Hello Atherys!   Today I shall write a bit on how the 5 Governments will work in Horizons. As you will see below they all have their unique spins and will hopefully appeal to a broad spectrum of players. What all Governments will have in common are their rights and responsibilities, one of which will be the assignment of towns and the distribution of town plots. (Unlike previous iterations of A’therys towns will be measured in Square Blocks, rather than restricted to plots of 16 x 16. More to come on that in the upcoming Town Plugin Diary.) In addition to rewarding town plots for set achievements and checkpoints, the assigning of plots may also be used as a system of rewards at the nation head’s discretion. While there is a risk of abuse, Staff will naturally step in if abuse goes too far; in addition to player-based means for removal of a nation head they feel is not properly doing their job. The Government will also have access to a currency called Argents that the Nation earns mainly through Shattered-Land Conquest. They will be able to buy special items, including necessary blocks for Airships (this is still a WIP) that they can distribute. With a few more unnamed possibilities the Government will actually have means to project their power, instead of being only a means of roleplay. Below I talk about the different Nations and how their Government works in Lore and in Mechanic.   Daidama Daidama is ruled by an Emperor which has absolute power. Thanks to our RP Plugin where it allows people to use nicknames, the elected Leader of Daidama will assume the role of this Emperor. They will, when being the Leader, act as this person, and if someone else becomes NH of Daidama they take over the same role. This does not prevent you from assigning your actual RP character a high ranking government position in case you want to RP as your normal character. Mechanic wise the NH will be elected by staff after reviewing applications (as we did in the end of Ascended). With the nickname switching it makes this easy and you don’t need to login on another account or have an NPC that is actually higher in the hierarchy than the player NH. (To compare to previous iterations; it would be as if we allowed the character Raviyna to be played by the player; rather than assigning them to Vizier each time)   Dalkun-Tir The NH will be the Outrider, a person selected by a God to lead the Nation. Of course no one is perfect, not even the Gods and so if the Outrider turns out bad the people can call upon their God (Mechanic: Staff) and send him prayers and he will judge the Outrider, either get him to become better or to get rid of him and elect a new one. Now the whole prayer thing will be a simple mechanic where we as staff will collect books with complaints (or compliments) in the span of a week or so and if something substantial (several people complaining about the same thing, to prevent “I heard he said”) we will talk to the NH. If it’s not correctable, we will kick him out. New Nation Head applicants will be screened, and placed under a series of trials (physical and mental).   Atvoria Atvoira is led by a council of the Guild representatives. This means the government has 12 player positions and 1 Staff (the Staff is only there to break ties. Nothing else). The person with the NH permissions will be the Guild Premier of the Law Guild, and is basically the only position that must be filled. The other seats will be filled by the respective guilds. Any player can pledge his allegiance to any guild and these members can then select their representative (think of guilds as political parties).   Klinholdt Welcome to the biggest Government mess, ever. Approximately every 30 - 60 days, anyone who wants to become NH can challenge the current NH, they can raise an army and all of these armies will battle it out in the Capital. The last one standing becomes NH. We expect this to be a chaotic nation, so please be aware of this before choosing to join (of course you can always stay out of politics).   Gennaian Isles There are eight kingdoms in the Isles; seven of them are ruled by a King/Queen (usually the mayor of that islands town). The eighth kingdom and capital, Falkynthos; is ruled by the High King, elected by the other Seven (they may submit any name, even a peasant if they so wish). Pretty straightforward.   So this is it in its basic form. Each NH can of course establish government branches to share some of the responsibilities that the NH now has. Additionally, becoming NH will add that event to your personal timeline that will be displayed on your Forum profile (if you have linked it to your in-game account). And if nothing really bad happened it will become part of canon (in case of Daidama this will instead reflect the actions of the roleplay Mask, however your own character may still be noted as an important official during the timeline). Also good to know is that when we start all these positions will be initially filled by staff to make it easier. But we plan to get players into it as soon as possible afterwards.  

Hello Atherys! Finally a new entry into the diary! So yes we are not dead Actually we are still making good progress towards getting this server finished. One of the main plugins is now complete and we actually will showcase it soon (more about this later). Our build team is working hard on the capitals and our lore team is pumping out stories and descriptions of our world. Even our patreon is useful! At this point I want to say THANK YOU SOOOO MUCH to all patreons. You make this so much easier for us!   The major plugin that’s done is the Quest plugin, the first of its kind done for sponge! And it’s fantastic, we tried to find things it cannot do and failed miserably (or our imagination wasn’t the best in that meeting). With that done we have now an additional team that is working hard and that’s the Quest Team, not only are they coming up with ideas and Quest layouts, they also will write them in JavaScript. So they too will have a lot do to. Here I would like to remark that we still are looking for more coders. That and builders are right now the biggest bottlenecks. So if you are interested send us an application!   This Saturday (the 8th of Sept, at 22:30 UTC) we will be part of the sponge anniversary livestream event. On that event we will showcase the first capital and the quest plugin. So join the stream and enjoy! For our patreons we actually will have something a bit more special, but they will be informed via the patreon discord channel (so look out for that too).   While map wise we were done with the terrain etc. We had one major thing missing and that was large plants and assets (trees, rocks and such). This has now been rectified and you can expect to see a lot more landscape shots. There I suggest to either (if you are one) check the patreon channel or to keep an eye on our twitter feed.   I know this is just a small update but I did want to tell you that we still have a lot of people working on this fantastic project. And more will come soon!   See you beyond the Horizon! Sellt

Horizons Discussion Thread     Hey everyone! Since the original thread got quite large in terms of discussion, consider this the new discussion thread for Horizons gameplay. The old thread will remain open, but this is the (for now) up to date thread.
 
