New players - What is the server about?

I’ve been seeing a lot of new players log on and then wonder what the heck you’re supposed to do here, and log off. Missing out on a great server, because there is nothing there explaining what the server is about
I usually have to type a long essay saying everything about the server, and what our goal is. For example, I’d say something like this:
PCB is a server where you can build your own towns, or cities. In creative or survival. The lobby is a showcase area, it’s not the main project (One of the many confusions) Or you can just do your own thing. To be able to access warps, sethomes and other cool things, sign up on the forums using your Minecraft username. Here’s my town “" and here are some other towns "__” You can view the full warp list by saying /warp. Although you can’t warp yet because you aren’t member… Apologies for the spawn being derpy, and all the random builds and crap around cspawn. We’re working on getting a new spawn… soon. The survival spawn is already being built.
SO my suggestion is that there could at least be some signs at spawn, (I mean the SPAWN SPAWN not the creative spawn or survival spawn, the one in the lobby. I’ve seen a lot of people just press the “explore this city” button and wander around for a few, and as I said. Log off.
This is not a rant, or a complaint, but a suggestion, to help better the server. Thanks. -Ani

I agree with you, there’s been so many players in the past that just explore Lobby and then log off because they don’t know anything else. Perhaps what can be done is something like we had in the last Survival Spawn where you walk down the hallway of all the rules and such, only for Lobby it would just mention the basics and understanding intro that the newbs should know about the server, then put a button warp at the very end that brings you to the current SPAWN SPAWN where from there you can choose.

If I may I have one suggestion though, might be totally in agreement for some players and staff and possibly not for others. On a game I once played before Minecraft, when you first started you talked to some NPC’s who gave you the player basic ropes of controls and information of the game and such. Then you would be asked a series of questions by more NPC’s up ahead to be tested on your knowledge so you could proceed to play the game.
-How this could play in affect for PCB(Lobby/spawn/whatever) is if we give the newbs a hall of all the information they should know on signs and then once they read everything they would go through maybe 3-5 set of questions where the player has to click the right button under given correct option to proceed. If they click the right answer they move on, if not they just start over, but I mean things like this would really help newbs get a better sense of knowledge about the server, what they have access to, and knowing the admins usernames and such. The only reason why I know some of you may be against this is because this server accepts players of all ages…some who we know can barely read or understand English, and that’s where this could possibly limit some players from enjoying their time on this server

With the new resource packs, you can actually implement sounds, and have people talking. There could be someone explaining rules w/ a real voice talking. This is a long shot, but if we could make that happen, it would be amazing. Although, I don’t think it’s very practical, because half of the time even I have my sounds off so… They could just turn their sounds off and act like nothing happened.

ive been thinking for a while there might need to be something done about this, but i agree all the way with you ani. Cherry im not seeing how it would be a HUGE issue, but I do see it being a potential roadblock

I use to drift around servers and when I saw big blobs of text I’d just leave.
You’ll find more players that want to build and screw around rather than just focus on creating cities, and anyway, it’s mostly older members that make cities. We’d just say “In survival you can attempt to survive the night in your shack and live life like normal minecraft, or, if that doesn’t float your boat, you can travel to exotic cities and become a citizen, or you can attempt to construct your own town to call your own.” But I think we should ask the players that play the most, see what they think. They must have a reason they play so much, right?

In my opinion, if big blobs of text are going to discourage people who don’t like the type of server PCB is, no great loss.

I agree with Jape a bit here. We don’t need a mandatory wall of text for players to go through. It can certainly be there, but as an “About us” section. The mandatory part should be short and to the point.

I agree with Cherry about “like we had in the last Survival Spawn where you walk down the hallway of all the rules and such”. This part is important. As for answering “Why play here” or “What we do”, Well… that is optional and may be different for each person.

Here’s the problem. When people do click Survival or Creative spawn from the lobby, most of the time they walk past the list of rules and don’t even read them. You’re giving new players too much credit as more often than not they neither care about text stating what to do. It’s Minecraft, they SHOULD know what to do. When they walk past the rules and guidelines then wonder what they’re supposed to do, I think the problem lies with the player.

Though I did get an idea just so you guys don’t have to explain everytime some clueless player comes in, and we don’t have to do too much work. A command that explains the primary attractions of PCB. What makes our server different from other servers. Our towns, our economy, our big city, our survival and creative maps, etc. It can be /about or /helpme or something of that sort.

Or we could wire a command block to spew a short 2-3 line blurb at them :stuck_out_tongue:

u can make them go thru a easy maze with rules everywhere

Personally I absolutely despise maze’s in Minecraft. If I joined a server and had to do that, I’d leave instantly. I like the simple corridor idea like we had last time.

after reading all this… ive come to the conclusion we should just scrap the idea, and just continue doing what we are doing, tbh

The other day I tried out this server that had a pretty cool setup…

Once you joined, you couldn’t place blocks. There was a message from the console with all the rules and such, and once you read them all and agreed, you could build. I guess we could throw in a timer so you can’t just spam the metaphorical A button…

We could have a command that enables building for guests hidden somewhere in the rules so we can be sure they read them.

Oh! I like that idea! All it needs to do is take guests out of adventure mode. It can be a command they type or a button hidden near spawn. Instructions can be listed in the rule wall.

Add some cool redstone wiring anyone?

Add some cool redstone wiring anyone?

I could try. How about a door in the floor that they fall through when they hit a button, which then drops them into a tunnel that looks like spirals down as if they’re going into a vortex. They then pass over tripwires and it triggers a command block to take them out of adventure mode and into the normal spawn village. Perhaps this system could be in a dungeon type place underground?

I’d like to deny this but I feel there’s still some potential to this suggestion.

I don’t see a need for a “What is this server about?” as it’s a pretty general Minecraft server. People should know what the hell a Minecraft server is about. Surviving and building.

But I would like some way for new players to be able to acknowledge the rules.

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Is it me, or is this some what related to the topic i posted a while back saying something about the rules and such? Like a pop up or test.

Im pretty sure people said that it is possible but we need for RAM or something.

┬──┬◡ノ(° -°ノ)

What I’d like to see is a way for someone to acknowledge the rules without being too obstructing.

On some TF2 servers, you weren’t allowed to play until you pressed a number which tells you what number to press at the bottom of the rules. If you chose to ignore the rules and just play then that’s your business and it’ll be your fault for getting banned. We have our rules set up but I just want something that will stop them for just a couple seconds and encourage them to read them before suddenly deciding to venture on.

When I played PVP servers they made you set up a password/had you go through a test thing
It asked you a question, gave you two options to fall down a hole, go down the wrong one and you get set back to the start, go down the right one you get to progress. Why not implement that? It was some form of plugin iirc