PLAY & EARN — SURVIVE — BUILD — CONQUER
Mine $RUBY in-game, an ERC-20 currency, by mining Ruby Ore.
Use $RUBY to purchase land, islands and cosmetic items.
Rise through the ranks of your faction and lead it to glory.
Player-driven world
Non-custodial renting
Carbon offset mint
Ethical & transparent
We’re a tight-knit group of gamers and builders
who are excited to be witnessing the evolution of gaming — one with
provable digital ownership, decentralized autonomous organisations and
deeply engaged communities.
We don’t want to just witness it, however. We’re here to help create
it.
We have enjoyed a handful of NFT gaming experiences so far, but they've left us questioning the true potential of what lies ahead.
What if there was another way of approaching NFT gaming, one that
didn’t solely revolve around ‘metaverse’ land ownership, creating
lifeless social spaces and obsessing over huge mints? (Sorry Kevin, we
had to say it ) What would that look like? We’ve come together to
explore, to build and to answer these question ourselves.
Our vision is of a game that is first and foremost fun, with web3
principles and technology carefully intertwined
through-out.
We’re trying to capture the spirit of what makes web3 such an exciting
space, without getting stuck in the mud of what can also make it
shallow and sinister.
Sadly, we’ve experienced first hand the greed and immaturity that the
NFT space is currently prone to producing due to it’s adolescence. We’ve been rugged, just as many have, but we still have faith that there’s treasure waiting to be found, as many do.
So, armed with years of gaming and building experience and bound by an
overwhelming urge to create an exciting and experimental gaming
experience, we’ve set out to bring Blockmasons to the world, and with
it, set a new standard for NFT games in general.
If that sounds like a future you’d like to explore, too, then we hope
you join us on the journey. The sails are set and the anchor is
raised. Let’s see where the journey takes us.
- The Blockmasons Team
First and foremost, a game should be fun. From there, web3 mechanics can be carefully introduced ontop of the foundation of the underlying fun and engaging gameplay experience.
We’re a team of gamers, through and through. We’ve been playing games like Everquest, WoW and Runescape for well over a decade. Oh, and Minecraft too. Lots of Minecraft.
History doesn’t repeat — it rhymes. By looking back at the history of gaming and MMOs, as well as our own experience growing up playing them, we’ve created something that marries the time-tested gameplay of the greats with the future of digital ownership and web3 — while avoiding the pitfalls of those that didn’t make it.
Too many projects aim for a spectacular mint, but don’t plan (or survive) beyond that. For us, the mint is just the beginning — we have a clear path ahead of for how we’re going to continue developing the game once we’re live. Read on for a breakdown of the gameplay features & roadmap.
At the heart of Blockmasons is an on-going war between the two great factions, House Dagoth ▣ and House Uldum ☩
Created by our artists
Factions
Upon mint, each Blockmason is randomly assigned one of the two factions, permanently. This defines your allegiance: your loyal allies and your common enemy.
Factions
You don’t arrive in a world with a story and fit in around it, rather you venture out and create it. The lore and story of the world will come from the battles and events that unfold within the game, driven by the players and community.
Factions
We’ve created a DAO inspired structure for the in-game factions. The leader of each faction is the Grand Master, who is voted in by the faction each week, as well as a council and officers. If the Grand Master is assassinated, they lose the role and a new leader must be chosen.
Ranks
Rise through the ranks of your faction, with the chance of eventually being voted in as its leader.
Roles
As a faction member, choose your role and contribute in the way you enjoy most.
RANKS
Lead your faction to glory.
Advise the Grand Master and vote on proposals.
Help guide and lead your faction.
ROLES
Initiate raids on enemy factions land & supply chain.
Keep your factions lands and people safe from raids.
Create strong defences, beautiful structures & housing.
Support your faction by gathering & crafting resources.
$RUBY is an ERC-20 currency earned in-game by mining Ruby Ore. Remember: Minecraft made mining cool long before Bitcoin did. We’re bringing it home.
$RUBY
Ruby isn’t just generated, it’s mined in-game. You’ll be able to mine a finite amount of Ruby Ore every day within your factions mine, giving you $RUBY. We have several plans to expand this in the future (PvP, events, gamemodes etc), but this is where we're starting from to make sure we get it right.
Created by our artists
$RUBY
Ruby is the currency upon which the spice of the economy flows. The purpose of Ruby isn’t to hoard it like a dragon, but rather to use it across the game; from purchasing in-game items, to rare cosmetics, to plots of land — most of which are represented as NFTs themselves.
$RUBY
Buy & sell in-game items with $RUBY.
Using the Blockmasons web app, you'll be able to buy and sell commodity items with other players using $RUBY. Need 200 Birch Slabs to finish your build? Pick them up here. Have an excess of smooth quartz blocks? Sell them to other players.
$RUBY
Buy & sell impressive builds.
