I was convinced that 1.18 would be an End update, and then that 1.19 would be an end update... but I'm still holding out hope.
Also, 1.20. Are we really almost on to 1.20? I'm starting to feel really old...
In short:
-Mojang has previously stated that they intend to update all existing dimensions before adding new things; and recent updates show a pattern of adding to and improving existing content rather than adding anything wildly new. (...Which, incidentally, has been amazing. This strategy keeps the existing feel of Minecraft, while still adding new and interesting content. Every time, I think Mojang can't possibly top the last update...)
-1.13 updated Oceans; 1.14 updated villages; 1.16 improved the Nether, and 1.17-1.19 appear to be focused on updating the Overworld and Underground. ...And in case you missed it, that leaves only one area of the game that hasn't recieved a major update for a very long time.
-While I can hardly pretend to know exactly what such an update would entail, I can make some reasonable predictions, and suggest some cool ideas, more for the purposes of demonstrating what such an update could bring than offering a clear cut roadmap of features.
Before I get into some ideas, it's important to keep in mind some basic design principles that define the End; so that we too can imagine how it could be enhanced and improved, without losing its existing feel. (Try and take some of these into consideration, and come up with your own ideas!)
Terrain ~ Each of the game's three dimensions are defined by extremely different Terrain; The Overworld, appropriately enough, has an interconnected overworld, with caves underground, and large land masses and bodies of water. The Nether exists exclusively underground, in molten, lava filled caverns. And the End is unique in that it has a sky-world sort of generation, with large and small floating islands. ...This should be pretty obvious, but it's still very much the most basic building block of worldbuilding, no pun intended.
Gameplay ~ Each dimension is also defined by distinct types of Gameplay; you play the game very differently in the Netherworld than the Overworld. In the Overworld, gameplay is governed by a daylight cycle; most biomes are relatively safe, especially to an experienced player; giving us a baseline for what 'ordinary' gameplay feels like. The Netherworld, on the other hand, is a hostile wasteland, filled with dangers and death around every corner. Nearly every mob in it is hostile or easily provoked, and even the most experienced adventurer needs to be extremely careful at all times.
The End has this aspect of danger- but it's a more ambient, brooding danger. You could certainly fall into the void... but ultimately, it feels empty and brooding. (This could be deliebrate, or simply a lack of content.) Most of the time players spend in the End is spent exploring barren wastelands. The threat of the void is always present... but never especially concerning.
...And of course, it's important to keep in mind that the End is a late game area, meaning it can have more powerful threats and risk reward scenarios.
Vibes ~ ...The hardest to define, obviously, but each dimension also has unique vibes. The Overworld resembles our own world, and thus tends to feel cozy and familiar, even peaceful. The Nether is the polar opposite, hostile, menacing, and rightfully hellish. The End's existing vibes make it feel empty, strange, barren, even transcendent; and it's important to try and keep this feeling in mind for anything we add. (It's also interesting to note that Minecraft Dungeons already gives us something of a vision for what an improved End could look like- or, at the very least, something to go off of.
Before I continue, I'd again like to reiterate that these aren't set-in-stone ideas, so much as a thought experiment as to what such an update could add.
New Terrain ~ 1.18 has had me thinking about terrain a lot, and how some of the ideas from that update could be applied to a Skyworld. Consider this:
Right now, the End mostly consists of large, scattered chunks of Endstone. Relatively flat and barren. New terrain variation could be added, like the Overworld, seperate from biome generation. In the simplest sense, terrain factors could include Size, & Verticality. The combination of these two could create four extremes of terrain, with a variety of types in the middle:
Wastes ~ Existing terrain type; when size is high, and verticality is low, the result is large, relatively flat landmasses, scattered a good distance apart, without much terrain generation. This would likely be the most common type, given as players are already quite used to it.
Archipelagos ~ Occurs when both size and verticality are low, an archipeligo is a series of much smaller islands clustered close together, with relatively ordinary terrain.
Mountains ~ Occurs when both size and verticality are high, mountains consist of enormous, towering landmasses of awesome size; difficult to traverse, but epic to encounter.
