My Ideas about/for PvP.Nerd.Nu

[Blockbuster]

INTRO

 

When I was told that Nerd was going to re-release the S server and make it more PvP focused I was truly excited.  Unfortunately, I was extremely let down by the staff when they released the server.  The server closed prior due to the lack of people playing on it and when they re-opened the server and made no changes to the gameplay at all I was surprised.  I am not sure if the thought was that 1.9 changed vanilla PvP enough to make it fun again but obviously it didn’t and the lack of anyone playing on the server proves that.

 

I tried to power through the first revision but eventually got bored of it for the lack of any type of "NEED" to play (which i will cover later). I was hoping that with PvP Revision 2 there would be changes, but again I was wrong.

 

As of the submission of this post the second PvP rev is 48 days old and only 140 players have spent more than 10 minutes on the server.  Out of that 50% of the players have spent less than 90 minutes total on the server and more than half have only played 1 or 2 days out of the 48.  If that doesn’t prove that something needs to change I don’t know what does.  I don't want to see the server disappear again because i enjoy the community and the non pay to win atmosphere it provides.

 

ISSUE WITH VANILLA PVP

 

In my opinion Vanilla Minecraft PvP died in Beta 1.7, worked well in Release 1.0, and then has been dead since.  The 1.9 PvP update didn’t make the vanilla pvp as fun as it was back in the day of infinite arrows, iron armor, a dsword, and an inventory of mushroom soup. So changes need to be made.

 

PROBLEMS

 

The main problem with PVP.NERD.NU is the fact that it does not provide its community with a “NEED” to play the game or an “NEED” to make sure to log in.  Here are some examples where it fails to create that “NEED”.

• The common thought by the staff seems to be if they make enchants easier, than people will PvP more because getting “God Armor” won’t take as long.  This in theory makes sense but doesn’t increase the amount that people PvP.  It actually in essence hurts the server by decreasing the amount of time people NEED to spend on the server.  Making enchants easy to get gives players instant gratification but makes enchants worthless and as players/clans grow it becomes so easy to get that losing items doesn’t matter.
• PvPing is pointless because there is NO NEED or reason at all to actually PvP on the server
  • There is no penalty for dying so players don’t NEED to ever protect themselves.  They can die multiple times and it does not matter to them.  This also can lead to players simply annoying/disrupting other players by constantly barraging them with stone weapons etc.
  • Player chests are impenetrable so players don’t NEED to protect their belongings.  Like I stated above if they die there is no penalty so they don’t care and since all of their goodies are locked up in the chest that can’t be opened they don’t NEED to PvP to protect it.
  • The current Risk/Reward structure for PvPing is pointless.  Since there is no death penalty and no ability to get items out of chests there are only a few times PvPing actually happens.  The first is when an armored person goes around and just kills whoever they see, most of the time yielding nothing of value because people don’t carry things on them since they are usually rushed to a chest the second they get anything of value.  The second is when two armored people/groups meet. This is the only actual case where PvP happens, but again whether you win or lose your risk is low and the reward is low as well. If you win, you get broken armor which you already have plenty of since enchanting is easy and if you lose you just go back to your base and get more armor which you have because enchanting is easy.

I believe by creating NEEDS it will make players want to play more.  Yes it makes the game harder and might make certain people complain/quit but at this point what is the difference since no one plays to begin with.

 

MY IDEA / WHAT I WOULD LIKE TO SEE IMPLEMENTED

 

So to recap above I would like to see:

• Make enchanting harder and more random.
• Create a penalty for death
• Disable locking of chests

What I would also like to see implemented into the server:

