On Saturday night, 1/4/2020, beebs42, Asheod, and Narwall42 all defended the Siege Keep from wave after wave of Pillagers, including more than a few Evokers. It was a blast, taking a total of about 90 minutes (start to finish) to get through all the waves. Everyone seemed to take turns falling off the castle walls at SOME point, and more than once screams of “OPEN THE GATES OPEN THE GATES” could be heard over the server’s Discord channel. We got plenty of loot, many heads, and the Hero of the Village achievement was a nice, crowning touch.

Good times! Let’s do it again. What’s a good date/time for everyone?

This week things were kind of quiet on the server again. As a result, this post is for two weeks instead of the usual one week re-cap.

A few notable achievements, but nothing server-shattering:

beebs has returned to his Mesa Base and continued building it out, leaving the nordic cabin as “complete,” for now. He mostly-completed The Hall of Skulls (a trophy room) below his castle.

That’s about it as far as I know.

This week things were kind of quiet on the server. A few notable achievements, but nothing server-shattering:

beebs conquered and “hollowed out” an ocean monument that’s west of his nordic cabin in the Frozen Lands of Nador. Plans for the monument are sketchy at the moment, but include replacing a lot of the remaining prismarine with glass for a better view of the surrounding ocean. Also, beebs has opened a Rocket Shop in the Nether Mall. You literally can’t miss it.

stormtalon42 finished his Creeper Farm, and opened another shop in the Nether Mall. He also completed his Cape Wither (just across from the Creeper Farm) exterior, and is building (among other things) a nether wort farm inside.

court12b joined the server. We’re hoping for big things outta him!

There is a new rail line in the Nether “station,” right near the mall, that takes you to the Soul Sand Sea. It’s at least 2 layers deep (and seems to be 3-4 in places!) and should be able to meet everyone’s Soul Sand needs. Mine away!

This week, there were a lot of project updates, but not really “big events.”

beebs built a nordic cabin in the Frozen Lands of Nador, intending to use it as a staging point/forward base for raiding the Pillager bases in the distant, frozen land. The cabin is hooked directly to the Nether Railway via a portal in the loft. To top things off, a small ice farm in out in the back yard because everyone needs ice sometimes. There’s even an Ocean Monument to the west, which beebs has cleared of Guardians AND removed the water from.

stormtalon42 finished off his Slime Ball Farm, and opened a shop to sell his goods in the Nether Mall. Speaking of the Nether Mall, there are now about a half a dozen player-run shops in there.  

qatamari cleared out an Undersea Temple near his reef base, set up a conduit, and has begun raising turtles. 

This week, buckg and JTtheEZkill  joined the existing crew on the server. JT made quite the debut, filling the server chat with “OMG WHAT IS THAT” and “WHAT THE HECK IS HAPPENING” messages for most of his debut.

beebs and stormtalon42 teamed up at the last minute to kill the Ender Dragon Sunday afternoon after beebs went hunting for a Stronghold. It went well; the Dragon is dead and The End is now open for everyone to exploit. Anyone looking for the End Portal will need to travel to qatamari’s reef base. and swim east. You’ll see lanterns and some stairs up; the entrance to the portal is beyond that, marked by a netherbrick pillar with lanterns atop it. Enter via ladder at the base of the pillar, and you will be directly in the portal room. There’s a quick Nether Portal there for leaving, but it’s too close to q’s reef base to be a dedicated destination.

Nether Update: There is now a lot more minecart track available for most of the Nether portals. beebs constructed the Nether Mall just north of the starter town hub/portal, and directly outside the area that has rapidly become “rail line central” for getting around the Nether. The Nether Mall has several shops in it already (as of right now, they all belong to beebs), and room for more. Anyone who’d like to claim a corner in the mall can go ahead and do so, it’ll be a great place to make some diamonds off your fellow server residents!

This week, the existing crew on the server was joined by another Ars member, qatamari. qatamari went west from town and put together a little cobblestone base, but found out later that he had built near a Pillager tower! Welcome aboard!

beebs and narwall42 teamed up just outside beebs’ mesa biome village/base, and headed north to The Frozen Lands of Nador (where they may have been forced to eat Robin’s minstrels) to check out the rumored Pillager Fortresses that could be found there. After getting their butts handed to them repeatedly, the did eventually manage to clear the fortress… only to find that the Pillager respawn rate there was high enough that they had to beat a hasty retreat and head back home.

beebs’ mesa town continues to grow and expand, and he now has a villager Trading Hall located in the bowels of the mesa itself. With such great enchanted books as Mending and Silk Touch already available, enchanted gear upgrades should start appearing in players’ hands.

narwall42 discovered the mooshroom island that is basically just west of beebs’ mesa village.

QChronoD expanded his desert base some more, upgrading his cactus wall to (mostly) fence.

Nether Update: There is now a minecart track available for some of the Nether base’s paths. This is a single-track railcar track that runs from just north of the Nether Hub, and goes to the portal that links up to the overworld near the mesa biome. The “main” Nether portal is in the basement of the spawn town lodge, and is safe to use.

The Village Area Mapping Project has begun! Grab a map, run out to a “blank” spot, use the map, and then hang it on the wall. Help everyone know what’s nearby! The map wall (and blank maps) are located in the big lodge, downstairs. You can’t miss it!

We have recently established a small base in the Nether! Work has begun on a Nether Hub, even though we don’t have a ton of places to go to yet. Head North out of the hub, and you’ll be on your way to the portal that takes you to a mesa biome for that sweet, sweet terra cotta! It’s a long walk, though, so we’re going to see about some rail tracks to help with the ride.