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Newsletter #60 for October 2023

Howdy folks!

It’s Tommy time! Community Liaison ThatTommyBoii reporting for newsletter duty!

We come to a new month so that means it’s time for another newsletter! We’re jumping straight in today!

PAXU and other conventions!

Want the chance to meet Joe at a convention? Here are some of the events he’ll be attending!

PAX Unplugged

Joe will not only be attending PAX Unplugged this year, but also holding a panel with fellow hermit VintageBeef!

The panel name is HermitCraft TCG: physical blessings of a digital world. Here’s the description!

Two Minecraft Let’s Players, Joe Hills and VintageBeef from the HermitCraft server, will share how their experiences making gaming videos prepared them for new adventures in the physical (or unplugged, wink) world. VintageBeef recently created a full trading card game in survival Minecraft, HermitCraft TCG, which was popular enough to justify physical production of over a million printed cards. Joe Hills, who helped him playtest the game, will lead him through a lively chat about the challenges of the playtest art direction and production pipeline for the TCG.

The two Hermits will also discuss other ways their work on HermitCraft has rippled out into the real world via charity events and audience meet-ups. If time allows, questions will be taken from the audience.

Isn’t that exciting?! I know I’d be thrilled to attend, I hope I can make it to PAXU this year! All of the details are being finalized, so for now I can offer you this tentative date, time, and location (subject to change):

Sunday, December 3rd at 2:30pm in the Mothman Theatre (Streamed to Twitch.tv/PAX2)

You can buy badges to attend over at their website here!

Other upcoming conventions

Music City Multi Con ticket sales are open now! Get your tickets over at their website here so you can join in the fun!

Spring dates for TGD have been confirmed, so folks interested in attending can start putting that on their calendars! Here’s an overview of all the conventions!

Gamers Outreach Children’s Hospital visit and Go Kart update!

Joe has an episode out where he talks with Scar about his visit to a local hospital that received some of the go karts funded by the Gamers Outreach charity stream back in October last year!

You can find details and pictures available in the video, but as a quick summary, folks will be happy to know that the fundraising was a huge success and has already vastly improved the lives of children in hospitals across the United States. Gamers Outreach have even found ways to improve the karts in the future as they continue to help kids feel a little more joy in their lives.

Minecraft Servers

DS9 September Petitions

VOD and minutes are available here!

DS9 Carl Garner Federal Lands Cleanup Day parade

Our last B’Hala outpost build contest, oh my! This parade float build contest was in celebration of Carl Garner Federal Lands Cleanup Day, here’s a VOD if you missed it!

Thank you to team Warden Hunters for hosting! That’s a wrap on the B’Hala parades! Thanks everyone who hosted, and participated!

Haunted Mansion Build Contest

Even though our B’Hala parade build contests have ended, we still have the Haunted Mansion build contest! This was announced live at our August 2023 DS9 petitions, so here’s a refresher on the details!

  • Teams will build a haunted house mansion and landscape around it
  • The last day to build is Friday October 20th as the build window closes at the strike of midnight US central time, ticking into Saturday, October 21st. Judging will be later that very day at 1pm US Central time.
  • Your haunted mansion must be built at least 3000 blocks away from 0,0. Command blocks for teleporting far out are available inside the snowy mountain donut near spawn.
  • The goal is to be remote, and to also get a feel for what kinds of things you might learn from the experience to provide good feedback for the teleport system
  • There are otherwise no hard and fast rules, this competition is very loose! Everyone will get to present cool haunted houses that explore both the interior and exterior.

Winter Snow Globe Build Contest

This contest won’t launch until mid-November, but I thought a reminder would be helpful. If you can’t participate in our haunted mansion contest, worry not, there’s still our winter one!

So far the only details are that you can expect a specific build location with marked plots to build a winter landscape snow globe. The plot sizes will vary to allow different sizes of teams. The rest of the contest details are being withheld until the contest launches as we want everyone to have the same time frame to design builds for the contest when the time arrives.

Judging is scheduled for Saturday, January 20th at 1pm US Central time.

DS9 event schedule

  • DS9 Petitions
    • Saturday, October 21st, Noon US Central Time.
  • Haunted Mansion Build Contest
    • Ongoing until judging on October 21st, 1pm US Central Time.
  • DS9 Petitions
    • Saturday, November 18th, Noon US Central Time.
  • DS9 Petitions
    • Saturday, December 9th, Noon US Central Time.
  • DS9 Petitions
    • Saturday, January 20th, Noon US Central Time.
  • Winter Snow Globe Build Contest
    • Saturday, January 20th, 1pm US Central Time.

September Everstorm Closes

With the month coming to a close we also close the September Everstorm. The From the Fog mod was definitely our defining MVP mod of the month, but here’s a list of all the mods added that made September so terrifying.

  • betterthanmending-1.3.0.jar
  • ‘Book Of Experience 3.1.0.jar’
  • dungeons-and-taverns-v2.1.4.jar
  • everything-is-dirt-2.1.jar
  • fabric-api-0.87.0+1.20.1.jar
  • fabric-seasons-2.2.1+1.20.jar
  • From-The-Fog-1.20-v1.9.2-Forge-Fabric.jar
  • geophilic-v2.0.0-mc1.20u1.20.1.jar
  • HorseBuff-1.20-2.1.2.jar

Here are all the obituaries reported for September:

  • May was shot by a skeleton whilst trying to escape spawn.
  • eclogues was expertly handling a creeper when another creeper came from nowhere and blew up.
  • Arthr got bested by a creeper while investigating the ruins across the water.
  • MJ was doomed to fall fleeing from a skeleton he never even saw. That’s what he gets for coming out of the cave.
  • ruffboi did his best, but the creepers did better.
  • fancytoy got overwhelmed by a group of zombies while trying to secure a couple geodes.
  • quilavabucket died getting tag teamed by a skeleman and a zombie while stream watched.
  • Moonroses4u traveled 3000 blocks in a search for cactus. Two zombies cornered her, one with a sword. She leaves an unnamed horse with gold armor.
  • Centuritron succumbed to a Zombie with the aide of their old nemesis, a Creeper.
  • MagentaAvocado found the ravager in the mirror was closer than it appeared.
  • Beyr33 never saw the wither skeleton that killed him.
  • NJ went exploring for charity, rode the lightning but was skewered by the trident-wielding drowned.

