Opening Statement
Unfortunately this one is a little late as my mother was throwing her birthday party, and I had to amuse the attendees with my acrobatic feats and displays of archery (not really). Despite me being otherwise occupied for much of the day, the times is all finished and ready for the presses. So sit back and enjoy!
Project Progress
Harithilien Part 3 (In Progress): General terraforming is still ongoing. Also @iSMiTHz has mentioned he will create plots for some watchtower concepts soon. If you are interested follow this thread to get an update on that situation.
Misty Mountains (In Progress): There's still a lot of work to be done, we won't see this one finished for a long time. Unfortunately this week not many "landmark" places were added or changed.
Rivendell Revamp (In Progress): After a poll the team working on Rivendell has decided to change the forge to a more lore appropriate version. The forest on top of the hill will be modified, changing the styles and general size of the trees.
Dol Amroth (In Progress): Work has started on the general layout of the docks, with big wool piers being erected. There is also a wonderful boat, though it was just pasted in as a size reference. @demonataz has set up build plots for boats, where you can make your own boats to be docked at Dol Amroth
Osgiliath (In Progress): The build contest is still going strong. Additionally some oddities were noticed this week (missing things etc.) by one of our lovely community members, @Bombur8. If you find any oddities yourself make sure to bring them to a staff members attention.
Pelargir (On Hold): Not much progress here unfortunately. Some downtime in the pelargir project.
Paths of the Dead (In Progress): @Despot666 has been working very hard on the Paths of the Dead, but unfortunately progress is slow as there are very few artists working on the houses. If you're an artist and have some spare time, go and help poor old despot.
Annúminas (In Progress): The layout for the northern districts has been finished, and it features some cool height differences, getting lower and lower as we get closer to the water. The Australian flag has also grown in size, and the proud flag of my nation was rudely removed in an act of tragic vandalism.
Media of the Week
Nobody made any screenshots. How dare you people, make more screenies.
Out of spite I present to you: Bad end!
Build of the Week
The mountains around Dol Amroth have turned out to look very nice. Here's some of @wodleth's handywork.
Status Updates
Promotions:
-none-
Resignation:
-none-
Meet the Staff
Name: @SugarKoala (lizzy)
Age (optional): 17
Country of Origin: England
How did you find out about MCME and when did you join?
Many may be aware that I know the enforcer @JordD04 in real life. Now I’m not saying I joined because I wanted to play minecraft with him, but I wouldn’t have heard of this server otherwise. So shh yo thoughts.
Before MCME I played minecraft with friends on various small servers I either stumbled onto or forced Jord or another friend of mine to set up. I played for community and not really for building so when Jord told me about MCME again for the third time and said they do survivals? Well, I had to check this out and find out who on earth Jord was talking about and by this point most of the small communities I enjoyed playing with started to disintegrate. To conclude this small tale; I achieved whitelisted on the 17th March 2013.
What was it like when you were an adventurer (thrall/commoner) (droog/member)? Any nostalgic moments?
Due to when I was whitelisted I was lucky enough to see a mix of the original MCME and MCME 2.0. I took part in the survival during March so partnered with @Jesskuu and many others we made our way to Moria at least a dozen times. (I still can’t actually get through it, but I remember making a small hideyhole in the West Gate Entrance and eating a lot of bread )
Trekking that terrain was horrible, so to say I didn’t travel the server much while as a thrall without warping is an understatement due to how tedious this one journey was c:
After one survival in March, I then didn’t become active again till around October and this was on and off for a good while, mostly playing games with the community other than Minecraft. Sadly I missed an awful lot of progress and events and looking back on it in the timeline, I like to keep active so I then don’t miss anything more ;D Eventually I was bullied into being a commoner and then proceeded to take part in exactly 27 marsh jobs and other server activities.
What was the first staff rank you got? Why did you apply/shoot for that rank in particular?
