I suggested this years ago, and I've seen some discussion of similar transmitting devices, but they seem to be far more complex than what I'm suggesting, so here goes:
1. The radio block takes a redstone input, and transmits that to a matching receiver. One tic in, one tic transmitted.
2. The block has a GUI that you open with 1 slot on the top and 5 on the bottom, if you put a redstone block in the top slot it becomes a transmitter, empty slot is a receiver.
3. The lower part of the GUI is 5 slots like a hopper, you set the frequency by putting any Minecraft items you want in the slots, a transmitter with 1 bow, 52 smooth stone, an apple, 2 carrots and a furnace, can only be heard by any receiver with the same "frequency" or items in it's slot. You can have multiple receivers on a frequency and the game wouldn't allow multiple transmitters of the same frequency.
4. signal strength would drop with both distance and depth. It could either always send a signal strength of 15, or maybe it could transmit at the same strength as the input which would open up other possibilities.
5. It could be an expensive build such as requiring a beacon as a crafting item and there could be some limitations on how many could be on a server and it could render something like a single block with a 2 block tall antenna.
Man that was pretty bad. I was going to include something like this in a suggestion I was working on. I'd suggest that to make the device even simpler. Instead of leaving it to the player to determine the frequency in the GUI, it would probably be better to have the block adjustable with left clicking like a repeater or comparator. That way you have about 3 distinct frequencies. I know builds can get complicated, but I find it hard to believe people would use more than 3 transmitting transmitters if the range was kept reasonable.
I also think throwing in a concrete number/system for how the range and strength work would help out your post. How far does a full strength signal go? The answer to that question will probably be the make or break for a lot of people who may support this idea.
The range would be up to 120 blocks above ground with an input of 15 and would lose 1 for every 8 blocks.
Vertical range would lose 1 for every 8 blocks above it, losses would be additive.
The input signal could vary from 1 to 15 just like you get on a line of redstone.
If you always wanted full output you feed it with a repeater at the end of your signal which has an output of 15.
The suggestion of only 3 frequencies wouldn't work on a server as everyone's radio blocks would be interfering with each other but even having 1 frequency slot would give you tens of thousands of frequencies in this game as you count how many blocks there are and multiply by 64
This opens up a lot of possibilities for being at one base and getting a signal somebody had entered another base a long distance away.
You could relay by taking the output of a receiver and feeding another transmitter, on a server where there are a lot of players, and long continuous distances are loaded, you could receive signals from hundreds of blocks away.
You could have competitions where somebody hides a transmitter with a prize, gives out the frequency, and players have to use triangulation to find the prize by relative signal strength.
I believe that using a beacon in the crafting recipe is a clever way to make the item feel at the right tech level. Beacons wirelessly transmit potion effects, so its not a stretch to assume that they could be used to transmit redstone signal.
However, the numbers suggested are a little over the top for my taste. Just to put it in perspective, 120 blocks transmission distance means that you could put this transmitter at the top of most of most of the tallest mountains you'd find and still be able to transmit a redstone signal to the bedrock layer. That's way too far, a
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On top of that, if it travels that far, and it requires that you craft a beacon to get, I don't see why most people would ever be able to get enough of these transmitters to use even a fraction of the 'frequencies' that you are proposing. Shortening the distance would also make it easier to manage less frequencies because the relative bubbles of interference are smaller. Maybe these large numbers are what's needed for servers, but can you imagine the load on the servers trying to connect that many frequencies? I also don't think that the server argument holds any weight because Mojang doesn't make new blocks/entities specifically for servers (see the Phantom thread).
So as is, partial support. I like the idea, but the way it's balanced seems scattered.
If so then i do like the idea as when i have tried to build a mob spawn room and want to turn it off with redstone lamps in the room i always make a complete direwire of the wiring, having a way to do it wireless is much neater and easier.
Though i would say the simple GUI in the mod of selecting a channel is better than your idea of using items as a channel selection, i won't remember if i am using channel feather or channel zombie flesh, but i would remember channel 1 or 2
Then there is also the question of is wireless transmission a tech level too high for vanilla minecraft?
So this looks roughly like what I'm suggesting but at it's core this it what would happen and I don't think it's as complex as you are suggesting.
In the first place, Minecraft seems to be able to track things like a room full of chickens and when it's time for each to spawn an egg. If you spawn too many chickens you can crash the server as I've done but it can track a lot of things, so:
1. When a transmitter or receiver is created it gets logged in a table along with a frequency and location.
2. When a transmitter gets a redstone tic input, it checks the level, checks the registered matching receivers, does a calculation to see if each receiver is in range to get a signal of that strength, and sends the tic to those receivers in range.
