Happy New Year!

Alo people!  :)

A few people have already enjoyed their New Years, in which case this message is already too late. But for myself, 2014 is only a few hours away, and I am waiting for anticipation of the many changes, both in-game and RL, the new year will bring for us.

I wish and pray that 2014 will be a good year for everyone, and that we can call be together next year, stronger and happier than ever before!  I wish the same for your family and friends as well!

Have some pie, because I baked some a few hours ago (though the real thing is almost finished)...

Not too long ago, I came out of a little discussion which dipped into a nostalgia trip of Dravics' last days, complete with pictures....

It was fascinating and sad at the same time to hear about the final days of a place many of you treasured for so long.  I can say without hesitation that the DRC is not Dravics and will never replace Dravics... it was brought to the server primarily as a monument to a bygone era, one that should be admired and respected for all the love and attention that went into its creation.

Instead, I want us to focus on creating new memories and new experiences to share, new buildings to impress us, and new games to entertain us!  And I want to give everyone the assurance that their hard work won't go unappreciated or tossed away without any record of its existence, and likewise that I won't turn away those simply looking for a little fun and adventure.  Furthermore, despite what was outlined in our manifesto, in no way do I want us to forget our roots in Main!

That's why, I want to share with you some additional things I thought of that were not included in the manifesto....

1. We will eventually have a service whereby players can "buy" a schematic export of their building on our server, so they can keep a copy of their hard work to personally own forever (which they can then import to any maps of their own).  I haven't figured out Cheese pricing yet, but it will be priced by the chunk, with bulk discounts available for extra-large buildings.
   
2. To keep things interesting, I believe our future "Little Brother" side-server should alternate mods and worlds on a monthly basis, to keep it as the exciting, cutting-edge server it's meant to be.  What's more, players would be able to vote on what kind of mod combination to host each month -- so players who lament the loss of LittleBlocks, for instance, will still have a chance to play around with it on Little Brother.
   
3. We will still be partnered with Gunia's Main Server, and will still offer technical support to those who wish to connect to it.  For instance, I helped Mion with an installation guide for the new Gulliver 0.13.8 Forge auto-installer for Minecraft 1.5.2:
   
   https://www.dropbox.com/s/7jf4tjrikx9qglk/Gulliver152_Forge_AutoInstaller.pdf
   
   Those who are new to our server are encouraged to pay it a visit... thanks to the new launcher, you can do so as easily as selecting a new profile.  If you do, please take some pictures of my old Mountaintop Bakery HQ (later sold to Super) and my humble Nether bakery (inside the unfinished Hellmart).  :D
   
4. And lastly, although I'm still not sure what our future server mascots will look like, I do at least have better names for them.  The Big Sister mascot will be Baguette, and her Little Brother mascot will be Biscuit.  The mascots won't be a frivolous feature... my whole "tip jar" proposal actually hinges on their creation, since I'm not one to take "donations".  I rather offer something for something, and that could very well be artwork of Baguette and Biscuit (digital copies, or even whole prints if at all possible).  :)

And that's about it for now.  If you have any questions, ask me them "next year", lol.  :P

[unless you're already in the new year, in which case the jokes on me] XD

Thank you!