Wrapping up Year Three

It's hard to believe the third year of Superstes Noctis is coming to a close already, with the start of the fourth year in just a couple days! The server hasn't been all that active the past few months, but we're making some changes which should hopefully renew interest for the members of the server.

Double memory. We've doubled the memory on our server, which should allow us all to play simultaneously without generating lag in most situations and allow the server's render distance to be increased for better immersion and sightseeing. Since some of the server members are geographically somewhat far from the server -- which is hosted in Phoenix, Arizona by MCPro Hosting -- they create more strain on the server and more memory is needed to keep things smooth for them. (Especially when multiple people are online simultaneously, not always in the same chunks) The new plan should power up to 18 players, and since we only have 5 at the moment it should handle itself just fine.

Discussions on map changes. In the entirety of the running time of Superstes Noctis, we've been using the same map. This is awesome because it feels familiar and homely around spawn, as well as allowing extensive building with plenty of supplies to pull things off; however, it also means we have to explore quite far to see new terrain or the features of new world generation in updated versions of the game. Some players are content staying around spawn and building there, while others would rather explore and discover new things... which has prompted the discussion of whether or not we should make a new map. The trouble is that in order to keep our spawn area, we'd have to use MCEdit to plop it down in a new map with a different seed; this would leave choppy borders around spawn that would be difficult to clean up as well as some possible issues with copied entities and such.

We have yet to make final decisions on anything but the memory increase, but we don't need to rush to any decisions. One thing is for certain: the extra memory on the server will certainly make it more enjoyable as we continue to survive the night!