Couldn't the backup server just send udp packets at a special port of the main server while he takes over. Since udp is stateless it is fire and forget for the backup server and a simple listen on port x for the main server
That's not a bad idea. Have the process that launches fake also send these alert packets.
I'll keep that in mind as a backup, but I don't want to rely on the other server and I don't want to add the complexity. I'd rather just figure it out from the information that's already out there.