Interesting. Well I'm definitely interested and if there's any way I can help I'm in, though my time is limited due to school and work.
A lot of new posts... What Im gonna say is that some of you start to stray from the idea of the RPG server. What we are trying to get here is team work, not "Im gonna sieve through ton of cobblestone and get coal, iron and diamonds", thats not how its meant to work, because then everyone will have access to those materials without needing too much work... Plus, the server wont be all about mining and then logging off. There will be the whole aspect of guilds, market, auctions, quests, class development. This is not the a server where you race to get your diamond tools or wings... At least, that is how I see. About the mines - Well, if you set up about 5 mines(building-wise), each possibly having about 4 1-chunk mines... That gives you 20 1-chunk mines. If you make them reset once every x amount of hours, you shouldnt run into too much problem with having horde of people digging in one place at a same time.
IMO this would be a good place to use Undestructible once I finish making it work safely with servers, it allows for entire structures to be slowly regenerated over time, for a slightly more immersive and gradual change.
I definitely think progression should be limited to groups, one person getting draconic armor (just as an example, not saying that would be included) should not make draconium the standard. It may be available if someone is able to cough up enough money, but not standard. I also think that any attempt to make this a persistent world is probably wasted effort, (as in players choices permanently change the world) as Minecraft is simply not a game meant to support that, and more over it would somewhat ruin the experiences of new players imo. If there's a story, (as I think there should be if it's an RPG) it should be able to be experienced for each new player, perhaps even multiple times. I wonder if it would be possible to have some sort of mod/plug in that could keep track of multiple "characters" per account and one could have classes? I dunno, kind of rambling at this point, either way, I don't think the world should be persistent, and I think it's more fun if everyone has to progress on their own, although if say half the server had reached Draconium, it would stand to reason that it's not AS uncommon, although we have to be careful about that. I think packs like this should have limited access to mods like Mystic Agriculture that allow for rare and expensive materials to just be farmed en masse. Plants like that should be expensive to maintain and require a large group cooperation like a Guild, as you said above, Kiyuka. I think you could have a decent story too, you could do world-building the way T.O.M.E (Tales of Maj'Eyal) does it, where there are fragments of journal entries scattered about for people to pick up, and then have villages with NPCs who offer quests etc., and then of course a main quest. Of course, the scope of those quests depends heavily on how much work goes into the pack and vice versa, I think the mechanics of this pack are going to be a good bit of work, but nothing TOO crazy, things like quests are the tough part (I mean we have mods for that, but actually WRITING them takes more than just the mod, you need good writing skills and a creative mind, etc.)
Mods like Mystical Agriculture could be made to require multiple players' input to craft, for example a step needing a farmer to make the base seeds, then a mage to upgrade them to higher tiers, and finally a master in the skill relevant to a resource to make the actual seeds, then maybe require the farmer again to plant or breed them.
I know this is only an example, but there will be no Draconic Evolution... And I will give my soul and kidney to admins to keep it that way XD What I was thinking about quests was to have the main story/plot quest that will go on and on and on, continue from expansion to expansion... Then have few of those random "Ah, [name]! Im relieved to see you. They've burned down half our village with wicked sorcery and it can't go unpunished! Please unleash the justice upon those barbarians!" or "Oi, you, mind helping ol man out? We're at war and war means we go through a whole lot of weaponry, ammunition and food... We got enough food, but we could use some of the arrows and weapons of the fallen, Can you go get them for me?" type of deal. I do like the idea of the scattered pieces of journal though, a lot of games seem to use that kind of thing... It could add in extra depth to the game... They could even reveal locations of some loot chests or so, hm? Hm, I like the idea of the seed going back and forth between players... But then again, I feel like there will be no need for the miners, because all the materials can, technically, come from the farmers... Plus, I think they should be more focused on foods and supplying that to the server.
Yeah, for sure. I think Draconic would be out of place in a pack like this, I was just using it as an example. What I'd really like to see is Advent of Ascension used properly in a RPG pack, though I'm not certain it's still being updated regularly enough to be used, if it's been semi-abandoned there could be issues with bug-fixes etc.
I was thinking that Mystical Agriculture would be better left more in the lategame, requiring max levels in some classes for the highest tier crops. Since the miner would be needed for the ore crops anyway, with increasing levels for increasing tiers, I think that would keep the classes relevant while still allowing for some utility lategame.
So when we talk Guilds, are we talking massive guilds kinda Elder Scrolls style, where they're just like "Thief's Guild" "Mage's Guild" etc. or can players form their own and grow them to similar scales? Or both?