Pillars ~ Inspired by some of the Better End Mod's generation, high verticality and low size can result in small but tall pillar shaped islands, with more isles above or below the main line of generation- especially with other biomes generating here, this sort of shattered terrain could be extremely interesting.
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New Materials ~ And as long as the End is getting better generation, what about new materials? (Remember when the Nether consisted more or less exclusively of Netherrack?) On the simplest level, we could add a new variety of Endstone: Strongstone, (For want of a better name), is a harder version of Endstone that generates in large veins that run through islands, while End Stone is still the primary material. It's essentially a condensed version of Endstone that can be crafted as such, and is highly blast resistant, but extremely difficult to mine quickly. Shattered Endstone is a new type of sediment that generates primarily in End Wastes; it is gravity effected like sand, (leading to precarious incidents where it generates over the void), and can deal small amounts of damage to players who run through or jump on it when not wearing boots, as well as considerable damage to things that fall on it; (it also gradually causes boots to lose durability, especially when running in it.) This stuff could definitely be a nuisance- or possibly a handy defense. You can also smelt shattered endstone into normal endstone, or produce it as a byproduct of using explosions on endstone.
Finally, End Iron can now be found commonly in most biomes; obviously, iron isn't hard to obtain in the Overworld, but adding an endstone variant similar to Nether Gold in that it only drops nuggets would allow players to reliably obtain iron in the end, making it easier to set up a more permanent base.
...And of course, new biomes will probably necessitate new materials...
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New Ore ~ There's currently no good reason at all to mine in the End; there aren't even caves. That could be remedied, however, with a new ore.
Let me just be clear that this shouldn't be something 'even better than netherite,' there's no point in simply adding a slightly more durable, more powerful toolset.
Instead, players can find Etherite, (Ether, of course, meaning sky or heavens), generating semi-commonly in the End Wastes, but NOT other biomes. This violet-teal material sort of resembles the elytra, and only ever drops a single Etherite Shard when mined, regardless of fortune. It has several unique properties:
Combining four etherite shards with four ancient debris creates a single 'AscendedIngot.' (Please let me know if you can think of a better name. A smithing table can combine such an ingot with a diamond tool or piece of equipment to create an Ascended version. The ascended version has the same properties of diamond, save for two factors; they can be enchanted better than gold; and better yet, cannot be lost. They do not despawn when dropped, and if the player dies, they remain in their inventory. Hence, while Netherite tools are more powerful; Ascended tools can be made more specialized with enchantments, and are even harder to lose- despite their considerable cost.
Nine Etherite shards can be used to make Ether Blocks, which count as a metal block that can be used for beacons. Etherite blocks can furthermore be turned into Etherite Bricks, and Slab, Stair, and Wall variants. The Catch? Ether Blocks are invisible- or at least, partly so. They become visible on impact- that is, if an entity is walking on them, if they're being broken, if a projectile hits them, or if they're powered by redstone. Otherwise, they can only be seen using a night vision potion, or a special enchantment. In this manner, you could hide a bridge, wall, or even an entire base- purely because it seemingly isn't there. Ordinary mobs cannot see Etherite, and behave as if it isn't there- with the notable exceptions of Endermen. It's also pretty blast resistant, and more difficult to mine for those who aren't using night vision or the required enchantment. And finally, Etherite Shards and redstone can make a Phase Block, which, unlike normal etherite, actually disappears when powered by redstone, leaving only a faint outline, and reappears as a solid block when no longer powered, allowing for some interesting traps or machines.
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New Biomes ~ Some vague ideas for new biomes; (again, trying to keep with the vibes of the End), are as follows:
Chorus Forest ~ Improvements to the existing Chorus Forest Biome; a new ground cover is added, (End Scrub), which is a purple, patchy growth that grows on top of Endstone, but does not spread unless bonemealing endstone adjacent to Scrub. Bonemealing End Scrub can grow End roots- a simple, purplish grass-like growth, and Dark Fungi, which could be used for some sort of new potion. Both End Roots and Dark Fungi are found occasionally in Chorus Forests, along with piles of Rotten Chorus, which can also be made by crafting four chorus fruit together. Rotten Chorus is an extremely compostable material. Finally, Chorus Lichen is a spotty purplish growth that adorns the exterior of Chorus islands, and also hangs down in sheets on the bottoms. It behaves sort of like a ladder- when a player comes into contact with it, they become stuck in place until they jump out, regardless of the lichen's orientation, allowing for some interesting parkour applications.
