I think they should have made levitate potions. It just feels incomplete to have such a cool power but not use it yourself. That is mostly all.
I agree. I also (As I have said about 15 times already) dislike most of the potion effect arrows. I'm okay with the spectral and poison ones. But, strength and water breathing? How are those even useful?
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If you're interested in an awesome, white-listed, pure vanilla server, consider applying!
I think some of you who say minecraft doesn't fix issues are wrong. look at the bug fixes list. they fix a lot of bugs they don't fix every bug but no game has ever fixed every bug.
-there were things here that aren't here now because quotes-
Well, yeah, in that case there's no reason to change the feature if an equal amount of people like and dislike it, and your fix for that feature will just please the unpleased and irritate the pleased.
All this means is that your fix is not a very good fix. You don't have to keep a 50/50 pleased/unpleased ratio. A good fix would be pleasing more people than there were before, which isn't what Mojang is doing.
I agree. I also (As I have said about 15 times already) dislike most of the potion effect arrows. I'm okay with the spectral and poison ones. But, strength and water breathing? How are those even useful?
They're essentially stackable potions with a tiny drawback; shoot them directly upwards without charging it with an unenchanted bow, and in exchange for an insignificant amount of health and durability, you get the level 1 potion effect. Kinda OP, actually, especially with Instant Health arrows.
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Did something happen to you in your childhood to give you this unreasonable fear of rutabaga?
OH......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... Thanks for telling me
I'm running the snapshots and finding gameplay to be quite choppy on my fairly high horsepower rig. Video friendly settings helped a bit, but still no bueno.
I had no problems (with maxed video options) with 1.8.
If that doesn't improve when the 1.9 releases- then my heart goes out to anyone with a so-so system.
Your point about never being able to update minecraft again is true. But still, your examples are exaggerations. You really have no right to any minecraft updates, so you can't really say they're dumping trash on your lawn.
several parts of the game (e.g. terrain) could have been implemented in much better ways so that there ends up being something for everyone, and there are also many parts of the game (e.g. combat, progression, survival) that are far worse than equivalent aspects in other games.
Hold up. How can you possibly be mad about terrain when world generation mods, which are extremely common and compatible with pretty much everything, can completely override it?
And how is minecraft survival worse than other games? Hunger is interesting! If it's not hardcore enough for you that makes sense, but the majority of minecraft doesn't want a hardcore single-player survival experience. And how is combat worse? The 1.8 beta combat is incredibly deep for its simplicity; multiple action RPGs have been created with only a few additions on servers like Mineplex and Wynncraft, and building effective defenses on servers like Project Ares requires a lot of thinking. Progression might be bad, but how is that a new feature?
They're essentially stackable potions with a tiny drawback; shoot them directly upwards without charging it with an unenchanted bow, and in exchange for an insignificant amount of health and durability, you get the level 1 potion effect. Kinda OP, actually, especially with Instant Health arrows.
So essentially potion arrows that give benefits are a viable alternative to splash potions only if you don't want to heal your opponent in close-range pvp, right? (And to buff teammates from range, if you're thoughtful enough) (and to stack more potions on the arrows in the case of instant health, but I'm not so sure the arrows would land on you if you tried that while getting knocked around in pvp)
You're right that my examples are fairly extreme, especially since the most recent updates (1.8 and 1.9) haven't very many outright bad things (the worst was mutton in 1.8, although it didn't end up changing much).
Hold up. How can you possibly be mad about terrain when world generation mods, which are extremely common and compatible with pretty much everything, can completely override it?
Several reasons:
Mods are fine for singleplayer, but far more often than not, servers will be running Vanilla-generated worlds. Want cool terrain on public Multiplayer? Tough luck, the best you can do is pray that there's a server running that world generator that has a sizeable player base, or that you have plenty of friends willing to play with a server you (or they, doesn't matter) host. (Also applicable to many other mods that attempt to fix up the game's shortcomings.)
