Topic: Blocks of Crypto -- a Minecraft-Crypto Concept (Read 677 times)

I believe I'll go for an open Alpha with bug bounties :-)

Also might be looking for donations, but won't start accepting any until at least a working prototype is out.

Plan to run regular contests for helping the server (community-voted most helpful member, most wiki contributions, most bug reports, etc) once the server is launched, plus an opening day tokens giveaway.

I am super excited to see this project develop! Will you be accepting regular people as testers or only tech-savy people that are fimilar with the testnet and/or minecraft in general. As someone that hasn't played the game in a few years and that has never used the bitcoin testnet, I would still be interested in testing!

Answers to your questions, in order:

Yes, I will be accepting testers. We'll run on the Bitcoin testnet for awhile.

Everything is custom coded. If you read the summary of what these miners do, you'd know there's no existing plugin/system that integrates them the way we plan to. Or is this information not readily available enough? That might be my fault.

I will begin populating the wiki with detailed information for interested parties such as yourself: https://wiki.blocksofcrypto.io

Just wanted to give a quick update over here, I've set up a Minecraft server and updated the forums with generic information as a future touchpoint instead of BitcoinTalk.org.

https://blocksofcrypto.io

Are you accepting people to come test the server? I would be interested in alpha testing it and offering better suggestions on the server. I see that you have miners up and running is this using one of the plugins that exist on spigot or have you custom coded them? They look similar to the ones that exist on spigot. If you are custom coding everything why do you not use the ones that exist already? It would speed development time up and you could launch the server quicker.

Yes.

This project sounds extremely interesting and I might be interested in playing some minecraft again!
Asking as someone that hasn't played the game for like 8 years or so: Will we require the premium/payed version of the game ?

I code in spurts whenever I feel like it, so yeah. A lot of the lines, of course, are very short. It's not like every line has the text of a paragraph. It could just be, for example, a "{".

Perhaps once the project is complete, I'll look into this community-driven wiki idea.

That is some fast coding. I think that allowing members to contribute to the wiki when the server is released publicly will help with keeping it up to date. You could still be the admin that approves of edits but writing a whole server worth of information and changing that every time something is changed in your plugins sounds like it will take away and slow down the development of the server.

Yes, 8000 lines was only including my own code. I'm a one-man team.

The wiki content will be written by me and me only.

All custom coded? How big is your team? If the plugins are custom coded then people will not be contributing to the wiki because they do not know how the plugins work. I think a wiki will be a ongoing project when you have released the server to the public.

Logo created.

Wiki also up: https://blocksofcrypto.io/wiki

Own forum post up: https://blocksofcrypto.io/threads/concept-and-development-updates.1/

I need someone to help create a summary of cryptocurrency for this page: https://blocksofcrypto.io/wiki/index.php/Cryptocurrency

I could do it myself, but any small contribution helps take some work off my plate. Register on the wiki and PM me the username you used on the wiki, if you'd like to help. I'll review the offer and let you know if you're accepted. Not to be an /r/ChoosingBeggar, just no point asking someone to do it if I assess it's not going to be a job well done.

Would any established (looking @ y'all, Legendary and Hero members) members of this community who are also native English speakers like to take a gander at this? Doesn't have to be a solo thing too, can be multiple people contributing.

Click to view fullsize image: click here

I've made a visual representation of what I've got going so far...

Missing:
- season pass information
- the Token -> Playcash exchange information
- withdrawal and deposit information

I'll get to it soon! Goodnight for now.

P.S. This image is now in the main thread.

Current lines of code: 8016

Here's what's left:
- Quests
- Economy setup (deciding prices for every. single. thing.)
- Coding variability of token <==> playcash exchange rate
- Token plants
- Miners' stats (very simple! 20 minute job)

Here's a picture of the basic miner. Model name subject to change. The big, green name is randomly generated for every miner and allows some sort of identification method, inspired by how the Helium network (altcoin) names their "miners".



