March Recap: Current Issues

[Gainfullterror]

As of posting just moments ago, Snodia and dwayne have resigned.

I blame Mac.
It's interesting how most of the Chunk staff specifically are resigning, don't you think?

Right now it's suffering from being understaffed and 12+ staff members leaving with only a few replacing them.

Nobody has replaced them! That's the problem!

 

[betty's oldies]

I blame Mac.
It's interesting how most of the Chunk staff specifically are resigning, don't you think?


Nobody has replaced them! That's the problem!

Only 3 filled in their roles, if not completely. That's 2 mods and 1 admin. Next are zigbot and zach unless they really want to stay on the server. Sounds like Chunk is officially leaving this server (bye bye merge).

 

[Gainfullterror]

Only 3 filled in their roles, if not completely. That's 2 mods and 1 admin. Next are zigbot and zach unless they really want to stay on the server. Sounds like Chunk is officially leaving this server (bye bye merge).

When were Buuuddy and Skifby accepted? roughly at the end of April? Hubert was introduced at the begin of February-ish.
If you count the amount of staff who left after the last staff member was introduced, it'd probable be around 10 leaving, with nobody to replace them.

 

[Sophie]

What's with hypixel, our competitor, doing at 50k+ players (sometimes 60k)?

O_O

Interesting thread, thanks :)

 

[Sophie]

As for high prices that's a little bit of a rock and a hard place. If we were to drop the prices of our ranks then people who had already bought them would want to have that discount too. You would be surprised but even when we do a sale we get players emailing our support team asking for the discount to be refunded to them, even though they bought the rank over a year ago. We are looking at bringing new items to the store but I don't think we are ready to assign a release date to them.

Are you taking suggestions for store and price-related things?
edit: Too late, made one because bored and life is boring and stuff ._.
(´｡• ᵕ •｡`) ♡

 

[Power Ranger]

I blame Mac.
It's interesting how most of the Chunk staff specifically are resigning, don't you think?


Nobody has replaced them! That's the problem!

To be fair if one of my best friends was thrown off of cubecraft I probably wouldn't play on cubecraft that much anymore myself. I saw what happened today/yesterday (timezones :P) Mac did not recieve a very nice farewell as CARDAN's thread explains. What's to make you think they didn't have the exact same reasoning as CARDAN when leaving?

 

[Gainfullterror]

To be fair if one of my best friends was thrown off of cubecraft I probably wouldn't play on cubecraft that much anymore myself. I saw what happened yesterday. Mac did not recieve a very nice farewell as CARDAN's thread explains. What's to make you think they didn't have the exact same reasoning as CARDAN when leaving?

I see where you're coming from, but I have my reasons for jumping to my conclusion.

 

[TheFastBowler]

Disclaimer: No sarcasm is intended at all. This thread is here to highlight the current issues of this month (some traced back to January). This thread will be updated again tomorrow on the 31st if more news pops up.

So, let's begin.

Introduction
A few updates were added to this server over the past 3 months. Let's begin with a few:

-Before 2017: Major hacker problem. While fewer hackers appear in games, a lot still cheat and go unnoticed for a long time.
-January: Lucky Islands update
-February: Eggwars update + speed eggwars added. Also SG update on the last day
-March: Sentinel introduced and UHC re-added.

Looks great, doesn't it? But what happened besides that?

Issues
Why is our player count going down? What's with hypixel, our competitor, doing at 50k+ players (sometimes 60k)? Let's look at the major issues that have surfaced over the last month, starting with how many staff have left and how many have joined.

1. Former staff as of 2017 (I might have missed a few).
-HackersDontWin
-Aimee2323
-Jespoe
-Stefanvld
-Saradabaschi
-Mac
-CARDAN18
-Cheez
-PinkSparkleWolf
-Snap
-Snodia
-dwayne

Counting at least 12 staff, here's how much power staff have lost. That's 1 head admin, 1 admin, 5 mods, and 5 senior mods. 3 new staff (Buuuddy, hub3rt and skifby) came to replace 3 members, but that's still 9 major staff gone from the server. My theory here is that staff applications are too difficult (very small window) for applicants to get in, thus keeping the server heavily understaffed. Additionally, for the head admin (an interactive one in fact, not just a regular one) to leave, that's a lot of interaction lost between the playerbase and the staff.

2. Marketing (credit goes to @ronnielei for her rant)
-People are leaving. Not only are prices high (see subpoint #2) but too many hackers means many will be frustrated with the server and leave. More people leaving translates to fewer potential customers and affects the server's revenue. Don't make enough revenue? This server will close just like MCSG did. People advertise this server by word of mouth too, not just from streams or videos. If they didn't have a good experience, more people will learn about their bad experiences.

-Notice what makes the other servers shine in terms of cosmetics. Cheap ranks, right? This is because they keep their prices low with a long sale (at least 50%+ off on their ranks). What do we have? The opposite: ranks and prices are much more expensive and we're roughly the same size as Mineplex. Let's leave this up to you: where would you buy your stuff if both stores gave you the same items but one cost a lot cheaper than the other?