If a terrain mod stops updating and your worlds are using that terrain generator, you're either forced to stay on that version (and thus miss out on potentially good updates and mods as new versions come out) or update and have ugly chunk borders (vertical walls of stone basically) appear between generated and ungenerated terrain, as well as get vanilla terrain again.
Basically what I've been saying before: players should not have to step up to fix Mojang's problems. That's Mojang's job. The fact that a mod exists that can patch up one of the game's shortcomings does not excuse the fact that the shortcoming exists, and installing that mod does not fix that shortcoming. It just patches it up. Sure, I'll be happy, but that doesn't mean there isn't a crappy feature still in the game... in actuality, the fact that I had to install a mod in the first place just to get enjoyment is evidence that it's definitely a problem.
And how is minecraft survival worse than other games? Hunger is interesting! If it's not hardcore enough for you that makes sense, but the majority of minecraft doesn't want a hardcore single-player survival experience.
Hunger is basically irrelevant due to how common food is and how much food has been added recently. Passives are everywhere and nearly all of them drop food, and tall grass is a borderline guaranteed source of renewable, reliable food. Starving is actually pretty damn difficult if you're trying at all; people have mentioned it earlier. Mobs are basically the only other thing that's a threat to the player (other than the player's own stupidity in a few cases) and they're downright trivial since nearly all of them are balanced around earlygame players in a game where midgame equipment can be obtained in two to four minutes.
And while not everyone is looking for a hardcore Survival experience, there are still people who seek one. Minecraft barely provides a survival experience in the first place, however, so they're left either looking for a different game or a mod that adds what they want. Heads up: you can add difficulty without forcing everyone to play with it (forcing everyone to play a harder game would arguably be worse than keeping it super easy). Just make Normal and Hard harder for the people who want an actual challenge. People who like an easy game can stay on Easy, while people who bought the game for Survival can up the difficulty.
And how is combat worse? The 1.8 beta combat is incredibly deep for its simplicity; multiple action RPGs have been created with only a few additions on servers like Mineplex and Wynncraft, and building effective defenses on servers like Project Ares requires a lot of thinking.
Taking a very basic look at what Mineplex offers, it addresses Minecraft's PVP issues relatively well with kits.
See, the biggest problem with Minecraft's PvP is that there's no variety whatsoever; players have almost no options beyond looking at the target, spamming a button (M1 for melee, M2 for ranged), and a bit of fancy footwork with WASD if the need arises. In other words, the absolute basics of pretty much every real-time combat system.
The lack of options in combat creates two huge problems that kill it. First, is that because the player can't really do anything but move, look, and attack; there's no skill involved. Second is that there's no variety in gear: there's a clearly defined "best" loadout. This means combat isn't about fighting smarter than your opponent--you can't fight smarter than your opponent because skill means so little--but is instead about being the biggest fish in the sea by amassing the best possible equipment.
Kit PvP, which is what Mineplex seems to be, averts both of these problems. An individual kit gives you actual options in combat, meaning there are skills that can be developed. Plus, since you can only have one kit at a time, everyone doesn't play identically; this means that you can't outgear everyone else to win and instead have to rely on your skills, which now actually exist because you can do things besides moving and attacking.
I don't know what Project Ares is, but you seem to be talking more about building than combat which actually is pretty well-off.
There isn't enough info to say if 1.9 will fix this yet. Nothing we've seen so far touches any of those problems (the best things being that potion arrows and buffed splash potions give you a few more options, even though you're still capable of using every playstyle at the same time) but Dinnerbone has been implying that there are melee combat changes beyond just shields that will add a layer of complexity. Whatever it is, it might fix the problems to some degree.
Progression might be bad, but how is that a new feature?
Now on to another topic:
So essentially potion arrows that give benefits are a viable alternative to splash potions only if you don't want to heal your opponent in close-range pvp, right? (And to buff teammates from range, if you're thoughtful enough) (and to stack more potions on the arrows in the case of instant health, but I'm not so sure the arrows would land on you if you tried that while getting knocked around in pvp)
Since splash potions were recently buffed, it seems that potion arrows are more or less replacements for "standard" splash potions. If you just want to debuff someone, you shoot them with an arrow now instead of throwing a potion.
