Skyblock Gambling And Pay-To-Win in Skyblock.

Gambling and pay-to-win is a dangerous illnes in this server.

Anyone who owns casinos should take it down themselves purely out of ethics.

Children play on this server, and exposing them to gambling is an uncomprehensibly irresponsible thing to do.
This could ruin a person's life.

The server is also pay-to-win. you can get loot crate keys, ranks, and kits for real money that give you an advantage over other players.

Again, children play on this server. we should not subject them to this kind of afforded inequality.

minecraft is a kids game. As we age and continue playing our favorite games, we should become good role models - not bad ones.

is your success in a videogame worth more than the safety of another kid?

How do you justify creating and hosting casinos for kids.
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Go ham everyone. CosmicTsunami suggested I bring this debate here.
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Significant Edit (3/8/25):
Id like to change this discussion into both a discussion and a call to action (which it has slowly already turned into by the nature of the ethics in question)
So lets have it said that if you personally resonate with these ideals I encourage you to hunt down malpracticing casinos that are reporting false odds, false machinery, and false prizes and report them for the scam that they are committing. and until the server itself passes a rule that makes gambling illegal we should be harsh on our critiques: there can be no exceptions.

Edit (3/24/25):
The poll, as of now suggest that more than half of the people who've seen this thread agree that gambling is bad. Maybe we push again to have it moved out of our supposed to be kid-friendly spaces.

 

What is the "win" goal though? the only argument you could have would be for [/is top].... [/bal top] in eco got taken out because it was considered the "win" goal. there's really no advantage when there's nothing to win. crates have the chances listed. I dont see the problem. I dont see the "win" goal.
Gambling is bad, and noobcrew removed server-based gambling machines that were in spawn years ago. they have already done what they need to to be non pay to win.

 

I'd say the "win" goal is to make a good skyblock island. which is a deeper hole than before because now that sense of "finally succeeding" is self determined, and cross-referenced with other paying players. that turns into a toxic environment for young players.

Edit - Id like to respond to more of what you said.

I'm glad that the server is not pay-to-win by Mojang standards and doesn't have gambling implemented in a way that Mojang disagrees with.

However, lets be real for a second. what do you see when you log into the server... what are the players doing... what are lootcrates doing...
lets focus less on "if the person in charge says so, then it must be fine" and focus more on our actual behavior.
while Mojang approved, there are still pay-to-win, and gambling aspects on the server.

 

I disagree. People can do what they want with their grass or money. It's not the server or casino owners job to raise someone elses kids

 

• "the "win" goal is to make a good skyblock island" - Welcome to minecraft, that's Every server in existence. no goal except the one you set for yourself...
• "is self determined, and cross-referenced with other paying players. that turns into a toxic environment" - You're right, but the second part is just wrong. a toxic environment is not created by people creating their own goals for making their islands better. im sorry but it just doesnt even make sense.
  
• "Mojang standards" - What more could you ask for? are mojang standards not strict enough??
  
• "what do you see when you log into the server" - I see people afk making money to build out their islands the way they see fit. ive seen new people come in and ask to see some really cool islands so that they have an idea of whats possible and give them ideas on what to do.
  
• "lets focus less on "if the person in charge says so, then it must be fine" and focus more on our actual behavior." - not focusing on that you missed the point.
  
• "there are still pay-to-win, and gambling aspects on the server." - Player made Casinos are a topic that is more likely to be a better debate.
• on a final note, what are you trying to even fix? what is the problem? player casinos? lootcrates? what is the point you are trying to make??

 

It’s the server owner responsibility not individual players

 

If the only way you can think of making money for a minecraft server is by exposing children to gambling environments and profiting off of them...
then should that server make any money at all?
are your needs more important than another person's safety?

I should say, the legal battle is some absolute BS. Microsoft is greedy and evil for that, and I stand with noobcrew completely on that one. Also noobcrew has done a little more than the bare minimum of what they can to stop things like this. I am adressing this to us players and our behavior not to noobcrew. what can WE do as a community to stop this from continuing.

 

But why? Like I stated, it's not a casino owners job to raise someone elses kids, in the real world people won't stop making money because people have a gambling problem so why should they in Skyblock? You can do this sure, but don't try forcing this on everyone else

 

okay... let's start with bullet point six. Player-made casinos are exactly what I am talking about. and if you've been making arguments with those casinos out of the picture then you should refrain from saying things like bullet point five.
Again, in bullet point three you're ignoring the casino advertisements.
Finally, for bullet point two, all I have to say is how can an unpaying player compare themselves to a paying player without feeling like something was unfair?
I mean I feel like I wrote it pretty plainly, "cross-referenced with other paying players."

