Hey! This is an open forum for any opinions you may have on what you feel that AJGaming should aim for. This is more of a log and follows up the discussion to the discord chat. We have had ideas floating around about starting to link up with individual mod creators and run servers for packs like FTB and Technic (Official) Rather than developing our own. This would allow us to focus on the community building and server specs and speeds more than having to test, create and release the packs at the same time too. However, this is fully up for discussion. Just a warning. Anything that staff say here is not definitely going to happen. This is just a place where we can all get our heads together and see what we really want!
Honestly I think that would be a great idea, linking with the actual mod creators, and being able to fix problems both on the server side, and for the creator as well. Allowing us to have those updates/bugfixes, but also even creating the chance for us to not have server breaking problems. Not saying at all that we haven't been able to handle ourselves and prevent said things, but these things would help everybody. Replying ish to @daforsyth I don't think networks are dying by any means. Our network is honestly more active then I've seen at all. Now I know I could be wrong but I haven't seen all the servers peak player counts and such, but just because other things die doesn't mean this will too. At the rate stuff has been added I think it will continue to grow for a while. Now of course ftb and technic has died off, they don't provide servers as amazing as ours. Hell, I'm sure if we happened to make a tekkit classic server it would be amazing for a while. (Not saying we should or suggesting it just an example) I like @iioHei's idea, having some sort of minigames server with multiple minigames, of course the decisions would have to be decided someway or another. Most likely multiple votes or something. (Will add more as the discussion goes on.)
Lmao I got nothing. All modded networks I've seen get stuck here. The golden days of modded are dieing slowly and that's a sad truth. Any custom pack will have already had versions done of it before. Any sort of dedicated pack has low support. FTB is a graveyard and people hardly care about technics supported packs. Idk what to do here tbh but all other big networks normally keep the same stuff grow big and then die or give their soul up to become a pixelmon server to help kill the good days of modded. :/ Welp I think about this stuff a lot to no avail as I've moved across a ton of networks in my time. To be brutally honest I think we are on a timer for a few years before stuff declines. I hope for a miracle. If not likely we become a ghost network where the small playerbase just moved to the next pack leaving the previous one empty or we sell our soul to pixelmon which I hate. Well I'm hoping for a miracle idea. .-.
- Community building and retaining people sounds like the best bet rather than releasing packs rapidly, otherwise older released packs will just die out. - Going to external people sounds great! Just be careful with who you work with and such. From what I've heard about that all so far it really does sound like a good choice as trying to make new modpacks seems so stressful - Keep giving creative players competitions and such as they seem to love that but maybe you should do cinematic shots on YT when you announce the winner so it feels like a much bigger achievement aesthetically not to mention YT is a great place to advertise/post cinematics on to get traction. - Wether or not its the case, talking about the next pack release after one pack already has been released makes the current ones feel neglected. Like the forum posts about the next modpack in development but at the same time Gigabyte couldn't even stay up for 10 mins. It didn't make people happy in general on that server. - I love, love, LOVE thaumix. I loved gig too but thaumix feels way more balanced and less p2w, you have so much to do and different modpacks to go down that you can't really run out of stuff to do imo. Community on there so far is amazing, everyone is pretty friendly to each other and people are learning together. - AJ in general is great, the people are amazing, the fact the server feels looked after in a lot of senses is what makes me stay. Sure theres always a lot of shit and sometimes it gets frustrating but in general compared to every other server I've been active on, this one has been so unique to me and genuinely fun.
Im trying to brainstorm ideas, but each idea I come up with ends up with a dead end. But what I was thinking of is some kind of replacement to Lost, maybe some kind of mini-game players can go to when they are bored with Modded.
From the perspective of a pack dev, post will be long and jump from topic to topic. Modded 1.7.10 is starting to die out as support for the mods moves to 1.10 and 1.12. No one is going to develop (good) stuff for 1.8 and 1.9, so don't bother doing anything with those. 1.7.10 content is getting stale with most servers having used most of the mods on them and players are getting tired of doing the same thing over and over again. Another problem is that large mini-game servers like Hypixel and Mineplex have large staff teams that are creating fun games for people to play, but mostly the people that are playing those are younger, and usually teenagers and adults are the ones that are playing modded. Suggestions: You could try doing a FTB server pack. https://www.feed-the-beast.com/ has some really good packs, and most of the have some sort of progression and custom recipies through ModTweaker or HQM. (HQM is currently going through a rewrite for 1.12) Another problem with the higher versions of MC after 1.10 is the jump in required memory, although using Foamfix will usually reduce RAM use by .5-1.5gb. Some other complaints I have seen is that if you were to make a new pack most of the mods are not updated, like Ars 2. Currently Ars 3 is in development by Growlith1223 but he is currently rewriting the mod from scratch. There are replacements for Ars out, but most are in beta. The most promising I have seen is the Wizardry Mod. https://forums.spongepowered.org/t/betterkits-nbt-support-kit-preview-easy-to-use/15326 https://minecraft.curseforge.com/projects/wizardry-mod Blood Magic is also in Alpha for 1.12. With Thaumcraft 6 coming out for 1.12 soon servers that create a pack for that (assuming it is a good one) will probably have a jump in players who want to try out the new version of it, especially when it gets some quality addons, although some of the classic ones like Forbidden Magic may not be updated by their original authors, as many have stated that they are not updating to future versions or have disappeared for years (Thaumic Horizons dev). Assuming it gets some new good