By vote, the update will be done on Friday, November 20th.

The main server has been updated to 1.16.4. It only took a week and two days to re-open, but it happened!

This update will be the largest jump between versions that Pearl has made, but thanks to developers in the wider Minecraft community, the process should take about the same time as the last few server updates. That said, the server configuration will be adjusted to accommodate all the new survival-related content from 1.13 to 1.16.

Due to the size of this update, I am splitting coverage into multiple posts over the coming days. Some will be poll threads and some will be more detailed posts/threads about a specific topic. This thread is locked to set up contiguous update-related notices, but members are certainly welcome to create open discussion in their own threads.

Current Index:
Vote on Date
New Game Worlds (no Ateph reset)
Known issues / Bug Reports

 

Please note that the server has been already set to allow connections from newer Minecraft versions, but such clients may experience cosmetic bugs from the translation between the versions. Therefore I recommend still using a 1.12 client until the server itself has been updated to 1.16.

 

The main server has been locked for the update process. Login attempts will fail until the server is opened again, either resulting in a kick or being sent to the lobby server (depends on the precise server state at moment of connecting).

Progress updates
(11/21 - 11/27):
Server update is taking longer than expected, I haven't forgotten to re-open access. Newer builds of the server wrapper now include a type of world update when jumping between versions and it's been alternating between fast progress (almost a thousand chunks checked per second) and really slow progress (<100 chunks checked per second). If it wasn't for the slow conversion periods, the server update would have been more or less completed on the 20th.
The server is technically on 1.16.4 now and plugins have been updated, albeit some need to be re-enabled (waiting for server to complete current task) or have their configs/permissions fine-tuned from changes between versions (working through those while waiting). So, we're all waiting, myself included, for the server to finish doing its own business.

(11/28)
Working through the plugins that were disabled or had configuration changes. Also opening access to new Minecraft materials.

(11/29)
While I still have admin tasks to complete, the server is reasonably stable and functioning enough to have people online, so it's been re-opened.