I am playing the XBOX 360 Edition, and I have a map I've already committed (too) much time to. My problem is that I cannot find any strongholds using Eye of Ender.
According to the version history, the seed was generated after strongholds were added, as they were added concurrently with ravines and abandoned mine shafts, both of which there are plenty.
I have heard that Eyes of Ender fail for maps which are substantially under water, and this is the case for my map. About 60% is ocean biome.
I was hoping that someone with experience or who is in a position to know could confirm this for me, also, whether it is possible for a seed to generate without strongholds despite having the other generated structures which were implemented with the version.
I''ve been doing the minecart/TNT trick in selected spots, but I'd rather just get the official word on this, set these nagging doubts aside and get back to digging my giant hole.
Thanks are owed to whoever can help!
Additional Question: Is there any info available about the general range of possible spawn locations for strongholds for the XBOX 360 Edition? I read that they spawn within something like 512 to 1250 from center, 120 degrees apart on PC, but obviously that would be outside of the range of the XBOX 360 map size.
UPDATE: Stronghold located at x:190, y:44, z:-127, approximately 35 degrees from center. I don't have the time to explore further at this moment, but I will update later to either confirm or disconfirm the broken portal and the 120 degree spread theories.
Since 1.8.2 (when strongholds were first added), I have not generated any seeds that did not have a stronghold. There were a couple, early on, where the end portal itself was not intact.
I have successfully used Eyes of Ender for Survival Island seeds that were greater than 90% water; however, the searches were done in Creative mode (usually just to verify things before posting the seed to the seeds list). I think, when using Eyes of Ender honestly (i.e. in survival mode), over water is very difficult since the Eyes tend to sink to the bottom and are, therefore, difficult to retrieve in order to throw them again. You can isolate a quadrant of the map though by throwing an Eye from X0, Z0 and just see what direction it goes off into. For the most part, though, I have found my pure survival strongholds the hard way (i.e. by doing a lot of tunneling across the map at various coordinates) or just stumbling into them while exploring various caves on the map... or by using seeds where others have posted stronghold coordinates. Generally, when playing pure survival, I save my Eyes for plugging into the portal frame itself.
Thanks for the reply, UpUp. Unfortunately, my Eyes of Ender won't "throw" at all. I've read that this is affirmation that the map has no stronghold whatsoever, and yet I have heard reports of this being the case in maps where a stronghold was nonetheless discovered the hard way.
If you are able to use the eye of ender than that means there is a stronghold, although like up said on an ocean map it becomes a bit more trickier to find due to the amount of water.
Just because there is a lot of water on the map doesn't mean there is not a stronghold. Finding the stronghold and the portal room are two separate things. As strongholds tend to be spread out sometimes, and vast enough to get lost in. So that makes finding the portal in one quite difficult at times. The eye doesn't always point to the portal as it should, but does at least verify if there is a stronghold or not. Usually. It is a very rare occurrence that a map doesn't have one, I have not found one that didn't have after that update, but there are a couple made around that time that don't. That was mainly a glitch or not intended as it was suppose to be 1 for each map. That was fixed in the patch after that update.
Hmm... could be that the portal is not in tact.... as I have never came across one with out a stronghold. And yes you will have to probably find the hard way. More likely the portal is just not intact. Which means the only way to get to the end is using creative to complete the portal unfortunately....><
Thanks for the reply, UpUp. Unfortunately, my Eyes of Ender won't "throw" at all. I've read that this is affirmation that the map has no stronghold whatsoever, and yet I have heard reports of this being the case in maps where a stronghold was nonetheless discovered the hard way.
Thanks for eliminating the water theory, though.
Another thing that can be tricky about throwing Eyes of Ender is when you happen to throw them 180 degrees from the direction they want to go. I can look like the Eye has just exploded in your face, but it may have travelled in a line directly behind you instead. Also, if you don't have your head at a good angle to view the path of the Eye, the particle trail can mislead you into thinking the Eye has just exploded.