Mmm, it could work as an end-game thing, yes. I will add that to the mod list in the first post for now, and we will see how that can be tweaked to suit us. Mostly player-built. What I was thinking was - Once you are level x and have enough of money and at least 3 people, you can start up your guild that can hold up to 20 people in the highest tier. And I guess they would be limited... So I would say, have 4 slots opened at the start. Once they are semi fullish, open up another guild slot for grabs.
If guilds are able to hold limited resources, they should probably come with a pretty hefty cost to setup, and also to maintain.
The drop rates can be adjusted accordingly to not become a thing where anyone with enough free time can produce a meaningful amount, limiting the ability to even work a sieve and adjusting from there based on skill. Maybe someday you work your way up to an IE Crusher to break the blocks down, something along those lines. The goal is not the impossibility of progression by an individual, but rather making a community goal much more obtainable. If we model resource gathering after the real world, digging a section of land by hand and sifting it is time consuming for little reward. Using this as a guideline it would take a certain skill set to dig, another to sift, and a third to evaluate the product of that sifting. Jitrid is a miner, he goes out and digs through cobblestone and brings back several stacks of it. He doesn't care what's in it, he just really loves to dig cobblestone. Sandstroem is a prospector, he doesn't really care where Jitrid gets that rock from, he just wants to look through it and see if there's any material he can use, he breaks it down and looks through it, finds something he thinks is valuable and brings it to _Cil0_. _Cilo_ is an appraiser, she doesn't care where Sandstroem gets those piles of minerals it's her job to take those chunks of raw ore and distribute them according to their value, she identifies the mineral type and then brings them to wyndman the artificer, or Sirwill the blacksmith, or snowfox the jeweler. Sirwill takes the iron and shapes it into weapons and armor for Tipsied the city guard. While one person could have all those skills, and may have limited abilities in each skill set, I would never be able to make a sword as well as Sirwill, I could probably slap some sticks together and call it a sword since as an artificer I would be able to craft, but Sirwill working with snowfox and Mrtwisty the hunter could all put together a diamond sword.
I like where you're going, but I want to say, let's not make this too "realistic". I definitely think we should have some realism/balance in terms of progression and resource gathering, but if it just doesn't feel rewarding people aren't going to have fun. Bringing back an inventory of cobble and getting very little out of it maybe "realistic" but it won't give any sense of a return on the time invested. I think we can have a good RPG without it being hyper-realistic, especially in a game like Minecraft.
...Gosh, you involved like most of the staff in making a simple sword XD But, if I was in Jitrid's spot, I think I would rather just drop ton of that cobblestone to the nearest npc who is on fire to get that cobble for a nice, hefty price. I see what you are trying to say and it is quite cool idea... but as Xyrik said, it might be a bit too realistic for something as simple as minecraft. Plus, remember that the more you complicate stuff, the harder it will be for the staff to find a way to make it possible. Think of poor Jitrid(or any other dev) as a cat with 9 lives - each complicated thing take one of his lives... I would say it would be best to work in expansions if that is possible. Have basic setup done, quests, levels, dungeons, bla, bla, bla, then do a big "suuupriseee" putting in a new mod or a new dungeon or new city or new whatever, I think that would stop people from rushing forward, because they wouldn't know what is coming out anyway.
Maybe Jitrid's day job is just that as a coal miner digging the rock, but at night he studies combat as he dreams of slaying creepers. With some sort of internal economy Jitrid would of course be paid for his cobblestone collection as well. We had a similar system back in anarchy with a jobs system, but much like anarchy it never really got further then "it's there". Since this is the drawing board there are so many possibilities still. The balance may simply be a player can do anything at a base line of crafting, they can certainly mine cobble, and the rare visible iron ore, enough to maybe scrape by, but they would never be as good as Jitrid at it. How this is done mechanically could be a matter of having a more abundant mine have a skill barrier to it, or expanding on the miner's ability to simply increase his ore yield when he finds a vein of an ore.
you know referencing the mystical crops thing back before i lost track of the thread lol. they could be fun but heres my 2 cents a guild hall would have limited plots they could be placed therefore limiting the number you could grow they have a slow slow growth rate just enough to boost production but not enough to even replace a class but would require multiple high level professions to get them plantable kinda a prestige item like hah my guild has these does yours
It might be sufficient just to prevent them from spreading, so that people can't just make 1 and then invalidate whichever class happens to have made it.
This is such an amazing idea and I would love to see this actually get made! It would be so fun to play!