One tic in, one tic sent, one tic hopefully received.
3. Redstone does this now, it gets a tic from an adjacent block, modifies it to lower the level and passes it to the next block or blocks, it modifies the tic according to what device is next to it and performs a task dependent on what type of devices are involved. The only difference is the blocks aren't next to each other in this case so it would need to track the transmitters and receivers in a table.
4. Just like the chickens, too many of them could be a problem so there may need to be a limit but this is no more high tech than any other redstone device. It gets a tic, it sends a tic, just like a repeater gets a tic of 1-15 and sends out a tic of level 15, it just has to do a calculation to figure out where that tic needs to be sent.
5. As for the issue of too many frequencies, my guess is that it's the total number of T/R's in the table that MC uses to track the sets more than the number of unique sets. IE: 1 transmitter with 1000 receivers could crash the system whereas 10 transmitters of all different frequencies and 20-30 receivers would likely create no problem.
I believe that using a beacon in the crafting recipe is a clever way to make the item feel at the right tech level. Beacons wirelessly transmit potion effects, so its not a stretch to assume that they could be used to transmit redstone signal.
However, the numbers suggested are a little over the top for my taste. Just to put it in perspective, 120 blocks transmission distance means that you could put this transmitter at the top of most of most of the tallest mountains you'd find and still be able to transmit a redstone signal to the bedrock layer. That's way too far, aleftOn top of that, if it travels that far, and it requires that you craft a beacon to get, I don't see why most people would ever be able to get enough of these transmitters to use even a fraction of the 'frequencies' that you are proposing. Shortening the distance would also make it easier to manage less frequencies because the relative bubbles of interference are smaller. Maybe these large numbers are what's needed for servers, but can you imagine the load on the servers trying to connect that many frequencies? I also don't think that the server argument holds any weight because Mojang doesn't make new blocks/entities specifically for servers (see the Phantom thread).
So as is, partial support. I like the idea, but the way it's balanced seems scattered.
A lot of this is answered in post #7 but here's some additional thoughts.
1. It's designed to be an expensive build but, on my last server I had accumulated a couple stacks of Wither skulls on a pure vanilla server, so, for the advanced player that wants to modify a nether fortress to become a wither spawner, and spend the time to kill them, this is no problem.
2. It seems like your main objection is the range but if you think about it, it gets a tic, it checks a table for where to send that tic, if it meets the parameters, it sends that tic and it gets received. It doesn't matter if it's 5 blocks away or 100, if the calculation = true, that receiver gets a tic. There is no interference if there are virtually unlimited frequencies.
3. my server argument assumes that many people on a server are going to use many more T/R sets than one person in a single player game, so that would be the worst case.
4. the potential number of frequencies are irrelevant, what's going to affect the game is the total number in use. The game still has to look in a table to see where the device that got the redstone input needs to send it to, even if you are limited to 3 or 4 frequencies. You can still crash the game if you try to power 500 receivers with 1 transmitter, just as you will crash a server if you build an unrestricted chicken breeder.
A lot of this is answered in post #7 but here's some additional thoughts.
1. It's designed to be an expensive build but, on my last server I had accumulated a couple stacks of Wither skulls on a pure vanilla server, so, for the advanced player that wants to modify a nether fortress to become a wither spawner, and spend the time to kill them, this is no problem.
2. It seems like your main objection is the range but if you think about it, it gets a tic, it checks a table for where to send that tic, if it meets the parameters, it sends that tic and it gets received. It doesn't matter if it's 5 blocks away or 100, if the calculation = true, that receiver gets a tic. There is no interference if there are virtually unlimited frequencies.
3. my server argument assumes that many people on a server are going to use many more T/R sets than one person in a single player game, so that would be the worst case.
4. the potential number of frequencies are irrelevant, what's going to affect the game is the total number in use. The game still has to look in a table to see where the device that got the redstone input needs to send it to, even if you are limited to 3 or 4 frequencies. You can still crash the game if you try to power 500 receivers with 1 transmitter, just as you will crash a server if you build an unrestricted chicken breeder.
You're right, my problem is primarily with the range because I feel it's unnecessary/doesn't fit with what we have currently.
A fully powered beacon only goes 50 blocks in a directions and you need to take up almost 4 stacks worth of world space to do it. Here you're more than doubling that range with a footprint of only 2 blocks. In addition, the range unnecessarily complicates the block because it forces a GUI. The range forces a GUI because as you extend the range, you increase the chance that you'll run into another frequency of the same type. Reducing the size reduces the risk of meeting similar frequencies which makes it more feasible to have a left clickable block.
