while it's true that plants are able to grow when nobody is standing in that chunk, it is generally at a very reduced rate. and, once again, since opticraft has a very low tickrate at peak times, plants will basically seem to not grow at all.

Thank you cschurz, you answered my other question perfectly, thank you. I was wondering if that was it.

I'd also have to agree with Midgetized about it looking good on paper. It seems that Opticraft has a lot of griefers (could be subjective since I haven't played on a server of this magnitude before) and that being closer to a largely populated area could yield you pain and suffering for the most part. One of the reasons why I'm not too fond of the /warp option at all. It's nice, but it can also be EASILY misused.

The higher the level of the Silk Touch, the % increases

Actually, there is only Silk Touch I. [sorry, read after the fact that you corrected yourself]

Any server that runs the EnchantView plugin can show you exactly what enchant it is you're getting.

There's also BetterEnchants which allows you to choose (for a cost) each enchant to put on an item and the level of the enchant. XP requirement increases with that. Note the server will need to run the mod/plugin for you to be able to use that capability.

As an aside, the randomness of enchanting is totally hosed. You may get Unbreaking II for 36 XP at some point and then you might pick up Unbreaking III, Fortune II, and Efficiency III for 26. Or Unbreaking II for 23. I've seen Unbreaking II at 45 a couple of times even!

SO, morale of the story, if enchanting, don't count on the highest value XP giving you the best enchants... Personally I suggest that every server runs EnchantView since the variety and randomness rather... poor and imo unfair for the time vested getting the XP.

Sorry for the derail...

PS: As another note, you CAN actually get multiple enchants on a pick WITH the Silk Touch I enchant as well. I once had a gold Pick with Unbreaking III, Efficiency III and Silk Touch I. I once spent approx 34 on a pick with Efficiency IV, Unbreaking III and Fortune III. It's really all luck of the draw with Enchants the way they're set up in MC right now...

These quotes would have been fine, but as you can see (i hope), you have a really bad attitude in both of these. Not to mention you do not offer any alternatives at all, you are just complaining that you cant get enough money. You can call it the "nick bandwagon" if you want, but I am not the only one who sees the attitude.

I didn't intend for any attitude. If you read them that way it still didn't give you the right for you to throw out "ignorance" because of it... Honestly I think it's a pretty crappy response from someone with admin status.

Yes, this is how it is supposed to work, if every newbie was bringing in more cash than they were spending, everyone would be rich instantly. It is supposed to be hard to start out as a newbie, it's survival.

I get that. I think that goes without saying as well. My statement, and I'll try to be clear, again, that this has to do with new players, having to spend more money than they're able to make, because their food stuff's isn't growing.

I put my observations. I gave pretty concise explanations of how fast stuff was growing for me. I'm also not discounting 24kGold and that his/her stuff may BE growing. But, 24k also seems to have been on the server for a while as well. Has 24k actually sat down, like I did for 2 hours and observed growth? At the same time as I observed the issues? Chances are probably not. So, I would go insofar that 24k's statement should have little bearing on what I observed.

I also stated there's a possibility that things could HAVE improved yesterday. I didn't get a chance to sit there for 2 hours and time it again, personally I find it a waste of my time. I was willing to do it the first time so there'd be some data for troubleshooting purposes.

As far as the pig/chicken/cow comment. I have a chicken/pig farm, a small one, and observed that even animal growth was a bit slow (though I didn't mention it), I also can't feed the animals wheat... as I have a limited supply of it. My best bet at first was to use the eggs I get to maybe drop 1 chick out of 16 eggs. But I found that, this was not a method that was sustainable i.e. chicken for food vs replenishment of chickens with eggs. I used up more food stuff trying to dig up iron/gold/diamonds than just standing there and watching it grow... which isn't fun. I also don't stray far from my plot either and usually hang within at least 100 and am usually right below my plot. Which I would assume means that my stuff should grow since I'm in still in the same chunk.

