Server Expansions: "Separate New Worlds"

[Aeonex]

[Indrae]

I have no opinion one way or the other on whether a Creative World should be flat or not. I want to make it clear though, that City World is not "Creative World", and will remain flat until we have sniper and can build the terrain ourselves. Not a bad plan though.

[9bjames]

I have quite a lot of input on this for and against it, but right now, I'm pretty tired after just coming home from an exam (which was pretty far off campus, finished 40 minutes early, but it took about that much time to get back home, lol). Will write more maybe later tonight.

Edit - Okay, delay on my input... that exam must've taken more out of me than I thought.
I'll make a proper post sometime tomorrow if I get time, just need to evaluate and try to organise my thoughts on it better, something I rarely do, lol.

[EducatedPizza]

[Aeonex]

Pizza: Excellent Ideas! I love them, you even came up with the same picture for the spawn I had in my head! Everyone could just go to the spawn to visit a new portal, rather than memorise a bunch of warps.

Regarding City-World, would it be possible to have that as "part" of the creative world? I.E. It's on a separate map, as it is, it doesn't need to be merged, but it doesn't have it's own world portal at spawn. We might also be able to add this as a rank reward for Honored-Architect for Creative World? (That way, the very best creative users get "elite builder" access and can contribute with excellent creative build structures. Of course, respect rules will always be enforced and people who act privileged over others will be reprimanded.

[Indrae]

Not entirely sure I'm following this. Are you suggesting that City World (I'm going to abbreviate it to CitWo for the rest of this post) be used as a reward for Honored-Architects? If so, I don't think that would really be in line with the vision I had for the world. I'd rather not focus on what rank someone is in a different world, but rather on their ability to build, as well as their ability to work well with the CitWo team. CitWo is also not a free build map (ideas on big projects will eventually have to be discussed thoroughly before construction begins). In all likelihood, if someone ever does achieve Honored-Architect, they would most likely be allowed on the CitWo team, but I'd rather keep that up to my and the CitWo council's discretion. Keep in mind also that CitWo has its own ranking system currently, and that is something I would like to preserve.

As far as the portal is concerned, I wouldn't be opposed to having City World be accessed through a portal in the Creative World (although I assume we'll still be able to warp between worlds at will (with the exception of AW perhaps)).

I think this could be a great way to better organize our server in a manner that is new user friendly. I agree with Pizza that we have relied on warps for too long to navigate to different worlds, and that is unfair to new players who may not be able to identify those warps.

A concern I have though is how ranks will factor in to this. Obviously, the Redstone world and Adventure/Survival World would have their own setup. But when it comes to a Creative World, Traditional World, and Art World, the solution is less clear cut. I think adding prefixes (not the kind we have always talked about) such as CW (could conflict with CitWo ranks), TW, and AW (possible conflict if Adventure World is not renamed) would be beneficial to help identify which map people are on. What we could do, is allow each world its own rank progression. For example, someone who has achieved the rank of Architect in Creative World might only be a Member in the Traditional World because they have not fulfilled the criteria to be promoted to the rank in both worlds. This isn't a system that I truly support wholeheartedly, and would probably complicate things for our OPs (possibly more than reviews do now). I realize though that Creative vs. Traditional building is a divisive subject on the server (or, perhaps just among us OPs), and we do need some way to bridge the gap with a solution that everyone can live with.

[9bjames]

Umm, okay, before I can get into my main points which I wanted to raise initially... I'm going to tackle these new posts at a time...

@Pizza: okay... what you've suggested with the whole centralising portals idea is something I've also had for a long while... and something I've actually made a rough start at. It isn't quite the same, but it's essentially a giant build, called nexus... There is a warp to it if you want to see the (minimal) progress I have made, at /warp nexus... but the idea is generally to have one giant area, which has seperate, equally giant rooms, to represent each world... and within each room would be a portal, linking to the portals that other people have created for those worlds. My problem with this, of course, is that I don't like the idea that the effort I have put into both writing out the signs for the second spawn, and the effort in beginning on nexus will be made redundant... I digress though, that is more and issue of conflicting ideas, than server interests. I was thinking something similar with containing a portal to nexus within the exit of the new spawn, but whichever one works better...