• Land claiming - this would prevent people arguing over claims and make clear and defined boundaries of peoples/clans land
  • make it chunk based
  • Make the limit based off of the amount of people in the clan and set a max limit
  • Will avoid people taking massive plots of land at spawn
  • have the claim dissolve if players dont login within a certain amount of time.
• Protections – create some way to define the amount of land a player/ clan is allowed to protect.  Possibly make it material based so players need to put X amount of an item in a chest to enable protections.  This type of method would increase players NEED to play since it would require them to make sure that their protections were always enabled.  I have more detailed ideas on how to do this but will save that for later
  • Land/Chest protections
    • Some type of way players/clans can protect certain areas of land from being interfered with to a certain level.  Maybe use reinforcement materials on builds etc.
  • Offline protections
    • Nothing is more annoying then coming back into a game to find everything you’ve worked for destroyed by people who attacked it while no one was around to protect it.  What I would do is have it set up to be that after X amount of minutes after the last member of a clan logged off that clans land would be impervious to being attacked.  The reason it wouldn’t be instantaneous is to prevent players from just logging out to prevent being raided or to protect themselves.
• Death Penalty – there needs to be a penalty for dying.  However, too big of a penalty will annoy people and too small of a penalty would make it useless.  My idea would be that when a player dies within a clan, X amount of materials are taken out of their “Protections” chest.
• Physical Economy – I’ve always found economies interesting in Minecraft.  Creating one would create another NEED to play on the server.  It adds another level of things to do on the server other than PvPing.  Therefore, if there is no one on to PvP you can focus on that, or if PvPing isn’t your thing you can focus on becoming a rich player. The reason it needs to be physical instead of virtual is that you should be able to lose it and have to protect it just like everything else.
  • Would have a turn in villager at spawn that would convert materials to physical currency.
• Disable Enderchests - Great idea but horrible for PvP.  The second enderchest were implemented it ruined PvPing.  Before enderchests people would carry more valuable things but now that they exist it provides a way for people to teleport their valuables around and also make them unable to be stolen.  I would get rid of them so people would have to carry items more often.
• Disable Enderpearl Travel
  • I’m not really opposed to it one way or another, I just feel like it is more fun to play without it.
• Drop Inventory on Logoff – the main reason for this is to prevent people from abusing alts to store items in a safe place and impenetrable place.
  • This would create an unprotected chest at the players location with the players inventory in it.
  • Players would hold their inventory 15 minutes after logging off before a chest would be created in case a player DCs on accident.
• McMMO – I’ve always been a huge fan of it.  It adds another secondary element to the game that makes it fun to play so even if very few people are on you can level up certain skills and see where you compare with the rest of the players on the server.
  • I would make it hard to obtain
  • I would disable the PvP elements of it as they are too overpowered
  • I would use the repair and salvage functionality of the plugin so players could salvage item they don’t need from raiding etc.
• Add Rarity/Events – the biggest attraction for me in any game is being able to somehow obtain that one in a million item.
  • Mob Event
    • Have an overpowered mob randomly spawn on the map and announce it to the server where it is located.
    • This will increase PvP at the mobs location
    • Have the mob drop a special “rare item” like an unbrekaing V book or something of that nature.  Maybe implement crates and crate keys
  • Chest Event
    • Have a random chest spawn at an announced location
    • This will increase PvP at the chests location
    • Add variety of chests and vary the % drop chance
      • Common – crappy items
      • Uncommon – decent items
      • Rare – specialty items
  • King of The Hill
    • If enough people are on have it randomly trigger the event
    • Will increase PvP

Make the game more difficult not easier.  Easy games aren't fun to play for more than a few days because you lose interest.

 

I believe implementing features like the ones i provided above would provide a nice platform to build off of and a more fun place for players to play.  I also believe it would help with retention of old and the gaining of new players as it can appeal to more audiences. 

 

Of course people will more than likely complain that it is different and some may not like it.  The biggest complaint I always hear is when players say its not S and its too differet, but again since very few people are currently playing on it to begin with I believe it’s worth a try.

 

Sorry for the long post as I put a lot of time and effort into it and I appreciate you taking the time to read it.

 

I look forward to hearing other player’s ideas and feedback in regards to this.  Hopefully people agree with me =)

 

On a side note I also update my modpack which can be found here.

Edited July 1, 2016 by Blockbuster

[tobylane]

Start with PvE-like pvp regions on the PvE modded server. It'll give a good idea of the overlap of - people still playing, seeking pvp, willing to play modded. I suspect it'll be too low to do anything more than pve town events a few times a rev.

[jllmprrt]

The drop inventory on log off thing seems a little extreme... I feel like shelling out an extra $26, or however much minecraft is these days, is a fair trade for getting to hold a few extra valuables if ender chests were to be disabled

[Herr_Fawkes]

The ideas you're positing aren't bad, but they remind me a lot of the old S server's death spiral. Stuff was changed on a rev-to-rev basis near the end in an attempt to gain more players, but the server died anyway. The fact that we're already talking about big changes like this doesn't bode well for the server. Given the small playerbase, I'd say getting rid of PvP and either replacing it with another server or going to a 2-server format and saving ourselves some cash is the way to go.

[Blockbuster]

Start with PvE-like pvp regions on the PvE modded server. It'll give a good idea of the overlap of - people still playing, seeking pvp, willing to play modded. I suspect it'll be too low to do anything more than pve town events a few times a rev.

That would be somehting to add to the PvE server, not a server dedicated for PvP.

