@weatherdog:
I think skeleton grinders are more useful than spider grinders, don't you? Each archer only needs one bow, and therefore three string, and it will last until he somehow loses it. Arrows, however, are in constant demand, and in large quantities. Using a skeleton grinder is a much faster way of producing arrows than by crafting. What makes you think spiders are more useful?
I thought of a new strategy: Open an enemy's mob grinder! If you don't think you can succeed in capturing an enemy mob grinder, then open it up and let in some air! Especially if it happens to be a creeper grinder, let the mobs out and about before you retreat. The bigger the breach, the harder it will be to seal up again, so TNT would be a good tool, as long as you don't destroy any spawners.
well, as far as i know, the only dungeon grinders you can make that will give you USEFUL items are skelly or spider dungeons. though i understand why skelly dungeon grinders are of a higher priority, but what is a safe way to get the string needed to make you bows and fishing rods?
If you die out in the wild or in enemy territory, especially in battle, chances are unlikely you will ever get your bow back. and about fishing rods, i find that fishing is probably the best way to gain food without too much effort. Since 1.8, you will have to chase down pigs, cows, and chickens to gain food, zombies are even tougher to kill (debatable) because they can hurt you, and their meat only makes you get hungry twice as fast, farming, though one could say it requires no effort to gain food from one, since you can do other things while your farm grows, but you still have to put in effort of making the farm, you have to waste time picking the crops, and you have to replant seeds and such. Plus, you might need to expand it, repair it, and other things of the sort.
Fishing, on the other hand, only requires a fishing rod (which is relatively easy to make) and a person with patience who will fish until the fishing rod breaks, or until he gets the needed amount of food. Now that food stacks, all you need is to put it in a furnace(s) and put in the appropriate amount of fuel ((char)coal can cook/smelt 8 items) and come back later after doing whatever and putting the food in a chest(s), if you have any.
Spider dungeons are useful to start up the process, but i agree with you, because at one point, you will have more string than you will need, but it's good to have a surplus of materials just in case.
But, as you said, skelly dungeon grinders are more useful because for most people, you will need MUCH MORE arrows than you will ever need string.
PS: I never said spider dungeons grinders are more useful than skelly dungeons grinders, i said that they are only ones worth making, both of them.
@weatherdog:
Don't forget creepers! Any serious PvP clan will need lots and lots of gunpowder for TNT.
Also, I think enough string can be gained by killing spiders by hand. They are common enough to provide enough string with just a little effort.
I agree with you about fishing. Fish are more filling than anything you can farm.
@weatherdog: Don't forget creepers! Any serious PvP clan will need lots and lots of gunpowder for TNT.
Also, I think enough string can be gained by killing spiders by hand. They are common enough to provide enough string with just a little effort.
I agree with you about fishing. Fish are more filling than anything you can farm.
well, i actually was talking about dungeon grinders. What i mean by that is, not mob towers, but actually taking a dungeon that found, and turning it into a mob grinder for the one mob that spawns inside of it.
Creepers are never a product of dungeon mob spawners. They only spawn naturally probably because notch figured they would just blow up the spawner. So that being said, the only really useful spawner to trap is a skeleton since you need so little string that you will get a sufficient supply out of your main dark room grinder. I guess you could trap a spider spawner though if you really need the string.
I have been thinking about position of structures just now. Do they even need to be far apart? If you think about it, wouldn't it just be more efficient to have all your structures, farms, storage, etc all at one location? You don't need to ever transport, and you get a huge advantage of number when it comes to defense. Yes, if the enemy did succeed in attack, you would lose more, but you could just have a fall back complex in a different location which is just hidden as opposed to defended. You would have more power seeing that the enemy would have a much harder time defeating you, and if they finally destroyed the complex, you would have another complex ready that you can uncap simply by giving your team its coordinates, which were originally only accessible by the leader.
Actually bread heals 2.5, which is equal to cooked fish, and you don't need to burn coal cooking it. If you are out of meat, bread is the best farmable food since it grows like weeds when you have a big enough, efficient farm.
Creepers are never a product of dungeon mob spawners. They only spawn naturally probably because notch figured they would just blow up the spawner. So that being said, the only really useful spawner to trap is a skeleton since you need so little string that you will get a sufficient supply out of your main dark room grinder. I guess you could trap a spider spawner though if you really need the string.
I have been thinking about position of structures just now. Do they even need to be far apart? If you think about it, wouldn't it just be more efficient to have all your structures, farms, storage, etc all at one location? You don't need to ever transport, and you get a huge advantage of number when it comes to defense. Yes, if the enemy did succeed in attack, you would lose more, but you could just have a fall back complex in a different location which is just hidden as opposed to defended. You would have more power seeing that the enemy would have a much harder time defeating you, and if they finally destroyed the complex, you would have another complex ready that you can uncap simply by giving your team its coordinates, which were originally only accessible by the leader.
Actually bread heals 2.5, which is equal to cooked fish, and you don't need to burn coal cooking it. If you are out of meat, bread is the best farmable food since it grows like weeds when you have a big enough, efficient farm.
I guess I was thinking of mob factories in general. About spiders and skeletons: My thoughts exactly.
Hm. Concentrating your forces at one location might improve your chances of successfully defending against invaders, but it does embody the old adage of putting all your eggs in one basket. Having multiple bases to fall back to, instead of one emergency bunker, is definitely safer. Also, it's very important to have some sort of early-warning system, which, unless you happen to be really good at concealing a complex redstone alarm system for your whole territory, involves placing outposts. Having your locations spread out also helps with concealing your location. The bigger the base, the easier it is to find (usually).
About loaves and fishes: There I go again, speculating without actually testing the details. I think we agreed, however, that melons were more efficient than bread. If you have something to say about that, please let us hear it. This is the sort of thing we need the MSF for.
Well actually one melon slice only heals one heart, so you aren't getting much for your inventory space.
Good point about the placement of bases. Though I think it would be the best idea to have one active at a time, and the rest dormant bases which all have the same functions for when they are used. If a base is not active, the enemy really has no way of finding it provided that it is 5000+ blocks from spawn, which it should be.
There are 4 basic functions that a base is used for: Storage, mining, farming, and mob grinders. These are really the only things one can do with a base. So when all 4 of those functions are complete, you can send a few people to prepare another outpost in the same fashion. Your main member base will only operate in the "current" base, not even knowing where the dormant bases are, so an enemy will not be able to track down your other bases. By the time the enemy blows, it up, you have an identical base to fall back on and you can continue what you were doing right from where you left off.
So basically, yes have multiple structures, but each one should be independently functioning.
Also, Nether transportation has been deemed unproductive a while back. I have used it not too long ago, and it can actually be a really useful and efficient method of transportation. Despite what people say about ghasts and such, it isn't as dangerous as people say it is. One useful thing about it is that it can be used to make a base far from spawn. It can even be useful for attacking a far away base. We have also been through discussion about using the portal to land straight on top of the enemy's base, and that was disproved. I think now though that it could be very useful for a surprise attack. In all honesty, what are the odds of their having a trap portal?
What I don't really think matters though is having a functional base in the nether, or fighting over land in the nether. Most things in the nether can be done in an in and out manner so there is no need to settle there.
Hey there! I've been reading through this thread for a bit now, and it intrigued me. I had actually been considering the very ideas discussed, and I was stoked to see that so many others shared my interest.
Now, the main problem that I see is that vanilla Minecraft is kind of poorly structured to contain a deep strategic game like Europa Universalis or, less deeply, Age of Empires/Total War. But if it could be modified, it could transcend all of them.
Specifically, as discussed in a few previous posts, we face three problems: there is no defined goal, death is either too cheap or too meaninglessly tedious, and the strategic contours are far more suited to stealthy below-ground hit and run style tactics than establishing an aboveground presence. Even if you do have "gentlemanly conduct," the least gentlemanly gentleman, all other things equal, will always win.
A secondary problem is that resources are too cheap - if you get established anywhere, you can get pretty much anything with a bit of ingenuity and building. A side effect is that there is no meaningful trade, removing a lot of the depth that could emerge from diplomacy and cooperation.
I have a few (semi) vague proposals to correct that. They synergize with each other.
First, we can use maps that have relatively limited amounts of land (still a lot, but not so much that all of the players together couldn't keep an eye on most of it). An effective way to do this is to use ocean biomes to separate the map from other landmasses. Perhaps Dutch-style terraforming could be introduced by changing some of the border biomes after the map generation (giving a minor incentive to do that). This becomes relevant for a later proposal.
