Admin Update 16/10/2014

[Malcovent]

Hi Blocktopia,

There are a few upcoming changes that we feel should finally be discussed to ward off any sense that there’s no ‘gameplan’. This post will cover three things – Bukkit, the Microsoft buyout (briefly), and apathy among upper ranks.

Bukkit

For those of you who aren’t aware, Bukkit has been our choice of server software for some time now (I’m unsure but I think it may be 2-3 years so far?) – however after one of the bukkit devs issued a takedown notice due to licensing issues, we can no longer continue to run our servers on Bukkit after 1.7.10. Our response was safe to say – less than pleased. The current choice candidate still in development (although by far not the only candidate) is Sponge . All estimates are speculative though I personally think there’s a good chance of it being ready before Christmas.​

​

What this means for us is the following...​

• Our servers may remain at 1.7.10 for some time, this is also the source of many unfixed bugs in some of the servers, since initially fixing the bugs fell under my responsibilities but I opted to wait until there was news on whether bukkit would be continuing or not.
• We will start fixing any server bugs as of next week.
• I’ll try to host more Friday events, I apologise if most of them are movie night.

Just to make sure we’re clear – the only detrimental effect this will have on Blocktopia is that our servers may not update for a while, though we’ll more than likely host 1.8 vanilla servers. Come Christmas we should be back on the right track. We will let you know the second we have any firm dates on a new server software.​

Apathy

Every admin tends to enter the folds with a key area to work on, the one I’m choosing to work on now that I’m back is apathy among the upper ranks. I think it’s a foregone conclusion that a number of higher ranks – myself included, are subject to losing enthusiasm once we make it to admin rank, and most of us know from experience how easy it is to become subject to this.​

​

To help bolster productivity, we’re currently organizing a bi-weekly head staff meeting for controllers+ to attend, here we will discuss and keep track of all things from community issues down to individual server updates. I’m not sure if we’re going to post a recap since it may be inappropriate to publicly share community issues & upcoming server updates, but if there’s anything we can recap that we feel should be publicly shared, I assure you we will post it.​

​

Microsoft

Microsoft bought Mojang, I don’t intend to expand on this a great deal as ultimately for foreseeable future we don’t think this will have any negative affect on Minecraft – it’s pretty far outside of our scope of interest right now.​

​

Thanks for reading, myself and the other admins will be lurking in the thread to answer any questions you may have.​

 

[Trap_Wolf]

Babygurl, js, those meetings are specifically supposed to be for you. I'm just speaking from experience from being on University organizations and comittees, Executive Board ((administration in this case)) are strictly to benefit the members and creates discussion amongst yourself and you aren't obligated to share any information, and really should not be, publicly. But, you do you babygurls. :U

 

[Choclate_god]

Pete and Repeat were in a boat. Pete fell out, who was left?
Also if the servers update does that mean the new one is coming out

 

[Trevmaster9]

So we are going to use Sponge? Sweet.

 

[Trap_Wolf]

I don't know, I was VP of an organisation that made a lot of its minutes public. In fact, I'd say sharing the large solutions and agreements (excluding those that are confidential) helps people understand what's happening.

it's called Executive Board Meetings and then General Assembly Meetings

 

[YouWould]

So we are going to use Sponge? Sweet.

Unconfirmed, though I wouldn't be opposed.

 

[Catcocomics]

If my calculations are correct, this is going to be a very cold and "wet" (high atmospherical precipitation rates, for those who messed up brains) winter, so I think that means if I'm not playing minecraft, Zelda, sonic, or smash bros, I'll be running around outside brandishing my newest (or simply best) sword that I have in my collection at the time.

The only downsides I can see for switching to sponge are the following:

* Spoutcraft might not support us any more (but honestly, I stopped caring about spoutcraft 2 years ago...).
* You guys (the ones who know what they are doing in this matter) will probably have to rewrite all our plugins (and sympathy from me, if wanted).
* This will probably delay SMP 4

 

[Jivvi]

Would creating/submitting minigames of sorts for 1.8 to keep things fresh be something that might be good?

 

[Pick Yer Poison]

I'm glad to see something being done about the apathy in the upper ranks. It's a problem that's been going on for a very long time and it's about time.

 

[GmK]

Would creating/submitting minigames of sorts for 1.8 to keep things fresh be something that might be good?

Baker93
superstein
Malcovent

Go Go Gadget!

 

[Jivvi]

Actually it would be possible to have lots of little sorts of games hooked up to one world, with a teleport hub. I could probably do that if people want, and I can adjust some things I have on the side to suit full vanilla, and other people could contribute too

 

[Lee_scar]

Actually it would be possible to have lots of little sorts of games hooked up to one world, with a teleport hub. I could probably do that if people want, and I can adjust some things I have on the side to suit full vanilla, and other people could contribute too

You mean a second Adventures and Tournaments?(should be kinda called Minigame Hub or something considered its more then just adventures and tournaments, lil tunnel vision on the name.)