Splash potions have two advantages: now, they leave a cloud that inflicts the potion effect, which means that negative effects are decent for area denial. They can also be extended to have a longer duration than a potion arrow OR boosted; the boost is probably the best option, since you can compensate for lessened duration on potion arrows compared to extended splash pots simply by using more arrows.
So, in a nutshell: splash potions are now useful for area denial, potion arrows are useful for anything else a potion can do.
It makes a big difference when you explain what problems you have with MC updates instead of just saying "they're crap", so thank you for that. I actually agree with a lot of what you are saying.
I agree that starving to death is virtually impossible to do in vanilla, even if you play as a vegan like I do. Wheat is everywhere, mushrooms are abundant in dark forests, apples can be obtained from oak trees. I would say that's why mods like "Hunger Overhaul" and "Spice of Life" are in so many modpacks that purposefully attempt to make the game more difficult on that front. Or why complete overhauls like Terrafirmacraft make it harder to obtain food.
Just out of curiosity, how would you change the hard mode in vanilla MC to make it more challenging?
It makes a big difference when you explain what problems you have with MC updates instead of just saying "they're crap", so thank you for that. I actually agree with a lot of what you are saying.
I agree that starving to death is virtually impossible to do in vanilla, even if you play as a vegan like I do. Wheat is everywhere, mushrooms are abundant in dark forests, apples can be obtained from oak trees. I would say that's why mods like "Hunger Overhaul" and "Spice of Life" are in so many modpacks that purposefully attempt to make the game more difficult on that front. Or why complete overhauls like Terrafirmacraft make it harder to obtain food.
Just out of curiosity, how would you change the hard mode in vanilla MC to make it more challenging?
IK even on nether is easier to get food you just need a bowl and the mushroom are everywhere. and on the overworld you can survive with a bucket a cow and rotten flesh.
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Doesn't matter what the press says. Doesn't matter what the politicians or the mobs say. Doesn't matter if the whole country decides that something wrong is something right. This nation was founded on one principle above all else: the requirement that we stand up for what we believe, no matter the odds or the consequences. When the mob and the press and the whole world tell you to move, your job is to plant yourself like a tree beside the river of truth, and tell the whole world — "No, you move
It makes a big difference when you explain what problems you have with MC updates instead of just saying "they're crap", so thank you for that. I actually agree with a lot of what you are saying.
I agree that starving to death is virtually impossible to do in vanilla, even if you play as a vegan like I do. Wheat is everywhere, mushrooms are abundant in dark forests, apples can be obtained from oak trees. I would say that's why mods like "Hunger Overhaul" and "Spice of Life" are in so many modpacks that purposefully attempt to make the game more difficult on that front. Or why complete overhauls like Terrafirmacraft make it harder to obtain food.
Just out of curiosity, how would you change the hard mode in vanilla MC to make it more challenging?
The changes I would make are very mod-ish in nature so they wouldn't really suit well with Vanilla. The most applicable things to add to Vanilla would be to rebalance caves to iron equipment and the Nether and End to (enchanted) diamond equipment, and make food much harder to get yet simultaneously longer lasting (i.e. you won't have to shove steaks down your throat every five minutes, but actually getting those steaks requires you to go out of your way rather than accumulating more food than you can eat over time).
I am in the process of creating a mod that attempts to rebalance the game, so if you want to know everything I would add, shoot me a PM.
@Kholdstar normal mode shouldn't be too hard or too easy, right now it,s good, that's why it's named Normal.
P.S.:I do not want to create any flamewar.
Most of the difficulty levels tend to become about equal in difficulty when you get a modicum of skill (i.e. you're not a complete newb any more). This is mostly because the biggest change between difficulty levels is mob damage, and iron armor will typically reduce any incoming damage to negligible amounts anyway. Hence why Easy stays as it is (because there's barely a difference between it and Hard) while Normal and Hard get larger buffs. Yeah, it's called "normal" but that doesn't mean it actually has a medium amount of difficulty.
