Quite a while ago now I built a 3in1 gold farm above the Nether. You know the type, shifting floors, Ghast crusher on top and cactus below for killing Magma cubes.
The spawning pad is 50x12 and each slice of it consists of:
4 hoppers
4 comparators
4 sticky pistons
2 normal pistons
2 redstone blocks
4 tripwire hooks
22 string
26 half slabs
6 solid blocks
A Ridiculous amount really, especially considering you need to multiply all that by 50 and then of course collect the drops with either 600+ hoppers or use minecarts.
I opted for the "cheaper" version, minecarts, which still required 600 + powered / unpowered rails 1200+ solid blocks, 1800+ layers of snow plus a load of cacti and sand and a storage system / flesh dispenser.
All this would be well and good if it was ridiculously productive. It most certainly is not.
5 minutes AFK (y255) produces approximately, on average, 1632 nuggets and the odd Magma cream and Ghast tear per hour.
Pretty pathetic in all honesty considering the time taken to build it, the resources used and the time taken to acquire those resources.
Anyway... I play sometimes with my daughter, who is 6, in her world and she wanted to build a gold farm. Knowing what I already know I opted for a cheap / quick design.
Together it took us less than an hour to build, probably closer to 30 minutes. I built it myself in creative in 20.
The resources used for this farm are as follows:
2 sand
2 cactus
72 half slabs
304 wood planks
874 solid blocks
105 iron
Plus a little bit extra for decoration. This farm, although not designed for Magma cream, or Ghast tears produces approximately 2500 nuggets per hour and as an added bonus, it also produces zero lag.
Maybe if you read this and are thinking of building a Gold farm, hopefully I have saved you a lot of time and resources.
There's really not much to see mate. It's just 8 spawning platforms with a gap in the middle with open trap doors. they fall to the bottom, die and the hoppers feed the drops into a chest.
There's a piece of cactus on either end to kill the tiny magma's that get in there if they haven't gone over the edge and despawned in the distance.
With a 2-wide gap you could get magma creams as well.
It's possible to completely prevent anything going over the edge with a fence post on the outside at spawn level and a half slab one block above thus not reducing airblock efficiency (saying that I think a tiny magma could jump 1.5 blocks high?). But it's not worth the extra trouble imo. Less than 5% go over the outside edge anyway.
Your farm concepts sound really great and I'd like to see more of it. The screenshot you posted is nothing anyone could work with, sorry. I can just see some glowstone and a lot of black nothing. Would be awesome if you could post some more!
- MoosDalai
Sorry, I didn't realise the picture was so dark. It's dark on my monitor but I can see it. On my daughter's tablet it isn't really viewable at all
Nothing groundbreaking. Just some crude, old fashioned trap doors
Automated farms are meant to be expensive, it's endgame stuff, what you and your daughter built is for the first few days till you get resources, no doubt it works, but if not for building ridiculously expensive, complex and time consuming things, minecraft would get boring very quickly.
The only thing an automated farm is meant to be is... Automatic.
Don't get me wrong, I like taking on the bigger projects but I don't see much point in doing so when something better can be achieved in 1% of the time for 1% of the cost.
If you're the opposite, then great. That is the beauty of this game, it can be played how you want
Automated farms are meant to be expensive, it's endgame stuff, what you and your daughter built is for the first few days till you get resources.
That's the dumbest thing I've heard in these forums in quite a while. What the OP did was maximize efficiency, by reducing the costs and increasing the returns. His daughter will thank him later in life. Kudos to him to put a whole lot of us to shame with his superior results with much less work. Maybe that's what is bothering some people here...
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I was trying to think of a signature and this is what came up.
That's the dumbest thing I've heard in these forums in quite a while. What the OP did was maximize efficiency, by reducing the costs and increasing the returns. His daughter will thank him later in life. Kudos to him to put a whole lot of us to shame with his superior results with much less work. Maybe that's what is bothering some people here...
What I was thinking too. Jealousy IS an ugly thing!
Well, tried it out yesterday (still WIP). At first I tried to make it to Nether, but spawning rate is absolutely awful. 128 block spawning radius is just too huge. So I decided to go above the bedrock, but it seems you can't place blocks higher than Y=256. So some of your spawning still happens in nether too. So, I made my killzone at level 200. Haven't checked yet if Nether area is spawnproof, but I do get better results. Anyway, I do have a question. Do mobs move when they spawn outside of the 32 block radius? If not, I have to use pistons instead of trapdoor system.
