This update is a major internal rewrite focused on stability, scalability, routing reliability, and production readiness.

Large parts of the plugin architecture were redesigned to improve failover handling, backend monitoring, reconnect behavior, and long-term maintainability.

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Added

Centralized Health Monitoring

• Added async centralized backend health monitoring
• Added cached backend health states
• Added backend latency tracking
• Added backend quarantine handling
• Added automatic backend recovery detection
• Added safer ping scheduling system

Sticky Sessions

• Added real sticky-session support
• Players now prefer previously connected healthy backends
• Added stale session expiration handling
• Added safe sticky-session fallback behavior

Weighted Balancing

• Added configurable weighted backend balancing
• Routing now properly respects configured server weights
• Added improved balancing logic combined with:
  • backend health
  • player limits
  • latency checks
  • sticky sessions

Routing Improvements

• Added improved fallback routing
• Added deterministic routing behavior
• Added retry cooldown handling
• Added safer reconnect flow
• Added backend quarantine protection
• Added reconnect spam protection

Metrics & Diagnostics

• Added improved routing diagnostics
• Added backend monitoring improvements
• Added cleaner debug output
• Added better lifecycle logging

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Improved

Architecture

• Reworked internal plugin architecture
• Split large systems into dedicated services
• Improved service separation and encapsulation
• Improved maintainability across routing systems
• Improved lifecycle management
• Improved async safety

Performance

• Reduced unnecessary allocations
• Reduced repeated routing lookups
• Reduced async scheduler overhead
• Reduced ping amplification during outages
• Improved routing hot-path efficiency
• Improved cache usage

Concurrency

• Improved thread safety
• Improved session state handling
• Improved reconnect synchronization
• Improved retry handling under heavy load
• Improved async task cleanup

Reliability

• Improved backend outage handling
• Improved fallback reliability
• Improved retry stability
• Improved shutdown handling
• Improved startup validation
• Improved reconnect handling during backend instability

Security

• Improved plugin messaging validation
• Improved malformed packet protection
• Improved backend validation
• Improved routing safety protections

Codebase

• Cleaned and standardized code formatting
• Removed excessive AI-style comments
• Removed noisy block comments
• Simplified internal structure
• Cleaned unused logic and redundant code
• Improved readability across the project

Documentation

• Fully rewritten README
• Added architecture documentation
• Added routing documentation
• Added deployment recommendations
• Added troubleshooting guidance
• Added scaling recommendations
• Added configuration explanations

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Changed

Java Version

• Updated project target from Java 8 to Java 17

Server Version

• Supports only 1.19.x or higher

Plugin Naming

• Standardized plugin naming to:
  • FlowGate-Lite

Artifact Naming

• Final build artifact is now:
  • FlowGate-Lite-1.0.5.jar

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Fixed

• Fixed backend ping amplification
• Fixed unsafe plugin messaging behavior
• Fixed multiple routing edge cases
• Fixed reconnect instability issues
• Fixed various async lifecycle problems
• Fixed inconsistent plugin naming
• Fixed startup validation issues
• Fixed shutdown cleanup issues
• Fixed several routing race-condition risks
• Fixed stale retry/session handling
• Fixed inconsistent balancing behavior

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Recommended

Before deploying to production:

• stress-test reconnect behavior
• test backend outage scenarios
• test proxy restart behavior
• verify failover routing under load
• monitor memory usage during extended runtime

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Compatibility

• Java 17+
• Waterfall
• BungeeCord-compatible proxy environments