Tonight's story isn't very interesting and certainly isn't exciting, but at least it is short! I just wanted to get this written down as it is a fairly significant day in my world's history. I also make this post as something of an intermission between the first and second part of the "Shadowspire and the Twilight Watchtower" post.
The first time I sought out a stronghold was in 2014. Very unfortunately, my records don't show it, but it was almost certainly Aug. 28, Dragon's Death, the day I first slew the Ender Dragon on this world, and only the second time I had ever done so on any world. [EDIT: It was actually two days prior, Aug. 26: Pic 1, Pic 2.]
The second time I raided a stronghold was April 23, 2016. At that time, I also established a small outpost above it, but not without being brought to half a heart while also poisoned and without any weapons after I suddenly fell through a river bottom and into pitch black darkness surrounded by monsters.
(Above) Pretty well sums it up. Can't see anything. I'm hungered and poisoned. I have no weapons on my hotbar. I hear the clatter of bones, moan of zombies, chitter of spiders, and the wicked, haunting laughter of a witch. This is not good.
Tonight, I found the third and final (original) stronghold. Like the second one, this one was generated in version 1.8.
I'm seeking the same thing as I was last time: library book shelves. This time, they're for the enchantment station in the Twilight Watchtower, which is undergoing heavy renovations as I make it a full-fledged base of operations.
I don't want the bookshelves because I lack multiple double chests full of resources to craft them, but because I simply want bookshelves from a stronghold. All enchantment stations in Midgard are made from stronghold bookshelves. Of course it doesn't matter. Stronghold bookshelves are no different than any other. But, anytime I enchant a book, I know the bookshelves that surround me came from a stronghold.
These aren't books made from sugarcane pulp auto-farmed by a robot minecart below the castle sandwiched between the hide stripped off a defenseless cow's dead corpse. No, these are otherworldly gimoires liberated from a labyrinth guarded by monsters deep beneath the the world.
It's the same as the plain gray-and-white Illager banner that hangs on the wall of Old Tower. It's not that I can't make one, but then it wouldn't be a banner from a Woodland Mansion. That's its whole entire value, like I've said before:
The banners are easily craftable; it's just light gray with a white daisy. Unfortunately, it's plain, ugly, and contains no rare materials (like a creeper head, Notch apple, or even a wither skull). However, each of the decorations on display in Old Tower is a piece of memorabilia or a trophy of some sort. The banner would be of no value at all to me had it not been taken from a Woodland Mansion—that is the entirety of its worth. Now, when I look at it, I can say, "I found a mushroom island between here and the Woodland Mansion that banner came from."
Unlike the first and second stronghold, the trip to this one and the search for a library once inside went without a hitch. That doesn't make for a legendary tale . . . but it is what it is.
(Above) I started out at the Twilight Watchtower. I was worried that after having found two other strongholds, the eye would wander toward one of those making it difficult, but it ended up being the easiest to find yet. It took six eyes to find. I don't know if that's many or few. I have multiple double chests full of pearls and blaze rods, so it didn't really matter either way.
(Above) The eyes led me to a spot beneath that plains-colored swamp oak in the Brinemire Swamp. The Brinemire Grotto base isn't far to the right (west) of the screenshot. Those are the Olympian Mountains jutting out of the horizon to the south. I'm standing atop the Witherfell Mountains, named after the underground base to the north, the place in which I've killed all three Withers.
(Above) For some reason, I was surprised to see an oak door in a stronghold. As this world is locked in hard difficulty, I would never put a wood door in a place where zombies could tear it down. I realize that the stronghold designers don't share my concerns—it just struck me. In my opinion, spruce would look a lot better than oak in a Stronghold.
(Above) Here's what I came here to find! It took less than five minutes.
(Above) All the books have the same enchantment thanks to an old bug. Absolute garbage. After Witherbane, the max-enchant sword I use solely to kill wither skeletons and the Wither, I'll never again put Fire Aspect on a sword—not because it affects drops, but because the fire rarely does significant damage. However, at the same time, flaming mobs become a much greater threat to a player in melee. I wouldn't put Flame on a bow, either, but the tracer-like effect on arrows in flight balances its impracticality, and monsters out of melee range on fire are no more dangerous. Plus, they're easier to see. As for Lure, I have multiple max-enchant fishing rods, though I don't think I'll ever lose the first, "Lucky," due to Mending.