 

The drop inventory on log off thing seems a little extreme... I feel like shelling out an extra $26, or however much minecraft is these days, is a fair trade for getting to hold a few extra valuables if ender chests were to be disabled

little extreme yes, but it would prevent alting from being an issue.  the object is to prevent players from stashing there goods and making them completely unraidable which is something you don't want. 36 items per alt is alot of storage to hide valuables.

 

 

The ideas you're positing aren't bad, but they remind me a lot of the old S server's death spiral. Stuff was changed on a rev-to-rev basis near the end in an attempt to gain more players, but the server died anyway. The fact that we're already talking about big changes like this doesn't bode well for the server. Given the small playerbase, I'd say getting rid of PvP and either replacing it with another server or going to a 2-server format and saving ourselves some cash is the way to go.

The old S server's death spiral was caused by poor execution and lack of defining the actual problems that plagued the server and a path to fix them.  

 

What i am proposing is a completely new server then what nerd is used to.  I could go into pages and pages of details about my ideas, but i figured a small synopsis was better to see everyone's initial reaction.

 

The player base is small and my hope is that by implementing these changes it will help its playerbase grow, which will help the community grow, which could potentially mean more money to help support server costs.

 

I wouldn't mind personally financing the server for a few months to see if it would be something that would work or crash and burn.

 

The bottom line is if nothing changes then there is no point on wasting the resources on the server since ive been playing on it for the past few days and 90% of the time i am alone and rarely see new players joining.

 

Start with PvE-like pvp regions on the PvE modded server. It'll give a good idea of the overlap of - people still playing, seeking pvp, willing to play modded. I suspect it'll be too low to do anything more than pve town events a few times a rev.

That would be somehting to add to the PvE server, not a server dedicated for PvP.

[Guest Former Staff]

I have to say, it's very refreshing to see facts laid out alongside ideas for how to improve upon PvP. While I don't know what may be best for PvP, just seeing a constructive discussion has my support as a player. :-)

 

If there's any chance at growing PvP, finding what makes it fun to play then it needs to move away from what feels like a single player survival world and have admins who are broadcasting it's presence, inviting people to join in various events and such.

 

At this moment in time, I feel that PvP is a waste of resources and if the PvP admins have given up then turn it off today, there is no point in creating any further revisions with the same ethos.

[Silversunset01]

... I'd say getting rid of PvP and either replacing it with another server or going to a 2-server format and saving ourselves some cash is the way to go.

Just to throw it out there, our server costs will not change if we host 2 or 3 servers. The box is the box, no matter what we put on it.

[ScaryBilbo]

I agree with some of these ideas and not so much on some of the others, but as long as we are talking about Survival/PVP i think there are aspects that definitely need to change.

 

• Yes there should be a need to play, perhaps a rewards for time spent in game, unlockable kits or a server-side achievement/reward system.  

 

• I think there should be a limit on how many personal chests you can lock, this way the player has to put value on what they want to keep safe. If you were in a clan you would have a set amount of safe storage based on how many members you had.

 

• A penalty for pvp related death, not death in general (mobs, fall damage etc.) is what i believe you meant so im going to talk about that. Im partial on the idea of a penalty for death because im shit at pvp, that being said i do think there should be a way to avoid pvp. Now hear me out on this one; When a player is killed a set a certain of times in a set amount of time the option to become passive(not able to damage other players or be damaged by other players) should become available. Being passive would have a time limit or until the next server restart. A cooldown would be in effect if the player disabled passive mode prematurely and a message would show in chat both when the player enabled it and disabled it.

 

• I do like the idea of unique items and events occurring, things like "supply drops" or "legendary mobs" spawning somewhere on the map. A supply drop would have a notification in chat with a drop time and location, this way players would be able to prepare, travel to, and contest the drop zone. The supply drop could have a chance to have a unique item, weapon or armor piece. The legendary mob would spawn in the same manner but upon defeat, it would give the player or clan who kills it an economy reward.  The only thing about this is the "random location" would be random in the fact that it could spawn in one of many protected set locations(example: a ruined castle, an abandoned village/town, an empty arena, a wrecked ship, a jungle/desert temple). The only other thing is that mobs that spawn in the world would also have a rare chance to drop unique weapon or item.

 

• XP grinding and enchanting is always an issue on S and most players have a different opinion on what is fair and balanced. I personally would like to see the whole vanilla process disbanded and moved in the direction of economy. Enchants would only be obtained by buying them from the server shop. Also the server shop will buy/sell most items and ores, this way everyone would have access a way to make money and no need to hang on to ten chests of cobblestone. The only thing is that the more you sell any given item the less you get for it/the cheaper it is(just like a real economy). Other ways to get money would be through lottery, killing players and mobs, collecting bounty's, selling heads to the server shop, and winning mini-games. 