End Wastes ~ Improvements to the existing end wastes Biomes; including flatter, tiered terrain with large patches of shattered end stone, and occasional sparse patches of end roots. Etherite is exclusively found in this biome.
Dark Jungle ~ An uncommon biome that consists of a dense, twisted, overgrown jungle of giant, strange fungi-like structures tower over the jungle, dense undergrowth makes travel difficult, and twisting, giant vines overrun the island, and connect them to adjacent landmasses. In keeping with the more ambient environment of the end, instead of dangerous beasts, more ambient hazards such as thorny growths, or hostile flora would serve to keep less intrepid explorers out.
End Ruins ~ An extremely rare biome, consisting of a messy conglomeration of alien structures, made from purpur, endstone, and etherite. Not really a large structure, but rather an entire biome made up of mish-mashed structure components. While said ruins might have some extremely valuable materials, they could be guarded by dangerous purpur golems; hostile iron-golem like beings with a devastating laser attack, and the ability to phase through walls.
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New Structure ~ ...And last but not least, one of my favorite ideas for the End; two new types of relatively rare structures; an Elytron Hive, and Elytron Nest. Elytron Hives are bulbous, floating structures that can generate inside other islands, made of rotten chorus, plated with armor plating made of endstone and strongstone. Elytron Hives would, (again), have some sort of valuable material inside, but are guarded by Elytron- dangerous, large alien insectoids that might just finally give Bane of Arthropods a proper use.
Endermite can now infest endstone and rotten purpur blocks in the same manner of silverfish. They infest the walls of Elytron hives to prevent players from simply drilling through. Elytron do not like them, and actively try and kill them, if not to the point of being distracted from the player.
Beetle Elytron are the regular type of Beetle- they scuttle around Hives, and try and pin down invaders, doing a small bit of damage as long as they hang on, and letting go when dealt damage. They can be fairly easily distracted, and even tamed using Chorus fruit; they also harvest nearby chorus plants and use the harvested fruit to feed other Elytron.
Striker Elytron are one of the more dangerous varieties; they are capable of flight, and, like Beetle variants, latch on to intruders- but in addition to doing damage, try and drop their catch from a considerable height.
Guardian Elytron are the most dangerous variant; they're large, fast, and deal quite a bit of damage. They aren't found in regular Elytron Hives though.
The Elytron Nest is a rare, large structure- it consists of a giant, floating conglomeration of rock, riddled with tunnels and infested with Endermite. Large chambers contain chorus plants, and other valuable loot. (Such as etherite?) Smaller hives encircle the main nest, and Guardian Elytron make raiding this place a considerable feat.
End Shipwrecks are larger versions of Endships that can occasionally be found wrecked in various biomes.
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What do you think? Feel free to share your own ideas regarding an End update. I included some (rough) concept art, some of which is a bit outdated... but it gets the idea across.
The ascended version has the same properties of diamond, save for two factors; they can be enchanted better than gold; and better yet, cannot be lost. They do not despawn when dropped, and if the player dies, they remain in their inventory. Hence, while Netherite tools are more powerful; Ascended tools can be made more specialized with enchantments, and are even harder to lose- despite their considerable cost.
I do not see any point in a material with a higher enchantability unless you can actually get higher level enchantments, such as Protection V, Sharpness VI, or Unbreaking IV, and even then you are better off using Netherite in most cases (e.g. Sharpness adds 0.5 damage per level above 1 but a Netherite sword deals 1 more damage than diamond; the increased armor toughness of Netherite makes it better against higher damage sources and the specialized Protection enchantments can already hit the protection cap with as few as 1 piece with 3 pieces of Protection IV (level V enchantments would be more useful if you had a mixture of enchantments, but all Protection V would hit the cap anyway); Unbreaking III Netherite has more uses than Unbreaking IV diamond, especially on armor (there is a base 60% chance of Unbreaking having no effect so it can never be as good as even Unbreaking I on tools), never mind that Mending makes durability almost meaningless; and so on).
