[PMC] Fundraiser #2 - Development

[buzzie71]

Lime spawn ship has now been given the designation SS (UMCS?) Persistence, an Endurance-class retrofit deep space troop transport (I envisioned it to have originally served as a smaller exploration vessel or a transport for a crack team of commandos, but was later modified to carry more crew) built at Eclipse Auxiliary Shipyard and in the service of the UMC Space Command.  Two signs with this info have been placed on the ship's bridge.

 

I've changed up some interior decorations, repurposed the sheep room into some bunks, and added the map, subject to modifications pending the construction of the real map (I went off Sir_Didymus's MS Paint diagram on page 1 of this thread).

 

I added a bunch of signs that (hopefully) will make it easier for players to exit the ship, though I'm trying to think of an additional way of doing this that would also not be highly obtrusive to the ship's aesthetics.  So far I tried carpeting on the ground but even that looks a bit weird in the corridors.

 

In terms of basic structure there's one more thing I'm thinking of adding (and I would probably be cheating it in >< thinking of using the space behind Engineering on the top deck for an additional social space of some sort), but the rest will depend on what information is needed on the ship, whether SafeBuckets will be in play, whether it is possible to give players flying within a region, etc. - so I consider the project to be "ongoing" in that sense and probably will be until the ship is incorporated into the map.

[schererererer]

Red spawn ship is done - I added a small space for a little vignette of a storyline in sign form. Aside from that and a possible melon replenishing button, it's ready to be pasted in. I'll get cracking on the moonbase dome setups soon - this should take much less time to do than the ship.

[Guest]

Could I get the rights to make spheres bigger than 5? Maybe up it to 10 or something atleast? I got about 200 rocks to go.

[SkrapssparkS]

Could I get the rights to make spheres bigger than 5? Maybe up it to 10 or something atleast? I got about 200 rocks to go.

A tech would have to do it, but just posting here to say I'm alright with it if mods can use larger world edits in event. Just don't go creating stupidly large world edits that crash the server... That's my job

[Sir_Didymus]

Short update:

 

1. Switch got an empty world sorted out, named correctly and world-bordered etc.

2. An example team island (250x250ish) schematic is with the other EAdmins to test (I have no idea what I'm doing).

3. Built some wool placeholders in the space map to represent all the major builds (for planning/layout purposes).

4. Zomise has built approximately a bazillion space rocks, and so...

5. Pasted some rocks in to inspire myself - now feeling very spacey.

 

 

p.s. May have lost wyndysascha in the void a few times... he did not handle it as well as Sandra Bullock.

 

~Didy

[Silversunset01]

p.s. May have lost wyndysascha in the void a few times... he did not handle it as well as Sandra Bullock.

~Didy

Oh....myyy

[SwitchViewz]

In regards to Zomise's request for larger brush sizes. Dumbo52 was awesome and bumped brush size up from 5 to 15 for mods. Happy worldediting!

[WyndySascha]

 

May have lost wyndysascha in the void a few times... he did not handle it as well as Sandra Bullock

 

Hey, I only hallucinated George Clooney one time.

[SwitchViewz]

Plugin Information & Features

 

EasyJetpack

Features:

- 4 different types of jetpacks:

• Standard Jetpack: An easy to make jetpack that provides basic flight
• Burst Jetpack: A better jetpack then the Standard jetpack that gives continuous thrust instead of constantly tapping shift
• Hover jetpack: A better juetpack then the Burst jetpack that allows you to hover for long periods of time
• Teleportation jetpack: Works just like an enderpearl without require the pearls. Look at something and hit shift and you will be teleported in that direction

- Fuel/refueling

• Uses coal to fuel your jetpack and you must have coal in your inventory for it to take

- No fall damage

• The plugin comes with built in Fall Boots that stop all fall boots however it appears that no matter what jetpack you use, even without the fall boots, you do not take damage.

