Ridiculous

The discussion meant for nevastop’s thread has already spilled into this one and to stop it going anywhere else that thread needs to be unlocked. The players will have their say regardless, but a civil discussion could be aided by staff being more open to the debate outside of their private circle; especially when that debate is reaching different conclusions to their own.

What would they be getting from us that they can't get else where?

No. I can't think of a time when we haven't drawn from the same pool. What's the problem with people playing on both servers? The furthest we can go from P would be a chaos/faction/kits server, but where's the appeal in that for a community like ours? As important as ads are making sure the server itself engages people will do more to increase the number of players. If people don't like my pitch on how to do that, then I want to hear theirs. We all agree that S needs to be more distinctive and active. The details of how we bring this about are up for discussion. I pretty much view pearls as something to make raiding easier. I don't see the value added by keeping someone pearled after an attack.All that does is reduce the number of players available for pvp.

This S rev has been really fun, but the following tweaks would improve it: cobble replaces smoothstone for protections bounties and prison pearls are more expensive bounties can't be collected by clanmates ender chests return beds in the nether no longer explode true random spawn a smaller map a higher iron buff public clans for new players arenas Unfortunately, these sort of changes won’t be enough to bring or retain new players next rev because S has already begun to falter in the <10 dangerzone (at least when I’ve been playing). Civcraft has added more sand to our sandbox, but we’re not really making anything with it. Some players have experienced more of its potential than others, but for their experiences to be shared and made a bit more substantial the server has to provide a structure to bring players together and give them objectives to work towards. This rev the discharge/border control threat provided that incentive, but that wasn’t sustainable without a lot of x-ray abuse. Building has to return as an aspect of conflict alongside grief and new players need to be included in the action. That’s not something we are going to have without a traditional spawn surrounded by large building projects. This is my proposal: Split the map into three regions. The biggest one is S as it exists now, the other two will have a city built on them and at the end of the rev these cities destroy each other. Note this MS paint masterpiece, http://imgur.com/Aq5W681 Islands A and B essentially have P’s rule set (but rather than PVP or grief resulting in a ban, the offender is pearled), don't freak out they're pretty small. These areas are for the more social play styles, for people who want to build something cool and use it in PVP when it’s done. We’ll need to nominate a player or a small group of players to oversee the building of a city on each island and the construction of defences. People will need to work together to strengthen their city or set out to explore the wastes of islands C. Island C is for PVP. Hiding, raiding looting ect. It has ore plumps and nether portals that A-B do not. As someone who plays mostly on this island it’s the same deal as last rev except maybe one of the cities wants my resources or pvp skills. Maybe I feel like allying with a city or maybe not. Perhaps the players on Islands C decide to wipe out both cities. The islands would be linked together with warps. Warps from a skybox spawn to A, B or C and warps between A/C and B/C (squares and circles in da pic). Say the rev lasts for 2 months. The first 6 weeks would be set-up after which the current S rev's rules go global. Which city survives the next two weeks? The one with the biggest defences or the best traps? The sneakiest invasion plans? The one that bribed the most pvp’ers? This is mish mash of what’s made S, P and the CTF events good. It could well be sucky and unworkable. At the very least it’s something different. S won’t survive as an underpopulated civcraft clone.

Bans are sloppy business on this server, since policy changes according to how badly a member of staff wants to ban a player, while at the same time we insist that the same rules are being enforced in each case. Personal grievance is as big an influence in these bans as wider server opinion. For instance, Forzaire’s shenanigans attracted very little ire in-game, but his appeal was handled very confrontationally. Slide was really annoyed by his behaviour outside of the game and set out to make an example of him. The attitude that the player base needs teaching like this is really “toxic”. MCPublic’s banning system serves to help people play Minecraft; it is not a daycare or a HR department. The way players chose to play does not need to be moulded or managed. Don’t blame them for behaving like kids if that’s how you choose to treat them. Disrespect between players and staff can run both ways and neither is good for the health of the servers. We need fewer better written rules, a broader range of mods enforcing them and better use of server specific rules.

What a silly way of dealing with things

What do you think about bringing some old revs back for us to play on, Mrloud?

