I found a server called Gaia Legends and it is super new like about a week old. Even with a low player base it feels really polished and well setup.
It is semi vanilla and it has custom items plus jobs and other extra stuff. The cool part is it is easy to understand and everything feels simple to use in game.
There are crates but it does not feel pay to win. It sounds like you can get the crate stuff just by playing normally.
The owner is really active and seems to care a lot about the server and helping it grow. If you want to join a server from the start this one seems like a good pick.