Here's a video showing the miner information persistency over plugin reload / server restarts. Also note how it removes the item from inventory, even if in creative.

https://imgur.com/VFIpJRD

Each miner's information is stored on the server and the only identifying information is stored in an NBT tag on the item itself. It's impossible to create new miners or change their hashrates / exploit the system by editing the NBT information. Only the standalone server has access to the miner information. Here's me spawning in a miner with the UUID "this_is_a_fake_uuid" and trying to place it.

https://imgur.com/vqftjx0

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Reminder to join the Discord server. I'm lonely... https://blockofcrypto.io/discord

Just calculated, altogether the project is now almost 8000 lines of code (excluding libraries).

https://imgur.com/a/JNZnvRa

Each miner's information is tracked as well as its entire ownership history. There are different models of miners, each with a different skin and hashrate. Each miner's earnings will be (own_hashrate / total_hashrate). Excited! Made a LOT of progress over the weekend. Will begin working on the custom token plants implementation soon.

Join the Discord! https://blockofcrypto.io/discord

Will share more frequent updates on the Discord server: https://blocksofcrypto.io/discord

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EnjinCraft deals with NFTs.


The "digital currency" is the "token", then. Maybe I'll name it differently, but for now, it's just called "token".

I have notting to do with the link. And only saw a little of this post.

Only posting the link if something you can use from it https://enjin.io/software/enjincraft

My son played it 2-3 days. But went back to normal minecraft (friends etc). As crypto guy I liked all the things he fund and stored in my wallet ;-)

edit:
https://github.com/enjin/enjincraft

I'm obviously not trying to discredit Bitcoin, I'm saying that the EULA will likely cater to the fact that Bitcoin isn't legal tender in most countries, including the one that which the company exists. So, while Bitcoin most definitely is a real currency, its not registered globally as that by, at least technically. Hence the suggestion of creating a virtual based currency for the server, rather than integrating via Lightening directly.

Last few for today.

https://imgur.com/a/XSjPNMi

Goodnight.

https://imgur.com/a/5VNrEr6

Changed my mind. Set up the backend for the season passes and quests and created a simple GUI for it. Still no ability to purchase season passes just yet and haven't populated the quests database, but progress is progress.

Made a GUI for basic functions today!

https://imgur.com/a/w1gDo10

Working on deposit/withdrawal request GUI then I'll get started on the in-game interactions for the miners and token plants before doing the backend, so there's something to show... less discouraging.

Quick update. I was working on this till four in the morning last night and knocked out before posting an update.

Scrapped the socket communication idea, too much difficulty with creating a whole ass message system. Instead both programs read from the same database periodically (every few seconds) and leave instructions for the other to follow / update each "task" with the correct new "state" -- if a task isn't carried out successfully it'll be easy for a human to fix

Shifted everything from a standard Java project to a Maven project for easier building and rewrote some parts to be compatible / up to date with Java 16.

Hi, thanks for the offer. I'll get in touch.

I'm not sure. I think I can aim for Christmas, 2021.

How long do you think until you release the project?

Hey notasimp,

I have played Minecraft since the early days and would love to know more about this.

Any way I can join the team and help out? Check the DMs for contact info.

For all future updates, here are keywords:

CREATED - feature done being programmed, functional
STARTED - just started working on this, non-functional but code exists for it
FINISHED - feature finished, functional

A short update for tonight's session:

I have resumed development on this project! Hope to get some screenshots of in-game progress soon.

Will do this:

1. Wallet (done... kinda! supports deposits, but not automatic withdrawals just yet)
2. In-game development work (next up)
3. Linking those two with a dynamic exchange rate / market
4. Server setup (other plugins, permissions, builds, etc)
5. BETA

How real does it need to get? Bitcoin is an official currency in Venezuela, which might be considered as pretty real...

I haven't read the EULA in a long time, but I would assume that depositing for virtual currency within the game would break it already? Since, most games don't allow the sale of in game currencies, and I believe Minecraft also didn't allow purchasing of any non cosmetic items, which a virtual in game currency would violate that.