The survivors of September’s Everstorm share these final reports:

  • Gritmonger was a consummate coward and risked nothing in trying to stay safe and stockpile resources in two-block-high bunkers.
  • Void raided dungeons, built a Skulk island, and decided to kill the dragon before the end of the world.
  • Kindalas almost died. Almost.

October Everstorm opens

October may be the scariest month of the year with Halloween as it’s crown jewel, but we already got our horror quota filled from September! This month you can expect a more welcoming spooky experience. How can this be? Well the only hint I can give you is that this iteration will be using the StarterKit mod on the server side to give folks a Halloween basket and treats when they first join. Please enjoy!

Pinball FX Weekly Tournament

If you’re interested in the tournament standings you can find that here. These placings are calculated on a player’s best 15 scores out of the whole series, so come and see how you can do! Here’s how folks held up in September’s weekly tournaments results!

September Winners

  • Week 9: The Machine: Bride of Pin•Bot results are available here and the winner was ToxxicGlitter!
  • Week 10: Theatre of Magic results are available here and the winner was ToxxicGlitter!
  • Week 11: Safecracker results are available here and the winner was ToxxicGlitter!
  • Week 12: Champion Pub results are available here and the winner was Joe Hills!
  • Week 13: White Water results will be available in the discord when the tournament closes out at the end of this week.

Congrats to our winners for their awesome pinball skills! Here’s what you can expect to play during October!

October Tables

  • Week 14: Star Trek: The Next Generation
  • Week 15: Monster Bash
  • Week 16: Creature from the Black Lagoon
  • Week 17: Addams Family

Do you have what it takes to join the ranks and climb to the top of the standings? Play pinball with us to find out! Details are under Activity-Sign-Ups > #weekly-pinball-challenges.

HermitCraft 9 Videos

Whoa, so many videos came out in September! Joe’s been spoiling us with it all! I don’t want to clog this newsletter further with video embeds, as not including the Gamers Outreach video linked above, there’s another 10 videos!

Instead, you can follow this link here that will take you to Joe’s HermitCraft Season 9 playlist. It’s conveniently placed right at the video after the charity update episode, so you won’t miss anything! Woohoo!

Streams and other content

Upcoming Streams

If you’re looking for a place to find out when Joe is streaming, have I got the answer for you! You can see a calendar of all Joe’s upcoming streams over at this page over here!

Get in the Halloween mood!

Do you want some spooky Halloween themed videos to get you in the mood for the holiday? You’ve come to the right place! These videos here have been selected by Joe for their seasonally appropriate themes and ambience.

Enjoy these classic Joe Hills videos!

So long for now…

Phew! What a long newsletter! Lots of love and care went in to crafting this for you lovely folks out there reading this! I hope you enjoyed, and if you’re celebrating at the end of this month, have a happy Halloween!

This has been TommyBoii reporting for newsletter duty.

See you around!

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Petitions September 2023

Video on demand

[VOD coming soon]

Summary

  • DottyMatrix requests to Joe to follow her
    • Joe obliges and receives a server tour
  • Moonroses4u requests copies be made of the new AltCodex++ book
    • Joe obliges and makes copies
Posted on

Newsletter #59 for September 2023

Howdy folks!

It’s Tommy time! Community Liaison ThatTommyBoii reporting for newsletter duty!

Welcome to our new monthly newsletter! Old and new readers alike can use this resource as a means to get all the news happening with Joe and his Patreon discord server! Without further ado, here’s the news!

Hermits return!

Joe’s been so excited to play more HermitCraft with his friends! You can see Joe playing Xisuma’s new Bedwars game, and on his team returning to the server is Hypno! I can’t recommend this episode enough to folks, take a look!

Joe’s also excited to see Iskall and Stress on the server again! You can check out their videos linked below, be sure to give them a warm welcome back!

Quarterly meeting and Petition minutes

We covered this already in our final weekly newsletter, but just to be safe I wanted to provide folks with this link to our quarterly meeting VOD and minutes along with this link to our petitions VOD and minutes.

These are worth checking out for information on how we operate the discord and for our upcoming build contests!

A quick update

I also wanted to take a moment to let folks know that since the quarterly meeting the staff have had one of our monthly meetings and have started cooking up our next wave of Minecraft servers.

They will have complimentary but not identical structures for handling complaints and conflicts so players with different play-styles will still have a home here. We recognize that one method of conflict resolution will not work for all types of players.

For more conflict averse players we will have a high tempo resolution system moderated by Yirggzmb on her more relaxed Vanillish server.

More aggressive play-styles will be optimized to problem solve amongst themselves on ToxxicGlitter’s Modded server, with Toxxic stepping in when necessary.

The Flagship Vanilla server with Joe as creative lead will continue in season 10 with a monthly petition approach somewhere in the middle of the previously mentioned servers. There will now be more accessibility as TommyBoii (that’s me!) will serve as a proxy for folks who feel they are unable to raise issues themselves for any reason.

The only confirmed date we have right now is the last day of Toxxic’s 1.19.2 Create Mod server. That will ending on October 2nd. More information will be announced in the near future, so keep an eye out for that in October’s newsletter!

