Dev Blog #1: Build a Minecraft Skyblock Plugin

What type of plugin am I building?

I'm building a Minecraft 1.20.4 Skyblock plugin. Skyblock is a popular game mode in Minecraft where players start on a small island in the sky and have to expand it by gathering resources, building structures, and completing challenges. The goal is to create a thriving island and become the richest player on the server.

That's what everyone wants and I don't exactly want that. I prefer something a little bit more like the one of Hypixel. Not too complex but with interesting features and mechanics.

Considerations / Requirements

This plugin is for Edmine Network, a Minecraft server that I'm working on. Here are some considerations and requirements for the plugin (some features are missing):

Players should be able to create and manage their own islands.
Islands should have a border that prevents players from falling off.
Players should be able to invite others to their islands.
Players should be able to visit other players' islands and interact with them.
Islands should have a shop where players can buy and sell items.
Players should be able to compete in challenges and earn rewards.
Implements dungeons, custom items, custom mobs to make a better experience
Players should be able to level up their islands and unlock new features (size, generator, etc..).
Players should be able to edit island ranks permissions via a GUI.

Also, I need a skyblock that can be played by at least 50 players at the same time.

Time to think about the architecture

Before I start coding, I need to think about the architecture of the plugin. Here are some questions I need to answer (I didn't put all the questions):

How on earth a minecraft server in 1.20.4 will handle 50 players at the same time?
How will I store island data? In a database? In files?
If I have customs mobs and a lot a features, how will I handle the performance?
How will I handle dungeons?

What architecture did I choose?

I decided to use a cross server architecture. For example, if I have 50 players on the server, I will have 6 servers, one for the skyblock spawn (only one because spawns are not that heavy), 3 for the islands servers (because islands are heavy) and 2 for the dungeons servers (because combat may be heavy).
I said cross server, I forgot to tell you that I'm also going to develop an inventory sync system. For example, if a player is on the island server 1 and he goes to the island server 2, his inventory will be the same. This is a little bit complex but I doable.
For the dungeons, nothing has been decided yet. I will think about it later.

For the islands, I will use a database to store the data (worlds, informations etc..). I will use something maintained by the community and was developed by Hypixel for 1.8 (I will use an updated version of the community: Advanced Slimeworldmanager). This plugin exists in different versions and different names (SlimeWorldManager for 1.8 to 1.14, AdvancedSlimeworldmanager for 1.15+).
For the databases, I will use MySQL for everything. Plus a redis server for caching. Maybe not a redis server because of the recent license changes but an open source fork of it.

What about the performance?

For the performance, I will use a lot of caching. I will cache the islands, the players, the dungeons, the mobs, the items etc.. Also, I will use a lot of async tasks to handle the heavy tasks.
Obviously, every database / cache query will be async and safe with CompletableFuture and a callback system to handle the results on the main thread.

The end

That's it for this blog post. I started to code the plugin, and I will post the next blog post when I have something to show.
Stay tuned!

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Published by Farmeurimmo