Monthly Archives: June 2013

Quick progress notes

Mojang announced in the launcher they are getting ready to release Minecraft 1.6 – the horse update. As such, I’ve started working on the needed changes to make it work on our servers. There are a LOT of changes, similar and perhaps more than the 1.5 release so it may take a bit.

So with this in mind, a forward notice: whenever Mojang will release – probably later this week or next – 1.6 do NOT upgrade your game client, or better yet make a backup copy of your 1.5.2 NOW and use that until I’ll announce it’s okay to upgrade.

Work on the Tekkit like server is nearly complete. Our latest bugfix playthroughs didn’t find any game breaking bugs. Expect a semi-open beta where more people will be able to join and start playing in a few days.

Lots of coding, testing, tweaking… fun! Need a break soon though.

Stay safe, have fun 🙂

Datacenter connectivity issues

I am aware there are some network connectivity issues with our datacenter that are preventing some people to connect from time to time, or disconnect those that are playing.

The datacenter has confirmed they are having a temporary network issue and hopefully will fix whatever it’s broken ASAP. Not much else I can do since it’s not something related to our server directly. I’ll update the post once they give an ETA

Thank you for your patience, and sorry for the trouble this might cause you.

UPDATE 13:00: The datacenter located the issue at their DNS servers and applied a fix. Will keep monitoring the server to make sure everything is fine on our end.

UPDATE 14:00: We haven’t received nor observed any more disconnects so we can conclude the issue is indeed fixed by the datacenter.

UPDATE 16:30: The earlier problem is back. I’ve escalated the incident with the datacenter and they are investigating the issue. Again, this incident has nothing to do with our server and affects a large number of servers in the datacenter. It’s not much I can do, except wait for their problems to get fixed.

UPDATE 17:20: I have applied a workaround to use 3rd party DNS servers instead of the datacenter ones and this seems to be working well. Enjoy 🙂

Clarification on the new Minecraft server

It seems I may have been less than crystal clear on earlier explanations, so here’s another shot at it…

What we have now:

Skyblock server
Survival Games server
Creative server (semi-private)

What we’ll have in the near future:

Skyblock server
Survival Games server
Creative server (semi-private)
New server – tekkit like

Now: 3 servers. Near future: 4 servers. There we go 🙂

Discuss, suggestions, feedback in this forum thread: New Minecraft Server – Tekkit on Steroids

New Minecraft Server – Tekkit on Steroids

A couple days ago I dropped a few hints in Skyblock chat about two new big things that will be added in the near future. Back then I might have mentioned one will be added to the Skyblock server, and that you’re going to love it. Still got a bit of work to do on that one though, so bear with me for a while longer. However, today’s a good time to give a bit of information on the other thing…

I know a lot of you have asked for something like this, and so I set to make it happen. After nearly 3 weeks of hard work a new server will be added to the MCSpaceCraft gaming hub.

It will run on Minecraft 1.5.2, but it’s not vanilla Minecraft. In a way it’s like Tekkit, or FeedTheBeast, but running a completely custom mod pack. Together with a couple other moderators we went and tested literally over 100 of the best plugins, and hand picked the best ones out there to make sure you’re going to get an awesome experience. It’s not yet ready for launch but it’s nearly there. Soon, very soon!

No matter your experience level, or your preference, I can virtually guarantee there will be something in there that you’ll love to do. For the die hard farmers we have flowers and trees cross breeding, lots and lots of bees to raise, crossbreed, analyze and what not. We have amazing machinery, we have computer networks and so much more waiting for you to discover once we launch.

While I’m not yet ready to spill out the full mod list, here’s a sneak peek into some that will be added for sure:

  1. Balkons Weapon Mod
  2. BuildCraft
  3. Equivalent Exchange 3
  4. EnderStorage
  5. Factorization
  6. Industrial Craft 2 (with over 10 extension mods)
  7. MineFactory Reloaded
  8. Mystcraft
  9. Thermal Expansion
  10. Treecapitator
  11. Wireless Redstone
  12. Applied Energistics
  13. Steve’s Carts
  14. Modular Power Suits
  15. Twilight Forest
  16. Forestry
  17. Gravitation Suite
  18. ExtraBiomes XL
  19. Jammy Furniture Mod
  20. Liquid XP
  21. Mo’ Creatures
  22. Forgotten Nature

Keep in mind this is just a short list, and there are many more that are already added waiting for you to discover.

So if you’re not familiar with these, start reading and get ready. You’re going to be in for a treat really soon!

There’s something I need you to do though, and it’s fairly important! This new server needs a name. Tekkit would be an understatement, and misleading since we’re not running a Tekkit pack. And here’s where you come in…

It’s a server made for you, so it’s only fair you get to name it.

What I need you to do is get those creative juices flowing, and come up with an awesome name to match the server. Not only will the name of the player that made the suggestion will be displayed on this site, on the front page in a blog post for everyone to see, but there will be an amazing prize at the end for that person to claim on the new server right as it opens.

Even if you can’t think of a name, go to the forum and vote on the names your fellow players proposed to increase the chances to see the name you’d like end on top. I reserve the right to decline the top voted name and pick the runner up if I feel it’s not appropriate – so get those dirty words outta yer mind right now 🙂

Discuss, suggestions, feedback in this forum thread: New Minecraft Server – Tekkit on Steroids

Before closing, I’d like once again to THANK YOU for your awesome support and donations that made this possible!

Skyblock Major Changes

Taking a short break from the two secret projects I’ve been working on in the past 2 weeks – one of which will be coming to skyblock in the next few days – it was time our main Skyblock server received some love.

A lot of major changes have just been applied on the server moments ago.

1. If you’re a diamond donator and disconnected while flying it used to mean falling to void and dying unless you were a fast typist. Not anymore. Now fly is enabled by default when connecting to the server, if you are a diamond donator. You no longer have to type /fly!

2. If you ever disabled your fly mode, you may have come across an annoying error message. Gone. Poof. Fixed.

3. You know it’s in the /rules that killing people outside of PvP arenas is not allowed on this server. We’ve received endless reports from players they were killed on islands, and one of the most common causes of death was lava or burning. You know how much I hate banning people, so instead I just applied a workaround. All players are now immune to lava and fire damage (except in Mob Arena).

4. Ever built that perfect shop around your warp, only to have players glitching through the doors or glass walls with enderpearls and stomp all over your island? Not anymore! Enderpearls can still be used to teleport around, but using them to glitch through blocks or doors should no longer be possible.

5. A while ago we introduced a plugin that will protect your most valuable blocks (including beacons, dragon eggs and diamond blocks) so only the person that placed them down was able to mine them back. Creative people worked around this – in a way – so they moved these blocks with pistons. While it didn’t allow them to pick up the blocks, it would prevent the owner from picking them up too if they wanted. Not anymore. Pistons can no longer push any protected blocks (beacons, dragon eggs, gold blocks, iron blocks and diamond blocks).

6. If you placed a dragon egg on a block, then later mine the block, the dragon egg would fall down and either be lost, or you’d be unable to pick it back up. Now dragon eggs no longer fall down and magically float in the air when the block they were sitting on is removed.

There’s yet a lot of new exciting things coming to Skyblock and elsewhere in the next days.

Because we care! Play hard, and stay safe 🙂