CivWiki Monday Newsletter for February 20, 2023
Good morning and happy Presidents’ Day from New England!
Presidents suck though, how about server admins?
Well, apparently server admins suck because they always do, and totally not for completely unforeseen reasons that are not going to be evident in roughly 10 paragraphs. It was quite an eventful week whether you liked it or not and summarizing it all up is going to be quite a feat. It’s a good thing that today is a holiday for me. As long as we stay positive, everything will work out fine!
Are we ready for the news?
Featured
Featured Image
This week’s featured image is of South Lucassio in Pavia, a cozy little suburb south of Pavia City. Of course, it’s made by RektTangle who’s entered this as part of Pavia’s photo competition that closed earlier this week. There were a lot of good images and this one’s my favorite, but I’ll show who won later on in the newsletter, hint: this did. Great work from Pavia and Rektangle as always!
Featured Article
CivRealms was a long-running Civ server, having storied history in the Civ genre. The goal of CivRealms was to provide a different mechanical experience than the mainline servers it ran alongside, like Civcraft and CivClassic. Its most well known iteration, 2.0, ran from May 2019 and well into 2021. The administration were also much more involved in player interactions; although making controversial decisions, they were committed to making the server a safe and enjoyable place for its playerbase.
Many countries who were active on other servers, such as CivEx or Devoted settled on the server. Throughout its lifespan conflicts between players emerged, including the Hell War and the Great War. Additionally, several countries emerged with their own culture, like Carbon and Alexandria, as well as other nations on the server’s expansions, the Thomas Archipelago and the New World. While CivRealms is no longer an active server, its philosophies have continued in the development and upcoming release of CivReign. (Full article…)
This week’s featured picture is the city of Zexenia, on the coast of the main continent.
CivReign News
The CivReign lobby, built by Topaz4293. I imagine you spent a lot of time here…
So yes, the newsletter is going to be covering CivReign news, as I’ve stated several times before. It is the Civ newsletter, not just the CivMC newsletter. You’ve already noticed that I’ve reformatted several of the news pieces to accomodate for the switch — Sunday nights are going to be a lot harder though!
Well, let’s address the yellow elephant in the room. CivReign was set to launch on Feburary 17, 2023. (insert subtle foreshadowing here)
- The launch came after a couple of delays due to initially slow development — Cortwade announced on Feburary 17 that the launch would delayed a second time to February 19, following the previous delay from the January launch date. They’ve said that the damper for these was map re-exporting, as well as critical configuration issues.
- As a result, RektTangle, who has been doing a lot of the work, was promoted to Admin.
- RektTangle has been in contact with me several times, and has basically given me the impression that CivReign on launch, would be a “hackathon-like server”.
- There’s been considerable anticipation regarding the launch, with a considerable amount of nations awaiting launch; several CivMC nations such as Gensokyo, Imperial Federation, and Mount Augusta are bringing their own nations over to the server.
- BritishWanderer has commented that the launch of the server coming so early in a mainline server’s history (in relation to CivMC) is relatively unprecedented, and is concerned that the community would splinter once more like during the CivRealms/CivUniverse days.
- RektTangle has also posted a quick start tutorial for those who are new to Civ and intending to play CivReign.
- Also prior to launch, Cortwade released a new set of rules and perenially allowed lists of mods that players can use on the server.
Seeing that it launches on a Sunday night at 5:00pm eastern, I’m going to have a long night ahead of me unless something weird happens. So let’s see what happened during the first seven hours of CivReign’s launch (yes, I do cutoff at 12am Monday for news if you didn’t know):
Alright, well something weird happened…
- TTastic posted that they would be continuing to delay the launch for a few hours, with the last content post being at around 6pm Eastern Time, mostly blaming the delay on loading all the plugins, maps, and configs onto the server.
- However, by 8pm Eastern it was clearly evident it was not going to launch within the day. At 9pm, TTastic made the unfortunate announcement that launch would be delayed to the next day on Monday, February 20th, 2023 at 5pm eastern once again.
- As an offset for the delay, he committed to tattooing the word Civ on his ankle.
- On the bright side, if you’re reading this, then that probably means you’re going to play today!
- While some may have expected that the launch was not going to happen on Sunday, it still feels really underwhelming and disappointing that the delay would occurred.
- It’s understandable and they’ve said that they want the server to have the level of polish that the playerbase is expecting, it’s just unfortunate that it’s happened this late in the process, as many were anticipating the launch to not get delayed again.
- However, some players eventually decided to grief the lobby using a glitch, and Cortwade then made an announcement saying that griefing would be met with a ban.
It isn’t a Civ server without a launch day delay at this point and this time, there was two! I’m still looking forward to playing the server today, and all I hope is that they’re good and the admins invest in the community more.
CivMC News
The Imperial Federation Sheep Factory, built by Asgeir.
Give him rats…?
Brand new blood on the server came in the form of what I’m going to collectively call the Rat Pack.
- Claims post first occurred on early Monday morning, with the Great Thrall Clan claiming in the northwest and Arnuk, a new territory claiming in the lower newfriend reserve.
