>Explanation/What I’m suggesting.
With the new image engine introduced in one of the recent snapshots, item icons are now generated and stored in individual .png files instead of all textures and icons being stored on a single image, this allows for many new options for textures, included the currently popular “Animated Textures” which allows for any item or block to be animated in a easy to learn, easy to implement, and almost infinitely entertaining way. I propose a new piece of functionality that I would not have even dreamed of before this major change to the way items are rendered, we should have a means by which to use different image files to be used as the image file for an item (examples in the pictures below, this would not be limited to the number of items present in Minecraft, but would rather be limited to the dedication of texture pack and custom map makers. This would allow a seemingly “infinite” number of items to exist as long as they act the same as an already existing item, a good additional example would be allowing there to be more than one “type” of wooden sword, one textured as a wooden club, another as board with a nail in it, or even disguising a wooden sword as a wooden sign (kind of simulated in the pictures below, just with the golden sword).
A normal gold sword
A gold sword disguised as a sign, note the damage applied to the sign, signs don’t take damage.
A gold sword disguised as a stone sword, not impressive, but still true, also showcasing an additional possible feature of this system, the overlay image.
>Pro’s
-Because I’m not asking for any new items or recipes to be made, nor am I asking for any additional texture work on Mojang’s part, just back-end functionality to accommodate this, it doesn’t have any noticeable impact on vanilla gameplay, doesn’t have any effect on survival/balance, or require any major gameplay changes to Minecraft as a whole.
-The only way this would honestly affect anyone would be through a save file NBT editing program and potentially additional work on the part of texture pack makers and/or those willing to put extra effort into their custom maps.
-Builders and Pixel Artists would have infinitely more variation in the materials they can use to create their structures and images and the generation of new blocks would be “add a texture, edit a tag, and build”, similarly pixel artists would be able to choose the color of their wool or other blocks without limit based on their own tenacity.
-Mapmakers and PVP mapmakers would no longer be reliant on using just colored leather armor to discern between teams, and could design different types of armors for different teams (red team and blue team could have red team and blue team diamond armor). A few other examples that could be implemented with this will be on the bottom.
-while this would be part of a different suggestion, if extensively done, could also apply to mobs and armor, I would be excited most for the armor portion and less for the mobs.
-As a bonus for Mojang adding this functionality would also pave the way for visually random generation of terrain and loot drops, with different textures of grass and other terrain, unique items found in dungeon /mineshaft /fortress chests and mob drops, different textured mobs without having to create a whole new mob and a texture for it, a sweeping implementation of randomosity for paintings, and more immersion than you can shake a +1 roleplaying stick at when playing custom maps.
>Con’s
-I realize this might not be possible with the current engine and may require additional code or a rewrite, and as with all new features, will inevitably introduce new bugs.
-While this is merely an option, it might be used to an unfair advantage in some adventure maps by just using the default texture packs. Hopefully that doesn’t cripple anybody’s plans.
-I have a less than ideal implementation to deal with items that become blocks/entities, examples being wheat, coco pods, mine carts, armor, or enchantment tables, as these items may lose that NBT data when placed, further review shows they use completely separate images when they grow, possibly making this idea somewhat impractical for those specific blocks, entities might be easier as they are relatively static after placing.
-I also don’t have any suggestions on what would happen when you repair an item altered in this fashion through an anvil, would it change back to its original image? Or would it keep most of the tag formatting (and therefore the swapped image) like it does with some tags currently.
-Again this option is presented for immersion purposes and isn’t a critical feature and depending on difficulty may be placed low on Jeb and Dinnerbone’s to-do list, assuming they decide to implement at all.
>How to implement.
I Propose we add a few new optional tags to items (and potentially blocks) that would indicate what file to use, due to the current engine, if a custom texture in a texture pack cannot be found for an item, it replaces that texture with the vanilla texture, making this option not only useful, but also somewhat future proof. The proposed tags, NBT structure and examples are as follows.