If your world is a 1.8 world, the end portal could be not intact which would cause the eyes to not work. During that update there was a few glitches that could cause the end portal to be like this, as the End wasn't added yet, so it wasn't much of a priority
If you did not fully explore your map AND there was an update that cause biome shift between the generation of the map and your explorations. It has been confirmed possible that the eyes will lead you to where the stronghold originally should have been but the stronghold is now somewhere else due to biome shift.
there was a thread about this - search for posts by user EvilDogBoy; I think he was the one who id'd it.
According to the version history, the seed was generated after strongholds were added, as they were added concurrently with ravines and abandoned mine shafts, both of which there are plenty.
I have heard that Eyes of Ender fail for maps which are substantially under water, and this is the case for my map. About 60% is ocean biome.
I was hoping that someone with experience or who is in a position to know could confirm this for me, also, whether it is possible for a seed to generate without strongholds despite having the other generated structures which were implemented with the version.
I''ve been doing the minecart/TNT trick in selected spots, but I'd rather just get the official word on this, set these nagging doubts aside and get back to digging my giant hole.
Thanks are owed to whoever can help!
Additional Question: Is there any info available about the general range of possible spawn locations for strongholds for the XBOX 360 Edition? I read that they spawn within something like 512 to 1250 from center, 120 degrees apart on PC, but obviously that would be outside of the range of the XBOX 360 map size.
UPDATE: Stronghold located at x:190, y:44, z:-127, approximately 35 degrees from center. I don't have the time to explore further at this moment, but I will update later to either confirm or disconfirm the broken portal and the 120 degree spread theories.
I have successfully used Eyes of Ender for Survival Island seeds that were greater than 90% water; however, the searches were done in Creative mode (usually just to verify things before posting the seed to the seeds list). I think, when using Eyes of Ender honestly (i.e. in survival mode), over water is very difficult since the Eyes tend to sink to the bottom and are, therefore, difficult to retrieve in order to throw them again. You can isolate a quadrant of the map though by throwing an Eye from X0, Z0 and just see what direction it goes off into. For the most part, though, I have found my pure survival strongholds the hard way (i.e. by doing a lot of tunneling across the map at various coordinates) or just stumbling into them while exploring various caves on the map... or by using seeds where others have posted stronghold coordinates. Generally, when playing pure survival, I save my Eyes for plugging into the portal frame itself.
Thanks for eliminating the water theory, though.
Just because there is a lot of water on the map doesn't mean there is not a stronghold. Finding the stronghold and the portal room are two separate things. As strongholds tend to be spread out sometimes, and vast enough to get lost in. So that makes finding the portal in one quite difficult at times. The eye doesn't always point to the portal as it should, but does at least verify if there is a stronghold or not. Usually. It is a very rare occurrence that a map doesn't have one, I have not found one that didn't have after that update, but there are a couple made around that time that don't. That was mainly a glitch or not intended as it was suppose to be 1 for each map. That was fixed in the patch after that update.
Hmm... could be that the portal is not in tact.... as I have never came across one with out a stronghold. And yes you will have to probably find the hard way. More likely the portal is just not intact. Which means the only way to get to the end is using creative to complete the portal unfortunately....><
Another thing that can be tricky about throwing Eyes of Ender is when you happen to throw them 180 degrees from the direction they want to go. I can look like the Eye has just exploded in your face, but it may have travelled in a line directly behind you instead. Also, if you don't have your head at a good angle to view the path of the Eye, the particle trail can mislead you into thinking the Eye has just exploded.
Thanks guys!
If you did not fully explore your map AND there was an update that cause biome shift between the generation of the map and your explorations. It has been confirmed possible that the eyes will lead you to where the stronghold originally should have been but the stronghold is now somewhere else due to biome shift.
there was a thread about this - search for posts by user EvilDogBoy; I think he was the one who id'd it.