As long as the above is correct, allowing to deposit or cash out any real money would break the EULA regardless how you implement it.

The question is whether there is a guaranteed exchange between the in game currency and the external cryptocurrency. If there isn't, it might be hard to convince people to still deposit real, externally usable cryptocurrencies. If there is, the in game currency might be regarded as a unit of account for the external cryptocurrency, and thereby possibly a collision with the EULA.

I'm sure we could simplify the language, yes. Or provide a short, simple, 2-minute explanation of how the Lightning Network works. The concept isn't too difficult to explain; I think there are existing YouTube videos that do a good job of getting the basic message across.

The simplest way, of course, would be to raise the withdrawal limit / set it reasonably high that fees wouldn't be an issue either way.

Its worth mentioning; Despite this probably being a excellent way to inform, and teach those unfamiliar with cryptocurrencies making it too complex could bring its own problems i.e if the payment system put in place is complex, it will discourage those that aren't familiar with Bitcoin or cryptocurrencies. Effectively, limiting your target audience. So, while you could have a lightening system in the background, I'm not entirely sure it would be a good idea to present it like that to the users of the server. I said before, you want to appeal to the general user base of Minecraft, and not just those interested in cryptocurrencies, and by implementing a easy, and simple system it would be much more likely that you retain a player base, and eventually given enough time those users will likely be more interested in learning about cryptocurrencies. So, effectively you are acting as an advertisement for Bitcoin in a indirect way. 

Interesting. Will look into doing this programmatically -- not sure if the library I'm using right now supports it or if I'd need to code this myself (more work).

I see. I'll definitely look into this.

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Just an update on the project as a whole: still on a work course till the 23rd, expect to resume development on the 25th after a day's break.

You don't need to open a channel to every single user. You could open a single large channel to some medium/large sized node which could take care of payment routing for a small fee.


You could even open a direct channel to BlueWallet node to make sure that there would not be any failed routings. In such a case, you would not have to pay any transaction fees for withdrawals made to BlueWallet.

I'm not sure we'll start out with sufficient funds to do that for each user.

Yeah. I think paying in an altcoin or having a high payout threshold will be the solution I'll go for.

Yes, you need to lock up a certain amount of coins in a multi-signature address beforehand.


You also need to worry about inbound/outbound liquidity. When you open a channel, all funds are on your side of the channel. Unless someone opens a channel to your node or you spend some coins over the Lightning Network, you won't be able to receive any payments.

I know it's complicated. An average minecraft player would not bother to do all of that. That's why you could recommend BlueWallet to your players. This way, they would be instantly able to receive Lightning payments without any extra configuration. It's a custodial wallet, though.

LN contracts require a pre-payment, though, don't they? And a contract is between max two parties.

Meaning an additional amount will always be tied up in open LN contracts.

I am not sure what you are trying to say here. A channel is maintained between only two people. A node can have multiple channels. When some node routes a payment, it receives coins in one channel and uses some other channel to send the same amount of coins (minus the fee). If there was only one node which could route a payment from you to the player, it would not be necessarily more expensive than an on-chain transaction. The LN was designed for micro-payments, so you would end up paying a couple of satoshis or even less.


In other words, the player can receive payments over the Lightning Network as long as they don't close their channel.

Correct. Furthermore, my understanding of the Lightning Network is that for channels with < 2 recipients (other than sender) the fee is actually bigger than if the main network was used.... didn't really read much into the technical side of the LN though.

The LN might work if the player requested multiple withdrawals without sending coins between each withdrawal to an address/recipient not on the LN.

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Just a development update, haven't gotten much done. Been on a course for work since the 28th and I've been arriving home around midnight, leaving home again at 6+ in the morning, so no time or energy to work on this project.

Will begin working on it again end July. Will be drawing up proper timelines and plans for the project soon.

Wouldn't a solution that uses LN fix issue 1?

Cheers mate.


I agree entirely.


The fantasy "token" is worth a set amount of Bitcoin, the in-game cash ("Playcash") which is used as the primary economy of the server is not.

