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Making Uncovery Better

This forum is a continuation of the blog post on this link: http://uncovery.me/2014/02/17/making-uncovery-a-better-server/

I have been coming up with some ideas that might make the entire joining process a little less complicated.

To clarify things better to new users, why not use terms that are more familiar to them. Some users I find a bit overwhelmed by the difference between "Join us" and "Building Rights". I believe we should clean this up into 2 sections. "Join us" => Visit Us and "Building Rights" => Join Us. It seems more like a logical ordering that users will better understand.

Now on the current building rights page, it gets a little redundant. For example: Step 1: Choosing a world (creative vs survival) and Step 6: Pick a survival or creative lot are essentially the same step. And it suggests in steps 2 & 3, picking a lot before a user even visits the world. I propose a little more of a logical re-ordering.

I put together a little flow chart with a clearer concept. May I suggest using a little jQuery to show/hide divs to make this possible.

I recommend showing things one step at a time, so users don't skim ahead and not complete everything, such as not walking to their lot.

So like step 1, the user picks between creative or survival, and it shows the pro's and con's of both, but once they select the lot type they want, then they won't see anything on the application about Empire stuff if they chose Flatlands or vice-versa. They can always come back and change between creative/survival until they officially claim their lot.

Step 2 would appear after they made their selection in step one and introduce them to their world name, either Flatlands or Empire, then it would say how to get to that world via the portals and how to navigate it using wood swords, etc.

Step 3 would introduce how to navigate and claim lots, it would suggest open lots relative to the world you currently chose only, and tell the user how to use the 2d map to find open lots, and tell them to explore and find a lot they want, and then click a button saying that they are currently at the lot they want (this emphasizes them to walk), you probably could even do a websend request so instead of the user selecting their lot from the drop down, it pulls their in game coordinates in game and then figures out which lot they are in and if it's valid or not, it's an advanced idea but it could work, but if you have a pulldown like you currently do, only show creative lots if they chose creative, and survival if they chose survival. And then yeah, they claim the lot.

Step 4 would be the quiz, you might make the map questions world-specific to match with the world the user chose, and make the walking to your lot question about lava/water usage as a settler for the creative quiz.

These are just some concepts that I think might improve the Guest experience.
Here is kind of the flow plan I was thinking incase you are a bit more visual.

I like the idea to structure it. It seems a log of people did not even scroll down to read the whole page.
Let me think how to improve this.

Something that might also improve the gameplay for newer users is a starting kit.

VERY minimalistic ideas , but hey , it is free stuff , and I wouldnt have complained

-Wooden Pick & Wooden Axe
- 16 Torches
-4 Steak
Or something along those lines. We could incorperate this with the test somehow. Like making it to where if you get a 100% on the test , you get the items above , 90% You get the items minus the torches , and so on.
And limit the passing score to about 85% to 90% , but have certain questions required to get right.

I believe I've rambled enough , I hope I get my point out :)