@ Ash: This kinda continues on from what I was thinking about with nexus. Each room could either represent a world, or a type of world; there would be either one, or several portals in each world room, for however many worlds, or however many seperate portals players have made for the different worlds. If all you are trying to do is to give the image of merging them together, into groups rather than physically merging the worlds, then it would be possible to simply contain another portal, in the same portal room to link to the seperate areas. Almost having different gateways, which link to vastly spaced out locations in the same worlds etc. (or at least to give that feel)
This was just the idea with nexus, it could be carried into whatever build, or system is chosen in the end.

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Okay... so here are my full thoughts on the matter... or at least as fully as I can write this.

Firstly, I want to know what the overall goal is for this; are we trying to physically merge the maps together? Or is it just to bring everything into an more easily accessible system?
When I first read this, I disagreed since I was under the impression that by "merging", you mean physically merging all of these maps into one. I would just like to say, even with worlds such as PVP and AW, I don't think that should be done. This is since really, it would missmatch... PVP and AW were both introduced to bring in the different map generating changes from two different versions of MC, but also the rules... We would be forfeitting the difference between AW and PVP, which is either "no mobs and grief allowed" - all natural, VS "danger, lots of mobs, pvp, but free to build, with risk of minor theft" - modified natural feel, more safety in building. Players still use both, because of these differences. I personally don't like the idea of merging them.

The question I have is, what are we trying to gain here? I am completely for an idea to make portals centralised, as, like I've said, I've even made a start on a building that would do this. But what is this to achieve? Are we going to start grouping and categorising worlds to make them easier to find? Or are we trying to reduce thenumber of worlds altogether?

One thing I don't agree with is naming Flatlands "art world", even now it has several buildings there which have nothing to do with art... since that wasn't the main idea for flatlands. It was based on having enough flat, empty space with no requirements to clear land, so player could do pixelart... but also so that players could build more easily. The latter is something done less now, but it still is done.

As with grouping, I'm not even sure that the groups suggested would be adequate for some of the worlds. For instance, traditional world... that would include main world, planetoids, tunnels, desert world... maybe flatlands also? I don't disagree with an art world in general, but I don't see that being as flatlands as it is... If anything I would actually only set flatland, and main world as the "Traditional world", have planetoids as a seperate one altogether possibly (not necessary as such, but I'm pretty sure planetoids is still no building allowed for anyone under OP level? in which case, couldn't be counted so much), but the ones I would definitely group seperately from those would be desert world and tunnels... They still have the traditional building rules, but they have damage, and different ways to create zones... (the latter really just being so for flatlands, and also player's aren't allowed to build freely there)

Finally, as for Indrae's concerns, as he has said, City World isn't so much of a general, all purpose, high quality build area, but instead an ongoing project. One which players can of course add to, but one which he wants to oversee very closely. I think his opinion is that grouping this together with other creative worlds would give the wrong impression of what the world is about.


Overall, I have a lot of mixed feelings about this, and I'm not sure I like the direction it could be headed in. It could be used to help the server out a lot, but it could also confuse things... I still feel as if there is more to say, yet these are all the points which come to mind right now. This post is being heavily editted by the way, mainly since I'm still not done having my say, but also becuase really I'm still pretty worn down.

For all the bad points I've raised, I do also see potential. If this is simply used to group worlds of similar types, I have no problems with it. On the other hand if we are trying to eliminate, or force worlds together though, which may not have the same rule sets, I'm not completely for it. I see no problems with grouping creative worlds together, so long as it's only by category, and not by rules... and I also see no problems in having areas dedicated to pixelart, to traditional, legitemate building, redstone, or any other things like that. It would give players a clearer idea on where they can go, to do what; making the worlds more evident is an even better idea, which would help players get the most out of their experience. I just do not like the idea of forcing areas together which don't fit, or... (something else which my mind has melted from before being able to type...)

[EducatedPizza]

@aeon- thank you! I had been having this idea for a while and I feel that a portal system centered around a new spawn would be beneficial in countless ways. As for city world. Id be more than fine keeping it as a separate portal within the new creative world that has been proposed. I would just suggest that the permissions for that world remain up to Indy because he has already put a lot of thought into it. Other than that, I think having it as an extension of creative world would be fine.

