jKov Builder Application

jKov

Mummer
Guest
16

United States

The server was recommended to me on Youtube. It was a video on the ibxtoycat channel that showed the server and all the main attractions, after I saw this I was very intrigued.

The Chronicles of Narnia was good, and just a lot of pop culture shows and movies that people are into now a days. For instance Breaking Bad, Prison Break, ect.

Game of Thrones

Season 1, Season 2, Season 3, Season 4, Season 5, Season 6, Season 7

Robb Stark was definitely a favorite of mine. He depicted the honor and morality of his father Eddard Stark very well and was an overall great character.

I'd say I'm a very quick learner. I've learned tiny things like solving rubiks cube in 20 seconds, playing advanced piano pieces completely self taught for about 6 months now, and I am learning about music production currently, and love epic fantasy music and I don't know, maybe I can make a soundtrack for the launcher or something. Back to the point of me being a quick learner, I feel like I can inherit the ability of higher level builders so that I could independently work on large products with a good knowledge of how the building style of the server works.

I am history nerd, and when I watched Game of Thrones I just fell in love with the old medieval style of everything. I am getting into the books now because the show is over and I just need more of this great fantasy and learn as much about it as I can. I now want to build on the server because I feel like it will be a very immersive experience of this fantasy and it will expand my imagination while reading the books.

https://imgur.com/a/WQzttrg REAPPLICATION

YOU KNOW NOTHING, JON SNOW
 

Emoticone11

The Dark Lord Sauron
Staff member
Hey jKov,

Thanks for your interest in the server! Very sorry for the delay in response, been a bit busy recently.

Your house seems like a pretty good start! While it's not quite up to server standards, you have the general shape and structure down, so I think we can work from there and get you up to server standards soon enough. I'll start out with some general feedback to start out with.

- Try to think about the materials you're using, and make sure they're sensible. For instance, you have a stone brick arrow slit window in the middle of a daub & wattle facade, which doesn't make much sense. It also looks a bit odd, the bright color of the bricks contrasts badly with the dark daub & wattle. The wood panelling underneath the windows is also unecessary, and having it indented using the wall versions is weird.

- Usually windows should just be 1x1 or 1x2 (vertical), almost never 2x1 (horizontal) or larger. Also, the shutter placement above the windows doesn't make sense.

- The roof seems a bit top-heavy. I'd probably make it one block higher. Also, instead of using full blocks on the underside of the gable (the overhang part of the roof), use upside-down stair blocks so it seems a bit smoother.

- The interiors are a decent start (you have the rafters and everything) but also too empty. In fixing this, be careful not to add clutter just to fill space either. You want to plan out interiors a bit more before actually making them: try to divide into rooms, place stairways, etc. before actually doing any furniture. Make the layout interesting. Make sure each part of the house has a specific purpose.

- The inner wall here with stone mixed in with daub & wattle doesn't make much sense; it should just be entirely daub & wattle (or wood).

- Don't use torches inside ordinary houses at all, those are more of a detail for castles or city streets.

- The furnaces here are weird. There should be a fireplace somewhere on the ground floor, which they probably also use to cook. Check /warp furnish for some designs. Also, it's a bit hard to tell, but the house seems to lack a chimney.

Please feel free to ask if you have any questions on the feedback. Overall, I'd recommend studying some more recent locations (/warp klsprawl, /warp duskendale, /warp whiteharbor, /warp holyhall, etc.) in a bit more detail before continuing. Once you're ready though, for the first challenge build, please make a medium-sized house in the style of /warp woodwright, with a yard attached. Good luck!
 

Emoticone11

The Dark Lord Sauron
Staff member
Hey jKov, sorry again for the delay! I had a lot of things come up last week, but should be more punctual with future responses.

Your Woodwright house looks very nice, you picked up the style quickly. The gradient and daub & wattle are both great and I think it would fit in well in the Reach. Here's some of the feedback I do have this time:

- Below the roof, you want to use upside-down stairs so it seems smoother, rather than having hard 90-degree corners all under the roof. You can do this using slate stairs or wood ones as well. Although at Woodwright, you'll also notice that some of the houses don't have roof overhangs in the front/back at all. This is common, especially for houses which look too top-heavy from the side with roof overhangs.

- The row of stone in the shed here doesn't make very much sense, considering that the shed is otherwise all made out of wood.

- The interiors still need a bit of work. Overall, the bottom floor is way too large considering how low the ceiling is, so it just doesn't look proportional. It also seems very empty. The rafters feel random/jumbled, rather than organized rows of horizontal beams supporting the ceiling. Lastly, a lot of the features seem too "modern", like the kitchen area and the writing desk (keep in mind that a medieval peasant wouldn't be capable of or need to write in the first place). Before even placing furniture, and possibly even before/during the exterior process, I suggest doing all your interior planning, creating rooms/subdivisions in interesting ways, and also making the staircase connections between floors. Try to save the specific details until the very end, but think about the purpose of everything along the way. Look up inspiration about medieval houses and lifestyle on google and try to make your builds immersive. This will make the results a lot better.

- When you use cabinet or workbench blocks, like in the corner here, you should always cover up all but one side. It doesn't make much sense for cabinets to open up on multiple sides, after all. You can usually do this with "half door" blocks, or other furniture.