-tag
>img
-image (pick any image, really)
-overlay (armor overlay images specifically, should be able to be applied to all images for enhanced functionality)
-armor (this would apply to the actual armor displayed on the player/entities’ bodies, not sure how well this would work on mob armors.)
-top (applies to workbenches, logs, tnt, furnaces ect…, anything that requires a different texture for the top.)
-side (similar to Top, but applies to the side textures of a block instead, used for a lot of the same blocks above)
-front (also similar to Top, but applies to blocks with a different texture for the front…)
-bottom (applies almost exclusively to the Cauldron and Cactus)
-Inner (applies almost exclusively to the Cake)
-active (applies to redstone objects, this is the “powered” state of the block, lit glowstone lamps, powered dust, unlit torches, lit repeaters/comparators ect, can also apply to lit furnaces and jack-o-lanterns)
-entity (for mine carts and boats mostly)
An example furnace to illustrate.
I know I’m missing some options and I’m sure if we got a solid implementation plan (alphanumeric instead of strings to decide which “face” or “stage” image is used might be overall more efficient) that full functionality would be achieved with this
>Why implement?
Aside from the Pro’s listed above, I do have my own selfish purposes for this feature, the implementation of this feature would allow me to complete a PVP map that I’ve had on my mind for a while titled “Cultists and Crusaders” with the two teams being themed on what the title suggests, one team, the Cultists, would be representative of a dark end-of-the-world cult who’s ultimate goal is to summon world ending horrors from beyond the end of the known universe to grant them immortality and power unimaginable, and the Crusaders, knights and priests of a holy order seeking to maintain balance and sanity in the world, who challenge the Cultists and try to prevent the end of the world. Having this functionality would let me add different tiers of armor, weapons and items and remain thematically separate between the two teams, with the cultists’ equipment possessing wicked edges, dark and grungy armors, and dirty equipment, contrasted against the Crusaders’ being brighter, cleaner and bearing whatever motif or insignia representing their religion.
Some Examples (add pictures)
For Custom map makers, if this feature was implemented for blocks as well as items, you could edit dirt blocks to resemble the cracked stone brick texture and place these “cracked stone” blocks at a wall between two rooms, causing the wall to crumble easier under an explosion (TNT or otherwise), possibly emphasizing the weakness in the wall.
On the flip side, this could be used to prevent intrusion by some players by disguising obsidian or bedrock as dirt.
Also for custom map makers, changing the texture of flowing water for whitewater rapids or more bubbling fountains and still having the normal water with normal flow. This can be used to disguise water as lava for a secret lava entrance too.
Adding more food. Different types of cakes, having a variety of cookies, meats, and bread (sandwiches?) without having to actually add new crafting recipes or new items altogether.
Concealed weapons and tools, using a herring to cut down the largest tree in the forest? Sure you can do that now, why not disguise your iron axe as a herring and put King Arthur to shame. Or just plain old stealth weapons, blank out the texture entirely and assassinate your friends without being at all detectable (except by particle effects).
It should be noted that this can also work in an un-fun fashion, a hacker on a server could disguise their Sharpness X/Fire Aspect X/Knockback X diamond sword as a fish and use that ruse to sneak up on unsuspecting players use that to their advantage, on the other hand, hackers probably aren’t concerned about fairness or other people having fun in the first place.
A little more immersion in the Enderdragon battle, instead of obsidian spires, you could have some custom textured Enderbrick spires that hold the crystals at the top, they would still be obsidian, but would instead look like “Enderbrick” or some other appropriate material.
Tl;dr
Add NBT tags to choose what image to use for your items and blocks instead of the default.
If you have an questions or critiques, feel free to post with them, if you think this is a good idea, feel free to promote it, Thanks
Disclaimer: Custom textures were used to present these mockup images, I’m not a (even decent) programmer and didn’t mod this functionality into actual Minecraft.
As of recently, I've been experimenting with enchanting non weapon items and blocks in the hopes of finding new weapons to use for potential adventure maps.. however, I found there were so few items that could be used like this effectively...
This suggestion (if implemented) would remove that one small problem and allow for custom map makers to allow for almost limitless new items and weapons, essentially meaning unlimited fun! Purely because of that I give my 100% Support!