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Did something happen to you in your childhood to give you this unreasonable fear of rutabaga?
Mods are fine for singleplayer... No, quite a few bukkit servers have terrain generation and even pre-generated worlds
If a terrain mod stops updating... Yeah, that's always been a problem with minecraft; new updates ruin mods, when all of a players' installed mods are way better than a single update. But that's generally okay because you can downgrade until the mod updates, and as long as you pick a popular mod it's nearly guaranteed to update.
players should not have to step up to fix Mojang's problems... I think the majority of vanilla players don't think the terrain generation is bad, they probably think mushroom islands are cool and really don't care if there are other problems. So vanilla works for vanilla.
in actuality, the fact that I had to install a mod in the first place just to get enjoyment is evidence that it's definitely a problem. You did after the first 100-ish hours of play, which is really the extent of minecraft vanilla. Beyond that you've done pretty much everything in survival. You can keep mining for your redstone creations or something if you want, but terrain generation is unlikely to be a big concern for you during the late-game.
Hunger is basically irrelevant... It's a nice early-game challenge, especially with rationing via saturation and rotten flesh if you're desperate. And in longer forms of PvP it's definitely relevant.
Just make Normal and Hard harder for the people who want an actual challenge... Well, it's hard to make a pure survival game that doesn't just feel like a grind. And really, if you were constantly hungry then it would become a grind. I really like how Hard makes monsters stronger, and I play with it all the time, but I'm probably not interested in always trying to find food. I think that's at the level of "so different from the core gameplay that it should be left to the mods".
See, the biggest problem with Minecraft's PvP is that there's no variety whatsoever; players have almost no options beyond looking at the target, spamming a button (M1 for melee, M2 for ranged), and a bit of fancy footwork with WASD if the need arises. In other words, the absolute basics of pretty much every real-time combat system. While I do agree that minecraft combat is a bit too dependent on aim and spam-clicking to win, it's actually a lot deeper than you make it out to be. Correctly knockbacking, critical hits, block-hitting, splash potions healing your enemy if you're too close, flame swords' interaction with flame potions, fishing rods, flint and steel, slowness potions, poison not killing, armor durability to consider, golden apples giving health boost in addition to regeneration (if you have a limited supply then you have to decide to eat before or after) and so many more mechanics make combat actually such a strategic experience that there are very successful 1v1 servers. And when I watch my brother play those (I never play them, they're too hard ;P) I can see that there's a lot of strategy going on that I don't even fully understand. And Project Ares is basically a vanilla minecraft PvP server. There are no special abilities added, all they do is give everyone approximately equal items, and an objective like "leak lava from the enemy obsidian core", which combines to make a strategic experience where people actually build mid-combat to get an advantage.
So, in a nutshell: splash potions are now useful for area denial, potion arrows are useful for anything else a potion can do. Splash potions are actually different from lingering potions which you describe. Lingering Potions did not replace splash potions. And I do think that in some cases a splash potion of healing would be superior to a healing arrow, because you can't get knocked out of the way of the arrow, you don't get slowed to apply the effect, and the arrow does somewhat random knockback. It's definitely an interesting decision they have going, it's just hard to see what exactly the pros and cons of each potion type is. Overall I think it's a very nice part of the update, as long as they don't mess up the balance.
You can mention things like knockback, crits etc but it all still boils down to spam. Critical hits still involve spamming a button (space in this case), knockback happens pretty much all the time because people sprint all the time, etc. No one is really going to bother with fishing rods, poison, flint and steel, slowness, etc because spam clicking with a sword still gets the job done just fine with no effort. As long as spam clicking is braindead no one is going to bother using the other stuff in the game that is somewhat different.
