The Future of Atlas
12-15-2019, 07:36 PM
Hello everybody, Pike here. As we come to the end of 2019, it’s easy to see how… interesting of a year this has been for Atlas. It had its ups and downs, but we’ve made it through. In this thread I want to recap on some of the events that happened this year and discuss how I think Atlas needs to move forward, both in development and community. I’m excited to express my thoughts, and hear the thoughts of others, so let’s get started.
So, what was 2019 for Atlas? Well, after the server relaunched earlier this year following the development period that started in late 2018, it came out strong, the server was capped at 40 players for a while, and stayed approximately that number during the first weeks after release. However, the server was consistently full (Staff had priority, however, and could join when it was full, I won't lie I was considering leaving staff at the time but stayed because I could basically ignore the player cap…. Only the perks, I suppose), and during this time Atlas was the most active I had ever seen it.
The initial buzz died off, but several large active nations, and plenty of smaller ones who were equally active, started contesting on the recently released leaderboards, and the daily player count was still very good. As it got later into the year, activity has fluctuated, but we’ve kept a pretty consistent player count as of late, and we’ve done some advertising stuff which I have noticed has actually brought around at least one new nation who seems to be quite the leaderboard contender.
Also later this year we actually had the split, where we created the server Shiraxia. Shiraxia is like Atlas but more oriented to PvP, whereas Atlas has become more PvE/less focused on PvP aspects. This split caused some controversy, but the devs are committed to it, and at the last SotS we actually heard of some new content coming to Shiraxia, called seasons, which from my understanding will mean that nations will compete to win the season, and it’s meant to bring around a lot of quick, fast, and fun conflicts as nations fight for top dog. I didn’t attend the SotS, so maybe I’m incorrect, but that’s the vibe I got from the notes.
We got some new content this year, three of the bigger updates definitely being cooking, agriculture, and magic, cooking and agriculture were released with the relaunch earlier this year, and magic was released later this year. These are the next two big additions to Atlas’ amazing custom skills, and I really hope to see more exciting skills in the future, which we’ll discuss more later. Cooking allows us to make custom foods with different flavors, to produce food that replenishes more hunger, has more saturation value, or gives us XP. Magic allows us to create our own custom spells using combinations of magic words, and cast these spells using custom gold, iron, or diamond wands. This replaced the previous magic system we had, with the three branches of magic. I’m very (read; very) bad at the new magic system, but I think it’s a big step up from what we had, so shoutouts to Tyr for this new magic plugin. Last but not least, and my personal favorite, is agriculture, which was also released earlier this year. It allows us to grow custom crops and berries, and harvest new fruits from trees, all of which can be eaten, and some find uses in cooking and brewing as well.
We’ve received a lot of smaller updates this year too, such as the new shop citizens, obelisk shards, skill trainers, etc, but we could be here for quite a while discussing them, and the new features they brought us. However, I’d also like to discuss some events in the community that happened this year, I’ll try to keep this brief since obviously a LOT happened this year.
As I mentioned previously, the first couple weeks after launch was a busy time for Atlas, as a lot of old nations reformed and several new nations came onto the field. Over time, the initial hype died off, but several players still played consistently, especially after leaderboards were introduced.
There were a few small conflicts this year, but nothing to the scale that we have seen conflicts in the past, and most conflicts passed quickly. Won’t talk too much on the conflicts, but it was really a pretty peaceful year in that respect. One of the bigger ones was Mezil vs Morvia, which ended the way most expected, with the relic back under Morvian control. This conflict wasn’t anything super special, but it has produced some good memories on our side, as I sailed for well over an hour with the relic, and then of course the conflict ultimately ending with Mezil’s “diss track”. That's really the only serious conflict that I remember, and only really because of the funnier side of it.