However.. for your idea to work, people still need to download the texturepack that was used... and so if you were to use a custom texture pack.. could you not just get the texture pack to replace an unused item and rename it with some simple NBT tag editing? Therefore making the ability to create various weapon types from the same weapon the only usefull feature of the suggestion...
However.. for your idea to work, people still need to download the texturepack that was used... and so if you were to use a custom texture pack.. could you not just get the texture pack to replace an unused item and rename it with some simple NBT tag editing? Therefore making the ability to create various weapon types from the same weapon the only usefull feature of the suggestion...
But still... Support to the MAX!
I see what you are saying, but keep in mind that while it will take a texture pack with dedicated textures to add “custom” blocks to your game, you can still swap out “vanilla” textures, as explained in the obsidian/dirt and dirt/cracked stone example above, no matter what texture pack you use, even the vanilla textures, you will always see the correct texture because they are all included in all versions of Minecraft by default. So to foolproof your maps you should instead use already established images without having to rely on custom textures to hide your secrets. I’m also not concerned about this particular issue because most map makers include customized texture packs to go with their maps and what is it seriously going to change? Most users who aren’t going to use a texture pack aren’t going to use a texture pack even if the map advertises use of this feature anyway.
btw excellent suggestion for a newcomer (i also noticed that you read the guide, which helps alot)
Thanks, It's nice being able to receive compliments and set examples for others. i do have a confession though... I found a very similar (read: same concept, different implementation due to age) suggestion that I didn’t initially find, figured out why though, I searched for NBT and found a short list of suggestions, none of which referred to image swapping, this one had NBTEdit instead of NBT in the title. My apologies to FenixDowned (see his post here: http://www.minecraft...rt-from-packs/" ) if this idea gets implemented, credit should go to him for the original idea. However this thread was posted before the changes in the recent snapshot to how textures are stored and may still provide a better (or at least newer) solution than FenixDowned’s thread.
kinda like it. might be fun, walking around in a pvp server with a wooden sword and leather armor. and there are all the guys in iron, reading their weapons. buuuuut, you actually have full dia. someone will have a bad day
support
btw excellent suggestion for a newcomer (i also noticed that you read the guide, which helps alot)
Or your wearing full enchanted diamond armor and tools,
but you actually wearing leather armor and wooden tools.
Everyone is running away from you while you listen to the trollolol song at youtube.XD
With the new image engine introduced in one of the recent snapshots, item icons are now generated and stored in individual .png files instead of all textures and icons being stored on a single image, this allows for many new options for textures, included the currently popular “Animated Textures” which allows for any item or block to be animated in a easy to learn, easy to implement, and almost infinitely entertaining way. I propose a new piece of functionality that I would not have even dreamed of before this major change to the way items are rendered, we should have a means by which to use different image files to be used as the image file for an item (examples in the pictures below, this would not be limited to the number of items present in Minecraft, but would rather be limited to the dedication of texture pack and custom map makers. This would allow a seemingly “infinite” number of items to exist as long as they act the same as an already existing item, a good additional example would be allowing there to be more than one “type” of wooden sword, one textured as a wooden club, another as board with a nail in it, or even disguising a wooden sword as a wooden sign (kind of simulated in the pictures below, just with the golden sword).
A normal gold sword
A gold sword disguised as a sign, note the damage applied to the sign, signs don’t take damage.
A gold sword disguised as a stone sword, not impressive, but still true, also showcasing an additional possible feature of this system, the overlay image.
>Pro’s
-Because I’m not asking for any new items or recipes to be made, nor am I asking for any additional texture work on Mojang’s part, just back-end functionality to accommodate this, it doesn’t have any noticeable impact on vanilla gameplay, doesn’t have any effect on survival/balance, or require any major gameplay changes to Minecraft as a whole.
-The only way this would honestly affect anyone would be through a save file NBT editing program and potentially additional work on the part of texture pack makers and/or those willing to put extra effort into their custom maps.