Minecraft Servers

DS9 parades

August had only one parade held, and what a parade it was! In celebration of Independent Worker’s Day, folks built all kinds of floats on the Deep Slate Nine server! Here’s the VOD for anyone who missed it!

We have one last parade to hold at our B’Hala outposts, and it will be for Carl Garner Federal Lands Cleanup Day! The parade float build contest is hosted by Team Warden Hunters.

If you’re interested in participating you can join everyone on Saturday, September 23rd at 1pm US Central time. Be sure to bring enough materials to build your float, you only get 1 hour to build!

DS9 event schedule

  • DS9 Petitions
    • Saturday, September 23rd, Noon US Central Time
  • Carl Garner Federal Lands Cleanup Day, hosted by Team Warden Hunters
    • Saturday, September 23rd, 1pm US Central Time
  • Haunted Mansion Build Contest
    • Ongoing until judging on October 21st, 1pm US Central Time.
  • DS9 Petitions
    • Saturday, November 18th, Noon US Central Time.
  • DS9 Petitions
    • Saturday, December 9th, Noon US Central Time.
  • DS9 Petitions
    • Saturday, January 20th, Noon US Central Time.
  • Winter Snow Globe Build Contest
    • Saturday, January 20th, 1pm US Central Time.

August Everstorm Closes

Here are all the obituaries reported for August:

  • Magenta could not fend off the pillagers and the trident-wielding drowned at the same time
  • SuperStone was cornered in a cave by a heavily-enchanted skeleton.
  • ChefNutmeg was sniped by a skelly lighting up the nether fortress.
  • Ellas died to a tree climbing drowned, they lasted about 20 minutes
  • Eclogues withered away due to hubris
  • ruffboi died as he lived: ridiculous and easily jumpscared by creepers.
  • Beyr33 went out with a bang by falling 1900 blocks after killing the dragon.
  • seanard shot the moon and then landed in the void.
  • Gritmonger got blown up by a creeper while campfiring-up random villages to provide safe havens for people using return horns from the end.

The survivors of August’s Everstorm share these final reports:

  • Centuritron logged on to check out the server, didn’t know what to do, then logged back off alive.
  • SalemOleander was briefly enthralled with the random mining gifts, and made it out in one piece.
  • DottyMatrix decided that Everstorm was the right place to learn how to endbust for the first time, and returned with her own wings to tell the tale.
  • quilavabucket used this Everstorm to get over a fear of hardcore and successfully ran a deep dark city and fought the dragon.
  • Kindalas successfully built a starter house on the ruins of Magenta’s Starter House.
  • Laxmi13 needs to take more risks because she didn’t die building a house, mining, or fighting the dragon.
  • Mantuamaker found a hole and just kept digging.
  • MJ missed the Dragon fight because of sushi.
  • WizardOfDocs spent several happy hours mining for loot chests, and for all we know is still there to this day.

September Everstorm opens

Since August’s Everstorm was so well received Joe has resumed his creative lead role with more assistance from his 10 year old kid providing creative input! Together they have prepared 2 months of autumnal excitement for you to enjoy!

One feature already announced is use of the Horse Buff mod! With the server-side version you can expect to see fixes to horse movement when running up blocks and inclines. If players install the mod client side as well it will increase the speed at which blocks are broken when on horseback, so that’s cool!

PVP is off but no other details have been released. Joe keeps saying something about this being the most terrifying Everstorm ever, and that things are glitchy and weird. I have no idea what that all means; Can you figure out what’s happening there?!

Better be quick about it too, as this iteration ends on September 28th!

Pinball FX Weekly Tournament

If you’re interested in the tournament standings you can find that here. These placings are calculated on a player’s best 15 scores out of the whole series, so come and see how you can do! Here’s how folks held up in August’s weekly tournaments results!

August Winners

  • Week 5: Whirlwind results are available here and the winner was ToxxicGlitter!
  • Week 6: Junkyard results are available here and the winner was ToxxicGlitter again!
  • Week 7: Black Rose results are available here and the winner was ButterFlyGirlKMC!
  • Week 8: The Party Zone results are available here and the winner was Laxmi13!

Congrats to our winners for their awesome pinball skills! Here’s what you can expect to play during September!

September Tables

  • Week 9: The Machine: Bride of Pin•Bot
  • Week 10: Theatre of Magic
  • Week 11: Safecracker
  • Week 12: Champion Pub
  • Week 13: White Water

Do you have what it takes to join the ranks and climb to the top of the standings? Play pinball with us to find out!

HermitCraft 9 Videos

If you missed the episode that came out before the Bedwars video, no worries! Here’s episode 69!

Streams

Upcoming Streams

If you’re looking for a place to find out when Joe is streaming, have I got the answer for you! You can see a calendar of all Joe’s upcoming streams over at this page over here!

Notable streams playlists

Joe’s been playing more V-Rising with his betrothed, BadgerSpanner! Here’s a link to a playlist of the VODs!

Craft fans can enjoy all the latest arts and crafts VODs over at this playlist!

If you like to watch hermits playing TCG live you can see the latest VOD at this link!

Upcoming conventions

Update! Music City Multi Con ticket sales are open now! Get your tickets over at their website here so you can join in the fun!

TGD Fall registration is closed but you can still join their waitlist if any spots open up! Spring dates for TGD have been confirmed, so folks interested in attending can start putting that on their calendars!

So long for now…

I hope you enjoyed our first monthly newsletter! I think the structural changes it provides gives a more concise way to access information at once. It’s certainly easier to write it this way!

As always we welcome feedback under Joe Hills Meta > #feedback-newsletter. I look forward to writing for you next month!

This has been TommyBoii reporting for newsletter duty.

See you around!

Posted on

Newsletter #58 for August 21st, 2023

Howdy folks!

