Lightman's Currency: Claim Economy
Land isn't free — and on your server, it shouldn't be either.
Lightman's Currency: Claim Economy connects Lightman's Currency with your server's chunk-claiming mod to turn land ownership into a real economy. Claiming costs money, protections require ongoing upkeep, and holding land keeps costing you for as long as you hold it.
Works with either of the two most popular claiming setups — install whichever one your server already uses:
- FTB Chunks + FTB Teams — the full experience: paid claims, protection upkeep, land/build chunk splitting, and an optional war system.
- Open Parties and Claims (OP&C) — paid claims and party bank accounts, with more features on the way.
You don't need to configure which one to use — the mod detects whichever is installed automatically. If both are installed, FTB Chunks/Teams is used.
If you've ever had a server where claimed land sits forever, unused, with zero cost to the owner — this is the fix.
Minecraft: 1.21.1 · Loader: NeoForge · Side: Client + Server (required on both)
Why use this?
- Land has a price. No more infinite free claiming — every chunk costs real money from a bank account.
- Works with your existing claim mod. No need to switch — FTB Chunks/Teams or Open Parties and Claims, whichever you already run.
- Teams manage money like a team. Parties get an automatically-synced Lightman's Currency bank account with roles that mirror your claim mod's ranks.
- Protection isn't free either (FTB Chunks/Teams). Want griefing protection, PvP immunity, or locked blocks? Pay for it, on a recurring basis.
- Optional PvP economy layer (FTB Chunks/Teams). Turn on the war system and let teams pay to escalate conflicts over land.
- Keep players from printing their own money. An optional toggle disables Lightman's Currency's Coin Mint outright, so the economy can't be bypassed by minting coins straight from raw materials.
Feature support by backend
Both backends get the core paid-claim economy. A few deeper features are currently FTB Chunks/Teams-only, since they map onto systems (per-chunk-type protections, a two-tier claim split) that Open Parties and Claims doesn't structure the same way. Support for these on OP&C is planned.
| Feature |
FTB Chunks + Teams |
Open Parties and Claims |
| Paid chunk claiming |
✅ |
✅ |
| Unclaim refunds |
✅ |
✅ |
| Free starter chunks |
✅ |
✅ |
| Team/party bank accounts |
✅ |
✅ |
| Build / Land chunk split |
✅ |
⏳ planned |
| Protection upkeep |
✅ |
⏳ planned |
| War system |
✅ |
⏳ planned |
| Force-load upkeep |
✅ |
⏳ planned |
| In-game claim/balance UI |
✅ |
⏳ planned |
On OP&C, an unaffordable claim is allowed for a moment and then automatically reverted with a chat message, rather than blocked outright — a limitation of OP&C's public API, not a bug.
Features
💰 Paid Chunk Claiming
- Claiming a chunk draws funds from the player's or team's bank account, at a fully server-configurable price.
- Unclaiming refunds a configurable percentage of that price back.
- Grant a configurable number of free starter chunks per player/team before charges kick in.
🧱 Two Chunk Types: Build & Land (FTB Chunks/Teams)
Every claimed chunk is either a Build chunk or a Land chunk — pick whichever fits the job:
| |
Build Chunk |
Land Chunk |
| Best for |
Bases, builds, infrastructure |
Borders, territory, open land |
| Available protections |
Mob griefing, explosions, PvP, block interact/edit, entity interact |
Block interact & block edit only |
| Upkeep billing |
Per chunk |
Per group of N chunks (cheaper at scale) |
| How to switch |
Alt+click / Alt+drag in the FTB Chunks map |
Same |
🏦 Automatic Team Bank Accounts
Every party gets a linked Lightman's Currency bank account the moment it's created — no setup required. Roles sync automatically and stay in sync:
- Owner → Account Owner
- Officers / Admins → Account Admins
- Everyone else → Account Members
The account can't be deleted while the team exists. On FTB, if the party disbands, remaining funds and any unclaim refunds are split out to members' personal accounts.
🛡️ Protection Upkeep (FTB Chunks/Teams)
Every protection you enable adds a recurring cost, billed on a configurable interval (default: hourly):
upkeep cost = base protection price × billable chunks
- Run out of funds, and protections get stripped one at a time, in an order you configure.
- Top the account back up, and they're automatically restored.
- The UI won't even let you enable a protection your account can't afford — it blocks the toggle and warns you instead of silently bankrupting you.
⚔️ Optional War System (FTB Chunks/Teams)
Turn it on and teams can declare war on each other for a price:
- Every incoming war scales your upkeep up.
- Every outgoing war costs you upkeep based on the target's own base costs.
- A dedicated War screen (in Team Settings) shows active/pending wars, full cost breakdowns, and how exposed your target actually is (unprotected PvP, block edit, explosions).
Don't want PvP-driven land grabs? Disable the whole system with one config flag.