And speaking of lingering potions, it appears they would be good for area denial but are very impracticable because the ingredient to make them is going to be rarely obtained in PvP. To make lingering potions you need dragon breath, only way to get that is to go to The End and capture the Ender Dragon's acid pools with bottles. Then you have to kill the dragon because the portal to leave the End closes everytime you do the fight so you can't leave with the breath. If you don't do the end game it's impossible to use them.
I think the modern updates are awful. They are all like a mod pack. Minecraft is sort of losing its simplicity. Ocean Mountants, Bunnies and Armor Stand there the only things good. For 1.9, i just see the End City and revised Ender dragon fight good.
yes, and also as of now, it doesn't have much use except for food, torches, and shields, but it would be cool if we could double wield swords.
So how exactly does it ruin fun and challenge like you said before? It's an offhand slot, it's only using for right click options, you're not supposed to be able to attack with two weapons.
I think the modern updates are awful. They are all like a mod pack. Minecraft is sort of losing its simplicity. Ocean Mountants, Bunnies and Armor Stand there the only things good. For 1.9, i just see the End City and revised Ender dragon fight good.
Oh hey, more of this "updates are like modpacks" nonsense. Unfortunately Minecraft needs to lose some of its simplicity to fix some of the horrible features and mechanics that already exist.
They aren't like modpacks at all. Modpacks have a completely different goal than updates.
Am I the only one that thinks gold blocks in ocean monuments should be replaced with diamond ones? The structures are difficult to find and are very rare so no, it wouldn't be OP.
They're not terribly rare IMO (although it may just seem that way to me because you can move more quickly across oceans than other biomes). They're also really easy to cheese, and that many diamonds would either be useless (if you already have a big stockpile) or extremely overpowered (if you don't have a big stockpile; you just got one).
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Did something happen to you in your childhood to give you this unreasonable fear of rutabaga?
I agree. I also (As I have said about 15 times already) dislike most of the potion effect arrows. I'm okay with the spectral and poison ones. But, strength and water breathing? How are those even useful?
If you're interested in an awesome, white-listed, pure vanilla server, consider applying!
http://www.minecraftforum.net/forums/servers/pc-servers/2811770-axiba-smp-community-focused-vanilla-survival#c4
I think some of you who say minecraft doesn't fix issues are wrong. look at the bug fixes list. they fix a lot of bugs they don't fix every bug but no game has ever fixed every bug.
I have 2 challenges for everyone.
1. find one perfect game that pleases everyone.
2. find out exactly how many people do like the updates and how many people don't like the new updates.
I guarantee based of the fact alone that minecraft's community is still growing has to mean that more people are satisfied then unsatisfied.
Well, yeah, in that case there's no reason to change the feature if an equal amount of people like and dislike it, and your fix for that feature will just please the unpleased and irritate the pleased.
All this means is that your fix is not a very good fix. You don't have to keep a 50/50 pleased/unpleased ratio. A good fix would be pleasing more people than there were before, which isn't what Mojang is doing.
They're essentially stackable potions with a tiny drawback; shoot them directly upwards without charging it with an unenchanted bow, and in exchange for an insignificant amount of health and durability, you get the level 1 potion effect. Kinda OP, actually, especially with Instant Health arrows.
OH......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... Thanks for telling me
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I'm running the snapshots and finding gameplay to be quite choppy on my fairly high horsepower rig. Video friendly settings helped a bit, but still no bueno.
I had no problems (with maxed video options) with 1.8.
If that doesn't improve when the 1.9 releases- then my heart goes out to anyone with a so-so system.
Your point about never being able to update minecraft again is true. But still, your examples are exaggerations. You really have no right to any minecraft updates, so you can't really say they're dumping trash on your lawn.
Hold up. How can you possibly be mad about terrain when world generation mods, which are extremely common and compatible with pretty much everything, can completely override it?
