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[Scullyking]

This is my opinion and should be respect, in turn I will respect yours too. Any constructive criticism is strongly appreciated. Let's try and get a nice debate going.

In my eyes, the core at Minecraft is survival, right? Yes there are the redstoners, builders, modders and map-makers (awesome people, don't get me wrong), but getting dirty and surviving is the essence of the game. You mine, and you craft.

The survival content of the game is becoming watered down with a bounty of new mechanics, which is making it too easy. Take a look at old let's plays from Alpha/Early Beta versions of the game, and you'll notice a few things:

• Mobs (especially zombies) seem to be able to hit you from a good 2/3 blocks away.
  
• No hunger bar! Dungeon runs are actually a challenge. You tend to die a lot.
  
• Cocoa beans are treasured! A cookie is a "special" occasion.
  
• Slimes are a god-send, found only in rare underground caves.
  
• Mushrooms? You'll need to go on a caving expedition to collect those.
  
• Apples and golden apples, only found in dungeons.

These are just a few examples, if you have any more, please let me know and I will update this thread. It may seem like a lot of small changes, but together they make survival really easy. I'm not saying we scrap the hunger bar or anything, but something needs to be done. Increasing the difficulty of the current difficulties would upset a lot of players, so why not a new, extreme difficulty.

My proposal is a new difficulty setting called Extreme (or whatever), it could look something like this:

• Higher mob attack strengths (at least a 2 heart increase).
  
• Increased mob health.
  
• Mobs spawn more frequently.
  
• Mobs can spot you from further away.
  
• % chance of mobs dropping loot decreased.
  
• Higher % chance of being poisoned by Raw Chicken and Rotten Flesh.
  
• Higher exhaustion level increase for all actions (players will sprint less).
  
• Less frequent villages.
  
• As suggested: Better mob AI, becuase buffing numbers is artificial difficulty.

Stuff that would stay the same because it doesn't affect the game that much:

• Ore density (eh, once you have a set of iron armour and a bunch of diamonds, your set).
  
• Number of ravines (IMO ravines are cooler than villages and strongholds combined).
  
• Healing power of foods (this will compensate slightly for the increased power of mobs).

Also, this is very different to Hardcore mode! For those who don't realize, the only thing different about Hardcore is that the world get's deleted. I'm not suggesting that happen in Extreme mode, because that would suck.

Another minor rant. Does anybody else feel like theres certain game mechanics that don't feel finished? As of the addition of quartz, blazes, fortresses and nether mobs, a nether portal has finally become a worthwhile investment. But here are some things that just feel incomplete or unrealistic:

• Trading - Better and more deals.
  
• Potion brewing - Needs more ingredients and some kind of fuel.
  
• The End - It's rubbish, sorry but it simply is. Lacks a point, except a really easy fight.
  
• Wither fights - Why should the player get the choice of being attacked by the wither? Why not have it randomly spawn in caves (very rarely of course)! And only in extreme mode.

Thank you for taking the time to read my views! Please respond with helpful criticism and ideas of your own! Again, this is my view, respect it and I will respect yours. Thanks again!

Scullyking

[AEtherTech]

Play on hard?

[Event_Horizon]

AEtherTech, on 07 February 2013 - 05:43 PM, said:

Play on hard?

You mean hardmode creative? LOL.

I agree that survival is too easy but just chugging more damage, health, and detection range only adds artificial difficulty. The only way to make it difficult is to give each mob special AI that's smart and knows how to dodge and attack. Possibly harder mobs too, like Iron Golems but wild versions that not only have a powerful attack, but are able to smash through most armor. Another mob that's fast and agile will also add to the difficulty, but they also need group AI, meaning mobs will try to group with nearby mobs; survival in numbers!

The hunger system is fine as it is, with the exception that the slow regeneration gained from having a full hunger bar should also take away hunger points much faster than it already does.

[Mettan]

I'll just go on in response to your minor rant right now.

Scullyking, on 07 February 2013 - 05:26 PM, said:

Does anybody else feel like theres certain game mechanics that don't feel finished?

I do certainly agree that there's a few things here and there that could certainly use improvement (such as the Nether, it could certainly have more content), but it's certainly no reason for major overhauls. I'd rather just see small additions for smaller things, large additions for larger things.

Scullyking said:

unrealistic

ಠ_ಠ

Scullyking said:

• Trading - Have you ever seen a good deal?

Actually, I have seen some decent deals. But that's not the point. The point is that trading needs some improvement. Maybe more deals available from the start, easier to get new deals, but less available deals per villager? That way, there's less buying useless stuff to get new deals, and more advantage to having more than one villager of a particular type.

Scullyking said:

• Potion brewing - Needs more ingredients and some kind of fuel.

While there should certainly be more potions (after all, unused potion effects!), some variety of fuel is not actually necessary if you think about it. The reason why brewing takes no fuel is that it's heat-based (through some kind of magic), and the Blaze Rod provides said heat. That's why you can't just use a stick instead.

Scullyking said:

• The End - It's rubbish, sorry but it simply is.

