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  1. #1

    [completed] New server plans (These are no longer 'new' plans)

    Note that this thread is quite old. We've been discussing things for quite some time. This opening post reflects the current plans for the new servers. So if you read things in this thread that don't seem to make sense given this opening post, that's why

    For the past 4 years I have kept the HappyDiggers servers up and running with the help from a couple of awesome volunteers. During that time I've pocketed most of the expenses involved with this. I've done this because I consider this a hobby and I wanted to keep my servers open to the public as much as possible without them having to join a 'pay to win' server. After some people (Jiro can be a real nag ) have repeatedly asked me to open up the flood gates that are your wallets, I'm now thinking about doing a server donation drive to pay for a server upgrade so we can run more and better servers. I'd like your input on the idea, how to present it, the perks and anything else you may have ideas for.

    HappyDiggers currently has 2 physical servers. On these two physical servers we are currently running the following:
    • HappyDiggers MC
    • HappyDiggers Vanilla (V.I.P. access only)
    • HappyDiggers Snapshot
    • HappyDiggers TFC
    • HappyDiggers TFC Hardcore
    • HappyDiggers Lobby (for TFC servers)
    • HappyDiggers FTB (V.I.P. access only, runs dev builds of HappyDiggers AMP mod pack)
    • BungeeCord Proxy
    • HappyDiggers website
    • Email
    • Cross-server backups


    If we were to rent two servers with comparable specs we'd be looking at $323 / month for the primary and $178 / month for the secondary server. Prices from here. So that's roughly $500 / month worth of hosting. Obviously we're not paying that much However it does give you an idea that what we're doing here costs quite a lot of money.

    Both of the HappyDiggers servers were bought by myself. Sverf is generously paying the electric bill for one of them. It's not $500 / month, but take the cost of two servers, divide that by 36 (3 years, 12 months) and add around $50 for electricity and bandwidth and you get a monthly cost of around $130,- So what we're doing is quite cost effective compared to renting a server elsewhere.

    The plan is to upgrade the main server. The parts I bought are:
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Size:  2.2 KB Intel Core i7-5820K - Boxed BX80648I75820K € 399,90
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Size:  1.9 KB Western digital Purple - 4TB € 164,80
    Total including tax €1250.90

    Obviously we don't need a donor drive to fund the parts now. However I'd still like to continue with a donor setup for those willing to support our community. I'm not going to go through all the hassle of creating a seemless world. It's a nice idea, but I just don't have to time and energy to do it.

    The plan is to create/configure the following (new) servers. Please note that the following lists are subject to change:

    • Lobby server, free
    • TFC freebie server, free
    • Jail server, free
    • ARK survival evolved, free
    • TFC regular, donor tier 1
    • TFC hardcore, donor tier 1
    • TechnodeFirmacraft, donor tier 1


    Current plan for pricing:
    • free means free.
    • tier 1 €15,- / for as long as we're running Minecraft servers. Access to all the tier 1 servers.

    People who have donated in June of 2015 or later will gain access to the servers based on the amount they've donated for a full year from the moment we open the servers.

    We will open up a market which people can use to donate. This market will also offer several other donate options for those who wish to donate more than €15,- Please keep in mind that we will reward ANY donor package with access to the tier 1 donor servers. Also none of the donor packages will have any kind of pay to win stuff. It's just a few little cosmetic perks you can use to show of your support.

    These are the current donor packages:
    Donor 15,00 EUR
    Spoiler!

    Donor Awesome 30,00 EUR
    Spoiler!
    Donor Legendary 60,00 EUR
    Spoiler!
    Donor Epic 100,00 EUR
    Spoiler!


    Outdated perk stuff and server specifications. Please read our Servers page to view the current status.
    Spoiler!
    Last edited by Rainnmannx; 19th May 2016 at 00:28.

  2. #2
    I'd like to add that I'll count donations made the past month (May, 2015). Those donors will get the option to 'upgrade' their donation. So if someone has already donated €25,- they can upgrade to V.I.P. by donating another €25,- making their donation for the server drive €50,- in total.

  3. #3
    Sounds like a cool idea to have a Donation Drive!

  4. #4
    Come on guys, I know you're reading this

    Please give me some input here. Do you think it's a good idea? Is it a bad idea? Do you have concerns? What would you like to see changed?

    I'd like to smooth out this plan before going public so the more people voicing their opinions the better.

  5. #5
    Prices are fair. Old mate who's been on the server for a week isn't going to pay 200 pounds to become an admin, but I also think that most people who would donate that much would actually want to become an admin. Same goes for the moderator rank. Also, I doubt the HD email will get any use, apart from the occasional junk mail accounts and such. :P

    How to announce it? No one option will be enough! Make an announcement on the homepage, set up messages with the announcer plugin, and do a promotional live stream or video or something, just to give the donation drive a running start. Get everybody possible in on it! Get as many people as you can to watch, and as many as you can to join in! Get as many Staff and VIP members as possible, including perhaps past staff (like flying and wordie and such). What happens during the LS or video probably doesn't matter if there's that many people on there, the commentary will be enough. :P

    She's a lot of work, but if this all works out, the donation drive will be absolutely pinging along.

  6. #6
    Lazy Idle Couch Potato Heptagon_ru's Avatar
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    An offtopic first: is it (easily) possible to make some "like" button on forum posts? So when I see a post I like but have nothing to say about it, I'll just press that button and the author will see that. Like an opposite of "Report this" button. Like TFC forums have. Because it is often the case. I hope it's not only me who would like it.

