There's been some talk about the possibility of a map reset. With Minecraft (according to Notch) going Beta Dec 20th, we may not have a choice, period. However, if word on the server is to be believed, then tonight, those with a vote are going to decide the fate of the server if there's a choice. Now it's unclear as to who all gets a vote. It may just be admins, it may be staff, staff plus mayors, or everyone in attendence. However, those voting need to hear your opinions one way or the other as to whether or not you're cool with a map wipe and reset.
So, reply with your arguments for or against the map wipe, or at least your opinion on whether or not you'd be cool with it.
Ah, my misunderstanding, Chief. I thought that's what tonight was about. However, since you are interested in hearing feedback about the map reset...
Of all the land-owners here, I have perhaps the most emotional investment in my work on HC. I built an island from nothing but a 2x8 patch of grass, named after my baby daughter, and poured over every single last detail, had a marital fight over how much time I spent on it, and it's STILL a work in progress.
Which is why it may come as a surprise that I'm cool with a map wipe and reset.
I've been many things throughout my life: server administrator, software tester, tech support, husband, and father, and all of these things have taught me that you can't get too overly attached to the way things are. Change is not only inevitable, it is the engine that drives progress. We all knew (or should have known) walking into this that it was an Alpha-stage program, not a Beta. And anyone who's done Beta Testing knows that you don't get to keep all your cool stuff from Beta. Frankly, it's amazing that we kept our map as long as we did.
The work that some of you put out is just mind-blowing. I mean the dragon near recall? Epic. Vesuvius Trading Center? Beautiful. Nexus? Wicked. And that doesn't even begin to touch upon what y'all have accomplished. But the truth is, we're playing with digital legos, and sometimes you gotta tear apart what you've already made and start over. This is one of those times.
The great new mods enacted by The Chief, Flame, Aph, Serrat, Ilsyde, and others, have brought about some amazing new aspects of the game to make an already horribly addictive game even more fun. The changes made by Notch, as awful as his code may be, continue to drive exploration of the world and the desire to acquire more of it.
But the effect of these combined forces throw the existing world off-balance with every change. Newcomers are hampered by restrictions that those before them did not face (coughpowerpickcoughdammitNuincough). The wealth of scarce resources (like clay or pumpkins) are mostly devided between players that no longer log on, players that log on but don't want to sell them, or trapped, unharvested, in protected areas. The land itself is littered with never-to-be-finished half structures of people who started to carve a piece of the land out for themselves and then quit the game, and gutted pits that were once natural caves. The threat of monsters, while tangible outside the cities, is hardly noticable since the vast majority of the map was settled before the code would even allow for them to appear. Most of us had plenty of time to have our well-lit fortresses and arsenols of diamond armor and swords, and chests of food ready when the monsters showed up.
A map reset would be Herocraft's Gritty Reboot. All the great new toys added to the game by the admins, with the broadbrush equality of setting everyone back to zero. Suddenly, night-time will once more be a terrifying ocean of horror with tiny desperate islands of beseiged towns fighting for survival. Being the first person to build within eyesight of an area would actually be a possibility. Finding your own unmolested patch of pumpkins, natural cave systems, and mushrooms once more be possible. Even likely.
And everything you learned, building your last epic structure, could be applied towards building something even more awesome, with the rich addition of new resources that would once more be in abundance for those willing to put in the work to find them.
And that is what makes me cool with losing the digital paradise I built in the name of my baby girl.
No tool repair (for at least some time)
No dupes what-so-ever
Economy reset
New map (woo?)
New towns (yeah sorry this has to happen)
Meaning that from the start - it would be a much more harsh world. Creeper damage (and explosion for that matter) would be allowed (i think) .. monsters would patrol the map and stop builders from building at night.. Obsidian would have a use for anti-creeping.
There are plenty of pluses (and minuses) for a wipe.
Well we all knew the tool repair bug was going to disappear eventually. Best to have it gone from the server immediately following a wipe, rather than after most of the map is settled and new members have to contend with:
* most of the diamond already having been mined
* stuff that was built using infinite tool health
* gutted mines using said infinite tools (along with powerpick)
Dupes shouldn't have been happening regardless.
Economy reset is fine. Doesn't quite seem fair for those of us with hundreds or thousands of coin to carry it over to the next server.
New map is great.
New towns - It's already a regular complaint that there are towns -everywhere- and that there's nowhere appealing left to build that isnt within the "no build zone" of another town. You will have zero trouble getting people to build new towns.
