NerdNu feels like one of those old Minecraft servers you remember from way back where people actually talk and build together. It is mostly vanilla and has a strong focus on community so it is not about crazy plugins and pay to win stuff. It is about surviving and building cool things with other players.

There is a PvE world where players use survival mode and only fight mobs and not each other. People team up to make towns and cities and they do regular events. They run a Friday and Saturday games night with things like spleef thimble and ice boat races. They also do special events like a bow game at an abandoned archery range.

There is also a Creative server that is mostly open world with a mix of natural and custom painted terrain. You can protect your builds and you can use WorldEdit if you want. The Creative world has its own events like Spleef and Speed Build on alternating Saturdays. It even has a vehicle plugin so you can zoom around in different vehicles.

The server keeps things updated and does map resets like the recent PvE map reset and a new Creative revision that started in June 2024. They also run seasonal events such as a Christmas Speedbuild and a Creative Christmas Group Build for holiday and winter themes.

If you want a medium sized server with mostly vanilla gameplay and a solid community where people care about events and shared projects NerdNu really fits that style.