My first staff rank was foreman, but really this has only felt like a short period of time, really I feel like a ranger at heart still. (So stealing what I wrote for meet the ranger~)
When I applied for Ranger I think I had been on maybe half a tour. It irked me a little how infrequent they were or at least for my timezone, but talking to the other rangers they would still answer my questions and they were genuinely incredibly lovely people. It was a mixture of @Will_em and @Malkizid that suggested I would be good as a ranger after a particular marsh job as I had just assisted a good dozen or so people on to getting in teamspeak and guiding them through it so that Will could concentrate with the job. I would actively try and welcome new players and answer questions to just because I could. I didn’t realise this was ranger material at all because I knew Jord was a ranger so I believed that rangers mostly dealt with lore.I had only truly jumped into the community head strong for about 3 months at this point but I applied anyway with reserved interest posting my app at about 1am my time. Haha. Jord of course proceeded to read this application and mention it during school. Thanks man. I appreciated that. :U
Simply, I wanted to help greet new players and help them get involved with the community more than anything else as I still remember now how scary it was meeting people on TeamSpeak where everyone already knew everyone. I wanted to increase the number of tours and find an active purpose in this community to give back.
My time as ranger I also spent doing many jobs while getting people into teamspeak like I first did as well as running some very large tours, it was the jobs I did with people that stuck out quite well to me as bringing the community together with the purpose of MCME to build middle earth. I spent a lot of my time doing both tours and jobs and it’s lead me to the where I am today. I applied so I can run my own jobs, get involved in the organization and planning and docs which help run the server behind the scenes as well as still occasionally helping out on the odd tour. I truly have the best of both worlds and I’m really enjoying it!
Is there any type of architecture or server job that you enjoy working on the most? Why?
This is a difficult question, I probably shouldn’t admit that I’m not a strong builder ;D But I like running road jobs and root fixes, they’re really simple and allows a variety of people different things in terms of building roles, you’ll be quite surprised really c:Either way as it’s fairly simple it means that communication on teamspeak easily flows into conversation and you really get a strong sense of community through these kind of jobs.
What is your favorite thing about MCME?
At the end of the day, it's always, always, the community. It goes beyond how extraordinary this server looks because without being able to build together and play together this server wouldn’t mean as much to me as it does now. The community in MCME is one of the best I’ve ever had the pleasure to be a part of.
Do you have any other hobbies outside of MCME (besides MC and gaming)?
As surprising as it may be to some that I actually do do things off of making documents, building and leading tours on MCME and playing video games. I’ve been playing violin for about a year so I’m in my school’s band and choir as well as playing in my local youth orchestra.
I also volunteer with the a local youth group once a week and currently planning to get more involved in community events in my area. The list of assorted things I want to learn and get involved in is a little long so in terms of interests hobby wise, I’m generally a busy body in whatever I have an interest in. What can I say? It’s more interesting than school.
Community Outreach
new MCME Podcast: @rcpopcornman is running an unofficial podcast. It has just done a beta run this week and next week will be it's first real episode. If you want to send in topics for discussion or questions you can do so at mcmepodcast@gmail.com, it can be watched here.
Facebook Page: Have you checked out the MCME Facebook page? It is updated almost daily and provides not only great updates on the server, but also top screenshots, builds, promotions, and more! In other words, be sure to like us HERE.
Planet Minecraft Page: As stated before, please vote for us every day HERE. This helps draw attention and commemoration towards the server and is really appreciated by the community. So do your part and support MCME!
Times Feedback: Have a thought concerning the presentation of the MCME Times and how it can be improved? Because I am always looking for new ways to mix up and improve the Times experience through any means necessary and, if you have a comment or concern, its likely that someone else had it as well and just didnt say anything about it. So be sure to message me your thoughts on the forums.
Closing Statement
So that's this week. I personally love the boat in Dol Amroth and I hope it stays, though maybe you guys can make better ones (I doubt it). Also make sure to check out the podcast, it's pretty cool and a nice thing to see coming out of this community.
To finalise this all, a quote!
"We can't help everyone, but everyone can help someone."
- Ronald Raegan
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