I don't remember much of the spawn mechanisms in Minecraft. Took a long hiatus from the game and haven't really checked that info yet. Others will give more informed decisions. But this much I can tell you about pigmen traps in the Nether: Build them atop the lava ocean. Aim for a big one and carefully build your way to the center. Build from there. You are bound to have some spawns outside your control. But this way you'll minimize it.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I was trying to think of a signature and this is what came up.
Well, tried it out yesterday (still WIP). At first I tried to make it to Nether, but spawning rate is absolutely awful. 128 block spawning radius is just too huge.
So I decided to go above the bedrock, but it seems you can't place blocks higher than Y=256. So some of your spawning still happens in nether too. So, I made my killzone at level 200. Haven't checked yet if Nether area is spawnproof, but I do get better results.
Anyway, I do have a question. Do mobs move when they spawn outside of the 32 block radius? If not, I have to use pistons instead of trapdoor system.
You need your afk platform or, in this case, block to be 32 blocks away from the furthest spawning point. Depending on the shape of your platforms you can only make around 8 - 10. The one pictured has 8 platforms, each platform has, I think, 90 spawning spaces
This isn't the type of farm you can build from bedrock to build height. You can do it but it will be a waste of time
You can however build 4 of them in all four directions around you but having just 2 of them pretty much fills up the mob cap and will increase rates to approx 4500 nuggets p/h.
**I forgot to add, the half slabs at the top of the farm (to prevent ghasts from spawning) are at y254.5. Every platform is 2 blocks below until you get to the drop.
Ok, that makes sense. So that glowstone block in your first picture is afk block?
Thx for info again. Gonna try this out
Yes, that glowstone block is the afk point. It's 24 blocks away from the nearest platform and roughly, give or take a block, in the middle of all the levels.
I will dig out a world download later so you can see for yourself
It's more effective if you make 4x4 spawn pads with trapdoors between, in a large square. It means there's more chances of packs spawning. You can make several layers; best starting up near y=256. Make sure you're idling 24 blocks away from it. You can fit several layers of pads if you want; then yeah, just have a platform 24 blocks down (or more). Either all-hoppers with halfslabs on top, or hopper-carts on rails with a fair number of power rails (maybe use strips of redstone block).
Works pretty well, and is much simpler and resource-friendly than shifting floor designs.
Sure. I did it this way purely to save on hoppers but if I did it like you suggested I'd probably go with a minecart or two
Drop your afk point by about 10 blocks. As for the spawning stopping, It does that sometimes in the nether, I don't know why, but logging out and back it solves it.
Very interesting. Going to use this in my world. 19k Nuggets per an hour would be amazing for a modded world
I never said 19k an hour lol. I said I ran it for 5 minutes and concluded 1600 an hour for the shifting floor design, 2500 for the trap door
Ok, small update. I finally got it working. I set my afk point to Y=250. Lowest spawn platform is at level 224.
However, I see pigmen spawning and move around. But they also despawn, which is kinda disturbing. I understood that it won't happen if they're in 32 block radius. My afk point coordinates are X=0; Z=92. Closest spawning platform is Z=66 and furthest points are (X=9, Z=62) and (X=-10, Z=62). So it should be between 24-32 block radius.
I also noticed that after a while spawning just stops, although spawning pads are empty. Very odd...
Exit the world and reload if that happens. I believe it has something to do with 'hashmaps'.
Drop your afk point by about 10 blocks. As for the spawning stopping, It does that sometimes in the nether, I don't know why, but logging out and back it solves it. I never said 19k an hour lol. I said I ran it for 5 minutes and concluded 1600 an hour for the shifting floor design, 2500 for the trap door
Quite a while ago now I built a 3in1 gold farm above the Nether. You know the type, shifting floors, Ghast crusher on top and cactus below for killing Magma cubes.
The spawning pad is 50x12 and each slice of it consists of:
I opted for the "cheaper" version, minecarts, which still required 600 + powered / unpowered rails 1200+ solid blocks, 1800+ layers of snow plus a load of cacti and sand and a storage system / flesh dispenser.
All this would be well and good if it was ridiculously productive. It most certainly is not.
5 minutes AFK (y255) produces approximately, on average, 1632 nuggets and the odd Magma cream and Ghast tear per hour.
Pretty pathetic in all honesty considering the time taken to build it, the resources used and the time taken to acquire those resources.