In fact, until TMCWv4 I didn't even allow its "amethyst" items to be enchanted on the table, with the reasoning that nobody would want to risk getting bad enchantments on such hard to obtain items, and even afterwards I enchant them solely by using books despite having an enchantability close to gold, which doesn't even necessarily give better enchantments; for example, somebody who played with my mod directly enchanted them, I assume at level 30, and got Efficiency IV, Silk Touch, Unbreaking III on a pickaxe and Sharpness III, Fire Aspect II, Knockback II on a sword, which are entirely possible to get on diamond (though they apparently buffed enchanting since 1.6.4; this tool shows that gold has twice the chance of getting Silk Touch in 1.16 than in 1.8; also, with the addition of grindstones it is more practical to directly enchant but if you want more than 2-3 enchantments and/or Sharpness/Efficiency V it is probably still easier to use books - the chance of getting Efficiency IV on gold is about 9 times higher than Efficiency V).
I really don't understand why you presented those design principles. No shade, but all those things really go without saying.
Strongstone - This one's alright, but I see no point in it being gravity-affected like sand. Especially since The End is floating islands. Gravity blocks wouldn't fit in a place like that.
End Iron - I don't see too much of a point in this one, but I can't say it's "bad" by any means.
Etherite - This works, as I agree there should be a reason to mine in The End. The enchantment part sounds really overpowered. Especially coupled with the fact that Etherite tools don't leave you after death.
Ether Blocks - It sounds like a fun idea on paper, but sounds like it could get really annoying in practice. I can already see (or unsee) trollish invisible walls in a multiplayer server. Maybe if they're transparent instead of completely invisible.
Phase Block - Again, sounds fine if not entirely invisible. I know you mentioned an outline, but still sounds like it might cause problems like the Ether Blocks could.
All Biomes - They all sound good, though you should elaborate further on these golems.
Elytron Hive + Nest + Elytron - All sound okay.
Endermite - Sure, makes sense.
Beetle Elytron - I don't see any point in taming these things.
Striker Elytron - Sounds fine.
Guardian Elytron - Yeah, this is a lot of Elytron variants. Don't know if there should be that many.
Elytron Nest - Makes sense.
End Shipwrecks - Sure.
I can support most of this, except the invisible blocks part, and the Elytron Beetle taming part.
As I mentioned previously, enchantability is overrated; people do not enchant items like stone tools because they get bad enchantments but because they have very little durability and/or can't mine some blocks - despite having over 4 times the enchantability the only major difference between stone and gold is that gold can get Efficiency V and even that is a low chance - you are still much better off just combining two items with Efficiency IV or using books obtained by trading, fishing, etc*. Other enchantments are more likely but it is nowhere even close to a 4-fold difference, and it is even less for diamond vs gold. You'd also still have items which are inferior to netherite in every aspect (1 less damage, 8/9 the mining speed, 2/3 the armor toughness, no knockback resistance); much more of an issue is it is literally impossible to destroy the items, which will certainly never be added.
*Case in point - I enchanted a stone pickaxe at level 30 and got Fortune II, Efficiency IV, Unbreaking III - I then enchanted a gold pickaxe and it only got Efficiency IV, a second gold pickaxe got Fortune III but did not have Unbreaking, and only after enchanting a third time did I get overall better enchantments than the stone pickaxe. Just to be more representative I enchanted two more stone pickaxes, which again got similar enchantments as gold, including one just as good as the third gold pickaxe (Efficiency IV, Unbreaking III, Fortune III) - in order to really see a difference you'd need to enchant many more times and add up the number of times you got an enchantment (of interest, I had to enchant 6 more times, 9 total, to get a gold pickaxe with Efficiency V, and of those 6 only one had Fortune and two others only had one enchantment each):
Maybe you could craft a potion of “true sight” or something with the dark fungi, that allows you to see the Etherite blocks and phase blocks but only partially, like very transparent.
I was convinced that 1.18 would be an End update, and then that 1.19 would be an end update... but I'm still holding out hope.
Also, 1.20. Are we really almost on to 1.20? I'm starting to feel really old...