@james- where to begin. I feel that you're missing the point of this whole proposal. The main thing is to have a central area where new and old users can come to go to any world without having to remember a bunch of different warp names. The amount of portals or where they lead is completely up for debate. I was merely going off the worlds aeon proposed. I would personally suggest keeping all the world the same with the addition of creative world. 6 portals or 10 is not the issue.This would make this whole thing much less complicated and we wouldn't have to worry about merging worlds.

Once again, I was not trying to criticize your sign making abilities or demean the work that you have put into the second spawn. I just feel that the amount of signs that we use can come off as confusing to new members. It's a lot of information, and I feel that we need to split it up. That is why I propose centralizing a new spawn within the portal system. This makes the portals extremely accessible through /spawn while givin us a chance to split up the info a little bit. I would suggest each world have a "welcome area" with rules and rank information for that specific world. That way, new users can learn about our worlds and world rules as they visit them, not all at once. It would also give us a chance to make an informative entrance area for each world.

On to the nexus. I was unaware that this was going to be used as a large portal system. It has an awesome design and I commend you on the work that you have done on it so far. I personally feel that this portal system, if implemented, should be a decision made by all of us, both in design and implementation. I personally would not have chosen to have it underground as this limits our building capabilities. I understand where you're coming from though, and the purpose of this proposal isn't to say "forget everything James has done". I would propose keeping your spawn2 as the entrance area for the main world and perhaps use the nexus as the desert world entrance area? Just some ideas. They're both amazing builds and I am not trying to just shrug them off. Perhaps we could even use the nexus as the main spawn/ portal area if that is what is decided. I'm not ruling anything out, just tossing around ideas.

@ind - I think our ranks are complicated enough as it is. I don't think it's necessary to have separate world rank requirements. Rather, I would suggest having prefixes in front of your name depending on what world you're in. This would be the same as AW and PVP are now. The only world that would keep our traditional ranking system would be the main world. I don't think ranks are needed in flatlands, aw, PVP, desert, tunnels, planetoids, or creative. If anything, the user could keep his/her main world rank and just have a prefix in front of their name depending on the world they are in. This would keep our new rank system simple while allowing world differentiation


Ok, I just type all of that on my touch screen phone so I'm going to stop for now since I am seeing double.

[9bjames]

Lol pizza about seeing double... I'm a little weary myself, stayed up till 6am, after a stressfull exam (lots been happening... not much of it good... =/).
Anyway... I understood exactly the whole reason behind centralising the portals, and I do agree entirely with that (warps help, but not when you need to remember 20). I also don't disagree making it accessible via the new spawn is a brilliant idea, since it would give playes the chance to access them straight from the very start. What I was getting confused and stuck on was what the main goal of this idea was, and the main features thereof...

Also, I know you weren't criticising what I'd written; no matter what, where there's a lot of signs to read, it can end up being a chore. I only really mentioned that because I don't want it to go to waste.
The idea of splitting up rules/ information is interesting... but of course, there would have to be a set of general, all purpose rules and guidelines... possibly the rules etc could be referenced, but then there could just be a portal taking the the spawn Zan made, for more in depth information, and more help with commands/ plugins etc. There should still be commands noted in any spawn, no matter what... but of course, not all will be needed for a newbie.

As for the nexus... I don't personally mind how it is used, but the initial idea for it though was to contain a portal to every single world. there's little point if it only contains one or 2 portals, since it was built to have enough room to be expanded (e.g. several of the portal rooms would have been empty). I'd suggested this idea a while back as well, and I've been wanting more input... but not many people replied. Either way, I'll continue building it as designed, and see how it goes.

[EducatedPizza]

The main point of my proposal, as opposed to Aeon's, is to keep the worlds that we have and make them more accessible via portals at a new spawn. This would make them easy to find, easy to use, and give us a chance to create a new "server spawn" as opposed to a main world spawn that we currently have. The main server spawn could have minimal server information and links to our site and forum. The user could then pick a portal and be transported to each world where full world, rank, permission, and rules could greet them in a "world entrance area". This would allow us to break up the information a bit and give users a chance to learn about each world and it's rules at their leisure.