And how is minecraft survival worse than other games? Hunger is interesting! If it's not hardcore enough for you that makes sense, but the majority of minecraft doesn't want a hardcore single-player survival experience. And how is combat worse? The 1.8 beta combat is incredibly deep for its simplicity; multiple action RPGs have been created with only a few additions on servers like Mineplex and Wynncraft, and building effective defenses on servers like Project Ares requires a lot of thinking. Progression might be bad, but how is that a new feature?
Now on to another topic:
So essentially potion arrows that give benefits are a viable alternative to splash potions only if you don't want to heal your opponent in close-range pvp, right? (And to buff teammates from range, if you're thoughtful enough) (and to stack more potions on the arrows in the case of instant health, but I'm not so sure the arrows would land on you if you tried that while getting knocked around in pvp)
Spears, Daggers, and Hammers for 1.9
You're right that my examples are fairly extreme, especially since the most recent updates (1.8 and 1.9) haven't very many outright bad things (the worst was mutton in 1.8, although it didn't end up changing much).
Several reasons:
Hunger is basically irrelevant due to how common food is and how much food has been added recently. Passives are everywhere and nearly all of them drop food, and tall grass is a borderline guaranteed source of renewable, reliable food. Starving is actually pretty damn difficult if you're trying at all; people have mentioned it earlier. Mobs are basically the only other thing that's a threat to the player (other than the player's own stupidity in a few cases) and they're downright trivial since nearly all of them are balanced around earlygame players in a game where midgame equipment can be obtained in two to four minutes.
And while not everyone is looking for a hardcore Survival experience, there are still people who seek one. Minecraft barely provides a survival experience in the first place, however, so they're left either looking for a different game or a mod that adds what they want. Heads up: you can add difficulty without forcing everyone to play with it (forcing everyone to play a harder game would arguably be worse than keeping it super easy). Just make Normal and Hard harder for the people who want an actual challenge. People who like an easy game can stay on Easy, while people who bought the game for Survival can up the difficulty.
Taking a very basic look at what Mineplex offers, it addresses Minecraft's PVP issues relatively well with kits.
See, the biggest problem with Minecraft's PvP is that there's no variety whatsoever; players have almost no options beyond looking at the target, spamming a button (M1 for melee, M2 for ranged), and a bit of fancy footwork with WASD if the need arises. In other words, the absolute basics of pretty much every real-time combat system.
The lack of options in combat creates two huge problems that kill it. First, is that because the player can't really do anything but move, look, and attack; there's no skill involved. Second is that there's no variety in gear: there's a clearly defined "best" loadout. This means combat isn't about fighting smarter than your opponent--you can't fight smarter than your opponent because skill means so little--but is instead about being the biggest fish in the sea by amassing the best possible equipment.
Kit PvP, which is what Mineplex seems to be, averts both of these problems. An individual kit gives you actual options in combat, meaning there are skills that can be developed. Plus, since you can only have one kit at a time, everyone doesn't play identically; this means that you can't outgear everyone else to win and instead have to rely on your skills, which now actually exist because you can do things besides moving and attacking.
I don't know what Project Ares is, but you seem to be talking more about building than combat which actually is pretty well-off.
There isn't enough info to say if 1.9 will fix this yet. Nothing we've seen so far touches any of those problems (the best things being that potion arrows and buffed splash potions give you a few more options, even though you're still capable of using every playstyle at the same time) but Dinnerbone has been implying that there are melee combat changes beyond just shields that will add a layer of complexity. Whatever it is, it might fix the problems to some degree.
Since splash potions were recently buffed, it seems that potion arrows are more or less replacements for "standard" splash potions. If you just want to debuff someone, you shoot them with an arrow now instead of throwing a potion.
Splash potions have two advantages: now, they leave a cloud that inflicts the potion effect, which means that negative effects are decent for area denial. They can also be extended to have a longer duration than a potion arrow OR boosted; the boost is probably the best option, since you can compensate for lessened duration on potion arrows compared to extended splash pots simply by using more arrows.
So, in a nutshell: splash potions are now useful for area denial, potion arrows are useful for anything else a potion can do.