While I said the whole trip went without a hitch, I did manage to forget my Silk Touch axe back at Castle Midgard. So, I had to fly back there and fetch it. With rocket-powered elytra, it took less time to do that than use my pick to collect the shelves. The axe came out of an End city chest with "just" Silk Touch and Efficiency IV. As there's no difference (lacking Haste II) between Efficiency IV and V on an axe meant only for use on bookshelves, and as it's in no danger of running out of durability for the next ten decades, I never maxed out its enchantments. Just no need at all. The regular axe I carry is called Arborcide and is enchanted with Sharpness V, Fortune III, Mending, and Unbreaking III.
(Above) I only harvest the shelves in the center. I always leave the ones set in the walls. If times get tough in a couple years, I may change that policy, but it's more likely I'll strike out in search of a new stronghold many kilometers from home.
If you read through all of that, congratulations, you've reached the end!
I found your posts a couple of days ago and I'm hooked. I absolutely love the way simple desires and ideas have evolved to make such amazing buildings that seem to be both functional and beautiful. The way you weave a story into your worlds and buildings is really inspiring.
I have one question though. What is your process for adding each of those buildings on to the castle? In Minecraft I struggle to really feel like it's worth my time to make any more than a single tower in each location, but I love the look of a sprawling castle.
Once I learned the forum wasn't going to shut down, my urgency to work on this journal greatly declined. Instead, my efforts shifted to finishing a number of projects around the castle before the upcoming 5th birthday, July 2, 2019. You know, I have to clean the place up a bit for the anniversary—sweep the halls and such.
I'd like to manage to actually have some sort of "celebration" this go around. What I would really like to do is upload a short series of 10- to 20-minute videos giving a tour of the castle. I found that walking through the castle just briefly looking around with almost no commentary at all took about 45 minutes to do any sort of justice at all for the subject. That was the time it took me on my third attempt after the first one took just over an hour. Regardless, 45 minutes is too long. I wouldn't think anyone would set through that and listen to me blather about my Minecraft world. So, instead of one long video, I'd like to make a short series of the castle's various locations, the list of which has been in the Table of Contents for a very long time now. Looks like there's eight locations.
The original post is a work heavily in progress, but it's currently the place to go for an overview of the world. I'd like to answer questions and reply to individual posts, but it's late. I just have enough in me to make a short post.
This was once again going to be a What Have You Done Recently post, but I decided to format and post it here, instead.
***
Tonight, I took a brief respite from the labors of terraforming by gliding around just above cloud level, circling Bleach Bone Forest and the Olympian Mountains surrounding the castle. I still enjoy the simplicity of flying around, looking for an interesting place to explore. Usually, I'm looking for a fun new adventure in the deepest, darkest recesses at the bottom of a cave or edging along the sheer face of a ravine, lava bubbling far below me.
Most might consider it a boring waste of time, but sometimes I like to retrace my steps, enter a shadowy cave I've previously explored, but left only dimly lit, riddled with dark branches that still spawn monsters. I almost always know which routes I took because of my method of placing torches—I hang them on the right-hand wall, but I also have a number of idiosyncrasies when doing so. Often, I can tell a lot by the way in which a torch is placed.
I also leave a lot of signs for myself, usually just a date. It gives me a chance to reminisce, not just about Minecraft, but about life in general. A whole lot of changes have happened in my life in the five years since Midgard came into existence July 2, 2014. For example, since I started this world, my father was killed in a car wreck. I had returned to college late in life, and have since finished. I've moved across the country. I met my girlfriend and she moved in with me. I could probably go on, but I digress. This is the history of Midgard, not my autobiography!
As I was rocketing around tonight, I found a sign that I hadn't seen in a while; one dated March 20, 2016. That sounded familiar, but I couldn't quite recall the era in which it was placed. It was four days after I upgraded from Java Version 1.8.9 to 1.9, a significant change in Minecraft. With 1.9 came an off-hand and a redesigned combat system. The game was much different back then. For example, healing potions were commonly used and hunger had a whole lot less of an effect on combat against mobs. Shields didn't exist and weren't needed because skeletons weren't nearly such a threat. Hard to imagine monster AI was even worse than it is now.