In short:
-Mojang has previously stated that they intend to update all existing dimensions before adding new things; and recent updates show a pattern of adding to and improving existing content rather than adding anything wildly new. (...Which, incidentally, has been amazing. This strategy keeps the existing feel of Minecraft, while still adding new and interesting content. Every time, I think Mojang can't possibly top the last update...)
-1.13 updated Oceans; 1.14 updated villages; 1.16 improved the Nether, and 1.17-1.19 appear to be focused on updating the Overworld and Underground. ...And in case you missed it, that leaves only one area of the game that hasn't recieved a major update for a very long time.
-While I can hardly pretend to know exactly what such an update would entail, I can make some reasonable predictions, and suggest some cool ideas, more for the purposes of demonstrating what such an update could bring than offering a clear cut roadmap of features.
DESIGN PRINCIPLES ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Before I get into some ideas, it's important to keep in mind some basic design principles that define the End; so that we too can imagine how it could be enhanced and improved, without losing its existing feel. (Try and take some of these into consideration, and come up with your own ideas!)
Terrain ~ Each of the game's three dimensions are defined by extremely different Terrain; The Overworld, appropriately enough, has an interconnected overworld, with caves underground, and large land masses and bodies of water. The Nether exists exclusively underground, in molten, lava filled caverns. And the End is unique in that it has a sky-world sort of generation, with large and small floating islands. ...This should be pretty obvious, but it's still very much the most basic building block of worldbuilding, no pun intended.
Gameplay ~ Each dimension is also defined by distinct types of Gameplay; you play the game very differently in the Netherworld than the Overworld. In the Overworld, gameplay is governed by a daylight cycle; most biomes are relatively safe, especially to an experienced player; giving us a baseline for what 'ordinary' gameplay feels like. The Netherworld, on the other hand, is a hostile wasteland, filled with dangers and death around every corner. Nearly every mob in it is hostile or easily provoked, and even the most experienced adventurer needs to be extremely careful at all times.
The End has this aspect of danger- but it's a more ambient, brooding danger. You could certainly fall into the void... but ultimately, it feels empty and brooding. (This could be deliebrate, or simply a lack of content.) Most of the time players spend in the End is spent exploring barren wastelands. The threat of the void is always present... but never especially concerning.
...And of course, it's important to keep in mind that the End is a late game area, meaning it can have more powerful threats and risk reward scenarios.
Vibes ~ ...The hardest to define, obviously, but each dimension also has unique vibes. The Overworld resembles our own world, and thus tends to feel cozy and familiar, even peaceful. The Nether is the polar opposite, hostile, menacing, and rightfully hellish. The End's existing vibes make it feel empty, strange, barren, even transcendent; and it's important to try and keep this feeling in mind for anything we add. (It's also interesting to note that Minecraft Dungeons already gives us something of a vision for what an improved End could look like- or, at the very least, something to go off of.
Before I continue, I'd again like to reiterate that these aren't set-in-stone ideas, so much as a thought experiment as to what such an update could add.
So without further ado;
ASSORTED IDEAS ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
New Terrain ~ 1.18 has had me thinking about terrain a lot, and how some of the ideas from that update could be applied to a Skyworld. Consider this:
Right now, the End mostly consists of large, scattered chunks of Endstone. Relatively flat and barren. New terrain variation could be added, like the Overworld, seperate from biome generation. In the simplest sense, terrain factors could include Size, & Verticality. The combination of these two could create four extremes of terrain, with a variety of types in the middle:
Wastes ~ Existing terrain type; when size is high, and verticality is low, the result is large, relatively flat landmasses, scattered a good distance apart, without much terrain generation. This would likely be the most common type, given as players are already quite used to it.
Archipelagos ~ Occurs when both size and verticality are low, an archipeligo is a series of much smaller islands clustered close together, with relatively ordinary terrain.
Mountains ~ Occurs when both size and verticality are high, mountains consist of enormous, towering landmasses of awesome size; difficult to traverse, but epic to encounter.
Pillars ~ Inspired by some of the Better End Mod's generation, high verticality and low size can result in small but tall pillar shaped islands, with more isles above or below the main line of generation- especially with other biomes generating here, this sort of shattered terrain could be extremely interesting.
