Well long gone are the days where you have 200x200 biomes, deserts, jungles, snow and everything right by the spawn, now we can be travelling well over 10,000 blocks to get anywhere these days. Obviously making a 10,000 segment minecart track isn't going to cut it like the old days, that'd be far too expensive. Using the nether is kinda out of the question now due to the fact that you'd still have to navigate thousands of blocks through that ghast infested lava trap. And due to expense, ice/trapdoor tunnels and piston pushers are out of the question too. Is there a better way to get around these days?
If you want to travel in one direction, a piston flying machine should do the trick, slap that thing down at about 180 blocks of height and it shouldn't collide with anything. There are plenty of designs on YouTube if you want to know more about it. The best thing about this method is: It is AFKable.
I can already imagine how that thing would work, and that's such a cool and interesting concept. I'm guessing it uses slime blocks or something like that to function. Is it any kind of fast though? Faster than running normally? Also, thank you for the quick response
They can be quite fast if built correctly, I think the faster designs may even be on par with sprinting. The main advantage is however that it requires little infrastructure as opposed to minecarts and therefore can be used to explore new terrain.
Minecart is definitely a good, but glitchy method of travel for shorter distances.
Will definitely need to breed a faster horse to get around, but that has the limitation of only being able to go through 3 high spaces and 2 wide spaces.
They can be quite fast if built correctly, I think the faster designs may even be on par with sprinting. The main advantage is however that it requires little infrastructure as opposed to minecarts and therefore can be used to explore new terrain.
Thank you! I will definitely have to check those out, that sounds really exciting!
Personally I would not rule out the nether. It really does reduce your distances so dramatically it is worth the investment. As for it being a ghast filled nightmare there are two approaches to avoiding them:
1) Go above the nether and build your tracks up there, you can use ender pearls to get up and dark oak to get down. However, some people consider using dark oak to break bedrock as a 'glitch' and therefore are reluctant to use this.
2) Go just below bedrock, level 118y(ish), and tunnel. You do not get ghasts. The only risk is you do get occasional uncover lava but this easy to deal with. It takes a lot of mining but netherrack is like butter, so it is very fast. to go large distances.
You have a very good point there. I have no problem using the nether roof, although I will not complain when they patch it as it is a bit of an exploit of a feature that wasn't meant to be there. If ignoring the nether roof idea though, I suppose running 2000 blocks in the nether is still a ton faster than running 16,000 in the overworld.
I personally decided to use command block travelling hub. To make it more interesting so things would not be too simple I decided to have some additional rules.
Central hub station is made into 0,10,0.
Every target station is made from lapis blocks, everyone is identical to each other, sort of Tardis.
From each Tardis, you have to go there or come back to central hub at least once by orthodox methods, i.e. either through nether or preferably overland.
There might be some additional rules like allowed coordinates for Tardis, (only coordinates ending with two zeroes), limited list of biomes, only sky Tardis allowed (max height possible), some obligatory damage when teleporting, like 20 block fall, teleporting into burning netherrack or maybe create some sort of payment when using central hub. Maybe in my next world i introduce some of those.
That's a cool idea. I was almost considering command blocks myself, but I wanna stay vanilla and cheat free for now. A payment method would be cool if you could implement that. Not something farmable though, like iron, gold, emerald etc. Like a diamond, or a lapis block.
On another note, I got this sweet ride. It has good speed and decent jump height
I used to build some pretty extreme sky rails in my old worlds, however, these days I tend to dislike it. I'd still do it even with the effort involved, but for some reason rail travel seems slower/glitchier in the overworld then it used to be. No way am I spending all that time for transport that is now nerfed to be no faster than horses and has lag lurches. However, I always build nether rails on my big worlds and encase them in cobblestone. The distance shrinkage really is amazing saving 7/8 of your rails and half the time you are mining through netherrack as the guy above said so it is quite easy to lay them with a little planning.
For the overworld I tend to use boats and horses. A fast horse is as good as an overworld minecart and takes far less investment. Plus you can take it exploring to new areas. Boats are for areas with a large amount of rivers or crossing oceans. So I'll make a network of horse trails for land travel linked to boat launchers for crossing water. It's quite effective. Just dismount, tie your horse to the post, press a button and shoot off!
Also, these days just splashing yourself with Speed II and sprinting you can get around surprisingly fast if you haven't been lucky enough to find horses yet.
I did once experiment with horse trails in the nether. It worked but I needed a taller tunnel then for minecarts which made them actually take more time, still it's kinda fun riding your horse through portals and running around the nether with it.
