A reflection on LOTC

[the GOAT of the craft 606]

Hello everyone.

 

I played this server back in Aegis and stopped playing on the second map. In my times as a young man I spent many days of my early teenage years running down the King's Road, being a bandit with Kane before finally ending up with the Flays for the remainder of Aegis and the White Rose for the second map. I distinctly remember spending my times immersed in the worlds that LOTC had created for my young mind to explore. I wandered far and wide, I met many different people in character (some of who I still talk to this day), all through the medium of in game LOTC chat. I would send messages to people I thought were cool and talk with them in /msg and then get their skype. We would have a skype chat of a few of us, all chatting shit and meeting up IG as we were part of a larger group. I saw nothing wrong with this as we didn't plan any nefarious plots to alter the narrative of our roleplay, or the roleplay of the wider server.

 

I left the server for a long time, and upon being made redundant from work came back to try and grasp a bit of the excitement that this server brought me when I was a nerdy little teenage boy, sat in my bedroom grinding out hours on a MC roleplay server.

 

I came back in October last year and played on and off. I have found my time to be much worse than when LOTC was first created.

 

I understand that technologically (at least outside of LOTC) things have progressed since I played, but discord has done so much damage to roleplay. There was a time, many years ago, that you would have to seek out someone in game to get a job. You would interact with them, let them know what you wanted to do. They would offer you a role in their nation doing whatever job it was you wanted, if they have a place for it. Now it's all done through discord. In fact, EVERYTHING seems to be done through discord. Want to be a steward of a city? Here, join our discord and apply there. Want to make any progress at all in the group you're in? Join their discord, become part of their community and OOCly befriend them. And honestly, this shit sucks.

 

It's not even just discord though. What's going on with the technical side of the server? I feel like it's regressed since I played 13 years ago. There are people on the forums asking for Nexus to come back. Now, I wasn't around for Nexus, I left before it's inception, but c'mon. Where is the innovation? I feel like anyone could make a roleplay server, host it on vanilla Minecraft, and they've basically got what LOTC has now. What really differentiates this server from a vanilla SMP any more? We can do less things than base Minecraft gameplay, and there's a fishing plugin. Even 13 years ago there was a plugin to differentiate races. I can't remember the specific details, but every race had an advantage and disadvantage kinda thing. Where has the uniqueness gone? Is this just laziness from the admin/mod/technical team since LOTC has not been kicked from the number 1 spot of MC roleplay? Is this because there's a large cohort of players that would be against this, preferring to keep things simple with a * or ** emote?

 

Metaplay has also been dealt with horrendously, at least in the case of the Vinovian Company. So the admin/mod team decided it was fair to ban a load of Haense players and then let the Pontifical States start a war to take over their kingdoms? Are you crazy??? Now we have a human kingdom that has been created through no effort whatsoever because 30 of the other side were banned. How is this good for roleplay? How is this good for the narrative of the server? We've also got players who were banned for metaplay coming back to the server and taking high ranking positions in this new nation. Like what?????? How does this work?? Oh, it doesn't.

 

Not only that, but why on earth are so many people metaplaying? I understand that this server hosts people from many different backgrounds. Whether you are disabled, neurodivergent, mentally ill, a "normie", whatever you are. But jesus christ, it's not your real life. This is meant to be fun. You don't need to be coming up with plots to get power in a Minecraft Roleplay Sever. Get a grip. If this server is the be all and end all for you then I pity your life.

 

This server was a source of joy for me when I was younger and it's sad to see the state it is in now. I would love for it to somehow return to the state it was in when I was younger. To build upon the things it has already, not to strip them away so that the experience in bare bones, carried by nothing other than a jaded and spiteful communities roleplay. This community needs to take a long look at itself. Stop being at war with one another OOCly. Stop creating elaborate ruses to catapult yourselves to positions of power, or to topple other powerful characters. Try to have fun. There are things in life to take more seriously than a Minecraft Roleplay Server. 

 

Thanks for coming to my TEDtalk.

 

/rant

[Cheese 8882]

get this man on admin 

[the GOAT of the craft 606]

2 minutes ago, Cheese said:

get this man on admin 

 

@Tythushere if you wanna talk pal !