Yeah, it needs more stuff. New enemies, larger islands, not immediately spawning the dragon, and more materials would make the End at least 300% better.

Scullyking said:

• Wither fights - Why should the player get the choice of being attacked by the wither? Why not have it randomly spawn in caves (very rarely of course)!

Random Wither spawning, no matter how rare, would be disastrous. Just imagine randomly encountering one when unprepared. Not fun.


This is all just from my own opinion, so if anyone has a problem with any of it, it's their problem, not mine.
(Please keep this a respectful topic.)

[Scullyking]

Mettan, on 07 February 2013 - 05:59 PM, said:

And also, random Wither spawning, no matter how rare, would be disastrous

I was thinking just on this 'harder' mode. And a very random event.

[Andreas90s]

Bravo sir, Bravo!

I think these kind of ideas should be implemented into Hardcore, though.
Hardcore is simply Hard without re-spawning, not really much harder.

[Scullyking]

warfighter67, on 07 February 2013 - 05:49 PM, said:

The only way to make it difficult is to give each mob special AI that's smart and knows how to dodge and attack.

This is a very good point, adding better mob AI as a suggestion.

[DistortedDorian]

Sorry i cant agree with you Scullyking 100%. I dont want anything change, if you want zombies take more health then play on Hard. I agree that Trading need to be a bit better.

[MartyLoup]

Can't agree with you more. One thing that should be added to the list is a tamed-down ore generation, though. Coal and Iron are both way too common, and their veins are insanely huge. On my SSP map that I've been playing on for about a month (about 1 hour of play each day), I already have a full stack of iron blocks and a chest filled completely with coal. And I've barely ventured out of my cave house or done anything like strip mining, this is all just visible ore that I've found.

I haven't played on that map in a while, mostly because it's not that fun when you have enough iron blocks and coal to make and power a rocket ship.

[Eeirail]

I think there needs to be a higher difficulty but also include these on the higher difficulty
- Food heals less
- Less breathing time under water
- Horde spawning chance at random once every three nights.
- Decreased durability of tools
- Faster MoBs
- MoBs can spawn in brighter light.
- poison should hurt less but stay active until you cure it with some sort of antidote.

Those are just a few things I can think of as well.

[MrSnowBunni]

I disagree that survival is the essence of the game, in fact I believe the opposite. The essence of the game would appear to be that of creation. This isn't MineSurvive or SurvivalCraft, it is Minecraft. The game started out as a game where all you could do was build, referencing MC Classic that you can play on their website. Then it evolved into a more survival oriented game, yes, but again it was about crafting and building. From how I see it, the point of mobs was to add a more challenging aspect to collecting the resources needed to build more magnificent things.

[Crowdit]

Yeah I don't think the game needs to be more difficult. Mobs should be only an annoyance. If they were a serious threat it would ruin part of the fun.

[Scullyking]

Crowdit, on 07 February 2013 - 07:42 PM, said:

Yeah I don't think the game needs to be more difficult. Mobs should be only an annoyance. If they were a serious threat it would ruin part of the fun.

Different people have different ideas of what is fun, I am not suggesting getting rid of all other difficulties. If you prefer playing on Peaceful, then thats fine.

Eeirail, on 07 February 2013 - 07:22 PM, said:

- Horde spawning chance at random once every three nights.

Love the idea of this!

[RobertFrans]

Scullyking, on 07 February 2013 - 05:26 PM, said:

In my eyes, the core at Minecraft is survival, right? Yes there are the redstoners, builders, modders and map-makers (awesome people, don't get me wrong), but getting dirty and surviving is the essence of the game. You mine, and you craft.

Ehhh, no. The core of Minecraft is not surviving. The core is definitely building and destroying everything you want. It has a reason why the building is so enorm complex and in depth, from redstone mechanics to decorative blocks. You can build almost everything you want, from working CPU's to 1:1 replications of New York. The survival aspect is only ment to give you an extra challenge with the building, since you have to find and craft the right materials yourself and must protect yourself against some dangers and starvation. The dungeons and other structures are, so I think, also just ment to inspire you, to give you some help by creating your own story. They are not completely eleborated, because you have to do that. You can even ignore the surviving aspect and play on Creative. Or just play without the monsters in Peaceful.

Maybe the survival aspect could have some more improvements and challenging features. But it is not the core of Minecraft, it may not hinder the building too much. The core is your imagination, your creativity, the freedom you have to do what you want in your world. If you only build bases to survive, of course the game would become quickly boring some day. But if you challenge yourself to make the most magnificant, complex and stunning buildings or mechanics, just to let them be part of your world and to give you joy in building and finishing them, then you will get the challenge of planning, searching and working as efficience as possible. Then you are, so I think, playing Minecraft to the max.

[Eeirail]

Scullyking, on 07 February 2013 - 07:48 PM, said:

Love the idea of this!

Thank you ^- ^ I liked that one more then my others to.. I was just brainstorming though. I am totally for a new much harder level of playing for survival. After all when I think survival I think of surviving not just living.