saberfysh

CMC Starlog #001: Emergency Transmission This is a manual transmission log aboard escape shuttle #4 for mining expedition 1690E75. 26 hours before arrival of prospective planet 1690E (Zeta Sextantis), the SS Galantes was attacked by unidentified forces in the local planetary system. Sensors did not detect any incoming craft, nor any recognized hailing frequencies before the attack, suggesting non-coalition forces of alien nature. At present, the SS galantes and the attached science vessel holding Professor Irving, Geologist Ardones, and Dr. Galahad have not been accounted for by the SCDIM, suggesting a high likelihood that the ship is missing, disabled or destroyed. We are declaring worst-case scenario. Enacting contingency clause 13.06A (Destruction of Craft and Crew Members) until this message is received, ETA 1803 days. Attached are logs from main bridge confirming wake from cryosleep was successful 10 days before final approach, and Captain Moliot confirmed our bearings as 4.5 light years away from Caledonia. As the current shuttle has lost contact with all other nodes, the rest of the team will be presumed dead within 7 days, with any detected survivors inheriting chain of command. Failure of main scientific objectives is imminent, and it is unknown if the same forces that have attacked the spacecraft will discover this shuttle, currently en route to the planet surface after resuming navigation. Should destructive forces or critical LS system failures occur in the next several days, consider this log the final words from the crew of the SS Galantes. Saberfysh, 2nd Lieutenant & Mining Engineer of the Caledonia Long Range Reconissance Mining fleet, 75th division.

Below is an archive copy on the nerd.nu forums of the subreddit post in /r/mcpublic used to present a digest of the CMC Starlogs. Posts here will be separated for each log entry as opposed to one long wall of text. ________________________ Hello again, PVE! Saberfysh here. As you may know, I had spent the majority of rev 15 building and connecting a structure at (+750 +400) called CMC, also known as the Caledonia Mining Colony. With the new rev 16 soon to be upon us, I thought this would be a good time to provide the crucial backstory to the CMC plotline as context for my creations next rev. Originally I was going to produce a series of posts called CMC starlogs, with a theme towards space travel and planetary exploration, but will now present it in a full digest. This is a side story with a slight connection to the Unity storyline created by Buzzie from rev 11 and will serve as companion material to existing PVE lore. In any case, I look forward to potential interactions this may have with various factions on PVE, especially ones who are futuristic or related to Unity lore. For those who hate reading, the TL;DR is: I'm from another planet and my ship was shot down by alien Storm, killing the rest of my crew. With the help of robots onboard, I built the CMC and survived this rev learning alot about the planet; Next rev is about me constructing a spaceship. EDIT: I will post the shuttle crash log first, then add more material and forum links in the future. Stay tuned! CMC Starlog: Prelude Caledonia Survey Expedition 1690E75 ESCAPE Shuttle #04 Serial Number EZ01JY-9G0651 Firmware Generated Log 2615 AQ 22 -- ETA 26:03:57 ] #####DANGER: HULL BREACH REPORTED#####] ##Depressurization detected from SCDIM] ##Shuttle SCDIM compiling report...] ##Bridge Deck Nodes 1-11, 20-39, 47 offline] ##Main System WARNING: Full ARL collapse, oxygen garden reserves vented] ##EVACS calculating personnel locations and escape routes...] ##Airlock state down 12B 20A 43C] ##Shuttle LS/NAV/SS activating...] ##SCDIM received authorization for fast launch override.] **ALL PERSONNEL: Please proceed to Escape Shuttle 1 2 4 5 9**]]] > Shuttle Rear Hatch open.] > USER INPUT: LAUNCH EJECT] > SCDIM is authorized for fast launch override.] > Security code bypassed.] > Pressurizing cabin...] > Decoupling maglocks...] > LS/SS status OK] > Performing fast launch override.]] ...............................................]] > NAV state resume. ] > Reorienting craft for NAV target 1690E75.] > Thrusters activated.]] ##WARNING: Atmospheric Re-entry detected.##] ##NAV deviations unrecoverable, crash state imminent!] ##Redirecting maximum power to SS...]]!@$%!#234$!#^@^3()@$%@#3441%!#$%@232#%#@$%@#$%@#%@!@#$%@%$#@]!@$%^%#*$^&*&@%$%!#$%$#^&*%#21514!#$^%@#####################

Speaking of buying nether portals, that gives me an idea: Padmins can have a contest with a portal as the prize. They would be able to choose how many they feel like adding, as well as when to do so. Anybody could sign up to something like that and play for a chance to win.