We can’t discuss the community without discussing the ban of AFU (Aka Atheran Federal Union, Covenant of the All Mother, or as many of us know them from previous times before they joined together, Aureus) members, however. I won’t go into too much detail because it was a really complex issue, but I’d like to bring up some key points:
The result of this on Mezil was some members leaving, but ultimately the most active members started, or already had, their own nations, which you now know today as Insula, Bhumi, Laeria, and Rosenrot, mainly. This has led to where Atlas is now, with a lot of smaller nations doing their own thing, most are solo or duo nations, with only a few having more than 3 or 4 active members.
So, that was Atlas’ last year, some great updates, some community mixups (For better or worse is based on your own opinion), and a lot of change, overall. I think this has left Atlas with some things to improve in the coming year(s), and that’s really what I’d like to discuss today: where does Atlas go from here?
This is not an easy question to address, but I will try my best. I’d encourage everyone else to share their thoughts too, because at the end of the day, the devs are making this server for us, and telling them what we think and what we want only makes their job easier. First, let’s discuss the future of Atlas’ development, then we’ll discuss the community and some other things.
Atlas as a server has amazing potential for development. I could sit for hours and just list off things they could add. I mean, the server has a great base for future development right now, it has a lot of solid custom features, and we could continue adding features and content to this server until the day I die, and still have plenty left to do. In this way, the devs have relative freedom, they can develop a lot of great plugins.
On the other hand, this can also be a detriment, since Atlas has so much that can be added, they have to make decisions about what features to add in what order. This is where the community needs to step up, I think. Like I said before, they’re ultimately making this server for us, the players, and if we can communicate to them features we’d like to see through our suggestions and feedback, we can really help the devs make the server we’d like to see and play on.
Of course, we all have a different vision for Atlas, for example, my suggestions (Almost none of which are published) tend to be rather complex, with a lot of detail, really encouraging players to take pride in their work and allowing some nations to specialize in certain areas, which encourages trading and commerce instead of nations getting greedy and trying to do everything themselves. This is just my take, and I intend to write suggestions that show these ideas. I think everybody should write suggestions that show their ideas, we’ll all have different ideas and our own takes on ideas.
So, to put it shortly, Atlas has a very sound future for development, and I think the community should also help by posting our own suggestions and giving feedback to help Atlas become the best it can be.
Now, let’s talk about the community. Like I mentioned previously, the community right now has several good nations, the issue arises in that those nations are majority solo or duo, and there aren’t really many new players looking to be recruited on a regular basis. What I can see from this is that Atlas has a good base of veteran players who are all running good nations, the issue is new players joining, and then new players staying long enough to be recruited and learn the ropes.
In this way, it’s going to be a slow and steady process of server growth, but when it does grow I think we’re going to see the best we’ve ever seen Atlas’ community, as there will be many solid choices for nations for new players to join, and I think this will let us foster an amazing community in the future.
This is really going to come down to time and advertising, so I think if we stay on the course we’re on now and continue steady advertising, we should see Atlas start to grow on it’s own.
I think the devs have a lot of exciting things planned for us next year, as we continue the storyline, get new content, and grow the community.
Let’s go back to my original question: where does Atlas go from here?
Atlas goes up from here, but I think there are some things we need to make sure to do next year and further into the future to truly make Atlas the best it can be, which I will list here before I end off:
That’s about all I have to say, I just wanted to take a moment and write this up so we can look back on what has happened, and look forward to the future. I hope everybody else is as excited as I am, and I hope you all have great holidays.
Well, that’s all for now, see you next time.
-Pike
So, what was 2019 for Atlas? Well, after the server relaunched earlier this year following the development period that started in late 2018, it came out strong, the server was capped at 40 players for a while, and stayed approximately that number during the first weeks after release. However, the server was consistently full (Staff had priority, however, and could join when it was full, I won't lie I was considering leaving staff at the time but stayed because I could basically ignore the player cap…. Only the perks, I suppose), and during this time Atlas was the most active I had ever seen it.