Edited July 4, 2016 by ScaryBilbo

[buzzie71]

As a disclaimer for the rest of the post - I haven't given actual implementation details too much thought, only some ideas about gameplay mechanics:

 

- The most important thing is to ensure that there is a steady supply of PvP targets to hit.  A lot of why S revs have declined so fast I think is that fewer players amount to fewer targets to PvP, which leads to players not logging in, which again leads to even fewer targets to PvP.  (This is assuming every player is fair game as a PvP target - which even though it creates PvP, especially in rev 20 with Bluehaven, I don't believe making PvP should include encouraging the killing of builders and other non-combatants; see below.)

 

- There should be a way to allow for greater mobility in the PvP hierarchy.  An often repeated line of advice for players who get camped is to leave the original base, assemble PvP gear in another location, and then come back to kill the camper.  Though I believe this has come to be a core tenant of PvP, it is also extremely hard to kill someone in the highest level gear (thinking Prot4 diamond, potions, pearls, high-damage swords) without also assembling gear that is or close to the highest level gear - forcing only one way to prepare and fight.  Multiple ways (eg. use of fire) would make for more interesting gameplay, give underdog players hope and reason to keep playing, and make players with the highest-level gear work a bit harder to ensure they keep their position or reputation at the top.

 

- There should be a reward for PvP - something that would encourage players who want a fight to go up against similar players.  Since high-level diamond fights tend to result in extremely worn down armor for the winner, one reward could perhaps be automatic armor or weapon repair for surviving pieces.  Maybe economy currency for the killer (corresponding to a loss of currency for the loser to prevent rapid inflation), higher rewards for killing someone who is better equipped, lower rewards for killing someone who is less well equipped?

 

- Alternatively, prevent damaged armor from being destroyed at all, similar to how elytra is handled, though there should be a defense penalty for wearing worn-out armor compared to pristine armor (maybe peg completely-worn-out armor damage reduction to 0?).

 

- Similarly, there should be a disincentive to kill players who are on the server to build, or are not interested in fighting, or are returning to base (this implies disabled beds, which would be great for encouraging PvPers to stay close to a point on the map, but would not be great news for builders).  For me, I generally treated anyone with a KDR of 0 (ie. no kills) as not a fighter, and avoided engaging them in combat.  There would need to be a way to classify players reliably as being uninterested in PvP (ie. a way to tell apart a builder/non-combatant from a PvP support role from a player logging in for the first time, etc.) - but once that is done, some penalties could be assigned to PvPers for repeatedly killing them, or buffs can be given to the victims that will help them avoid PvP.  (Invisibility?  High damage resistance?  Maybe even temporary PvP immunity?)

 

- It might be worth manipulating what drops from a player and what doesn't.  One of the biggest deterrents to playing on S/PvP was (is?) the fear of losing the entire inventory when killed.  For non-combatants this included ores as well as building materials and/or tools; for PvPers this included gear that potentially represented hours or days of preparation lost in 10 minutes at most.  Part of the reward of PvPing I think comes from getting the loot from the player killed, but there should be a balance between what PvPers gain (to make PvP worthwhile) and what victims lose (to encourage them to keep playing).  Perhaps builders lose a large percentage of building materials, or PvPers lose their weapons and potions but get to keep their (damaged) armor?  Incentives must be taken into account too - if builders always drop their armor for example, they can potentially be made a huge target by PvPers who seek to farm builders for even basic armor.

 

- I'm not a huge fan of boss mobs on PvP myself, but in the absence of other player targets, that might be a fun diversion especially if there is a reward attached that can help PvPing ability (though not be crucial to it).  It could even be summonable if there are fears of players stealing the reward at the location of the boss mob at one point on the map.

 

- The sad part of all of these is that it's possible to game the system one way or another - care must be taken to minimize the possibility or advantages of doing so.

[Blockbuster]

I have to say, it's very refreshing to see facts laid out alongside ideas for how to improve upon PvP. While I don't know what may be best for PvP, just seeing a constructive discussion has my support as a player. :-)

 

If there's any chance at growing PvP, finding what makes it fun to play then it needs to move away from what feels like a single player survival world and have admins who are broadcasting it's presence, inviting people to join in various events and such.

 

At this moment in time, I feel that PvP is a waste of resources and if the PvP admins have given up then turn it off today, there is no point in creating any further revisions with the same ethos.

Thanks for your support Barlimore as I am doing my best to try and help revive the server.

 

I also begrudgingly agree with you that at the current time, in its current state, it is just a waste of resources.  That being said, I don't want to see it disappear again which is why I started this post 

 

 

Just to throw it out there, our server costs will not change if we host 2 or 3 servers. The box is the box, no matter what we put on it.