One last note: there has been a nether portal feature for ages which allows for 1-way teleportation. Because of the way portals link you can custom craft a nether portal which links to a different overworld portal then the overworld portal that links to it. So you can go through a portal. Reenter the same one nether-side and come out having teleported about 2000 blocks. This is because overworld portals across a very large area all link to one nether-side portal and the nether-side portal will pick only 1 of those to link too. This is a 1-way teleport only though meaning you could have several tp points jumping to an important place like your main base but it wouldn't work in reverse. I've never utilized this because I use nether rails which make precise portal links and something like this wouldn't work with many close nether-side portals about, but if you don't care to use the nether that way with many portals, it might be useful to you. The wiki has instructions on where to place the nether portal manually to set it up to maximize the jump distance. The nether portal will connect to the overworld portal that is closest too: x*8 & z*8
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It is labour/resource intensive to build a nether minecart system, but its probably the easiest way to cover vast distances in a short time, especially if you build in the roof of the nether as previously suggested - i didnt, so had many lava lakes to cross but it was ... fun. Now I have quite a rail complex in the nether which means I can visit areas of my world quite quickly in relation to going overworld.
I do have a very fast horse (13.8 blocks per second) but its really difficult to breed a fast one due to the way the stats of the foal are calculated. Your better off trying to find one naturally, as I found my horse. Horses are great to get around but not in tree dominated biomes, and you have to lead them across 2 block deep or greater water otherwise you get thrown off - I usually carry cobblestone with me and just make a short bridge for rivers, but for oceans ... well.
And a tip about horses - when you find them in the wild, and try taming them, take note of how fast they move when you try to mount them - a fast horse will walk quicker than a slow one, and when you can tell the difference you be able to mount a horse once and know if its worth taming or not (for speed anyway).
Oh yeah, and horses are susceptible to speed potions when splashed
They've been mentioned before, but horses are a good option.
Since they do have the limitation of needing a 2x3 space to go through (only 2x2 if the block your head passes through is one that does not cause suffocation such as leaves), you would want to set up roads or at least paths to travel along, such as digging tunnels through hills.
The nether is a viable option. Digging a tunnel for your track and possibly building an enclosed space around it would keep ghasts from being an issue. I'm not sure about pigmen, though; I think they require a 2x2 area to spawn, though, so just having a 1 block wide space for the mine cart rails would be enough.
I'd recommend travel methods from mods, but OP wants to stay vanilla so I'll refrain from bringing those up.
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I'm not sure about pigmen, though; I think they require a 2x2 area to spawn, though, so just having a 1 block wide space for the mine cart rails would be enough.
My minecart lines are two blocks wide, but one is a half slab, however, pigmen can spawn on the tracks, I often get them in my tunnels. I'm not very clear on the more complicated details of mobs spawning, but I assume they get there because they are part of a pack which spawns on a block centred just outside the tunnel wall (my walls are 1 block thick in open space) and this allows some of the pack to spawn inside my tunnels. I assume if I could make the tunnel walls thick enough all round I could stop it... but I think they can spawn directly on tracks as well.
My minecart lines are two blocks wide, but one is a half slab, however, pigmen can spawn on the tracks, I often get them in my tunnels. I'm not very clear on the more complicated details of mobs spawning, but I assume they get there because they are part of a pack which spawns on a block centred just outside the tunnel wall (my walls are 1 block thick in open space) and this allows some of the pack to spawn inside my tunnels. I assume if I could make the tunnel walls thick enough all round I could stop it... but I think they can spawn directly on tracks as well.
Mob packs can only spawn if there are no transparent blocks at the center location, but individual mobs can spawn on transparent blocks, so you can prevent them from spawning on the tracks by ensuring the walls are thick enough. However, that means at least 20 blocks thick as mobs spawn in a 41x41 area (+/- 20 blocks out from the center), though the majority spawn much closer to the center (99% within 10 blocks). Note that the area is only one block high, so you only need to make the ground outside one block higher or lower than the rails (see the Wiki for details).
Also, I use rails myself; the resources are extremely cheap considering my playstyle (I easily mine 700 iron in a single sitting, enough for 1,867 rails, and have mined over 45,000 rails from mineshafts - I've never actually needed to make any regular rails; by the time I get around to making a secondary base I'll have plenty since I'll have explored an area over 1000x1000 blocks, with bases typically 500-750 blocks apart, essentially just stopover points so I can restock on food/wood and empty my inventory), and since I lay the rails to new secondary bases there is no issue with exploring new terrain; my method of placing them is in a 1x2 tunnel a few blocks below sea level, with usually no more than one curve (i.e. go straight out until I reach the x/z coordinate my base is at, then head straight towards it).