The initial buzz died off, but several large active nations, and plenty of smaller ones who were equally active, started contesting on the recently released leaderboards, and the daily player count was still very good. As it got later into the year, activity has fluctuated, but we’ve kept a pretty consistent player count as of late, and we’ve done some advertising stuff which I have noticed has actually brought around at least one new nation who seems to be quite the leaderboard contender.
Also later this year we actually had the split, where we created the server Shiraxia. Shiraxia is like Atlas but more oriented to PvP, whereas Atlas has become more PvE/less focused on PvP aspects. This split caused some controversy, but the devs are committed to it, and at the last SotS we actually heard of some new content coming to Shiraxia, called seasons, which from my understanding will mean that nations will compete to win the season, and it’s meant to bring around a lot of quick, fast, and fun conflicts as nations fight for top dog. I didn’t attend the SotS, so maybe I’m incorrect, but that’s the vibe I got from the notes.
We got some new content this year, three of the bigger updates definitely being cooking, agriculture, and magic, cooking and agriculture were released with the relaunch earlier this year, and magic was released later this year. These are the next two big additions to Atlas’ amazing custom skills, and I really hope to see more exciting skills in the future, which we’ll discuss more later. Cooking allows us to make custom foods with different flavors, to produce food that replenishes more hunger, has more saturation value, or gives us XP. Magic allows us to create our own custom spells using combinations of magic words, and cast these spells using custom gold, iron, or diamond wands. This replaced the previous magic system we had, with the three branches of magic. I’m very (read; very) bad at the new magic system, but I think it’s a big step up from what we had, so shoutouts to Tyr for this new magic plugin. Last but not least, and my personal favorite, is agriculture, which was also released earlier this year. It allows us to grow custom crops and berries, and harvest new fruits from trees, all of which can be eaten, and some find uses in cooking and brewing as well.
We’ve received a lot of smaller updates this year too, such as the new shop citizens, obelisk shards, skill trainers, etc, but we could be here for quite a while discussing them, and the new features they brought us. However, I’d also like to discuss some events in the community that happened this year, I’ll try to keep this brief since obviously a LOT happened this year.
As I mentioned previously, the first couple weeks after launch was a busy time for Atlas, as a lot of old nations reformed and several new nations came onto the field. Over time, the initial hype died off, but several players still played consistently, especially after leaderboards were introduced.
There were a few small conflicts this year, but nothing to the scale that we have seen conflicts in the past, and most conflicts passed quickly. Won’t talk too much on the conflicts, but it was really a pretty peaceful year in that respect. One of the bigger ones was Mezil vs Morvia, which ended the way most expected, with the relic back under Morvian control. This conflict wasn’t anything super special, but it has produced some good memories on our side, as I sailed for well over an hour with the relic, and then of course the conflict ultimately ending with Mezil’s “diss track”. That's really the only serious conflict that I remember, and only really because of the funnier side of it.
We can’t discuss the community without discussing the ban of AFU (Aka Atheran Federal Union, Covenant of the All Mother, or as many of us know them from previous times before they joined together, Aureus) members, however. I won’t go into too much detail because it was a really complex issue, but I’d like to bring up some key points:
- The primary leadership of the AFU was banned from Atlas, this followed the drama that resulted from their attack on Ryondell of Mezil, which upset many Mezil members, myself included, and we didn’t plan to return
- They were later banned from Shiraxia as well, ultimately crippling the nation, leaving it on the shoulders of less active members
- This was never officially announced to my knowledge, although everybody knows about it anyway. I’ve seen some confusion, especially from newer players, and I’d like to assure you all that this was not an easy decision for the staff, and it was a situation that had taken years to develop, I don’t want to talk too much about it or take sides in this thread, but I’d really encourage you to talk to some of the higher staff if you have any concerns about this, they should be able to explain the decision and address your concerns
The result of this on Mezil was some members leaving, but ultimately the most active members started, or already had, their own nations, which you now know today as Insula, Bhumi, Laeria, and Rosenrot, mainly. This has led to where Atlas is now, with a lot of smaller nations doing their own thing, most are solo or duo nations, with only a few having more than 3 or 4 active members.