The advantages of having a left clickable block are a little less concrete but important nonetheless. Simplifying the block makes it feel a bit more low-tech which makes it easier to digest as a new entry to redstone components. It also makes the block easier to use, bringing further acceptance. And, it also makes the block more familiar, since this is how real radios work.
Finally, I could be off base here, but I don't think the majority of players put in the time to farm for beacon components, while it's good to keep a worst case scenario in mind, I don't think a block should be made solely around that assumption. There may be some people/servers who'd be able to generate enough beacons to need a large number of frequencies, but if only 5% of the Minecraft players do that, making a more complicated block is a waste of development time. Of course, I don't know how many players actually get to that point, but I'd be willing to go out on a limb and say that most don't do that regularly.
You're right, my problem is primarily with the range because I feel it's unnecessary/doesn't fit with what we have currently.
A fully powered beacon only goes 50 blocks in a directions and you need to take up almost 4 stacks worth of world space to do it. Here you're more than doubling that range with a footprint of only 2 blocks. In addition, the range unnecessarily complicates the block because it forces a GUI. The range forces a GUI because as you extend the range, you increase the chance that you'll run into another frequency of the same type. Reducing the size reduces the risk of meeting similar frequencies which makes it more feasible to have a left clickable block.
The advantages of having a left clickable block are a little less concrete but important nonetheless. Simplifying the block makes it feel a bit more low-tech which makes it easier to digest as a new entry to redstone components. It also makes the block easier to use, bringing further acceptance. And, it also makes the block more familiar, since this is how real radios work.
Finally, I could be off base here, but I don't think the majority of players put in the time to farm for beacon components, while it's good to keep a worst case scenario in mind, I don't think a block should be made solely around that assumption. There may be some people/servers who'd be able to generate enough beacons to need a large number of frequencies, but if only 5% of the Minecraft players do that, making a more complicated block is a waste of development time. Of course, I don't know how many players actually get to that point, but I'd be willing to go out on a limb and say that most don't do that regularly.
I would have no objection to limiting the range if I could get this block because I've wanted one for years but limiting the range to 50 wouldn't fix the problem you're concerned about. If I were actually trying to use it as some type of alarm that my base was being invaded in MP, or that some process I was running was finished and it was time to return to that base, I would just relay a series of them to get to the 100 or 120 block away that I needed. It would cost me more because I'd need 2 or 3 transmitters and that many receivers, but I'd still be polluting the same distance of environment with the same or more frequencies as there are now 2 transmitters pumping signals at a spot in between them.
I also don't quite get your complexity issue, clicking on T/R and bringing up a GUI with 2 slots, top slot determines if it's a T or R, and bottom slot takes any block or stack of blocks and determines the frequency, this is less slots than a hopper, and look at how ungodly complex a villager trading GUI is. If you're going to make this block possible, I can easily see a single redstone build using multiple frequencies to accomplish a lot of tasks that now take me loads of redstone and repeaters. For instance, I built a racetrack on a server that timed horse races between me and my friends. I think it was about a 50 or so meter track I could have used 4 or 5 sets on that one build, and every one would have needed to be different frequency sets.
Also, the T/Rs wouldn't HAVE to be such an expensive build as to use beacons, it could use ender eyes or something much cheaper like that. I don't know how much redstone builds you do, but I've built all kinds of complex builds from auto sugar cane farms to auto chicken farms that spawn, kill, sort, and respawn chickens, totally automatically. I've built towers that flash section by section up toward the sky and the first thought I had after I finished was it would be so cool to have a radio block to turn that tower on and off from the observation building 50 or so blocks away.
I'm not a programmer by any stretch of the imagination, but when you look at the complexity of what this game does now with it's spawning mechanics, it's lighting mechanics, things like ender chests, and it's current redstone mechanics, I don't think even my version of transmitter with almost unlimited frequencies, is any more complex than half the stuff we already have. You take a redstone tic from a block, instead of moving it to an adjacent block or device, you look up a running table that says this tic get sent to xx,xx,xxx. If you add this block, you still have to maintain some table that tells you where the receivers are located, and, unless you only have 1 frequency, you still have identify if this transmitter is an A,B, or C, (in your scenario), or a stack of 32 half wood slabs, in my scenario. (Or, maybe a GUI where you have 3 slots that take 0 to 9 giving you about 1000 frequencies)
I'm not really hung up on the particulars, I just can imagine 1000 cools things you could do with this block. Think about setting mob traps you watch from a distance and spring by radio block, I can go on forever with possibilities and you can do these things without the radio block but if you think like that then why ever add any new content to the game and whens the last time any new redstone device was added?