 

this makes no sense at all? If you pay, then yes you should get an advantage, how do you suppose the server makes money? As for ads, watch an American football game, you will see many sports book ads, no matter the age of the viewer, that's how the world works and if you don't want to use a casino you don't need too.

 

So You're saying Player run, Player built, Player funded Casinos are the fault of the server owner allowing a gambling environment? How does that make the server pay to win? And why should noobcrew implement a no player built casino rule? people should be able to build what they want.

 

I don't check the shop page that often, but if you go to Skyblock Shop | Welcome, they give you the privilege of checking the last 8 purchases that have been made on the server, and if you check often, most of them come from expansions and kits. These kind of purchases don't incentivize any kind of gambling, and I'm sure crew could think of many other ways to implement purchases if he wanted to put the effort in.
Yes, unfortunately this is everywhere, not just minecraft servers, but maybe we shouldn't compare ourselves to everyone else, and maybe we could make an good example out of it, if only it was possible. Too bad not everyone want's a good and healthy server I guess.

Of course, if the players see this kind of gambling, then why wouldn't they adopt this kind of behaviour as well?

It's not your job, but it's an act of kindness and conscience to help others, especially children, which many join in to play on this server. This kind of predatory behaviour only leaves a bad impression on the server.

 

I personally would like to add that, most casinos/the most popular ones do advise discretion to the gambler. Done via signs and maparts typically with “Gamble with what you can afford to lose”. Like mentioned before, it is the individual’s choice to gamble or not. But casino owners ‘ aren’t entirely heartless.

The pay to win aspect, I feel isn’t necessarily an issue due to the numerous events and monthly top voters gc. (Coming from a player who is nearly entirely f2p). Once again this is my opinion on the matter, feel free to make counter points.

 

To say that I am forcing this on everyone is simply not the case. I have no authority to enforce anything I say. all I'm saying is that ethically we ought not to create gambling and pay-to-win environments for kids. If this ethically resonates with you, you might feel as though it is a "must-do" but that's not my decision: that's yours.

Additionally, just because everyone else is doing it - doesn't mean we should do the same. We could make a good example. we could BE the responsible ones.

And what of "raising someone else's kids"
-1- If all kids were raised well by their parents, servers could be unstrict and unregulated because everyone would be acting very responsibly. Like you wanted.
-2- If kids were not raised well, servers would have to add more and more rules to stop players from acting irresponsibly. This models what we might see in real life.
-3- If kids are not being raised well and servers also leave everything unregulated - this becomes a recipe for perpetuating disaster.

do we blame the parents? or the server? or both. In scenario 1 it is the parents pulling the weight, in scenario 2 it is the server pulling the weight, and in scenario 3 nobody is pulling the weight in raising people responsibly.
can we expect all parents to always be good parents? or is that unrealistic.
do kids pick up behavior from other, less-well raised, kids from time to time?
These are all great questions to consider ^

I'll leave you with this: Pretend you own a casino; should the server take your casino away, or should you have learned the responsibility from your parents to take your casino away yourself.
do you think it's okay to get kids into gambling?

Absolutely 0cultado, if I knew how to put "agree reactions" on your post I would.
Additionally I'd like to still remind everyone reading that while loot-crate keys are not the most frequent thing bought, they still have a spot on the shelves of the store page.

You are asking counter questions to talking points I've never even made.

I'm saying player run, player built, and player funded Casinos are the fault of the players. and we should know better than to do this.

the server having pay-to-win features and gambling environments are two separate arguments.
and, once again, I am not appealing to noobcrew to implement anything. I am arguing that we players, off the basis of our ethics should decide to be good role models and take our casinos down ourselves.

to appeal to authority and just let the "server owner handle it" is lazy of us.
I never asked for noobcrew to implement a "no casino build rule." I admire that noobcrew is giving us the freedom to build whatever we want, and we should take that and respect it - not use it to swindle kids with gambling.

Earlier you were asking me what my point/goal was for all this. I started this thread to bring to light the way that all of this community feels about the gambling and paying to win that happens in the server. I'm not expecting someone to just choke up a fix. I want us to hear, out loud, our justifications for keeping gambling around and maybe realize why that's harmful.

does it matter if a casino owner is heartless or not if the casino still exists?
how much heart does one need to simply remove a casino they own?

 

You must be a survival main, try eco.

 

You're wrong, it's noobcrew's and the staff full responsibility to enforce this, as they're the prime example enforcing this disgusting behaviour. Players are only taking advantage out of the situation and following the example, not that I'm judging anyone, but players won't compromise as you can even see from prior answers. I know you're very upset, but you shouldn't ramble effortlessly, or people will just completely disregard you and your ideas, which would be a real shame.