Second, make it so farming (both crop and passive mob spawn) can only occur in environments lit by sunlight. I don't know if this is possible (zombies burn, so it should be). If not, maybe set an arbitrary height limit or something. Sure, this would make it impossible to have cute underground farms, but it would be more realistic and make a real reason to own (and raid) aboveground land. I think we could set exceptions for mushroom farming (realism), and throwing chickens would still spawn them, and normal mob grinders would still work. Maybe still allow bone meal insta-farming.
Third, implement biome-based farming systems. So maybe wheat could only be planted in plains/?/? biomes and sugarcane could be planted and spawn in swamp/?/? biomes, etc. That way, just controlling a little patch of land wouldn't be enough to be self-sufficient - you'd have to either trade, raid, or control. Also, filling in ocean might just yield usable strategic farmland, if you get lucky with the biome.
Fourth, make death costly but not insurmountable. Make it cost cake and gold for team members to respawn at the altar(or escape from spawn prison). After cocoa farms are implemented, you could add cookies to that mix. Also, give each team a starting altar and make crafting new altars take a few gold blocks (really expensive - around 27 gold ingots or so). Altars shouldn't be collectible. They'd have to be destroyed. Sacrifices of cake and gold could only occur at altars. I can't mod this, but some proxy should be workable. This would make it so it would be very costly to wage wars of attrition (as well as making practical uses for gold, sugarcane et al.) It would also give more reason to trade. Finally, it would give a real incentive to wipe an entire team out, since if just one survivor escapes, a while out, the team could return in force (by building a new alter and respawning). Kind of like squashing real-life resistance movements, come to think about it.
Finally, at the same location (a block or two away) of each team's starting altar, put a bedrock with some team marker, and give the coordinates to all players. The goal of any given game would be to have one's marker simultaneously on some specified percentage of team bedrocks. So for 2-4 teams it would be all of them, and a declining percentage after that (since 1 near-victor vs. 3 underdogs is about the border between fair and unfair). That would make it so losing your bedrock wouldn't be the end of the world, and stealthy bedrock coups could be viable strategies. Finally, it would force at least one aboveground fort.
I know you said "no mods," but Minecraft was designed to create the individual survivalist's experience. E.g. it would be tedious to have to go across three biomes just to make a cake. But for organized teams, adding that realism really adds to the quality of the experience, in addition to adding depth to the politics and economics.
Sorry for the wall-of-textishness of this, but I think that making a few modifications would really add to the endogenous narrative quality of the Art of War SMP experience.
EDIT: Oh yeah, it might be cool it have subsequent games occur on the same map (with some blocks changed to model decay and restore used resources like gold). So we could see something like the rise and fall of civilization and gradually increasing complexity.
There was an HTML version at once point... but never a PDF... I don't know how I would go about making one.
@Matthew
Structures DON'T need to be far apart. As you said, COMPLEXES need to be far apart. I never said anything about not having a farm and storage in the same location. In fact, every single base my clan ever had was an all-in-one base. It is, however, a very large loss when taken, as you suggest.
@Locke
The MSF was more about theoretical Minecraft Science and Physics than practical Minecraft Axioms such as which type of food is most efficient. You keep mentioning it, but it no longer exists. You're welcome to re-create it, in any way you see fit.
@Matthew Again
Wait... who said Nether Transport was unproductive?! Certainly not me...
I also always advocated using the portal as a means of surprise attack, but to date, nobody has ever done it and posted anything here about it.
ONA always used to have a trap portal, to answer your question.
I disagree with your point about settling in the Nether, simply on the terms that people, like you said, feel no need to settle there. They simple want to use it as a means of transportation. That's why ONA's bases that were made underneath the lava in the nether were almost never found.
@drahorb
I enjoyed your post, but for the most part I disagree with many of the points you bring up. Using maps with limited amounts of land is a good idea. It creates a situation where resources are NOT unlimited, and in which people will eventually have to fight over land. I disagree, however, with changing the farming system. I don't believe that tending to and fighting over farms is what armies really want to be doing all the time. In terms of the (almost) perma-death and altar system, I don't see how that seems fun at all. This system would make new armies fear for their lives. They would have little to no resources with which to ressurect the accidentally killed member and such. Also, what would an army do when they were entirely wiped out? Be banned from the server?
I say melons are more efficient because they are much more available. But that's already been discussed, and it's 3 in the morning, and I really don't want to type that all up again. I think it's a bad idea to only have one active base. If you only leave a skeleton crew at the rest of your holdings, because these strongholds are what you are trying to protect. The enemy finding a base almost never depends on whether or not you have men defending it. You forget one purpose of bases: shelter. Soldiers inside a base are protected from mobs and enemies. Bases are very important strategically. If you have them, the enemy will want them, so you have to defend them. It's basic logic. They're not going to just ignore other bases because they're empty. In fact, that makes them more viable as a target. If you keep the bulk of your forces in one base, soon you will only have that one base. All your bases should be self-sufficient anyway. You have to prepare for sieges.
Whether or not you use the Nether depends on your estimate of the enemy. If you think he is likely to use the Nether against you, then you should prepare for that. If you believe that he won't expect an attack from the Nether, then surprise him. A base in the Nether could be considered an alternate form of Nether defense. You use it to prevent the enemy from entering your Earthside base through the Nether. Of course, a Nether base could make an excellent fallback, like you said one should have. Not many commanders will think to look for you in the Nether. Nether bases will become viable if you make them necessary. If you constantly attack using the Nether, or if you build a Nether base to counter an enemy's base in the Nether, then you can begin something virtually unexplored in Minecraft PvP: Nether warfare. If you make sure you are prepared for battle in the Nether, then you can give yourself an advantage over the enemy by bringing the battle to the Nether. I can pretty much guarantee that 90% of Minecraft players are not currently prepared for combat in the Nether.
@Drahorb:
I can sum up my response to your post in a very concise way (and these are in no specific order):
1st: We are here to discuss warfare in vanilla. I said something very similar a page or two back, but everyone has their own opinion of what Minecraft should have that it doesn't, and what Notch should remove. This thread is for discussing how best to wage war with the current system, not how to change the system to improve war. Again, there are many different servers with many different combinations of mods, plugins, and rules, and there just might be one that is perfect for you.
2nd: Trade and diplomacy are actually quite common in larger servers. In my experience, peaceful negotiations are actually more frequent than wars. Factions that are mostly restricted to certain biomes may not have as much access to certain materials as others, so they trade.
3rd: Warfare in Minecraft has as much of a defined goal as it does in real life. It can be for many things, and it's up to you to decide what to fight for. The fact that the game doesn't point you in one direction is one of the great things about Minecraft (i'm starting to get deja vu). There are many RP servers with such defined goals. In this sense, all the different servers available are like separate games that all use the same engine.
4th: I disagree with a lot of your ideas, but I want to bring attention to your point about death. The lack of consequences for death are what separates war in Minecraft from real life war. It's the main problem I have when I'm coming up with new ideas and theories for my posts.
5th: This sounds like an outline for a server. This would be great to have as a server, and if you can find all the mods and plugins you would need, I say go ahead and make it. Just try to avoid remaking all of Minecraft in your image, so to speak. Most of us like Minecraft the way it is. And if we don't, we find a version of it that we do like, and play on that server (seriously, this feels more and more like what I said to that last guy).
6th: Exactly like I said the last time, they do play to steal the enemy's block like that. It's called "capture the flag," and lots of servers hold events in this style. The problem with having a set goal like that is that it changes the nature of the war. Wars would be fought for completely different reasons. For instance, if a war was declared over an injustice or unfairness, the problem wouldn't be solved by capturing the enemy's block. You can't say, "I got your flag! That means I was right!" Putting such restrictions on war would degrade it to little more than a sport. People wouldn't ever start them, because they no longer have any sufficient medium to solve their problems, so they would no longer have any reason to fight. Imagine the UN put such limitations on war in real life. What do you think would happen? And what do you do if a clan decides to wage an actual war, and ignore your rules? Or if a faction refuses to surrender when their block gets stolen? Minecraft is too free-floating to support such player-enforced rules. That kind of fighting is only really capable when the game itself supports it.
7th: What's with you and cake?
8th: Don't worry about apologizing to us about writing a wall of text. We're used to it :smile.gif:.
@Val:
When I mention the MSF, it's as a joke, because I don't feel like going to the trouble of testing something myself. If I knew a lot of people really well, who I knew were suited to that sort of thing, and I had the means of setting up my own server or getting a spot on a good server where we wouldn't be attacked and we had all the resources we needed, then I might consider restarting the MSF myself. I was also sort of hinting, since I'm still a little bitter that ONA is gone.
Techinclly creeper spanweers and blze spanwers do exists. You just need like Mcedit to bring them in. The Nether is really with zombie pigman a plase to grin cooked pork and gold nuggests. 9 nuggests= 1 gold so that allows you to farm gold.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I beat two super hostile maps, see of flame 2 and spellbound, have to finish more. Plan to do inferno mines for lulz and win when it goes out. Have fun!
