NIghtfort Server Build - Gift Settlements

AerioOndos

Donkey Lord
Staff member
Pronouns
they/them
I'd recommend having a heart tree (could have a segment of northern carving on a non-weirwood tree. It'd be fun to have more non-weirwood heart trees) rather than a shrine. It'd help distinguish worshippers of the Old Gods south of the wall from the Free Folk crab worshippers north of the wall on Storrold's Point.
In terms of terrain, the lore suggests that the land slopes down towards the sea, so smoothing down hills next to the sea or making hills seem more like old stabilised dunes would be good. Also having infrastructure for heavy fishing during times when the area isn't icebound.
Honestly, I'd prefer if the Eastern Coast had icebergs rather than icesheets so that there still is the possibility of sailing from Eastwatch to Braavos and Ib, and to sail across the Bay of Seals as Wildling raiders are doing at this point in the story. However, icebergs have been difficult to construct in the past but hopefully the addition of more ice blocks makes this a possibility.
I've lost most of my handwritten notes but I still have a few saved.
 

Gawain777

Street Preacher
I'd recommend having a heart tree (could have a segment of northern carving on a non-weirwood tree. It'd be fun to have more non-weirwood heart trees) rather than a shrine. It'd help distinguish worshippers of the Old Gods south of the wall from the Free Folk crab worshippers north of the wall on Storrold's Point.
In terms of terrain, the lore suggests that the land slopes down towards the sea, so smoothing down hills next to the sea or making hills seem more like old stabilised dunes would be good. Also having infrastructure for heavy fishing during times when the area isn't icebound.
Honestly, I'd prefer if the Eastern Coast had icebergs rather than icesheets so that there still is the possibility of sailing from Eastwatch to Braavos and Ib, and to sail across the Bay of Seals as Wildling raiders are doing at this point in the story. However, icebergs have been difficult to construct in the past but hopefully the addition of more ice blocks makes this a possibility.
I've lost most of my handwritten notes but I still have a few saved.
I think icebergs would be ideal too, but honestly? I'm not even sure if it'd be stable large icebergs like you'd expect - likely more just slurries and slush, given the explanation for snowy north is its some early autumn snows rather than it having snowed in for months. I could try some designs using the new gradient we found on my plot.
Regarding the heart tree idea sounds good. With the terrain can figure it out later, our goal is to focus on the village itself first and foremost!
 

CashBanks

A Knight at the Opera
Staff member
Spectacular work guys, love the use of pebbles and some of the new designs you've come up with.
The barrow outside the walls looks really nice too

2022-05-12_09.56.50.png

I picked up on the debate around the best block to use for the palisade walls and how you had initially suggested using firewood blocks, and seems you've now settled on the below gradient of wooden planks.
2022-05-12_09.49.51.png

It's my understanding that the Northern Clan builds have typically used the full log/rope log blocks for palisades like in this example at WullVillage3

2022-05-12_09.59.40.png

The huge logs obviously aren't ideal, but to me they seem a little more evocative of the ramshackle/rural aesthetic than the neatly arranged wooden planks. I'm curious to gauge the temperature of attitudes towards this approach though.

Another possibility would be to go the nuclear option and look into adding CTM textures to firewood so that they would extend if placed vertically on each other. My first guess is that this wouldn't negatively affect current uses of firewood, it might just occasionally make the stored firewood logs longer.

I'm not sure though if this CTM would allow for any variation to the order of logs and might seem a bit repetitive (see second pic). Plus there's the issue of potentially outdating older builds.
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Keen to get people's thoughts. If the firewood CTM isn't possible my initial preference would be to use the full log blocks like in other Northern builds, but open to being persuaded otherwise.
 

RavishMeRed

Printmaker
Staff member
Pronouns
he/him
Like Cash said, the logs aren't ideal, but I personally feel the gradient wood half-door palisade feels really out of place. As far as the firewood style, I would also suggest not using the style if the style is dependent on a future update (if the CTM is in a wip state). In order to fit in with other Northern Builds and stay within server cohesion, I would stick to the log design.
 

Emoticone11

The Dark Lord Sauron
Staff member
A bit late to this convo, but my preferred approach to palisades is this thin-log variant (example from a holdfast right near Atranta):

2022-05-13_00.09.28.png

The downside is that you can't use the rope variants, but if that's something that's necessary, it wouldn't be that unreasonable to add thin log rope variants.

I also wouldn't be terribly opposed to adding stake/palisade blocks if demanded; there is the risk of outdating stuff, but I don't think palisades are super common and it does seem feasible in principle to go around updating the existing ones.
 
F

FD001__

A bit late to this convo, but my preferred approach to palisades is this thin-log variant (example from a holdfast right near Atranta):

View attachment 12601

The downside is that you can't use the rope variants, but if that's something that's necessary, it wouldn't be that unreasonable to add thin log rope variants.