Also, unlike horses they can be pretty much automatic; get in, start moving and you'll end up at your destination without further interaction (aside from stopovers between bases), and you can use them day or night without worrying about mobs (the nights in my worlds are especially dangerous since there are no caves they can spawn in once I've explored them out; when I come across a cave I previously missed it often has ridiculous amounts of mobs in it).
I've not considered the Nether since the furthest out secondary base is only about 2,500 blocks away (in one direction, 500 or so in the other three), and due to how I explore the world it will take a very, very long time to get much further; I've only explored an area a bit larger than two fully zoomed maps (each 2048x2048) so far in 40 days of playing (I've had the world since I bought the game nearly two years ago). Also, there have been mentions of bugs and glitches with minecarts but I haven't had any issues, but then I'm playing in an older version. I've also used boats, though I tend to stop exploring under oceans once I get more than a few hundred blocks out, and would make a railway under one if I crossed it (unlikely considering the oceans are 10s of thousands of blocks wide, though there are smaller oceans similar to 1.7 oceans and I added in small islands, similar to Mushroom Islands, suitable for building on).
Personally I would not rule out the nether. It really does reduce your distances so dramatically it is worth the investment. As for it being a ghast filled nightmare there are two approaches to avoiding them:
1) Go above the nether and build your tracks up there, you can use ender pearls to get up and dark oak to get down. However, some people consider using dark oak to break bedrock as a 'glitch' and therefore are reluctant to use this.
2) Go just below bedrock, level 118y(ish), and tunnel. You do not get ghasts. The only risk is you do get occasional uncover lava but this easy to deal with. It takes a lot of mining but netherrack is like butter, so it is very fast. to go large distances.
#2 for sure. Take whatever pains or measures necessary to get up to z = 112 or so in the Nether, then tunnel. MUCH much easier
Though I have no idea how much iron and wood you would go through just to travel a certain distance to get somewhere faster.
Or you can use horse. Those are the fastest mobs capable of being ridden.
Hope this helps.
Will definitely need to breed a faster horse to get around, but that has the limitation of only being able to go through 3 high spaces and 2 wide spaces.
Thank you for the reply
Thank you! I will definitely have to check those out, that sounds really exciting!
You have a very good point there. I have no problem using the nether roof, although I will not complain when they patch it as it is a bit of an exploit of a feature that wasn't meant to be there. If ignoring the nether roof idea though, I suppose running 2000 blocks in the nether is still a ton faster than running 16,000 in the overworld.
I personally decided to use command block travelling hub. To make it more interesting so things would not be too simple I decided to have some additional rules.
Central hub station is made into 0,10,0.
Every target station is made from lapis blocks, everyone is identical to each other, sort of Tardis.
From each Tardis, you have to go there or come back to central hub at least once by orthodox methods, i.e. either through nether or preferably overland.
There might be some additional rules like allowed coordinates for Tardis, (only coordinates ending with two zeroes), limited list of biomes, only sky Tardis allowed (max height possible), some obligatory damage when teleporting, like 20 block fall, teleporting into burning netherrack or maybe create some sort of payment when using central hub. Maybe in my next world i introduce some of those.
On another note, I got this sweet ride. It has good speed and decent jump height
For the overworld I tend to use boats and horses. A fast horse is as good as an overworld minecart and takes far less investment. Plus you can take it exploring to new areas. Boats are for areas with a large amount of rivers or crossing oceans. So I'll make a network of horse trails for land travel linked to boat launchers for crossing water. It's quite effective. Just dismount, tie your horse to the post, press a button and shoot off!
Also, these days just splashing yourself with Speed II and sprinting you can get around surprisingly fast if you haven't been lucky enough to find horses yet.
I did once experiment with horse trails in the nether. It worked but I needed a taller tunnel then for minecarts which made them actually take more time, still it's kinda fun riding your horse through portals and running around the nether with it.