True, but by getting rid of it you could allocate more resources to the more active servers, even though they seem to handle everything fine.  My hope is that by implementing this server it helps grow the community which could mean more donations, which could mean possibly getting a second server and opening more game types to help grow the community more.

[Blockbuster]

 

I agree with some of these ideas and not so much on some of the others, but as long as we are talking about Survival/PVP i think there are aspects that definitely need to change.

 

• Yes there should be a need to play, perhaps a rewards for time spent in game, unlockable kits or a server-side achievement/reward system.

I like the idea about play time rewards, however, i find that it could be unfair to those that don't have the same amount of free time to play the game as others and could thus unbalance the game if the rewards scaled with playtime.  The same thing goes for "kits".  Maybe implementing a crate key type reward where you would get a key for every X amount of hours logged playing and then that key would give you a random item? 

 

A server side achievement / reward system sounds cool to me.

• I think there should be a limit on how many personal chests you can lock, this way the player has to put value on what they want to keep safe. If you were in a clan you would have a set amount of safe storage based on how many members you had.

 

If some type of raiding isnt implemented then i would completely agree with this.  However, i feel that clans should have a max fixed amount per clan and not base it off of how many members you have since alting could lead to unbalancing the amount of locked chests.

 

• A penalty for pvp related death, not death in general (mobs, fall damage etc.) is what i believe you meant so im going to talk about that. Im partial on the idea of a penalty for death because im shit at pvp, that being said i do think there should be a way to avoid pvp. Now hear me out on this one; When a player is killed a set a certain of times in a set amount of time the option to become passive(not able to damage other players or be damaged by other players) should become available. Being passive would have a time limit or until the next server restart. A cooldown would be in effect if the player disabled passive mode prematurely and a message would show in chat both when the player enabled it and disabled it.

That is what i meant, PvP related death.  You'd have to tie it into a combat tagging system along with dying due to "natural causes" within a proximity of an "enemy" player so that players couldnt just jump into lava to avoid the pvp penalty.

 

As for your passive idea I do agree with that to a degree.  Maybe make the player invisible for a defined amount of time so that they could get back to where they were going without being seen or disturbed.  

 

• I do like the idea of unique items and events occurring, things like "supply drops" or "legendary mobs" spawning somewhere on the map. A supply drop would have a notification in chat with a drop time and location, this way players would be able to prepare, travel to, and contest the drop zone. The supply drop could have a chance to have a unique item, weapon or armor piece. The legendary mob would spawn in the same manner but upon defeat, it would give the player or clan who kills it an economy reward.  The only thing about this is the "random location" would be random in the fact that it could spawn in one of many protected set locations(example: a ruined castle, an abandoned village/town, an empty arena, a wrecked ship, a jungle/desert temple). The only other thing is that mobs that spawn in the world would also have a rare chance to drop unique weapon or item.

Completely agree.  Even if the server had low populations this could still be fun for those that are playing.

 

• XP grinding and enchanting is always an issue on S and most players have a different opinion on what is fair and balanced. I personally would like to see the whole vanilla process disbanded and moved in the direction of economy. Enchants would only be obtained by buying them from the server shop. Also the server shop will buy/sell most items and ores, this way everyone would have access a way to make money and no need to hang on to ten chests of cobblestone. The only thing is that the more you sell any given item the less you get for it/the cheaper it is(just like a real economy). Other ways to get money would be through lottery, killing players and mobs, collecting bounty's, selling heads to the server shop, and winning mini-games. 

That is a very interesting concept to make the economy the way to get enchants.  I think that would be interesting to try out, however, you'd have to find a way to balance the economy in the first place.

[Blockbuster]

As a disclaimer for the rest of the post - I haven't given actual implementation details too much thought, only some ideas about gameplay mechanics:

 

- The most important thing is to ensure that there is a steady supply of PvP targets to hit.  A lot of why S revs have declined so fast I think is that fewer players amount to fewer targets to PvP, which leads to players not logging in, which again leads to even fewer targets to PvP.  (This is assuming every player is fair game as a PvP target - which even though it creates PvP, especially in rev 20 with Bluehaven, I don't believe making PvP should include encouraging the killing of builders and other non-combatants; see below.)

 

That is key to the survival of any server.  Adversely the community would need to acknowledge that gaining a great amount of players won't happen overnight. 