My thoughts: I like this plugin as it provides multiple types of jetpacks that are not to difficult to build and removed fall damage to increase the fun factor. I have no real concerns about this plugin

 

FlightPack

Features:

- 4 default types of jetpacks:

• Coal jetpack: A jetpack that runs on coal
• Redstone jetpack: A jetpack that runs on redstone
• Glowstone jetpack: A jetpack that runs on glowstone
• Solar jetpack: A jetpack that you can put into a charging station and charge it via the sun for power

- Refueling

• Instead of carrying around the fuel you need, you equip the jetpack you want to use, put the resource for it in your hand, and right click in the air and it will add that resource for your jetpack. This is useful for not taking up inventory space

- No fall damage

• When using the jetpacks fall damage is disabled on purpose

- Custom jetpacks

• This plugin provides huge functionality for making your own jetpacks. You can have custom crafting recipes for them, have them run on different fuel types, have them last for longer/shorter duration, 

My thoughts: I would 100% hands down pick this plugin for us to use however it does not work. I have tried everything from messing around with permissions, changing config options, and more to get this to work. However I can not get it to let you fly and it is constantly throwing exceptions in the console. Unless we can get tech help with this plugin I don't think it is feasible to use it.

 

SuperJetpack

Features:

- 2 types of jetpacks:

• Standard jetpack: Basic jetpack
• Advanced jetpack: Slightly better

- Jetpack upgrades

• You can craft a variety of items to upgrade your jetpack, such as being able to increase fuel capacity, increase speed, block fall damage

My thoughts: Not a bad plugin but the lack of jetpacks did not appeal to me and being able to upgrade your jetpack was a neat idea, but I'm afraid it might be to expensive or confusing.

 

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I also tested these jetpack plugins: Fred's Jetpacks, PowerOfPickles Jetpack

 

However the 3 up top were the ones that stood out the most to me and I think we should pick one of them. I will be talking with the techs and see how feasible it is to fix FligthPack.

[SwitchViewz]

Update: Thanks to redwall_hp we were able to figure out why FlightPack was throwing exceptions and it now works! We will most likely be using this one for the fundraiser. 

[Sir_Didymus]

Another quick update:

 

1. C45Y kindly loaded my schematic fragments, and after two loooooong server crashing pasting sessions, the red and lime team islands are now ready for their respective team ships and domes to be placed. \o/

 

2. Map 'debris' population has begun - anyone who isn't planning on participating in the CTF, and has a particular fondness for //cut, //paste, and //replace - please let me know!

 

3. Center buff project now underway (thanks Narissis!).

[Narissis]

3. Center buff project now underway (thanks Narissis!).

 

I got in a ton of work on it last night, so the fuselage is starting to take shape. Still a long, long way to go but we'll get there. :)

[Sir_Didymus]

Hey everybody - the builder of the third buff tower is having to drop out due to irl time constraints. Are there any volunteers out there who would be willing to pick that up? (You're not picking up a half finished project - it's not yet started).

 

There are approximately four weeks in which to complete this build, based on the schedule, so if you feel that's an achievable time frame, please help us out!

 

If interested, please post here, or pm me, or mail me in game, or send a small trashcan-shaped droid that projects holograms - you know, whichever.

 

 

Thank you!

 

~Didy

[Sir_Didymus]

Map update pics to try to bribe you to volunteer:

 

 

 

 

~Didy

[Guest]

I'll give the third buff tower a go with a parkour challange, unless someone else wants to snatch it (in which case be free to do so).

[Sir_Didymus]

I'll give the third buff tower a go with a parkour challange, unless someone else wants to snatch it (in which case be free to do so).

 

Thank you so much, Zom!

[stellarviking]

I'm gonna go ahead and give the third buff tower a try. I didn't realize that Zomise volunteered but I will so she has less to work on

[Guest]

I'm gonna go ahead and give the third buff tower a try. I didn't realize that Zomise volunteered but I will so she has less to work on

 

I'm totally ok with this. :)

[Sir_Didymus]

I'm gonna go ahead and give the third buff tower a try. I didn't realize that Zomise volunteered but I will so she has less to work on

 

In that case, thank you so much as well, stellar!

Volunteers are just awesome.

[SwitchViewz]

Tech/Plugin Update

 

CutePvP changes are currently underway and being worked on by Dumbo52. He has mostly completed the scoreboard feature and will soon be moving onto other aspects.