I didn't include shelter because you can attain that anywhere by digging 3 blocks down and putting a glass block above your head, or even a dirt block if you have a watch. If you are concerned about a creeper falling on you when you leave, you can also build a makeshift dirt shelter at the cost of 13 dirt blocks, and you can increase safety elevation too with this at the cost of a single dirt block per y coordinate.
The activity of a base does indeed affect how long it takes to be found, under the assumption that bases are not found by tunneling through hundreds of thousands of blocks. Bases are usually found by either using a spy to obtain the coordinates from a clan member, or using a scout to secretly follow someone to his base.
If nobody goes to an inactive base, a scout cannot follow the person there. If people below the top of the totem pole do not know the coordinates of a base, a spy will have a very hard time getting these coordinates.
And thus, there is then only one base they can find and attack, which will also have a concentrated defense line.
Also, what servers do you all play on? I really have been looking for a war serer, but ever since pixelville pvp came down from its peak, I couldn't really find a server that had a decent war system. The current #1 server battlecraft has a no-griefing rule and also weird arbitrary limits like how many redstone contraptions one can have. Another server had a mod which required you yourself to kill a monster to get its drops, which prevents mob grinders. I would join Ordo Imperator Novum, but their server REQUIRES role playing, and prohibits certain use of minecraft physics such as pillaring blocks, and thus gets in the way of the vanilla aspect.
I would love to be in a war with factions that actually had over 50 members each. The thing is that I cannot really find any.
This is an amazing thread. I really love all the work you have put into this, it is truly fun to read. There is also some great discussion going on here, and I almost feel stupid interrupting it with my post here. :biggrin.gif:
Basically, all of this is fun to read, but it seems to me like this is all hypothetical. Have wars on such a large scale actually taken place / still go on? And if so how do you become a part of it?
I have had the game since fall of last year, but I haven't even known the extent of the online scene until just recently. I'm basically looking to get myself instituted into it. I have joined some servers but don't really know what to do. I am PVP inclined, and war like this sounds fun. Any pointers on how you spend your time on Minecraft and enjoy it would be good to hear, too. :smile.gif:
Yes, that would work against mobs, but how does that protect you from enemy players? Even if you completely conceal yourself underground, what's the point of having a clan in a battlecraft server if all your soldiers act like they're in SSP? Why do you think forts are fortified? There is no way you can defend yourself with a dirt shelter or a glass block. By shelter I don't mean a place to wait out the night away from mobs, I mean having serious protection from enemies while you gather, build, and otherwise prepare for war. It means having a wall and other defenses if you're above ground, and booby traps and hidden entrances underground. If you don't count shelter or protection in your list of the values of a base, then you must not have any of these things, in which case I have no idea how you survive on a serious PvP server. I could care less about mobs. To trained soldiers, they're nothing more than an annoyance compared to the enemy. Actually, they are a valuable source of materials.
I'll admit that activity does improve the chances of the location of a base being found out, but it's not the only factor, and it's not necessary. If they enemy is smart, they know what to look for to find hidden entrances. If they've found and captured outposts, they can figure out the general logical location of your bases. And if there aren't any outposts to find, as you're suggesting, then they have all the time in the world to search for your base, and chances are you don't even know they're there. And in the event of retreat from your active base to the next backup base, how on earth are you going to keep the location secret from the enemy when you let the rest of your army know? Because in a situation like that, you would be in the middle of losing a battle, so everyone would be busy fighting. If you say "follow me!" then the enemy can follow you, to. The theory might sound better, but in practice it's not plausible. And again, what's the point of having an inactive base if no one's there? What happens if you retreat to the next base and find it held by the enemy? To keep it safe, you need to have someone posted there, which means there is a chance for the enemy to find it, unless you keep that garrison cut off from all clan life.
There aren't any such servers that I am aware of. PAoW seems to have been the last. However, there are possibilities if you are open to RP. Some of the bigger RP servers, such as Lord of the Craft, pretty much guarantee large-scale warfare.
OIN's server, Cavera, currently isn't enforcing RP, and I think there might be a chance that they won't again. And the pillar thing is just so you don't find any random 1-block pillars, because they have no real point. It's fine to build them temporarily, or as part of a structure, just not on their own. I'm a Puer in OIN. I had the same concerns as you did, but they're not really that big of a deal. So go ahead and join, we're always looking for new members. We have uniforms (but if you don't like that either, no one really wears them anyway)!
I apologize in advance if I come off as a bit inexperienced. I just got Minecraft a couple of weeks ago, and I've never played on a SMP server. This is all based on strategic thought experiments. I posted this here because it seemed within the spirit of vanilla (none of the Art of War's points are essentially changed).
My idea was directed less as a universal modification for the sort of open-ended war servers (where groups of people join and leave every day) than as a way of focusing the conflict for closed servers (3+ defined teams of experienced people, each with 20 or more people). I apologize if my tone came off as universalistic; I was just proposing an alternative that would correct many problems in that specific scenario without adding in weird doodads (like airships and alchemy) or coming off as too artificial (e.g. block protection or "challenge wars"). Obviously, if one doesn't like my approach of emphasizing the economic and grand civilizational (100s of year abstractions) aspects rather than focusing almost entirely on war (real-time basis), then this wouldn't work for him/her.
I mean, the problem now is that people can easily burrow into the unplumbed recesses of the Earth and prolong conflict indefinitely, which isn't a problem for open-ended servers (just ignore them) but is a problem for closed servers. Again, the most ungentlemanly gentleman will always win (ceteris paribus). The bedrock markers (which are not meant to be stealable, so you have to control all of the centers simultaneously; it's not classic capture-the-flag) are meant to symbolize the cultural center of gravity of any given "nation." Like Rome, or Carthage, or Paris, or New York City. And victory is meant to symbolize establishing enduring cultural hegemony for a few hundred years (like Rome after beating Carthage, Egypt, Greece). Capturing the flag of any given nation won't kill it (unless you capture all of them, i.e. cultural hegemony). Sure, resistance movements might still exist, and eventually the hegemony would die. If you think of it in that context, it becomes a bit less artificial than Capture the Flag, and if you think about it, kind of resembles the contours of real life (capturing Paris would doom France; they couldn't just relocate to Burkina Faso like in vanilla Minecraft without losing a lot of prestige and initiative).
@Locke_Erasmus
2. Well, it's good to hear that trade is more common than it seems based on the thread. But, at least in theory, it should be pretty easy to become self-sufficient for most resources since there's little biome specialization once you work on it a bit. And self-sufficiency means little to no trade.
3. The problem with this is that any set of different teams often wouldn't have coordinated opposite goals. I'm all for sandbox (I tried to streamline my proposal as much as possible). But strategy is ultimately the pursuit of knowable and mutually exclusive goals in opposition to other intelligences, in a complex world. This wouldn't necessarily be the case in vanilla without slightly more constraints.
I mean, most wars in real life are either prestige affairs (proving good faith for diplomacy), boosting strategic allies, or gaining cultural hegemony. The bedrock "flags" symbolize the last, and the first and second would come as intermediate goals to the ultimate goal of the third. Feel free to disagree with me, especially if you pursue a less "grand civilization" scale. It seems you want Age of Empires/Starcraft more than Europa Universalis/Civilization, which is a perfectly valid way of looking at things.
4. Yeah. I mean, I'm not claiming that my idea is the be-all-end-all of Minecraft warfare. I would welcome any clever and non-intrusive way to rejigger the cost/benefit curve of death. This was just my attempt to do so.
6. Well, I mostly addressed this point in the intro. Yes, it is a little "game mechanicky," but it is necessary that there be some way of simulating the cultural center of gravity to prevent France from relocating to Burkina Faso when Paris falls. If anyone can come up with a more organic idea, then I would be all for it. Of course, if you aren't doing a civilizational-scale scenario (so relocating to Vichy rather than relocating to Burkina Faso, or something), then of course, having such a focal point might be a little weirder. I think that if they were far enough apart, the fact that you have to own all of them simultaneously and couldn't just steal them would be a meaningful proxy for dominance. That way, if everyone else burrowed away or tried to grief, you'd win pretty easily (eliminating the least gentlemanly gentleman problem).
In response to your point of player-enforcement, the server would be close-ended (defined teams only), and presumably we'd have a system where players could enter a command to save the server state and check the four blocks for whether all of them have a given team marker on it (generating an auto-win for that team). I assume we'd have to have specific times to play to prevent imbalances due to logged-on player imbalances (which would restrict players to similar timezones). So real wars would be the only possible wars, since most all-out wars of revenge would harm a team's strategic position. Also, in real life, injustices don't really cause wars unless they harm another great power's strategic position or they damage the trustworthiness of another power's erstwhile ally. E.g. most powers seemed content to rest on their hands during the Darfur genocide or the (early) Rwanda genocide. "Nations have interests, not friends."
