It may not be done but it is too spread out. Going to Andy's house and the dance club was optional. Now the most used things (market and town portals) are on opposite ends. I feel like I need a swiftness potion to get over there! :confused:

 

Luckily there is a speed boost in spawn.

 

I am with revan on this one, the new spawn is not to my liking at all, its way to spacious and there is nothing to fill the gaps, not to mention the dots everywhere that make it look like someone barfed up a rainbow of dots over spawn. I personally have already built my own version of spawn previous to this post in a single player creative world just to see what things would look like if they were done just a little differently, and trust me it has made a lot of a difference.
With the new layout of portals and the removal of the mining and nether structures, we have a ridiculous amount of space empty in spawn, unless there are major changes to what they have already done, it is not going to get better no matter how you try to fill the gap.
I would post screenshots of what I have already done but I feel they would be unappreciated by the people who have worked on spawn currently and besides that it is not done, but trust me it looks so different, I have started rebuilding a few of the shops and totally reorganized the positions of a lot of the shops and such.

Also Shotgunboy0130 http://imgur.com/I2P5kH2,8BpeoIv,JkCNwSS,FnBMJi2 - I think thats what you wanted. :p

But I agree I would love to see a total revamp of spawn from scratch and allowing users to have a major part in that would be awesome. Ofcourse there would have to be certain requirements but it would be awesome none the less.

~Jakey

 

I do not like the current spawn, either. And I completely understand it is not finished. However, at this rate, it is starting to feel like a doll house, with mismatched scaling, styles, and simplicity with open space that cannot logically fit anything later (such as the portal areas). It's a mess; there is no consistency or cohesion. (Another thing it reminds me of is a toy car play mat.)

Our spawn should not be done until whoever is redoing it has taken a look at spawns on other popular servers. Do not copy, but take from for brain food and ideas. Spawn needs to be grand, detailed, and match the server's theme. Everything needs to be consistent, and stylistic choices that are to guide and help users need to be done in ways that users not only enjoy, but can clearly understand and follow.

Last spawn was good at being grand and unique - whatever direction spawn is going now is the complete opposite. Very simple, no detail, nothing unique. Having a plain spawn with mismatched styles and scales will not impress users who first join. First impressions are everything.

Although, if there is a contest for designing spawn, I would like to see those designs more as a base, rather than a direct recreation. ECC still needs it's own flare and touch to whatever spawn is.

 

Personally i think that spawn is a disgrace to ecc, are server does not represent what that spawn represents sorry to the staff who built it but it is not to my liking at all, i have built many spawns, i have a build team of my own, and we have built some magnificent spawns, but andrew has held back on the idea of having a build team on this server for times like these when the server needs a nice spawn.

 

I'm an MMO playing Amish gangster
Thanks for blowing my cover

 

As Clou said, this may be posted a bit early, as construction isn't finished yet. However, my initial reaction to spawn is; far too open, directionless, and random. I'll expand on these below, but I would honestly like to have some player influence on the new spawn. I'm biased, as I would personally love to build a spawn for ECC, even if it was only a small part of it, but I think that ECC has a wide range of building talent that should be tapped into for the new spawn. Right now its just... eh... I'll explain my points below.

Far too open - I'm sure this view is shared by a lot of players, but right now there's sooo much unused space between portals, it's extremely annoying to run 200 blocks just to get to a portal. I mean, the whole point of the portals are to provide fast transportation to the different things in ECC, it doesn't make sense to spread them out so much that this quick transportation is highly diminished. I really hope that spawn will be added upon in the coming weeks, because right now it's just flat, uninteresting landscape between the important places of spawn.

Directionless - This is my point against those saying the new spawn is "more attractive to newer players" or "better than the old, cramped spawn". You spawn into the server and see... what? You see a hodgepodge of signs that aren't giving a clear message to anyone. I personally even get confused to what the signs are trying to say, and can't distinguish what's important and what's not. I wasn't a huge fan of the old spawn, but I did like how everything was very condensed. New players spawn and see the important stuff in front of them. Portals, SG, Warps, and the Tutorial. The new spawn you can just barely see the "EcoCityCraft" Sign and a few distant portals. Worst of all, the Tutorial portal is given no love and hidden in the corner, making it very unnoticeable for first time ECC'ers. The spawn definitely needs a more builder-friendly appearance, a clear path they need to take as to learn about the server.

Random - This is a personal opinion, and I imagine that it'll be changed in the future, but right now there's all these random buildings scattered across spawn that serve 0 purpose. These little buildings don't really add interest to the spawn but just take up space instead. Besides this, the placement of portals is just bizarre to me. You have all these nice, looming portals in one half of the spawn, and then the Market portal is tucked away in its own little building. To be honest, it just looks extremely out of place, and it irks me.

The build scheme of spawn itself was pretty bad before, and remains that way now. The server stores, which are the only thing that really stayed the same, are as all over the place as ever. We literally have a entire quarter of spawn that could be used to space out the shops and make everything look nicer and more organized. There's huge roads leading to each portal with plain stonebrick, along with some sporadic tree placements, but there's so much more that we could be using this space for. The spawn is ECC's first impression to new players, it's supposed to represent what the server stands for. Honestly, right now it's an unorganized, crazy place that does not give an accurate portrayal of what ECC is. This is my biggest problem with spawn.