But for me, the biggest change 1.9 brought was the introduction of elytra—but I hadn't yet acquired a set by March 20, 2016. No, turns out that would happen three days in the future as chronicled in my short journal, My Quest for Elytra Complete! (Pic Intense, End-Game Spoilers)
(Above) Just south of Castle Midgard and north of Hook Mountain on the ridge where the Olympian Mountains meet Bleach Bone's tree line, flying past the lava falls of Mount Doom (not the same as Leangreen76's Mount DOOOooom), the large cave mouth in the center-left of the screenshot is what caught my eye. However, I also noticed the three wooden fences touching my cursor in the picture. I would have placed those to tie a horse, so it's not hard to deduce I explored this area before elytra turned my equine transportation into little more than pasture ornaments. The chunk border errors in the picture are where 1.8 terrain meets 1.7. That was the only upgrade so far where I had any sort of issues with new chunk borders.
(Above) After landing, I jumped down into a crack in the ground to find this tree with a sign beneath it dated March 20, 2016 around the day I began constructing the castle's highest tower.
Seeing the tree in the cave tonight sparked a vague recollection of the day.
It might sound fanciful, but I remember wondering what it would look like growing inside a cave if the tree were really alive. It could get rain and reach sunlight through the crack in the ceiling overhead, but I'm not sure how nourishing the shallow and rocky soil would be. Still, I lived in Colorado where one can regularly see trees seemingly growing out of soil rock, and Colorado isn't the only place I've personally seen trees growing in caves. I day dreamed about it a little bit, then figured it was a nice enough area to do some light terraforming around the entrance from the surface and put up a horse tie-down outside.
It's only 750 meters to the castle, but that was a fair enough distance through rough country by horseback that I wouldn't come here often. Even at 32-chunk render distance, the Tower of Midgard isn't quite visible from here, but by elytra, of course, it's nothing at all to glide 750 meters on a whim. Even 7,500 meters isn't much of a trip anymore. Back then, I think I considered distances around 1,000 meters to be short, 3,000 to be medium range, 6,000 to be long range, 12,000 to be extra-long, and 20,000 or more to be epic. I rode more than 20 km to find a jungle, and I undertook that voyage in December of 2015.
Anyway, this is the type of thing that's important to me. I'm not a good builder. The castle is massive and imposing, but it's about as plain as can be. I've said it in my videos and wrote it many times: it's just a decorative traffic controller. I don't much enjoy mining or making redstone contraptions. Farming is a chore; I'm down to just one potato harvest in a real-time year. The adventures I take aren't all about slaughtering monsters or surviving the darkness. They're about finding something that sparks my interest in some way, either in my imagination or memory.
This tree reminded me of a good time in my life. I can still hear the river waves beat against the sandy banks, echoing in a cave and in my mind. In my memory, I was in my early twenties, siting on a rock drinking beer and watching the barges float down the Ohio river. My best horse—then a young filly—was tied not far away. We were all resting after a long horse ride in the rocky Shawnee National Forest. One of the things I remember about that cave was that it had a crack in the ceiling and a gnarled, tough old tree growing up in its center. It was a good time, and I enjoyed thinking about it. So, on March 20, 2016, I stuck a sign in front of that Minecraft tree knowing that if I were to ever return, it might spark that same good memory in me.
I was glad it did then, and I was glad it did again tonight. So, I took a screenshot and wrote this post real quick before bed.
***
It's a bit hazy now, but I think I fell asleep in my chair while proofreading the above post. I woke up a few hours later with a dry mouth, headache and some dizziness. I very nearly closed the browser window and turned off my computer, but I left it running until I next sat down at the computer. As if someone else had written it, I just now went over it well enough to turn at least turn incoherent ramblings into complete sentences, and clear out the personal lamentations one sometimes writes late at night when too deep in one's cup. Even though it's much to do about nothing, I'm going to go ahead and post it in hopes some reader out there might at least find some mote of entertainment in it.
At the same time, this post highlights the gradual divergence from the New Castle Era (Dec. 7, 2015 to May 29, 2016) and the Age of Flight (May 30, 2016 to July 11, 2017)—a dramatic transformation in my play style, accomplishments, and objectives. It isn't nearly enough to say the biggest difference between the two was that I rode horses everywhere in the New Castle Era and glided on eyltra using a Punch II bow for propulsion in the Age of Flight. Not to mention the big changes Java version 1.9 brought(!), the way I played, the things I did, and places I went were distinct.
More importantly, it strikes at the intangible quality that makes Midgard a special survival single player Minecraft world—and it's certainly not the castle! The rich history of its natural locations and my exploration of them in this large-biome world seed is what makes it a unique place. This thread is the chronology of that journey, so in that way, I suppose this post is as important as any.
