Pending Review Return To Ceardia

With the upcoming 1.16.4 update of the server, we will soon have access to exciting new nether-related blocks and other goodies. Also, soon, we will be coming up on the 10 year anniversary of the opening of MassiveCraft.

What better way to celebrate these things, than to create an homage to the past - A return to Ceardia, one of the great old worlds of early MassiveCraft.

What was Ceardia?:

Spoiler: Ceardia Map

Ceardia was the third survival world on MassiveCraft (preceeded by Aloria and Binral). It was the last world to use vanilla Minecraft seed-generation. It was later replaced by Daendroc and Ellador, which were the first worlds to use custom world generation.

Ceardia had two major cities: Silveredge and Lukkerdam.

Silveredge:

Spoiler: Silveredge Map

Spoiler: Silveredge Images (Courtesy of the Massive Archive)

https://www.massivecraft.com/the-silver-edge-city-mayor-3

Silveredge was the main city in Ceardia, as well as a major hub for commerce, factions, and roleplay. It's power and position was surpassed only by Regalia. The city was built where a river (the Silver river) emptied into the sea. The city was split into 6 districts: the Central District, the Golden District, Downtown, the Docks, the Farmlands, and the Outskirts.

The Central District was the heart of the city, housing city hall, and an info center. Only very influential and wealthy people were able to acquire land in the Central District.

Downtown was a more mixed area, and served as the home for artisans and workers of all types. This was also the home of the Silveredge Bank.

The Golden District served as a noble district, and also contained the Silveredge Keep.

True to their name, the Docks were the center of maritime trade in Silveredge. Featuring extensive docks and shipbuilding facilities, this district was also filled with warehouses and housing for sailors and dockworkers.

The Farmlands were situated on the north-west edge of town, and served as the primary food source for the city.

Outside the city was the area known as the Outskirts. This area was filled by seedy ne'er-do-wells, and criminals. It also housed the city cemetery, in which the dead wife of the mayor, Ninjabaver, was said to be buried.

Players could claim land for their factions in Silveredge. Most factions used these as shops and embassies. Silveredge was destroyed by the tendrils and then was later rendered inaccessible with the deletion of Ceardia.

Lukkerdam:

Spoiler: Lukkerdam Images

Lukkerdam was a faction and city led by Luukwullink, who was an admin at the time. It appears to have served as a trading hub, and was also known for building ships. On or nearly before May 30, 2012, Luuk had his staff removed for reasons not immediately known. (See here.) As a result, Lukkerdam was disbanded, and the land denied to other factions (as the city was built in creative.) It was later used as the site for a number of events centered around the character "MrsBaver" who unleashed the "tendrils" on Ceardia that later destroyed it. This was later changed to have been the doing of the void.

Not much remains on what Lukkerdam was, and the photo linked is the only one I could find.

What Happened to Ceardia?:

Spoiler: The Destruction of Ceardia

https://www.massivecraft.com/the-summer-food-festival-event


https://www.massivecraft.com/the-daily-crepper-lukkerdam-is-alive


https://www.massivecraft.com/the-daily-creeper-silver-edge-under-attack


https://www.massivecraft.com/the-daily-creeper-evacuation-announced


https://www.massivecraft.com/ceardiablockaded

As a result of the aforementioned MrsBaver events, and the need to delete Ceardia to make room for Regalia, Ellador, and Daendroc, there was a gradual destruction of the various cities and towns in Ceardia. This progress is documented in the "Daily Creeper" releases at that time.

Revisiting Ceardia:

With Ceardia becoming accessible against to Regalia, and restoration efforts being underway for many years, it can be surmised that a good deal of Ceardia has been cleared of void growth. As such, it's likely that some, if not most, of the coastal areas have likely been cleared of this Void Growth, including the ruins of Silveredge and remains of Lukkerdam.

Silveredge was a major port along a major river (the Silver river) and would make a smart place to clear void growth and set up a permanent, albeit small, settlement. Think a small village with a docks, surrounded by tall and dense ruins and shipwrecks. Silveredge's sewer, long known to have been filled with monsters, have become a dense, twisted refuge of void growth and fauna, hard to clear due to their deterioration and labyrinthine design.

Lukkerdam is completely destroyed, with only the smallest traces of it's existence remaining.

The Rionnag Plains are starting to be cleared of void growth themselves. The cleared lands are covered in mostly new growth, not unlike that which comes after a bad wildfire. Scattered across the plains are small, intermittent ruins.

The center of the island, particularly the mountains and forests, are still densely covered with corrupted void growth and inhabited by vile void monsters.

The void forests are made mostly of darker "regular" wood e.g. spruce and dark oak, and nether wood and materials. They are a dense, twisted forest, with dangerous flora everywhere (e.g. wither roses). Occasionally, throughout the forests, remnants of the dark tendrils that initiated the destruction remain, snaking across the land. The mountains are also covered in these void trees, and are thoroughly savaged by the tendrils, and otherwise corrupted.

Spoiler: The Tendrils

Rebuilding Ceardia:

Ceardia will have a number of niche environments not well suited for a full survival world. Considering this, and the historical nature of the world, it would be best to manage Ceardia as a quest world. The world would be redesigned from the ground up, loosely inspired by the original world. The ruins of Silveredge would be laid out similar to (if not larger than) the original Silveredge - the docks, the keep, the central square with statue - it'll all be there, albeit utterly devastated.

The spawn town will be the aforementioned village in Silveredge. There'll be quests to do all manner of things taking you all over the map, ranging from killing troublesome monsters in the forests (new mobs, such as the mentioned Elds, Canters, and Flasmann) and Silveredge sewers, to helping build new settlements further outside Silveredge.

This could be a progressive quest world, where, as enough people complete the various quests, which could be daily, the settlements are "rebuilt" (not unlike how the spawn worlds in Essalonia/Essa were/plan to be upgraded over time). Ceardia would be a developing project, and we would be rebuilding Ceardia in "real time", with progress being actually visible.

This will make this quest world significantly more engaging than Silverwind has been - it's not a one and done world, where most of the world is left unused.

This should be tied with RP events and quest lines! Have Regalia send archaeology expeditions to Ceardia. It's mentioned on the wiki that Ceardia had some fairly extensive Seraph ruins, thought to possibly have been destroyed, hidden in the mountains. On top of that, Ceardia is the historical homeland of the Ailor race - it only makes sense they'd want to continue studying their history, and the origins of their race.

Have survival-geared events, where mercenary bands go to Ceardia to help clear monsters, defend towns, etc...

With all that rebuilding would entail, the content you can create with this is virtually endless.

We could turn an abandoned continent, arguably one of the historically most important, consigned to memories and the wiki, into an actual living, breathing part of MassiveCraft, engaging for both communities. What better way to honor the history of the server, and also create new content?

 

I also want to piggyback something @enderdonut suggested - instead of just having ancient debris in the a copy paste nether world like in vanilla, do a raid system where you can get ancient debris. This keeps the value high while also providing a fun gameplay angle.

Why not have those raids happen in this world? (if not actually, then canonically).