copies it over the primary and re-attempts the load through the normal pipeline), start a new character (with explicit warning that it overwrites), or return to the main menu.

If a recovery file ALSO fails to load, the menu re-enters with the new error so the player can try the next one. In no case does the game silently drop the player back to the main menu with the impression that their saves vanished.

Root cause of the bloat is separate — all of the affected autosaves are 73 MB each, written seconds apart, which means something in the save pipeline is writing a huge quantity of state on every save. Likely candidates: the NPCs list (serialized per-player in single-player — ~130 alive NPCs with their memories/goals/dialogue history each), or DungeonFloorStates (accumulated per-floor room state). Investigation open; this release fixes the "I can't even see my save" symptom. The next release will target the actual bloat.

Music Shop Instrument Browsing

Two compounding bugs:

Level-range filter hid low-level instruments. BuyInstruments() filtered the instrument list to MinLevel <= playerLevel + 30 && MinLevel >= playerLevel - 20. At Lv.100 that is MinLevel 80 to 130 only. Every instrument below Lv.80 was invisible, so an endgame player shopping for a low-level companion (Melodia recruits at Lv.20 and wants an Old Lute) literally could not browse to the item they wanted. The weapon shop shows everything from Lv.1 up and leans on display-time colouring + purchase-time validation to handle affordability and level requirements, which is the right pattern.

Boundary pagination silently exited the shop. Pressing P on page 1 or N on the last page checked for currentPage > 0 / currentPage < totalPages - 1 respectively. On failure the code fell through to the int-parse block, which failed to parse "N" or "P" as a number, then hit currentPage = 0 and returned — kicking the player all the way back to the main shop menu with no message. Unknown input (typos, Enter on an empty prompt) did the same.

Fix:

• Removed the level-range filter. The list now shows every instrument, sorted by MinLevel then by Value. Items the player cannot afford or cannot equip are already greyed out at display time, and PurchaseInstrument enforces class + level at the point of sale.
• Pagination: boundary N / P now stays on the current page instead of falling through. Empty input and unknown input also stay on the current page. Only Q (back to shop) and a valid purchase number exit the browser. A successful purchase resets currentPage to 0 for next visit.
• BuyInstrumentByNumber (the direct-number path from the main shop menu) updated to use the same ordering as the browser so typed numbers continue to line up with the displayed list.

Discord Live Server Status Channel

New Discord feature on top of the v0.57.13 gossip bridge: a single auto-updating stats embed posted to a designated #server-status channel. The message is edited in place every 60 seconds with:

• Online players (level, class, location) — up to 20 shown, with *...and N more* footer if the server is busier
• World totals (registered players, total monsters slain, average level, highest level, deepest floor reached)
• Highlights (top player by level, current king, most popular class)
• Server uptime (read from systemctl show --value -p ActiveEnterTimestamp usurper-mud so it reflects actual game-server uptime, not bot-reconnect uptime)
• Connection instructions (SSH command, web terminal URL, BBS reference)

Implementation. New env var DISCORD_STATS_CHANNEL_ID (separate from the existing DISCORD_GOSSIP_CHANNEL_ID) — if unset the feature is skipped silently. On bot ready the bot scans the last 50 messages in the channel looking for its own previous stats message and reuses that ID if found; otherwise posts a fresh one. Self-heals if the message is deleted manually (catches Unknown Message on edit and reposts on the next tick). Reuses the existing getStats() function (30s cache) so the DB isn't hammered by the 60s timer. Bot only needs View Channel, Send Messages, Embed Links, Read Message History on the stats channel — same perm set as the gossip channel, no new OAuth scopes.

Node-side change only — ships via ssh-proxy.js and usurper-web restart, no game-server binary change needed for this feature.

Discord !who Command and Login / Logout Announcements

Two additions on top of the v0.57.13 gossip bridge, both landing fully in v0.57.14:

!who command in the Discord channel. Typing !who (or !online) in #in-game-gossip responds with the current list of players in-game — name, level, class, location — pulled directly from the shared online_players SQLite table. Same data source as the website live stats feed, so the Discord output always matches what the site shows. Command is intercepted BEFORE the gossip relay path, so it's not mirrored into the game and doesn't count against the per-Discord-user gossip rate limit. !help is also handled locally and lists available commands. Everything else continues to relay into /gos as before.