 

As for jetpacks, we are currently working on deciding what jetpacks to use and what recipes the jetpacks should be. We hope to have jetpacks put together by the end of the week and then have FlightPack loaded onto E for testing. That's about it for technical related items, things are moving smoothly here.

 

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The below is a update/response to Dumbo52's post from a few pages back.

 

Scoreboard

Looks good to me, the total players will be currently online players.

 

Flag Points

Looks good to me!

 

Alerts and Brodcasts

Broadcasts look good to me. Regarding alerts that should be fine, I doubt we will need to change alerts mid-game.

 

Passive Buffs

Could this be made so that we can set a time for how long the buff lasts? Such as /cutepvp buff add <team> <buff> <time>

 

Buff Towers

Allow admins to change which team owns a buff tower. Such as /cutepvp towerowner <bufftower#> <team>

 

Team Points

Looks good to me!

 

Team Balance

I'm not sure how we should go about team balancing, will need to review some of the responses people have made. I believe one of the most popular ideas was to give the team that is behind by X points a buff to help catch them up.

[Guest Former Staff]

Team Balance

I'm not sure how we should go about team balancing, will need to review some of the responses people have made. I believe one of the most popular ideas was to give the team that is behind by X points a buff to help catch them up.

 

I've gone through the feedback topic and pulled out the individual responses that mention team balancing, to help you come to a decision:

[1] -

To start off some ideas, for the future CTF, I'd love to see some use of nerfing a team that get's too much of a point spread.

 

 

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[2] -

 

Beacons used as forward spawns, people can place beacons as forward spawn points and the beam gives its position away so it needs to be defended.

 

make the strength buff strength 1 only, too OP otherwise.

 

Next map i would like to see a river that flows directly red base from blue base. With some difficult terrain to make combat focused near the river.

 

Maybe one long round with auto balance every 12 hours?

 

Set up period. 1-3 hour of set up before fighting begins. Maybe even spawn players without walls around them? Time to get defenses rolling without having to focus on attacking.

 

Harder to break blocks - maybe make player placed blocks take much longer to break then normal. It would encourage coordinated attacks and long lasting offensives. 

 

Maximum CTF. For the 3 or so days CTF runs, have the CTF portion online during a mainstream time to prevent night capping. Makes the game fair for people who are not insomniacs like me and zburdsal. When CTF is down for the night, mini games. *also to keep people entertained throw in some player made games for fun (no prizes)

 

Higher XP plump and Higher wool output from sheep

 

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[3] -

 

During the event

• Have a solid plan, are we running for 3 days straight? Do we have plans if we need to reset early? etc
• Engage users for feedback during the event, is strength OP? do we need to nerf it? feedback these results into potential reset plans

CTF specific

• Strength was OP as balls, tone it down in future ( my bad, sorry )
• Simplify base walls, no inner overhang so users can build up until the wall protection
• Extend the per team build area to encompass the walls ( let them build a new gate if they want to )
• Hunger regeneration seemed really popular, maybe enable it ( toned down ) in future. It makes the initial first few hours before a base is fully established much smoother without 30 people screaming for food
• Provide a way for members of the staff team to talk to specific team channels
• Outer walls may help defenders in future revisions of this event, review base/terrain placement to make this possible

 

---

 

[4] -

 

I'm with Master on his point about balancing the teams, though maybe buff the badly losing team to encourage closing a massive point gap (I thought Strength 2 and Regen 2 would be useful there, or some other cool special ability to make survivability and flag stealing easier ), at least until the point gap closes back to within a certain range.

 

The other alternative I can think of is active autobalancing, which will probably not be too well received ._..

 

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[5] -

 

What everyone else has said was pretty much the feedback I was going to state. I also wanted to add to Difficult1s idea about the next map.

 

If you've ever played World of Warcraft, there's a really cool PvP map (forgot the name) where each side has a fortress and in the middle runs a large-ish river dividing each side. You either have to swim or jump on debris to cross the river, or dare to cross the middle bridge where its horribly dangerous. Theres also several structures in between to weave through and some hard-to-navigate terrain in the sides, making the players focus on battling in the Danger Zone (ziiiing); the battle-heavy section. Most of the fighting either happens on the gate bridges of the fortresses with water around it, or at the large river, which would call for some really intense scenarios!