Roaming Monsters and Creeper Damage - Bring it! We're supposed to be hardcore. Getting a fortress up capable of fending off the monsters should feel like an effing moment of relief and bliss from the terror, with the nagging suspicion and fear that maybe one left one area not well-lit enough, or secure enough, and that at any moment, bad things could happen. It should be a bittersweet moment of victory.
Creepers are the most feared thing outside of Hell. At least they should be. Currently they're just bouncy green dongs with a sad-face. But when Boomers can explode, nothing is more terrifying. Nothing. Except, of course, the wife pulling in the garage while I'm playing MC when I shoulda been doing chores or something.
Wife: "So, you've been playing Minecraft instead of doing the dishes, like I asked? SSSSSSSSssssssssssss...!!!"
I'm already planning my next work for the new map.
Yes, but at least it's the good kinda crazy, as opposed to the "has an entire house full of floor to ceiling shelves filled with jars of his own bodily waste" sorta crazy. Cause that's the bad kind.
Man, I'm jonesin' so hard for some Minecraft right now.
I'm for a map reset personally, I have a lot of diamonds and a lot of gold, decent amount of coin... yea, I've got no where close to the amount "wealth" a player like Skaduush has... but its a game, I'm one of the most active players on the game and forums, but sometimes you restart the game and thats that!
Hopefully with a new restart I can get some sort of clan formed to band together and be willing to go fight the monsters, thats still the most fun part of this game for me. I want to go loot and kill.
Also, is there any talk of removing teleporters from the game? Like powerpick, I feel this rune is too powerful (I'm fine with the mod controled herogate). All too often people were just building teleporters to every little place.
This game is meant to be explored and Kain, I know that precisely the reason you "hid" the spells... you wanted people out exploring the terrain.
A map reset would be cool. As an adventurer. If i owned the modern marvel that is this server however i would be very hard pressed to let it go.
Kainzo your server is hands down the best, period.
I want you to know that creating a new world in my opinion would not lose you any loyalty from anyone. In fact it may garner even more!
Either way were all behind you and know that we can trust our dreamworld away from our real lives in your hands. YOU THA MAN!
If there is a map reset, I think that the number of towns should be LIMITED. I for one found it difficult to be on all the time to not only get people into Vesuvius, but as well as manage it, be there for banking, etc. Most towns that have a large number of citizens, like EIC, Argon, etc., I look at the citizen board and have NEVER heard of some of these people, which most likely means they won't be coming back.
1. Citizens should have to be on the server for at least a week before being allowed into towns. There should be a way to check when the last time someone was online, to provide mayors with a way to keep tabs on their citizens.
2. The map isn't big enough to support a shitload of cities, so I think cities should be a minimum of 10 citizens. The citizens must be on all the time, not just people "testing the waters". None of this hamlet/village crap.
3. Most people build shit and just leave it. There should be penalties for building something and leaving it vacant. You know who you are.
However, I will bring all of this up at the meeting later tonight.
If there is a map reset, I will join another city instead of rebuilding. I put in a lot of hard work to get the multiple levels set up, not to mention pouring and casting most of the obsidian (I would say about 15% came from Powerpicking), and to start from scratch with a stone pick would be a bit disheartening to say the least.
I hope all goes well, and we do get this much needed map reset, with hopefully a bigger map? Anyways, I agree with your 1st and 3rd points Nuin, but I for one like the 'Hamlet/Village Crap', because it gives the mayors a strive to want to become a bigger and better city.
I do not agree with having a City Limit either, that's another fun aspect of the server, seeing who will be involved with the biggest cities, and seeing the smaller cities building up to something great, but we do however need a bigger map to house all of these cities.
I'm not too fond of the Economy Reset, I wish the coin would carry over since some of us have worked for the thousands of coins we own. But if it's needed, it's needed.
We are not doing a "very large" map - for various reasons. We let the map get above 1GB on file - this was a mistake and we will be limiting our map size considerably - right now we're using only 150 mb - thats 1/7th the size! - we may go up to 300 and sit there - but that is only 1600-1800
I do want larger maps for more room - but we cannot have too large of a map because it will lag more / increase restart times and backing up the data times.
Surprisingly, despite all the land and personal wealth i own, as well as a couple hundred hours of labor building things, i am for a reset.
Had an idea...
-Kingdoms as a major factor. Have a sort of township system, but on a larger scale. once a town becomes a capital, it begins expanding as a kingdom, slowly encompassing more towns. Have several levels of kingdom. Below is a revised town system i have in mind.