- The Arnuk clan quickly seceded and declared independence, claiming their use of “religion” created a rift in the community.
- Soon after the secession, PandaOLord from the Thrall Clan attempted to attack the Arnuk clan but was pearled; his pearl was handed off to Icarus but then freed soon after.
- The Great Thrall Clan has also arguably crayon claimed more territory, including some in Sovia, which was OK’d by Icarus.
Time will tell whether it’s more drama for the server or they’re a long lasting civilization, but all I can say right now, is that this is funny.
Western Half of the Server
- Icarus has annexed the Temporal Isles. It was a mutual agreement between Credix and Zolo, the Icarian leaders and DrBaconHair, Blu, and Jamiemie, the Temporal leaders.
- Soon after, Temporal leadership announced that they would also unclaim most of the nation’s territory that was claimed since December leaving only the city in Icarian hands. Most territory became unclaimed.
- Icarus also announced a build competition on their creative server
- Additionally, Icarus agreed to a mutual defense clause against raiders with Icenia. (pdf) It was passed unanimously by the Icenian Senate.
- Icenia also caught Bewsiej and Elithys deliberately breaking snitches on an Icenian iceroad, eventually resulting in Butternut trespassing into Icenian territory.
- Icenia decided to avoid escalation of the aggression, to maintain healthy relations with nearby Butternut County.
- Some also hoped that there would be some measure of accountability on the server for “drunken acts” as other incidents like Build Nights where the MtA voter tree has been stolen has been a point of contention.
- After last week’s declaration of war, and with Kallos mostly pearled, Warmia has declared independence.
- Estalia will claim much of the previous Kallosian land for a few weeks. Sentencing is expected to be stricter but still relatively lenient compared to CivClassic, with a post expected from the Elysian Pact soon.
- Due to inactivity, D_Loaded has passed on DonFuer leadership to Nuts and will helm the project going forward.
- Prime Minister elections in the Commonwealth have begun again; the three candidates, PergySkeel, reffelruz and OakShelf all have different visions for the country’s future. At the time of writing, Pergy is in the lead.
- Following an announcement from a few weeks ago, Pridelands made an amicable separation from the Imperial Federation.
- The two countries continue to be partners; the Two Lions Concordat, the peace treaty, also issues a mutual defense pact between the countries.
Eastern Half of the Server
- Let’s start with something lighthearted; there have been Paddington Bear statues showing up in Estalia’s 0,0 Mall and in Pavia’s Town Hall, showing the likeness of Paddington_Bear herself; they’re quite big and it is a secretly coordinated effort…
- Spoonce and Jamiemie were married in Pavia this past week; the wedding went off without a hitch with the exception of some drunken festivities afterward.
- Something more somber was that Pavia’s Crown Prince, Cissonius I passed away while “exploring rubble” in Kallos. He survived one dice day.
- The Dukes elected Paagf I, Duke of Vetranio as their next Crown Prince to replace the Rat King.
- Lambat City is also holding its 2nd Metro Council elections; there’s currently a record five candidates running for the council positions.
- Yoahtl held a Great Pigeon Migration to Exilus this past Saturday.
- Nick was also elected as mayor of Mount Augusta (although I’ve obviously only implied that as there is no public announcements. Don’t forget to throw announcements publicly, Nick!)
- I’m just pissed that Nick had to ping everyone for a copypasta. Did you really have to?
- IceCarim and BrickWall were appointed to the Supreme Court in Cortesia Del Mar.
- Meanwhile, a very long ruling about the legitimacy of campaigning for two different positions was made, we’re talking like 10 pages with full judicial citations. What the hell guys?!
- The international rail station in Nara is currently under construction as it’s undergoing some modifications.
I know there’s a big story around advertising, but we’ll get to that under the “The Metagame”, ok?
Everywhere Else on Civ
On the river of Norge, with Hylian_Gamer on CivRev.
CivRev
- Wheatistan was attacked by Adderall (remember him?), tomyy789 and CostcoFruits; Enna bravely defended the town several times, eventually allowing ma kapesi Janet Blackquill to aid and pearl Adderall.
- This however, is even more confusing as some actually vouched for Adderall to be able to play on the server as a vouching whitelist is active.
- While the server is not as active as the other two we’ve seen so far, Owain is still constantly making adjustments to the gameplay, including nerfs to boars, and fixing bugs regarding seasons.
- He’s hoping that the server will eventually release outside of beta in about 1-2 months as bugs get squashed slowly but surely.
- There are quite a lot of interesting gameplay changes that make it much different playstyle wise, including several new mobs and a temperature scale. If you haven’t tried it I’d recommend at least spending a little time on the server, at the very least searching for your own IRL location on the IRL world map.
Metagame Highlights
- GDan/Solitaire7 has been going off on CivMC advertising lately:
- Early last week, he sent out a poll for advertising research on CivMC in order to better diversify his efforts to bringing people on the server.
