Request: Help in understanding Settlements

[OXOFiniteOXO]

Hello! I am looking for some help on this matter. I have an account with 10 characters on it. Each of my ten characters have their home beacon near each other. I was hoping to make a large platform/settlement for myself. I mapped out in a spreadsheet, as you can see above, the plots (each grid square is a plot) that each character owns. They all have ample amount of interconnectivity (I thought…) as I have been trying to make a large platform and reserve some land for myself.

But then I run into this problem:

Only 6 of the 10 characters are within the settlement. I don’t know why the other 4 are not counted. The black plots shown above are from other players’ plots, so, no other settlements are being bridged. And yes, all of the characters (except 1) have beacons with > 10,000 prestige, but, they were ALL within the settlement at one point, before they reached 10,000 prestige, and now they are not.

I have tried to remove all the plots, then re-add the plots, I’ve tried to disconnect and reconnect, but I don’t know what I am doing wrong. Can somebody help me with this? Does anyone have any suggestions of a good layout?

Thanks in advance for any help you may offer.

[Tmmk]

Any plot / surface that is 2 plots wide and longer then 4 (I believe) will fall out of settlement.

[Tmmk]

Most of the other colors will be seen as roads and not be counted as valid settlements. So zone settlement won’t be carried. 3 wide atleast and long doesn’t matter

[Nightstar]

Every plot needs to be touching 6 plots in the adjacent 9 plot columns. A plot column is the space of the plot, from themantle to the max height.

Looking at your diagram I would guess that the missing beacons will have an error message saying something about “attempting to bridge multiple settlements” causing them to be excluded.

Adding a few key plots where the plot density is not sufficient for settlement status should clear you up.

Yo can add them vertically (on top of one another) or horizontally (next to each other) but they have to be within a 3x3 grid, inspecting each plot as the center of it’s own 3x3 grid.

[Tmmk]

Exactly. [10char]

[majorvex]

Check your plots in build mode & see if any are mostly red. If everything shown is one plot high, then you may see some red “roads” in build mode that you will need to make two plots wide or two plots high. Vertical rows of single plots can also cause broken settlement “road” problems.

[OXOFiniteOXO]

Okay, well, I have learned a little bit here.

Some notes: Yes, most of it is one plot high, except the densely packed area around JelFrost, because I am trying to keep a mountain hollowed out.
Thanks for the info about “Roads” as I did know that a road does not count, but I didn’t know what qualified a road from the ‘build view’ minimap of plots.
If the red hashes refer to roads, then from these images:

There are plots that border each other, 7 of them, all in a single plot high line, but still, that would include Zelphine in the settlement, yet it doesn’t.

So, they are still considered a road, even if you have 3 ‘roads’ that are then bridged?

I planned to eventually fill out the areas, but I was trying to reserve the area, first. I guess I’ll try to fill things in and see how it goes. I’ll report back after.

[majorvex]

All of those plots that are red need to be widened.

[Nightstar]

So here’s a cutout, and this would be how you look at plot 5. Including itself you see there’s only a total of 5 plots adjacent.

In this case, a plot in plot 4 will actually fix plots 1,2,5,and the one plot to the left of this grid at the top.

@OXOFiniteOXO

So, they are still considered a road, even if you have 3 ‘roads’ that are then bridged?

For this purpose every single plot is assessed individually, and if even one of them doesn’t meet the requirement, you will get the error on the entire beacon.

This error also happens when the connection is between 2 or more beacons, not just within the same beacon. This is important because all of the 6 plots do not have to be part of the same beacon. If one of your characters has more plots then the others, they can strategically place single plot beacons and that will still fix your problem.

Here’s what I’m talking about, a spot where plots from separate beacons are still making the requirement for each other:

The term “road” comes up because it’s in the debugger description but of course, it doesn’t matter what the purpose of the plot is.

[OXOFiniteOXO]

Okay, I have added a bunch more plots but still have the issue with the beacons not incorporating.

There are 7 non-road plots of Vii connecting to JelFrost, and then they are side-by-side for more than 10 more plots, but Vii won’t join the settlement. Then, because Zelphine only has connection to Vii and Acinia, And JelFrost connects to Acinia (but maybe not with enough plot double-up because I don’t have enough plots right now), I’m not sure exactly why Vii, and then Zelphine, wouldn’t be incorporated.

I thank you for everyone helping me look into this, but I’m still not understanding why it won’t update to incorporate the beacons after strengthening their connections or how to fix this further.

[Nightstar]

If you’re going to be around for a qhile I can help with this in about two hours, maybe less.