A lot of this could be done with command blocks placing and removing redstone blocks or torches in remote circuits.
Though command blocks are more risky if you get the coordinates wrong and on a server one wouldn't want just anybody having unrestricted access to command blocks of course.
A lot of this could be done with command blocks placing and removing redstone blocks or torches in remote circuits.
Though command blocks are more risky if you get the coordinates wrong and on a server one wouldn't want just anybody having unrestricted access to command blocks of course.
Yes but I'm looking for vanilla component that anybody can use. As I've said, I can accomplish these things with lines of redstone and repeaters but this thread is about new content and I can't remember the last time a new redstone device was added. The server I play on is totally un-moded and I don't use mods on my single player games either.
I would have no objection to limiting the range if I could get this block because I've wanted one for years but limiting the range to 50 wouldn't fix the problem you're concerned about. If I were actually trying to use it as some type of alarm that my base was being invaded in MP, or that some process I was running was finished and it was time to return to that base, I would just relay a series of them to get to the 100 or 120 block away that I needed. It would cost me more because I'd need 2 or 3 transmitters and that many receivers, but I'd still be polluting the same distance of environment with the same or more frequencies as there are now 2 transmitters pumping signals at a spot in between them.
I also don't quite get your complexity issue, clicking on T/R and bringing up a GUI with 2 slots, top slot determines if it's a T or R, and bottom slot takes any block or stack of blocks and determines the frequency, this is less slots than a hopper, and look at how ungodly complex a villager trading GUI is. If you're going to make this block possible, I can easily see a single redstone build using multiple frequencies to accomplish a lot of tasks that now take me loads of redstone and repeaters. For instance, I built a racetrack on a server that timed horse races between me and my friends. I think it was about a 50 or so meter track I could have used 4 or 5 sets on that one build, and every one would have needed to be different frequency sets.
Also, the T/Rs wouldn't HAVE to be such an expensive build as to use beacons, it could use ender eyes or something much cheaper like that. I don't know how much redstone builds you do, but I've built all kinds of complex builds from auto sugar cane farms to auto chicken farms that spawn, kill, sort, and respawn chickens, totally automatically. I've built towers that flash section by section up toward the sky and the first thought I had after I finished was it would be so cool to have a radio block to turn that tower on and off from the observation building 50 or so blocks away.
I'm not a programmer by any stretch of the imagination, but when you look at the complexity of what this game does now with it's spawning mechanics, it's lighting mechanics, things like ender chests, and it's current redstone mechanics, I don't think even my version of transmitter with almost unlimited frequencies, is any more complex than half the stuff we already have. You take a redstone tic from a block, instead of moving it to an adjacent block or device, you look up a running table that says this tic get sent to xx,xx,xxx. If you add this block, you still have to maintain some table that tells you where the receivers are located, and, unless you only have 1 frequency, you still have identify if this transmitter is an A,B, or C, (in your scenario), or a stack of 32 half wood slabs, in my scenario. (Or, maybe a GUI where you have 3 slots that take 0 to 9 giving you about 1000 frequencies)
I'm not really hung up on the particulars, I just can imagine 1000 cools things you could do with this block. Think about setting mob traps you watch from a distance and spring by radio block, I can go on forever with possibilities and you can do these things without the radio block but if you think like that then why ever add any new content to the game and whens the last time any new redstone device was added?
I don't know how the game actually transmits redstone signal. It could be that the way it's implemented currently heavily relies on the number of blocks the current powered block has to check, making every extra block that needs to be checked a huge burden on the system or it could be done much more efficiently. Either way, my opinion regarding the tech side of things is that anything can be done, it just depends how much time and money you want to throw at it and whether you think its worth the benefit.
When talking about whether its "too high tech for Minecraft" or "too complex", I was referring about how the new block feels to the end user. Inserting things into a block to change the frequency, although a really good way to separate frequencies, doesn't make intuitive sense both in the game world and in the real world, so the whole idea suddenly seems very high tech and "not Minecraft". A shifting stick is much easier to understand, much more familiar and still accomplishes the same task, so it's easier for people to accept the novel concept of non-contacting redstone transmission. The cost of a stick is of course the number your limited to, but one of the great thing about Minecraft is that it forces you to be creative with the limitations it gives you. Things would be different if this was implemented as part of a larger update with a lot of brand new similar concepts, but if we're talking about a singular redstone block addition, the goal is to introduce a new concept while keeping the 'feel' of the old stuff. Or at least that's the way I prefer it.