It’s Tommy time! Community Liaison ThatTommyBoii reporting for newsletter duty!

This is our last weekly newsletter, don’t be sad that it’s over, smile because it happened! Let’s not delay the inevitable, here’s the news!

2023 Q3 Quarterly Meeting

Thanks to all the folks who attended our quarterly meeting! If you missed it and would like to see the VOD you can do so here!

If you want the minutes of that meeting they are available for folks to read here!

The next quarterly meeting will be on Saturday, November 18th at 1pm US central.

Minecraft Servers

DS9 August Petitions (and build contest announcements!)

VOD and minutes are available here!

DS9 independent worker’s day parade

Wow what an incredible parade! If you’re interested in the work folks put into this parade check out this VOD! If you’re not already a member and are interested in joining us for our next parade you can join Joe’s patreon to support him and gain access to our minecraft servers. Our next parade is the last one at B’Hala!

Thank you to team Deztiny for hosting!

If you don’t have time to watch the VOD something exciting to note is that Quinn and Joe plan to record a new version of Quinn’s song Lines. This is inspired by server member Phali’s club dance remix, so keep an eye out for that!

DS9 event schedule

  • DS9 Petitions
    • Saturday, September 23rd, Noon US Central Time
  • Carl Garner Federal Lands Cleanup Day, hosted by Team Warden Hunters
    • Saturday, September 23rd, 1pm US Central Time
  • Haunted Mansion Build Contest
    • Ongoing until judging on October 21st, 1pm US Central Time.
  • DS9 Petitions
    • Saturday, November 18th, Noon US Central Time.
  • DS9 Petitions
    • Saturday, December 9th, Noon US Central Time.
  • DS9 Petitions
    • Saturday, January 20th, Noon US Central Time.
  • Winter Snow Globe Build Contest
    • Saturday, January 20th, 1pm US Central Time.

Everstorm obituaries

Folks should note that August’s Everstorm will go down on August 31st! This is because Everstorm cycles will now align with monthly newsletters, so be sure to get your obituaries and survivor’s messages sent in a timely manner!

  • Magenta could not fend off the pillagers and the trident-wielding drowned at the same time
  • SuperStone was cornered in a cave by a heavily-enchanted skeleton.
  • ChefNutmeg was sniped by a skelly lighting up the nether fortress.
  • Ellas died to a tree climbing drowned, they lasted about 20 minutes
  • Eclogues withered away due to hubris

Pinball FX Weekly Tournament

Week 7: Black Rose

Congratulations ButterflyGirlKMC!!! First place this week was well earned, fantastic!

1st: ButterflyGirlKMC. 2nd: ToxxicGlitter. 3rd: JoeHills. 4th: jsparker77. 5th: Laxmi13. 6th: ferretterrier. 7th: Beyr*QC.

Week 8: The Party Zone

Come play some pinball with us! You can join in this week by using the code available under Activity-Sign-Ups > #weekly-pinball-challenges!

Tournament Standings

The standings for week 7 are not yet available, but once they are you can find them on this page.

You can also see how your best scores compare and where you place in the full tournament! Take a look at that over here!

Streams

Upcoming Streams

Great news for fans of variety streams! Joe will now have a semi-recurring “Thursday Night Overflow” stream on twitch! If you’re interested be sure to check out the streaming calendar to stay up to date on when those cool streams will be!

You can see a calendar of all Joe’s upcoming streams over at the new page here!

Notable streams

V Rising with Badger!

Crafts stream!

TCG Tuesday!

Upcoming conventions

Music City Multi Con tickets sales have still not opened. TGD Fall registration has closed but there is a waitlist available to join. We still have a tentative date for Spring TGD.

So long for now…

I’m sad to see the weekly newsletter go but I look forward to seeing you in the new monthly newsletters! Thank you to everyone who kept tabs and provided feedback and contributed to making this newsletter the best it could be. I couldn’t have done it without your support!

This has been TommyBoii reporting for newsletter duty.

See you around!

Posted on

Petitions August 2023

Video on demand

Summary

  • in season 8 hermits spent months going through seeds, hermits would check to see if the seeds were truly viable and it drove them bonkers
    • when it was time for season 9 the hermits had a hermit staff member pick a seed for them.
      • Joe didn’t get to plan his season 9 and neither did we in DS9.
      • Joe wants season 10 to be more of a collective experience for us, so these two build contests will help test things for season 10
    • Joe will still be creative lead, but this is our time to test out Joe’s ideas so no one has to be startled and blindsided by them.
      • a few explicit changes, a lot of early season stress was from small world borders. Joe likes being able to promote his server as a bleeding edge flagship server. we’re not part of conversations of updates when we aren’t immediately up to date on updates.
    • when hermits talk about problems the number one thing is people arguing about how soon is too soon to update. Joe can put up with the hermits spiraling for 6 hours but not his server too.
      • Joe’s compromise is #feedback-vanilla-smp
  • Proposal 1: update to the latest jar asap and when available, additionally add quality of life and performance mods
    • Joe wants to test a game mechanic that is new in snapshots. We will have it in time for season 10, a feature of random numbers in command blocks.
      • What if: we have a command block that gives you the feather falling effect, teleported you 300 blocks in the air a random set of blocks along the cardinal directions
  • Proposal 2: At server launch we will prepare for 2 hours and then fight the dragon
  • Proposal 3: Once the dragon is dead Joe will add 8 cardinal and secondary direction teleporter pads with command blocks that will allow players in small groups to get thrown thousands of blocks away without a teleport back until the end of the contest.
  • Proposal 4: At server launch a 3 month build contest starts for folks to create neighborhoods. Similar to B’Hala outposts but bigger and without neighbors.
    • The theme would be “company town” from a mining town to industrial factory town to space settlement, towns are required to have a main street for parades and places for employees to live and places to buy and sell things, but folks get to decide what their theme is.
      • In the short term everyone gets to have the survival Minecraft experience. folks who join later after the initial contest can join existing towns or pick a direction and go somewhere new if they want to start something new.
      • Joe does not want to encourage centralized planning of nether tunnels
      • Joe wants the free stuff at petitions to slow, the goal of petitions is supposed to be a problem solving thing.
      • Joe recognizes that if someone is using something in a way that upsets other people it is a problem we are here to address
        • Have a focus on talking about things to be able to move on
  • DS9 multi-month Halloween build contest that has started as of 08/19/23
    • teams build a haunted house mansion and landscape around it
    • Contest ends late October, tentatively the 21st.
    • It must be at least 3000 blocks away from 0,0
    • The goal is to be remote and get a feel for what kinds of things you might learn to give good feedback for the teleport system
    • No hard and fast rules, very loose, but everyone gets to present cool haunted houses that explore the inside and out.
  • Another build contest will launch in mid-November. A specific build location with plots for a winter landscape snow globe build contest.
    • Plot sizes vary for different sizes of teams and would be judged sometime around January 15th.
Posted on