I have posts from last rev and the previous poll related to this topic, here they are for reference: https://nerd.nu/forums/topic/3051-long-term-player-retention-on-pve/?p=23892 https://nerd.nu/forums/topic/2948-pve-map-poll/?p=23080 If this is too long to read, here are some brief points: Small maps lead to stronger and easier travel networks that promote community; Large maps prevent map crowding or ore shortages. This is the hardest thing to balance. Short revs provide high activity and keep the server map fresh; Long revs allow mega builds, less administration, and better timing with new Minecraft version releases. Maps of all sizes benefit from biome variety; large maps are a great opportunity to add surprises or interesting landmarks/terrain at the edges to spark exploration. Proposed formula for PVE's map size: Rev Duration = (K - 1) months, whereby K is thousands of blocks in map diameter (i.e 8K) -- an 8K map is set for 7 months of play. Server activity has been stimulated by player events (PVE lotto, Spleef League, Archery, Porkball, Golf Tournaments) and admin events in the past (e.g. Halloween/Xmas mob invasions, Treasure Hunts, Bounties, Obstacle courses, Contests, etc.) PVE's greatest asset is in crowd-sourced storytelling (Argoth/Brom nuclear war, Yowie drug cartel, Spleef rivalries, Signeca) and recurrring admin plot devices (Aboose Moose, Hail Broadcast, Unity, Dr.Sign) I could elaborate, but that would be redundant. It would seem the latest experiment in having a large map did not pan out in spite of the majority vote from the last poll to have one. Now that everybody is aware of what they're asking for, this poll will reflect the opinions of a more experienced player base.

Sometime last rev, I vaguely remember the origin of this rule explained to me. During the birth of Nerd.nu, there was a subgroup of LGBT players that were part of the initial playerbase, and the rule was created after people began annoying them constantly with racist/homophobia jokes. It was so excessive that they had no choice but to take a zero-tolerance stance, which persists to this day. It was the only way to stop the trolling at the time. For the record, I don't condone racism or homophobia; it's clearly not right. However, racists and homophobes have had immense kneejerk power over this server's administration for as long as I remember, and this stance is a relic of our era as Reddit Public Server. WIth the rebranding into a more broad Nerd.nu Gaming Community, I agree that this proposal revises our rule appropriately to match modern times. For a server that openly allows conversation about sex, drugs, violence, sprinkled with profanity here and there, it would seem rational to me not to hold racism/homophobia to a double standard and that we should treat all unsightly behaviour with equal vigilance, especially if we're expanding to other games.