As far as the range is concerned, you're only thinking in one direction. If you look at the picture attached, you'll see that the 120mm circle extends in 3 other directions and that the amount of unused area is pretty large when compared to the two 50mm circles. If you're doing massive builds, this may not matter or even be advantageous, but if you're building your own thing with other people who are building their own things, suddenly you have a lot of interference that could have been avoided by reducing the range. The illustration also only shows it in the xy-plane, when you put everything in 3 dimensions, the amount of dead space and potential interference is massive and the only fix to that is to have a ton of frequencies as opposed to a few.
Also in case it wasn't clear, I'm assuming that a transmitter can't pass back a signal to a receiver that just powered it, meaning that the two 50's are using the same frequency. Anyway, the numbers can always be played with, but at the end of the day it's a good idea in general and I'd like to see some form of this implemented at some point.
I don't know how the game actually transmits redstone signal. It could be that the way it's implemented currently heavily relies on the number of blocks the current powered block has to check, making every extra block that needs to be checked a huge burden on the system or it could be done much more efficiently. Either way, my opinion regarding the tech side of things is that anything can be done, it just depends how much time and money you want to throw at it and whether you think its worth the benefit.
When talking about whether its "too high tech for Minecraft" or "too complex", I was referring about how the new block feels to the end user. Inserting things into a block to change the frequency, although a really good way to separate frequencies, doesn't make intuitive sense both in the game world and in the real world, so the whole idea suddenly seems very high tech and "not Minecraft". A shifting stick is much easier to understand, much more familiar and still accomplishes the same task, so it's easier for people to accept the novel concept of non-contacting redstone transmission. The cost of a stick is of course the number your limited to, but one of the great thing about Minecraft is that it forces you to be creative with the limitations it gives you. Things would be different if this was implemented as part of a larger update with a lot of brand new similar concepts, but if we're talking about a singular redstone block addition, the goal is to introduce a new concept while keeping the 'feel' of the old stuff. Or at least that's the way I prefer it.
As far as the range is concerned, you're only thinking in one direction. If you look at the picture attached, you'll see that the 120mm circle extends in 3 other directions and that the amount of unused area is pretty large when compared to the two 50mm circles. If you're doing massive builds, this may not matter or even be advantageous, but if you're building your own thing with other people who are building their own things, suddenly you have a lot of interference that could have been avoided by reducing the range. The illustration also only shows it in the xy-plane, when you put everything in 3 dimensions, the amount of dead space and potential interference is massive and the only fix to that is to have a ton of frequencies as opposed to a few.
Also in case it wasn't clear, I'm assuming that a transmitter can't pass back a signal to a receiver that just powered it, meaning that the two 50's are using the same frequency. Anyway, the numbers can always be played with, but at the end of the day it's a good idea in general and I'd like to see some form of this implemented at some point.
I don't know either, how the programming actually works but I would imagine it would go like this: 1. A redstone block changes state for whatever reason, 2. it checks all adjacent blocks to see if they are affected, 3. it updates those blocks that now have to repeat the process.
Thinking about this, and looking at your diagram, brought me to the realization that: Wait a minute, minecraft isn't really broadcasting anything, my radio block is doing the exact same thing as a single piece of redstone, just following a different procedure: 1. it changes state, 2. it checks a table that says that these couple of matching receivers are at these particular locations. 3. it does a calculation to see if the receivers are in range based on the strength of the input signal, 4. it updates those receivers in range. This has the "feel" of having a range, and the effect of calling it a range, but there's no actual signal being broadcast as there would be in the real world, it's just checking a table and running a calculation.
There is no actual issue with range as long as there are multiple frequencies, and as you noted you pretty much have to have multiple frequencies to be able to relay or you would get some infinite loops with the transmitter sending a signal back to the receiver that is powering it.
Back to the complex issue, I get that an Ender Chest, that's just as complex, is probably magical as opposed to technologically complex, so it has a different feel, but a comparator is probably just as complex as the radio block. And, if you look a the complexity of the redstone builds being done now, with actual computers being built that can run all sorts of calculations, I don't think adding a block that can transmit a signal from point A to point B, is a lot different feel than a chest that you can access anywhere that has this extra inventory. How many Minecraft players have never used a comparator??? I don't know but I'll bet it's about the same percentage that would never use a radio block, even if it were available.
I suggested this years ago, and I've seen some discussion of similar transmitting devices, but they seem to be far more complex than what I'm suggesting, so here goes:
1. The radio block takes a redstone input, and transmits that to a matching receiver. One tic in, one tic transmitted.
2. The block has a GUI that you open with 1 slot on the top and 5 on the bottom, if you put a redstone block in the top slot it becomes a transmitter, empty slot is a receiver.
