Minecraft

[Duff-e]

I've got so much iron I've stopped using stone tools for anything, even for stuff like shovels that are so weak as to be a massive waste of resources.

You're lucky, I've started 6 worlds now and I still can't find enough iron to justify the cost of making rail road tracks/carts.

Gunpowder has been an even bigger problem though.

[Jetsetlemming]

Gunpowder's always annoying. It's so easy to get Creepers to explode on their own, far easier than to actually kill them. Wish they dropped it when they naturally exploded. Then again, it's not like TNT's even all that good.

What I've yet to find is lava, actually. I've found iron, gold, and a couple diamonds, but still no lava at all.

[twiz]

Hmm interesting. I have a boatload of iron, a bunch of diamonds and gold, and have yet to have any desire to use it for anything. Still using stone tool 99% of the time, an iron pickaxe is hardly any faster, and stone is so plentiful the stone pickaxes are basically free. I actually have a need to get rid of stone.

Well, I made a full suit of armor out of iron, and a few swords, but I'll only break the sword out if I meet some nasty mobs while spelunking. I've got a couple iron pickaxes for mining gold/diamond/redstone. And a bucket out of steel... but right now, I don't see any point in ever using gold or diamond. Gold is actually less durable/fast than stone!

I've actually used one diamond to make a jukebox, but have yet to put my record in it...

[Zyn]

Gold has the same durability as Wood, so it's only used for decorative purposes ... and golden apples

[Hourences]

You need to find caves for lava and iron and all that. I have whole truckloads of iron in my castle. Some caves are really really deep and long, those are the ones you want to find, lots of stuff in those.

For lava you can also just go straigth down into the ground and keep digging. At one point you'll hit the bottom of the world. If you still havent found lava then, just start tunneling around on the bottom of the world and you'll bump into it. Be careful though, it might suddenly flood your whole tunnel

[twiz]

Yeah, I spent my first few hours in my current world at the bottom of the map, collecting diamonds/gold/redstone. Have yet to use it for anything besides the one diamond for the jukebox Plenty of lava down there. Just keep your tunnels to 1 block wide x 2 high(just big enough for you to fit) and you'll be fine with the lava. If you bust a rock and it gets bright in your tunnel, backpedal and throw down some stones.. always keep an inventory slot with stone/dirt right next to the pickaxe you're using

I hope they add some uses for gold, because right now.. its really quite pointless. Besides bling(diamond's got it beat anyways, and way more functional too) and golden apples(the most exorbitantly expensive item ever).

[Jetsetlemming]

There's a program on the minecraft forums that alters your locally saved games to spawn dungeons in them, complete with themed levels, monster spawns, and loot chests. I reached the bottom of one finally, after many deaths and tribulations, collected myself, and returned to my basecamp between the second and third floors of the dungeon in a cave offshoot.

Daaaamnnnnn

Using the painterly pack for textures.

http://painterlypack.net/index.html

I don't have the slightest clue what that item is in my inventory three squares right of the top left corner. It's not a tool as using it doesn't make a strength bar appear on its icon, but equipping it and using it swings it like a tool.

[Duff-e]

Jetsetlemming, I haven't downloaded anything besides the alpha available to everyone and I have found dungeons with monster spawns and loot chests though I can't say I noticed any particular theme.

They look like this:

Are you talking about something different?

Also if you guys didn't already know there is a program called cartographer that makes cool overhead maps of your territory. You can also use it to find deposits of stuff but it's not as useful as it sounds because the maps are so damn huge.

[twiz]

I've heard of that before, might give it a try one of these days. How is it at mapping out caves?