A huge part of what defines Minecraft is the magnificent and awe-inspiring builds that are created within it. We not only want encourage that, but also make it simple for players to buy and sell services from one another.
$RUBY
Buy, sell & rent plots of land.
While building on your faction island or in the Wilderness is free, it comes with a different price; your buildings aren't safe. In-fact, they'll most likely be destroyed by raiding parties and bandits relatively swiftly.
Using $RUBY, you can purchase plots of land across the peaceful island of Northlodge to build freely, and in peace. You can also purchase buildings within the gated city of Wellington at the center of the Northlodge.
$RUBY
Display your NFTs in-game.
By using a small amount of Ruby, you can craft magical NFT frames within the game that allow you to hang any of the NFTs in your wallet on your walls. Adorn your walls with your favorite NFTs, or create a gallery to show them off and sell them.
The game world is spread across several islands, some big and some small.
Created by our artists
The World
A vast open world, ready to be explored. We wanted to keep the world open and expansive without falling back on constant teleports as the core travel mechanism. As such, boats will transport you between the islands; from there, you’re on foot or mount.
The World
A large and resource-rich island, The Wilderness presents lots of reward with equal amounts of risk. Each faction has a harbour and small outpost to enable access to the island, but otherwise the island is untouched and unowned. Brave players and parties will venture here to find rare metals and precious stones, all while watching their backs for bandits from the enemy faction seeking to rob them of their loot.
The World
In the far north lies Northlodge, a peaceful and civilized land containing the ancient and neutral city of Wellington. Using Ruby, players can purchase the surrounding plots of land, owning them as NFTs themselves. PvP is disabled on this island, with a focus on building and coexistence.
The World
Each faction is based on its own island, neighboring one another in close proximity. Here you’ll find each factions city, as well as a harbor for access to the other islands.
The World
Dotted around the world are countless small islands, safe from the tentacles of war and conflict. With enough Ruby, you can purchase an island for yourself. This will give you a safe place to build and entertain in peace.
All great stories start with a character. Your Blockmasons NFT defines your in-game character.
Character
For a truly immersive RPG experience, you should create your own character. As such, your Blockmason doesn’t come with generative art, but rather you design your character yourself using the Blockmasons character creator. This art then becomes your characters in-game skin.
Character
We’re starting with a small playerbase and growing it over time as the game grows and scales. To do so, we’re creating a system where holders can recruit subsequent generations of Blockmasons, either to use, sell or, or to rent to other players. So, if you hold and stake a Gen 1 Blockmason, at the start of the next roadmap stage you’ll be able to recruit a Generation 2 Blockmason, so on and so forth.
Character
Recruited Blockmason's will forever bear the original characters name as a form of lineage, as well as belonging to the same faction.
Character
We’ve developed a system, inspired by Moonbirds ‘nesting’, that allows you to stake your Blockmason in a non-custodial way — that is, without sending it out of your wallet to be replaced by a staked version. As such, you’ll be able to non-custodially stake your Blockmason in order to enter the game to play and earn Ruby.
Character
Thanks to the non-custodial method of staking, you’ll be able to rent your Blockmason without you or the person renting it incurring a prohibitively high gas fee, as has been common up until now. While renting, you’ll also be able to (optionally) receive a % of the Ruby gained from the player renting your token.
While the game is centered around factions, NFT communities can form guilds for their members to join and hang out together.
Guilds
Spread across the world, guild islands are private spaces that are accessible by boat from any major harbour. It’s up to guilds as to whether their islands are public or not, as they can keep them only for their members and their distinguished guests should they choose.
Guilds
Form, manage and keep track of guilds in a simple way within the guild section of the Blockmasons web app.
v0.1a
3,000 Gen 1 Minted
Initially we’re launching Blockmasons out to a small group of players so we can test the scaliblity and mechanics of the game in a safe enviroment.
The features we ship the Alpha with will be limited, and we’ll be carefully watching and listening to the community to gather as much feedback as possible.
While the Alpha will be chaotic, it’ll be a lot of fun too. The formative first chapters of the games history will begin being written as the war machine spurs into action, and the two great houses go to battle.
As a reward for being early to help us shape the game, Alpha holders will be able to recruit Gen 2 Blockmasons once the Beta arrives.
Mine Ruby ore
Join your faction and prepare for war
Create your own character
Show-off your NFTs in-game
Connect without a fuss
v0.1b
2,000 Gen 2 Minted + 3,000 Recruited
Once we’ve had a chance to test the core mechanics of Blockmasons during the Alpha, we’ll then proceed to release another wave of features.
With the arrival of the Beta, we’ll be looking to increase the player count of Blockmasons by double, releasing 4,000 Gen 2 Blockmasons.
Instead of simply minting all 4,000, the Alpha holders who staked their Blockmasons for the majority of the Alpha period will be able to use $RUBY to recruit one Gen 2 Blockmason each.
The remaining Gen 2 Blockmasons will be minted.
