Minetown

As a major shop owner, I agree to reset the economy vs. tax as was done moving from Classic to Agharta--during that move, several players moved with far too much advantage, and that shouldn't be done this time; This time EVERY player should start with 1 mtc to make a fair playing field for everyone.

I have put in lots of time building up my base and MT $. I am not infavor of starting over. With that said I will go along with what is best for everyone and the server being I don't know how all of the technical things work. I may not like the decision made but I will support what you all decide.

In response to the proposed changes in the new world:

1.) Yes.

10k diameter will provide enough variation in biomes that everyone should get a chance at land they want. And if not, this should help foster a more tightly knit community. This will encourage members to build towns where they share community buildings that provide services everyone needs, such as farms and shops.

2.) YES.

How can you judge where you want to start your house if you're more encouraged to teleport away from builds? Right now, the 9k and 18k warps only show builds in those areas. A rail system will allow users to survey the community's projects much faster and with a more "realistic" feel. I WISH WE STILL HAD PASSENGER TRAINS LIKE THEY DO IN THE EU! PENNSYLVANIA IS MORE THAN SHITTY ROADS AND GRUMPY OLD PEOPLE! <object class="emojione" data="https://resources.enjin.com/1489581540/themes/core/images/emojione/svg/2639.svg?0" type="image/svg+xml" standby=":(">:(</object>

3.) Yep.

It's hard to get into an economy when only a few dominate it. You really have to work your ass off to get to that same level of success as the few very successful.

SUGGESTION: I think the economy should be resource based, with voting and donation rewards converting to that as well. Minecraft already has forms of currency already built into it. Yes, some of the villager trading is disproportionate to how real economics works. However, members either have to do ithemselves or become an existing part of someone else's villager farm to save time, which will again encourage player interactions.

Most of the staff already know me and some of my ideas I've already mentioned to them. But I never wrote it down on the forums. So...

I think the change would be good but could bring some negative things along with it. The smaller size would be beneficial for server performance and we are already super spread out and with even more space in between(to include a better web map). Some of the newer members or older might leave since they spent too much time on agharta as is, but it would help the NEWER members start anew as everyone else would too.

as a small shop owner I believe that anyone has the chance to succeed at making it big in minetown. They have plenty of open land to mine for resources. Anyone can sell anything at punkypal's bazaar just like anyone. Making a new map will not make it easier for people to succeed it will do nothing that the map we already have can do. I personally just started becoming successful by making my first 40k and am slowly starting to become successful from hard work.

There's quite a few things that a reset can fix that we can't fix with Agharta. Our reasoning for proposing this idea is that Agharta itself is old, overly large, and under-par for performance. You can only expand a map so far, especially one that was too large to begin with. It's aging, which is the same problem that we ran into with Classic. By starting a completely new world (keep in mind Agharta wouldn't be going anywhere right now, it would still be maintained and playable for atleast six months) with a brand new economy, the playing field would be leveled. We can correct some things that weren't done correctly last time the map was reset, now that we have the experience under our belts. We realize we're asking for everyone to make sacrifices here (including ourselves, ones that us veteran members have already made once), but these are sacrifices that we believe will better the community in the future, negate server stagnancy, and promote future growth by planning for what lies ahead.

Many vets that are still here, like myself, don't stick around because of a map (although it is nice to be able to view the nostalgia), we stick around because MT means something to us as a community. It's not just a collection of region files on a server. The players, staff, and veterans here are our closest friends, no matter how much we may fuss, argue, or disagree with each other. This community is my family, I love it, and I'm proud of it and all of it's participants, past and present, and I have no hesitation in saying that I believe I speak for all our admins, and my closest friends when I say this. We're just doing our turn and part in making sure that it lives on so that others can come to enjoy it just as we have. This proposal isn't a decision we take lightly, which is why we want your thoughts on it. All we ask is that you view our ideas with an open mind, as we view yours.