7. Cake is the good requiring the most diverse set of agricultural goods, so it would boost inter-team trade (since most other goods could, in theory, be gathered within a single or very few biomes). Also, since respawning would symbolize the birth of children to a nation, cake and gold effectively represents the food and treasure cost of raising children to adulthood. So poor teams and badly connected (trade-wise) teams would have a harder time rebounding from a bloody defeat.
Thank you for your cogent criticism of my points and tolerance of my inexperience. I think most of our differences result from different visions of what Minecraft warfare is supposed to represent.
I understand that you're aiming to make warfare in Minecraft more like warfare in real life, and I understand your reasoning, but you're going about it the wrong way.
First off, if you have enough people willing to fight wars the way you describe to fill such a closed server, then you could easily have them play the way we have already outlined on this thread. The biggest reason that the types of war we discuss don't happen is that not enough players are willing to or organized enough to play that way. You'll run into the same problem setting up this type of server. As for civilization, you're talking about softcore RP, with a dynamic history, player civilizations, but no character RP. That's great, and that's the sort of server that best utilizes our ideas. No one said we were looking for a server that focuses only on war. We just want one that, when war does occur, fights the way we want to.
How does underground combat "prolong combat indefinitely"? And I think that open servers are great as long as they only let the right people in. And we don't promote "gentlemanly" fighting, just smart fighting. Fighting dirty is great, and , like you said, wins the most wars. It's not about how nobly you fight, it's about how intelligent and adaptable you are.
You're right. It's not capture the flag, it's king of the hill. Still the same issues. I don't think it's wise to artificially assign value to anything, whether it be an obsidian block or cake. This is what's wrong with your approach to making Minecraft War more like real life. Paris is worth defending because the people of France value it as their capitol, not because some unspoken international law says it's the heart of France. Minecraft is great as a tool to simulate real life because you don't have to symbolize anything. In real life, symbols only have as much value as people give them. If D.C. was destroyed or conquered, the rest of the U.S. wouldn't go with it. Americans give it extra value because it holds the leaders of our nation, not because it's a symbol. In Minecraft, your main base is your capitol. It's important because the leader(s) of the government/army are there, and usually because it's the biggest city with the most resources. But when you're talking about capturing the capitol, the leader(s) can easily relocate, and the nation isn't finished. There's nothing to prevent a nation from relocating a capitol, if the people aren't blinded by tradition. Giving artificial value to a capitol or an important city isn't what separates real-life warfare from Minecraft. Historically, nations fall when the capitol is taken because the rest of the nation has already been subdued and the government is forced to make a last stand there. No war that I know of has ever been won because an army walked through a nation and captured the capitol without first defeating the rest of the nation. Capitols are saved for last because they are usually the biggest and most heavily defended. Even if relocating the capitol causes the nation to lose "prestige and initiative," the nation still exists.
Another thing that Minecraft has in common with real life is that any goals are set by you. Nations in real life don't have artificial goals, they have concrete ones. As the leader of a clan in Minecraft, you only make a decision when yu have a reason that has consequences. You missed my point when you replied to my observation about factions refusing to surrender when their block was captured. The obsidian blocks you're talking about are only valuable symbolically, and Minecraft is a very concrete game. Capturing the enemy's blocks doesn't actually affect them in any way, so they are free to continue fighting you. Objectives in Minecraft are only worth pursuing if they have some sort of concrete benefit. You see, in your effort to make Minecraft closer to real life, you're actually making it closer to an RTS game, where you win when you kill a VIP or hold a certain spot for a certain amount of time.
Self-sufficiency is fine. Even if trade is not necessary, diplomacy is still very valuable, because it's better to neutralize threats before you have to face them. Even though we're here to talk about how to best wage war in SMP, I don't think anyone here would disagree that peace is a preferable state to war for a clan. If you can avoid a war through diplomacy, then it is worth it to keep diplomatic lines open. Trade only strengthens the bonds between factions, and it's not the end of the world if trade isn't necessary. Opposing goals are only necessary if you are trying to enter a state of war (that's not even the only grounds to start a war. Groups could just as easily declare war because of competition towards the same goal), and even if you are, why would it be necessary to have coordinated goals? Like I said, goals in Minecraft are whatever you want to make them, and artificial goals detract from the game. Whether clans wage war because they have opposite goals or identical goals, nothing about vanilla SMP prevents it. The system isn't the problem, and altering it isn't the solution. All that matters is how seriously the players take the game, and how willing they are to be organized.
Why do you need to symbolize the core of a nation or clan when the clan is a perfect representation of the nation already? You can achieve cultural hegemony in Minecraft in exactly the same way as you do in real life. If you dominate a foreign nation in real life by enforcing your laws and oppressing it's people, there's nothing that prevents you from doing the same in Minecraft. Giving clans an artificial goal such as defeating the enemy is wrong. If a clan doesn't want to rule the world, but just defend what is theirs already, why not let them? Minecraft PvP isn't only about aggressive warfare, and megalomaniacs aren't the only ones with a right to play organized PvP.
I'm not aiming to change anything about Minecraft PvP. I do my best to help people use vanilla Minecraft to fight wars. If they don't want to play vanilla, then they're welcome to use any of my ideas that apply to their server. One of the biggest aspects of this is to address the differences between Minecraft war and real-life war, and the most important of those differences is death. I don't wish death in Minecraft was more permanent or more serious, I just adapt my strategies and ideas around how it is already.
Why is it important to prevent capitols from being relocated? The "central culture of gravity" doesn't need to be simulated. If it exists (which it often doesn't, especially in real life), then it exists. Minecraft is one of the most organic games there is. There's no need for such a focal point of a faction or clan, except to be the center of command for the government. Imposing rules on war, such as you need to control certain points to win, takes away from the realism. If controlling these points works, then it works, and if not, then you keep fighting or give up, just like in real life. Not all countries in the world are France. And what's wrong with Paris relocating, anyway? Who cares how easy it is to win a war? War isn't a game with rules. When you win, it's pretty obvious, and you shouldn't have to tell the losing side. If the enemy doesn't acknowledge that you win, then you haven't won yet. Forget the "gentleman" thing. Chivalry is dead, at least in war, and if you try to enforce it by imposing rules on warfare, no one's going to listen to you.
Never forget that in real life, wars aren't ever decided by something concrete, like whether or not they are in possession of a certain artifact.
I'm not sure what your definition of "real war" is, but what you've described so far doesn't sound at all like real war to me. And when I said injustice, I was talking about the victim fighting against the oppressor, not necessarily a third party fighting a war of intervention. Many wars have been fought because a messenger or VIP was killed.
About cake: Cake may do those things, but it has no special benefits as an item. When trading, other players aren't likely to accept cake as payment just because of the reasons you gave. I'm fine with using an item as currency, but it's better to use something rare that you don't have to craft, like gold ingots or ender pearls. And forget about symbolizing things. As much as you might want otherwise, Minecraft is not real life. It has completely different values and goals and needs. If you want to pretend that Minecraft is real life, try RP.
@Everyone:
Anyway, I've been thinking, and talking to people. It seems that everyone is looking for a good server to play on that uses the ideas that we talk about here on this thread. However, it seems no one has really found one that can live up to the example set by Project Art of War. So why don't we all have our own server? A new Project Art of War made by the people who know the most about it? I know nothing about setting up a server, but if someone who follows this thread does, please speak up, and maybe we can set something up. Or we could all go to the best server I've found, Cavera. We should make sure that no one faction starts off more powerful than the others, so feel free to start your own clan, unless you think you would be hopeless as a commander. We'll make sure the server is well-advertised, so we have no shortage of recruits. If we end up with lots of little clans, factions should merge with others that are similar in values, goals, and approach. If you think this is a good idea, please speak up. The more support this has, the more people will go along with it.
Fantastic read my friend! I love that someone put art into the war in Minecraft instead of just action. Well worth my time and it taught me some new tricks.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Member of AoKHeaven- User name: Jecon
In life, we are either pawns or kings - Napoleon
Everyone ready? It's time for Locke's Prepared Post #2! (yay!)
Locke_Erasmus on Distributing Your Forces
Fear of retribution can be just as strong a deterrent to attacking a weak position as actually having the strength to defend that position. Think of the game of Risk. I used to distribute all my armies evenly among each territory adjacent to the enemy, until I realized the enemy usually wouldn’t take advantage of an opening in my defense if I had a strong force nearby that could cripple him through his weakened territory. A smart enemy will reinforce his surrounding territories, and only attack if his opponent is soft inside his defending wall. This idea translates very well into a Minecraft context. When building and fortifying your holdings within your territory, try not to be “crunchy on the outside, chewy on the inside.” Keep your last resort, your main base, well away from threats. Keep the core of your territory protected behind several “walls” of protection, if you can.