- I’ve also sent him data from my previous poll that I promised I would put publicly but haven’t :(
- Friday then saw him post a picture of Pavia on r/Minecraft as well as several other subreddits, which garnered a good amount of attention towards the server!
- I made a roast thread and roasted all of you on Sunday
- Kaprediem has written a reflection on his past three years on Civ, talking about the drama cycle and the burdens of responsibility while leading Lambat.
- Somebody finally noticed that the 3 alts policy that CivMC advertised was never put into place, which is honestly the best thing that’s ever happened to Civ in years
- Tybug has been updating SnitchVis’ map data and has put in a lot of work for a very niche utility
- It’s very cool seeing some old history, namely the demise of Civcraft 1.0, thanks for sharing!
- CivMC also made a shadow update on Sunday morning, although the details of which are not disclosed. Most likely, it’s a dupe fix.
The Fun Stuff
The cityscape of Shiroyama in Nara, facing the entrance of the Castle Grounds. Taken by Prawny!
Builds
Ok so let’s see what Pavia dragged out of the oven today…
- Blatlas’ town square picture shows the rapid development of just the area outside the Town Hall
- Not to toot my own horn here, but I honestly can’t believe I got second in the Pavia picture competition with Pavia’s main street picture that I took several months ago.
- Warmia’s rail station is looking fantastic, and not just from the front
- The dwarves in Dalgon are still continuously building their fusion react— i mean large hole in the ground which is starting to look really fleshed out
- Ok, it’s not feature-worthy, but Plupsnup is doing some work in CCTT with his farm setups
- I’m personally not a fan of Acacia but the Rat Nests in Thrall are going pretty hard
- Appreciate lichume’s first house, it’s actually very majestic
- Insert Paddington Bear Statue #1 and Paddington Bear Statue #2 here
- The Petergrad Art & Culture Museum is nicely decorated
- Honestly, I can’t believe that this thing is a wool shop in Pacem
- Probably did highlight it last week but ma kapesi on Rev is a nice settlement by the sea
- Additionally there’s an interestingly shaped tower posted by Alzuboxxer
And now, the featured pictures…
- Although everyone’s mad about the CivReign launch, the lobby was amazingly put together, another great build from Topaz and the Gensokyo gang
- I already showed you Rekt’s South Lucassio for the highlight today but what about Bedford and Lugano? Or his photography on the Rainy Wedding Day? You can see all of his Pavian renders on this brand new post here. He’s rightfully won the Pavia Picture competition.
- Imperial Federation has a brand new Sheep Factory built by Asegeir, it was built really quickly and actually does look like a factory
- Something a bit different from CivRev today, Norge is a Scandinavian settlement and hopes to offer something different to the table, its first build is very cute
- And of course, another one of Nara’s renders showing how much the city has grown. But I honestly like the more candid pictures, including this one that Prawny got too busy to fully render
Multimedia Projects
- Look at all the people showing up for Spoonce and Jamie’s wedding!
- Quauhtl’n’Mia is doing art again and has this very interesting depiction of wjkroeker in the nether
- On the boring but crazy amount of effort side, IceCarim delivered a 10 page ruling which honestly blows my mind, that’s more effort than this probably
- I kind of like the graphic design in OakShelf’s campaign posters, though, very vibrant images
- I really love the design of the invitation for the Spoonce/Jamie wedding, it’s a welcoming design and really highlights the showcases on the server
- Now on the other hand, this invitation to get sued is another lazily made parody and I hope this trend ends
- Technically a meme about CivReign’s delay but i love the dancing cat
- “But if you close your eyes…”
Memes
- Can’t wait to put this piece of news behind a Vine boom sound effect, which immediately makes it not funny
- Kallos and Elysian Pact meme
- Alenarith exists, but i wish it was a civball
- “You will eventually find yourself filing taxes for an imaginary nation”, what a weird fortune cookie
- Apparently Jackbox is what Yoahtl does in their free time
- A reminder that this shitty meme I made for CivMC’s delay exists
- learn to swim
- “No, I’m claiming it for the newsletter XP farm”
- “Oh my gosh the community is so ungrateful”
- bgbba is mad as fuck, from Icenia’s game of Gartic Phone
Delayed Cry for Help
A fun CivBall map of the prospective CivReign countries made by Alzuboxxer. Alzu won’t like this because I didn’t include the Estalia version, but they also forgot that Estalia joining is a joke to rile people up!
So I’m going to quote Cortwade that “there’s only a couple more things left to do. I’m personally incredibly confident we WILL launch tomorrow”, so if it doesn’t it is NOW HERE, and I will personally execute him as admin if he fails.
No advertisements this week, just cause this is getting too lengthy and while I would, it’s probably not going to be very interesting. However, I’m going to do the usual CivWiki shilling:
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If you want to support the newsletter’s or CivWiki’s mission but can’t do any of the above, feel free to contact me on discord!
Phew, well I think that’s it for this week. I probably missed something or eight things but this was a pretty long one, which might be the status quo for weeks going forward. I hope you enjoyed it. Anyway…
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