I both agree and disagree with you in regards to the killing of in essence PvE players.  As it being a PvP based server i feel that everyone should be free game, however, acknowledging that certain players arent a threat should be taken into consideration to help keep the server population stable.  What i would honestly like to see is some type of HYBRID PvP/PvE based server and I have great ideas for that, the problem is finding a balance between the two playstyles.  I might post my full idea on that later.  But in short Players would be able to chose a PATH either PvE or PvP (able to be changed later via cooldowns and warmups) and based on the path they chose it would grant them different types of permissions.  So PvE path players would be protected from PvP when within the territory of their land but susceptible to PvP once outside the confines of their land.  The PvE players could also take up arms to protect there land from invading PvPers if they chose but that would then flag them as PvPers. PvP players would be able to protect their land along with raid other towns and would always be susceptible to PvP.

 

- There should be a way to allow for greater mobility in the PvP hierarchy.  An often repeated line of advice for players who get camped is to leave the original base, assemble PvP gear in another location, and then come back to kill the camper.  Though I believe this has come to be a core tenant of PvP, it is also extremely hard to kill someone in the highest level gear (thinking Prot4 diamond, potions, pearls, high-damage swords) without also assembling gear that is or close to the highest level gear - forcing only one way to prepare and fight.  Multiple ways (eg. use of fire) would make for more interesting gameplay, give underdog players hope and reason to keep playing, and make players with the highest-level gear work a bit harder to ensure they keep their position or reputation at the top.

 

I am not sure on how you would implement this while keeping it balanced.

 

- There should be a reward for PvP - something that would encourage players who want a fight to go up against similar players.  Since high-level diamond fights tend to result in extremely worn down armor for the winner, one reward could perhaps be automatic armor or weapon repair for surviving pieces.  Maybe economy currency for the killer (corresponding to a loss of currency for the loser to prevent rapid inflation), higher rewards for killing someone who is better equipped, lower rewards for killing someone who is less well equipped?

 

I agree with this as a reward based incentive for PvPing would definitely add a NEED to actually PvP.  Maybe base it on the ELO system for ranking players PvP prowess and base the reward off of the correlation between your ELO and who you kills ELO

 

 

- Alternatively, prevent damaged armor from being destroyed at all, similar to how elytra is handled, though there should be a defense penalty for wearing worn-out armor compared to pristine armor (maybe peg completely-worn-out armor damage reduction to 0?).

 

The only way I would see that working is by having the armor go into your inventory once it hits its breaking point, but if your inventory is full then it would fall onto the ground.

 

As for repairing said armor.  McMMOs repair functionality is awesome in regards to this.  It could provide players the ability to setup repair shops since it doesnt require XP to repair items and the higher your repair skill is the more you can repair etc etc.

 

- Similarly, there should be a disincentive to kill players who are on the server to build, or are not interested in fighting, or are returning to base (this implies disabled beds, which would be great for encouraging PvPers to stay close to a point on the map, but would not be great news for builders).  For me, I generally treated anyone with a KDR of 0 (ie. no kills) as not a fighter, and avoided engaging them in combat.  There would need to be a way to classify players reliably as being uninterested in PvP (ie. a way to tell apart a builder/non-combatant from a PvP support role from a player logging in for the first time, etc.) - but once that is done, some penalties could be assigned to PvPers for repeatedly killing them, or buffs can be given to the victims that will help them avoid PvP.  (Invisibility?  High damage resistance?  Maybe even temporary PvP immunity?)

 

As stated earlier by ScaryBilbo a way to get around that is to put some type of protection on a player for X amount of time after they die.  I agree this should happen.

 

- It might be worth manipulating what drops from a player and what doesn't.  One of the biggest deterrents to playing on S/PvP was (is?) the fear of losing the entire inventory when killed.  For non-combatants this included ores as well as building materials and/or tools; for PvPers this included gear that potentially represented hours or days of preparation lost in 10 minutes at most.  Part of the reward of PvPing I think comes from getting the loot from the player killed, but there should be a balance between what PvPers gain (to make PvP worthwhile) and what victims lose (to encourage them to keep playing).  Perhaps builders lose a large percentage of building materials, or PvPers lose their weapons and potions but get to keep their (damaged) armor?  Incentives must be taken into account too - if builders always drop their armor for example, they can potentially be made a huge target by PvPers who seek to farm builders for even basic armor.

 

I understand the concept but by limiting what is dropped it would be hard to code along with unbalancing the risk/reward structure of PvPing.

 

- I'm not a huge fan of boss mobs on PvP myself, but in the absence of other player targets, that might be a fun diversion especially if there is a reward attached that can help PvPing ability (though not be crucial to it).  It could even be summonable if there are fears of players stealing the reward at the location of the boss mob at one point on the map.

 

The reason for the mob to be spawned in the first place is to make players gather at it and try to kill it while not being killed by other players.