Thanks a lot for reading. I appreciate the interest and replies and I promise some day I'll get around to answering questions and the like!
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My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
Once I learned the forum wasn't going to shut down, my urgency to work on this journal greatly declined. Instead, my efforts shifted to finishing a number of projects around the castle before the upcoming 5th birthday, July 2, 2019. You know, I have to clean the place up a bit for the anniversary—sweep the halls and such.
If you don't post again before the 2nd, HAPPY 5TH ANNIVERSARY!!
I'd like to manage to actually have some sort of "celebration" this go around. What I would really like to do is upload a short series of 10- to 20-minute videos giving a tour of the castle. I found that walking through the castle just briefly looking around with almost no commentary at all took about 45 minutes to do any sort of justice at all for the subject. That was the time it took me on my third attempt after the first one took just over an hour. Regardless, 45 minutes is too long. I wouldn't think anyone would set through that and listen to me blather about my Minecraft world. So, instead of one long video, I'd like to make a short series of the castle's various locations, the list of which has been in the Table of Contents for a very long time now. Looks like there's eight locations.
The original post is a work heavily in progress, but it's currently the place to go for an overview of the world.
(Above) Just south of Castle Midgard and north of Hook Mountain on the ridge where the Olympian Mountains meet Bleach Bone's tree line, flying past the lava falls of Mount Doom (not the same as Leangreen76's Mount DOOOooom), the large cave mouth in the center-left of the screenshot is what caught my eye. However, I also noticed the three wooden fences touching my cursor in the picture. I would have placed those to tie a horse, so it's not hard to deduce I explored this area before elytra turned my equine transportation into little more than pasture ornaments. The chunk border errors in the picture are where 1.8 terrain meets 1.7. That was the only upgrade so far where I had any sort of issues with new chunk borders.
I'm glad you've not been too hindered by the old chunk borders, they can be terribly troublesome!
(Above) After landing, I jumped down into a crack in the ground to find this tree with a sign beneath it dated March 20, 2016 around the day I began constructing the castle's highest tower.
More importantly, it strikes at the intangible quality that makes Midgard a special survival single player Minecraft world—and it's certainly not the castle! The rich history of its natural locations and my exploration of them in this large-biome world seed is what makes it a unique place. This thread is the chronology of that journey, so in that way, I suppose this post is as important as any.
Thanks a lot for reading. I appreciate the interest and replies and I promise some day I'll get around to answering questions and the like!
That's the beauty of long worlds like ours, every place/building holds a significant memory or event or just the history of how that area/place came to be! Instead of signs and dates mine s more just folders and folders by year of screenshots! So I can always look back on a certain date and see what I was doing then or how old a build is/when the last time it was developed.
Thankfully there hasn't been an update yet that has made me want to stick to keeping my world in one version I.E. 1.7.3/1.8/1.9. I always wonder if there will be one, I don't know if you feel the same?
Like Minecraft forums or interested in my world? Try My message board, it's better moderated because I run it directly and have run Internet message boards for 21+ years! Better software and I have much more control to keep the content more up to date. Free to join, 13 years+.
Again this year, I'm just too tired to do much with Minecraft. But, I did take pictures for the Old Fort Becomes Old Tower section of first post, adding another snapshot to the history books. Quite a noticeable change from last year on this day, with the retaining walls and terraforming behind the castle.
Here are the pictures I took, plus the same with shaders:
If you don't post again before the 2nd, HAPPY 5TH ANNIVERSARY!!
Thank you!
I'm glad you've not been too hindered by the old chunk borders, they can be terribly troublesome!
Thankfully, mine, unlike some of yours, are out in the wilderness. I consider them to be like interdimensional rifts where one reality meets another.
That's the beauty of long worlds like ours, every place/building holds a significant memory or event or just the history of how that area/place came to be! Instead of signs and dates mine s more just folders and folders by year of screenshots! So I can always look back on a certain date and see what I was doing then or how old a build is/when the last time it was developed.
So true! With more than 12,000 screenshots, I do the same.
Thankfully there hasn't been an update yet that has made me want to stick to keeping my world in one version I.E. 1.7.3/1.8/1.9. I always wonder if there will be one, I don't know if you feel the same?