Playcash must be able to be generated freely (i.e. from quests, selling items to the server shop, etc) -- it can therefore NOT be pegged to a Bitcoin balance... unless you're willing to sponsor me unlimited Bitcoin.

The issue is, your probably restricted by Mojang's EULA. They probably won't authorize the ability for a real life currency to be earned, and sold via in game. I haven't checked the EULA in a long time, but most games have similar policies in place which restrict the purchasing, and selling of in game items, and I'm sure a lot of them have extended that to cryptocurrencies ever since they have emerged.

By creating a in game currency, it'll probably be easier to work with the EULA. Also, it does save a butt load of work trying to implement Bitcoin into the server. The virtual currency could operate the exact same, and is probably a more secure implementation, since you aren't storing Bitcoin on the server. Instead, users would earn the virtual currency, and then request a withdrawal at x time.

Its just like how your bank account works. The money that you see on your screen isn't actually cash/good or whatever. Its just a number, which is processed later on down the line, rather than immediately as you push withdraw or send.

Many services already offer a setup, and most users won't even know the difference. 

 

I see some users are suggesting that you should create some in-game currency that can be converted to Crypto, but for me it kind of defeats the purpose. I want to see a server where you can use Bitcoin (BTC) as the economy and not some kind of fantasy token. (We see lots of games where in-game currencies are created and in some of these games, people pre-mine them to enrich themselves)

Minecraft still has a huge cult following and we can tap into a group of people that are very passionate and would appreciate some real world reward for their time and effort. (That are not linked to Fiat currencies)  

Something like this : https://finance.yahoo.com/news/minecraft-players-win-bitcoin-treasure-160033197.html

Always interested in hearing about it, as Minecraft is probably one of the only games which gives enough freedom to implement something like this. In fact, I believe many have attempted, and partially succeeded in the past. You are probably aware of it, but I believe there was a server which integrated Bitcoin, and had Bitcoin payouts for things like mining in Minecraft. There was also a casino inside Minecraft, which I believe might have closed down due to legal issues, I'm not entirely sure on that though.

I do absolutely believe though, that the best way of making this a success is to focus less on attracting those already involved in cryptocurrency, and instead trying to entice the general Minecraft playing demographic, but offering the ability to earn money that can be redeemed to real life cash.

 

Damn bro, I had that idea like in 2013

Best of luck! It will be tough to make, but it's very much possible.

I just checked it out. Doesn't seem very popular. As Welsh said, the size of the demographic that both plays Minecraft and is into Bitcoin/cryptocurrency is already notably small. The Minetest x crypto demographic is very likely even smaller. I want to build off an existing, accessible playerbase -- namely, the Minecraft community. After all, you don't need to know jack shit about crypto to join the server. One could join and learn while playing.


That's precisely what I intend to do. I spent a good 25+ hours this last week working on the project and I'm happy to say I'm well into the standalone server that'll run the wallet. The only thing I've touched on the plugin is the code implementation to get it to talk to the wallet/account server.

I'm currently running it on the testnet network and I've gotten deposits and withdrawals to work. I'm planning to finish the standalone server before working on the plugin and in-game mechanics. I'll be creating a simple web interface as well for users to access their accounts and tokens, so in case the Minecraft server is taken offline for maintenance there will still be a way for them to retrieve their funds at any time.

I'm not always at my computer and I'm usually quite busy, so also looking into (minimally) having logging integrated into a Telegram bot. May add notifications through Telegram in the future, things like confirming deposits, miner under attack, plant growth progress, etc.

I've planned out a rough development road map for the Minecraft plugin, researched the libraries I'll use, and out down the base code as well. The current version can be loaded by the latest version Spigot server and will start and connect to the standalone server.

I'll post a proper update or a link to more updates in the OP soon.