📡 Force-Load Upkeep (FTB Chunks/Teams)
Force-loading a chunk is free to enable, but each force-loaded chunk adds a small recurring charge — no more infinite free keep-alive chunks.
🖥️ Native FTB UI Integration (FTB Chunks/Teams)
No separate menus to learn — everything shows up where you're already looking:
- Claim prices and balance, right in the FTB Chunks map.
- Protection prices, next to each toggle in FTB Teams settings.
- Pending-change indicators for anything queued for the next upkeep cycle.
🪙 Optional Coin Mint Lockout
A simple on/off switch that disables Lightman's Currency's Coin Mint block server-wide, so players can't undercut the claim economy by minting money straight from raw materials. Independent of Lightman's Currency's own mint/melt recipe restrictions — this is a full stop, not a restriction.
Requirements
Must be installed on both client and server — it registers custom network packets and (on FTB) client-side UI hooks.
Installation
- Drop the
.jar into your mods/ folder, alongside Lightman's Currency and whichever claim mod set you're using.
- Launch the server (or your single-player world) once — the config file generates automatically.
- Tune the config to taste (see below), then restart or
/reload.
Server Configuration
Generated at:
world/serverconfig/lc_claim_economy-server.toml
General
| Setting |
Default |
Description |
claimPrice |
10000 |
Cost to claim one chunk, in copper (10,000 = 1 Diamond coin) |
freeChunks |
0 |
Free chunks granted before charges apply |
landChunkGroupSize |
5 |
(FTB) Land chunks billed once per this many chunks |
unclaimRefundRatio |
0.8 |
Fraction of the claim price refunded on unclaim |
forceLoadUpkeepPrice |
25 |
(FTB) Upkeep per force-loaded chunk, per period |
upkeepPeriodMinutes |
60 |
Real-time minutes between upkeep charges |
disableCoinMint |
false |
Disables Lightman's Currency's Coin Mint block server-wide |
Protection Costs (FTB Chunks/Teams — added to upkeep per billable chunk)
| Setting |
Default |
mobGriefProtectionPrice |
10 |
explosionProtectionPrice |
10 |
pvpDisablePrice |
5 |
blockInteractProtectionPrice |
15 |
blockEditProtectionPrice |
15 |
entityInteractProtectionPrice |
15 |
War Settings (FTB Chunks/Teams)
| Setting |
Default |
Description |
warEnabled |
true |
Turn the war system on or off |
warCostMultiplier |
2.0 |
Scaling factor for incoming/outgoing war upkeep |
Protection Dismantle Order (FTB Chunks/Teams)
protectionDismantleOrderLand and protectionDismantleOrderBuild control the exact order protections drop in when upkeep can't be paid — land chunks first, then build chunks.
Quick Start
- Get money. Deposit at an ATM, use your wallet, or as an op:
/lcbank give players <playername> <amount>.
- Claim chunks. Use your claim mod's normal claiming flow — the price is deducted automatically. Not enough funds? On FTB, the claim is rejected outright; on OP&C, it's allowed then immediately reverted.
- (FTB) Switch to Land chunks for cheaper large-territory upkeep — Alt+click or Alt+drag in the FTB Chunks map.
- (FTB) Enable protections in FTB Teams settings — each toggle shows its price. Can't afford it? The change is blocked, not silently applied.
- Set up a team account — created automatically when a party forms. Fund it from any ATM.
- (FTB) Force-load chunks as usual — no upfront cost, just a small recurring charge per chunk.
- (FTB) Check upkeep anytime with
/upkeep details and /upkeep priority.
- (FTB, optional) Go to war from the War screen in Team Settings — see costs before you commit.
Commands
| Command |
Who |
Description |
/upkeep details |
Owners & Officers (FTB) |
Show the most recent upkeep breakdown |
/upkeep priority |
Owners & Officers (FTB) |
Show the protection dismantle order |
FAQ
Do I need both FTB Chunks and Open Parties and Claims? No — install whichever one you already use. If you somehow have both, FTB Chunks/Teams takes priority.
Why was my protection disabled? (FTB) Your team's account didn't have enough balance to cover upkeep. Top it up and the protection returns automatically at the next billing cycle.
Can regular team members claim chunks? No — only Owners and Officers/Admins can claim, unclaim, or force-load chunks for the team.
What happens when a party disbands? Claims are released (with the configured refund), the remaining team balance is distributed to members, and the team account is removed.
Can I turn off the war system? Yes — set warEnabled = false. The War button disappears from the client UI automatically. Not applicable on OP&C, which doesn't have a war system.
Can players just mint their own money to pay for claims? Not if you don't want them to — set disableCoinMint = true to shut off Lightman's Currency's Coin Mint block entirely.
Where's the config file? world/serverconfig/lc_claim_economy-server.toml on a dedicated server, or the equivalent path under saves/<world>/ in single-player.