I was greatly looking forward to OptiFine's release of 1.14 . . . Until they changed the patrol-spawning mechanics to all biomes. At the same time, having played a hardcore world in 1.14.2, I was looking forward to the Vindicators being included in the groups. Finally, something that could actually cause a little damage to a careless player in diamond armor! Why they took those out I have no idea. The traders look like they're going to be an annoyance as well.
All that aside, I think all of us with multi-year worlds are at least a little afraid each time a major update comes along.
As much as I despise Jeb and Mojang, that's due to the terrible, longstanding bugs and poor programming practices (among other reasons), not the creative direction the game is going. I've liked every update so far, even the ones I've skipped. The new combat update looks really promising. I've said it countless times: just make Minecraft combat Skyrim combat with the serial numbers filed off. All they had to do was make the weapons swing as fast as they can do damage . . . And that's what they did. Step in the right direction at least.
Uh-oh! 1 min to midnight! Posting!
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My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
Rants seldom go well on Internet forums. Instead of sympathizing, respondents often find ways to disagree with the complaint and focus on whatever detail doesn't fit their experience or match their opinion. Cunningham's Law probably has a lot to do with it, I think.
This is a rant, so I doubt it will be one of this journal's more popular entities, but it's also a very important part of my world's history, so I'm chronicling it.
Around midnight between July 7 and 8, I side-graded from 1.12.2 to 1.14.2 after about two hours of converting my world's 1.25 million chunks. I was eagerly anticipating all the new features of the game. Having listened to many of the big-name Minecraft Youtubers out there, I knew 1.14 was full of glitches and performance problems, but I believed I could look past its flaws.
I'm not sure if that's actually going to be the case.
While nothing looked wrong with 1.13 to me, I only play Minecraft about six months out of the year, and that version was released during my break. When I came back, I didn't want to immediately put forth the effort to retrofit my skeleton XP farm to the new water mechanics. At the same time, the I knew the game's performance took a hit, as usual, and I didn't see anything in the update that really interested me. So, I waited for 1.14, but then I saw the complaints and videos showing that the full release version was so rife with potentially world-damaging bugs that there was no way I was inflicting that on my five-year-old world. I know Mojang's programming practices are deplorable, but I've never seen them release an update in a such a sorry state. They should be ashamed. I know they aren't, but they should be.
Castle Midgard did not fare well in the transition, I would find. It uses a great deal of under-piston lighting because that's been the common way one lights wooden and cobble floors for practically as long as Minecraft has been around. Like carpets, pistons have always allowed light to pass through them. The last time Mojang was so callous to change that (I think in a 1.9 pre-release), I thought they listened to the community backlash on Reddit, but it turns out, the game's new-and-not-improved lighting system doesn't allow light to pass through pistons. Again, like carpets, transparency doesn't make sense, but there are a whole lot of aspects of Minecraft and how it handles light that doesn't make sense—at least the piston lighting allowed us to keep spawns from happening without spamming torches or covering the floor with garish blocks. So infuriating.
(Above) Before clearing the castle of its monster infestation, I went outside to look at my disfigured horses. There they are, my steeds of five years, but they don't look like the ones I knew all this time. Sorry, Kitt and Frostwind. Nothing I can do. Jeb can't fix the multiple glitches surrounding horses, but he could find time to change their model. Never mind that horses turn invisible when the player dismounts sometimes.
(Above) Back inside the castle, this was my first indication that something was wrong. There are NO places anywhere within the massive castle's walls that allow mobs to spawn. This central corridor and staircase was built in early 2016. I have never seen a mob other than endermen in it.
It was war inside the castle for the first time ever. That might sound fun, but it wasn't. It was heartbreaking seeing groups of creepers, skeletons, and zombies in Castle Midgard's halls. As all mobs have pitiful AI and are far to weak to ever hope to give a player with top-tier equipment a meaningful threat or challenge, it was also a slaughter. Ember Reach in one hand, Frost Fate in the other, I burned and hacked through the intruders like kindling. Thankfully, there were no creeper explosions, the only thing I worried about happening. I didn't take pictures because I knew I would never be able to look at them without my blood boiling. Just walking through the castle doing nothing at all takes about 45 minutes to enter every room, but only a few of them—the biggest chambers, mainly—are lit by piston lighting.
The villagers in the villager farm were safe being protected by two-block-thick glass bubbles—though the glass isn't for defense against zombies. Zombies can't get to them no matter what; both slabs and lighting prevent that. It's to keep them from disappearing due to the #1 most up-voted bug on the bug tracker, the only bug with 1,000+ votes; the bug that's been around since at least version 1.4.2; the bug that the community fixed six years ago but Mojang is too stupid, too lazy, and too apathetic to do the same: MC-2025. So, I wasn't worried about the villagers, but I did go to check on them.