My best bet actually, was fishing, for a while. But, during the 2 hour observation period, I spent a half hour trying to catch fish, and I caught two. Why? Lag? I'd see the bobber go under, I'd right click and get nothing. Repeatedly. So, now that's not panning out any more. Could it be my connection? Maybe. I had 6Mbps ADSL, but let me preface that with the fact that on other "less active" servers, I have NO problems fishing. I just changed my connection to a 30Mbps/3Mbps cable line. So maybe there'll be some change on Opticraft now, I don't know.

Don't get me wrong, I like the server and all, especially the warp options which help a lot. It's just frustrating to try and explore, run out of food, have to sit there for hours at a time just to watch my food stuffs barely grow, then sell all my gold and iron (can't even sell the diamonds I have), and spend all my cash on bread. Explore a bit, run out of food, spend some more money. Eventually the money just disappears and I wouldn't have a farm to support myself. Now keep in mind that I was projecting the possibility of events, not that it is happening currently. I still have $8,000 I think. But, add it up.. One bread = $100 right? 64 breads x $ 100= $6400 that's not cheap and doesn't leave much headroom for exploration.

I was hoping that purchasing a few melons would be a faster food source, but at the time, that even took forever. Where on other default setup servers I get by with more than enough leftovers with the little farm that I have, I'd have to have a wheat farm almost 5 times it's current size on the Opticraft server to support any bread/melon operation. But, again, as I stated before, the situation could have resolved yesterday. I'm just trying to elaborate for those that may not understand the cycle of a new player trying to make it. By new, I mean someone that's managed to develop an established farm of some kind.

At this point I"m just thinking of putting in a massive underground wheat farm, I'll have to see how much seeds cost though. I don't have anything else I can sell at the market anymore since I spent it all trying to get money to purchase a protection stone.

Anyways, I don't think I needed to have gone into such detail but there it is... jesus I'm out of breat.... ok maybe not.

@Nick: Before YOU go off and start a flame war with your "ignorant" comment you should be reminded that NEW players can't survive if they don't fix the farmable item issue. Maybe I should have prefaced it with that... but, maybe your "ignorant" brain should have understood that by my comments.

And about that /balance statement... It's pretty much rhetorical that people that have millions of dollars in game shouldn't have a problem... now should they? They're already well established, have whatever they need, and are pretty much yanking on their privates waiting for something exciting to happen.

The fact that the market is a luxury is also understood. Why then bother "monitoring" and adjusting pricing? Why bother if it is just a luxury? Let people sell protection stones and diamonds. What they're doing now is making it harder for younger players to even bother competing cash wise. But again... as a "veteran" member you probably wouldn't get that concept either because of your "ignorance".

As it stands NEW [had to make that clear for you] people will run out of money and starve before any of their food grows.

Next time, would you mind being a bit more respectful before throwing the "ignorance" out there? Doesn't feel nice coming at you with that does it?

@midget: lol No, actually I wasn't looking at them either.

@Boshi: There's enough water. My melons and pumpkin plots are very small and definitely within the water's effect radius. As far as the sugar cane, it has to be next to water anyways, I have my sugar cane set around a lake. Concerning the wheat farm and water requirements (http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/File:WheatFarmPatternAR8x81W2T.png). That's pretty much my layout.

My plot is on the near the edge of the world, so maybe that's affecting me somehow?

Hey everyone,

I'm relatively new to the server and am curious about something.

When I plant anything like wheat, trees, or even worse, melons, sugarcane, or pumpkins, they don't grow. When I say don't grow... I could be sitting there for 3 hours and I won't get ANY growth on my Sugarcane. When doing melons or pumpkins the plant itself takes beyond 2 hours to grow, the melon and pumpkin fruit a little less long. I watched a movie and then some and stuff didn't grow at all... that's not right...?

Wheat seems to grow the fastest out of the lot, but man... 3 hours or so for it to grow? Wiki says somewhere around 37 minutes for full growth on default server.

Now I don't know if this is related, but spawners spawn enemies limited and slowly.

Considering that the market is severely skewed and you can't really make good money off the market (some items not even 1/2 cost to sell...) I'm slowly starving spending my cash on food since nothing I am trying to grow is sufficient to get by... since it WON'T GROW.

Is this a bug... how long is this bug going to go on? What is causing it? All I know this isn't normal...

Doc