[sam33497 7356]

23 minutes ago, the craft of the lord said:

Whether you are disabled, neurodivergent, mentally ill, a "normie", whatever you are. But jesus christ, it's not your real life. This is meant to be fun.

 

I almost had a bingo but then you had to say this was supposed to be fun...

[Aesopian 1639]

1 hour ago, the craft of the lord said:

Hello everyone.

 

I played this server back in Aegis and stopped playing on the second map. In my times as a young man I spent many days of my early teenage years running down the King's Road, being a bandit with Kane before finally ending up with the Flays for the remainder of Aegis and the White Rose for the second map. I distinctly remember spending my times immersed in the worlds that LOTC had created for my young mind to explore. I wandered far and wide, I met many different people in character (some of who I still talk to this day), all through the medium of in game LOTC chat. I would send messages to people I thought were cool and talk with them in /msg and then get their skype. We would have a skype chat of a few of us, all chatting shit and meeting up IG as we were part of a larger group. I saw nothing wrong with this as we didn't plan any nefarious plots to alter the narrative of our roleplay, or the roleplay of the wider server.

 

I left the server for a long time, and upon being made redundant from work came back to try and grasp a bit of the excitement that this server brought me when I was a nerdy little teenage boy, sat in my bedroom grinding out hours on a MC roleplay server.

 

I came back in October last year and played on and off. I have found my time to be much worse than when LOTC was first created.

 

I understand that technologically (at least outside of LOTC) things have progressed since I played, but discord has done so much damage to roleplay. There was a time, many years ago, that you would have to seek out someone in game to get a job. You would interact with them, let them know what you wanted to do. They would offer you a role in their nation doing whatever job it was you wanted, if they have a place for it. Now it's all done through discord. In fact, EVERYTHING seems to be done through discord. Want to be a steward of a city? Here, join our discord and apply there. Want to make any progress at all in the group you're in? Join their discord, become part of their community and OOCly befriend them. And honestly, this shit sucks.

 

It's not even just discord though. What's going on with the technical side of the server? I feel like it's regressed since I played 13 years ago. There are people on the forums asking for Nexus to come back. Now, I wasn't around for Nexus, I left before it's inception, but c'mon. Where is the innovation? I feel like anyone could make a roleplay server, host it on vanilla Minecraft, and they've basically got what LOTC has now. What really differentiates this server from a vanilla SMP any more? We can do less things than base Minecraft gameplay, and there's a fishing plugin. Even 13 years ago there was a plugin to differentiate races. I can't remember the specific details, but every race had an advantage and disadvantage kinda thing. Where has the uniqueness gone? Is this just laziness from the admin/mod/technical team since LOTC has not been kicked from the number 1 spot of MC roleplay? Is this because there's a large cohort of players that would be against this, preferring to keep things simple with a * or ** emote?

 

Metaplay has also been dealt with horrendously, at least in the case of the Vinovian Company. So the admin/mod team decided it was fair to ban a load of Haense players and then let the Pontifical States start a war to take over their kingdoms? Are you crazy??? Now we have a human kingdom that has been created through no effort whatsoever because 30 of the other side were banned. How is this good for roleplay? How is this good for the narrative of the server? We've also got players who were banned for metaplay coming back to the server and taking high ranking positions in this new nation. Like what?????? How does this work?? Oh, it doesn't.

 

Not only that, but why on earth are so many people metaplaying? I understand that this server hosts people from many different backgrounds. Whether you are disabled, neurodivergent, mentally ill, a "normie", whatever you are. But jesus christ, it's not your real life. This is meant to be fun. You don't need to be coming up with plots to get power in a Minecraft Roleplay Sever. Get a grip. If this server is the be all and end all for you then I pity your life.

 

This server was a source of joy for me when I was younger and it's sad to see the state it is in now. I would love for it to somehow return to the state it was in when I was younger. To build upon the things it has already, not to strip them away so that the experience in bare bones, carried by nothing other than a jaded and spiteful communities roleplay. This community needs to take a long look at itself. Stop being at war with one another OOCly. Stop creating elaborate ruses to catapult yourselves to positions of power, or to topple other powerful characters. Try to have fun. There are things in life to take more seriously than a Minecraft Roleplay Server. 