Anyway... I play sometimes with my daughter, who is 6, in her world and she wanted to build a gold farm. Knowing what I already know I opted for a cheap / quick design.
Together it took us less than an hour to build, probably closer to 30 minutes. I built it myself in creative in 20.
The resources used for this farm are as follows:
Maybe if you read this and are thinking of building a Gold farm, hopefully I have saved you a lot of time and resources.
Screenshot:
Sugar Cane Farm Alternatives: http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/2162971-sugar-cane-farm-alternatives/page__hl__+sugar +cane +farm
There's a piece of cactus on either end to kill the tiny magma's that get in there if they haven't gone over the edge and despawned in the distance.
With a 2-wide gap you could get magma creams as well.
It's possible to completely prevent anything going over the edge with a fence post on the outside at spawn level and a half slab one block above thus not reducing airblock efficiency (saying that I think a tiny magma could jump 1.5 blocks high?). But it's not worth the extra trouble imo. Less than 5% go over the outside edge anyway.
Sugar Cane Farm Alternatives: http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/2162971-sugar-cane-farm-alternatives/page__hl__+sugar +cane +farm
Sorry, I didn't realise the picture was so dark. It's dark on my monitor but I can see it. On my daughter's tablet it isn't really viewable at all
Nothing groundbreaking. Just some crude, old fashioned trap doors
Sugar Cane Farm Alternatives: http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/2162971-sugar-cane-farm-alternatives/page__hl__+sugar +cane +farm
Exactly! Couldn't have said it better myself.
The only thing an automated farm is meant to be is... Automatic.
Don't get me wrong, I like taking on the bigger projects but I don't see much point in doing so when something better can be achieved in 1% of the time for 1% of the cost.
If you're the opposite, then great. That is the beauty of this game, it can be played how you want
Sugar Cane Farm Alternatives: http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/2162971-sugar-cane-farm-alternatives/page__hl__+sugar +cane +farm
That's the dumbest thing I've heard in these forums in quite a while. What the OP did was maximize efficiency, by reducing the costs and increasing the returns. His daughter will thank him later in life. Kudos to him to put a whole lot of us to shame with his superior results with much less work. Maybe that's what is bothering some people here...
I've never been a fan of those massive farms that take dozens of stacks of irons, this one is just perfect.
What I was thinking too. Jealousy IS an ugly thing!
Two words: Powered Rails.
I don't remember much of the spawn mechanisms in Minecraft. Took a long hiatus from the game and haven't really checked that info yet. Others will give more informed decisions. But this much I can tell you about pigmen traps in the Nether: Build them atop the lava ocean. Aim for a big one and carefully build your way to the center. Build from there. You are bound to have some spawns outside your control. But this way you'll minimize it.
You need your afk platform or, in this case, block to be 32 blocks away from the furthest spawning point. Depending on the shape of your platforms you can only make around 8 - 10. The one pictured has 8 platforms, each platform has, I think, 90 spawning spaces
This isn't the type of farm you can build from bedrock to build height. You can do it but it will be a waste of time
You can however build 4 of them in all four directions around you but having just 2 of them pretty much fills up the mob cap and will increase rates to approx 4500 nuggets p/h.
**I forgot to add, the half slabs at the top of the farm (to prevent ghasts from spawning) are at y254.5. Every platform is 2 blocks below until you get to the drop.
Sugar Cane Farm Alternatives: http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/2162971-sugar-cane-farm-alternatives/page__hl__+sugar +cane +farm
Yes, that glowstone block is the afk point. It's 24 blocks away from the nearest platform and roughly, give or take a block, in the middle of all the levels.
I will dig out a world download later so you can see for yourself
Sugar Cane Farm Alternatives: http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/2162971-sugar-cane-farm-alternatives/page__hl__+sugar +cane +farm
Sure. I did it this way purely to save on hoppers but if I did it like you suggested I'd probably go with a minecart or two
Sugar Cane Farm Alternatives: http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/2162971-sugar-cane-farm-alternatives/page__hl__+sugar +cane +farm
I never said 19k an hour lol. I said I ran it for 5 minutes and concluded 1600 an hour for the shifting floor design, 2500 for the trap door
Sugar Cane Farm Alternatives: http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/2162971-sugar-cane-farm-alternatives/page__hl__+sugar +cane +farm
I did miss the 5 minute reference in the original post so my apologies... 19,000/hr is significantly better than 2,500/hr.
But then the update from the OP above implies he meant 1,600 hour based on 5 minutes of afk...