    About the donations. I'm thinking in boundaries of TFC server only, since play only on it.

    I would enjoy having some more cosmetic/visual perks, like:
    having access to an unlimited supply of all kinds of fireworks.
    a snowball minigun.
    ability to produce the same thunder which staff makes when appears near you.
    ability to issue some weird sounds , e.g. diabolic laughter, so other players will hear that (i saw it is possible )
    some particle effects (that is less useful and fireworks will do fine instead).
    Of course any bad usage of even cosmetic perks should be punished (and their usage should be logged).

    Some other funny perks could be:
    An access to a random item dispenser. So once a real-time week or day the player can come to Spawn and push a button and get a random TFC item. It can be from dirt to red steel armor.
    A free summonable immortal horse, like that Arvak from Skyrim Dawngard. With limitation how many summonings per time period. Maybe just a one-time-use but renewable in a dispencer spawn egg with tamed and saddled horse.
    A vanilla beacon, so the person can place it on the base. But without effects, purely cosmetic.

    Now some criticism.

    Personally I don't like that people can get VIP/Mod/Admin status for money.
    It's unsafe - bad people or competitors can get access to data and corrupt, steal, get personal info, etc.
    Also this practice could potentially decrease trust to the staff/VIPs. Now we know and sure that staff and VIPs are promoted because of their deeds, and they have earned that and were watched long time before promotion.
    I am not sure that the announced money amount will work as a good enough barrier.
    Surely I am not experienced in these matters, and I'm sure you guys have discussed it and have solid experience.

    About the mail perk ... will it be interesting for people? I guess people either have a personal mailbox already and having another one will be uncomfortable, or they dont use mail at all It is useful for staff, for official matters.
    Again - not experienced.

    Update: lol, while I was writing it, both InsaneJ and Pernix posted ))
    Last edited by Heptagon_ru; 1st June 2015 at 12:56.

  7. #7
    Lazy Idle Couch Potato Heptagon_ru's Avatar
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    Btw, I'm not sure about Kickstarter, I have an impression that it is for heavier projects. Maybe some other platform, like the one Kitty used recently, some Patreon thing.

    And another concern about new staff: of course it is unlikely that like 10 people will suddenly pay and become new moderators. But if so - who will control them during the probation? Current staff is pretty busy as I understand, and prism helps a lot. But admins/moderators have powers which are probably not logged, this complicates matters ...
    Last edited by Heptagon_ru; 1st June 2015 at 13:52.

  8. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by Heptagon_ru View Post
    Btw, I'm not sure about Kickstarter, I have an impression that it is for more heavy projects. Maybe some other platform, like the one Kitty used recently, some Patreon thing.

    And another concern about new staff: of course it is unlikely that like 10 people will suddenly pay and become new moderators. But if so - who will control them during the probation? Current staff is pretty busy as I understand, and prism helps a lot. But admins/moderators have powers which are probably not logged, this complicates matters ...
    To solve the problem with buying and supervising the Mod. and Admin ranks we could set for our donators some Lite versions of those ranks. The current staff members will be their supervisors which control how they act on the server (if they respect others, they do their job etc.) and after a period, the main staff of the server will decide if we give full access to the guy or not (something similar to VIPs, from Normal to VIP).

    The lite versions will be:

    Moderator Lite (ML) - their treatment will be on the same level as VIPs but, obviously, they will have more commands and privileges than VIPs.
    Admin Lite (AL) - they will be treated on the same level as current Moderators but with a few more privileges than the mentioned rank

    Like I said earlier, after a period (lets say we can do this monthly) we will decide if one of the donators are eligible for the full access rank, Mod. and Admin.

  9. #9
    Do the perks interest you?
    No. I don't care that much for perks. I know that even with donating you wouldn't just be able to buy yourself mod or admin, considering there is probably some sort of trial period. It still feels kinda not right though.
    A separate HD e-mail seems kinda redundant. I don't know what the use of it would be.


    What other perks would you like to see?
    For me personally, the only perk I'd like to see added is that you can make dispenser in tfc :P It's a config option afaik. Maybe some other people would be interested in changing other configs options.


    Would you be willing to donate? If so, how much?
    Yes, 10 euros. Possibly more considering this donation drive is a big investment.


    How should we present this? Our website, kickstarter, something else?
    I think a big, visible progress bar on the website itself, would be ideal. Perhaps with a link to a more suitable medium for things like this.
    http://i.imgur.com/v4naT6Q.png

  10. #10
    Lazy Idle Couch Potato Heptagon_ru's Avatar
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    For me it would be useful to see some separate type of announcement, like annual. So I could consider donating again.
    Maybe as some form of celebration, idk ... A server's happybirthday ... And people could gift server stuff ... Then server should have name )) And naming server can be one of the perks! ))

    And the announcement should clearly show somehow that I have donated long time ago, because I will not remember that and will always think that I've just recently donated.
    But I should think "hey, wow, a year has passed since I donated, and I still enjoy HD and still have job and earn money, let's donate again".

    I.e. the targeting should be divided onto two parts: for new donators and for people who already donated.
    I can't think yet about possible good rewards for re-donating.

    About that great idea with bar: lol, there could be two parallel bars, one green with donations, and one blue with expenses ))

    Hmmm, since the majority of players are very young, we should found few and ask their opinion. I suspect that staff and VIPs are in general more adult then most of players, so our desired rewards don't match theirs.
    Last edited by Heptagon_ru; 1st June 2015 at 14:32.

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