-Builders and Pixel Artists would have infinitely more variation in the materials they can use to create their structures and images and the generation of new blocks would be “add a texture, edit a tag, and build”, similarly pixel artists would be able to choose the color of their wool or other blocks without limit based on their own tenacity.
-Mapmakers and PVP mapmakers would no longer be reliant on using just colored leather armor to discern between teams, and could design different types of armors for different teams (red team and blue team could have red team and blue team diamond armor). A few other examples that could be implemented with this will be on the bottom.
-while this would be part of a different suggestion, if extensively done, could also apply to mobs and armor, I would be excited most for the armor portion and less for the mobs.
-As a bonus for Mojang adding this functionality would also pave the way for visually random generation of terrain and loot drops, with different textures of grass and other terrain, unique items found in dungeon /mineshaft /fortress chests and mob drops, different textured mobs without having to create a whole new mob and a texture for it, a sweeping implementation of randomosity for paintings, and more immersion than you can shake a +1 roleplaying stick at when playing custom maps.
>Con’s
-I realize this might not be possible with the current engine and may require additional code or a rewrite, and as with all new features, will inevitably introduce new bugs.
-While this is merely an option, it might be used to an unfair advantage in some adventure maps by just using the default texture packs. Hopefully that doesn’t cripple anybody’s plans.
-I have a less than ideal implementation to deal with items that become blocks/entities, examples being wheat, coco pods, mine carts, armor, or enchantment tables, as these items may lose that NBT data when placed, further review shows they use completely separate images when they grow, possibly making this idea somewhat impractical for those specific blocks, entities might be easier as they are relatively static after placing.
-I also don’t have any suggestions on what would happen when you repair an item altered in this fashion through an anvil, would it change back to its original image? Or would it keep most of the tag formatting (and therefore the swapped image) like it does with some tags currently.
-Again this option is presented for immersion purposes and isn’t a critical feature and depending on difficulty may be placed low on Jeb and Dinnerbone’s to-do list, assuming they decide to implement at all.
>How to implement.
I Propose we add a few new optional tags to items (and potentially blocks) that would indicate what file to use, due to the current engine, if a custom texture in a texture pack cannot be found for an item, it replaces that texture with the vanilla texture, making this option not only useful, but also somewhat future proof. The proposed tags, NBT structure and examples are as follows.
-tag
>img
-image (pick any image, really)
-overlay (armor overlay images specifically, should be able to be applied to all images for enhanced functionality)
-armor (this would apply to the actual armor displayed on the player/entities’ bodies, not sure how well this would work on mob armors.)
-top (applies to workbenches, logs, tnt, furnaces ect…, anything that requires a different texture for the top.)
-side (similar to Top, but applies to the side textures of a block instead, used for a lot of the same blocks above)
-front (also similar to Top, but applies to blocks with a different texture for the front…)
-bottom (applies almost exclusively to the Cauldron and Cactus)
-Inner (applies almost exclusively to the Cake)
-active (applies to redstone objects, this is the “powered” state of the block, lit glowstone lamps, powered dust, unlit torches, lit repeaters/comparators ect, can also apply to lit furnaces and jack-o-lanterns)
-entity (for mine carts and boats mostly)
An example furnace to illustrate.
I know I’m missing some options and I’m sure if we got a solid implementation plan (alphanumeric instead of strings to decide which “face” or “stage” image is used might be overall more efficient) that full functionality would be achieved with this
>Why implement?
Aside from the Pro’s listed above, I do have my own selfish purposes for this feature, the implementation of this feature would allow me to complete a PVP map that I’ve had on my mind for a while titled “Cultists and Crusaders” with the two teams being themed on what the title suggests, one team, the Cultists, would be representative of a dark end-of-the-world cult who’s ultimate goal is to summon world ending horrors from beyond the end of the known universe to grant them immortality and power unimaginable, and the Crusaders, knights and priests of a holy order seeking to maintain balance and sanity in the world, who challenge the Cultists and try to prevent the end of the world. Having this functionality would let me add different tiers of armor, weapons and items and remain thematically separate between the two teams, with the cultists’ equipment possessing wicked edges, dark and grungy armors, and dirty equipment, contrasted against the Crusaders’ being brighter, cleaner and bearing whatever motif or insignia representing their religion.