(I had a Paint diagram that was easier to understand, but I'm still not sure how to get it online. I'll edit it here instead when I can)
This basic diagram shows the basic layout for territory of a large army (ignoring terrain and territory shape). The (MB)at the bottom is your main base, and the line at the top is the shared border with enemy territory. |F| indicates a fort (above or below ground), O's are outposts (more for communication, supplies, and monitoring the territory than actual fighting), and T's are terrain traps/alarms. Everything represented on this diagram should have some sort of presence aboveground and underground. Otherwise, an invading enemy could walk right over or under a fort or a trap without noticing it or being noticed. This layout is meant mostly for detection of an enemy force. Even though we don’t want the enemy to know the location of our holdings, we do want to stop them before they get too deep into the territory. Now, to explain the layout. Imagine an invading force crosses the border by one of the forward terrain traps. Hopefully they set it off, hindering their progress and alerting you to their presence. All forward manned outposts are put on alert, and the nearest fort sends a force to engage the invaders, while of course leaving a sizeable garrison at the fort. Think of the two forward forts as safeties in (American) football. They are in a perfect position to react to any threat. If an invading force encounters an outpost before a trap, then it’s almost guaranteed you’ll be alerted. A force is sent from the nearest fort to reinforce the outpost. Meanwhile, the rest of your territory keeps their eyes peeled for any other enemy activity. Diversions are common. The three forts surrounding the main base are like Siam in Risk, protecting your last stronghold. If the fight is taken that close to home, chances are you know where all the enemy are located, so you are free to move your troops between forts to respond to threats.
Each fort (and your main base) should have its own division. A division should be made up of 24 to 40 soldiers in 8-man squads, plus a Commander. Squads should have a Squad Leader and a Lieutenant (or sergeant, whatever you want to call your officers is fine), and should be comfortable with splitting into two 4-man platoons, led by the Squad Leader and the Lieutenant. Each outpost should have an assigned squad, with one platoon always on duty at the outpost and the other at the division’s fort. Obviously, each division with a fort should be in charge of the region surrounding the fort, and all the holdings in that region. The division is responsible for keeping traps and alarms functional and outposts and the fort stocked with supplies. Of course, not all divisions will be stationed to a fort and not all squads will be stationed to an outpost. Any units not stationed are reserve and offensive units. These units are the reinforcements, and stationed troops are garrisons. I can’t stress how important it is to maintain a strong reserve. The arrival of fresh reinforcements with new armor and weapons will turn the tide in almost every battle. However, be careful how you spend your reserve, because the most important time to have them is at the end of a war or battle. If you send all your extra troops into the first battle of an invasion and they lose, you’re screwed. Only send what reinforcements you think are necessary, and try not to waste them. Reinforcements can either be the biggest P cost or the biggest N cost in a war. If you’re confident that committing more troops will win the battle and it does, then you’ve won the battle and you’ve kept the bulk of your reserve strength. Congratulations. But if they don’t win, then you’ve just wasted your best hope for victory later on. But enough of that. I’ll go more into commitment later.
1. Sign up to photobucket.
2. Save your diagram to any folder.
3. Click 'Upload now' on photobucket, and upload your image. Get the [IMG] code for the image, and post it here.
well, as far as i know, the only dungeon grinders you can make that will give you USEFUL items are skelly or spider dungeons. though i understand why skelly dungeon grinders are of a higher priority, but what is a safe way to get the string needed to make you bows and fishing rods?
If you die out in the wild or in enemy territory, especially in battle, chances are unlikely you will ever get your bow back. and about fishing rods, i find that fishing is probably the best way to gain food without too much effort. Since 1.8, you will have to chase down pigs, cows, and chickens to gain food, zombies are even tougher to kill (debatable) because they can hurt you, and their meat only makes you get hungry twice as fast, farming, though one could say it requires no effort to gain food from one, since you can do other things while your farm grows, but you still have to put in effort of making the farm, you have to waste time picking the crops, and you have to replant seeds and such. Plus, you might need to expand it, repair it, and other things of the sort.
Fishing, on the other hand, only requires a fishing rod (which is relatively easy to make) and a person with patience who will fish until the fishing rod breaks, or until he gets the needed amount of food. Now that food stacks, all you need is to put it in a furnace(s) and put in the appropriate amount of fuel ((char)coal can cook/smelt 8 items) and come back later after doing whatever and putting the food in a chest(s), if you have any.
Spider dungeons are useful to start up the process, but i agree with you, because at one point, you will have more string than you will need, but it's good to have a surplus of materials just in case.
But, as you said, skelly dungeon grinders are more useful because for most people, you will need MUCH MORE arrows than you will ever need string.
PS: I never said spider dungeons grinders are more useful than skelly dungeons grinders, i said that they are only ones worth making, both of them.
Don't forget creepers! Any serious PvP clan will need lots and lots of gunpowder for TNT.
Also, I think enough string can be gained by killing spiders by hand. They are common enough to provide enough string with just a little effort.
I agree with you about fishing. Fish are more filling than anything you can farm.
well, i actually was talking about dungeon grinders. What i mean by that is, not mob towers, but actually taking a dungeon that found, and turning it into a mob grinder for the one mob that spawns inside of it.
Creepers are never a product of dungeon mob spawners. They only spawn naturally probably because notch figured they would just blow up the spawner. So that being said, the only really useful spawner to trap is a skeleton since you need so little string that you will get a sufficient supply out of your main dark room grinder. I guess you could trap a spider spawner though if you really need the string.
I have been thinking about position of structures just now. Do they even need to be far apart? If you think about it, wouldn't it just be more efficient to have all your structures, farms, storage, etc all at one location? You don't need to ever transport, and you get a huge advantage of number when it comes to defense. Yes, if the enemy did succeed in attack, you would lose more, but you could just have a fall back complex in a different location which is just hidden as opposed to defended. You would have more power seeing that the enemy would have a much harder time defeating you, and if they finally destroyed the complex, you would have another complex ready that you can uncap simply by giving your team its coordinates, which were originally only accessible by the leader.
Actually bread heals 2.5, which is equal to cooked fish, and you don't need to burn coal cooking it. If you are out of meat, bread is the best farmable food since it grows like weeds when you have a big enough, efficient farm.
I guess I was thinking of mob factories in general. About spiders and skeletons: My thoughts exactly.
Hm. Concentrating your forces at one location might improve your chances of successfully defending against invaders, but it does embody the old adage of putting all your eggs in one basket. Having multiple bases to fall back to, instead of one emergency bunker, is definitely safer. Also, it's very important to have some sort of early-warning system, which, unless you happen to be really good at concealing a complex redstone alarm system for your whole territory, involves placing outposts. Having your locations spread out also helps with concealing your location. The bigger the base, the easier it is to find (usually).
About loaves and fishes: There I go again, speculating without actually testing the details. I think we agreed, however, that melons were more efficient than bread. If you have something to say about that, please let us hear it. This is the sort of thing we need the MSF for.
Good point about the placement of bases. Though I think it would be the best idea to have one active at a time, and the rest dormant bases which all have the same functions for when they are used. If a base is not active, the enemy really has no way of finding it provided that it is 5000+ blocks from spawn, which it should be.
There are 4 basic functions that a base is used for: Storage, mining, farming, and mob grinders. These are really the only things one can do with a base. So when all 4 of those functions are complete, you can send a few people to prepare another outpost in the same fashion. Your main member base will only operate in the "current" base, not even knowing where the dormant bases are, so an enemy will not be able to track down your other bases. By the time the enemy blows, it up, you have an identical base to fall back on and you can continue what you were doing right from where you left off.
So basically, yes have multiple structures, but each one should be independently functioning.
Also, Nether transportation has been deemed unproductive a while back. I have used it not too long ago, and it can actually be a really useful and efficient method of transportation. Despite what people say about ghasts and such, it isn't as dangerous as people say it is. One useful thing about it is that it can be used to make a base far from spawn. It can even be useful for attacking a far away base. We have also been through discussion about using the portal to land straight on top of the enemy's base, and that was disproved. I think now though that it could be very useful for a surprise attack. In all honesty, what are the odds of their having a trap portal?
What I don't really think matters though is having a functional base in the nether, or fighting over land in the nether. Most things in the nether can be done in an in and out manner so there is no need to settle there.
Now, the main problem that I see is that vanilla Minecraft is kind of poorly structured to contain a deep strategic game like Europa Universalis or, less deeply, Age of Empires/Total War. But if it could be modified, it could transcend all of them.
