Thanks to Shaun for the banner <3
- Progress report:
Roadmap established.
Custom world generator acquired.
New world generation complete!
Configuring initial plugin setup...
Put the world live for testing (manual whitelist)
Make landfall with a spawn area
Claim the spawn village zone for future use
Demonstrate the new town system
Prep a starter kit for players
Test new world generation for the Wild
Put the Wild live alongside Escapia
Open a portal between the worlds
Spoiler! :
A week ago I launched three polls to help me get a better view of what we want and what we like as a community. One of these polls asked which three factors are most important to you in survival multiplayer. Thanks for your feedback everyone! The top three factors were: Creation, Community and Exploration!
Interestingly, these were the three points I voted for, and the points I'd been planning my roadmap around. I'm glad to know that we're on the same wavelength. The launch of the new world will focus on bringing more to these elements. Below I've outlined just a small part of my plans for the future.
Important note: This is a roadmap. It's also modular. What this means is that not everything here will happen at once - in fact, much of it might never happen. Everything here is on the radar, and if I have my way everything here will happen. But remember, there are no guarantees or timescales.
Interestingly, these were the three points I voted for, and the points I'd been planning my roadmap around. I'm glad to know that we're on the same wavelength. The launch of the new world will focus on bringing more to these elements. Below I've outlined just a small part of my plans for the future.
Important note: This is a roadmap. It's also modular. What this means is that not everything here will happen at once - in fact, much of it might never happen. Everything here is on the radar, and if I have my way everything here will happen. But remember, there are no guarantees or timescales.
Spoiler! :
One point that's been brought up time and time again is that the things we build look nice, but they don't do much more than that. It's time we changed that, and functional builds are the answer. Maybe you want to build town facilities that people can actually use, or maybe you'd like some more home comforts and conveniences in your private builds. This will be an ongoing project that relies heavily on input from you guys; I want to be as receptive as possible to your ideas, and with the state of plugins and server scripting in 2017, there's a high chance we can make your suggestions into reality!
- Town facilities: shops, banks, trading posts, travel stations, casinos, civic buildings. Town mayors can invest in functional buildings to offer unique services and generate income.
- Arenas: PVP, spleef, race tracks, community event plazas. If you build a place for competition, we can power it up with plugins. A PVP arena with class loadouts? A race track with speed boosts? Sure, we can do that.
- Home automation: Inspired by modpacks - new circuitry, sorting systems, automatic smelting, and more. New ways to spend your accumulated resources to become a captain of industry or redstone scientist.
- New conveniences: Personal teleporters? Resource multiplying? Improved farming, cooking and fishing? Sure, why not. Make your life easier and get what you want, faster.
Spoiler! :
Towns are one of the best things about multiplayer survival. They're a quantifiable way to get people working together towards a common goal. Creating something for the greater good of the community is an excellent motivation for a lot of players. Trouble is, there's only so many times we can build communal tree farms, mob grinders and the like. Towns deserve more!
- "Official" towns: a new plugin that works with Worldguard (cuboids) to designate town territories, districts and plots. Prospective mayors can create town regions and either invite members or advertise plots allowing players to join. Towns are ranked according to their number of residents, and gain access to certain town features or perks accordingly.
- Finally, an economy system: Earn money from the Escapian Reserve by cashing in gold to your nearest bank or by completing jobs. Donate resources to server-built projects, export goods through trading posts, complete server-run challenges like mob hunting, and more.
- Spend money to make money: Town residents pay taxes into the town pot, which mayors can invest in town features. Businesses - NPC shops, casinos, attractions with entry fees - pay some of their profits into the pot. Towns are big business!
- Shopping opportunities: Spend your hard-earned cash to buy resources and items from shops, play games, enter competitions, buy consumable or time-based perks, and of course, pay your taxes.
- Friendly competition: Your town is your team in Town vs. Town (TVT) contests. Go head-to-head to decorate your town in a themed build-off, play home and away spleef matches in your town arenas (Spleef League, anyone?), or even grief each others' towns in PVP sieges! (Don't worry, you'll only be griefing copies, not the original towns!)
Spoiler! :
Here's another idea that's been thrown around a fair bit - a mining world, a place to go and gather resources, that regenerates every so often. We're doing it! Our main world, Escapia, will be for building, for making homes and towns and mega-projects and all the lovely things we talked about above. Sure, you'll still be able to go mining there, to chop down trees and gather resources. But there's a dedicated world for resource farming now - and so much more... welcome to the Wild!
- Endlessly regenerating: The Wild regenerates every two weeks (definitely subject to change) with a new seed, allowing players to go exploring for new lands whenever they please. (Regen period depends on popularity and necessity)
- Random structures: There are no generated structures in Escapia. That means no villages, no temples, nothing to pillage. Terrible idea, right? All your generated structures are now found in the Wild. Because the world regenerates, there's always new places to find and loot, and they can't be monopolised by the first player to find them. And since you're probably wondering - yes, there will be ways to bring villagers from the Wild into the main world. Your iron farms are safe!