mods you could get some new players. I also looked and saw you were trying to do a hardcore pack and have some suggestions for that. Most hardcore packs just amp up mob health and make stuff scarce. I would suggest (this would take more time to create) a progression, scaled difficulty pack. Some mods that you can use to do that are: Game Stages: https://minecraft.curseforge.com/projects/game-stages This mod lets you create stages that players have to pass, and it has multiple addons with more in development. Using its addons would help you make it so people have to actually play through the mods instead of just finding it or stealing/having it given to them by another player. (not sure if there is group stages thing for groups) EX: Dimension Stages: https://minecraft.curseforge.com/projects/dimension-stages Lets you block players from dimensions until they have completed a prerequisite. Crafting Stages: https://minecraft.curseforge.com/projects/recipe-stages People cannot craft an item or see it in JEI until they have done prerequisites. Link to addon list of GS: https://minecraft.curseforge.com/pr...ations/dependents?filter-related-dependents=3 Another thing you could do, as Gamestages would be better suited for a tiered progression RPG pack, is create artificial difficulty. Rough Mobs: https://minecraft.curseforge.com/projects/rough-mobs Adds more effects to mobs, for example Skeletons will switch to a melee weapon when close to you, and creepers will vanish but leave particles for you to see where they are. It also adds boss mobs with special abilities. Corpse Complex: https://minecraft.curseforge.com/projects/corpse-complex Allows creators to set keepInventory rules for different parts of the inventory. You could set it so when people die, they only keep their armor and baubles. Scaling Health: https://minecraft.curseforge.com/projects/scaling-health Makes a configurable difficulty level depending on how long a player has survived, and you can set it to lower difficulty and health when the player dies. Mobs will scale up in health depending on the difficulty of the player or average of the surrounding players. Mobs will also have a chance to drop heart crystal fragments which you can use to raise a configurable amount of health. There are several other mods that I wont name, but there are some that turn PVP on at night, etc. P2W: Before I accidentally posted this early, I saw a post about Thaumix? being too P2W. You could always try adding some more cosmetic stuff, because people like looking fancy. Also in the (almost 0% chance that mojang cares) event that Mojang actually enforces thier EULA for once (they wont, they dont care enough) you would have. Also moving past 1.7 lets you use Sponge, which is better than bukkit and integrates well with modded servers. Particle Aura: 1.8 I think added the /particle command, and there are plugins that lets you give people cloaks and wings made out of them, as well as auras. Better Crates Plugin: These just look cool. https://forums.spongepowered.org/t/...keys-use-custom-particles-keys-and-more/16433 https://forums.spongepowered.org/t/teslacrate-key-shockingly-powerful-crates-api-5-6-and-7/19116 Armourers Workshop: Armorers workshop lets you create cosmetic armor, blocks, wings, and weapons out of blocks. Really well optimized, works very well for donations if you have good builders. Currently finishing development in 1.7 and moving on in a few months. Although last time me and Jack tried it I believe it conflicted with something. https://minecraft.curseforge.com/projects/armourers-workshop Other cool plugins: https://forums.spongepowered.org/t/...arding-players-for-every-day-logging-in/21976 https://forums.spongepowered.org/t/triviaquest-question-in-game-trivia-questions/18051 Actually has NBT support for once -v https://forums.spongepowered.org/t/betterkits-nbt-support-kit-preview-easy-to-use/15326 https://forums.spongepowered.org/t/gift-rewards-rewards-achievements/12182 Not sure if spigot is compatible with sponge but 80% sure it is. https://www.spigotmc.org/resources/ultra-cosmetics-opensource-free-1-8-1-12.10905/ https://www.spigotmc.org/resources/playerauras-minecraft-eula-compliant-cosmetics.27027/
I kinda agree with what @duhadventure said, the modpacks that seem to succeed is the packs that have a general progression trend to it. I mean, look at what Sevtech did, it took 1 year to build but it turned out amazing. I would say to test out the waters with a progression based modpack, and probably try to grab the attention of some YouTubers/Twitch streamers to attract public attention.
As @Ellielza said above our community is very limited as it is. We create a new mudpack and everyone seems to just move over to it and leave the other one. The issue is getting one of these modpacks to be mega popular is very difficult. If we used FTB as a base it would allow us to use these mega popular packs and create servers that focus more on the content rather than attempting to stay online This is not as easy as it may seem. Its hard to get Youtubers and Streamers to work for you and even when they do agree prices tend to be sky high.
I dont think that minigames are an option, because if someones going to play minigames its going to be on a big boy network like hypixel
Minigames should always be a no-no unless its relevant, like the build battle on Creative. It wasn't popular but it wasn't advertised, I honestly think if it was then it would've been awesome
Its difficult going into anything of the vanilla sort. Its extremely hard to advertise and gain new people. The only reason that the current vanilla setup is doing so well is because of @BlueFusion12 amazing utilization of advertisement over time and the google search CEO certain pages gain.
The only time getting YT's to work is if you are friends with them, and even then the ones that are worth partnering with usually have better things to do. Generally it is not worth it unless you are Hypixel rich, and they dont really need to pay them since they are such a big server. Also the ones that gather TYbers attention are usually singleplayer or Co-op packs. Also that. As someone trying to build a new community for a server that I work on, yes getting new people and building a new community is very difficult, especially with how saturated the server market is. Also made less P2W suggestions in my longpost Dont try to make a Minigame server. Its not worth it based on the competition.
our exposure is seemingly just coming from the community maybe start using the AJ youtube channel and upload videos more getting them recommended to people and they come play giving more exposure, also the AJ twitter update that and consider making a facebook page as that also gets teens there attentions getting them into these servers getting more exposure. In all just update your media coverage - Zaladin
