Server Guide

Getting Started

What the server is and what to do on your first day.

What you do here

You join one of nine factions. Inside that faction you join a House or make your own. Houses claim provinces, build cities and towns, earn coins and food, and go to war with other factions.

Everything is built by players. There is no server shop and no free land.

Your first steps

1. Join the server and pick a faction. You are protected from PvP for your first 24 hours. See Rules.
2. Join a House, or make one. Ask in the Discord or in-game to join an existing House. To make your own, open a staff ticket. It is free and has no requirements. See Factions & Houses.
3. Read the red playerbook. You get it in-game. It explains how the mod works and is the fastest way to understand what you can do.
4. Claim your personal land with /claim.
5. Begin your adventure.

Once you are on your feet, your House can claim a province and build on it. See Colonization and Settlements.

Commands

Words used in this guide

If something here is unclear or missing, ask staff in-game or in the Discord.

Rules

Breaking these gets you punished. Ask staff if you are not sure about something.

Server rules

1. Be respectful. No hate speech, no harassment, no personal attacks. Report problems to staff instead of fighting in chat.
2. No griefing or stealing. Do not break or take from anything you do not own.
3. No cheating. No xray, fly, no-clip, or duplication glitches. Only mods approved by staff are allowed. Report exploits you find.
4. No advertising. Do not post other servers or communities without staff approval.
5. Keep names clean. No slurs, hate group references, or explicit content in usernames or in-game names.
6. Respect staff. Do not argue with staff in public chat. Appeals go through the Discord. Bribing or impersonating staff is a ban.

PvP rules

PvP is always on. There is no toggle. Anyone who is not under new player protection can be attacked.

1. New players are protected for 24 hours. This starts the first time you join. During those 24 hours you cannot be attacked and you cannot attack anyone.
2. Do not work around protection. You may not kill a protected player with traps, lava, TNT, mobs, or anything else.
3. Do not abuse your own protection. While protected you may not use it to help your side in a fight.

Examples of abusing protection:

• Taking gear or loot from a fight that is happening.
• Body-blocking, baiting, or trapping players who are in PvP.
• Tanking hits or mobs for someone else.
• Scouting or tagging enemies you could not otherwise reach.

If you do this, your protection is removed. You can be punished further on top of that.

Roleplay

Roleplay is welcome but not required. You can play a lord, play a soldier, or just play Minecraft. All of it is fine.

Building rules

These apply to everything you build. They are repeated in the sections they belong to.

• Build it yourself. Generated structures cannot be used as settlements.
• Build what fits the land. No wheat farms in barren ground. See the fit rule.
• Towns must be enterable. Towns can be raided, so they cannot have defences that cannot be passed. See Towns.
• Outposts must look like a camp. Low-effort outpost spam is not allowed. See Outposts.
• No death traps. Fort defences are checked by staff during inspection.

Contact staff in-game or in the Discord.

Factions & Houses

Who rules what, and how you get a seat at the table.

How a faction is built

There are nine factions: Gondor, Rohan, Mordor, Isengard, Gundabad, Woodland Realm, Erebor, Lothlórien and Dale.

Every faction is made of Houses. One House holds the Kingship and leads the faction. Players who are in the faction but not in a House are Free Agents.

Houses

The House is the main political group of a faction. A House is led by a Lord and holds land through its cities.

Making a House

Open a staff ticket and ask for one.

• It costs nothing.
• You do not need land, coins, or members.
• The only requirement is an active player who wants one.

Getting land

Making a House does not give you land. To own a province you must hold the city in it. The House that holds the city is the regent of that province.

Kingship

One House per faction holds the Kingship. The Lord of that House is the King.

• The King speaks for the faction in diplomacy.
• Only the King can declare war. See Declaring war.
• Unhappy Lords can call a Civil War to remove the King.

Free Agents

A Free Agent belongs to a faction but not to a House. They can play and make personal land claims, but they have no part in diplomacy. No treaties, no war declarations, and no vote when Houses decide something.

To join a House, ask in the Discord. To make one, open a staff ticket.

Settlements

The world is split into 98 provinces. This is what you can build in one.

What to build first

Cities and towns need each other:

• A city makes coins but grows no food.
• A town grows food but pays no coins until a city exists.

Build the city first. The city is what makes your House the owner of the province, so it settles who rules before anything else goes up. Building the city and the first town at the same time also works.

