Vanilla Minecraft News Discussion

[Gilberreke]

I love the skin improvements :o

I wonder if it extends to armors. I can immediately think of a bunch of cool things to do with it. And it's backwards compatible. Cool.

[dawnraider]

Wait, skin changes are backwards compatible? That's awesome! One of the very few good changes by Mojang recently (and by that I mean stuff that isn't just meh), and we can actually use it. I always hated that each arm was identical, and that only heads could have a second layer. This is great!

Everything else, though, is just meh. It is stupid, but it doesn't have that much of in impact since, as FC said, their methods don't do shit.

[Nabetsu122]

While it doesn't change current generation, I do feel like that replacing wool with stained clay in desert temples feels a bit more natural, instead of wondering where the ancients found wool in the middle of a desert (unless you are Towns, in which you have Snoats).

On the topic of grinders/farms: very rarely in my vMC worlds do I use grinders, since I prefer to hunt for my resources (or you can call me lazy, whatever you prefer). That said, while the new change would not affect me, I feel like it is the wrong way to deter resource farming, since all you have to do is add a block, a potion, and a bit of afk to build up the resources.

[FlowerChild]

While it doesn't change current generation, I do feel like that replacing wool with stained clay in desert temples feels a bit more natural, instead of wondering where the ancients found wool in the middle of a desert (unless you are Towns, in which you have Snoats).

Yup, which is exactly why I changed it to obsidian in BTW months ago :P

[dawnraider]

While it doesn't change current generation, I do feel like that replacing wool with stained clay in desert temples feels a bit more natural, instead of wondering where the ancients found wool in the middle of a desert (unless you are Towns, in which you have Snoats).

Yup, which is exactly why I changed it to obsidian in BTW months ago :P

And even then, why use clay, of all things? Doesn't clay have a lot of water? Even the little things in BTW are amazing.

[Six]

While it doesn't change current generation, I do feel like that replacing wool with stained clay in desert temples feels a bit more natural, instead of wondering where the ancients found wool in the middle of a desert (unless you are Towns, in which you have Snoats).

Yup, which is exactly why I changed it to obsidian in BTW months ago :P

And even then, why use clay, of all things? Doesn't clay have a lot of water? Even the little things in BTW are amazing.

I more like the connection they give the temples to nether portals, and the utility they offer for that purpose.

[woeuntoyou]

Nice changes to player skins. Really all I could ask for from Mojang nowadays.

[erikdk321]

I can also see a lot of possibilities for skins now, for once: Good job Mojang on actually releasing something that works and will be used by the players.

[BinoAl]

...Wait, did "design by committee" actually just get something good done?
https://twitter.com/jeb_/status/424952385417773056

[FlowerChild]

Wow. Jeb tweet on the above fiasco:

I just wish automation was by design, and not by unclear mob spawn rules

So...we have what is effectively one of the people currently designing MC complaining about the game's lack of design.

I think that may be the first time Jeb has almost gotten my head to explode :)

[caveatEmptor]

Hahaaaaa... yeah. I just want to grab the guy by the shoulders and tell him that he doesn't get to say "I just wish" when he's the designer. Make it happen if you just wish!

I at least sort of get where he's coming from with the unclear rules issue- there's a lot of non-obvious information to know about spawning rules, mob drops and behavior, plant growth, and probably a bunch of other stuff in the game. Stuff like that helps when creating automated builds and it's annoying to have to refer to wikis and the like to figure out all the nuances. I can think of a few BTW changes and features that address these issues (ender specs, mobs continuing to move farther away from the player, and so on) but there's still always going to be a lot of unclear rules in a game like MC. It's just not a good reason to scrap a good mechanic like automation.

[FlowerChild]

Yup, that's exactly right. If they'd just stop fighting (ineffectually no less) against mob traps, and embrace the emergent gameplay they provide, then they could work towards designing with them in mind to make them feel less random and more like an integrated part of the game.

I've tried to do this with a number of features in BTW, mob-traps included, but also extending to other stuff like the Buddy Block, and Vine Traps, when an unanticipated "feature" turned out to be cool enough that I felt it was worth legitimizing it instead of leaving it in exploit territory.

[jecowa]

It looks like villagers will harvest and replant crops. https://twitter.com/jeb_/status/425648729111408640

[eternal8phoenix]

It looks like villagers will harvest and replant crops. https://twitter.com/jeb_/status/425648729111408640

Yay! Mojang supported slave labor! Wheat for all!

On a slightly more distressing note, Dinnerbone has semi-automated the end of many servers/builds

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Seriously....what on earth was he thinking? I could kinda understand it for golems...but this is just going to lead to griefer central.

Up/downward facing buttons are kinda neat though. Good for hiding build with at any rate.

[CreeperCannibal]

It looks like villagers will harvest and replant crops. https://twitter.com/jeb_/status/425648729111408640

Yay! Mojang supported slave labor! Wheat for all!

On a slightly more distressing note, Dinnerbone has semi-automated the end of many servers/builds

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Seriously....what on earth was he thinking? I could kinda understand it for golems...but this is just going to lead to griefer central.

Up/downward facing buttons are kinda neat though. Good for hiding build with at any rate.

The villagers maintaining their crops feels right in the terms of their own generated crops in their villages, It makes villagers more functional and beliveable. The plantations that will result from this however, will pretty much end any seed collection and auto harvesting. So less machinery, more villager labor. I doubt Dinnerbone was thinking about how the players would exploit this. Likewise don't think he understood what kind of grief trap he just invented. The saftey's servers will have to take against this will cripple any possible automation unless there's a fix specifically preventing the spawing of withers/golems due to non-player placement.
It's been said a few times now but can we tone it down with the anti-mojang jokes/comments? All of it still helps towards propigating a biast against all things mojang and thus only encourages more anger noise than actual critcism for new vanilla MC features.