-Lack of votes and advertising. Where are we? A mere 40 votes compared to Mineplex's 30k+ votes? Here's a comparison between the two in terms of voting:
CubeCraft's: http://minecraft-server-list.com/server/108375/
Mineplex's: http://minecraft-server-list.com/server/218820/

3. Updates
While the server did a great job releasing new content, how did the community respond? Let's look at what other releases were not stable on the first day:

-Eggwars update: speed eggwars achievements were broken except for the one-time only ones (e.g. win with a helmet only).
-SG: broken border
-UHC: broken achievements, custom generation instead of vanilla, short grace period, fixed ore locations

While I understand that first releases aren't polished, some are game-breaking. For example, the first few days of SG forced a stalemate by pushing the border too close to spawn -- this separated the last few players from each other. It gives an impression that these updates were made from what the server wanted, not what both the players and the server wanted. It took weeks just to fix speed eggwars' achievements and in the meantime there's still other projects on the work. We don't need more games or updates the people want -- we need current projects to be fixed first before releasing completely new content.

Conclusion
We dug ourselves into a deep hole. How will we get out? We're in at least 3, if not more, issues: marketing, update quality, and staff. Something needs to be done about all of these. We might still have a chance to return back to a successful server. Make your choice before it's too late.

This needed to be made.
There is a lot of controversy going on from the staff view, playerbase is reducing. Something must be done.

 

[Power Ranger]

There is a lot of controversy going on from the staff view, playerbase is reducing. Something must be done.

The playerbase has risen since I joined O_o

 

[betty's oldies]

The playerbase has risen since I joined o_O

When I joined last year, Cube had fewer than Mineplex. During the summer, it managed to surpass mineplex's player count. Now, it's taken a beating and losing players (around the same number of players as hiveMC and mineplex at this time I'm writing this). We're not talking about last year -- we're talking about this year and what the player count was months ago compared to now, not years ago.

 

[Troublesomee]

Since there are a lot of staff members leaveing, I totaly agree with you, they definitely need new staff members.
Also, you're completely right with the bugs we have seen in the past days (weeks) border bugs, point bugs, level bugs, etc.
Never looking at the player count when I join cubecraft tbh.
Well, I believe you, Hypixel can easily outnumber us.
The updates are good in my opinion.

@Ping Ether Most of the time they will not accept 12 or 13 year old staff members, some players are saying I really need to be a mod, but It's not like that, you first need to apply, you need a really good one before going into the interview.

 

[Ping Ether]

Since there are a lot of staff members leaveing, I totaly agree with you, they definitely need new staff members.
Also, you're completely right with the bugs we have seen in the past days (weeks) border bugs, point bugs, level bugs, etc.
Never looking at the player count when I join cubecraft tbh.
Well, I believe you, Hypixel can easily outnumber us.
The updates are good in my opinion.

@Ping Ether Most of the time they will not accept 12 or 13 year old staff members, some players are saying I really need to be a mod, but It's not like that, you first need to apply, you need a really good one before going into the interview.

Oh so is that why they accepted Nikoshka, Buuuddy and Orangeric?
Of course we're not considering bad applications, I never said someone applying under the age of 13 should be accepted without context...
I don't know why exactly you felt the need to point out how one gets the position, it's kind of thrown out there without reason... I don't quite get your point?

 

[Troublesomee]

Oh so is that why they accepted Nikoshka, Buuuddy and Orangeric?
Of course we're not considering bad applications, I never said someone applying under the age of 13 should be accepted without context...
I don't know why exactly you felt the need to point out how one gets the position, it's kind of thrown out there without reason... I don't quite get your point?

I'll try to explain, I mean like, most of the staff members are 14/15+ for example, if we apply, we wont get accepted, ofcourse, everyone needs a good apply but still, they will most likely accept members that are 14/15+
They also need more staff members, in my opinion.

 

[betty's oldies]

I'll try to explain, I mean like, most of the staff members are 14/15+ for example, if we apply, we wont get accepted, ofcourse, everyone needs a good apply but still, they will most likely accept members that are 14/15+
They also need more staff members, in my opinion.

No. zRinne and Dutchie are a few who got accepted as 18+. Age doesn't matter for 13 and up when it comes to applications.

 

[zRinne]

Regarding the helper requirements, age doesn't define maturity although it is required that players meet the required age, to apply.
I have witnessed a 12 year old being more mature than an 18 year old.

I agree that we are indeed lacking man-power however, we can not rush hiring staff members as we want to be careful on accepting staff who will handle the community, forums and in game issues.
Rushing and forcing people out may result in damage made within the team and cause trust issues with the community/staff.
We are always in the look out for potential helpers.

Your opinion matters, we're taking this setback as an opportunity to revamp ourselves, fix on things such as our communication with the community, projects and so on forth. Please do bear with us.

Thank you for your understanding.

 

[Despacito 2]

No. zRinne and Dutchie are a few who got accepted as 18+. Age doesn't matter for 13 and up when it comes to applications.