 

- The sad part of all of these is that it's possible to game the system one way or another - care must be taken to minimize the possibility or advantages of doing so.

This is true.  Before you implement anything you need to play devils advocate and see how it could possibly be abused which is what I try to do when i hear other people giving ideas.

[tobylane]

How it could be abused? People have a target and will kill them regardless of penalty. I lived being the target.

 

I'm not going to be going into detail on this yet again, I just repeat the topic that doesn't get dealt with - culture. It is the (or one of) answer to your question but I recommend we don't go any further with it.

[Blockbuster]

How it could be abused? People have a target and will kill them regardless of penalty. I lived being the target.

 

I'm not going to be going into detail on this yet again, I just repeat the topic that doesn't get dealt with - culture. It is the (or one of) answer to your question but I recommend we don't go any further with it.

 

I dont understand what you are saying and/or asking?  I think you are talking about getting killed from coming from spawn and a simple pvp protection plugin could eliminate that from happening.  As for getting killed out in the open, that is part of the PvP playstyle.  The only way that would change is if the server went into the PATHS type server i briefly mentioned, but even then, PvPing would still be prevalent.

 

As for the culture of the server, it is a PvP server so killing and getting killed is part of it and if you don't enjoy that at all, then the PvP server isn't for you.  That is why PvE is a server, for those that do not enjoy the risk of being killed and losing items.

[Guest Former Staff]

It's been interesting to see the feedback of people who seem to care for PvP, however it has been a week without a reply from a PvP admin and with Cmchappell stepping down, I think it's about time this topic got some attention from Bluuefuzzy please.

 

Will PvP continue over to revision three?

 

If so, how is the revision going to look (which ideas from this topic or beyond resonate with you?) and will you be expanding your team / support?

[Blockbuster]

Sorry for my absence.

 

Since nobody else was commenting on the post,  the lack of players to socialize with on the server, having to move my office out to a cubicle at work while we renovate (thus not being able to play games so I don't get fired) along with the release of PokemonGo I have not been around.

 

With the stepping down of cmchampell leaving Bluue the only admin and the lack of any responses from her in regards to this topic I am starting to fear that the PvP server on nerd.nu is going to die.

 

I really would like to not see that happen so if there is anything I could do to make sure that doesn't happen please let me know.  I would be all for Administrating the server and configuring it along with finding the devs needed to code the plugins to give it the appropriate playstyle as suggested above or try and manipulate current mods to get the same result.  I have run servers in the past with decent player bases so this wouldn't be my first rodeo.  I know we have tech admins but I can handle myself around a server box along with the countless hours of creating the configurations of the plugins to get everything to play nicely.

 

So please let me know if there is anything I can do.

[Blockbuster]

Sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo two weeks and no responses =(

[Guest Former Staff]

TLDR: Goodbye PvP.

[Blockbuster]

sigh. so just to get this straight

 

• the survival server closes because of bad gameplay and lack of players
• server reopens in 1.9, change name from S to PvP, but do nothing different to gameplay for why server originally closed
• players complain about the fact nothing changed and start to lose interest, but are told changes are going to happen
• rev 2 comes out and still nothing is changed and the server dies faster than it ever has before
• I try and explain why it dies and how to fix it along with getting community input
• no pvp staff takes part in the conversation
• end result is to give up on the server and let it close again instead of addressing the underlying issues why it failed the first time and then failed again

i can't believe the PvP admins gave up on it so quickly and the Heads didn't seem to step in and do anything about it. 

 

makes me sad again to see the server die when it wasnt really given a chance to succeed in the first place.

 

 

I would still like to develop a real PvP based server if given the opportunity and if it comes to costs for the resources I wouldn't mind funding it.  I felt like there was good feedback on here and I would rather try something new and it fail then to completely give up on it.

[Guest Former Staff]

and the Heads didn't seem to step in and do anything about it.

 

Just want to say from my perspective the head admins were handed a team that they didn't put into place- That was my fault, in hindsight a bad decision given the individuals gave up on the server.

[tobylane]

• the survival server closes because of bad gameplay and lack of players
• server reopens in 1.9, change name from S to PvP, but do nothing different to gameplay for why server originally closed
• players complain about the fact nothing changed and start to lose interest, but are told changes are going to happen
• rev 2 comes out and still nothing is changed and the server dies faster than it ever has before
• I try and explain why it dies and how to fix it along with getting community input
• no pvp staff takes part in the conversation
• end result is to give up on the server and let it close again instead of addressing the underlying issues why it failed the first time and then failed again

i can't believe the PvP admins gave up on it so quickly and the Heads didn't seem to step in and do anything about it. 