 

[GmK]

You mean a second Adventures and Tournaments?(should be kinda called Minigame Hub or something considered its more then just adventures and tournaments, lil tunnel vision on the name.)

Well I was more thinking of small events servers:

- First team to build a diamond statue of Malcovent
- The Great Race across a map
- Treasure Hunt Event

 

[Lee_scar]

Well I was more thinking of small events servers:

- First team to build a diamond statue of Malcovent
- The Great Race across a map
- Treasure Hunt Event

Do we still have the plugin that was used for the treasure hunt map before? Rather are there better ones?
Another idea could be a flying machine contest, given the server would be 1.8

 

[GmK]

Do we still have the plugin that was used for the treasure hunt map before? Rather are there better ones?
Another idea could be a flying machine contest, given the server would be 1.8

Yeah all these would need to be run vanilla, as after meeting events.

I like the flying machine contest idea!

 

[Jivvi]

Well I was more thinking of small events servers:

- First team to build a diamond statue of Malcovent
- The Great Race across a map
- Treasure Hunt Event

These can be done also!

I enjoy messing about with command blocks, so if nobody else is interested I'd love to create some of these!

 

[Lee_scar]

I enjoy messing about with command blocks, so if nobody else is interested I'd love to create some of these!

What else could you do? I have a map that sets up an hardcore either free for all or team type setting.
Be fun to do a hardcore survival deathmatch deal

 

[Jivvi]

What else could you do? I have a map that sets up an hardcore either free for all or team type setting.
Be fun to do a hardcore survival deathmatch deal

Is it in need of rigging or is it ready to go?

I also started in a basic great-race concept map

 

[Love]

If my calculations are correct, this is going to be a very cold and "wet" (high atmospherical precipitation rates, for those who messed up brains) winter, so I think that means if I'm not playing minecraft, Zelda, sonic, or smash bros, I'll be running around outside brandishing my newest (or simply best) sword that I have in my collection at the time.

The only downsides I can see for switching to sponge are the following:

* Spoutcraft might not support us any more (but honestly, I stopped caring about spoutcraft 2 years ago...).
* You guys (the ones who know what they are doing in this matter) will probably have to rewrite all our plugins (and sympathy from me, if wanted).
* This will probably delay SMP 4

As far as I can tell SpoutCraft ran with Bukkit, so without Bukkit, we won't have SpoutCraft anyway. I don't think it'll be too much of an issue, since Sponge will be rather innovative in itself. And besides, this is all still fairly early, we don't know the exact fate of anything.

Plugins aren't too terribly hard to re-write *for the most part*

>implying SMP was going to release right after 1.8 in the first place. You expect us to work that fast? >.>
(Also this isn't close to being SMP4. Maybe SMP6/7 at this point)

 

[77thShad]

Blocktopia Ultra Hardcore would be so good.

 

[Duffie]

Blocktopia Ultra Hardcore would be so good.

I never played one a match of UHC, so it'd be an interesting gamemode to try out. Isn't there a command block setup for it, too?

 

[Lee_scar]

I never played one a match of UHC, so it'd be an interesting gamemode to try out. Isn't there a command block setup for it, too?

Blocktopia Ultra Hardcore would be so good.

Is it in need of rigging or is it ready to go?

I also started in a basic great-race concept map

I have a rig that's ready to go.
Just need to test it on 1.8 and make sure nothing in it has broken.
As well as if any of the command blocks need to be tweaked or combined.

 

[Hunter]

can some of the simpler ctnt weapons (such as pistol) be recreated in vanilla via the use of commandblocks?

 

[Jivvi]

can some of the simpler ctnt weapons (such as pistol) be recreated in vanilla via the use of commandblocks?

Could be possible in some ways, particularly, for example, using mob eggs to summon a Cow, have the Cow shoot arrows along the 4 major axes, and then remove the Cow. Block are virtually impossible to do, although scoreboards can detect certain other events that can be played with. Example being I created a gold sword with a leech effect by detecting when a player used a gold sword, and giving them health.

I have a rig that's ready to go.
Just need to test it on 1.8 and make sure nothing in it has broken.
As well as if any of the command blocks need to be tweaked or combined.

If you like, you can toss me a download and I can fancify it a little. (NBTExplorer is fun)

 

[Notme]

Hmm nice to hear news about it. I guess Bukkit kicked a... bukkit

We should name SMP 8 (lop was 4, vsmp - 5, jte - 6 and dod - 7): Myth of Crimson Sponge.

So transition looks more graceful, than it was with hmod, right?