Stand out from the crowd
Exact revenge, hunt players
Explore the world
Recruitment
v1.0
5,000 Gen 3 Minted + 5,000 Recruited
At this stage, the game will have gone through ample rounds of testing, both in terms of scaliblity, security and gameplay mechanics.
Once we feel confident we’re ready, we’ll release a raft of important features for the release of Blockmasons.
With the release will also come another round of recruitment for those who have staked with us through the Beta, allowing them to use $RUBY to recruit one Gen 3 Blockmason each.
Rent your Blockmasons
Northlodge opens its shores
Explore the world
Recruitment
ON-GOING UPDATES & EXPANSIONS
The full release of Blockmasons will just be the beginning. While we have a path plotted for the features we wish to build as a foundation of the game, there’s plenty of ideas we have to explore further down the track.
What’s more, we’ll be allowing the community to put forward their ideas and suggestions for where things could go.
From here, expect to see new gamemodes, on-going events, fresh content and new features.
Critterz wasn’t the first project to explore NFTs in Minecraft, but in our minds they’ve been leading the way. How they’ve built and engaged their community is second to none. What's more, the technological hurdles they’ve overcome are huge and we’ve learnt a lot from them.
A top shelf team of builders creating a fun game that splices classic RPG mechanics with web3 features — what’s not to love.
From their legendary community to the on-going features and expansion that they consistently produce, Crypto Raiders is a huge source of inspiration for Blockmasons.
Cryptovoxels is one of the earliest metaverse projects, and both the project and it’s founder Ben are a huge source of inspiration for how NFT projects can and should be run.
Alright, there’s a bit more to it than that. Read on.
Since it’s inception, we’ve been building Blockmasons in public live on Twitch. In-fact, we’re live right now as we type this. A lot of projects lack transparency. We’re probably overdoing it
Do non-doxxed projects run by groups of teenagers scare you? Yeah, us too. That’s why we’re not only fully doxxed, but also a registered business (Minechain Studios Ltd). Noice.
We’re proud to be active members of some of the highest-quality groups in the NFT space, such as Proof, Shiny (SOSC) and Jericho. We have deep rooted relationships and reputations.
*Do your own research — this article has some great tips on how to do so.
So far, all costs have been paid for by the founder of the project, TheCoppinger. We haven’t raised any money from external investment.
100% of the money raised from the mint will go into the project itself. Some of this will cover pre-launch costs such as un-paid time the team has worked so far, but none of it will be abitrarily put into the founders wallets.
We believe that the core team should be properly financially aligned with the success of the project. Thus, we’ll take profit from trade commissions as opposed to from the mint. This means when the project does well, we benefit.
Project funds will be properly secured in a multi-sig wallet (Gnosis Safe) to mitigate the risk of it being compromised. We’re well versed in the best practises of operational security.
MARKETING & DESIGN
Founder of Blockmasons, TheCoppinger is a crypto old timer with lots of startup, design and marketing experience. Ask him about his HODL tattoo!
MEMBER OF
WEB3 DEVELOPER
Threecreepio is a prodigical old school developer, with a penchant for retro gaming and staying one step ahead. He claims not to be Notch, but we’ve never seen them in the same room together...
MEMBER OF
MINECRAFT DEVELOPER
A software engineer by trade, a Minecraft aficionado by choice, XL Muffin is a never-ending pit of Minecraft knowledge, with chocolate-chip-chunks of development skills baked in.
MARKETING
ohms is a talented marketer, long time Minecraft player and expert builder. His skills at marketing are only topped by his ability to create beautiful structures in Minecraft.
PROJECT ADVISOR
VendableFall is a DevOps-gun-turned-NFT-wizard. Due to her high levels of experience in the NFT space, she's here to help keep everything on track.
MEMBER OF
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We’re always open to smart and well-aligned folks jumping in and getting involved. If our vision and ambitions resonate with you, get in touch and let’s talk shop.
WHAT VERSION OF MINECRAFT?
Java edition, 1.18.2 (latest release)
DO I NEED TO INSTALL MODS/PLUGINS TO PLAY?
Nope — due to the custom Blockmasons launcher, all the necessary files are installed automatically when you first go to launch the game. It'll also automatically keep everything up to date, too. Neat!
CAN OUR PROJECT COLLAB WITH YOURS?
Maybe! Drop us a line and lets talk.
WHY AREN'T YOU LAUNCHING ON NFT WORLDS?
While NFT Worlds are one of the pioneers of the Minecraft NFT gaming, we wanted to retain full creative and technical control of Blockmasons — while it would have likely been easier and quicker to launch on NFT Worlds, it wouldn't have given us the freedom and independence to do what we're here to do.
Have a question that hasn't been covered?
Hop on Discord and we'll give you an answer.
Created by Minechain Studios © 2022 — made with ♥ from New Zealand, Sweden, California & Canada p.s. ygmi
Created by Minechain Studios © 2022
With ♥ from New Zealand, Sweden, California & Canada
p.s. ygmi