2023 Q3 Meeting Minutes

  • Emoji
    • Emojis approved emojis will be added this upcoming Wednesday, if not next Wednesday.during a craft stream.
    • /o/ \o\ dance emoji approved but will be two separate emojis, not animated.
    • Xiexie emoji asked to be more legible, request being considered but not guaranteed
    • Good point emoji will be workshopped on crafts with Cleo stream
  • More channels
    • New word-games channel has been created
    • Games that interest Joe will have channels pop up out of cycle and be archived out as needed.
    • The discord channels feel unorganized to some, we’re taking suggestions on how to improve it.
      • We will not have the discord become a community server as that opens us to potential threats such as bot accounts.
    • Fashion channel is not feasible right now
      • Financial concerns mean Joe does not feel like he can handle the additional stress currently as the fashion channel requires more moderation.
  • YT Stream notifications
    • The new calendar feature on joehills.net has helped Maahes0 as well as others
  • Website usability and changes
    • The changes to website have been well received
    • Links at the top of the page will be added for the /soon page and the /live page.
  • Moderation philosophy review
    • Tommy’s suggested system would work well if we had more funds for staff but we don’t
    • Problems that happened over time happened because Joe did not allow for time for staff to have meetings like he originally intended,
      • Having not all staff attend the meeting and having minutes available would be beneficial for Joe
    • Joe doesn’t want this server to be like others, he wants it to be genuine and unique.
    • Utilizing Discord’s new timeout feature will help with edge cases
    • Staff will be using a spreadsheet to help see patterns in bad behavior
    • Feedback still welcomed in feedback-moderation-and-rules
    • Joe has added Modmail to the Patreon invite message
      • The Modmail tutorial will be updated
    • Joe will be stepping in to tell folks to chill when needed
    • Joe takes responsibility for issues falling through the cracks but we’re feeling optimistic about the future
  • SMART goals
    • Finishing the pinball machine is really important to Joe
      • Immigration paperwork caused issues for Joe and took away his focus for the build
      • Some projects may not get as much attention, such as Halloween builds, but the goal is not in any danger
    • Losing the car is endangering Joe’s goal of meeting fans for signings and TCG games.
      • If Joe can get sponsored to go to local conventions that would be helpful
        • This is dependent on Joe reestablishing connections he has
        • Getting sponsors would help relieve stress for Joe
      • Joe will still prioritize going to events for meeting fans and hanging out
      • In theory TCG games could start being played in December
      • If Joe gets a day job that allows him to travel on the weekends it might be viable
        • Ideally he wouldn’t have to get a day job
    • Relying on twitter and where to move functionality
      • In the short term joehills.net will be the best place to find info on Joe
        • The HermitCraft website is not run by Joe, and is made in databases and languages he does not work with.
      • Realistically, if Joe had to spin up a discord alternative we could
      • Joe has been and will continue to post links to his social media posts.
    • 2024 Launch of Vanilla SMP Season 10
      • Long term build contest with teleporters to encourage spread of players instead of condensing around spawn or one area
      • Feedback-vanilla-smp channel available for feedback
    • Postpone having to start a new day job
      • Joe was able to avoid cutting the discord thanks to folks on Tumblr supporting Joe on Patreon.
        • Joe is avoiding expenses and pairing down where he can
      • Joe needs to avoid losing money during the hiatus between season 9 and season 10.
      • Alternative revenue ideas Joe had are off the table for now
      • There is no scenario here where Corrinne starves but Joe may need to return to a day job if things get bad enough
        • This is a continuous concern until Joe gets a day job or things take off for Joe in season 10 of HermitCraft
      • The problem is one good month of money doesn’t stretch forever
      • If Joe had to lay off staff and close most of the discord he would need to know to do so now and not later.
      • The best time to get a new job is after the start of season 10
        • The second best time is mid August.
      • Joe trusts Tommy enough to run the discord full time, but does not have the funds to do so
        • Until then, Joe intends to focus on improving his art.
      • Feedback-revenue created for folks in the community to suggest revenue ideas.
        • Considering something like kickstarter for something during the hiatus
Posted on

Newsletter #57 for August 14th, 2023

Howdy folks!

It’s Tommy time! Community Liaison ThatTommyBoii reporting for newsletter duty!

If you’re ready to hear the news you’re in luck, here it is!

TCG cards update

Joe’s made a post over here on Mastadon about signing his TCG cards! He and the other Hermits have been signing cards like mad and sending them back to Creo, so we’re one step closer to folks being able to get their signed cards!