Cities

• One city per province.
• 8 building slots. A city needs at least 4 buildings to count as a city.
• The House that holds the city is the regent of the province.
• Cities make coins. They grow no food at all and are fed by their towns.
• Cities can have as many defensive layers as you want: walls, tunnels, and so on. Every extra gate adds a capture point in a siege.
• Cities cannot be raided.
• All long-distance fast travel runs city to city.

Towns

• Up to four towns per province.
• 4 building slots each. A town needs at least 2 buildings to count as a town.
• Towns grow all the food in the realm and work all the mines.
• Every town is linked to the city of its own province for fast travel.
• Towns can be raided.

Outposts

• No limit per province.
• No building slots. The only thing an outpost holds is a fast travel point.
• An outpost is enough to colonize a province.
• Upkeep is 2 coins per day.
• Travel to and from an outpost has the longest cooldown on the network.
• If an outpost is raided, its fast travel point is disabled for 24 hours.

Forts

• A fort produces nothing.
• Upkeep is 5 coins per day.
• If a province has a fort, attackers must win a fort battle before they can siege anything in that province.
• A fort can build a stable, which gives it a fast travel point.
• Staff check fort defences during inspection. They must stay playable, so no death traps.

An outpost is the cheap way to hold a new province. A fort is what you build when you expect to be attacked.

The fit rule

Build your settlements however you like, as long as the buildings fit their surroundings. No wheat farms in barren land.

What counts is the category of the building, not how it looks. A Farm is a Farm whether it is a wheat field in the Westfold, a mushroom cavern under the Lonely Mountain, or an orchard in Ithilien. Same slot, same numbers.

Housing works the same way. Smials, dwarven halls, elven flets and orc burrows are all just Houses.

Suggesting a new building

You can suggest one. First check it is not one of the eleven under a different name:

• A brewery or trading post is a Market.
• A smithy or weavery is a Craftsman.
• A vineyard is a Farm.
• A warg pen is Husbandry.
• A quarry is a Mine.
• A temple or library is a Guildhall.

Economy

The economy is split in two: the coins you find and trade with as a player, and what your settlements produce.

Player coins

• Coins are found in structures and dungeons in-game.
• They are used to trade with other players.
• You store them on your balance with /coinpouch, or /cp for short.
• They cannot be spent on buildings, upkeep, or colonization. That is settlement production.

Settlement production

Settlements run on three resources: population, food and coins. These coins belong to the settlement, not to your coin pouch.

1. Housing creates population.
2. Buildings employ that population.
3. Employed buildings produce food and coins.
4. Population eats food. Buildings and wars cost coins.

If you do not have the population, the building does not run. If you do not have the food, your settlement stops growing.

Buildings and slots

There are eleven building types. There are no tiers and no upgrades.

Two extra rules:

• One commerce building per town. A Market or a Tavern, never both.
• Cities produce no food. Not a small amount. None. A city eats what its towns grow.

What each building needs

A building only counts once it looks like the thing it is meant to be. Below is what staff look for per type.

Farm

Feeds the settlement.

• A storage building such as a shack, barn or windmill, with chests or barrels inside that actually work
• Farming tools stored or on display at the building
• Water bordering the field or running through it

A windmill can be the storage building, as long as the inside is furnished and not just decorative sails.

Husbandry

Animals kept for food, materials or mounts.

• Small animals (pigs, sheep, chickens): a pen of at least 7x7 with normal fence height
• Medium animals (goats, boar): a pen of at least 12x12 with fencing they cannot get over
• Large or dangerous animals (elk, wargs and the like): a paddock of at least 16x16 with a tall wall, log fence or barred perimeter that suits the animal
• At least two live animals of that species inside the pen. The species has to spawn naturally in that biome.
• A feed trough, hay store or feeding station
• Shelter sized for the animal, such as a lean-to, barn or covered stall

The fencing has to make sense for the animal. A warg behind one row of oak fence does not pass. A boar in a proper stone sty does.

Fishery

Brings in fish for the table and for trade.

• Built on open water at least 2 blocks deep that connects to the wider waterway
• A boat, or a jetty or pier reaching at least 5 blocks over the water
• A drying rack, smoker or barrels for the catch
• Nets, crates or fish barrels around the place

Hunting Grounds

Game and pelts taken from the wild around the settlement.