 

Thanks for coming to my TEDtalk.

 

/rant

 

 

do polls

 

also admins block it

[Netphreak 510]

Server went through a lot since you've been on hiatus. You're currently comparing gold nuggets (2013) to donkey dookie (now). 
It would take many days of deep explanation to bring you fully up to speed on all of the terrible decisions that were made to bring LOTC to this current and sad state; but as the saying goes, dookie rolls downhill, starts from the top. 

TL;DR (It's not a TL;DR)  LOTC Sold, money grabs were more important than a stable community; people being placed into positions they never should have been placed in, only driving the divide further. Temporary changes to try and fix the issues that the Veteran players have proclaimed would happen but were swiftly ignored; leaving them with very little choice but to search elsewhere for RP mediums, quality decreased, quantity increased; donations soared. Youtube Streamer gets brought in, LOTC turns into PVP factions server with more writing thus decreasing quality even more but increasing quantity and more donations. 

Skip to today and to quote Spaceballs. "Sanders, Sanders I don't know what to do! I can't make decisions! I'm a President!" ~President Skroob. (Current state of affairs.)

 

P.S. Does this outfit make me look fat?

[monkeypoacher 8055]

4 hours ago, the craft of the lord said:

I understand that technologically (at least outside of LOTC) things have progressed since I played, but discord has done so much damage to roleplay. There was a time, many years ago, that you would have to seek out someone in game to get a job. You would interact with them, let them know what you wanted to do. They would offer you a role in their nation doing whatever job it was you wanted, if they have a place for it. Now it's all done through discord. In fact, EVERYTHING seems to be done through discord. Want to be a steward of a city? Here, join our discord and apply there. Want to make any progress at all in the group you're in? Join their discord, become part of their community and OOCly befriend them. And honestly, this shit sucks.

 

thank you. it feels insane even bringing it up because "apply on discord" is so synonymous with doing basically anything in RP that telling someone not to use discord for something is like telling them not to log on.

 

i think to some extent you are experiencing nostalgia; being in the right skype/teamspeak groups still mattered back then. the main difference to now is like you said, discord lets you sort of automate away the inconvenience of having to talk to people in minecraft. also, there is basically no simple enjoyment to be had playing the game without discord, because minecraft mechanics like mining and placing blocks have been replaced with a broken korean MMO and roleplay is inconsequential without being able to build stuff in the minecraft world

 

my pet theory is tythus/telanir/kowaman gets final say over basically any decision staff makes & since all of those people have aged out of actually playing the server, they make decisions to prevent things from happening that would require their active attention. there's a critical lack of vision on every rung of the ladder though. we need to give head admin to a younger zoomer who is actually motivated to do things

 

[Laeonathan 5889]

Quote

I came back in October last year and played on and off. I have found my time to be much worse than when LOTC was first created.

 

Ive "only" played since 2018. But it used to be A LOT worse back then. It was an absolute hell. Metaplay was essentially legal, ooc hatred defined everything, wars were far more toxic, rp quality was dogshit with most people.

 

LOTC has improved a lot since. That's all I can tell you to console you since I'd say you're largely right.

[𝕾𝖙𝖆𝖗𝖌𝖚𝖘𝖍 2451]

I agree that the gameplay has become quite lazy. Both staff and players seem to prefer taking the easy route instead of creating an immersive atmosphere that truly reflects a Minecraft-adapted Lord of the Rings world with its own unique identity. There have been attempts at innovation, such as the unsuccessful magic plugin and the Nexus job professions, but these features were removed for various reasons. In my experience, many excuses were made, claiming that they did not serve role-play; however, this often meant that role-playing was limited to chatting, rather than actively engaging in the actions of the role. Since the removal of these innovations, the game has seen little improvement, which has been extremely disappointing. I tried to inspire some change by suggesting my idea for a productive addition that would benefit all aspects of role-playing, including the texting side.

 

Spoiler

 

Regarding Discord, while it has many features, I don't believe it differs significantly from using Skype or TeamSpeak. Although it offers more functionalities for gaming communities, the onboarding process for characters and new players has been severely lacking. The role-playing features intended to help integrate players into the culture and Kingdom have been overshadowed by an emphasis on out-of-character (OOC) interactions, which has diminished the game's immersive atmosphere. Even in-game, it seems there are more out-of-character commands than role-play functions. Additionally, the staff's favoritism towards their cliques has hindered the overall improvement of the broader game, preventing it from running smoothly.