I also wouldn't be terribly opposed to adding stake/palisade blocks if demanded; there is the risk of outdating stuff, but I don't think palisades are super common and it does seem feasible in principle to go around updating the existing ones.
Thin log rope variants would be really handy for building ships and docks, just fyi
 

Azulejo

Bloodmage
Staff member
I mean there's always the risk of outdating stuff, but I think it would be very handy. To some building with full logs in most cases already looks like an aged technique due to the size of the logs, or in other words, to some those buildings already look "outdated". There's definetly interest in expanding the possibilities of building with logs. I would add that if the rope variant is added to wall logs, adding it to fence post logs would be amazing too. It's really handy to represent tied cattle or horses, ropes for small boats and I'm sure tons of machinery. Also whenever we get 1.13 and waterloged blocks the possibilities are going to skyrocket. To put it in perspective, as someone with interest in Dorne I don't think Planky Town could be properly done without those fence and wall rope logs to represent the barges and boats tied in place.

Sorry for posting this on the Nightfort thread, seems like a conversation around the matter sparked and I wanted to share my thoughts on it.​
 

Margaery_Tyrell

The Dark Lord Sauron
I mean there's always the risk of outdating stuff, but I think it would be very handy. To some building with full logs in most cases already looks like an aged technique due to the size of the logs, or in other words, to some those buildings already look "outdated". There's definetly interest in expanding the possibilities of building with logs. I would add that if the rope variant is added to wall logs, adding it to fence post logs would be amazing too. It's really handy to represent tied cattle or horses, ropes for small boats and I'm sure tons of machinery. Also whenever we get 1.13 and waterloged blocks the possibilities are going to skyrocket. To put it in perspective, as someone with interest in Dorne I don't think Planky Town could be properly done without those fence and wall rope logs to represent the barges and boats tied in place.

Sorry for posting this on the Nightfort thread, seems like a conversation around the matter sparked and I wanted to share my thoughts on it.​
Finish plankytown
 
F

FD001__

Hey Cash!

I see that the locations for Gift settlements also leaves room for immersion builds - so I'd like to apply for a grove where druids live together, inspired by Gedyneith in The Witcher 3. (Witcher fans?)

It would be isolated from its surroundings, and lives with little to no contact with the outside world. They live from foraging, along with a goat. 4 druids in total live together, all living around the weirwood to perform rites and occasionally receive visitors from nearbly villages/hamlets.

Test is at my plot. /warp finn01

 

CashBanks

A Knight at the Opera
Staff member
Hey dudes, I am here to apply for a small gift settlement/hamlet near queens crown, more specifically just exiting the forest east of queens crown. Anyways, aeks said that this would be appropriate as long as the hamlet was a bit undercover and discrete as the kings road is nearby. the hamlet shrives on livestock and farming. All houses will be made out of turf to complement the undercover-ness a little bit more. I took main inspo from norrey as there hamlets have nice terrained? builds. that is where I would encourage all builders building here to go to for inspo. terrain set is plots, bronze is plot outline red is a big communal livestock area and centre of action.
thanks for reading and here is my plans, see my plot for more/ jj, Thanks jj
Hey JJLyric were you good to finish off this hamlet? I'm thinking it could be worth adding a palisade wall around the perimeter for defence (they'd have plenty of wood from the forests). Otherwise think it just needs the stone yard walls and a muddy snow path leading towards the Kings Road.

1665570140118.png
 

Finn01

Herald
Applying for a watchtower/holdfast in the New Gift just north of /warp frostsedge, at the location marked out here:
1622158441511.png

There are abandoned holdfasts throughout the New Gift, that were formerly part of Umber land. This is just one watchtower abandoned when the land was given to the Watch.
 

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Applying for a watchtower/holdfast in the New Gift just north of /warp frostsedge, at the location marked out here:
View attachment 17667

There are abandoned holdfasts throughout the New Gift, that were formerly part of Umber land. This is just one watchtower abandoned when the land was given to the Watch.
Nice Tower, it will make the area looking more up to date.
I would suggest to make the top crenelations way more snowed in and add snow on the leaves at the backside.
Reducing some of the moss blocks and adding more normal cobblestones towards the snow could help to make it look more icy.
 

AerioOndos

Donkey Lord
Staff member
Pronouns
they/them
I know it's a big task but id think it would be a good idea to have a look at the terrain from the Kings road through to the sea around that point. We still need it to be a slow slope down to the sea and rn it's kinda strange vanilla flat, if I'm remembering correctly what I worked with at Norreyhf1. I'm willing to help out with blending the snow as part of that.

Also agreed with Wursti about the moss blocks. Fewer of them is better and the plain stone helps the colours not clash quite so much.
Plus, the more vegetation you make on the structure, the more there's going to have to be in copses around aka more terra
 
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Finn01

Herald
I know it's a big task but id think it would be a good idea to have a look at the terrain from the Kings road through to the sea around that point. We still need it to be a slow slope down to the sea and rn it's kinda strange vanilla flat, if I'm remembering correctly what I worked with at Norreyhf1. I'm willing to help out with blending the snow as part of that.

Also agreed with Wursti about the moss blocks. Fewer of them is better and the plain stone helps the colours not clash quite so much.
Plus, the more vegetation you make on the structure, the more there's going to have to be in copses around aka more terra
It's just ivy tbf, I'll get rid of it.

The crenellations are about as snowed in as the tower at giftham5.
 
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AerioOndos

Donkey Lord
Staff member
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No no, that's not what I mean. I like the ivy! It's good and adds contrast! I'm trying to build on Wursti's post and generally bringing more vegetation to the landscape is good. Helps break up the black and white monotone. working in that for two long hurts the eyes *cries in Norrey*

The more terra bit was a little bit of a note that the surrounds might need some love and care to properly place greenery.
 
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