• A hunting shack in forest or wilderness, outside the walls and outside the built up area
• A weapon on show: a bow, a crossbow or a spear rack
• A skinning rack or drying pelts
• Storage for meat and pelts: barrels, chests or a smoker
• Some sign of hunting nearby, such as a game trail, a salt lick or a bait station

It should look remote and rough. A hunting shack built to the same standard as a townhouse does not pass.

Mine

Supplies the province's raw ore.

• An entrance cut into a hillside, a cliff face or a dug out pit, not a hole in flat ground
• The first 10 to 15 blocks of tunnel built out and lit, with supports such as timber, stone arches or braces
• Rails, ladders or stairs showing how the ore gets in and out
• An ore cart, a pile of ore or loaded chests at the entrance

Market

The settlement's trade hub.

• At least 4 stalls, each one different in shape, roof or colour. Not the same stall copied four times.
• Each stall sells a different kind of goods, with the wares on display
• A square, crossroads or plaza that the stalls face onto
• Seating, barrels or crates around the space

The stalls must be real, usable player shops, not decoration.

Tavern

Where the settlement drinks and relaxes.

• A common room of at least 8x10 with a bar counter and drink storage on show, such as barrels or bottles
• Seating for at least 6, whether tables with chairs or benches

Rooms upstairs or to the side that suggest guest lodging are welcome, but not required.

Craftsman

Any trade you like. Someone should be able to tell which one from outside, without stepping in.

• A working production piece for that trade: a forge and anvil, a sawpit, a tanning rack, a mason's bench, a loom, an alchemist's still, whatever the craft needs
• Both raw material and finished goods on show. Ore and tools, logs and planks, hides and leather goods, wool and cloth.
• An outside that shows the trade at a glance: a chimney and anvil for a smith, log stacks for a lumberer, drying hides for a tanner, stone dust and blocks for a mason
• Storage for the trade's own tools and materials, separate from normal household storage

Guildhall

Where the settlement is led and its business is settled.

• A meeting room of at least 10x10 with a table seating 6 or more
• A banner, crest or map on display
• Something for records: bookshelves, a ledger desk or a map table
• An outside that matches its standing. It should be one of the larger and more central buildings, not house sized.

Harbour

The city's link to the sea.

• A dock or pier reaching at least 10 blocks into open water and at least 3 wide
• One medium ship moored, at least 7 blocks long
• One small boat or dinghy moored separately
• A cargo area on the dock: crates, barrels or a warehouse
• Mooring posts and lighting such as lanterns or braziers

Mint

Where the city's coin is struck and its treasury is kept.

• A standalone building of at least 10x10, built to a higher standard than the buildings around it. Stone or brick rather than plain wood.
• A smelting or casting station inside: a bank of furnaces, a mould table or a press
• Two separate visible stockpiles of gold and silver, whether ingot piles, ore stacks or coin stacks
• Secure storage such as a vault door, a barred window or a strongbox

Housing

Housing can be built anywhere. It is free and takes no slot.

A home only counts if it is livable: a bed, light, a door, storage, and a believable reason someone lives there.

Settlement population totals round down.

Mines and ore

The resource nodes of a province decide what can be mined there. You can see them on the live map.

• One node allows one Mine.
• The mine can go in any town of that province. The regent picks which town gets it.
• Three iron nodes means three iron mines across the whole province, not three per town.

A Mine does two things. It pays +1 coin, and it places ore nodes inside the mine that respawn over time. You still have to go and mine the ore yourself.

There are eight ores, sorted into five rarities. Rarer ore means fewer nodes in the mine and a slower respawn.

Upkeep and costs

• All of this is paid out of settlement income, never out of a player's coin pouch.
• Defenders pay nothing for being attacked. Only the faction that declared the war pays war upkeep.
• A settlement that cannot feed itself stops growing.

Ore node counts, respawn times and payout timing are set by staff and can be changed for balance.

Colonization

How a faction claims an empty province.

Requirements

A claim counts once all three of these are true:

Cost

The coin cost doubles with every colonization until it reaches 80, then stays there.

After you claim it

• An outpost holds a fast travel point, so a new province is never cut off.
• An outpost does not make you regent. For that you need a city in the province.
• The outpost still has to look like a camp. See Outposts.