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New Materials ~ And as long as the End is getting better generation, what about new materials? (Remember when the Nether consisted more or less exclusively of Netherrack?) On the simplest level, we could add a new variety of Endstone: Strongstone, (For want of a better name), is a harder version of Endstone that generates in large veins that run through islands, while End Stone is still the primary material. It's essentially a condensed version of Endstone that can be crafted as such, and is highly blast resistant, but extremely difficult to mine quickly. Shattered Endstone is a new type of sediment that generates primarily in End Wastes; it is gravity effected like sand, (leading to precarious incidents where it generates over the void), and can deal small amounts of damage to players who run through or jump on it when not wearing boots, as well as considerable damage to things that fall on it; (it also gradually causes boots to lose durability, especially when running in it.) This stuff could definitely be a nuisance- or possibly a handy defense. You can also smelt shattered endstone into normal endstone, or produce it as a byproduct of using explosions on endstone.
Finally, End Iron can now be found commonly in most biomes; obviously, iron isn't hard to obtain in the Overworld, but adding an endstone variant similar to Nether Gold in that it only drops nuggets would allow players to reliably obtain iron in the end, making it easier to set up a more permanent base.
...And of course, new biomes will probably necessitate new materials...
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New Ore ~ There's currently no good reason at all to mine in the End; there aren't even caves. That could be remedied, however, with a new ore.
Let me just be clear that this shouldn't be something 'even better than netherite,' there's no point in simply adding a slightly more durable, more powerful toolset.
Instead, players can find Etherite, (Ether, of course, meaning sky or heavens), generating semi-commonly in the End Wastes, but NOT other biomes. This violet-teal material sort of resembles the elytra, and only ever drops a single Etherite Shard when mined, regardless of fortune. It has several unique properties:
Combining four etherite shards with four ancient debris creates a single 'Ascended Ingot.' (Please let me know if you can think of a better name. A smithing table can combine such an ingot with a diamond tool or piece of equipment to create an Ascended version. The ascended version has the same properties of diamond, save for two factors; they can be enchanted better than gold; and better yet, cannot be lost. They do not despawn when dropped, and if the player dies, they remain in their inventory. Hence, while Netherite tools are more powerful; Ascended tools can be made more specialized with enchantments, and are even harder to lose- despite their considerable cost.
Nine Etherite shards can be used to make Ether Blocks, which count as a metal block that can be used for beacons. Etherite blocks can furthermore be turned into Etherite Bricks, and Slab, Stair, and Wall variants. The Catch? Ether Blocks are invisible- or at least, partly so. They become visible on impact- that is, if an entity is walking on them, if they're being broken, if a projectile hits them, or if they're powered by redstone. Otherwise, they can only be seen using a night vision potion, or a special enchantment. In this manner, you could hide a bridge, wall, or even an entire base- purely because it seemingly isn't there. Ordinary mobs cannot see Etherite, and behave as if it isn't there- with the notable exceptions of Endermen. It's also pretty blast resistant, and more difficult to mine for those who aren't using night vision or the required enchantment. And finally, Etherite Shards and redstone can make a Phase Block, which, unlike normal etherite, actually disappears when powered by redstone, leaving only a faint outline, and reappears as a solid block when no longer powered, allowing for some interesting traps or machines.
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New Biomes ~ Some vague ideas for new biomes; (again, trying to keep with the vibes of the End), are as follows:
Chorus Forest ~ Improvements to the existing Chorus Forest Biome; a new ground cover is added, (End Scrub), which is a purple, patchy growth that grows on top of Endstone, but does not spread unless bonemealing endstone adjacent to Scrub. Bonemealing End Scrub can grow End roots- a simple, purplish grass-like growth, and Dark Fungi, which could be used for some sort of new potion. Both End Roots and Dark Fungi are found occasionally in Chorus Forests, along with piles of Rotten Chorus, which can also be made by crafting four chorus fruit together. Rotten Chorus is an extremely compostable material. Finally, Chorus Lichen is a spotty purplish growth that adorns the exterior of Chorus islands, and also hangs down in sheets on the bottoms. It behaves sort of like a ladder- when a player comes into contact with it, they become stuck in place until they jump out, regardless of the lichen's orientation, allowing for some interesting parkour applications.