While I do have a long list of things I don't like about this new spawn, there are portions that I'd like to keep if I had my perfect spawn for the server. Those new portals? Awesome, they're so much more interesting than the previous ones, and the art above them is another thing I like. Because it's more spread out, there's less lag, which is also a great thing for players who hang around spawn a lot. I just feel that with some help from the community, the spawn could be so much more than what it is now. And anyway, that's my rant, thanks for reading.

tl; dr?: The spawn is too spread out, directionless, and random. I don't like it, and hope that some drastic changes can be made to revamp it.

 

I'd like to point out that spawn looks horrible on Jakey's texture pack, and I myself believe that with a default (or higher res remake) texture it looks a whole lot better. And yes, it's not perfect. And I know it won't be perfect. But we can't afford to lose our spawnshops (rebuilding those will cost A LOT of time), we have limited space, we have to keep it simple, we have to make it so that new players can easily figure out where to go and have everything open and visible.

The previous spawn had none of those things. It was just a bunch of stuff thrown together and pasted onto each other over time.

As for what Jakey said about the "rainbow barf", Do you prefer the old big wool roads?

Honestly, the old spawn was a horrid mess, at least this one is a bit organized. People can easily find what they're looking for, the only real problem I've come across is the fact that people need to walk more, (and I know several ways to solve this, which I will propose to andrew) but aside from that, everything is visible and will be easy to navigate when we're done.

also jakeyray18 I'd love to see your design.



EDIT:

Although I agree that the spawnshops are a horrid mess, it's just not feasible to change it.

 

Im really glad he did a TL:DR
I respect his opinion and I'm at work

 

I think Revan's idea should exist in the new world of 'Rising' in ECC, i think that having the same spawn for both world will be just weird. I would love to see this as a competition where the player who wins gets Eco Dollars maybe. But it is andrew's decision at the end of the day so, we'll wait and see.

 

Spoiler

I am looking at spawn on default, and on my other six texture packs. Texture packs are not a good excuse - especially when you say higher res is better, considering many people can't logically run higher res.

If you can build UP, you can scale things properly, make more dynamic and interesting buildings, give details, etc. "We have to keep it simple" - is this by Andrew's rules/guidelines for redoing spawn, or just the designers group decision? Simple can still be dynamic and detailed. Things shouldn't be limited to the point of TOO simple. And as it stands, it looks like even OLD users have no idea where anything is... so how on earth is it currently - and going towards - being "easily figured out"? Open space and giant portals =/= "easy to figure out." In fact, it makes things a lot harder unless EVERYTHING is scaled large, not JUST very select things.

Previous spawn was at least intuitive for those who cared enough to really try the server out. Being compact was good. New users NEVER want to be running around trying to find something that should be IMMEDIATELY or QUICKLY available. So, if spawn stays giant space and long runs like this, I highly, highly suggest spawning users directly in front of clearly labeled warp signs. As well, even though previous spawn was copy-pasted and built over time, it was all the same style with proper scaling and simple paths and setup.

Old spawn was not a horrid mess... It had flow. Yes, things may have been in oddball spots, but overall it had a set plan (very square and block-based (think streets in America)), which was easy to understand, and it WAS organized. Organization comes in many, so very many forms. Previous spawn was organized by corner and NESW directions. Currently? There is no proper organization - it is spread out with no clear direction (such as the SG space completely hiding the market and not fitting in at all). People are also stating they are having trouble finding things, so I don't see how it is easier yet. Visibility highly depends on each user, and as a guide, it should be built to be visible for even the crappiest of computers and especially non-donors (not everyone has fly).

EDIT: As a note, if the market area cannot be redone, then spawn should be built BASED ON THE MARKET AREA. Consistency is absolutely key. Mismatched spawns are never good first impressions.

 

Well duh, if this was the final spawn, I would hope the nightmare would end. It is like the opposite of a tourist attraction, all empty land.

 

When I first saw the new spawn, I was so confused. For people with pretty bad computers like me and for those who don't really know the lag at the beginning, I at least have render distance at tiny. So when I did /spawn, I came to nothing around me except some stone bricks and a sign that said "follow the blue path for spawn portals." So I did, and when I saw the new portal I was disgusted.

I really don't see how making the portals bigger and throwing them against the edge of the map makes them any more organized. Even the dots were not even placed like it mattered. It looked like someone just broke some blocks and replaced them with wool just to get it done.

Dots are so much worse than paths. Kuke, I didn't even look at the paths because it was so easy to figure out where to go and I loved how when you spawned there was everything at your fingertips. It takes quite some time to get to the portals.

My main question is where is the creativity? When you used to join the spawn, you were sent to another world. A rocket ship, the nether mountain, the ravine. Statues everywhere, a snipe box and a mansion. Where did it go? I really think a crazy mess is the best way for things to express themselves.

Now, tell me this. I'm joining a server and I'm practically prepared to spend hours farming in a straight line. That sounds boring enough. As moofin said, first impressions are everything. If I went to a server that didn't sound as fun as a concept before trying it, and I saw some generic spawn with portals and some swords above one to symbolize PVP, would I stay? I know I wouldn't, because I personally hate generic.

 

The dots will not be staying. They *were* just placed to get it done.

 

I know right, they need to change the spawn quickly, or else the server is gonna collapse and do the opposite of attracting new players.

 

Yes.

 

yes 11000000111001Shane

those ones and zeros are binary code for 12,345

 

Good for you.