3. The lower part of the GUI is 5 slots like a hopper, you set the frequency by putting any Minecraft items you want in the slots, a transmitter with 1 bow, 52 smooth stone, an apple, 2 carrots and a furnace, can only be heard by any receiver with the same "frequency" or items in it's slot. You can have multiple receivers on a frequency and the game wouldn't allow multiple transmitters of the same frequency.
4. signal strength would drop with both distance and depth. It could either always send a signal strength of 15, or maybe it could transmit at the same strength as the input which would open up other possibilities.
5. It could be an expensive build such as requiring a beacon as a crafting item and there could be some limitations on how many could be on a server and it could render something like a single block with a 2 block tall antenna.
I'm glad someone is on the same wavelength...
Man that was pretty bad. I was going to include something like this in a suggestion I was working on. I'd suggest that to make the device even simpler. Instead of leaving it to the player to determine the frequency in the GUI, it would probably be better to have the block adjustable with left clicking like a repeater or comparator. That way you have about 3 distinct frequencies. I know builds can get complicated, but I find it hard to believe people would use more than 3 transmitting transmitters if the range was kept reasonable.
I also think throwing in a concrete number/system for how the range and strength work would help out your post. How far does a full strength signal go? The answer to that question will probably be the make or break for a lot of people who may support this idea.
Per request:
The range would be up to 120 blocks above ground with an input of 15 and would lose 1 for every 8 blocks.
Vertical range would lose 1 for every 8 blocks above it, losses would be additive.
The input signal could vary from 1 to 15 just like you get on a line of redstone.
If you always wanted full output you feed it with a repeater at the end of your signal which has an output of 15.
The suggestion of only 3 frequencies wouldn't work on a server as everyone's radio blocks would be interfering with each other but even having 1 frequency slot would give you tens of thousands of frequencies in this game as you count how many blocks there are and multiply by 64
This opens up a lot of possibilities for being at one base and getting a signal somebody had entered another base a long distance away.
You could relay by taking the output of a receiver and feeding another transmitter, on a server where there are a lot of players, and long continuous distances are loaded, you could receive signals from hundreds of blocks away.
You could have competitions where somebody hides a transmitter with a prize, gives out the frequency, and players have to use triangulation to find the prize by relative signal strength.
This seems a little too advanced for Minecraft.
I mean, it would be very useful, but I'm not sure how I would feel like having advanced technology in Minecraft.
I'm on the fence for this suggestion.
I don't even play Minecraft much anymore yet here I am on the Minecraft forums for some reason...
I believe that using a beacon in the crafting recipe is a clever way to make the item feel at the right tech level. Beacons wirelessly transmit potion effects, so its not a stretch to assume that they could be used to transmit redstone signal.
However, the numbers suggested are a little over the top for my taste. Just to put it in perspective, 120 blocks transmission distance means that you could put this transmitter at the top of most of most of the tallest mountains you'd find and still be able to transmit a redstone signal to the bedrock layer. That's way too far, a
So as is, partial support. I like the idea, but the way it's balanced seems scattered.
So this looks roughly like what I'm suggesting but at it's core this it what would happen and I don't think it's as complex as you are suggesting.
In the first place, Minecraft seems to be able to track things like a room full of chickens and when it's time for each to spawn an egg. If you spawn too many chickens you can crash the server as I've done but it can track a lot of things, so:
1. When a transmitter or receiver is created it gets logged in a table along with a frequency and location.
2. When a transmitter gets a redstone tic input, it checks the level, checks the registered matching receivers, does a calculation to see if each receiver is in range to get a signal of that strength, and sends the tic to those receivers in range.
One tic in, one tic sent, one tic hopefully received.
3. Redstone does this now, it gets a tic from an adjacent block, modifies it to lower the level and passes it to the next block or blocks, it modifies the tic according to what device is next to it and performs a task dependent on what type of devices are involved. The only difference is the blocks aren't next to each other in this case so it would need to track the transmitters and receivers in a table.
4. Just like the chickens, too many of them could be a problem so there may need to be a limit but this is no more high tech than any other redstone device. It gets a tic, it sends a tic, just like a repeater gets a tic of 1-15 and sends out a tic of level 15, it just has to do a calculation to figure out where that tic needs to be sent.
5. As for the issue of too many frequencies, my guess is that it's the total number of T/R's in the table that MC uses to track the sets more than the number of unique sets. IE: 1 transmitter with 1000 receivers could crash the system whereas 10 transmitters of all different frequencies and 20-30 receivers would likely create no problem.