This is a massive project, and while it could definitely be possible to do. You might want to try appealing to the more casual Minecraft player, rather than users of Bitcoin. I don't know what the demographic would be for Bitcoiners that also play Minecraft. Instead, you should try promoting it as a way of earning money while playing Minecraft. That would likely appeal to the general public more, and therefore you would generate more players.
This is something that is probably more hassle than its worth. Depending on your country of residence, you would likely have to register with a gambling commission, get licensed, and wouldn't be able to accept users from certain countries unless you have a sufficient enough license.

I understand you wouldn't be providing the services exactly, and just using an API. However, I do still believe that would require being licensed. Not to mention, this likely goes against the Mojang EULA.

You might want to consider Minetest, which comes without an EULA, and has gained quite some traction lately. Having a fully open sourced codebase would be more alongside with Bitcoin's transparency anyway.

Spent the night up with some friends yesterday brainstorming how the economy could work. Updated OP with a lot more detail about playcash, tokens, etc.

Added some ideas to my OP.

I think players are generally quite saavy when it comes to pricing. In-game economy is usually very simple. If we implement a floating/dynamic value in the server-shop, it will reward attentive players who also manually vary their personal shop prices.

Let me very quickly explain the common setup for Minecraft economies.

• Server runs a shop. It buys and sells usually at hugely uneconomic prices, i.e. it sells diamonds at $500 per diamond but only buys them at $50 per diamond.
• Players can setup their own physical shops. These are either in protected areas like a rentable "stall" in a safe, server-managed shop complex OR out in the wild but on protected plots of land (this would be the case on our server, most likely) OR out in the wild and unprotected.

As for ours:

• In the economy I'm thinking about, the only way to directly earn Bitcoin will be to convert a special item into a premium currency balance in-game. Call it... blooptokens... whatever. One emerald = 1 blooptoken. Let's say.... 100,000 blooptokens = mBTC. Something like that.
• Non-premium in-game currency is measured in virtual dollars. The virtual dollar to blooptoken rate varies and is controlled by the server. In that sense, blooptokens are like a centralized token.
• Blooptokens can be spent directly with the server to withdraw BTC to an address.
• Blooptokens can be sent directly to other users without first converting to virtual $.

Went off on a little tangent there, but just had to get the idea out.


Not possible in Minecraft. Items all look different and named items are italicized. Very obvious what's what, so this is not a concern. There aren't different rarity diamonds, for example, just diamonds, emeralds, gold ingots, etc. They're all skinned differently and can be told apart quickly. Maybe naming an item would fool someone logging on for the first time, but any reasonably experienced (~a few hours?) Minecraft player would be able to pick up such an obvious scam immediately. It has the same chance of happening as someone falling for a Nigerian prince scam.


Having run my fair share of Minecraft servers in the past (including a network I still host but is pretty much deserted due to lack of advertisement), I'm aware of how to counter this. Simply put, there are plugins like this (https://dev.bukkit.org/projects/orebfuscator) that obfuscate nonvisble blocks, changing them into random blocks / other valuable blocks. Blocks are "revealed" or unobfuscated when exposed to air. This makes x-ray cheats redundant as suddenly every block is valuable until discovered legitimately.

The link is to a plugin that's outdated. There are newer alternatives, many of them. Not a problem to code, either, though I'm sure there are open-source options out there that the community has heavily refined or optimized. Would definitely be installing one of those, as well as an anti-cheat plugin to ensure fair play on the server as far as cheat/hack clients go. I use Spartan (https://www.spigotmc.org/resources/spartan-anti-cheat-advanced-cheat-detection-hack-blocker-1-7-2-1-17.25638/, link requires login on SpigotMC) on the network I run and it works well.

Possibly. But then how will the server get its balance in the altcoin? Unless you're suggesting we hold a hot wallet stocked with the altcoin of choice... which is risky if the altcoin dips. What's the transaction fee like for ETH? That's one of the most stable altcoins I know. Will check it out.


No doubt about it. I'm sure we can find a way to moderate in-game transactions, however, to prevent or dissuade/discourage scams in-game. What kinds of deceptive tactics are you thinking of?

I'm not sure. A long time ago, Minecraft players were pretty evenly spread between many small servers. Nowadays, the majority of the online population spends its time on large networks like Hypixel.