I found my first dungeon today.. spider spawner. No loot chest at all!!! I was pissed

So after that failure, I wandered around that area a bit since there were some caves around. I was doing my normal thing, exploring some cave systems and mining, when I happened upon a cave.. I honestly can't remember what the entrance looked like. That was 5 hours ago. It was enormous, and beautiful. I've done my fair share of spelunking, and I've seen what I thought were huge cave systems... they are nothing compared to this. 10x bigger than anything else I've ever encountered, and that's just what I explored. Before I threw in the towel today I found more passageways, for another day. They go down further... oh my. I think I'm mostly under the "ocean", as I was near the beach when I entered, and that there's water everywhere. And lava, everywhere. Huge waterfalls of lava into huge lakes... treacherous mining, but beautiful. Mobs all over too. I'm glad I armored up well before setting off.. usually I don't, but it paid off.

It is also the most mineral-rich area I've ever seen. Iron ore and coal all over it. I went through a dozen iron pickaxes, just mining coal/steel/gold/diamond, and towards the end I gave up mining iron and coal since I had so freakin much. I actually had to stop halfway through and make a furnace so I could smelt the iron ore i'd dug up to make more pickaxes. I stopped twice and dropped chests because I couldn't carry anymore... just to give you an idea, not including the six pickaxes I made and a partial suit of armor, I came out with 232 iron ingots, 320 coal, 30 gold, and 10 diamonds. I wasn't deep enough to get into real good diamond territory... perhaps tomorrow. The lava's there, for sure. Just need a bit more depth. I'm sure I went through at least 64 coal in making more torches too...

Towards the end, I realized that if I died, I would never find this place again.. I couldn't remember what direction I'd traveled from my base (its a good ways away), nor what the entrance to the cave even looked like. Seeing as I was out of food, and there was lava everywhere, I decided just to pick a spot and start digging a staircase. To my surprise, it wasn't long til I surfaced.. I wasn't very deep at all. I have a feeling there is a lot more beneath me. I kept hearings mobs below/around me... I'll have to pay them a visit :derp:

This, I will screenshot when I have time. It is too incredible not to share.

[Duff-e]

It's not so great mapping out caves, only surface stuff. You can use it to view minerals but like I said the maps are so big it's basically useless for that.

I had a similar moment of awe finding a huge pit in the middle of an otherwise regular cave.

I always carry at least one full stack of wood whenever I do anything now. Having to dig yourself to the surface from half way under the map with no tools because you got lost in a cave is very very frustrating. I would have gladly thrown myself in lava if I could have found some easily.

On another forum someone randomly spawned this world and shared the save file if you're interested (I have bad luck with spawning on flat land and beaches):

http://www.2shared.com/file/Bqr84Opo/World1.html

[Jetsetlemming]

Jetsetlemming, I haven't downloaded anything besides the alpha available to everyone and I have found dungeons with monster spawns and loot chests though I can't say I noticed any particular theme.

There's a program that spawns specific dungeons made out of randomized sets of custom designed rooms and floors, with treasure chests through it. Their entrances look like this:

The big tower there in the water.

[Buddy]

Jetsetlemming, I haven't downloaded anything besides the alpha available to everyone and I have found dungeons with monster spawns and loot chests though I can't say I noticed any particular theme.

There's a program that spawns specific dungeons made out of randomized sets of custom designed rooms and floors, with treasure chests through it. Their entrances look like this:

image

The big tower there in the water.

Fixed

[Jetsetlemming]

Doesn't look very fixed to me.

I've been terraforming that mountain into something defensible and livable over the past two days. Adding waterfalls, digging out some areas and filling in others to turn climbable slopes into walls, adding rock walls, doors, ladders, and torches, etc. Looks like this now:

(Top-down image using Minecraft Topographical Survey)

I found a post online showing how to make an infinite water pool, so the summit where all my stuff is has a 2x2x1 bath now that I can use to easily make waterfalls. Most of the thin areas of the mountain have been turned into waterfalls, with wider areas being levelled out and equipped with ladders. The NW slope is still climbable because doing all this takes a lot of time and I've been going clockwise.

[Jetsetlemming]

Playing with water. There are ways to make water spring tiles (the full tiles that can be picked up in your bucket) infinitely reproduce themselves, and I've now graduated from making waterfalls to making entire rivers and lakes.

[Skjalg]

It looks like this game has the morphing-terrain aspect that i love about transport tycoon really nailed down =)