2023 Q3 Quarterly Meeting

The meeting is this Saturday, August 19th at 3pm US Central time! I will see folks there and as always stream it to my twitch channel for folks to watch it live. The VOD and meeting minutes will also be made available for folks at a later date and time.

Current 2023Q2 Agenda

  • Emojis
    • When will be adding the new emojis approved at past meetings? -Tommy
    • /o/ \o\ Animated dance emoji -Maahes0
    • Good point emoji – Nepeta
      • Fair point image created by Quill
  • More channels
    • #fashion -Ad-Astra
    • #word-games -Tommy via Dahlia’s suggestion
  • No YT stream notifications – Maahes0
    • Stream announcement channel -BadgerSpanner
  • Website usability and changes -Joe
  • Moderation philosophy review -Joe
  • SMART goals – Joe
    • Complete pinball machine by end of season
    • Sustainably meet fans for signings and TCG games in 2024
    • Identify where we are reliant on twitter and move that functionality in-house or elsewhere
      • Website usability and changes
      • Monthly newsletter cross-posted to Patreon
    • Prepare for the 2024 launch of Vanilla SMP Season 10 by experimenting with game design concepts during the final months of 2023
    • Without having to change Corrinne’s schools midyear, postpone having to start at a new day job until after season 10 launches so I can attend the first recording sessions.

Minecraft Servers

Reminder to folks that Joe will be announcing a new long term build contest this Saturday August 19th at the DS9 petitions! Feedback is still welcomed pre and post petitions over in Joe Hills Meta > #feedback-build-contests.

Following this is the National Independent Worker Day parade, starring our beloved musical guest Quinn Hills!

DS9 event schedule

  • DS9 Petitions
    • Saturday, August 19th, Noon US Central Time
  • National Independent Worker Day, hosted by Team Deztiny
    • Saturday, August 19th, 1pm US Central Time
  • Carl Garner Federal Lands Cleanup Day, hosted by Team Warden Hunters
    • Saturday, September 23rd, 1pm US Central Time

Everstorm July closes

The last obituary of the world:

  • SuperStone explored the Terralith biomes and died running from skeletons in a forest, having never learned what to break to get armor.

The survivors of last month’s Everstorm share these final reports:

  • Laxmi13 joined last minute to die but enjoyed random loot too much to give up.
  • SalemOleander had a delightful and spreadsheet-filled time on their first Everstorm!
  • Gritmonger showed up late, but survived, and went on to light up one of the new style villages Seanard discovered.
  • Void got a headache trying to remember loot-drops and returned in time to get the final hit on the dragon.
  • Magenta made a house of chaos and ventured to all four corners of the world.
  • ruffboi showed up VERY late, and did little, but figured out how to get the elusive phantom membrane.
  • MJ worked through the randomization to build a Zelda inspired house. He explored a desert city, floating sky island, and rescued a villager trapped at sea.
  • Kindalas took advantage of the starter kits put to gather by Gritmonger and traveled to the End to help put an end to the Ender Dragon.
  • Beyr33 tried to turn the world purple without success after helping killing the dragon.

Everstorm August opens

The next Everstorm is here again! The parameters for this iteration have been selected by Joe and his wonderful daughter Corrinne! It’s up to folks to hop on the server and find out what’s new! If you’re interested the info to join is under Realms and Servers > #everstorm-aug-2023.

Also as a reminder to folks, this Everstorm and all the future ones to come will be synced to the monthly newsletters! The Everstorms will conclude within the last week of the month and the obituaries and survivor’s posts will go up in the newsletter that is posted at the beginning of the month following.

August’s Everstorm is set to end on Thursday, August 31st.

Pinball FX Weekly Tournament

Week 6: Junk Yard

Toxxic gets another congratulations for his 6th win in a row!

1st: ToxxicGlitter. 2nd: JoeHills. 3rd: Mr.Hardluck. 4th: jsparker77. 5th: ButterflyGirlKMC. 6th: R1X5.13. 7th: ferretterrier. 8th: Laxmi13. 9th: narya. 10th: eggandsuch. 11th: alpacatastic.

Week 7: Black Rose

Avast! Come play some pinball with us! You can join in this week by using the code available under Activity-Sign-Ups > #weekly-pinball-challenges!

Tournament Standings

Here’s the standings for week 6!

You can also see how your best scores compare and where you place in the full tournament! Take a look at that over here!

HermitCraft 9 Videos

Streams

Upcoming Streams

You can see a calendar of all Joe’s upcoming streams over at the new page here!

Notable streams

Crafts with Cleo!

TCG Tuesday!

Upcoming conventions

Music City Multi Con tickets sales have still not opened. Fall dates for TGD have been confirmed, so you can mark that on your calendar! We still have a tentative date for Spring TGD.

So long for now…

Next week is our last weekly edition of the newsletter. We’ve come so far thanks to folks like you who read these and stay updated. Thank you so much!

This has been TommyBoii reporting for newsletter duty.

See you around!

Posted on

Newsletter #56 for August 7th, 2023

Howdy folks!

It’s Tommy time! Community Liaison ThatTommyBoii reporting for newsletter duty!

We’re getting this newsletter out despite Joe’s internet suffering this thunderstorm season! Woo!

2023 Q3 Quarterly Meeting

Current 2023Q2 Agenda

  • No YT stream notifications – Maahes0
    • Stream announcement channel -BadgerSpanner
  • Website usability and changes -Joe
  • Moderation philosophy review -Joe
  • SMART goals – Joe
    • Complete pinball machine by end of season
    • Sustainably meet fans for signings and TCG games in 2024
    • Identify where we are reliant on twitter and move that functionality in-house or elsewhere
      • Website usability and changes
      • Monthly newsletter cross-posted to Patreon
    • Prepare for the 2024 launch of Vanilla SMP Season 10 by experimenting with game design concepts during the final months of 2023
    • Without having to change Corrinne’s schools midyear, postpone having to start at a new day job until after season 10 launches so I can attend the first recording sessions.