[BinoAl]

Wait wait wait. Jeb, who no more than a couple days ago was calling Mob Farms "basically item duping", is adding a way to automate farming?

[FlowerChild]

Wait wait wait. Jeb, who no more than a couple days ago was calling Mob Farms "basically item duping", is adding a way to automate farming?

Like many of Mojang's automation "features", he likely doesn't anticipate it, and thus it's just an accidental biproduct of what he's doing. He probably just thinks it's just a bit of character for villagers.

I think a lot of times when people suggest this stuff, they neglect to mention the real reason why they're suggesting it.

Also, I'm not sure if his distaste for mob traps extends to automated farming. Despite what he says to the contrary, I think his distaste for mob traps may be largely thematic with the whole "mobs spawning out of nowhere and feeding into a trap makes no sense" thing expressed by many Minecraft players.

Mind you, if you accept mob traps, then you can design thematic elements to justify how they work, much like I've tried to do with BTW. At a certain point, I think it's best to accept the limitations of your technology and try to build thematic justification for it rather than trying to hide it from players and pretend like those limitations don't exist.

In other words "ok, we need to spawn and despawn mobs based on the position of the player as we can't track that many persistent entities, how do we build that into the back story?"

[JiiKoo]

Wait wait wait. Jeb, who no more than a couple days ago was calling Mob Farms "basically item duping", is adding a way to automate farming?

Yeah, that was pretty much my first thought, as well. I guess I could see him thinking food is such a non-resource in vanilla that it doesn't matter at all, but at the same time it's fairly trivial to get iron or gold for pretty much any use other than large scale building, or beacons. That being said, I find it a bit cool that villagers actually do something with the crops they are growing and bringing the villages alive, even if it doesn't really have that much impact on anything as far as I know.

And being able to place buttons on the floor and ceilings might have some fun uses. Not having played on any open servers where griefers might lurk I personally don't much mind the Wither thing. ...thinking about it now, though, it might be a rather nasty surprise if a wither spawned when you enter your base (assuming people use pressure plates for doors, anyways).

[eternal8phoenix]

It's been said a few times now but can we tone it down with the anti-mojang jokes/comments? All of it still helps towards propagating a bias against all things mojang and thus only encourages more anger noise than actual criticism for new vanilla MC features.

I'm sorry if you felt I was adding to that noise. I just don't think they put much thought into the consequences of some of their plans. Sure villagers replanting their crops makes it look more normal, and gives the different villagers a kind of flavor (I'm assuming only brown "farmer" one's do this) but it WILL inevitably be used by someone to make a full auto farm. So, here come the plantations. Still not sure on the auto-wither thing since I realized it won't be the mega-grief I thought it would since the block dispenser is not vanilla, so actually building the body is eventually going to require some player input (There's no glitch to dupe soul sand like regular sand, right?)

I do actually kinda like some of their recent things. I like the idea of hardened/stained clay although the texture could use some love. And also using it in the temples instead of wool. It makes a lot more sense at any rate. I don't have a problem with the whole clay=wet thing, since it's a temple, of course they are going to use precious/hard-to-get materials in building it.

[FlowerChild]

I'm sorry if you felt I was adding to that noise.

I think it's the degree of vitriol that is being used in many posts here that's getting annoying, to myself included. Critiques are fine, but turning it into a big emotional show is a drag.

Put another way: Less Fox News please, and more...

Never mind, I can't think of any remaining legitimate news organizations to complete my analogy. Just less Fox News please :)

[RandomObj3ct]

back on track

you can now get redstone signals with the rotation of items in frames, i don't know how it makes sense but some cool combo locks should be possible.

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also, finally you can make mossyy cobble stone, although i prefer the BTW method.

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say what you want about a few people constantly hating on recent changes, at least we're not going to be whining about a change like this(see reddit)

[Taleric]

Put another way: Less Fox News please, and more...

Never mind, I can't think of any remaining legitimate news organizations to complete my analogy. Just less Fox News please :)

Lol! That volly would have been called in as danger close :P

What are we to do in a world of media sensasonalism where every outlet is a varieying degree of tabloid XP

The overall impact of the recent updates has been really relative when you consider how easy things are anyway. I look at all the changes from a performance standpoint anymore; will my rig suffer more for something unessisary while BTW keeps it nice and cool.

Redstone in a frame is a nice gimmick but at what cost.

[RandomObj3ct]

Redstone in a frame is a nice gimmick but at what cost.

if it's done right there shouldn't really be one, it should(we don't know how they work) only send a signal when the frame is updated. As there is no way to spam updates onto a frame, there should be a negligable performance hit, even if you could spam them it would be no worse than a redstone clock.

[Gilberreke]

I kinda like the item frames thing. It's been long-established I'm a fan of having more ways to interact with the world through redstone. This is basically a 4-way lever, which is cool :)

[barcode]

if it's done right there shouldn't really be one, it should(we don't know how they work) only send a signal when the frame is updated. As there is no way to spam updates onto a frame, there should be a negligable performance hit, even if you could spam them it would be no worse than a redstone clock.

I have always thought that punching a redstone ore block into giving off light should give off a redstone signal. That would have been quite a nice effect on some maps I've worked on...