Population Density

This mod spreads out new players so they start in active areas while keeping the areas population at a set ammount. This is done by dividing the world into regions with a 200 block radius. Once divided, the regions are scanned in a spiraling pattern starting from the origin. The scan determines the availabilty of surface wood, ore and near surface ore balanced against the number of player placed blocks with the region. Once a region with the proper ratio has been found, new players are assigned to that region as their home region and spawn there once they finish the tutorial.

The region spawn point is at the region's post and is where players must go if they wish to teleport to another region. The post will tell you the name of the region and the nearby region names.

lagcraft uses the population density plugin, which divides the world into regions of 400x400 blocks. This tutorial explains how the region commands work, and how you can reach another player, for example a friend that you want to visit, anywhere on the map.

The /village or /homeregion command When joining the game, every player is assigned a homeregion. This is the place where you can go to build, explore and meet other new players. New regions open up regularly, so the homeregion will usually not be the same for two players. You can write either /village or /homeregion to go to your homeregion for free. You can also write /movein, which sets your home region to the region you are currently in. After doing so, you have to wait a while before you can do /movein again.

It is not possible for players to create their own regions. They are all generated automatically by the server.

The /whichregion and /visitregion commands By writing /whichregion, you can get the name of the region you are currently in. All open regions have a name, for example waterfall2 or anvil4. If you know the name of the region you want to get to, you can write /visitregion, for example /visitregion waterfall2, and you will get instantly teleported to that region pole. However, it will cost you 80 mums to do so.

The /invitetoregion command A player can invite other players to come to his homeregion for free, by writing /invitetoregion, for example /invitetoregion vindictr. This sends an invitation to the player, who can accept it by being near a region pole and writing /acceptregioninvite. If there is no region pole near, the invited player can just write /spawn and then /acceptregioninvite right after that, since the spawn starting point is close enough to a region center.

The /randomregion command Writing /randomregion will teleport you to some random region in the world, but it costs 80 mums. It can be good way to find new places or meet new friends.

Navigating by coordinates Every single block in the world has an unique XYZ coordinate, so if you know the coordinate of a place and understand how to navigate by the coordinate system, you can always walk there.

You see your current position by writing /where. The Y value is the height (which means that it decreases if you dig down from where you stand), while X and Z coordinates increase or decrease when you move forward, backward or to the sides.

http://muttsworldmine.com/forums/uploads/gallery/album_851/med_gallery_4401_851_74144.jpg

In the example above, I am at the location 1797X,2978Z. I want to go visit my friend's house at 1750X,2930Z.

To do this, I start by walking in one direction and then write /where again to see which coordinate changes and if it increases or decreases. As you can see, the X coordinate has increased to 1808X, and since my destination is at a lower X coordinate than I started on, this means that I am heading the wrong way. Therefore, I turn around and walk the in the opposite direction until it shows 1750x instead.

On some computers, you can also press the F3 button to see your coordinates and how they change in real-time.

http://muttsworldmine.com/forums/uploads/gallery/album_851/med_gallery_4401_851_74655.jpg

After reaching 1750x, I use the same method (walking a few blocks and looking at how the coordinate changes) to find out which way along the Z axis I should walk. I want it to decrease, since I am moving from 2978Z to 2930Z. After finding this out, I just keep walking towards 2930Z. When the /where command shows those coordinates, I am there!

http://muttsworldmine.com/forums/uploads/gallery/album_851/med_gallery_4401_851_10495.jpg

Coordinates never change, so if you want to remember the location of something important, like a mine, a mob spawner or a friend's house, you should always write the coordinates down. That way, you can reach it fast, especially if you also remember which region it is in.

Finding the region poles and living in the wilderness Region poles can be found every 400 steps in any direction, also where the regions themselves are not active yet. You find them at X coordinate = 200+m*400, Z coordinate = 200+n*400, where m and n are positive or negative integers. For example, there will be one at 1400X,-4200Z, since 1400 = 200+3*400 and -4200 = 200+(-11)*400. So by navigating by coordinates (see above), you can always find a nearby region pole within minutes.

You can do /movein in a region which isn't active yet, if you prefer to live out in the wilderness. This will set your homeregion to the closest region pole, and you can still go there with /village, or invite people. Other players just can't get to it on their own with the /visitregion command.

How to find other players A common question from newbies to staff is "can you teleport me to my friend?" and the answer you will get is pretty much the same every time: Moderators are not taxis, and you have to get to him on your own. However, by using regions and coordinate navigation, it won't have to take that long for you to reach him. The flowchart below shows how to get PlayerA (you) to PlayerB's (the friend's) location:

http://muttsworldmine.com/forums/uploads/gallery/album_851/gallery_4401_851_16986.jpg

More detailed information can be found on the Population Density page.