Age doesn't matter but it should.
Also most people under the age of 14 don't really have a 'big' chance of getting accepted because most are very immature.
There are some exceptions as you can see from our Staff list.
BTW There are allot of mods that are around the 18 and older
TheZigBot (19) Ruben (18) DutchLemur (18) iLoveYouu (18) Skifby (17)
Camezonda (17) Serk (18) Lezappen (Around 19)
Not only that but all Senior mods seems to be older or 18. (except Dai who is in fact 17)

 

[Power Ranger]

When I joined last year, Cube had fewer than Mineplex. During the summer, it managed to surpass mineplex's player count. Now, it's taken a beating and losing players (around the same number of players as hiveMC and mineplex at this time I'm writing this). We're not talking about last year -- we're talking about this year and what the player count was months ago compared to now, not years ago.

You guys are really comparing the playerbase in the summer to the playerbase in the middle of the school year? xD No wonder you think the server is dying every server has more players in the summer xD

 

[Golapagos]

Disclaimer: No sarcasm is intended at all. This thread is here to highlight the current issues of this month (some traced back to January). This thread will be updated again tomorrow on the 31st if more news pops up.

So, let's begin.

Introduction
A few updates were added to this server over the past 3 months. Let's begin with a few:

-Before 2017: Major hacker problem. While fewer hackers appear in games, a lot still cheat and go unnoticed for a long time.
-January: Lucky Islands update
-February: Eggwars update + speed eggwars added. Also SG update on the last day
-March: Sentinel introduced and UHC re-added.

Looks great, doesn't it? But what happened besides that?

Issues
Why is our player count going down? What's with hypixel, our competitor, doing at 50k+ players (sometimes 60k)? Let's look at the major issues that have surfaced over the last month, starting with how many staff have left and how many have joined.

1. Former staff as of 2017 (I might have missed a few).
-HackersDontWin
-Aimee2323
-Jespoe
-Stefanvld
-Saradabaschi
-Mac
-CARDAN18
-Cheez
-PinkSparkleWolf
-Snap
-Snodia
-dwayne

Counting at least 12 staff, here's how much power staff have lost. That's 1 head admin, 1 admin, 5 mods, and 5 senior mods. 3 new staff (Buuuddy, hub3rt and skifby) came to replace 3 members, but that's still 9 major staff gone from the server. My theory here is that staff applications are too difficult (very small window) for applicants to get in, thus keeping the server heavily understaffed. Additionally, for the head admin (an interactive one in fact, not just a regular one) to leave, that's a lot of interaction lost between the playerbase and the staff.

The apparent "fix" would be to recruit more staff members. That's good and bad. We don't want to have too few, but we also don't want too many. There's something called "diminishing returns," where adding a new staff member to a project (when, say 1 is working on it at 100% efficiency) doesn't add another 100%. Every member the server adds will always be less than the ideal output. In this example, that's less than 200%. Add too many and some will not have any work -- this is past saturation and will do more harm to the server than good.

2. Marketing (credit goes to @ronnielei for her rant)
-People are leaving. Not only are prices high (see subpoint #2) but too many hackers means many will be frustrated with the server and leave. More people leaving translates to fewer potential customers and affects the server's revenue. Don't make enough revenue? This server will close just like MCSG did. People advertise this server by word of mouth too, not just from streams or videos. If they didn't have a good experience, more people will learn about their bad experiences.

-Notice what makes the other servers shine in terms of cosmetics. Cheap ranks, right? This is because they keep their prices low with a long sale (at least 50%+ off on their ranks). What do we have? The opposite: ranks and prices are much more expensive and we're roughly the same size as Mineplex. Let's leave this up to you: where would you buy your stuff if both stores gave you the same items but one cost a lot cheaper than the other?

-Lack of votes and advertising. Where are we? A mere 40 votes compared to Mineplex's 30k+ votes? Here's a comparison between the two in terms of voting:
CubeCraft's: http://minecraft-server-list.com/server/108375/
Mineplex's: http://minecraft-server-list.com/server/218820/

3. Updates
While the server did a great job releasing new content, how did the community respond? Let's look at what other releases were not stable on the first day:

-Eggwars update: speed eggwars achievements were broken except for the one-time only ones (e.g. win with a helmet only).
-SG: broken border
-UHC: broken achievements, custom generation instead of vanilla, short grace period, fixed ore locations

While I understand that first releases aren't polished, some are game-breaking. For example, the first few days of SG forced a stalemate by pushing the border too close to spawn -- this separated the last few players from each other. It gives an impression that these updates were made from what the server wanted, not what both the players and the server wanted. It took weeks just to fix speed eggwars' achievements and in the meantime there's still other projects on the work. We don't need more games or updates the people want -- we need current projects to be fixed first before releasing completely new content.

Conclusion
We dug ourselves into a deep hole. How will we get out? We're in at least 3, if not more, issues: marketing, update quality, and staff. Something needs to be done about all of these. We might still have a chance to return back to a successful server. Make your choice before it's too late.

These people left as well:
-FalseHonesty
-Snodia

 

[Yaanniicck]

It's sad to see this! :(

 

[Refresco]

It's sad to see this! :(

Yes it is. :(