 

makes me sad again to see the server die when it wasnt really given a chance to succeed in the first place.

 

 

I would still like to develop a real PvP based server if given the opportunity and if it comes to costs for the resources I wouldn't mind funding it.  I felt like there was good feedback on here and I would rather try something new and it fail then to completely give up on it.

 

• A server closes because of lack of players. Would you want it to happen any other way?
• It reopened as vanilla 1.9 based on requests, but the requesters did not turn out to enjoy what they chose enough to stick with it. Nothing wrong there, but it shows that even when we get what we want we still get bored of it.
• Players asked for no change, got bored of it, the admins were the first to come up with something concrete enough to try and so they did. How could that go any better?
• I wouldn't have made a new rev and I've forgotten why it was done.
• You do try, but you start with "I was extremely let down by the staff" which I would call a bad way to start
• Based on previous conversations I'm not surprised they didn't enter
• The underlying issue is that a few people state weak intent to play but don't actually play. The underlying issue is that Minecraft isn't as fun as it used to be, however it's dressed or modded up.

We may not want this situation, but once we are here there is nothing sensible to do but close. I also have ideas on what the server could be but none of them are worth trying in this situation.

[Blockbuster]

 

• A server closes because of lack of players. Would you want it to happen any other way?
• It reopened as vanilla 1.9 based on requests, but the requesters did not turn out to enjoy what they chose enough to stick with it. Nothing wrong there, but it shows that even when we get what we want we still get bored of it.
• Players asked for no change, got bored of it, the admins were the first to come up with something concrete enough to try and so they did. How could that go any better?
• I wouldn't have made a new rev and I've forgotten why it was done.
• You do try, but you start with "I was extremely let down by the staff" which I would call a bad way to start
• Based on previous conversations I'm not surprised they didn't enter
• The underlying issue is that a few people state weak intent to play but don't actually play. The underlying issue is that Minecraft isn't as fun as it used to be, however it's dressed or modded up.

We may not want this situation, but once we are here there is nothing sensible to do but close. I also have ideas on what the server could be but none of them are worth trying in this situation.

 

 

To your points, and i appreciate you taking the time to respond since it is nice to see someone else care

• no, a server should close if no one is playing on it, however, if no one is playing on it then you would logically think changes would need to be made to correct it
• i don't know of anyone that requested it be open as vanilla in 1.9 since when i logged in everyone was complaining it was vanilla and the admins at the time stated that there were plans to implement new game mechanics in the future, but wanted to release a 1.9 server as soon as possible.
• I completely disagree with your statement that players didn't ask for change, the admins planned alot of changes for the second rev but C45Y who was developing the plugins decided to stop playing
• The rev was created due to the new mechanics they were going to add based around C45Y's idea but again since he left nothing got implemented and the server was re-released with no changes and therefore pretty much no one played at all
• I was let down by staff because the staff are the ones that lead and control what happens to the server.  If your leader walks you off a cliff to your death would you not be disappointed with your leader?
• The lack of staff involvement is the main reason the server ended up the way it did.  The lack of an PvP admin to this post further drives that issue home.  It appears that they had already given up prior to my initial post and the subsequent posts from other community members that follow which is why instead of trying to make any changes they just decided to give up on the community and server and close it instead.
• I don't disagree with your last statement because i believe it definitely played a role but I don't believe that is the underlying issue.  If a product fails to the point you stop producing it and then you start producing it again but don't make any changes to the product, what would make you think the outcome would be any different?

I also disagree with you that since we are here there is nothing we can do.  That is a defeatist attitude and one of the reasons the server dies.  If you have an opinion or an idea on how to improve the server or any server you should voice your opinion instead of just stating you have ideas but its too late.

[c45y]

• I completely disagree with your statement that players didn't ask for change, the admins planned alot of changes for the second rev but C45Y who was developing the plugins decided to stop playing

 

Not entirely true, my vision for PvP was not shared by the whole admin team and we could not come to an agreement, so I stepped down from the position so there could be a single clear vision for PvP, not the merging of two completely different ideas. The initial launch in the old survival format was to gather feedback about a largely unknown PvP system after the mojang changes, it was not intended to remain.

 

I'm not making a personal attack on my other admins, it was a failing of myself and the ^headadmin team that a brand new admin with little to no training was thrown into the primary decision making position of a newly relaunched server, it should never have happened.

[Silversunset01]

There are a number of reasons why the PvP server is closing at this time, and I'd really like this to not turn into a finger-pointing thread. Right now it is the best decision given the circumstances. We are happy to have constructive feedback, and in the future if more projects come on board it will be important to have that sort of community input to ensure things are successful.