It makes a big difference when you explain what problems you have with MC updates instead of just saying "they're crap", so thank you for that. I actually agree with a lot of what you are saying.
I agree that starving to death is virtually impossible to do in vanilla, even if you play as a vegan like I do. Wheat is everywhere, mushrooms are abundant in dark forests, apples can be obtained from oak trees. I would say that's why mods like "Hunger Overhaul" and "Spice of Life" are in so many modpacks that purposefully attempt to make the game more difficult on that front. Or why complete overhauls like Terrafirmacraft make it harder to obtain food.
Just out of curiosity, how would you change the hard mode in vanilla MC to make it more challenging?
So many mods, so little time.
@Kholdstar normal mode shouldn't be too hard or too easy, right now it,s good, that's why it's named Normal.
P.S.:I do not want to create any flamewar.
My Signature
IK even on nether is easier to get food you just need a bowl and the mushroom are everywhere. and on the overworld you can survive with a bucket a cow and rotten flesh.
The changes I would make are very mod-ish in nature so they wouldn't really suit well with Vanilla. The most applicable things to add to Vanilla would be to rebalance caves to iron equipment and the Nether and End to (enchanted) diamond equipment, and make food much harder to get yet simultaneously longer lasting (i.e. you won't have to shove steaks down your throat every five minutes, but actually getting those steaks requires you to go out of your way rather than accumulating more food than you can eat over time).
I am in the process of creating a mod that attempts to rebalance the game, so if you want to know everything I would add, shoot me a PM.
Most of the difficulty levels tend to become about equal in difficulty when you get a modicum of skill (i.e. you're not a complete newb any more). This is mostly because the biggest change between difficulty levels is mob damage, and iron armor will typically reduce any incoming damage to negligible amounts anyway. Hence why Easy stays as it is (because there's barely a difference between it and Hard) while Normal and Hard get larger buffs. Yeah, it's called "normal" but that doesn't mean it actually has a medium amount of difficulty.
My replies are in bold because I'm not sure how to do this commenting thing easily.
Spears, Daggers, and Hammers for 1.9
You can mention things like knockback, crits etc but it all still boils down to spam. Critical hits still involve spamming a button (space in this case), knockback happens pretty much all the time because people sprint all the time, etc. No one is really going to bother with fishing rods, poison, flint and steel, slowness, etc because spam clicking with a sword still gets the job done just fine with no effort. As long as spam clicking is braindead no one is going to bother using the other stuff in the game that is somewhat different.
And speaking of lingering potions, it appears they would be good for area denial but are very impracticable because the ingredient to make them is going to be rarely obtained in PvP. To make lingering potions you need dragon breath, only way to get that is to go to The End and capture the Ender Dragon's acid pools with bottles. Then you have to kill the dragon because the portal to leave the End closes everytime you do the fight so you can't leave with the breath. If you don't do the end game it's impossible to use them.
i don't like dual wielding, it ruins the fun and challenge in minecraft.
It doesn't ruin a thing. Have you tested it out at all?
yes, and also as of now, it doesn't have much use except for food, torches, and shields, but it would be cool if we could double wield swords.
I think the modern updates are awful. They are all like a mod pack. Minecraft is sort of losing its simplicity. Ocean Mountants, Bunnies and Armor Stand there the only things good. For 1.9, i just see the End City and revised Ender dragon fight good.
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So how exactly does it ruin fun and challenge like you said before? It's an offhand slot, it's only using for right click options, you're not supposed to be able to attack with two weapons.
Oh hey, more of this "updates are like modpacks" nonsense. Unfortunately Minecraft needs to lose some of its simplicity to fix some of the horrible features and mechanics that already exist.
They aren't like modpacks at all. Modpacks have a completely different goal than updates.
They're not terribly rare IMO (although it may just seem that way to me because you can move more quickly across oceans than other biomes). They're also really easy to cheese, and that many diamonds would either be useless (if you already have a big stockpile) or extremely overpowered (if you don't have a big stockpile; you just got one).