- I don't really like the barrels being used as a wall here, as it's fairly obvious that they're supposed to be barrels. I'd stick with using wood planks or something similar for that. Also, in the same picture, try to cover up the slate from the roof and that hole in the side of the room, if you can.

- I'm not a fan of the beam going through the window here.

Overall you're doing good though! I think interiors right now are the main area you need to focus on - before doing the next challenge build, I would recommend taking some more time to explore Woodwright and other recent areas to study the interiors. Once you're ready though, for the next challenge build please make a middle-class house in the style of /warp whiteharbor. The middle-class ones can generally be found in the southwest area of the city. Good luck!
 

jKov

Mummer
Guest
Done. Sorry for the late response again. Thanks for the feedback too.
 

Emoticone11

The Dark Lord Sauron
Staff member
Hey jKov,

Thanks for being patient! My classes just started, so the last week's been a bit busy for me. You did a great job with this house, some aspects of it are really creative. I'll jump right into feedback:

- The gradient isn't fully there yet, the mix seems a bit messy/random between the 3 blocks you're using. Try to go for "blobs" of the white plaster rather than single spots of it; after all, it's supposed to represent corroded whitewash. Check out /warp gradient on the server if you haven't seen it yet.

- Small detail, but if you're going to have a roof overhang, and use wood stairs to cover up the bottom of that overhang, you should also use wood half doors to cover up the bits in-between the stair blocks.

- I like your creativity with the interior layouts, however some of the details seem really clunky, like the ring of wood stairs around this room. The full-block rafters in this room are also way too much, it's probably better to go with half slabs there. Sometimes it's a bit tricky to strike the balance between having interesting features and making it too messy, but just try to be mindful of it. Make sure your details make architectural sense too.

- I'm not really fond of either of the furnace/fireplace designs in the house. The one in the kitchen is strange because it has two ovens next to each other, and no apparent chimney (also it's really cramped right in front of the table). The one on the lower level is just massive. A medieval house would likely not have central heating like that, they'd just have a hearth which they use for heating (by convection around the house) as well as cooking. In general, I usually just use a subtle hearth design with an arrow slit window or empty space, ash block or glowing coals in the bottom, and a chimney above it. Here's an example of what I mean, and here's a slightly larger one.

- There seems to be stone brick blocks above wood here in the chimney, don't do that.

- I'm a bit confused by the glass in the wall here. It doesn't seem to look outside from what I can tell. What is it supposed to be? I probably wouldn't use glass at all in a house like this, in any case.

Anyways, great work with everything else. For the next challenge build, please make a middle-class house in the style of /warp duskendale. Keep in mind the style here is a bit more complex, so take your time learning it. I'm sure you'll do fine though, feel free to ask if you have any questions on the style or on my feedback above. Good luck!
 

Emoticone11

The Dark Lord Sauron
Staff member
Thanks for being patient, I had to wait till the weekend to get back to you as well!

Overall this looks pretty good, definitely an improvement from the WH house. I think, just in general, your exteriors are pretty on point (with a few minor things that I'll address), though the interiors still need a bit of work in some parts. Here's some of the feedback I have this time around:

- I don't really like the brick blocks with fence on top of it outside (you did the same thing in the WH house iirc). It doesn't really make much sense from a realism standpoint, and also looks kinda clunky.

- Make sure the shutters open up the right way, there's one on the front of the house that doesn't (you can tell by the way the hinges are facing).

- I'm not entirely sure about the windows which are half open and half carved wooden pane, it seems like it should be one or the other.

- The roof shouldn't have overhangs on the side (i.e. the gables), since it looks a bit too top-heavy otherwise. But in practice a house like this would be in a town with buildings on either side of it, so you probably wouldn't be able to have overhangs there anyways.

- The bottom floor of the interiors looks pretty good, but the upper floors have a few weird things going on. The main thing that sticks out like a sore thumb is the roof here. It doesn't really make any sense why an upper floor of a house would be made out of stone, especially since the lower floors are made out of wood. And even if the ceiling was made out of stone, it wouldn't be stable here - stone is heavy and a flat stone ceiling would collapse. This is why stone ceilings should always have vaults/arches supporting them (and are uncommon in ordinary houses).

- In the same room mentioned in the previous comment, it's a bit unclear what the vertical stack of thin logs is supposed to represent. Also, the spruce slabs in the back of the room (the one over the window for instance, and also the top of the cabinet) are rather messy.

- I find the layout of this room this room strange as well, particularly the stone column right in front of the furnace. There's nothing in that location in the floor underneath this one (unless I'm missing something), so I'm a bit puzzled as to what it's supposed to represent. There's also the issue of the random stone which I pointed out earlier.

- Probably, an "ordinary" house like this one (e.g. not a special profession like bookbinder, scribe, septon, etc.) would not have any books or paper, since literacy was extremely low during medieval times.

Overall you're definitely getting there, especially with the exteriors. I would recommend putting your subsequent focus (whenever you have time) on studying interiors more and trying to get a high-level sense of how we typically design multi-story houses and the structural elements that are necessary/realistic.

For the next challenge, please make a middle-class house in the style of /warp fairmarket. This is another town build, similar to Duskendale, and so the style will be fairly complex. I'm sure you'll do fine, just make sure to take your time with it. Good luck!