Fast Travel

There are no waystones. You travel along the network your faction has built.

The network

• Cities are the hubs. All long-distance travel runs city to city.
• Inside a province you travel between the city and its towns.
• Between provinces you travel city to city, then on to a town if you need to.
• Outposts reach into neutral or unclaimed land. Each one links to a city of your faction.
• Forts hold a travel point too, linked to a city like any other point.

Stables and roads

Stable

Every fast travel point needs a stable.

• One stall per connection, and every stall must have a mount in it.
• A town only links to its own city, so it never needs more than one stall.
• A city links to several towns and outposts, so it needs a stall for each.
• Stables are free and take no slot.

Road

• A road connects a town to its city and cuts the cooldown on that route by 50%.
• A road can be a simple dirt path, but you must build bridges or tunnels where the land needs them.
• Roads are free, take no slot, and do not have to be claimed.
• Griefing a road is not allowed.

Cooldowns

Who can use it

Only players of the faction that owns a travel point can use it.

Sharing a network with another faction will be possible through Military Access once in-game diplomacy is added. That is planned, not in the game yet.

Cooldowns can be changed for balance.

War

Who can declare a war, what happens during one, and how battles are fought.

Declaring war

• Only the King of a faction can declare war.
• The war needs a valid reason from the list below, and that reason has to have built up in play.
• Wars declared out of nowhere are not recognised.

Reasons for war

Civil War works differently. Every House in the faction picks a side, rebels or the ruling House. Each side keeps the provinces it owns. The war ends when one side holds everything or asks for peace.

Which Houses join

• When war is declared, both factions hold a vote among their Houses.
• A House that votes against joining stays out of the war.
• Exception: if the war is for a province, the House that rules that province is forced in. A regent cannot vote away the defence of their own land.

What a war costs

• 5 coins and 2 food per day, plus 10 coins per battle.
• Only the faction that declared the war pays. Defenders pay nothing.
• A war you cannot feed is a war you cannot fight.

What happens during a war

Declaring war sets both factions to war status and turns on raiding between them. What comes next depends on the reason.

A war over tension

There is no province at stake, so no battles are scheduled. The two factions raid each other until one side asks for peace.

A war for a province

A battle date is picked that suits both sides. Players are teleported to the starting area for each battle. Battles are fought in this order:

1. Border battle. Fought in open terrain at the border. Nobody may build. Defenders get 10 minutes to dig trenches and pick a spot, then the attackers march on them. A capture point is placed at the defenders' position. Attackers win by holding it uncontested for 15 minutes. Defenders win by killing all attackers or forcing them to retreat.
2. Fort battle, only if the defenders built a fort in the province. Same rules as a siege.
3. Siege battle. The strongest settlement in the province is besieged. If the province only has towns, the battle is in a town. If it has a city, the battle is in the city.

Sieges

A siege is never fought at the real settlement, so nobody's build gets ruined. A copy of the settlement is pasted into an arena. The arena has retreat points for both sides.

Attackers must take the capture points in order:

1. The gate. Hold it for 10 minutes to open the gates. This gives defenders a chance to sally out or shoot from the walls.
2. Extra gates. Cities can have several defensive layers. Every extra gate is another capture point.
3. The nexus. The last point. Taking it wins the siege.

Siege rules:

• Neither side may place blocks. That includes lava and water buckets.
• All doors can be opened by both sides, so the only safe spot is the official fallback gate.

Battle rules

1. One mount per player. Warg, goat, elk or horse.
2. No other tamed creatures. No wolves, trolls, or other tamed beasts.
3. Faction gear only. Each faction fights in its own gear. Splitting ranks by gear is encouraged but not enforced.
4. One weapon per type. As a dwarf, for example, you cannot bring two crossbows.

Raiding

While a war is active, the two factions can raid each other between battles. In a tension war, raiding is the whole war.

• A town can only be raided once every 24 hours.
• A raid cannot start unless defenders are online.

Military access (planned)

Once in-game diplomacy is added, factions will be able to give each other Military Access. That means using each other's fast travel network so allied troops can move across the realm. It is not in the game yet.

Artifacts

Artifacts are one of a kind items with abilities you cannot get anywhere else. There is only ever one of each, and only one owner at a time.

The artifacts

Rarity tiers

Every artifact sits in one of four tiers. The tier says how strong it is and how rare it is to see one.