Specifically, as discussed in a few previous posts, we face three problems: there is no defined goal, death is either too cheap or too meaninglessly tedious, and the strategic contours are far more suited to stealthy below-ground hit and run style tactics than establishing an aboveground presence. Even if you do have "gentlemanly conduct," the least gentlemanly gentleman, all other things equal, will always win.
A secondary problem is that resources are too cheap - if you get established anywhere, you can get pretty much anything with a bit of ingenuity and building. A side effect is that there is no meaningful trade, removing a lot of the depth that could emerge from diplomacy and cooperation.
I have a few (semi) vague proposals to correct that. They synergize with each other.
First, we can use maps that have relatively limited amounts of land (still a lot, but not so much that all of the players together couldn't keep an eye on most of it). An effective way to do this is to use ocean biomes to separate the map from other landmasses. Perhaps Dutch-style terraforming could be introduced by changing some of the border biomes after the map generation (giving a minor incentive to do that). This becomes relevant for a later proposal.
Second, make it so farming (both crop and passive mob spawn) can only occur in environments lit by sunlight. I don't know if this is possible (zombies burn, so it should be). If not, maybe set an arbitrary height limit or something. Sure, this would make it impossible to have cute underground farms, but it would be more realistic and make a real reason to own (and raid) aboveground land. I think we could set exceptions for mushroom farming (realism), and throwing chickens would still spawn them, and normal mob grinders would still work. Maybe still allow bone meal insta-farming.
Third, implement biome-based farming systems. So maybe wheat could only be planted in plains/?/? biomes and sugarcane could be planted and spawn in swamp/?/? biomes, etc. That way, just controlling a little patch of land wouldn't be enough to be self-sufficient - you'd have to either trade, raid, or control. Also, filling in ocean might just yield usable strategic farmland, if you get lucky with the biome.
Fourth, make death costly but not insurmountable. Make it cost cake and gold for team members to respawn at the altar(or escape from spawn prison). After cocoa farms are implemented, you could add cookies to that mix. Also, give each team a starting altar and make crafting new altars take a few gold blocks (really expensive - around 27 gold ingots or so). Altars shouldn't be collectible. They'd have to be destroyed. Sacrifices of cake and gold could only occur at altars. I can't mod this, but some proxy should be workable. This would make it so it would be very costly to wage wars of attrition (as well as making practical uses for gold, sugarcane et al.) It would also give more reason to trade. Finally, it would give a real incentive to wipe an entire team out, since if just one survivor escapes, a while out, the team could return in force (by building a new alter and respawning). Kind of like squashing real-life resistance movements, come to think about it.
Finally, at the same location (a block or two away) of each team's starting altar, put a bedrock with some team marker, and give the coordinates to all players. The goal of any given game would be to have one's marker simultaneously on some specified percentage of team bedrocks. So for 2-4 teams it would be all of them, and a declining percentage after that (since 1 near-victor vs. 3 underdogs is about the border between fair and unfair). That would make it so losing your bedrock wouldn't be the end of the world, and stealthy bedrock coups could be viable strategies. Finally, it would force at least one aboveground fort.
I know you said "no mods," but Minecraft was designed to create the individual survivalist's experience. E.g. it would be tedious to have to go across three biomes just to make a cake. But for organized teams, adding that realism really adds to the quality of the experience, in addition to adding depth to the politics and economics.
Sorry for the wall-of-textishness of this, but I think that making a few modifications would really add to the endogenous narrative quality of the Art of War SMP experience.
EDIT: Oh yeah, it might be cool it have subsequent games occur on the same map (with some blocks changed to model decay and restore used resources like gold). So we could see something like the rise and fall of civilization and gradually increasing complexity.
There was an HTML version at once point... but never a PDF... I don't know how I would go about making one.
@Matthew
Structures DON'T need to be far apart. As you said, COMPLEXES need to be far apart. I never said anything about not having a farm and storage in the same location. In fact, every single base my clan ever had was an all-in-one base. It is, however, a very large loss when taken, as you suggest.
@Locke
The MSF was more about theoretical Minecraft Science and Physics than practical Minecraft Axioms such as which type of food is most efficient. You keep mentioning it, but it no longer exists. You're welcome to re-create it, in any way you see fit.
@Matthew Again
Wait... who said Nether Transport was unproductive?! Certainly not me...
I also always advocated using the portal as a means of surprise attack, but to date, nobody has ever done it and posted anything here about it.
ONA always used to have a trap portal, to answer your question.
I disagree with your point about settling in the Nether, simply on the terms that people, like you said, feel no need to settle there. They simple want to use it as a means of transportation. That's why ONA's bases that were made underneath the lava in the nether were almost never found.
@drahorb
I enjoyed your post, but for the most part I disagree with many of the points you bring up. Using maps with limited amounts of land is a good idea. It creates a situation where resources are NOT unlimited, and in which people will eventually have to fight over land. I disagree, however, with changing the farming system. I don't believe that tending to and fighting over farms is what armies really want to be doing all the time. In terms of the (almost) perma-death and altar system, I don't see how that seems fun at all. This system would make new armies fear for their lives. They would have little to no resources with which to ressurect the accidentally killed member and such. Also, what would an army do when they were entirely wiped out? Be banned from the server?
I say melons are more efficient because they are much more available. But that's already been discussed, and it's 3 in the morning, and I really don't want to type that all up again. I think it's a bad idea to only have one active base. If you only leave a skeleton crew at the rest of your holdings, because these strongholds are what you are trying to protect. The enemy finding a base almost never depends on whether or not you have men defending it. You forget one purpose of bases: shelter. Soldiers inside a base are protected from mobs and enemies. Bases are very important strategically. If you have them, the enemy will want them, so you have to defend them. It's basic logic. They're not going to just ignore other bases because they're empty. In fact, that makes them more viable as a target. If you keep the bulk of your forces in one base, soon you will only have that one base. All your bases should be self-sufficient anyway. You have to prepare for sieges.
Whether or not you use the Nether depends on your estimate of the enemy. If you think he is likely to use the Nether against you, then you should prepare for that. If you believe that he won't expect an attack from the Nether, then surprise him. A base in the Nether could be considered an alternate form of Nether defense. You use it to prevent the enemy from entering your Earthside base through the Nether. Of course, a Nether base could make an excellent fallback, like you said one should have. Not many commanders will think to look for you in the Nether. Nether bases will become viable if you make them necessary. If you constantly attack using the Nether, or if you build a Nether base to counter an enemy's base in the Nether, then you can begin something virtually unexplored in Minecraft PvP: Nether warfare. If you make sure you are prepared for battle in the Nether, then you can give yourself an advantage over the enemy by bringing the battle to the Nether. I can pretty much guarantee that 90% of Minecraft players are not currently prepared for combat in the Nether.
@Drahorb:
I can sum up my response to your post in a very concise way (and these are in no specific order):
1st: We are here to discuss warfare in vanilla. I said something very similar a page or two back, but everyone has their own opinion of what Minecraft should have that it doesn't, and what Notch should remove. This thread is for discussing how best to wage war with the current system, not how to change the system to improve war. Again, there are many different servers with many different combinations of mods, plugins, and rules, and there just might be one that is perfect for you.
2nd: Trade and diplomacy are actually quite common in larger servers. In my experience, peaceful negotiations are actually more frequent than wars. Factions that are mostly restricted to certain biomes may not have as much access to certain materials as others, so they trade.
3rd: Warfare in Minecraft has as much of a defined goal as it does in real life. It can be for many things, and it's up to you to decide what to fight for. The fact that the game doesn't point you in one direction is one of the great things about Minecraft (i'm starting to get deja vu). There are many RP servers with such defined goals. In this sense, all the different servers available are like separate games that all use the same engine.
4th: I disagree with a lot of your ideas, but I want to bring attention to your point about death. The lack of consequences for death are what separates war in Minecraft from real life war. It's the main problem I have when I'm coming up with new ideas and theories for my posts.
5th: This sounds like an outline for a server. This would be great to have as a server, and if you can find all the mods and plugins you would need, I say go ahead and make it. Just try to avoid remaking all of Minecraft in your image, so to speak. Most of us like Minecraft the way it is. And if we don't, we find a version of it that we do like, and play on that server (seriously, this feels more and more like what I said to that last guy).
6th: Exactly like I said the last time, they do play to steal the enemy's block like that. It's called "capture the flag," and lots of servers hold events in this style. The problem with having a set goal like that is that it changes the nature of the war. Wars would be fought for completely different reasons. For instance, if a war was declared over an injustice or unfairness, the problem wouldn't be solved by capturing the enemy's block. You can't say, "I got your flag! That means I was right!" Putting such restrictions on war would degrade it to little more than a sport. People wouldn't ever start them, because they no longer have any sufficient medium to solve their problems, so they would no longer have any reason to fight. Imagine the UN put such limitations on war in real life. What do you think would happen? And what do you do if a clan decides to wage an actual war, and ignore your rules? Or if a faction refuses to surrender when their block gets stolen? Minecraft is too free-floating to support such player-enforced rules. That kind of fighting is only really capable when the game itself supports it.