Personally, things that motivate me to stay on a particular Minecraft server are friends and community. I think I will focus heavily on the economic aspect of the server, perhaps even code something to make the server shop price items at a floating value based on demand and an artificially determined supply (i.e. admin can trigger a "shortage" or "surplus" of a certain item, driving the price up or down).


I checked it out. It's an interesting concept... perhaps it could be something we run regularly on the server. Like a jackpot-type thing, where the first person to find the random chest is rewarded with the pot to date, and only players who contributed a set amount to the pot can play.


I realize this. And of course, the problem would be accentuated by the fact that payouts to players would be very small to begin with. Could an alternative be to payout using an altcoin? Or, possibly, set the minimum threshold for payouts high enough that the fee would become less of a problem. That way, only players with sufficient balance would be able to withdraw their earnings. It might be possible this threshold is set unreasonably high for a single player to achieve, thus requiring a team effort or guild structure.

Towny structure: residents belong to towns, towns belong to nations. At each level, it's possible to set a daily tax. Perhaps this could be a way a single player might hit the threshold for withdrawals: by being a town or nation owner.


I'm sorry, I don't understand. Do you mean it might be a problem if players join out of financial motivation rather than having fun?


As mentioned in my original post:


In-game advertising is technically against the EULA.

Attracting players shouldn't be the main concern, instead, you should focus more on how you're going to keep them on the server in question and that depends on how simple the whole process is going to be for them.

I'm not a Minecraft player but I've heard about a somewhat similar server before ^{["link" - make sure to check the other links within that article as well]} and I think Minecraft players would probably enjoy having another option in regards to such a server.

Update 12/08/21: This graphic should explain things better:

 

Update 07/08/21: Join the Discord server!

Update 05/08/21: A lot has been made, including a good portion of the backend / wallet management. Started working on in-game GUI today. https://imgur.com/a/w1gDo10

Wow. Much hype. Many fancy title.

I've played Minecraft since 1.3 days and have always dreamed of this iea.

Actually a fledgling project and more of an idea than concrete code right now, but here's what I'm thinking:

The main idea is to run a Minecraft server where the economy is pegged to cryptocurrency.

• Users should be able to earn minute amounts of cryptocurrency, somehow
• Users should be able to trade this currency in-game both player2player and player2server, for in-game perks or items
• Users should be able to both deposit and withdraw cryptocurrency

This is what I'm thinking:

• A premium currency is created in-game, whether it be virtual (a number) or "physical" (stored in blocks/items)
• An example of such an item might be emeralds -- whose spawn would then be disabled in wild + villager trade disabled, so the only way to get emeralds would be from the server / some process / trade
• Emeralds could be worth, say, 0.01 mBTC

Edit 23/06/21

• In-game cash will be called "Playcash"
• Premium currency will be called "tokens"

With this in mind....

General economy

• Each token is pegged to a fixed amount of Bitcoin
• Given the server's limited supply of Bitcoin, the supply of tokens (total amount of tokens that can be in circulation) is also capped.
• The playcash/token exchange rate is variable. As the server bank runs out of tokens, the exchange rate goes up, thus increasing the playcash value of tokens users hold as well.
• The server bank does not buy tokens back for playcash. Users can sell tokens to other users, though.
• The server will always allow deposits and withdrawals of crypto, i.e. withdrawals and purchasing of tokens.

Quest system

• Quests are available to EVERY player
• They grant playcash and in-game item rewards
• Premium quests are unlockable with a season pass, purchasable with tokens
• Premium quests give better rewards or otherwise unattainable items (read: Miner's Cores, later on)

Towny

• Raiding is permissible and very possible in the open world, as no land is protected
• Towns allow for protection of land (importance explained later)
• Founding a town costs tokens (server "earns" money back)
• Town owners/leadership can charge members a set tax rate on their playcash balance daily
• Towns have a daily playcash upkeep cost
• Higher membership = more protected land
• Tax rate limited by competition (who wants to join a town with higher tax rate? tax rate set by players needs to be competitive with other towns)

In addition to towns, there are nations:

• While towns have players as members, nations have towns as members.
• Founding them costs tokens.
• Nations provide a HUGE boost to the amount of land claimable by member towns.
• Nations can tax TOWNS on a daily basis.
• Nations have a daily playcash upkeep cost, like towns.