Of course, they're now all brown coats, including my Mending vendor, so I was none too happy about that.
At least I don't think it's that big of a deal considering how terribly easy the new mechanics make changing their profession. I've watched videos and seen several posts on Reddit about getting Mending vendors down to single-digit prices (even 1 emerald) with ease.
I'll move on before I blow a gasket.
(Above) I knocked out more than a stack of pistons so that the light from the glowstone could shine again. The floors are riddled with open holes all throughout the castle.
Right now, Castle Midgard's appearance is heavily damaged. The largest areas were built around the concept of under-piston lighting. Carpet is no replacement for pistons and it doesn't help at all that an extended piston's wooden surface remains transparent as I only used the cobblestone side.
I'm not sure what I'm going to do about the situation. I'm not going to mod the game. I don't even like to use a texture pack, and it only consists of clear glass and reverting the game's green carpet back to its original hue before the "World of Color" update de-saturated it, doing the exact opposite of that update's stated purpose. I'm not going to retire the world, either . . . but I am considering sticking with 1.12.2 or at least skipping 1.14.
The chunk loading performance is just inexcusable, even with OptiFine. The rubber banding and block lag is unbelievable considering this is a single player game. My frame rate constantly bounces from around 400 to less than 40. It's ridiculous.
Add to all that the wrong direction the illager patrols took between 1.14.2 and 1.14.3 and I just don't know if I can put up with it all. We'll see.
Thanks for reading. I hope my next post is more positive.
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My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
Minecraft is not a difficult game by any stretch of the imagination. I cut my teeth on Ghosts & Goblins. A Google search made right now put that game on every single list of hardest games on the entire first page of results. I've beaten Doom ][ in a single life and I was a murderer in my teens on DWANGO where I deathmatched the likes of its front-man John Romero and at least one now-famous pro who I see was born one day after me. Skipping ahead more than a decade to the last time I played Call of Duty—or even held a controller—was years ago, but I was pushing a very high-300's SPM/2.5 KD or so. I've beaten Diablo II and Torchlight II, its easier spiritual successor, both in hardcore on the highest difficulty. Aging hands and waning reflexes keeps me from being the digital warrior I was decades ago, but no one who knows me would ever question I'm a talented and skilled veteran gamer.
I've hinted for a while here on the forums that I've been playing hardcore, but that's nothing new for me. I've always played hardcore when Midgard wore on my patience, and I've advised many to do the same when asked how I've maintained playing the same world for more than five years. It breaths fresh life into the game when softcore becomes a bore.
I've always wanted to legitimately slay the dragon in hardcore, but I've never seriously tried to do so. Despite having multiple worlds (at least three) where I could have challenged her, I've never made the attempt, though those worlds are all still around somewhere on a hard drive.
It's not a difficult battle; easy in fact. Getting there is tougher, but if one plays it safe and is willing to invest the time and effort, the dragon fight should be a snap.
Unless it's not. Any number of things can suddenly go very, drastically wrong. The dragon's wing buffet can swat one high in the air to crash onto the ground—or over the edge and into the endless abyss. Just getting to the island without being knocked into the void can be the hardest accomplishment in the game, and it was by far my biggest worry when, about three hours ago, I made my first attempt ever to slay the dragon in hardcore.
At eight minutes past midnight, July 28, 2019, I slew the Ender Dragon in legit vanilla hardcore in my large-biome world created 20 days and eight minutes earlier.
My last post to this journal was one of the darkest moments in Midgard's history. My great castle was invaded after Mojang perniciously rendered its longstanding defenses useless. It was a painful reminder that while I am an immortal in Midgard, there are gods more powerful than I, and that those gods are fickle and apathetic.
As I've said in this journal and elsewhere on these forums many times, the castle that stands at what was once the center of my world is not its most important feature. However, it's far from inconsequential! It's my home and the seat of my power; it fuels my adventures and is the jewel of my crown. Lighting is the most vital priority of any build in Minecraft, and cobble is one of if not the most common building material; to take away a lighting method that's been around since before release 1.0 with matching aesthetics to cobble and other stone would be downright stupid of Mojang, so I wasn't expecting it to be removed. A chill ran down my spine when they did so without warning in a snapshot, but I thought the outcry settled that as a bad idea. I was wrong. Unfortunately, much of Castle Midgard was designed around under-piston lighting, so Mojang's absurd and reckless aberration was devastating.
