Y SO LONG? ლ(ಠ_ಠლ)

For all of you who don't want to hear our filthy lies and already know that we just spent all the money on coke and hookers: You can skip this, we can't fool you.

Now why does it take so long to release the new season? There are quite some factors that delayed the release again and again and again. We were a few times right at the release just to take another hit. Going into every incident here would get beyond the scope fast but I will try my best. Now as many of you know, we started to use a completely new generator(CityWorld) for the upcoming season. Of course we had to customize it for our needs. It all went good and we had it nearly done and ran into a major problem while stresstesting it: The generator can't handle more than a certain amount of schematics. And we exceeded that amount already back then. After a try to fix it and contacting the original developer of the generator we realized that fixing it would mean a rewrite of the generator. This was the major blowback. We decided to create our own generator rather than depending on other people again. We hope you guys can understand that such a generator isn't done over night. And with that frequent Minecraft updates, especially 1.7, it takes even longer.

Of course there were a lot more reasons to it, along with absence of key people, but that was the major one.

When is season 8 coming then?

Honestly I am afraid to answer this question with a ETA and beeing proven wrong AGAIN in the end. We don't know. All signs say it will be somewhen in January 2014 BUT that is assumed we don't run in other unexpected problems. So please don't quote me on it. It is more a wish of mine than an ETA.

What can I tell you then about the release? I can tell you how the release will look most likely:

1. Alpha (~ 1-2 days, Staff only) Test of concept of all new features/the world. First wave of fixes.
2. Closed beta (~ 3-5 days, Staff&Donator only) Major loot & difficulty test. Second wave of fixes (expect a lot of resets)
3. Open beta (at least 1 week, everyone) Lets say minecraft is about to release 1.8 when we start our betas. Then the open beta will last until all bukkit plugins we need have updated to 1.8. If there is no sign for a new minecraft release anytime soon, then the open beta will most likely last a week. Goal is finetuning of loot & difficulty balance, fixing as much bugs and exploits as possible and stresstest the server/map and adjust accordingly. You can assume that this phase will be quite laggy (if not already the closed beta) since this is the only way to really stresstest.
4. Release. Fucking finally. :)

Will it always be this chaotic?

You have to understand that most chaos came from that constant generator switch. We do not plan to go away from our newest one anytime soon. So if minecraft doesn't somehow break our generator for good with a new version, the next seasons should be released on time. We also learn from our mistakes and try to improve, so it should get better over time. Bear with us :)

What is on time?

We still discuss this topic but it seems most of us are comfortable with a season length of 3-4 months. We will see.

Do you have anything exciting for us today then?

Yes indeed we do. I spent the day with gathering all the changes and features for season 8. But please be aware that this is not set in stone. We might decide to take out some of those, add more or simply won't finish some in time. Sorry in advance.

Server

• A second server for europe will be setup upon release.
• Both servers will be independent from each other but run the same map.

World

• Map size increased from 8000x8000 to 10000x10000 blocks.
• Generator now does cityplaning instead of randomly placing buildings everywhere. (industrial, residential, highrise, etc. zones are a thing now. Also multiple cities.)
• 200 new schematics from our badass architect team. Massive variety, skyscrapers down to city parks and everything in-between. Huge amount of unique interiors to explore. (And we don't plan to stop building yet.)
• Custom Nether & End realms representing the apocalypse in the future and past. (Possibly won't be finished in time.)
• Improved sewers below the streets.
• Basic subway system below highways.
• About 80% of wooden doors in buildings are initially open now. A lot less door banging.
• Massively improved building decay.
• Less oceans and they are smaller.
• Multiple special and uniqe locations added.

Difficulty

• Increased mob difficulty beyond the vanilla "hard" setting.
• Added a lot of mob variations. (such as slow zombies that explode and poison everything in a certain radius upon death)
• Reworked the infection feature. Now less annoying but still deadly in certain situations. Also harder to cure.
• Food is harder to get. Overall aim is to make food the most valueable goods in the game.
• Agriculture nerfed. Farming needs good conditions to yield a good amount of food.
• You can now run out of seeds. Even with good conditions.
• XP Grinders nerfed. A lot less mob spawners and not as clustered.
• Mobs give less XP.
• Opening loot chests reward you with XP.
• Enderchest nerf. No decision on how yet, still discussed.
• Oredestribution nerfed. A lot less ores now.

Communication

• Custom communication plugin.
• Cellphones are now only found in loot chests. (Can't be crafted anymore.)
• Improved the way how cellphones work. (Conference calls, no more connection breaking)
• Nerfed yelling range.
• Can now build celltowers.
• Cellphones need a celltower in range to be able to call/receive calls. (Possibly added later on)
• Cellphones don't break in water anymore.
• Radiotower plugin broke. Own is in development. May take a bit longer.

Loot

• Completely reworked loot chests. There is a complex system behind the loot tables now.
• Nearly everything can be found in loot chests now. Even "god gear".
• Added special items in four categories: Uncommon, Rare, Legendary, Narcotics. All with uniqe stats/functions.
• Certain types of buildings have better chances for certain kinds of loot. (IE: A factory building has better chances to provide redstone related items, hospitals have better chances for narcotics etc.)
• Weapons, Tools and Armor can spawn in any condition.

Misc

• Withers can't be made by players anymore.
• Withers will be part of events or special locations.
• Fire Spread disabled. Still possible to burn items or single blocks, but fire won't spread over to other blocks.
• TNT & Gunpowder will be a lot harder to obtain.

Documentation/Help

Since the server dynamics get more and more complex we decided that we need some kind of way to introduce new players to the server. We decided that a lobby, how most servers do it, doesn't fit ours. So we came up with something we think will work great and not overload new players with informations. Most features will be explained as you play on. lets say you are new to the server and find a cellphone in a building. The lore of the item itself will contain informations about what exactly it is and how to use it (EXAMPLE). Of course we will still maintain the /help function for further information.

Final words

I hope I could get you at least a little bit hyped for the new year and the new season :)

However, I have to stress again that most of the changes & features aren't set in stone and can change.

Have a nice day and a happy new year :P