Hamlet (100 coins)= 25 block radius (2 signatures)
Village (500 coins)= 50 block radius (5 signatures)
Town (+1500 coins)= 75 block radius (10 signatures) (Grants mayor abilities)
City (+5000 coins)= 100 block radius (20 signatures)
Capital (+7500 coins)= 125 block radius (30 signatures)
One capital per kingdom. To expand the kingdom, the ruler pays the admin, as per township. To expand, kingdoms need "points" that function like signatures. Points are obtained by having nearby settlements sign with a kingdom. Places wishing to upgrade that are signed with a kingdom pay the money to the ruler of the kingdom (or however the power is distributed by the kingdom's people)
Hamlet = 1 point
Village = 3 points
Town = 9 points
City = 18 points
If a settlement won't sign to an expanding kingdom, there may be three choices. 1) Stop expanding. 2) Placate the settlements owner into signing. 3) Attack/siege the settlement to take it over and force them to sign.
This could prolly use revision, as it is an early concept idea.
We dont want to limit towns - we dont want to make it so new comers cant start up their own things with friends / etc if they want. We do have a limited amount of resources and so in that- theres a 'soft' cap of town amounts.
The encompassing of multi- towns means that the towns would have to 1) build close together and 2) be cooperating and want to merge. This is something can be discussed later and hashed out - im not opposed to the idea.
As for the possible reset, yes it would be a shame to loose the work established however the knowledge gained by achieving the work will remain so better things might evolve.
Looking over the Servers charter on the MC forum a couple of things of note I would like to have addressed.
1) Each town will be allocated their own township channel. Message an admin in game to get it set up!.
This seems to have fallen by the wayside and global is spamville. Even without a reset I think this should be fixed.
2) Other players will have the power to "mentor" new players with new handy spells to help them through their journey!
Like how? Currently the common knowledge is that spells can only be learnt from the locations and with locations been heavily policed to their where abouts, some players (like myself) have given up looking due to others making the searching task more difficult by hiding the spells. Of course the hiding of spells is only rumour and I cannot vouch that it is true or not. With a reset, the locations and surrounding areas should be protected.
Thou shalt not advertise what thou cannot deliver is a phrase that springs to mind.
Raetac @ Dec 16 2010, 04:32 PM wrote: As for the possible reset, yes it would be a shame to loose the work established however the knowledge gained by achieving the work will remain so better things might evolve.
Looking over the Servers charter on the MC forum a couple of things of note I would like to have addressed.
1) Each town will be allocated their own township channel. Message an admin in game to get it set up!.
This seems to have fallen by the wayside and global is spamville. Even without a reset I think this should be fixed.
2) Other players will have the power to "mentor" new players with new handy spells to help them through their journey!
Like how? Currently the common knowledge is that spells can only be learnt from the locations and with locations been heavily policed to their where abouts, some players (like myself) have given up looking due to others making the searching task more difficult by hiding the spells. Of course the hiding of spells is only rumour and I cannot vouch that it is true or not. With a reset, the locations and surrounding areas should be protected.
Thou shalt not advertise what thou cannot deliver is a phrase that springs to mind.
Each town does have its own township channel - we have several channels set up - users do use the township channels quite often - otherwise you'd be seeing a lot more spam. I think the global channel should be monitored a bit more than it is now.
The mentoring system is something we want to implement - but has been on the low list of priorities. I suppose we can let certain users the permission to guide users to spell locations and that would be a very basic mentoring system "Here! come with me to find spells" type things.
Kainzo @ Dec 17 2010, 08:35 AM wrote:
Each town does have its own township channel - we have several channels set up - users do use the township channels quite often - otherwise you'd be seeing a lot more spam. I think the global channel should be monitored a bit more than it is now.
Hmm in that case I should knuckle a certain Mayor to post up the channels name for Smugglers Cove *starts to look for said person*
I do not favor a map reset. It doesn't make much difference if the same map is being kept or not. As soon as a new world is created, it will be pretty quickly emptied out of all the valuable items, and it'll be pretty much as the current map, only all work done would be destroyed.
Call me crazy if you will, but if I make something, I expect it to last, not re-make it every month. Yes, I do like building, yes, a map reset would give everybody a fresh start, but that freshness wouldn't last very long with non-repairable tools, minerals and ores will be depleted even faster, and soon there will be a need for another reset as there is just nothing left. I don't really see the point of building something sturdy enough you'd think will last for a long time, but instead have yourself put back in the start with nothing-what-so-ever, and having to scavenge emptied-out mines again to find few pieces of coal.
Kainzo @ Dec 16 2010, 03:28 PM wrote: The encompassing of multi- towns means that the towns would have to 1) build close together and 2) be cooperating and want to merge. This is something can be discussed later and hashed out - im not opposed to the idea.