One last note: there has been a nether portal feature for ages which allows for 1-way teleportation. Because of the way portals link you can custom craft a nether portal which links to a different overworld portal then the overworld portal that links to it. So you can go through a portal. Reenter the same one nether-side and come out having teleported about 2000 blocks. This is because overworld portals across a very large area all link to one nether-side portal and the nether-side portal will pick only 1 of those to link too. This is a 1-way teleport only though meaning you could have several tp points jumping to an important place like your main base but it wouldn't work in reverse. I've never utilized this because I use nether rails which make precise portal links and something like this wouldn't work with many close nether-side portals about, but if you don't care to use the nether that way with many portals, it might be useful to you. The wiki has instructions on where to place the nether portal manually to set it up to maximize the jump distance. The nether portal will connect to the overworld portal that is closest too: x*8 & z*8
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tame them using x64 wheat
and ride them using a saddle
I do have a very fast horse (13.8 blocks per second) but its really difficult to breed a fast one due to the way the stats of the foal are calculated. Your better off trying to find one naturally, as I found my horse. Horses are great to get around but not in tree dominated biomes, and you have to lead them across 2 block deep or greater water otherwise you get thrown off - I usually carry cobblestone with me and just make a short bridge for rivers, but for oceans ... well.
And a tip about horses - when you find them in the wild, and try taming them, take note of how fast they move when you try to mount them - a fast horse will walk quicker than a slow one, and when you can tell the difference you be able to mount a horse once and know if its worth taming or not (for speed anyway).
Oh yeah, and horses are susceptible to speed potions when splashed
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Since they do have the limitation of needing a 2x3 space to go through (only 2x2 if the block your head passes through is one that does not cause suffocation such as leaves), you would want to set up roads or at least paths to travel along, such as digging tunnels through hills.
The nether is a viable option. Digging a tunnel for your track and possibly building an enclosed space around it would keep ghasts from being an issue. I'm not sure about pigmen, though; I think they require a 2x2 area to spawn, though, so just having a 1 block wide space for the mine cart rails would be enough.
I'd recommend travel methods from mods, but OP wants to stay vanilla so I'll refrain from bringing those up.
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My minecart lines are two blocks wide, but one is a half slab, however, pigmen can spawn on the tracks, I often get them in my tunnels. I'm not very clear on the more complicated details of mobs spawning, but I assume they get there because they are part of a pack which spawns on a block centred just outside the tunnel wall (my walls are 1 block thick in open space) and this allows some of the pack to spawn inside my tunnels. I assume if I could make the tunnel walls thick enough all round I could stop it... but I think they can spawn directly on tracks as well.
Mintutor now works in 1.13!
MrKite & Mc_Etlam ... I salute you!
Mob packs can only spawn if there are no transparent blocks at the center location, but individual mobs can spawn on transparent blocks, so you can prevent them from spawning on the tracks by ensuring the walls are thick enough. However, that means at least 20 blocks thick as mobs spawn in a 41x41 area (+/- 20 blocks out from the center), though the majority spawn much closer to the center (99% within 10 blocks). Note that the area is only one block high, so you only need to make the ground outside one block higher or lower than the rails (see the Wiki for details).
Also, I use rails myself; the resources are extremely cheap considering my playstyle (I easily mine 700 iron in a single sitting, enough for 1,867 rails, and have mined over 45,000 rails from mineshafts - I've never actually needed to make any regular rails; by the time I get around to making a secondary base I'll have plenty since I'll have explored an area over 1000x1000 blocks, with bases typically 500-750 blocks apart, essentially just stopover points so I can restock on food/wood and empty my inventory), and since I lay the rails to new secondary bases there is no issue with exploring new terrain; my method of placing them is in a 1x2 tunnel a few blocks below sea level, with usually no more than one curve (i.e. go straight out until I reach the x/z coordinate my base is at, then head straight towards it).
Also, unlike horses they can be pretty much automatic; get in, start moving and you'll end up at your destination without further interaction (aside from stopovers between bases), and you can use them day or night without worrying about mobs (the nights in my worlds are especially dangerous since there are no caves they can spawn in once I've explored them out; when I come across a cave I previously missed it often has ridiculous amounts of mobs in it).
I've not considered the Nether since the furthest out secondary base is only about 2,500 blocks away (in one direction, 500 or so in the other three), and due to how I explore the world it will take a very, very long time to get much further; I've only explored an area a bit larger than two fully zoomed maps (each 2048x2048) so far in 40 days of playing (I've had the world since I bought the game nearly two years ago). Also, there have been mentions of bugs and glitches with minecarts but I haven't had any issues, but then I'm playing in an older version. I've also used boats, though I tend to stop exploring under oceans once I get more than a few hundred blocks out, and would make a railway under one if I crossed it (unlikely considering the oceans are 10s of thousands of blocks wide, though there are smaller oceans similar to 1.7 oceans and I added in small islands, similar to Mushroom Islands, suitable for building on).
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#2 for sure. Take whatever pains or measures necessary to get up to z = 112 or so in the Nether, then tunnel. MUCH much easier