[xDK 1205]

I played back in Aegis too, and I completely agree. Discord has changed the server, and not for the better. But it is worth looking at how that shift happened and why it matters. Now I have my own theory:

 

Back in the day, we used TeamSpeak and Skype. They weren’t hard to use, most of us were on them all the time. The big difference was structure. Every major race or nation used the official LotC TeamSpeak as their base for their recruitment effort, since all new players came there. That meant everyone, from kings to random foot soldiers, shared the same space in different channels. You couldn’t avoid hearing what others were up to. And because of that, there was a natural spread of perspectives, ideas, and drama.

 

The smaller guilds and internal factions had their own TeamSpeaks. Kind of like servers within servers. These weren’t echo chambers. They were hotspots for internal tension. You’d have noble houses, religious groups, rebel cells, all pushing their own goals under the same banner. That created power struggles, secret alliances, betrayals. And all of it played out through roleplay. You didn’t need admin permission to stir up a plot. You just needed a reason and the RP to make it real.

 

Now with Discord, everything’s ironically more centralized. Every nation has one main Discord server. It handles recruitment, politics, military, city building, even RP events. And that flattens everything. There’s barely any internal opposition or narrative tension. If conflict shows up, it’s usually just a power move. It’s not about beliefs or character motivations. It’s about who’s friends with who in Discord.

 

Back then you could have three noble houses in the same kingdom who hated each other IC. Each had its own TeamSpeak, its own goals, its own vibe. Today everyone’s in the same Discord server, reading the same announcements, staying in line. That kills internal drama. It kills variety. You end up with one voice per nation. And if you’re not in the Discord, you’re not part of the story.

 

The tools changed. And with them, the whole structure of the server. What we lost was the messy, decentralized chaos that made nations feel alive. Now they’re just static Discord communities with Minecraft cities attached.

[Dalek348 1962]

This is a very insightful post which echoes what an unfortunately small minority of players actually realise. I also played in Aegis and quit at the end of the 2nd map. I am not on a LOTC discord and don't want to be. Although my life is busy now and I'm not a 15 year old with all the time in the world to play, I would actually consider logging on occasionally in my free time. The issue is that the server is boring, for many of the reasons explained in this thread.

 

The principal reason for me is, as you put it so well, that you can do less on the server than you can do in base Minecraft. My main concern is the lack of freebuild. I would play this server if I was able to build a very modest village, recruit townsfolk, interact with travellers and my neighbours and build a personal story and history. Of course, I can't do that and the only solution would be to befriend the right people on discord and get some land, which won't happen. The server fails to see the great value in having independent, active people who answer to no one and have no master, shaping the physical and political world of the server. Is that not the essence of roleplay? The inverse of that is what the server is now - which enforces and mandates "metaplay" and acts outraged when server policy results in the very same actions that it effectively mandates and encourages. This is a metaplay server, not a roleplay server.

 

So instead, I'm wandering around the world to all intents and purposes as a wandering soul, with the exception that I have the privilege of having inane, pointless conversations by interrupting strangers bunny-hopping in town squares. The lack of freebuild, and the lack of the basics of Minecraft like the danger of monsters, the ability to kill some time and gain resources by mining and crafting, in combination with the requirement to be on discord has effectively disenfranchised me on the server. There is no point to even logging on.

 

The last concerted effort to implement freebuild was successful in 2018 (I don't remember the map name) and it totally discredited all the arguments against freebuild, but there is no sign of recognising that. Freebuild is an important catalyst, it makes things happen and gets people interacting with the world. Without it the server is a pool of stagnant water, what it needs is a good stir and shake-up to get things moving and to set off chains of events which are written into the history of the server. 

 

Unfortunately, this server is now so old that there are so few people that actually know what things were like before, and are therefore able to put into context the current state of the server. For instance, anyone who joined after 2015 will think that activity quotas, "nations", and the general transformation of the server into a Paradox game are how the server has always been and how it always should be, and can't recognise these features as the consumptive cancerous tumour that they really are.