 

I appreciate it, and I agree. I do think it is the server owners responsibility to make sure this sort of thing doesn't exist.
I should not try to make arguments toward the same outcome from the perspective of someone who wants to blame parenting for this behavior.
but I do think there is value to discontinuing this behavior within ourselves as well.

I think its best put this way
-1- If all players are responsible, servers could be unstrict and unregulated because everyone would be acting very responsibly.
-2- If players are irresponsible, servers would have to add more rules to encourage players to act responsibly.
-3- If players are irresponsible and servers leave everything unregulated - this becomes a recipe for perpetuating disaster.

based on what we have, the server should be responsible because our reality is best modeled by option 2.

 

Hi Blobfish_Attack ! I think that gambling and the 'pay to win' aspect are two different issues and should/have been dealt with differently. I will address the gambling portion first and then share my thoughts about 'pay to win'.

Gambling on Skyblock primarily takes the form of casino spins and 'coinflipping', where two items of equivalent value are wagered against each other at 50/50 odds and the winner takes all. Some players in the past and present have expressed an issue with the rise in popularity of gambling, which is why the server has taken certain measures such as banning the word 'gambling' in casino advertisements as well as changing the name of the former lottery to /raffle instead. Of course, these are just half measures and haven't really reduced the number of gambling stations on the server.

Personally, I think the popularity of casinos has to do with the fact that there are only so many things one can do on Skyblock. This is primarily a social server; many people come for the challenge of Skyblock survival but stay for the community, which they form meaningful and long-lasting connections with (many people, including myself, have been here for more than a decade!). After beating the initial survival challenge in a matter of weeks or even days, they find themselves confused on how to "progress". You mentioned in your comments above that you personally think that the "win goal" of Skyblock is to 'make a good island'. However, due to the sandbox nature of both Skyblock and Minecraft itself, everyone has different 'win goals' after overcoming the initial survival challenge. Some people set the goal of accumulating enough grass to rank up to Skytitan, making the prettiest islands/maparts, constructing a community service island with public resources, or even just accumulating grass/rare items and being rich.

As of right now, genuine updates that include new playable content rather than QoL changes are infrequent and irregular (check out the Mob Arena, coming in a few weeks if you have time!). Due to this infrequency, more and more people have reached the "endgame" portion of Skyblock, so their only real gameplay options are 1. Jumping around in circles while texting in chat, 2. Making/browsing mapart, 3. Building their islands, 4. Engaging in player-run minigames like casinos, coinflipping, occasional skin comps, giveaways, etc. There's only so much maparting/building you can stand without exhausting your creativity, so many people just choose opions 1 and 4.

Now, to address the 'pay to win' allegation. You believe that the server store, which allows you to 'get loot crate keys, ranks, and kits for real money that give you an advantage over other players', is Pay To Win(P2W) . Since different people have different definitions of what P2W really means, let's go by your definition of 'afforded inequality' (I do want to mention here that, historically, P2W usually refers to PvP environments rather than PvE games like Skyblock).

As a free-to-play (F2P) player who has been here since 2014, I have carefully observed the way the economy functions on Skyblock survival. It is primarily a player-based economy which uses an unofficial 'grassblock' currency as its central legal tender as well as secondary currencies of iron and diamonds. Barter transactions are also extremely common and involve direct exchange of materials like wood, deepslate, quartz, etc in exchange for other materials of the same category.

Let's first cover monetary inequalities between ranked and F2P players. It is true that ranked players get a monetary advantage due to their respective /kits, but these advantages are, for the most part, highly exaggerated for anything below Skytitan. A quick review of Skyknight, Skyking and Skylord benefits on the /store reveals that the value of their kits 0.8grass (g), 4.67g and 5.67g per day, respectively, which is less than what you'd make from just a single hour of nether exploration/mining. Skygod and Skytitan kits grant 14.42g and 29.5g a day, respectively. Although this is a significant sum, consider that the average properly-operated ore gen yields between 37 and 42 grass worth of ores for the generic single-row setup and can be built by anyone regardless of rank. Thus, the monetary inequality is not a huge and insurmountable gap, but rather one which can be closed by a redstone-powered that takes a couple hours to set up.