7th: What's with you and cake?
8th: Don't worry about apologizing to us about writing a wall of text. We're used to it :smile.gif:.
@Val:
When I mention the MSF, it's as a joke, because I don't feel like going to the trouble of testing something myself. If I knew a lot of people really well, who I knew were suited to that sort of thing, and I had the means of setting up my own server or getting a spot on a good server where we wouldn't be attacked and we had all the resources we needed, then I might consider restarting the MSF myself. I was also sort of hinting, since I'm still a little bitter that ONA is gone.
I didn't include shelter because you can attain that anywhere by digging 3 blocks down and putting a glass block above your head, or even a dirt block if you have a watch. If you are concerned about a creeper falling on you when you leave, you can also build a makeshift dirt shelter at the cost of 13 dirt blocks, and you can increase safety elevation too with this at the cost of a single dirt block per y coordinate.
The activity of a base does indeed affect how long it takes to be found, under the assumption that bases are not found by tunneling through hundreds of thousands of blocks. Bases are usually found by either using a spy to obtain the coordinates from a clan member, or using a scout to secretly follow someone to his base.
If nobody goes to an inactive base, a scout cannot follow the person there. If people below the top of the totem pole do not know the coordinates of a base, a spy will have a very hard time getting these coordinates.
And thus, there is then only one base they can find and attack, which will also have a concentrated defense line.
Also, what servers do you all play on? I really have been looking for a war serer, but ever since pixelville pvp came down from its peak, I couldn't really find a server that had a decent war system. The current #1 server battlecraft has a no-griefing rule and also weird arbitrary limits like how many redstone contraptions one can have. Another server had a mod which required you yourself to kill a monster to get its drops, which prevents mob grinders. I would join Ordo Imperator Novum, but their server REQUIRES role playing, and prohibits certain use of minecraft physics such as pillaring blocks, and thus gets in the way of the vanilla aspect.
I would love to be in a war with factions that actually had over 50 members each. The thing is that I cannot really find any.
Basically, all of this is fun to read, but it seems to me like this is all hypothetical. Have wars on such a large scale actually taken place / still go on? And if so how do you become a part of it?
I have had the game since fall of last year, but I haven't even known the extent of the online scene until just recently. I'm basically looking to get myself instituted into it. I have joined some servers but don't really know what to do. I am PVP inclined, and war like this sounds fun. Any pointers on how you spend your time on Minecraft and enjoy it would be good to hear, too. :smile.gif:
Yes, that would work against mobs, but how does that protect you from enemy players? Even if you completely conceal yourself underground, what's the point of having a clan in a battlecraft server if all your soldiers act like they're in SSP? Why do you think forts are fortified? There is no way you can defend yourself with a dirt shelter or a glass block. By shelter I don't mean a place to wait out the night away from mobs, I mean having serious protection from enemies while you gather, build, and otherwise prepare for war. It means having a wall and other defenses if you're above ground, and booby traps and hidden entrances underground. If you don't count shelter or protection in your list of the values of a base, then you must not have any of these things, in which case I have no idea how you survive on a serious PvP server. I could care less about mobs. To trained soldiers, they're nothing more than an annoyance compared to the enemy. Actually, they are a valuable source of materials.
I'll admit that activity does improve the chances of the location of a base being found out, but it's not the only factor, and it's not necessary. If they enemy is smart, they know what to look for to find hidden entrances. If they've found and captured outposts, they can figure out the general logical location of your bases. And if there aren't any outposts to find, as you're suggesting, then they have all the time in the world to search for your base, and chances are you don't even know they're there. And in the event of retreat from your active base to the next backup base, how on earth are you going to keep the location secret from the enemy when you let the rest of your army know? Because in a situation like that, you would be in the middle of losing a battle, so everyone would be busy fighting. If you say "follow me!" then the enemy can follow you, to. The theory might sound better, but in practice it's not plausible. And again, what's the point of having an inactive base if no one's there? What happens if you retreat to the next base and find it held by the enemy? To keep it safe, you need to have someone posted there, which means there is a chance for the enemy to find it, unless you keep that garrison cut off from all clan life.
There aren't any such servers that I am aware of. PAoW seems to have been the last. However, there are possibilities if you are open to RP. Some of the bigger RP servers, such as Lord of the Craft, pretty much guarantee large-scale warfare.
OIN's server, Cavera, currently isn't enforcing RP, and I think there might be a chance that they won't again. And the pillar thing is just so you don't find any random 1-block pillars, because they have no real point. It's fine to build them temporarily, or as part of a structure, just not on their own. I'm a Puer in OIN. I had the same concerns as you did, but they're not really that big of a deal. So go ahead and join, we're always looking for new members. We have uniforms (but if you don't like that either, no one really wears them anyway)!
@Perfexionist:
Read the above paragraph.
My idea was directed less as a universal modification for the sort of open-ended war servers (where groups of people join and leave every day) than as a way of focusing the conflict for closed servers (3+ defined teams of experienced people, each with 20 or more people). I apologize if my tone came off as universalistic; I was just proposing an alternative that would correct many problems in that specific scenario without adding in weird doodads (like airships and alchemy) or coming off as too artificial (e.g. block protection or "challenge wars"). Obviously, if one doesn't like my approach of emphasizing the economic and grand civilizational (100s of year abstractions) aspects rather than focusing almost entirely on war (real-time basis), then this wouldn't work for him/her.
I mean, the problem now is that people can easily burrow into the unplumbed recesses of the Earth and prolong conflict indefinitely, which isn't a problem for open-ended servers (just ignore them) but is a problem for closed servers. Again, the most ungentlemanly gentleman will always win (ceteris paribus). The bedrock markers (which are not meant to be stealable, so you have to control all of the centers simultaneously; it's not classic capture-the-flag) are meant to symbolize the cultural center of gravity of any given "nation." Like Rome, or Carthage, or Paris, or New York City. And victory is meant to symbolize establishing enduring cultural hegemony for a few hundred years (like Rome after beating Carthage, Egypt, Greece). Capturing the flag of any given nation won't kill it (unless you capture all of them, i.e. cultural hegemony). Sure, resistance movements might still exist, and eventually the hegemony would die. If you think of it in that context, it becomes a bit less artificial than Capture the Flag, and if you think about it, kind of resembles the contours of real life (capturing Paris would doom France; they couldn't just relocate to Burkina Faso like in vanilla Minecraft without losing a lot of prestige and initiative).
@Locke_Erasmus
2. Well, it's good to hear that trade is more common than it seems based on the thread. But, at least in theory, it should be pretty easy to become self-sufficient for most resources since there's little biome specialization once you work on it a bit. And self-sufficiency means little to no trade.
3. The problem with this is that any set of different teams often wouldn't have coordinated opposite goals. I'm all for sandbox (I tried to streamline my proposal as much as possible). But strategy is ultimately the pursuit of knowable and mutually exclusive goals in opposition to other intelligences, in a complex world. This wouldn't necessarily be the case in vanilla without slightly more constraints.
I mean, most wars in real life are either prestige affairs (proving good faith for diplomacy), boosting strategic allies, or gaining cultural hegemony. The bedrock "flags" symbolize the last, and the first and second would come as intermediate goals to the ultimate goal of the third. Feel free to disagree with me, especially if you pursue a less "grand civilization" scale. It seems you want Age of Empires/Starcraft more than Europa Universalis/Civilization, which is a perfectly valid way of looking at things.
4. Yeah. I mean, I'm not claiming that my idea is the be-all-end-all of Minecraft warfare. I would welcome any clever and non-intrusive way to rejigger the cost/benefit curve of death. This was just my attempt to do so.
6. Well, I mostly addressed this point in the intro. Yes, it is a little "game mechanicky," but it is necessary that there be some way of simulating the cultural center of gravity to prevent France from relocating to Burkina Faso when Paris falls. If anyone can come up with a more organic idea, then I would be all for it. Of course, if you aren't doing a civilizational-scale scenario (so relocating to Vichy rather than relocating to Burkina Faso, or something), then of course, having such a focal point might be a little weirder. I think that if they were far enough apart, the fact that you have to own all of them simultaneously and couldn't just steal them would be a meaningful proxy for dominance. That way, if everyone else burrowed away or tried to grief, you'd win pretty easily (eliminating the least gentlemanly gentleman problem).