 

The only solution I see is for experienced players with the right ideas to apply for and consolidate the server's positions of power en masse. Please someone contact me when that happens.

Edited May 22, 2025 by Dalek348

[argonian 14254]

What I will really never understand is the obsession this server has with disabling as many Minecraft mechanics as possible. We all bought this game, the game which became the #1 best-selling of all time because of its, get this, mining and crafting, and yet anyone with any position of authority on the server thinks the winning play is to lock everything and turn it into a text-only MUD with no way of interacting with environment whatsoever. Where it really got funny was when the ST were talking about creating interesting caves to explore, and no one involved seemed to realise Minecraft has done this automatically for literal years now, and the idea of just letting people explore actual Minecraft caves was out of question.

 

As for resource gathering and the actual insanity that are nodes, why can't we just let groups handle their own wood, ore, etc. supplies through mining and lumberjacking in the real world? For resources that would be harder to gather without griefing the entire landscape, like terracotta and stone, use mine-worlds and let people pay to open entrances in their lands like in past maps. None of this OOC resource-island-purgatory thing please - aren't we supposed to be an RP server? If we do have a resource island it should be a real place ICly and be in addition to other ways of gathering resources (like from the actual map), not the only way.

 

Aegis did it pretty well where you could buy resource pits that auto-regenerated and they were real RP locations--like you'd have a sand mine right outside the Orcish city that you had to buy a permit to. Probably a fairly complicated system to code and manage, so I'm not saying to do exactly that, but the idea of trying to keep resource pits an RP thing is one to take from that.

[Borin 7645]

I've been playing what I will call uhh. Niccumcraft, an rp server on a different, very very similar, minecraftish, block survival sandbox game.

 

It's basically minecraft, just with more functions. It has been great combining both actual playing of the game with RP interaction with both my own group, other groups and staff events. My first experience of minecraft RP was looong ago on an RP server set up for people from the Empire War (lord of the rings, hobbit etc pvp server), and it was basically roleplay with a custom map, plugins, etc. To get resources, as with the server I'm playing now, you got TOOLS, and COLLECTED RESOURCES from the LANDSCAPE AND THE WORLD AROUND YOU (think trees, mines! Wow! So innovative!) to get BETTER TOOLS to make more stuff and progress and build things! And do cool stuff like alcohol brewing.

 

On the game im on right now you can do so much more - minecraft is far more limited in this sense, but the sentiment I feel is the same. Lotc takes the minecraft out of the minecraft and replaces it with ooc mechanics and systems that require endless ooc walkthroughs and guides. Interaction with the server is basically entirely ooc and discord, beyond the actual rp you get from attending events (arranged in discord) or rp that is prompted by seeing 'RP IN THE SQUARE/TAVERN/PALACE' pinged at you.

 

I like minecraft, I just cant really play it on lotc :/

[unlegiqDuck 324]

11 hours ago, Netphreak said:

 LOTC turns into PVP factions server with more writing
 

 

If this is a PvP server, i do wonder where all the PvP is at

 

Aside from that, some good points being made

Edited May 22, 2025 by unlegiqDuck

[Helmet 1454]

I have been wondering why I or anyone really plays the server nowadays.

I've been around since 2022, so I might not have the best perspective but I do agree with a lot that has been said here.

 

There is no incentive to log onto the actual server for other than making small talk with others, spontaneously building entire cities/keeps with little to no RP effort, doing solo emotes for sreqs, grinding materials for little beyond potion-making/warclaims, heading to nations at scheduled times to listen to meaningless politics/events, or immediately crushing all opposition/obstacles/flaws instantly because "I am my character therefor I can't lose" mentality. Thats it, thats all there is to realistically do or witness here as far as I've seen. And if thats all that there is to do, whats the point?

 

Almost every other day I hear about how things were 'better' back then. I find it a bit sad as I wholly believe them.

A solution to this might be to simply make RP without the use of discord, often it feels a lot less like a natural RP situation and more like ur forcefully grabbing them by both arms, sitting them down and dumping text onto their lap. Exhausting, and rarely results in anything interesting or meaningful.

 

When it DOES result in something interesting or meaningful, it's great fun though- it's just hard to find.

Edited May 23, 2025 by Helmet