In your case due to limited resources you can fix some of these by actually removing plots.

It may put some of your reservations off but it’s unlikely that anyone will plot within a maze of plots like that anyways.

You see here this white beacon can’t resolve due to having separate ares with the needed density connected by areas without it. This will stop it from joining the city or resolving itself.

I can’t tell what’s off to the right but for instance, removing plots 1.2.and 3 - and replacing them in positions 4,5, and 6 should fix the visible issue with this beacon. The fact that it has, internally, separate white areas split by red-hashed areas is causing its problem.

You might just be able to move someplots from the solid area around to make sure that everything meets density, if you’re into that kind of puzzle. For instance (I’m not saying this would work):

I just marked out some plots in red and placed the spots to give you some idea of what I’m talking about without spending a bunch of time on it so I’m not guaranteeing that specific configuration, but perhaps you can see what I mean.

I have to be AFK for much of the next hour or so but if you’re still around I’d be willing to come over and look at it with you after that.

Edit: removing the blue plots and making the red plots another beacon would also fix this, if you have some blocks to put 10k prestige int he red plots. If you split some of these up you could actually reserve more area.

[OXOFiniteOXO]

Thanks for the pointers.

Right now I need to try and get some sleep. I’m a bit over-due, and haven’t been getting enough as is. I’ve already nearly passed out at my computer a few times.

Sorry I can’t be around in a couple hours’ time, but I will try to work more on this, based on your guidance, in the morning, and I’ll update, then, how it goes.

Thanks again for the help, all.

Edit: To clarify - Most of the plots I have designated (except the ones I added in the past hour or so) already have their 8x8 bottom row filled with Refined Sedimentary Rock as that was the base I was using for my platform. I’ll have to flip/flop the plots around, see ow it goes, and then try to work on it before world regen takes my blocks, or, just remove them entirely. That’s another question for in the morning.

[majorvex]

Simple terms…if you see more than two red blocks on your display in builder’s mode, you need to add plots to widen that row or make it one plot taller so that it’s not red anymore. If it’s red = settlement bridging two…error

You can also watch the top navigation bar to see when the place/beacon name changes.

All of these areas with red rows need to be widened or the settlement will remain “broken”.

[Nightstar]

Oh yeah if that’s the actual site a whole change of strategy is in order.

Moving some of that into 2-wide strips and using the whole 4-wide reservations instead of 2-wide would help.

It doesn’t look that big overall, most people would be respectful of a plotted border and you could just fill in the builds as you level the characters, too. There’s pretty low odds of anyone griefing you specifically if you’re not on the edge of a large settlement.

[OXOFiniteOXO]

Okay. Thank you for the tips.

I admit that I didn’t fully understand the different hashes and their meanings in the build mode.

I was often confused when some parts were able to reserve land, and other plots didn’t, but since the roll out of reserve plots, it has changed a bit. First, any plot would reserve. Then the beacon had to be over 10K prestige to reserve, and then it was made so “roads” would not reserve.
Or I was confused when I had a beacon I was adding plots too, and suddenly it went from being part of the settlement to being dropped off.
I also had the situation where I was standing in the beacon of PunkyPink, and it said up above the compass it was part of the settlement, but then not counted among the settlement for prestige rank, etc. when I checked the beacon control panel.

Also, to explain a little, I started to branch it out as I did because I had made a base, and then someone else came along and “bridged” it, trying to incorporate it into their settlement. I had to remove plots that connected to theirs, to try and make it my own settlement. Then they build a huge pathway around me. That’s why the orange, gray, and the sky blue in the spreadsheet had irregular borders instead of squaring off. I guess it was a defensive knee jerk that I then decided to claim a bunch of land by branching out. Since then, though, that entire beacon has dropped off the map. It happened in the last week or two, and I planned to square up my borders eventually.

And yes, Majorvex did find my little base there on Beckon. It’s in a very early state as working a fulltime job, among other things, I don’t put as much time into Boundless to mine the rock, craft the stone, refine it, build the platform, etc. I plan to make a large farm, eventually, as the addition of farming was something that excited me. I also hoped a RL friend might one day join me in my area on Beckon. Trying to gather coin in the slowest way possible by rotating dailies on 10 alts. Though, when a week works out, it works out great. Craft the stone and refine it on alts to get their experience, and slowly level up 10 characters in about as passive a way as you can. It just takes time. Sorry to ramble

So, yeah, I guess I have a lot of work to do. Thank you, all, especially Majorvex and Nightstar, and I will try to use your tips to see if I can achieve what I set out to do. I’d still gladly take any other advice you may offer.