In response to your point of player-enforcement, the server would be close-ended (defined teams only), and presumably we'd have a system where players could enter a command to save the server state and check the four blocks for whether all of them have a given team marker on it (generating an auto-win for that team). I assume we'd have to have specific times to play to prevent imbalances due to logged-on player imbalances (which would restrict players to similar timezones). So real wars would be the only possible wars, since most all-out wars of revenge would harm a team's strategic position. Also, in real life, injustices don't really cause wars unless they harm another great power's strategic position or they damage the trustworthiness of another power's erstwhile ally. E.g. most powers seemed content to rest on their hands during the Darfur genocide or the (early) Rwanda genocide. "Nations have interests, not friends."
7. Cake is the good requiring the most diverse set of agricultural goods, so it would boost inter-team trade (since most other goods could, in theory, be gathered within a single or very few biomes). Also, since respawning would symbolize the birth of children to a nation, cake and gold effectively represents the food and treasure cost of raising children to adulthood. So poor teams and badly connected (trade-wise) teams would have a harder time rebounding from a bloody defeat.
Thank you for your cogent criticism of my points and tolerance of my inexperience. I think most of our differences result from different visions of what Minecraft warfare is supposed to represent.
I understand that you're aiming to make warfare in Minecraft more like warfare in real life, and I understand your reasoning, but you're going about it the wrong way.
First off, if you have enough people willing to fight wars the way you describe to fill such a closed server, then you could easily have them play the way we have already outlined on this thread. The biggest reason that the types of war we discuss don't happen is that not enough players are willing to or organized enough to play that way. You'll run into the same problem setting up this type of server. As for civilization, you're talking about softcore RP, with a dynamic history, player civilizations, but no character RP. That's great, and that's the sort of server that best utilizes our ideas. No one said we were looking for a server that focuses only on war. We just want one that, when war does occur, fights the way we want to.
How does underground combat "prolong combat indefinitely"? And I think that open servers are great as long as they only let the right people in. And we don't promote "gentlemanly" fighting, just smart fighting. Fighting dirty is great, and , like you said, wins the most wars. It's not about how nobly you fight, it's about how intelligent and adaptable you are.
You're right. It's not capture the flag, it's king of the hill. Still the same issues. I don't think it's wise to artificially assign value to anything, whether it be an obsidian block or cake. This is what's wrong with your approach to making Minecraft War more like real life. Paris is worth defending because the people of France value it as their capitol, not because some unspoken international law says it's the heart of France. Minecraft is great as a tool to simulate real life because you don't have to symbolize anything. In real life, symbols only have as much value as people give them. If D.C. was destroyed or conquered, the rest of the U.S. wouldn't go with it. Americans give it extra value because it holds the leaders of our nation, not because it's a symbol. In Minecraft, your main base is your capitol. It's important because the leader(s) of the government/army are there, and usually because it's the biggest city with the most resources. But when you're talking about capturing the capitol, the leader(s) can easily relocate, and the nation isn't finished. There's nothing to prevent a nation from relocating a capitol, if the people aren't blinded by tradition. Giving artificial value to a capitol or an important city isn't what separates real-life warfare from Minecraft. Historically, nations fall when the capitol is taken because the rest of the nation has already been subdued and the government is forced to make a last stand there. No war that I know of has ever been won because an army walked through a nation and captured the capitol without first defeating the rest of the nation. Capitols are saved for last because they are usually the biggest and most heavily defended. Even if relocating the capitol causes the nation to lose "prestige and initiative," the nation still exists.
Another thing that Minecraft has in common with real life is that any goals are set by you. Nations in real life don't have artificial goals, they have concrete ones. As the leader of a clan in Minecraft, you only make a decision when yu have a reason that has consequences. You missed my point when you replied to my observation about factions refusing to surrender when their block was captured. The obsidian blocks you're talking about are only valuable symbolically, and Minecraft is a very concrete game. Capturing the enemy's blocks doesn't actually affect them in any way, so they are free to continue fighting you. Objectives in Minecraft are only worth pursuing if they have some sort of concrete benefit. You see, in your effort to make Minecraft closer to real life, you're actually making it closer to an RTS game, where you win when you kill a VIP or hold a certain spot for a certain amount of time.
Self-sufficiency is fine. Even if trade is not necessary, diplomacy is still very valuable, because it's better to neutralize threats before you have to face them. Even though we're here to talk about how to best wage war in SMP, I don't think anyone here would disagree that peace is a preferable state to war for a clan. If you can avoid a war through diplomacy, then it is worth it to keep diplomatic lines open. Trade only strengthens the bonds between factions, and it's not the end of the world if trade isn't necessary. Opposing goals are only necessary if you are trying to enter a state of war (that's not even the only grounds to start a war. Groups could just as easily declare war because of competition towards the same goal), and even if you are, why would it be necessary to have coordinated goals? Like I said, goals in Minecraft are whatever you want to make them, and artificial goals detract from the game. Whether clans wage war because they have opposite goals or identical goals, nothing about vanilla SMP prevents it. The system isn't the problem, and altering it isn't the solution. All that matters is how seriously the players take the game, and how willing they are to be organized.
Why do you need to symbolize the core of a nation or clan when the clan is a perfect representation of the nation already? You can achieve cultural hegemony in Minecraft in exactly the same way as you do in real life. If you dominate a foreign nation in real life by enforcing your laws and oppressing it's people, there's nothing that prevents you from doing the same in Minecraft. Giving clans an artificial goal such as defeating the enemy is wrong. If a clan doesn't want to rule the world, but just defend what is theirs already, why not let them? Minecraft PvP isn't only about aggressive warfare, and megalomaniacs aren't the only ones with a right to play organized PvP.
I'm not aiming to change anything about Minecraft PvP. I do my best to help people use vanilla Minecraft to fight wars. If they don't want to play vanilla, then they're welcome to use any of my ideas that apply to their server. One of the biggest aspects of this is to address the differences between Minecraft war and real-life war, and the most important of those differences is death. I don't wish death in Minecraft was more permanent or more serious, I just adapt my strategies and ideas around how it is already.
Why is it important to prevent capitols from being relocated? The "central culture of gravity" doesn't need to be simulated. If it exists (which it often doesn't, especially in real life), then it exists. Minecraft is one of the most organic games there is. There's no need for such a focal point of a faction or clan, except to be the center of command for the government. Imposing rules on war, such as you need to control certain points to win, takes away from the realism. If controlling these points works, then it works, and if not, then you keep fighting or give up, just like in real life. Not all countries in the world are France. And what's wrong with Paris relocating, anyway? Who cares how easy it is to win a war? War isn't a game with rules. When you win, it's pretty obvious, and you shouldn't have to tell the losing side. If the enemy doesn't acknowledge that you win, then you haven't won yet. Forget the "gentleman" thing. Chivalry is dead, at least in war, and if you try to enforce it by imposing rules on warfare, no one's going to listen to you.
Never forget that in real life, wars aren't ever decided by something concrete, like whether or not they are in possession of a certain artifact.
I'm not sure what your definition of "real war" is, but what you've described so far doesn't sound at all like real war to me. And when I said injustice, I was talking about the victim fighting against the oppressor, not necessarily a third party fighting a war of intervention. Many wars have been fought because a messenger or VIP was killed.
About cake: Cake may do those things, but it has no special benefits as an item. When trading, other players aren't likely to accept cake as payment just because of the reasons you gave. I'm fine with using an item as currency, but it's better to use something rare that you don't have to craft, like gold ingots or ender pearls. And forget about symbolizing things. As much as you might want otherwise, Minecraft is not real life. It has completely different values and goals and needs. If you want to pretend that Minecraft is real life, try RP.
@Everyone:
Anyway, I've been thinking, and talking to people. It seems that everyone is looking for a good server to play on that uses the ideas that we talk about here on this thread. However, it seems no one has really found one that can live up to the example set by Project Art of War. So why don't we all have our own server? A new Project Art of War made by the people who know the most about it? I know nothing about setting up a server, but if someone who follows this thread does, please speak up, and maybe we can set something up. Or we could all go to the best server I've found, Cavera. We should make sure that no one faction starts off more powerful than the others, so feel free to start your own clan, unless you think you would be hopeless as a commander. We'll make sure the server is well-advertised, so we have no shortage of recruits. If we end up with lots of little clans, factions should merge with others that are similar in values, goals, and approach. If you think this is a good idea, please speak up. The more support this has, the more people will go along with it.
I got bored
Lol what, my post, or the OP?
In life, we are either pawns or kings - Napoleon
1. Sign up to photobucket.
2. Save your diagram to any folder.
3. Click 'Upload now' on photobucket, and upload your image. Get the [IMG] code for the image, and post it here.
I have Flickr, but it doesn't work for some reason. It only lets me post links.