Some Examples (add pictures)
For Custom map makers, if this feature was implemented for blocks as well as items, you could edit dirt blocks to resemble the cracked stone brick texture and place these “cracked stone” blocks at a wall between two rooms, causing the wall to crumble easier under an explosion (TNT or otherwise), possibly emphasizing the weakness in the wall.
On the flip side, this could be used to prevent intrusion by some players by disguising obsidian or bedrock as dirt.
Also for custom map makers, changing the texture of flowing water for whitewater rapids or more bubbling fountains and still having the normal water with normal flow. This can be used to disguise water as lava for a secret lava entrance too.
Adding more food. Different types of cakes, having a variety of cookies, meats, and bread (sandwiches?) without having to actually add new crafting recipes or new items altogether.
Concealed weapons and tools, using a herring to cut down the largest tree in the forest? Sure you can do that now, why not disguise your iron axe as a herring and put King Arthur to shame. Or just plain old stealth weapons, blank out the texture entirely and assassinate your friends without being at all detectable (except by particle effects).
It should be noted that this can also work in an un-fun fashion, a hacker on a server could disguise their Sharpness X/Fire Aspect X/Knockback X diamond sword as a fish and use that ruse to sneak up on unsuspecting players use that to their advantage, on the other hand, hackers probably aren’t concerned about fairness or other people having fun in the first place.
A little more immersion in the Enderdragon battle, instead of obsidian spires, you could have some custom textured Enderbrick spires that hold the crystals at the top, they would still be obsidian, but would instead look like “Enderbrick” or some other appropriate material.
Tl;dr
Add NBT tags to choose what image to use for your items and blocks instead of the default.
If you have an questions or critiques, feel free to post with them, if you think this is a good idea, feel free to promote it, Thanks
Disclaimer: Custom textures were used to present these mockup images, I’m not a (even decent) programmer and didn’t mod this functionality into actual Minecraft.
This suggestion (if implemented) would remove that one small problem and allow for custom map makers to allow for almost limitless new items and weapons, essentially meaning unlimited fun! Purely because of that I give my 100% Support!
However.. for your idea to work, people still need to download the texturepack that was used... and so if you were to use a custom texture pack.. could you not just get the texture pack to replace an unused item and rename it with some simple NBT tag editing? Therefore making the ability to create various weapon types from the same weapon the only usefull feature of the suggestion...
But still... Support to the MAX!
(Click the above banner to find out more!)
I see what you are saying, but keep in mind that while it will take a texture pack with dedicated textures to add “custom” blocks to your game, you can still swap out “vanilla” textures, as explained in the obsidian/dirt and dirt/cracked stone example above, no matter what texture pack you use, even the vanilla textures, you will always see the correct texture because they are all included in all versions of Minecraft by default. So to foolproof your maps you should instead use already established images without having to rely on custom textures to hide your secrets. I’m also not concerned about this particular issue because most map makers include customized texture packs to go with their maps and what is it seriously going to change? Most users who aren’t going to use a texture pack aren’t going to use a texture pack even if the map advertises use of this feature anyway.
Thanks, It's nice being able to receive compliments and set examples for others. i do have a confession though... I found a very similar (read: same concept, different implementation due to age) suggestion that I didn’t initially find, figured out why though, I searched for NBT and found a short list of suggestions, none of which referred to image swapping, this one had NBTEdit instead of NBT in the title. My apologies to FenixDowned (see his post here: http://www.minecraft...rt-from-packs/" ) if this idea gets implemented, credit should go to him for the original idea. However this thread was posted before the changes in the recent snapshot to how textures are stored and may still provide a better (or at least newer) solution than FenixDowned’s thread.
Or your wearing full enchanted diamond armor and tools,
but you actually wearing leather armor and wooden tools.
Everyone is running away from you while you listen to the trollolol song at youtube.XD
Anyways,great idea though.
100% support!