Now, let's talk about the non-monetary differences between ranked and F2P players. The most privileged obtainable rank is Skytitan, which has the following permissions:

• /setprefix - Cosmetic prefix COLOR change and has no gameplay impact
• /spawnmob - Spawns up to 2 of a limited list of passive mobs which can be obtained with cheap spawn eggs or by visiting /warp passive
• /god - Command which prevents taking damage on own island ONLY. Does not affect public islands and gives no competitive advantage
• /fly - Allows fly on own island ONLY. Does not affect public islands; allows for easier building and movement.
• /nick - Cosmetic nickname change and has no gameplay impact
• /enchant - Allows max enchants on enchantable items; non-Skygods/Skytitans can access enchanting tables for same effect + almost any skytitan will enchant for free.
• /repair - Repairs an item's durability; many islands offer public anvils and public exp grinders, so this saves only time
• /enderchest - Opens your enderchest in most places; Public enderchests available at spawn and many islands
• /spawner - Changes spawner type to some passive/hostile mobs. NPC Artemis at spawn sells spawn-eggs for between 5 and 15 grass to change this function; almost any ranker can change for you for free.
• /ptime - controls personal day/night time; mainly for cosmetics. Fullbright hack is allowed so this is mostly cosmetic.
• /pweather - Weather can be adjusted in island settings regardless of rank; this is also cosmetic.
• /jump - Teleports to a seen block ONLY on your own/trusted island. Saves a few seconds of travel time.
• /back - Sends you back to a location; I and many people struggle to use it as it often doesn't work how you want.
• /exp -Tells you how much xp you have and how much you need to level up. No impact on gameplay
• /kittycannon - Shoots an exploding kitten where you're looking. Cosmetic ONLY
• /movebedrock - Moves your island bedrock.

As you can see, the vast majority of these ranker perks are either purely cosmetic or simple quality-of-life changes which save a little time and their benefits can be accessed quickly, freely and/or cheaply in most cases. The only one that gives a 'competitive' advantage is fly, which MAY allow you to build farms faster/better.

I also want to take a minute to point out that the 'loot crate keys' and purchasable items on the store you mentioned are hilariously marked up on the /store and can be gotten for in-game currency for a fraction of the price. I have listed a few examples:
1. Elytra: Store price $15, in-game price 640-900g (10-13 stacks grass)
2. Beacon: Store price $10, in-game price 300g (4.7 stack grass)
3. Pig spawner: Store price $5, in-game price 30g (0.5 stack grass)
4. "4 pig spawners": Store price $15, in-game price 120g (1.9 stacks grass)
5. Enchanting table: Store price $5, in-game price 6 grass(0.09 stack grass)
6. Enchanted diamond pick: Store price $5, in-game price FREEEEEEEEEEE
7. Keys: Store price for rare, epic and leg key = $5, $7.50, $10 respectively. Ingame price for rare, epic and leg key = 11g(0.17 stacks), 210g(3.28 stacks), 320g(5 stacks).

Finally, I want to address the ways in which F2P players, which make up the majority of the server, can and have obtained all of the above 'P2W' benefits without spending a dime.

Firstly, the server gives out literally HUNDREDS of dollars in voting rewards every month (Top Voters Rules and Conditions | Skyblock Official Site). It takes less than a minute to vote at all four links every day and as long as you do this every day for a month, you get either a $25, $15 or $10 card depending on what place you finish at.

Secondly, the server hosts many giveaway events every year: On every holiday, special items appear in /gifts which can be sold for a few stacks of grass. On the three "major" holidays every year (Easter, Halloween, Christmas), the server hosts a massive Drop Party event which draws 300 to 400 people. 100 lucky attendees, many of which are unranked and lower ranking players, receive a special DP head item worth thousands of grass, which they then use to trade for ranks/other premium benefits on the store. Finally, F2P players, myself included, can simply farm up grass by selling what we produce and doing /vote+/daily and pay someone else to either spend their real $ or vote reward giftcards to upgrade us.

All in all, this server (while not perfectly balanced in all aspects of gameplay) has done pretty well in making it worthwhile for people to financially support the server while also keeping all of these 'premium' benefits fairly and squarely within reach of F2P players. I have helped many many new players throughout my 11 years on this server and without exception, every single person who put in the time to learn the game mechanics was able to reach their desired rank within a few weeks/months.

 

Bravo! You explained the situation nicely, especially what I only do when I'm online on the server xD
I agree with mostly everything u said, altho a bit sad with no/light mention with the gambling issue on loot boxes, but it's understandable if u'd like to stay neutral on that topic.
It's not the first time, neither will it be the last time this will be discussed about, but I truly appreciate ur thoughts and
transparency on the matter. It's these open discussions and everyone's opinions that sprout some relief and hope for the server, while we await for the longed mob arena return.

 

If you take away gambling your taking away a massive part of the server, multiple people have invested time and lots of money into building casino islands and having casinos put on their islands
I'm not too keen with the casinos that are built to look like games with colourful maparts and lights/pistons because then it is blatantly attracting kids
It probably isnt the best thing to have with the amount of kids on the server but its a long list of things that need to be addressed but wont ever be