Some basics:

Horizons Announcement Thread.

Main points:

A'therys: Horizons is a new iteration of the server with a map wipe, plugin wipe, fresh start. - We are moving to a new continent, this means the old nations are no longer playable. - There are 5 new nations - Atvoria, Daidama, Dalkun-Tir, The Gennaian Islands, and Kilnholdt, plus one unplayable nation! - We are going modded, which means you will need a client to play Horizons, which we will provide.   Speaking of modded: Haedhutner's Custom Plugins Thread. We are going open-source. Pop in and help out!   Town Management Thread: Main points:
  - Towns will be bought with in-game money earned from playing on the server. - Towns will not carry over. - They will require minimum populations to start, and will require regular upkeep. - The upkeep system is designed to push towns to have some regular activity. While not an explicit minimum, the less players you have - the more difficulty you will have in paying the tax.   We have an OFFICIAL build server for you to plan your towns out on and learn the basics of Conquest:Reforged. You will require the launcher to play.     You can read the new lore here. Alternately, keep up with lore updates here.

Are you looking to buy a prime piece of property this side of the Stormwall? Well have I got a deal for you!

Today we have a special post for you as a small update, which will hopefully provide some insight into the functioning of towns in Horizons. As you know, towns are an important aspect of the server experience. They provide us with shelter, community, and inspire us to build and immerse ourselves in the map. However, some changes are important to know for the release of Horizons. Towns   - Towns will no longer be purchasable with real money: all towns will be available within the game using in-game currency. - We will no longer be using Towny; a custom plugin is being developed for our specific needs. - There will be a minimum player requirement to start a town. No longer will one or two person towns be allowed to set up – our preliminary go-to number has been 10 people, but this may change (however it will not change drastically, so be prepared.) Without this minimum your purchase will be rejected by your nation head. - Each town will be required to pay a periodic upkeep through in-game currency. This will automatically be charged to your town bank; nonpayment will result in penalties up to eventual removal of your town. The upkeep will require that minimum of people to meet – extra hands will lighten the burden for you. Maintaining an active player-base will therefore be crucial to the survival of your town. We are aware that this number is high – it is meant to be. You may need to reach out to players you have not traditionally played with to meet the requirements. With this, new players will be valued as potential contributors to the towns upkeep and be welcomed everywhere. - Towns who keep their PvP status on (more on this later*) will be granted special privilege – their upkeep rates will be lower, allowing for less work to be spent mining and trading, and more time slaying and looting. This may not seem like much of a benefit at first, but players will quickly see the value in having to pay less tax. There will be more information on this process at a later date. - To facilitate players without a town, capitals will be livable – Considered a starter town, the nation head will be tasked with overseeing the running of their nation hub. In it you will be given opportunity for room and board in case you are unable to join a player-ran town. Your lodgings may not be as luxurious as if you were in a player ran town though.   More information will be released later, and all above is subject to change! This is the working explanation for the town mechanic – it may be tweaked, however the main points are relatively safe to assume as true unless stated otherwise.     (Just an example  of a title deed given by a nation Head)

A'therys Horizons Build Server Hey folks. Through the whole of yesterday I've been setting up a build server for Horizons which you can now go on, claim a plot of land and build on for whatever purpose you so desire. Below I'll explain how it will work. How to join You will need to acquire the ConquestReforged launcher, the download page can be found here. The version you need is 1.10.2. If you need a hand with installing the launcher please contact us and we will help you. Moving on: once you have downloaded and installed that, you will be able to connect to the build server on the IP build.atherys.com.  Once you have joined the server you will spawn inside a building (currently under construction) where you will be able to warp to people's plots, or just explore yourself. The spawn is currently being built, however you are still free to use the build server whilst this happens (it will come later on). [Please note, when adding people to your plot, it is completely your responsibility as to what happens in that plot. There are commands you can use to only give people access to build when you are online.]   How to get started We have a plot system in place on the build server which means that each player can claim a (maximum of 1) plot, add people to their plots, merge plots with friends, etc. To get a plot, simply do /plot auto and you will be teleported to the nearest plot available. You may want to fly out a ways to find an area where you and your mates can merge your plots to form a bigger plot. For example, a group like Exodus are quite big, therefore they can merge their plots to get a bigger area. (Merging plots should work, however if it doesn't please contact an Admin and we will help you.) Anyways, if you fly out and find a plot you want, you can also type /plot claim to claim that specific plot.   Rules All rules from A'therys Ascended apply on this build server with the addition of no griefing other people's plots. If no staff are on, please screenshot and send to staff over the forums/skype/discord as usual. There are a few rules with this build server that you must follow, they will be stated later. Staff will be monitoring this server as much as any of our other services.  If you are on the server and require help, you may use /helpop to contact staff (similarly to the ticket system on A'therys). This server works off a simple punishment system, if you are seen to be causing havock for staff, distrupting other builders, just being a pisswank in general, you will be straight up banned/tempbanned. To put it simply, don't be an idiot and you will be fine.   Bugs If you find a bug on the build server, please send me a PM via the forums and I will look into it when I can. It's good for you because it means we can iron them out and provide you guys with a good service to work on. Alternatively, you can also submit a topic in our bugs forum which can be found here.   Known Issues Some people have said there is an issue with the default Conquest Reforged mod that the launcher provides. Please use this version if you are getting this error. To use worldedit with conquest blocks, you must put "conquest:" infront of the ID. For example //set conquest:ice_lilypad_1 Most blocks can be rotated with worldedit now as of January 6th, however if there are any that don't work please forward the details to me and I will configure it.   I think that covers everything, but if you have any questions feel free to ask.  Many thanks!