A lot of this is answered in post #7 but here's some additional thoughts.
1. It's designed to be an expensive build but, on my last server I had accumulated a couple stacks of Wither skulls on a pure vanilla server, so, for the advanced player that wants to modify a nether fortress to become a wither spawner, and spend the time to kill them, this is no problem.
2. It seems like your main objection is the range but if you think about it, it gets a tic, it checks a table for where to send that tic, if it meets the parameters, it sends that tic and it gets received. It doesn't matter if it's 5 blocks away or 100, if the calculation = true, that receiver gets a tic. There is no interference if there are virtually unlimited frequencies.
3. my server argument assumes that many people on a server are going to use many more T/R sets than one person in a single player game, so that would be the worst case.
4. the potential number of frequencies are irrelevant, what's going to affect the game is the total number in use. The game still has to look in a table to see where the device that got the redstone input needs to send it to, even if you are limited to 3 or 4 frequencies. You can still crash the game if you try to power 500 receivers with 1 transmitter, just as you will crash a server if you build an unrestricted chicken breeder.
You're right, my problem is primarily with the range because I feel it's unnecessary/doesn't fit with what we have currently.
A fully powered beacon only goes 50 blocks in a directions and you need to take up almost 4 stacks worth of world space to do it. Here you're more than doubling that range with a footprint of only 2 blocks. In addition, the range unnecessarily complicates the block because it forces a GUI. The range forces a GUI because as you extend the range, you increase the chance that you'll run into another frequency of the same type. Reducing the size reduces the risk of meeting similar frequencies which makes it more feasible to have a left clickable block.
The advantages of having a left clickable block are a little less concrete but important nonetheless. Simplifying the block makes it feel a bit more low-tech which makes it easier to digest as a new entry to redstone components. It also makes the block easier to use, bringing further acceptance. And, it also makes the block more familiar, since this is how real radios work.
Finally, I could be off base here, but I don't think the majority of players put in the time to farm for beacon components, while it's good to keep a worst case scenario in mind, I don't think a block should be made solely around that assumption. There may be some people/servers who'd be able to generate enough beacons to need a large number of frequencies, but if only 5% of the Minecraft players do that, making a more complicated block is a waste of development time. Of course, I don't know how many players actually get to that point, but I'd be willing to go out on a limb and say that most don't do that regularly.
I would have no objection to limiting the range if I could get this block because I've wanted one for years but limiting the range to 50 wouldn't fix the problem you're concerned about. If I were actually trying to use it as some type of alarm that my base was being invaded in MP, or that some process I was running was finished and it was time to return to that base, I would just relay a series of them to get to the 100 or 120 block away that I needed. It would cost me more because I'd need 2 or 3 transmitters and that many receivers, but I'd still be polluting the same distance of environment with the same or more frequencies as there are now 2 transmitters pumping signals at a spot in between them.
I also don't quite get your complexity issue, clicking on T/R and bringing up a GUI with 2 slots, top slot determines if it's a T or R, and bottom slot takes any block or stack of blocks and determines the frequency, this is less slots than a hopper, and look at how ungodly complex a villager trading GUI is. If you're going to make this block possible, I can easily see a single redstone build using multiple frequencies to accomplish a lot of tasks that now take me loads of redstone and repeaters. For instance, I built a racetrack on a server that timed horse races between me and my friends. I think it was about a 50 or so meter track I could have used 4 or 5 sets on that one build, and every one would have needed to be different frequency sets.
Also, the T/Rs wouldn't HAVE to be such an expensive build as to use beacons, it could use ender eyes or something much cheaper like that. I don't know how much redstone builds you do, but I've built all kinds of complex builds from auto sugar cane farms to auto chicken farms that spawn, kill, sort, and respawn chickens, totally automatically. I've built towers that flash section by section up toward the sky and the first thought I had after I finished was it would be so cool to have a radio block to turn that tower on and off from the observation building 50 or so blocks away.
I'm not a programmer by any stretch of the imagination, but when you look at the complexity of what this game does now with it's spawning mechanics, it's lighting mechanics, things like ender chests, and it's current redstone mechanics, I don't think even my version of transmitter with almost unlimited frequencies, is any more complex than half the stuff we already have. You take a redstone tic from a block, instead of moving it to an adjacent block or device, you look up a running table that says this tic get sent to xx,xx,xxx. If you add this block, you still have to maintain some table that tells you where the receivers are located, and, unless you only have 1 frequency, you still have identify if this transmitter is an A,B, or C, (in your scenario), or a stack of 32 half wood slabs, in my scenario. (Or, maybe a GUI where you have 3 slots that take 0 to 9 giving you about 1000 frequencies)
I'm not really hung up on the particulars, I just can imagine 1000 cools things you could do with this block. Think about setting mob traps you watch from a distance and spring by radio block, I can go on forever with possibilities and you can do these things without the radio block but if you think like that then why ever add any new content to the game and whens the last time any new redstone device was added?