I strongly considered abandoning my world, but then I had an idea. I remade Midgard as a hardcore world. Using Midgard's seed, I started a new large-biome world in 1.14.2 and began anew.
Furthermore, I decided to raise the ante. This time, I wouldn't just quit when I felt like returning to Midgard on a whim, abandoning my hardcore endeavor. This is Midgard, a parallel reality chained in fate to the other—if I die here, the original Midgard is likewise no more.
I swore I wouldn't return to Midgard Prime until after I slayed the Ender Dragon in New Midgard—and if I died trying, I could never return home.
Thankfully, the shadow has passed. I am ready to return home and attempt to salvage or repair the damage Mojang has wrought.
I recorded the fight in a 30 minute video which I will post when I get a chance. It won't be anytime soon, but I'm eager to share it. At the same time, I hope to upload a complete tour of the castle in version 1.12.2, before I upgraded to version 1.14.2.
Thanks again for reading my journal! I took several screenshots and will detail my hardcore adventure in New Midgard soon.
Until next time!
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My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
I'm not sure what you mean about the lighting - covering up a light block with something where light would normally pass through it i would assume? The upgrade to 1.14.2 isn't too bad, it's where I'll be staying for a while as there's nothing that makes me want to rush to 1.14.3 or 4.
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Until 1.14, light passed through pistons. Since some rooms in Castle Midgard are so large, much of my light must come from the floor, not walls or ceilings. I designed much of the castle to be lit by an upside-down piston with glowstone beneath it. The back of a piston looks very much like cobblestone, the same block I use for most of my walking surfaces, so there was no garish light blocks like glowstone or sea lanterns to draw the eye downward. As a builder, I'm sure you'll understand my concern; drawing the eye to a focal point is an important aspect in all aesthetics.
An example:
I could carpet over the blocks or use slabs or 1,000 other techniques which I've used in many parts of the castle—but that's not as desirable to me, and it's not how the castle was designed years ago, and it's not how it's been for the last few years. I have a lot of work to do, and as I was agreeing with you in your journal, in a large castle, you can't just change one thing; one change causes a chain reaction where a lot of things need reworked. I'm not even sure how I'm going to fix some of it.
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My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
Ooh i'm not sure, when you've got a mostly cobble floor there isn't really much that will compliment it where light will pass through. Both glass and leave blocks would look out of place, it's possible just to red carpet down the middles so it doesn't look too out of place but even then that would be entirely your call.
I might have a play in a test copy of my world and get back to you on that.
EDIT:
What about cauldrons?
As well as removing all torches from this room I made sure there were none in the empty space below as well.
EDIT EDIT:
Maybe add the cobble walls to hide them:
Only trouble with this is there'll be a bit of a bump when you walk over them :-/
Like Minecraft forums or interested in my world? Try My message board, it's better moderated because I run it directly and have run Internet message boards for 21+ years! Better software and I have much more control to keep the content more up to date. Free to join, 13 years+.
The reason I went with under-piston lighting rather than being forced to use more aggressive measures is because it's almost perfectly the same as cobble. I'm pretty sure it literally is cobble, but slightly darker shade with a dark outline. No matter what I use otherwise, it's going to be out of place. I'm either going to have to cover it with carpet, or go with another method of lighting or preventing spawns. Elsewise, I'm always going to see it as a flaw.
Thanks a lot for taking the time to help me out, though.
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My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
The reason I updated past 1.12.2 was because I read the (sometimes-permanent) lighting bugs in 1.14.0 were supposedly fixed in 1.14.1, along with all the other scary stuff like all items in chests, item frames, armor stands, etc., being deleted.
Here I am in 1.14.2 and all of a sudden half of Castle Midgard goes white light. Reading on Reddit, I'm not the only one to have this happen; people are still reporting the same in 1.14.4. Upgrading to 1.14.4 didn't fix (knew it wouldn't), nor did removing all light sources in the area and blocking it off. I already took 2 hours to optimize my chunks while deleting the cache. If they mean I have to remove all light sources in the chunk, there's no way. The castle goes down to bedrock.