In relation to other concerns: a 10,000 block diameter would be plenty of space for our current player base, and would leave plenty of room to grow with both new versions on Minecraft, and the increased player base that you inevitably get with the advance of time. Reflecting on what Masta said, one thing many of us miss about Classic is how tight-knit everyone was. With a smaller map, it would harbor the growth of great towns that mean something to everyone, of which Classic had many. It would bring us closer together as a community, like things used to be.

Personally, I agree with Masta also on the idea of an item based economy like Classic was run back before there was an actual credit system, although I'm not sure how it would work out for Minetown in it's current iteration. We will definitely discuss this before making a final decision.

All of this being said, whatever your opinions and convictions are on this, please vote your mind on it. You have the opportunity to make a difference, use it.

~Jared

I have to admit I love the idea of a new server with new features and most importantly a new eco. Like Jared and Masta have stated prior to this, the idea of an item based eco is better than MTC (imo). I actually wouldn't mind seeing a plugin like towny come back (Like when Agharta was first released) as it makes people live together and form these towns for protection. I know a lot of people might not like living but lwc chest locks would be enough for people to protect their items. Just my idea but i'm down for it all... BRING IT ON!!!

No to towny, the whole having to claim in chunks is horrible. Having to buy the ability to claim is horrible. We can do towns if people want towns, just like we have in Aggie, but not everyone wants to live in a town. I know I sure dont, and have no plans on starting a new town like I had, or at least not one I am personally apart of. I want my property private and off the well traveled paths. Im getting my head around the idea of a fresh map, but dont start regulating the protection by forcing people to join a town to keep their builds safe.

I would be IN FAVOR of a fresh new map. And I don't say this lightly as (if you've seen my bazaar) I have a ton of work put into my builds. Expanding just the bazaar to it's current size has taken hundreds of hours. It boggles my mind to even think of the hours DTEandy, JessicaRabbit, Bumpy & Ronvandorp (to name a few) have put into their creations.

But first.... just think about it. Spleef arena: Gone - All the existing towns: Gone. Public farms: Gone! It will take months and months to get even a fraction of those resources back.

And building with be more work. It will be quite a while before y'all can just dump a ton of one resource on me or DTE and then buy exactly what you need.

So this is pretty big thing to support doing. Here are my thought on what I would want to see done so the pain isn't so bad.

1) Let's not do this until Minetown is 105% ready to run 1.9 - That means all the plugins and everything are squared away and working

2) As soon as #1 is ready, then the sooner the better.

3) No amplified please.

4) Did Agharta use the 'Large Biomes' setting at any point? I would be in favor of that one.

5) Continuing on from thought #4, was any seed manipulation mod used on Agharta? I think it would be awesome if it could be made so that desert, savanna and jungle has a higher % chance to be created in the south coords of the world, Ice and snow biomes had a higher % of appearing in the north coords and between the two was found primarily forest, hills, planes and the like. Sometimes you might see a northern desert or southern Taiga, but such would be uncommon. I don't know if such a mod is out there or if one could be created but if that could be implemented it would be VERY COOL!

6) I like the idea of seeing the giant ring of ocean go away, HOWEVER, some people may just like to set up on an island in the middle of a vast ocean. I might be nice if staff could do something to create at lease one (perhaps two) sizable oceans. I think a few mega oceans would also serve to help define the overall world map and give it some character. When you look at an average world map zoomed way out it doesn't look like it has any oceans, but just many lakes. You know what I mean? I'm thinking that perhaps in an area where two or three oceans just so happen naturally form rather close to each other with only a thin biome breaking them apart, staff could do a little "terrain painting" to merge them into one.

7) Great Wall of Expansion: Is there a good way to make it so that a future world size push out will not create the jagged and ugly chunk borders that hurt the eye? Are there any ideas or solutions for this problem?