End Wastes ~ Improvements to the existing end wastes Biomes; including flatter, tiered terrain with large patches of shattered end stone, and occasional sparse patches of end roots. Etherite is exclusively found in this biome.
Dark Jungle ~ An uncommon biome that consists of a dense, twisted, overgrown jungle of giant, strange fungi-like structures tower over the jungle, dense undergrowth makes travel difficult, and twisting, giant vines overrun the island, and connect them to adjacent landmasses. In keeping with the more ambient environment of the end, instead of dangerous beasts, more ambient hazards such as thorny growths, or hostile flora would serve to keep less intrepid explorers out.
End Ruins ~ An extremely rare biome, consisting of a messy conglomeration of alien structures, made from purpur, endstone, and etherite. Not really a large structure, but rather an entire biome made up of mish-mashed structure components. While said ruins might have some extremely valuable materials, they could be guarded by dangerous purpur golems; hostile iron-golem like beings with a devastating laser attack, and the ability to phase through walls.
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New Structure ~ ...And last but not least, one of my favorite ideas for the End; two new types of relatively rare structures; an Elytron Hive, and Elytron Nest. Elytron Hives are bulbous, floating structures that can generate inside other islands, made of rotten chorus, plated with armor plating made of endstone and strongstone. Elytron Hives would, (again), have some sort of valuable material inside, but are guarded by Elytron- dangerous, large alien insectoids that might just finally give Bane of Arthropods a proper use.
Endermite can now infest endstone and rotten purpur blocks in the same manner of silverfish. They infest the walls of Elytron hives to prevent players from simply drilling through. Elytron do not like them, and actively try and kill them, if not to the point of being distracted from the player.
Beetle Elytron are the regular type of Beetle- they scuttle around Hives, and try and pin down invaders, doing a small bit of damage as long as they hang on, and letting go when dealt damage. They can be fairly easily distracted, and even tamed using Chorus fruit; they also harvest nearby chorus plants and use the harvested fruit to feed other Elytron.
Striker Elytron are one of the more dangerous varieties; they are capable of flight, and, like Beetle variants, latch on to intruders- but in addition to doing damage, try and drop their catch from a considerable height.
Guardian Elytron are the most dangerous variant; they're large, fast, and deal quite a bit of damage. They aren't found in regular Elytron Hives though.
The Elytron Nest is a rare, large structure- it consists of a giant, floating conglomeration of rock, riddled with tunnels and infested with Endermite. Large chambers contain chorus plants, and other valuable loot. (Such as etherite?) Smaller hives encircle the main nest, and Guardian Elytron make raiding this place a considerable feat.
End Shipwrecks are larger versions of Endships that can occasionally be found wrecked in various biomes.
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What do you think? Feel free to share your own ideas regarding an End update. I included some (rough) concept art, some of which is a bit outdated... but it gets the idea across.
Cooking with Mindthemoods ~ Biomes ~ Archeology
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I do not see any point in a material with a higher enchantability unless you can actually get higher level enchantments, such as Protection V, Sharpness VI, or Unbreaking IV, and even then you are better off using Netherite in most cases (e.g. Sharpness adds 0.5 damage per level above 1 but a Netherite sword deals 1 more damage than diamond; the increased armor toughness of Netherite makes it better against higher damage sources and the specialized Protection enchantments can already hit the protection cap with as few as 1 piece with 3 pieces of Protection IV (level V enchantments would be more useful if you had a mixture of enchantments, but all Protection V would hit the cap anyway); Unbreaking III Netherite has more uses than Unbreaking IV diamond, especially on armor (there is a base 60% chance of Unbreaking having no effect so it can never be as good as even Unbreaking I on tools), never mind that Mending makes durability almost meaningless; and so on).