A lot of this could be done with command blocks placing and removing redstone blocks or torches in remote circuits.
Though command blocks are more risky if you get the coordinates wrong and on a server one wouldn't want just anybody having unrestricted access to command blocks of course.
Just testing.
Yes but I'm looking for vanilla component that anybody can use. As I've said, I can accomplish these things with lines of redstone and repeaters but this thread is about new content and I can't remember the last time a new redstone device was added. The server I play on is totally un-moded and I don't use mods on my single player games either.
I don't know how the game actually transmits redstone signal. It could be that the way it's implemented currently heavily relies on the number of blocks the current powered block has to check, making every extra block that needs to be checked a huge burden on the system or it could be done much more efficiently. Either way, my opinion regarding the tech side of things is that anything can be done, it just depends how much time and money you want to throw at it and whether you think its worth the benefit.
When talking about whether its "too high tech for Minecraft" or "too complex", I was referring about how the new block feels to the end user. Inserting things into a block to change the frequency, although a really good way to separate frequencies, doesn't make intuitive sense both in the game world and in the real world, so the whole idea suddenly seems very high tech and "not Minecraft". A shifting stick is much easier to understand, much more familiar and still accomplishes the same task, so it's easier for people to accept the novel concept of non-contacting redstone transmission. The cost of a stick is of course the number your limited to, but one of the great thing about Minecraft is that it forces you to be creative with the limitations it gives you. Things would be different if this was implemented as part of a larger update with a lot of brand new similar concepts, but if we're talking about a singular redstone block addition, the goal is to introduce a new concept while keeping the 'feel' of the old stuff. Or at least that's the way I prefer it.
As far as the range is concerned, you're only thinking in one direction. If you look at the picture attached, you'll see that the 120mm circle extends in 3 other directions and that the amount of unused area is pretty large when compared to the two 50mm circles. If you're doing massive builds, this may not matter or even be advantageous, but if you're building your own thing with other people who are building their own things, suddenly you have a lot of interference that could have been avoided by reducing the range. The illustration also only shows it in the xy-plane, when you put everything in 3 dimensions, the amount of dead space and potential interference is massive and the only fix to that is to have a ton of frequencies as opposed to a few.
Also in case it wasn't clear, I'm assuming that a transmitter can't pass back a signal to a receiver that just powered it, meaning that the two 50's are using the same frequency. Anyway, the numbers can always be played with, but at the end of the day it's a good idea in general and I'd like to see some form of this implemented at some point.
I don't know either, how the programming actually works but I would imagine it would go like this: 1. A redstone block changes state for whatever reason, 2. it checks all adjacent blocks to see if they are affected, 3. it updates those blocks that now have to repeat the process.
Thinking about this, and looking at your diagram, brought me to the realization that: Wait a minute, minecraft isn't really broadcasting anything, my radio block is doing the exact same thing as a single piece of redstone, just following a different procedure: 1. it changes state, 2. it checks a table that says that these couple of matching receivers are at these particular locations. 3. it does a calculation to see if the receivers are in range based on the strength of the input signal, 4. it updates those receivers in range. This has the "feel" of having a range, and the effect of calling it a range, but there's no actual signal being broadcast as there would be in the real world, it's just checking a table and running a calculation.
There is no actual issue with range as long as there are multiple frequencies, and as you noted you pretty much have to have multiple frequencies to be able to relay or you would get some infinite loops with the transmitter sending a signal back to the receiver that is powering it.
Back to the complex issue, I get that an Ender Chest, that's just as complex, is probably magical as opposed to technologically complex, so it has a different feel, but a comparator is probably just as complex as the radio block. And, if you look a the complexity of the redstone builds being done now, with actual computers being built that can run all sorts of calculations, I don't think adding a block that can transmit a signal from point A to point B, is a lot different feel than a chest that you can access anywhere that has this extra inventory. How many Minecraft players have never used a comparator??? I don't know but I'll bet it's about the same percentage that would never use a radio block, even if it were available.
i had a simalar idea once btw how do i make my own forum
Do you mean how do you make your own thread?
What's different from from what I've suggested?
If it's significantly different start your own thread.
If it's very similar post your improvements over what I've suggested in this thread.