If this refers to my previous post, let me clarify my thinking a bit. A kingdom's capital will never expand it's city limits any higher. When upgrading kingdoms, you essentially claim more territory for your kingdom. Ooh idea, if the kingdom limits collide with a settlement's limits that are aligned to you, you also control that area, even if parts of the settlement are outside the kingdom.
Anywho, i think kingdoms would be a cool addition because it would lead to more large scale combat in the future, as well as interesting government related shenanigans.
Also, for a map reset, you should allow people to keep coin they have and an inventory full of items. For donators, maybe have the banks and contents copy over?
Maybe the problem is that there are too many towns. And people are allowed to build homes in each.
What happens is, the player joins an existing city because big cities look nice, have a good atmosphere and are a safe place to store early items.
Then he gets bored, looks around other cities and builds houses there as well, basically abandoning his 'home city' for something new. Then those buildings get abandoned as well as he moves from town to town, creating that special 'something new' in each of them without ever looking back.
Finally he gets fed up with it and wants more power (donator commands, possible Mayor prefix, personal bank) and control (the ability to tell people where and what to build) so he starts a hamlet.
This is why we have ghost towns, large cities with dozens of derelict homes and new villages popping up every 2 days. Vicious circle.
Solution: is there one? Perhaps limiting the number of cities to only a few (1-4) will get rid of this problem and make for active, fun places where players can actually socialize and meet each other.
They could build a number of plots in that same city, e.g. one per week or one per 400 coins. So coin would actually have some real value and you could spend it even if you had a few thousand. 2000c would grant you 4-5 plots that you could connect and plan a large mansion etc. As long as plots are expensive, people won't get bored so easily because they have to invest a lot of coins to make their dreams come true (huge homes, farms that need loads of room = several standard plots etc.)
Everybody seems to be ignoring the biggest problem... Lack of in-game resources. One of the appearent reasons for the map reset as much I've heard. T'was said the new map would become 1/7th the size of the current one, and the current map is already almost completely dry of ores and minerals. If the map reset were to happen along with the tool-drop-reset glitch fixed, players would mine and use up ores and minerals even more than now, requireing another map-reset sooner or later, probably sooner. Iron doesn't grow on trees, nor does clay fall from the sky, and I have not yet found diamonds growing from soil. A map reset would be nice, but it does not have any point if all the problems will come back even faster.
If this issue can somehow be fixed without making some pointless cauldron recipe to "farm" iron and diamonds from, then by all means do the map reset.
Like Chief said, though, he doesn't really want to limit the cities. But as someone else mentioned, maybe rather than limit the cities, raise the "height requirement" to get a city founded. Instead of hamlets and villages, it's 10 people to get a town going. Anything before that, and the people are on their own. It's up to them to defend it, contribute the materials and build time, play time, and sheer devotion it takes to start up and succesfully get a city going, and thus the city "proves its worth" far more realistically than 2 or 3 n00bs getting together and saying "let's start a new city!" or something, and getting a ring.
Perhaps also have a staff member whose job is solely to "police" the rosters of cities and towns, and flag the ones whose members haven't logged on in a week or two, before approving a town ring.
Maybe also require the prospective mayor to submit a plan of some sort. Not just a charter of names and bylaws, but an actual city plan of how they intend to lay out the plots, etc.
In other words, don't limit the number of cities arbitrarily. Let the natural process of most people being lazy and unwilling to do much work limit it for you.
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As one more amend to this, I suggest a somwhat regular "landscape wipe" from floods/earthquake/tornado/etc... Where everything non-city is wiped from the landscape every so often unless:
* It's a donor structure (maybe give donors (x=tier level) number of no-wipes that they can use, of y square meters, that they can use up all on one structure, or x separate ones, etc.
* A group of people have a "settler ring." A settler ring would be a different color ring than city rings, that an ACTIVE community working hard to get their city up and running can lease for ONE landscape cycle. So if me and 4 other people are working hard to make our town, but don't have the 10 to become a city, but we know there's a landwipe coming up, we can pay a few hundred coins to get a temporary settler ring that will protect the settlement. If we don't have 10 citizens (or enough to make a city) by the next landwipe, we have to pay ANOTHER few hundred coins to get a settler ring.
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Those things combined will keep the number of cities down, allow newcomers to still do their own thing, at a cost. It will keep the landscape from becoming riddled with bullshit permanently. It will allow people freedom in the form of a meritocracy. That is, you get to start a city if you actually deserve to: either from putting in the time and work to get everyone organized in time, or by giving lots of money dollars to the server, nom nom nom.