So, that was Atlas’ last year, some great updates, some community mixups (For better or worse is based on your own opinion), and a lot of change, overall. I think this has left Atlas with some things to improve in the coming year(s), and that’s really what I’d like to discuss today: where does Atlas go from here?
This is not an easy question to address, but I will try my best. I’d encourage everyone else to share their thoughts too, because at the end of the day, the devs are making this server for us, and telling them what we think and what we want only makes their job easier. First, let’s discuss the future of Atlas’ development, then we’ll discuss the community and some other things.
Atlas as a server has amazing potential for development. I could sit for hours and just list off things they could add. I mean, the server has a great base for future development right now, it has a lot of solid custom features, and we could continue adding features and content to this server until the day I die, and still have plenty left to do. In this way, the devs have relative freedom, they can develop a lot of great plugins.
On the other hand, this can also be a detriment, since Atlas has so much that can be added, they have to make decisions about what features to add in what order. This is where the community needs to step up, I think. Like I said before, they’re ultimately making this server for us, the players, and if we can communicate to them features we’d like to see through our suggestions and feedback, we can really help the devs make the server we’d like to see and play on.
Of course, we all have a different vision for Atlas, for example, my suggestions (Almost none of which are published) tend to be rather complex, with a lot of detail, really encouraging players to take pride in their work and allowing some nations to specialize in certain areas, which encourages trading and commerce instead of nations getting greedy and trying to do everything themselves. This is just my take, and I intend to write suggestions that show these ideas. I think everybody should write suggestions that show their ideas, we’ll all have different ideas and our own takes on ideas.
So, to put it shortly, Atlas has a very sound future for development, and I think the community should also help by posting our own suggestions and giving feedback to help Atlas become the best it can be.
Now, let’s talk about the community. Like I mentioned previously, the community right now has several good nations, the issue arises in that those nations are majority solo or duo, and there aren’t really many new players looking to be recruited on a regular basis. What I can see from this is that Atlas has a good base of veteran players who are all running good nations, the issue is new players joining, and then new players staying long enough to be recruited and learn the ropes.
In this way, it’s going to be a slow and steady process of server growth, but when it does grow I think we’re going to see the best we’ve ever seen Atlas’ community, as there will be many solid choices for nations for new players to join, and I think this will let us foster an amazing community in the future.
This is really going to come down to time and advertising, so I think if we stay on the course we’re on now and continue steady advertising, we should see Atlas start to grow on it’s own.
I think the devs have a lot of exciting things planned for us next year, as we continue the storyline, get new content, and grow the community.
Let’s go back to my original question: where does Atlas go from here?
Atlas goes up from here, but I think there are some things we need to make sure to do next year and further into the future to truly make Atlas the best it can be, which I will list here before I end off:
- Us, the community, need to be expressive as to what we want to see come to Atlas, or changes we’d like to see, if you’re interested in writing suggestions and want some help, come join the suggestions Discord here, using this link if the previous doesn’t work or is too small for mobile users https://discord.gg/Mb6RCmw, or you can go to the news and events section of the forum, where there is a thread with the link.
- Everybody needs to do what they can to help the server grow, upvoting the reddit posts, inviting our friends, or just helping new players who have a question, we can all do something, and that’s what’s going to make a great community later
- To the devs: just keep being awesome, we all know you have the best interests of the community in mind, and I personally cannot wait to see what you have in store for us this year
- Everybody just keep enjoying this great server, it has a lot to offer, and the future only seems brighter, I hope 2020 is the best year for Atlas yet, and I’m super excited to just keep being a part of the wild ride that has been my time on Atlas
That’s about all I have to say, I just wanted to take a moment and write this up so we can look back on what has happened, and look forward to the future. I hope everybody else is as excited as I am, and I hope you all have great holidays.
Well, that’s all for now, see you next time.
-Pike