Before I go on with my ideas, I'd like to get the question of rev length out of the way. In my personal experience, many players convey in chat that they're annoyed both by the lack of clarity about the rev length, and the constant nagging from newer, uninformed players of when the next rev is, which drags down both the people who want to keep going, and the ones who don't. D3north's suggestion of having a fixed date subject to extensions by admin assessment and general vote is a decent solution to both these problems. It will literally stop the nagging, and let players plan ahead. However, I'm keenly aware that a fixed schedule is not the most feasible thing to do from a technical standpoint simply because Mojang does not release new versions of Minecraft on a fixed schedule, and there are plugin updates to worry about. If Mojang becomes too unpredictable, you can only work with what is the most stable server version at the time. So, I'm okay with a combination of what kb2zuz and d3north said: Start with a modest map size (4K or 5K), and expand the map based on rev extensions in anticipation of new versions of Minecraft, adding an extra nether portal or two along the way (since nether portals are strictly the jurisdiction of PAdmins). Alternatively, if you do not want to expand the map upon every rev extension and would like players to taste the entire map from the very start, then I propose a formula for PVE's map size: Rev Duration = (K - 1) months. Let variable K be the number of thousands of blocks of the map borders, meaning 8000x8000 is 8K. If you start the rev as an 8K map, you are foreseeing and thus arranging for a rev that could last for up to (8K - 1) = 7 months of play. Adjust this formula accordingly based on your observations of server activity, and keep in mind that larger maps should contain every biome and is begging for modified/realistic terrain (continents, additional water, rivers, valleys, volcanoes, penninsulas, etc.) due to the fact that minecraft's large biome world generation is currently prone to creating stale landscapes. That aside, here are a number of ideas I'd like to contribute towards long-term player retention on PVE: Less ore plumping, more trading/treasure hunts What made Rev10 great for me was the incentive to explore the entire map because decent ore plumping was only at the edges. Even then, it was only for overworld minerals (such as coal/emeralds/diamonds), which is acceptable. However, adding glowstone and nether quartz into the overworld in reliably large numbers spoils the players and makes them leave even sooner than usual because they don't have to visit the nether at all, unlike vanilla. They don't even take on the E part of PVE because it's readily under their feet. Bartering and trading is a part of the PVE community and establishing relationships between people who have glowstone/quartz keeps everyone informed on how to obtain this rare nether resource. Letting the admins stimulate the market instead keeps the rev interesting. For example, in Rev10, thrawn held a Dr.Sign hunting contest involving an obstacle course, with the reward being a chest full of glowstone. Everybody jumped on that because they knew it was rare stuff in vanilla. Or, you can put trade signs for these things at spawn. You'll give players incentive to work together for resources, rather than mining by themselves and swimming in stacks of it at home. Bounty Hunting Want to rile up the server into battling the environment? Rev12 Xmas and Rev14 Halloween are good examples of that, which the admins have been good in organizing the past year. We went from simple admin hunting (poor buzzie) to all-out events like this, dropping wither skulls, player heads, odd bones, and holiday foods. It's good. Now, I suggest you guys add another dimension to that: bounty hunting. Sometime during the rev, announce a bounty on some mob for an awesome reward and watch the headcount roll. It's like PVE Lotto, only you smack 50 zombie pigmen for a chance at a beacon instead of betting 5 iron blocks. You could either have winner takes all, have a jackpot that splits, or make it repeatable for anyone who wants it badly enough. It could be 100 slimes, 300 zombies, 10 witches, or 25 bats -- you name it. Hopefully a scoreboard plugin of some kind can allow this to happen. Secret Catacombs/Dungeons Some of you may be familiar with Azumarill's Dragon Egg vault contest in Rev12. Basically, it was a vertical safe for the dragon egg, guarded by 8 piston locks, which could only be opened with passwords by clearing 8 different obstacle courses placed around the world. The fact that a single person conceived of this was pure genius, and I think a variation of this from the admins in the form of generated catacombs/dungeon shafts underground would be the kind of adventure outside of building that gets people going. You could build 4-5 of these inconspicuously with a little bit of it poking out to the surface, keeping them locked from access at rev start, and then slowly open each catacomb one by one over time, supposing the players have discovered them. They will be harder than an underground mineshaft/stronghold, and can either contain treasure, a unique spawner, or a warp to a secret place. Nothing would make a server mobilize its forces more than a dark dungeon whose treasure is guarded by 5 cave spider spawners, small riddles, and a bridge over lava. We went nuts when thrawn popped a secret creeper spawner somewhere late into the rev; we'd do it for this too. If you feel truly crazy, you could even place a book inside each one with clues to unlock a final altar at spawn which requires passcodes, a stack of diamond blocks, emerald blocks, gold blocks, and quartz to activate the "Official end of Rev" fireworks, putting the rev's fate squarely in player hands based on an admin time-released dungeon storyline. The plot doesn't even have to be that complex. Buzzie's Rev11 Unity story of a marooned spaceship producing clones to find sponge blocks scattered across the map to create R.E.G.E fuel for the spaceship is a pretty straightforward tale. The fact that he wrote so much backstory and made a giant spaceship is extra gravy. It can be safely said that storytelling is what gives PVE character, and players have respected this server greatly for the entertainment value we bring to ourselves. From the Argoth-Brom nuclear rivalry, to the lava pit obstacle course in the Kingdom of Ra that killed 200 people, to Yowie's enchanted sugar cartel, tales of Lothos and Seneca as dragonslayers, playing music with Flumper on plug.dj, singing songs in Mumble, etc. Admin content such as the Unity storyline, Dr.Sign, holiday events and secret spawners all add to that. If these moments and things are shared with new players on a reasonably solid basis, I think you will see a lot more of them around.

I agree we have a very confusing server identity at the moment. I've taken a habit to calling the place Reddit Public Servers and referring to P as Reddit PVE, but the truth is we have many callsigns: Our subreddit is /r/MCPublic Our webpage, forum, mumble server and server domains are at nerd.nu Our plugin repository on Github is called Nerdnu Our map archives are at mcp-dl.com Our wiki is www.redditpublic.com. Whoever decided on parking that many domains for one minecraft server group is probably bleeding more money and causing more confusion than they need to. Consolidation of everything into one domain would fix this. The question is which one to use. IMO, the most static one is our subreddit name MCPublic, which is being linked by /r/Minecraft and is also not easy to completely transfer to another subreddit like /r/nerdnu, should we go that direction. Just like scher and ultrahub, I found these servers via the sidebar on /r/Minecraft, which at the moment is clearly written as "Official Reddit Minecraft Servers" and leads to our subreddit at /r/mcpublic. Yet it is clear that no Reddit staff/employees/moderators manage or fund this server, so we do have legitimate reasons to rebrand. At this point we're more like the "Unofficial Reddit Public server." Were we official, we'd probably be using www.redditpublic.com a lot more and inherit the subreddit's rules. Still, this one sidebar link was my earliest understanding of the server, and is a major factor to consider should we debrand ourselves entirely. We would have to notify the creator of /r/minecraft to remove or modify the link, migrate the outstanding resources to a single domain, then figure out a way to re-advertise. EDIT: typos