- CUSTOM structures: It's not just monuments, mansions and the rest that you'll find while exploring the Wild. An ever-growing list of custom structures unique to Escapecraft - many based on our past builds - will also spawn randomly, ripe for exploring and looting. Some of these will spawn only in certain biomes or underground, and each structure has its own loot table. Some will spawn mobs, some will contain traps. Who knows what you'll find when you venture into the Wild?
- A challenging world: Did I mention the Wild is set to Hard mode? Make sure you're prepared for a fight if you're going adventuring. Some custom structures may also spawn mobs that are tougher than usual. Even players in diamond gear will meet challenges in the Wild - but the rewards are worth it!
- Dungeons: Some structures you'll find are actually entrances to large, multi-level dungeons. Conquer the powerful mobs and tricky traps alone or with a party and claim valuable loot at the end. Dungeons come in a handful of difficulties, the toughest of which will give even players with fully enchanted diamond gear a run for their money!
- New kinds of loot: What's the point of a tougher world if you can't get better loot from it? New enchantments and buffs on weapons and armour, a new "accessory" class of gear you can hold in your off-hand for buffs, new consumables with special effects, unique items with custom powers, and even a way to boost your maximum health! Of course, we can't have you running around unopposed, so the mobs of the Wild might just have some new abilities too...
- Collectables galore: Slaying mobs or raiding chests might just reward you with unique head drops. These come in a range of rarities, from common to legendary, and collecting a whole set offers some nice bonuses. You'll want to trade and negotiate with other players to complete sets. You can also just decorate your house with them if you like.
Spoiler! :
Nothing draws people back to a now-and-then game like a good event. The promise of new and limited edition stuff is always tempting. Going forward I want to embrace events on special occasions. We've held events for dates like Halloween or Christmas before, but I want these events to have influence over the entire survival experience.
- Seasonal events: Easter egg hunt? Halloween haunted house? 4th of July fireworks? Events are fun!
- Seasonal items: Candy apples, exploding pumpkins, and a replica Excalibur from the Renaissance Fair.
- Seasonal structures: Explore spooky ruins, giant Easter eggs or summer beach huts. Or some other wacky thing.
- Seasonal town stuff: Gather crops for the harvest festival or put up a Christmas tree for festive rewards.
Spoiler! :
Will the new world have a spawn area, and what will be in it?
Yes, there will be a small coastal village at spawn, from which the player will disembark into Escapia by boat. It has no official town name; if you must call it anything, "spawn" will suffice. I intend to build this village from legit materials. Its' purpose is to illustrate server features, plugins, and the functions of the expanded town system. This village will provide guidance to new players, demonstrate what they can do, and offer them a small sample of starter items to help them on their way. This village is NOT the tutorial; that will be elsewhere, and mandatory. The port will initially claim a decent chunk of land around spawn, in order to expand with new buildings over time. However, it will not be intended to grow into a full-scale town. That's the job of player-built communities.
Can I help build the spawn village?
Sure thing! Let me know if you'd like to contribute. As I've said, we're building this place legit. The loose theme is "frontier town": new players are fresh off the boat on the shores of a new land, and the village should reflect that. It's a jumping-off point, not a home.
Will there be server-built rails or transport?
NO. It's up to players to build travel networks, be they rail networks or simple dirt paths. If players build a rail system and wish to link it to the spawn village, a station can be built in the village to join up with this. Until such a time, the only exit from the village will be on foot or by boat.
Yes, there will be a small coastal village at spawn, from which the player will disembark into Escapia by boat. It has no official town name; if you must call it anything, "spawn" will suffice. I intend to build this village from legit materials. Its' purpose is to illustrate server features, plugins, and the functions of the expanded town system. This village will provide guidance to new players, demonstrate what they can do, and offer them a small sample of starter items to help them on their way. This village is NOT the tutorial; that will be elsewhere, and mandatory. The port will initially claim a decent chunk of land around spawn, in order to expand with new buildings over time. However, it will not be intended to grow into a full-scale town. That's the job of player-built communities.
Can I help build the spawn village?
Sure thing! Let me know if you'd like to contribute. As I've said, we're building this place legit. The loose theme is "frontier town": new players are fresh off the boat on the shores of a new land, and the village should reflect that. It's a jumping-off point, not a home.
Will there be server-built rails or transport?
NO. It's up to players to build travel networks, be they rail networks or simple dirt paths. If players build a rail system and wish to link it to the spawn village, a station can be built in the village to join up with this. Until such a time, the only exit from the village will be on foot or by boat.
when do you think the wipe will be and everything at a new playable state?