Hello A'therys! Yesterday we had the Sellt Chat where I introduced what will happen with A'therys and where we are going. In two words: A'therys Horizons   Yes, we are working on a new A'therys, it wont just be another iteration with small changes, it will be basically a new game.   First, the bad things that will happen: All player data will be wiped, everyone will start new. This means no towns, no money, no exp and nothing that was sold in the Store.   Now, the good things and why we have that wipe:  Atherys will go modded. For what we want to do we can't stay with just plugins, but need to expand and going modded was the logical step. This also means a switch from spigot to sponge, which means our old plugins will not work anymore (no Towny and no Heroes). But don't fear, @HaedHutner is already working on our own custom town plugin (which incidentally allows us to have a town plugin that doesn't have a tonne of stuff that we do not need and also could possibly slow down the server!). Same will happen with the pvp plugin. Classes and skills will be entirely new, as will be the way you level. Store bought items, including towns, will not be available anymore for real money. All these things you will need to play for in order to obtain them. We will have some things we will sell, however, they will be entirely cosmetic.  Towns will be more restricted than it's now. You will need to fulfill some requisites to create a town (how many players join, resources etc).  Titles will also not be buyable from the store. You will earn titles through playing which also gives a lot more meaning to a title than it is right now.      Map One of the big mods we will have is ConquestReforged which will add over 6000 new blocks. Luckily, we got one of the best ConquestReforged map-makers to make us a custom map and from what i already saw it will be fantastic. Size wise it will be smaller, while the landmass will be about the same, (a lot of ocean has been remove). A big part of the map will be the Adventure Zone (Shattered Lands) and so the actual land where you can build your towns will be about half of what we have now.      Nations Another big thing: We are turning the globe and will move to another part of A'therys! You will be able to choose between 5 new nations and explore a sixth one that fell into ruins. The last one also will be the Adventure Zone with mobs, traps, dungeons, quests and an expanded Conquest System (for all the pvpers). The 5 new nations: Gennaian Islands: The Gennaian Islands are a collective of Kingdoms under a single national banner; akin to Ancient Greece. Daidama: Daidama is a ‘paradise’ of walled cities; where crime is swept away by justice, and atonements are swiftly dealt out. Dalkun-Tir: The lands of Dalkun-Tir  are lowland scrub and rocky steppes, inhabited by the spurned and exiled; hardened nomads who navigate the harsh landscape. Atvoria: Once ruled by the god Nalageos, Atvoria is a land saturated with glamour due to the dragon Zahatmos’ tampering with fate. As such, the people are involved within a constant story, where superstitions and fables come to life. Harugraun: Rugged terrain of mountains and forests; a land that pioneered gunpowder and rivaled only by the Daggerlands in ingenuity. It is a shame, therefore, that they happen to take five steps back every generation from sheer spite and strife. More Information on the Nations will be forthcoming, including their buildstyles.     My (your) Story We heard you and we want to give you more influence on the story of this world. As such, each player will get a profile page on the forum connected to the A'therys server. If you achieve something, (slaying the evil endboss, becoming Nationhead etc), you will get you an entry in your personal timeline and if appropriate in the Nations Timeline (Nationheads, Wars etc). You also will be able to add your own personal entries to your own timeline (only difference will be that the official stuff will have a "official" sign). Depending on all these things and our own ideas the world will also evolve. How far and in which direction, I can't say.     Release Date We don't have a deadline. We don't want to do another Evo and actually take the needed time to implement everything we actually planned.     Further Information I will resume my weekly diary where I will keep you all up to date. Additionally posts will be made to go into more details of what we are doing, what mods you can expect and what we are planning but didn't mention here (several things, but we need to be a bit further with it before it will be revealed).     Callout If you are a coder, builder, artist, pr specialist etc. and you want to help. Contact me or use one of the forms (builders) to join the team! I can't promise your money but i can promise you to work on a fantastic game and the pride that will go with it   -Sellt Pictures