In fact, until TMCWv4 I didn't even allow its "amethyst" items to be enchanted on the table, with the reasoning that nobody would want to risk getting bad enchantments on such hard to obtain items, and even afterwards I enchant them solely by using books despite having an enchantability close to gold, which doesn't even necessarily give better enchantments; for example, somebody who played with my mod directly enchanted them, I assume at level 30, and got Efficiency IV, Silk Touch, Unbreaking III on a pickaxe and Sharpness III, Fire Aspect II, Knockback II on a sword, which are entirely possible to get on diamond (though they apparently buffed enchanting since 1.6.4; this tool shows that gold has twice the chance of getting Silk Touch in 1.16 than in 1.8; also, with the addition of grindstones it is more practical to directly enchant but if you want more than 2-3 enchantments and/or Sharpness/Efficiency V it is probably still easier to use books - the chance of getting Efficiency IV on gold is about 9 times higher than Efficiency V).
TheMasterCaver's First World - possibly the most caved-out world in Minecraft history - includes world download.
TheMasterCaver's World - my own version of Minecraft largely based on my views of how the game should have evolved since 1.6.4.
Why do I still play in 1.6.4?
I really don't understand why you presented those design principles. No shade, but all those things really go without saying.
Strongstone - This one's alright, but I see no point in it being gravity-affected like sand. Especially since The End is floating islands. Gravity blocks wouldn't fit in a place like that.
End Iron - I don't see too much of a point in this one, but I can't say it's "bad" by any means.
Etherite - This works, as I agree there should be a reason to mine in The End. The enchantment part sounds really overpowered. Especially coupled with the fact that Etherite tools don't leave you after death.
Ether Blocks - It sounds like a fun idea on paper, but sounds like it could get really annoying in practice. I can already see (or unsee) trollish invisible walls in a multiplayer server. Maybe if they're transparent instead of completely invisible.
Phase Block - Again, sounds fine if not entirely invisible. I know you mentioned an outline, but still sounds like it might cause problems like the Ether Blocks could.
All Biomes - They all sound good, though you should elaborate further on these golems.
Elytron Hive + Nest + Elytron - All sound okay.
Endermite - Sure, makes sense.
Beetle Elytron - I don't see any point in taming these things.
Striker Elytron - Sounds fine.
Guardian Elytron - Yeah, this is a lot of Elytron variants. Don't know if there should be that many.
Elytron Nest - Makes sense.
End Shipwrecks - Sure.
I can support most of this, except the invisible blocks part, and the Elytron Beetle taming part.
As I mentioned previously, enchantability is overrated; people do not enchant items like stone tools because they get bad enchantments but because they have very little durability and/or can't mine some blocks - despite having over 4 times the enchantability the only major difference between stone and gold is that gold can get Efficiency V and even that is a low chance - you are still much better off just combining two items with Efficiency IV or using books obtained by trading, fishing, etc*. Other enchantments are more likely but it is nowhere even close to a 4-fold difference, and it is even less for diamond vs gold. You'd also still have items which are inferior to netherite in every aspect (1 less damage, 8/9 the mining speed, 2/3 the armor toughness, no knockback resistance); much more of an issue is it is literally impossible to destroy the items, which will certainly never be added.
*Case in point - I enchanted a stone pickaxe at level 30 and got Fortune II, Efficiency IV, Unbreaking III - I then enchanted a gold pickaxe and it only got Efficiency IV, a second gold pickaxe got Fortune III but did not have Unbreaking, and only after enchanting a third time did I get overall better enchantments than the stone pickaxe. Just to be more representative I enchanted two more stone pickaxes, which again got similar enchantments as gold, including one just as good as the third gold pickaxe (Efficiency IV, Unbreaking III, Fortune III) - in order to really see a difference you'd need to enchant many more times and add up the number of times you got an enchantment (of interest, I had to enchant 6 more times, 9 total, to get a gold pickaxe with Efficiency V, and of those 6 only one had Fortune and two others only had one enchantment each):
TheMasterCaver's First World - possibly the most caved-out world in Minecraft history - includes world download.
TheMasterCaver's World - my own version of Minecraft largely based on my views of how the game should have evolved since 1.6.4.
Why do I still play in 1.6.4?
Maybe you could craft a potion of “true sight” or something with the dark fungi, that allows you to see the Etherite blocks and phase blocks but only partially, like very transparent.