Minecraft Servers

Folks should know that at the next petitions, August 19th, Joe will be announcing a new long term build contest! All of the information and discussion will be happening live at petitions, so you should attend if you can! If not a VOD and minutes will be available like always. We also have a feedback channel, so please share your thoughts pre and post petitions over in Joe Hills Meta > #feedback-build-contests.

DS9 event schedule

  • DS9 Petitions
    • Saturday, August 19th, Noon US Central Time
  • National Independent Worker Day, hosted by Team Deztiny
    • Saturday, August 19th, 1pm US Central Time
  • Carl Garner Federal Lands Cleanup Day, hosted by Team Warden Hunters
    • Saturday, September 23rd, 1pm US Central Time

Pinball FX Weekly Tournament

Week 5: Whirlwind

Congratulations again for another win Toxxic!

1st: ToxxicGlitter. 2nd: Laxmi13. 3rd: @JoeHills. 4th: R1X5.13. 5th: ButterflyGirlKMC. 6th: jsparker77. 7th: Kingicecream_11. 8th: DarkHorseAsh. 9th: NJCoffeeJunkie. 10th: Drewbacca81. 11th: narya.

Week 6: Junk Yard

Play some pinball with us! You can join in this week by using the code available under Activity-Sign-Ups > #weekly-pinball-challenges!

Tournament Standings

Here’s the standings for week 5!

You can also see how your best scores compare and where you place in the full tournament! Take a look at that over here!

HermitCraft 9 Videos

Streams

Upcoming Streams

You can see a calendar of all Joe’s upcoming streams over at the new page here!

Notable streams

Upcoming conventions

Music City Multi Con tickets sales have still not opened. Fall dates for TGD have been confirmed, so you can mark that on your calendar! We still have a tentative date for Spring TGD.

So long for now…

Let’s continue to have a great August! Thanks for reading the newsletter!

This has been TommyBoii reporting for newsletter duty.

See you around!

Posted on

Newsletter #55 for July 31st, 2023

Howdy folks!

It’s Tommy time! Community Liaison ThatTommyBoii reporting for newsletter duty!

We’ve got plenty to announce, let’s jump in cause there’s no time to waste!

Collector’s Edition Joe Hills TCG card!

Today is the last day to pre-order Joe’s collector edition TCG card! You can purchase a signed or unsigned copy over here!

Monthly Newsletter

Big changes coming up! For those of you who keep up to date by reading the newsletters, we will no longer have weekly editions!

Well, actually August 21st is the last weekly newsletter. After that they will be monthly! So you can expect the first edition of the monthly newsletter (and every month after that) to be posted on the second Monday of every month!

Worry not, everything in the newsletter will keep being in the newsletter! So you will always get the information, just less frequently. The one exception to this rule is the stream schedule and upcoming meetups! Joe has created a new page on his website that will update as changes occur so folks will always have the most reliable and up to date source of stream times!

You can find our first beta version of that over at https://joehills.net/soon/

Synchronizing Everstorm

One of the things that’ll also change is Joe will be synching the Everstorm iterations to the monthly newsletter! This way we’ll still get to include your obituaries and survivor’s posts! July’s Everstorm will end on Sunday, August 13th, with the August Everstorm to follow shortly after.

Patreon Subs

Some of y’all might have heard Joe talk about this on stream, but Joe wanted to share the stats of the new subs he got on Patreon! We want to extend our gratitude to the folks on tumblr who promoted and encouraged folks to join and tip Joe, thank you so much! It’s been so incredible seeing new folks join the discord!

Joe has seen 21 new $1 tier subs, 27 new $5 tier subs, and 34 new $10 tier subs.

That’s incredible! Thank you so so much for supporting Joe, it really means a lot to see folks support Joe’s weird art and other shenanigans. He made a whole post on his tumblr, you can view that over here.

2023 Q3 Quarterly Meeting

Current 2023Q2 Agenda

  • No YT stream notifications – Maahes0
    • Stream announcement channel -BadgerSpanner
  • Website usability and changes -Joe
  • Moderation philosophy review -Joe
  • SMART goals – Joe
    • Complete pinball machine by end of season
    • Sustainably meet fans for signings and TCG games in 2024
    • Without having to change Corrinne’s schools midyear, postpone having to start at a new day job until after season 10 launches so I can attend the first recording sessions.

Minecraft Servers

Joe has some more group build contests planned for the minecraft server between now and when season 10 launches! He’s started writing up the rules for the first one, which will be announced and open immediately at the next petitions on August 19th.

Joe is welcome to feedback and would like folks to provide their thoughts on what did and didn’t work with prior contests like the neighborhoods in season 8 and outposts and map art build contests in season 9.

You can submit that under Joe Hills Meta > #feedback-build-contests.

DS9 event schedule

  • DS9 Petitions
    • Saturday, August 19th, Noon US Central Time
  • National Independent Worker Day, hosted by Team Deztiny
    • Saturday, August 19th, 1pm US Central Time
  • Carl Garner Federal Lands Cleanup Day, hosted by Team Warden Hunters
    • Saturday, September 23rd, 1pm US Central Time

Pinball FX Weekly Tournament

Week 4: The Getaway: High Speed II

Toxxic takes the win again, congratulations!

1st: ToxxicGlitter. 2nd: @JoeHills. 3rd: ButterflyGirlKMC. 4th: R1X5.13. 5th: jsparker77. 6th: ferretterrier. 7th: Kingicecream_11. 8th: ScannerWill. 9th: kindalas. 10th: NJCoffeeJunkie. 11th: Laxmi13. 12th: DarkHorseAsh.

