FinnLand: A Minecraft Server
On December 24, 2015, FinnLand was born. I wanted my son Finn to have a place to play Minecraft in a safe, friendly environment. What better way than running my own in-home server? FinnLand started as a low-powered Intel Atom ultracompact computer, open only to our home network. In the years since, the server was rolled onto a much more powerful system, with plenty of RAM and dual SSDs for storage. We opened the server to the outside world, inviting friends to join Finn and then allowing friends to claim areas for their own building fun. We have run every version of Minecraft from 1.8.8 to 1.18.2, and will keep updating as long as we can.
FinnLand runs Spigot, with WorldGuard to keep specific areas safe from griefing (intentional or otherwise). FinnLand also includes a custom ‘repair’ plug-in, because grinding forever to fix our favorite gear was not the point of play for us. (Repair only works on enchanted or uncraftable items!)
Access to FinnLand is controlled by a whitelist. The original goal, having a safe and friendly environment, has not changed, and the whitelist keeps it that way. Access to FinnLand is by invitation only. If you’re invited to join us, and you can be a good citizen of the shared world, you’ll be added to the whitelist.
As FinnLand has grown, the base world seed has not changed, but we have extensively edited or deleted regions to allow new terrain and features added to newer versions of the game. In the Overworld, this has mean selectively deleting areas that were lightly explored or did not contain our established bases or road networks. Changes to terrain generation in successive releases means that original areas of FinnLand are now interspersed with completely different biomes. With the Nether Update, we completely deleted the original Nether world.
All established bases are connected by road networks in the Overworld. Those with nether portals are also connected by roads and rails in the Nether. Signs are everywhere to indicate base locations. The FinnLand map, created with Minecraft Overviewer, can help orient those players who were not intimately involved in actually creating the bases and roads!
Because of the repeated revisions to FinnLand, there are multiple versions of the map. FinnLand 1.0 is “O.G. FinnLand”, used with versions 1.8.8 through 1.12.2. FinnLand 2.0 reset oceans and rivers for the Update Aquatic (1.13), deleted many villages for the Village and Pillage update (1.14), and regenerated the Nether entirely for the Nether Update (1.16). FinnLand 3.0 deleted essentially all lightly-traveled regions in preparation for the Caves and Cliffs Part 1 (1.17). The current map, FinnLand 4.0, again removed all lightly-explored regions in preparation for the increased world height (and depth!) of Caves and Cliffs Part II (1.18).
FinnLand lives at <home.drnixon.net>. If you’ve been invited to join, plug that address into your Minecraft server list.
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