Id hasn't confirmed anything officially, but it's widely suspected that certain anti-cheat algorithms were introduced in one of the recent updates (QLPP14 or so). But it's not an issue in FFA, cheaters favor other modes.
I'm not aware of any updates to netcode, but your problem sounds a bit peculiar anyway, might be best to play a few games and try it out. Maybe the routing changed, or some other factors...
At the moment, I can see 18 tier 4 FFA servers in EU, among them 6 custom servers with 16 player limit. It's also the only mode alongside duel that's active 24/7 here (at least one server active), other modes tend to die somewhere around 3-4 AM.
Nah, down to 5-6 per day now.
Who? Never heard of them.
Don't remember seeing the first guy, I've heard something about Stesamo getting back into quake, but haven't seen him online yet.
Trebor is still the best.
Sure, if you organize it and finance the prize money. :P