Week 5: Whirlwind

Play some pinball with us! You can join in this week by using the code available under Activity-Sign-Ups > #weekly-pinball-challenges!

Tournament Standings

Here’s the standings for week 4!

You can also see how your best scores compare and where you place in the full tournament! Take a look at that over here!

HermitCraft 9 Videos

Streams

Upcoming Streams

  • Monday, July 31st
    • 8:30pm: HermitCraft 9 Live
  • Tuesday, August 1st
    • 8:30am: V Rising with Badger Spanner
  • Wednesday, August 2nd
    • 8:30am: Crafts with Cleo
  • Thursday, August 3rd
    • 8:30am: HermitCraft with Quinn
  • Friday, August 4th
    • 8:30am: Morning Coffee on HermitCraft
    • 8:30pm: HermitCraft 9 Live
  • Saturday, August 5th
    • 8:30pm: HermitCraft 9 Live
  • Sunday, August 6th:
    • 8:30pm: HermitCraft 9 Live

Notable streams

Upcoming conventions

Music City Multi Con tickets sales have still not opened. Fall dates for TGD have been confirmed, so you can mark that on your calendar! We still have a tentative date for Spring TGD.

So long for now…

I hope you have a wonderful day, I look forward to seeing you next time!

This has been TommyBoii reporting for newsletter duty.

See you around!

Posted on

Newsletter #54 for July 24th, 2023

Howdy folks!

It’s Tommy time! Community Liaison ThatTommyBoii reporting for newsletter duty!

What a  month it’s been so far! Let’s get into the news!

Tennessee Game Days

From Friday September 15th to Sunday the 17th TGD will be running, and Joe will be there! A weekend of board and card gaming at a hotel just south of Nashville! You can find all the information you need to attend and have a great time at the convention website, the registration is open here, and you can view their game library!

There’s plenty more information available for folks in the discord, under Meet-Ups > #sep-15-17-tennessee-game-days.

Collector’s Edition Joe Hills TCG card!

Pre-order is still open for Joe’s collector edition TCG card! You can purchase a signed or unsigned copy over here!

If you’re interested in TCG games, good news! Joe has started streaming TCG games with Cub and other hermits on Tuesdays at 1pm US Central! Be sure to hop in or watch the VODs if you can’t get enough of the card game!

2023 Q3 Quarterly Meeting

Another quarterly time of year! Our next meeting will be held on Saturday, August 19th at 3pm US Central time.

Current 2023Q2 Agenda

  • No YT stream notifications – Maahes0
    • Stream announcement channel -BadgerSpanner

Minecraft Servers

Parade float building contests!

We have our last two parade float building contests scheduled!

In celebration of National Independent Worker Day, Team Deztiny will be hosting their parade on August 19th, at 1pm US Central time.

In celebration of Carl Garner Federal Lands Cleanup Day, Team Warden Hunters will be hosting their parade on September 23rd, at 1pm US Central time.

DS9 July Petitions

VOD and minutes are available here!

DS9 August Petitions

The next petitions is scheduled for Saturday, August 19th, at Noon US Central time.

June Everstorm

We have a few last minute survivor entries!

  • Kindalas kept logging in to say hello to his friends and managed to survive every time.
  • Void did archeology and chilled at home with their Sniffers
  • Seanard survived and thrived. Dragon defeated and all.

July Everstorm

Folks have been having a killer time on the Everstorm server!

  • ChloeTGaP was 50% sure she was safe around the piglins
  • Chefnutmeg was death Bacon’d. Murdered by a piglin that followed her back through the portal.

Pinball FX Weekly Tournament

Week 3: Attack from Mars

Another victory goes to ToxxicGlitter, congrats!

1st: ToxxicGlitter. 2nd: R1X5.13. 3rd: ButterflyGirlKMC. 4th: ferretterrier. 5th: jsparker77. 6th: JoeHills. 7th: Kingicecream_11. 8th: Drewbacca81. 9th: Laxmi13. 10th: Cosmic Goddess. 11th: kindalas. 12th: ScannerWill.

Week 4: The Getaway: High Speed II

Race to be our next winner! If you’d like to join in this week you can do so by using the code available under Activity-Sign-Ups > #weekly-pinball-challenges!

Tournament Standings

With our new rankings system for the tournament you can see how your best scores compare and where you place! Take a look at that over here!

HermitCraft 9 Videos

Streams

Upcoming Streams

New reoccurring streams are on Tuesday! V Rising with BadgerSpanner in the mornings and TCG with Cub and pals in the afternoons! All times in US Central.

  • Monday, July 24th
    • No afternoon stream
    • 8:30pm: HermitCraft 9 Live!
  • Tuesday, July 25th
    • 8:30am: V Rising with BadgerSpanner
    • 1pm: TCG Tuesday with Cub and pals
  • Wednesday, July 26th
    • 8:30am: Crafts with Cleo, pinball playfield design finalization
  • Thursday, July 27th
    • 8:30am: HermitCraft with Quinn
  • Friday, July 28th
    • 8:30am: Coffee and Catch-up on HermitCraft 9
    • 8:30pm: HermitCraft 9 Live!
  • Saturday, July 29th
    • Collab stream, time to be announced
  • Sunday, July 30th
    • Collab stream, time to be announced

Notable streams

Joe plans to have V Rising be a reoccurring stream, so check out this VOD if you want to keep up!

Upcoming conventions

Music City Multi Con tickets sales have still not opened. Fall dates for TGD have been confirmed, so you can mark that on your calendar! We still have a tentative date for Spring TGD.

So long for now…

Thanks for reading the news! Your kindness, interest, and support mean a lot to me!

This has been TommyBoii reporting for newsletter duty.

See you around