VanessaE wrote:The spawn on this server has been moved out east of the East Street/Ring Road intersection. As such, the area surrounding the old spawn (accessible via the "Gridknot" and "Cityknot" Travelnet networks) has been renamed to "Central City".
That's a very good idea. I even think you ought to move it further out. Much further :-)
It is great that the map wasn't just thrown away - that spawn was moved and buildings are safe and still there - as they have been for a very long time. That is what I wish for on a server - stability (as in: durability), protection of buildings, and a server admin who cares.
Still, the way the server(s) developed was not perfect. There is sometimes a clash in building styles. There are those which shape and even construct nature, those which make use of the existing landscape, and those which build something huge where mapgen is plain simply in the way. Neither is any better than the other - it's just a diffrent way of dealing with the environment. And the result is odd, mixed and chaotic. Also structures with vastly diffrent styles may not fit well togehter. A medieval farm inside a futuristic town *might* work as a single oddity, but if it's all thrown wildly togehter, it does look strange. Mapgen and lack of integration into it was also a problem on the new map of the survival server. Diffrent structures where just too close to each other. The smaller structures where nicely integrated.
Maybe a way out of this might be to do it a bit like we did it on Redcrabs server: Found a new town now and then. A town with some basic rules. Those rules need not be laws - instructions/hints of the city founder as to how he/she thinks the place ought to develop would be fine. One area could be devoted to pixelart, one to large monuments (doesn't mean there can't be monuments elsewhere - but this place could be flat and ready-to-build-on), another could be a nature preservate where you have to prove that your house didn't harm any butterflies :-), another one could be a huge city for skyscrapers and the like, another one historic buildings of one period of time, or cities where one material or color is dominant, elsewhere mesecon labs could spring to life, or just experiments beeing created. Most players could fit well into the "here's a road; build your nice cozy town-house alongside"-town type. But even those might enjoy a new themed town from time to time as it provides new ideas and challenges.
And there's something else I desperately wish for: Please no technology that requires frequent node updates close to spawn! No mesecon machines, no technic or pipework networks, not even digilines. Not around spawn for about 1 km or more. A travelnet that leads to a place with such machines is fine. But spawn is for meeting. It needs to be fast. A wall with a couple of signs giving instructions about the place is fine. That ought to be the central part of each settlement so that players can adjust their building style to what's fitting there. And it might be better to have just a small platform without too much exciting decoration - the new spawn is already a step in the right direction, although it's still not plain and clean enough in style for my liking. A small plaza around spawn and some not too complex, yet nice buildings around it - and behind those, nature from mapgen - could also work well. All places for building would then be accessible through the travelnets.
There's so much about these servers that I do like. The rules are sensible, the servers long-lived, griefers not beeing tolerated, buildings saved, creativity valued more highly than strict adherence to survival aspects, a very good technical base, excellent support... I still miss the survival server :-/