I too, vote for vanilla terrain with more hostile, interesting environments past a certain point. This was the hallmark of Rev8 and Rev10. People would build villages along giant rivers or unique places up in the mountains with wildly varying terrain in these farlands. I've never been a fan of large maps because logisitcally it hampers both simple rail and road construction that would traditionally foster community and relationships between small cities on PVE. On maps smaller than 5000 x 5000, cities, landmarks, players and fellow neighbours no longer feel "too far away" to reach, even for the average newcomer at spawn. Currently, it takes roughly 45 cooked steak worth of food to go from one edge to the other by foot. Non-CARBON small towns and hamlets rely heavily on horses, nether portals and nether roads to travel the 8k x 8k map within a reasonable amount of time. I don't know how many people actually do it this way (or if they travel much at all), but it bears pointing out. Big maps tend to favour big, existing cities that will dig the 3500+ block rail line, while small maps are more accessible to new players and smaller cities. Whatever sort of server culture the admins intend to have here will be influenced by the map size. Fortunately, there are enough players here whose building ability has matured enough that we can mount impressive feats to overcome distance, whether it be DEEPS, CARTS, CARBON, world loops, or independent world projects like noRTh. Perhaps larger maps are a sign that we as players have matured with the game and can take on something bigger. Still, I feel there's very little opportunity for players outside of portal towns and major roads/railways to connect with the rest of us in a practical way, unless we proffer CARBON building and wiring services. However, I do acknowledge that large maps are a popular shift from previous revs, and since we have proven that we have sufficient server power (250 slots without crashing!) to provide something of such grand scale, it's a great way to stand out as a server. Maps like these effectively eliminate most border disputes and the need for hasty map resets, reducing workload on the staff. We never run out of space and complaints are reduced. So, if we're going big, I'd say we make it interesting; we have a LOT of space on an 8k x 8k map after all. Let them taste every biome. Throw a volcano somewhere. Make a tiny oasis in what would be a very dry desert. Surprise people with a frosty tundra and let people truly feel a sense of scale, journeying to the frozen lands. Entice people to go far by putting nether quartz and glowstone there. Make it fun for old and new players alike to go really far out and enjoy every corner they visit. That would completely justify a large map.

I have encountered a number of players who also play League of Legends on the side. Since the game is popular and a lot of third-party sites like LOLnexus already keep extensive player records and statistics, no special organization would be required for nerdnu other than maintaining a list of people who actively play, so other players can simply invite others to games or friend request each other for something more permanent.

To be honest I came to believe in the "PvE resets their rev every 3 months" idea because that was historically the pattern that RedditMC ran on (based on reading the wiki). Up to that point PvE had never deviated heavily from this schedule of sorts, so I thought that a particular length of 3 months was decided upon by the server staff based on long-term observation of server activity and player feedback. It was like that before I joined, and I figured there was probably a good reason why. Maybe it was to match the seasons. Maybe that was how fast the RedditMC community could fill up the map. Maybe people were used to this timeframe since day one. Maybe it was the most reasonable length of time to play a rev in anticipation of new versions of Minecraft announced throughout the year. As an outsider, I've never been told the concrete reasoning behind it, so I'm left to muse silently with what I know are personal guesses, and accept that this is what staff considered the most optimal way of running the server. Only in recent times have the revs been extended, and while I've played on nothing but extended P revs (r10 and r11), this unannounced change of routine and rhythm probably threw people out of their comfort zone and usual expectations. I'm slowly understanding that behind the scenes, this server has had some untold turbulent history since PvE Rev 9 (Barneygale being a small part of that story) and that getting everything settled down internally has not been easy. I sense a lack of transparency and coordination which suggests certain things are still a work in progress, for it does not appear to be a smooth transition period between old staff leaving and new staff joining. In an attempt to fix that, you've done what you can to keep things running, starting with appointing thrawn as a head admin, totemo to a tech admin and getting many familiar faces (tompreuss, MrLoud, socarch, kitcatbar) into moderation and admin roles. Running a server entails a lot of things, such as coordinating events, maintaining server funding/stability, dealing with bans, dealing with plugins, fixing bugs, lack of staffing at certain periods due to real life responsibilities, etc. If it is true that RedditMC's leadership is currently dealing with all this with a downsized or inexperienced staff team, this can be overwhelming. In any case though, letting the community know what's going on is a better alternative than leaving them worried and restless. I too, am concerned about the welfare of RedditMC and many other players in this wonderful community would probably like to know too, or even help out here and there. So, I agree with Jala that even a monthly bulletin would do much to anchor and assuage the player base -- it's a good way to keep communication lines open and reinforces trust in the players that the server is an active and vibrant one. Telling us you need donations at the CTF event is a good example of that, as would telling us about adding new plugins like Enchantism on S or extending the duration of revs on P from now on. As long as you communicate with us in some official or very visible capacity, I think most in the community would be more understanding.