8 ) I would prefer to see a fresh economy than a tax but if there is a tax it should be graduated into brackets and each higher bracket pays a higher tax. (i.e. 5% on your 1st 5k MTC, 10% on the next 10k MTC, 20% on next 20k MTC, ect. whatever)

9) Please let vets bring over some of their stuff. Perhaps one chest full. It hurts bad enough to lose all the builds. Please don't take away my enchanted diamond pick!

10) PREVIEW PERIOD: An idea, when new map is ready, open it up for a week or two for people to explore. Then reset it after the exploration period and after that it's for good. This will give folks a chance to find the perfect spot to build and can take some time to consider the pro's and cons of the land they discover. In the end I think it will end up with more people much happier with their home land.

11) RUINS OF OLD AGHARTA: It would be pretty neat if before the world opens staff copied a few iconic player structures from the old server, modified them to look ruined, and then hid them out in the world, under oceans, or wherever for players to discover. I think that would be fun.

12) I'm not sure if 10,000 blocks diameter is big enough. Someone check my math but I figure this new world will have roughly only 5% of the area that Agharta currently has. That's a heck of a lot smaller! 12,000 block diameter may be a better number?

13) ITEM BASED ECONOMY: If you do this it will work fine with also keeping MTC if you keep MTC tied to one "gold standard" item, but you need to make one item the ONLY way to get MTC into the game. If you made diamond (for example) the item tied to MTC then there would be a admin shop that only bought diamond. As more people sold diamonds to this shop, the MTC in the world will grow. Using a resource that is not very renewable is best to avoid inflation. Voting to get MTC would have to stop. You can still have the point shop but no MTC for votes. Voting points would then be in essence a separate currency. -- On a side note: PLEASE don't have the new server buy emerald any more. Because of villager trades it artificially interferes with the free market prices of many items.

Addressing everything by numbers:

1/2: That's the general idea, we don't make a change that we're not ready for. We've been actively getting things ready for 1.9 since before it's release, and we're continuing to prepare things on a daily basis. It's a pretty large task with a community like ours!

3: It's already been stated, but amplified won't be happening, it would cause too much trouble to traverse, not even counting the trouble that less powerful clients would have.

4/5/6 We're not really on board with world modification. We're still in the preliminary planning phase right now and the current consensus is to make sure that isn't a giant ocean that covers 40% of the map, but other than that use vanilla worldgen.

7: Agharta wasn't generated with much "future-proofing" in mind, which means you have issues like this when expanding the map. One thing we'll be doing with the new map, if it's decided to even start a new map, is planning everything from the start for Survival, whereas Agharta was meant for more of an RPG feel. This includes planning for future expansions to continue the map, not generate new terrains with stark borders and edges.

8/9: The economy will be reset, and letting players bring over any items from Agharta would defeat the purpose of resetting it in the first place.

10: If we go with the new map, that won't really be an option. Once things get setup, the staff is going to have quite a bit of time to get server builds together (small spawn, market, etc.), so there would be no option of resetting the work they would have already done. Also given that our staff members would be working on these server builds up until release day, previewing for regular members wouldn't be an option. Think of it more as a suprise <object class="emojione" data="https://resources.enjin.com/1489581540/themes/core/images/emojione/svg/1f609.svg?0" type="image/svg+xml" standby=";)">;)</object>

11: A few staff members have actually expressed interest in the idea you mentioned here, so it'll definitely be in discussion.

12: In total area, yes, but you've got to remember that currently, a very large portion of Agharta is uninhabitable, and much of what is isn't actually inhabited. Agharta is much larger than it should be, and we won't really have any problem with a smaller map. The good thing about starting smaller is that if we do run into space issues, we can gen out a little farther. You can make a small map larger, but not vice versa.

13: The basis for the economy is still yet to be officially decided, mainly because we don't even know for sure if we're going to move to a new world; but we're going to be doing a major overhaul on how it's regulated.

We're glad to see good support and community involvement, and we're listening and discussing everything everyone is bringing up. Keep it coming!