 

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[6] -

 

Having 3 different rounds was very disappointing. Poor solution to a very 1 sided event, more should have been done to even it out - disabling strength and regen buffs as was suggested numerous times during the first round, having a deathstreak buff etc.

 

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[7] -

 

CTF was an amazing by far. Something additionally I would like to see is a deathban system. Killing a red team at their own base really doesn't mean much as they can resupply and come out to fight me. If we deathban like other faction servers for an hour max, killing a red player could possibly weaken their entire team. Same with blue team etc.

 

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[8] -

 

I noticed that the physical "inner walls" of the base weren't even necessary given the protections within the region. They were elaborate and well constructed for actual PVP defense, but served no practical defense purpose because of their location. A small fully protected defense wall around each flag could have served a really strong purpose to deter easy capture. We decided not to have complete outer walls around the base due to terrain and time constraints, and I feel that was a fine decision.

 

I really liked the earlier idea that teams should be able to place some "defense" blocks that the other team has difficulty breaking (possibly another good minigame reward!). My feelings are that each team needs an area only large enough to store resources (including animals) that are protected from the opposing team so that production cannot be easily disrupted (nerfing an entire team). Allowing all resource production within that area isn't strictly necessary. To that end I would like a much smaller "spawn" with only player starting area with protected chests and rules, and a barn that supplies a modest continual amount of animal resources. One might also consider supplies of modest weapons (arrows!) and armor to further even the playing field between players just joining and ones in full enchanted diamond.

Last thought for the moment: It wasn't quite clear in which regions players/blocks were protected from damage. Perhap a greeting message at the gate to the base could say "Blue Team is protected from damage within these walls, Reds beware", or something else with more flavor.

 

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[9] -

 

 You should be able to PvP and capture the flag whenever, allowing that only to certain timezones is an awful idea.

I would love to maintain PvP & capture all the time, and if we can I will try to work primarily toward a solution that keeps that given your opinion.

 

I still feel something needs to be done to alter how the game mechanics work when timezones cause one team to have 7 players while the other has 15 (1 v 5 is even worse). This happened to me twice in the last CTF. Ideally teams need balance in numbers and skill, but at least numbers. I think I saw 7 players vs. 2 take out the entire built defenses of red base and score over 30 points in 2 hours. Attempting to defend was a fruitless effort. The tactic of the game in that case becomes simply waiting for the other team to log off. Ideally I'd like it so that it is feasible for 2 players to defend against 10. Maybe a safe protected tower above the flag with an unlimited arrow supply (leaving the tower would clear your inventory?) where a sniper has a chance to defend the flag on their own.  Alternatively perhaps uneven numbers should confer a buff to the smaller team, up to the point that a large enough difference in points or players grants invulnerability. Maybe they can't make any progress, but they shouldn't have to eat through the entire teams resources and die constantly in order to mount a valid defense, it's highly demotivational.

 

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[10] -

 

Shorter and fixed Length Rounds:

 

So define a match start and end time. And I would keep this at maybe 6-12 hours max. A few things this will resolve.

 

* It allows for more rounds in a weekend. So it mixes up the teams a lot more.

* It gives define start and end for a match which can keep motivation. If you are down 80-30 and no idea when the round will end you do ultimately give up and ignore the objective of CTF.

* It prevents time-zone population imbalances. Red had a strong show in round 2. Blue stopped playing CTF. They did not have the numbers or will to play. Red was camping Blue's base very hard. Red team logged to sleep. Blue team then had a surge of over night population that allowed them to run flags un-defended. The next morning blue has a 3 to 1 population advantage and a good over-night of free flag caps because the game went too long and red could not compete against 3:1 population and saw all their effort gone because they needed sleep. Smaller round times would prevent this as you would clearly call round 2 to red then start a new round which would evenly split up the population that would want to play over the night in North American time to compete against each other instead of just stomping on Red team who was asleep.

 

Remove Str 2 and Regen buff

 

It was over powered and it became the real objective of the match. Whomever had these buffs (I believe from the center) was always the advantage. At one point you could see a bunch of blue team members inside red base. They cannot attack but they couldn't be killed because of the regen buff. There was no threat. The moment you stepped out of the base you were dead because of str2 was always an advantage over any gear you could possibly have or made at that point. This killed motivation in Round 2 and 3 where the winning teams had a monopoly on the middle buff.