Why is claiming land important?

Playcash -> token conversion mechanic

The conversion is NOT instant and the rate varies:

• In order to convert their playcash to tokens, users need to plant a special plant called a token plant.
• Practically, this will probably be a vanilla flower/plant we will disable from spawning naturally in the wild.
• Plants take x hours to grow. The faster they're set to grow, the worse the exchange rate (exponential % penalty)
• If another player breaks the token plant before it reaches maturity, they gain tokens instead of the plant owner, prorated for the amount of time the plant had been growing. The remainder of the ungrown tokens are discarded (portion given back to server, portion given to miners). It's therefore necessary to protect the growing token plants.

Miners

• Miners join the network by building massive, expensive, multiblock structures (think, like, a 9x9x9 cube of a valuable block) with a special block called a Miner's Core in the center
• Miner's Cores are purchasable ONLY from the server / given out as rewards
• Whenever tokens are spent/discarded/burnt due to fees, a portion of the burnt tokens = immediately distributed to the miner network.
• Each's miner shares the reward equally.
• Allows miner owners to earn tokens passively, but defending the miner multiblock structure is necessary.
• Miner's Cores can be broken and stolen

Technical stuff

• Minecraft server, set up for some gamemode... Towny?
• Custom Minecraft plugin to keep track of users' balances
• Custom server to manage the wallet

I use a dedicated server for all my projects, so development will be free. Actual production server would have to be different, of course, but I'm willing to tank that cost indefinitely. It's not that bad.

More importantly, one major challenge is finding an income source to fund the money that the server will be giving away. I considered in-game marketing the players, but that goes against the Mojang EULA.

I'm thinking:

• A partnership with a gambling site that has an API? Possibly allow users to bet on the site while in-game or (with the help of the Minecraft plugin) make bets more fun. Income would then be collected either directly in a fixed payment from the site or a % commission.
• It might be possible, however impractical, to create a way for users to mine BTC to their in-game balance... but unsustainable and inconvenient, to say the least
• Donations or sponsorships? Possibly selling cosmetic perks / perks that won't affect a player's ability to make/earn BTC in-game

Another challenge is advertising, as there's no real point in going through all this effort to create something that people aren't going to play on or use. I think that simply saying you can earn money while playing it will attract a large playerbase, but I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Lastly, there's the issue of security and trust. Who's to say I won't just walk away without paying anybody? Or barring that, who's to say the system won't be hacked into somehow and the coins stolen?

To-do list

• Make this forum post to gague interest / gather thoughts
• Buy domain: blocksofcrypto.io
• Wallet-handling server
• Minecraft plugin to handle balances
• Other Minecraft server setup (really fast)
• Beta testing
• Release
• Achieve ultimate victory??

Just a big mess of thoughts. Would love to hear your takes on it.

Edit

Some ideas:

• Quest system w something like a battle pass / seasonal pass. Users can complete quests and earn rewards, but these rewards are greatly amplified with the purchase of a seasonal pass that unlocks additional rewards. We make it feasible to make an ROI on this investment, but design it so that playtime and active contribution would be necessary. Can require that this user interacts with other users to breakeven on his investment in buying the season pass. Would encourage community building and also spice up the vanilla game.
• Run the server as modded server. I currently run a modded server with a custom modpack just for friends and DEFINITELY enjoy it more than vanilla Minecraft. Barrier to entry: potential users would have to download the modpack. Not a complicated affair, we can use public launchers/platforms like CurseForge (https://www.curseforge.com/) or the Technic Platform (https://www.technicpack.net/) to distribute the modpack, but it does add some hassle to the process of joining.