Eehee mentionned the Sads and as far I know they're not interested in this because my middling efforts to make contact with them have failed. edit: Gracefully redacted, see below

Optimizing would mean adding the kinds of tweaks discussed in the meeting so that our version of civcraft is more pvp focused and perhaps easier on newboids. The first kind of events are server wide. Barney mentioned a server where you take damage if you go outside in the day, maybe once a month we could run something big like this for a few days. For smaller weekly events we could just mess around with mob types/numbers/strength. I'd imagine that keeping an eye on minigames and adapting the promising ones into events would keep us well supplied. The second kind of events relay on groups (or individuals) organising themselves to complete a particular objective first, like slaying the end dragon. These should be going on all the time. Therefore, the intention behind a planned map is to increase the likelihood of you getting caught up in adventures when you're out exploring. Maybe you'll find a ruined city full of goodies at the edge of map, a ravine lined with diamonds or that the numbers of dungeons/temples have been increased and new traps added :3. To clear some other stuff up: It'd be impossible to please every player. Civcraft self-moderates a lot of things. Server wide or time dependent events work well for most server populations. A planned map is one with some game design behind it. It might have purposeful layouts, challenging terrain, loot stashes, sunken ships, abandoned castles, secret rails, hidden mob spawners or more exciting kinds of stuff. Civcraft revs are typically very long I hope that somewhere in this disorganised response I've covered all your questions.

I certainly wouldn't want to rush the techs and don't think we'd need to, there are 24 revs to work through after all. We've had enough brainstorming sessions and most expect the final decision to follow them soon. With that in mind, the earlier we show some kind of transition the less drama they'll be around the percieved lack of action by Sadmins.

After attending both meetings this would be my winning formula, optimized version of civcraft+unique events/quests+a planned map=a lively server

I think while we're waiting on the outcome of the server meeting it would be best not to let S idle in its current state. We should switch over to chaos at the earliest possible opportunity. I'm aware that the enjoyment of chaos on our current map would run out before anything like a version of civcraft (or other substantial changes :P) could be implemented. But we could also rotate in old revs to play on which have the potential for months of use. This would provide a short term boost in player numbers, help sustain the interest in survival and give many players the chance to revel in their nostalgia and give the old S a fitting send off. Thoughts?

The current Sadmins are very unfortunate to have inherited a dying server. Understand that S’s community has been aware of its decline for at least a year, but have had their concerns ignored and their offers of help rejected. Mrloud has done a very good thing by starting this process and it has a fair chance of success, especially if he takes Barney’s advice from earlier in the thread on implementation. Another fact is that, despite the good intentions of those involved, previous meetings have achieved nothing or even worse led to more alienating server policy. This makes mrloud’s job of responding to the community’s wishes even harder, but I think if TornadoHorse was finally appointed as an Sadmin the two of them would be able to work through any miscommunications (of the kind that’s cluttered the early part of this topic as well as this post :p). Indeed, this thread has yet to focus on the areas of discussion which are relevant to the scale of the problems facing s.nerd.nu and by extent the whole of mcpublic. Farting around with buffs, plumps and the general debate over the principles of vanilla vs modded play will not stop S’s imminent collapse. S can only survive via a paradigm shift: a sudden, risky, drastic set of changes. I’m worried that the kinds of Survivals which might result from this would have too little in common with what’s great about S now, but the alternative is that those things should disappear completely in a scarily close future. I think there are two distinct types of likely replacements for S. The first kind would be Barney’s smp experiments and I think S still has enough life left in it to be the genesis of completely new and exciting mc experiences. I imagine his will be the most likely outcome, but that outcome shouldn’t entirely please you. We would be incredibly lucky to hit on a formula as successful as S has been, it is far more likely that these experiments will lack that kind of endurance. We might end up introducing more instability and confusion into the running of the Server(s) in a fruitless search for a lasting alternative to what we already have. A future of fragmentation starting with S and following on P and C, as what happened to S repeats itself on them, is one in which mcpublic won’t be sustainable. The alternative suggestion is that we look for changes in S by incorporating it with “like” features from within the community. Put another way that means bringing S and P together in the same map (with C focused on creating content for this map) without completetly ruinning gameplay for the majority of players. This is possible if not palatable. In my opinion, it would mean refining the strengths of mcpublic and improving on its weaknesses and everyone will know that's the minimum requirement for servers looking to beat the competition for players.