Welcome back.
Online servers are up and down like yo-yo's. Steam is prone to blanket close all servers at random so any 24/7 server is currently not possible.
Patch wise things get better then worse then better again. But it is getting there. Where is 'there', well that is the eternal question
We (=69.GIAP=) worked out at current bandwidth use our 10mb dedicated pipe can handle 45 players with ease. My guess is the syndicate servers and the like can easily handle the 128 max. Problem seems to be steam limits servers to 35 players only, no idea why.
When our server is up we keep it stock as the beta's are sometimes scary things