 

Make buffs environment

 

Night vision, water breathing, speed, mining haste would be enough. It gives those teams an advantage of movement and gaining some resources but it does not give a fighting advantage.

 

Underdog / underpopulation relief

 

When you are outnumbered 3:1 or you are way behind you have no motive to play. Easy enough for the team in the lead to make bold statements like "Step it up" "be a team" or "Play better" but ultimately if you are facing too many hurdles you just choose not to bother. 3:1 ratio cannot be fixed with playing better. You are playing against 3 times your numbers. Also if you are behind with a score like 50 to 30 you have to make 20 captures. If you need  5 minutes to travel and 5 minutes back that is 10 minutes per a capture at the best so to get 20 more you need to capture both flags 10 times. That's 100 minutes of work. Assuming you have no resistance. But doing that with a 3:1 ratio and a team motivated to seek out and camp your base for kills. Good luck with that. Some relief is needed to the underdog team. Perhaps flag carriers of the underdog team has the regen buff. Perhaps the underdog team in population by a 2:1 or worse ratio gets the str2 buff. Anything to help them push back the odds a bit keeps them motivated to even try.

 

Turn in for Wool

 

You can have 1000s of sheep and get wool from it. But you also have some resources going unused. Redstone/Bluestone/Quartz/Gold are almost useless in the game. Have a turn in system to trade in these resources for wool to be used.

So the only source of wool is  not just creating a lag fest of too many sheep but you can get it from mass mining as well.

 

Lessen Gaps between islands

 

The island design was very cool. The problem with it was using horses was pointless as you needed to build lots of bridges and the spans were wide enough the time/effort was just a bit much. It was just easier to go full navy and make mass boats. If you lessen the gaps between islands you encourage the building and counter-building of bridges and you would also get more use out of horses. 

 

Flags not by base

Round 3 with the flags near the base but not on the same island was a good idea. Again with the above "lessen gaps" you allow teams to have to build some bridges to get to the flags easier to defend as part of their plan. This also keeps

the objective about supporting these 2 remote bases without your main base being camped.

 

Spawners made so they cannot be killed

 

Protect spawners from being killed. Once they are killed it removes map objectives to check on. Teams can still disable these spawners by preventing mobs from easily being killed. Likewise teams can spend effort to repair them. You see will see a struggle over these vs just killing the spawner and removing it from play.

[stellarviking]

An update-

 

I have an awful lot going on in my life and I cannot commit to Buff Tower 3. The reason why is not because I don't think I can, but I'd hate to make a promise that life would not allow me to keep. I'll still attempt, but I'd like to make this known

[Guest]

An update-

 

I have an awful lot going on in my life and I cannot commit to Buff Tower 3. The reason why is not because I don't think I can, but I'd hate to make a promise that life would not allow me to keep. I'll still attempt, but I'd like to make this known

 

You want me to take it again or?

[stellarviking]

Zomise, if you have the time. I don't want to say "oh yeah I got this" and then be unable to complete it.

[buzzie71]

I'm two days late with this, sorry >< but I took a few timings of exiting both spawn ships (starting from the designated spawn point and ending when I've stepped off of whatever is considered the ship - for lime this meant either jumping off the ledge near the engine intake thing, or jumping out the entrance in the front; for red this meant stepping off the quartz ramp).  

 

I got out of red spawn ship approximately 5-10 seconds faster than I got out of lime (depending on which exit was used - the side emergency exits on lime ship are a faster way out).  For competition's sake this is a little larger than I'm comfortable with - so I've placed two signs in lime ship to play around with the idea of using warp signs to shorten the walk.  (Other touchups are on hold until lime spawn ship is pasted onto the actual map.)

 

I've only really tried this once and it might be worth running more timings, but maybe that is something to keep in mind when placing spawn ships in the map?  Otherwise I can try looking into warp signs to skip part of the walk.  For easier orientation it would probably be more intuitive to also control the direction that players face when they use the warp, but I don't think that capability currently exists - for now I just have a sign on the wall that players will be facing when they warp telling them that the exit is directly behind them.