Text commands used instead of slash commands because Discord slash commands need the applications.commands OAuth scope at bot-invite time, and the existing invite doesn't include it — re-inviting would force every server admin to re-authorize. Text commands work with the already-enabled MessageContent intent and didn't need a re-invite.

Login / logout announcements. When a player connects to the online server, #in-game-gossip shows an italicised "PlayerName has entered the world." line. On disconnect, "PlayerName has left the world." Implemented via a new sentinel author __SYSTEM__ on the existing discord_gossip queue — no schema change. C# DiscordBridge.QueueSystemEvent(message) wraps QueueOutbound with the sentinel; the Node poll detects the sentinel author and renders as italic with no author-bold prefix instead of the standard **Name** *(in-game)*: message format.

Wired into OnlineStateManager.StartOnlineTracking (fires after RegisterOnline succeeds, so the player is actually in online_players by the time Discord sees the line) and OnlineStateManager.Shutdown (fires before the log line, using a cached cachedDisplayName set at login time so the logout line has a proper name rather than the DB username). Identity switches via SwitchIdentity do NOT fire events — only real connect/disconnect transitions do.

Both paths are no-ops when the Discord bridge isn't configured (single-player, BBS door mode, unconfigured env vars).

Files Changed

• Scripts/Core/GameConfig.cs — version bump 0.57.13 → 0.57.14.
• Scripts/Systems/FileSaveBackend.cs — GetAllSaves now resilient: per-file try/catch with filename-metadata fallback, skips *_autosave_*.json / *_backup.json / emergency_*.json from the slot list. New ReadGameDataByFileNameWithError returns (SaveGameData?, string? error) distinguishing missing file / IO / OOM / JSON parse / version mismatch.
• Scripts/Systems/SaveSystem.cs — new LoadSaveByFileNameWithError facade method exposing the error-returning path.
• Scripts/Core/GameEngine.cs — LoadSaveByFileName routes failures through new ShowLoadFailureWithRecovery method (full error detail, save folder path, scanned recovery files with numbered options to load backup/autosave/emergency, start-new with overwrite warning, or return to menu).
• Scripts/Locations/MusicShopLocation.cs — removed level-range filter from BuyInstruments; pagination N/P boundary, empty input, and unknown input now stay on the current page instead of falling through to menu exit; BuyInstrumentByNumber reorders to match the browser so typed numbers line up with what's displayed.
• Scripts/Systems/DiscordBridge.cs — new SystemAuthor constant and QueueSystemEvent(message) helper for login/logout/server-event messages using sentinel author __SYSTEM__.
• Scripts/Systems/OnlineStateManager.cs — new cachedDisplayName field; StartOnlineTracking queues "entered the world" event after RegisterOnline; Shutdown queues "left the world" event before the log line using the cached display name.
• web/ssh-proxy.js — (A) DISCORD_STATS_CHANNEL_ID env var + live stats channel implementation: getGameServerStart reads game-server uptime via systemctl show, formatUptime produces NdNhNm strings, buildStatsEmbed assembles the rich embed with online / totals / highlights / uptime / connect-info fields, initStatsMessage finds-or-creates on bot ready, updateStatsChannel edits in place every 60s with self-heal on deleted message; (B) !who / !online and !help text commands intercepted before gossip relay, with buildWhoResponse reading online_players table; (C) outbound poll formats __SYSTEM__-author messages as italic system lines.
• /etc/systemd/system/usurper-web.service.d/discord.conf (server-side config, 600 perms) — appended Environment="DISCORD_STATS_CHANNEL_ID=<channel id>".

Deploy Notes

Game binary (linux-x64 tarball → /opt/usurper, restart usurper-mud + sshd-usurper): ships the resilient save listing, load-path recovery UI, Music Shop browser fixes, and the C# side of Discord login/logout announcements.

Node file (scp web/ssh-proxy.js → /opt/usurper/web/ssh-proxy.js, restart usurper-web): ships the Discord stats channel and the !who/!help commands. Can be deployed independently of the game binary (and was, incrementally, during 0.57.14 development) because the two sides communicate only through the discord_gossip SQLite table and are loosely coupled.

New DISCORD_STATS_CHANNEL_ID environment variable on the usurper-web service is optional — bot skips the feature silently if unset. Bot also needs View Channel, Send Messages, Embed Links, Read Message History permissions on the stats channel (same four as the gossip channel).