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My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
MC day 260 or so in my large-biome hardcore world created July 8 with the same seed as my main world, Midgard, and I decided I would do some caving and mining below the current center of my operations. Located on the western edge of this world's version of Bleach Bone Forest, it's really more of a campsite than a "base."
However, what I'm seeking isn't located far below the ground, where I battle through endless caves, hack through spider-infested mine shafts, and edge along lava-bottomed ravines. Nevertheless, it's within the depths I pass three Minecraft days—an hour of game play—in my quest for a potion of slow-falling. That potion is made from phantom membranes, and those shrieking horrors come from the night sky high above me—but only after three days of sleeplessness.
I had never battled a phantom. Though I'd seen pictures, I'd never seen, nor even heard one in the game before. All I knew about them before tonight was that they fly and somehow appear in the sky if the player doesn't use a bed for three days.
Spoiler alert, I was in for quite a scare!
Captions are belowthe images.
After I emerged from the stairs down to the system of caves, ravines and abandoned mineshaft below my "base," I looked up to see a sinister black moon. I've always felt this should be when the monsters are strongest, though I realize it's the opposite.
I had no idea how many Minecraft days I had been below the surface. It didn't feel like an hour of real time to me . . .
. . . But it was!
As you can see from the above image, I'm desperately backpedaling away from the horrific flying menaces while holding two pick axes. What you can't see is that I'm also not wearing any armor! I was taking steak out of the ovens to repair my Mending picks!
Their first dive sent me running for cover, down half my hearts. I had no idea how rapidly they would return for more of my blood, so I scrambled to quickly don my armor.
The attack began after I heard this terrifying wail in my headphones. Having never head such a thing before, I was petrified; I had no idea what was going on. I looked all around, but not up! Mentally, I was in "safe mode" rather than "danger mode" and phantoms were far from my mind.
They made another strafing run just as I drew my weapon. This time, I met their dive with a slash of my diamond Sharpness V sword. One swing wasn't quite enough to down it, but it did make the damn thing turn-tail and start flying back towards its kind circling above me in the night sky. Before it could make good its retreat, I sprinted forward, jumped into the air, and batted it back down. Two hits and my first phantom was no more. The rest were soon to follow.
They look mean and sound really scary, but in the end, I (formerly) thought they did too little damage to be much of a threat. However, after now having looked at their wiki page, I see they do the same damage as endermen, so that's actually pretty good. Perhaps they're not very accurate? Their weird spawning mechanics seem to gradually allow a whole lot of them to spawn over time, especially if the player continues to skip sleep. The murder that spawned tonight had about five in it, I think. I can see them probably being a threat in larger numbers.
My prize for forced insomnia: nine membranes! Time to make some potions of slow-falling!
***
Though I probably consider my main base to be in this world's version of the Witherfell Mountains far to the north, I very well may have spent more time on the western edge of what would be Bleach Bone Forest in a small campsite:
The bamboo comes from a wandering trader who later mysteriously disappeared—villager authorities suspect foul play, but I swear I had nothing to do with it. I've never seen bamboo before in any world, and knowing this world, a jungle is probably some 25 km away.
The cows are my primary source of food, though I have potatoes. In my main world, I've eaten basically nothing but potatoes for five years. I forgot how saturating steak is! I might actually switch to it in my main world. I considered eating golden carrots, but couldn't really tell a difference between them and steak.
The cane was mainly for paper to make my first bookshelves, but now it mostly sells at market, though I keep a little back for firework rockets.
The food crops are all to sell for emeralds to use for enchanted books. Half of the fields are alternating rows of potatoes and wheat; the other half is carrots and wheat. (The way Minecraft works, you want to plant in alternating rows; it grows much faster.) I harvest with my Fortune III pick. In the first town I discovered in this world—and it's basically in the same location as the first town I discovered in my main world—I have a dozen or so master-level farmers who buy what I reap.
I make about a stack of emeralds each trip to town, though I'm very close to running out of things to buy. I have max-enchant armor, and with Mending, that means I'll never need another set. I'll eventually finish out the rest of my equipment, but haven't yet bothered with anything other than my two picks (one being Fortune III and the other Silk Touch). My Sharpness V sword ("Sworde") has Looting II; otherwise it's maxed out (minus Fire Aspect, which I don't want). Another Looting II or Looting III book has so far eluded me! My bow is simply Power V, Unbreaking III.
A view while gliding. The very western edge of Bleach Bone Forest surrounds three sides of the small "peninsula" of plains biome in which I am camped. That large oak tree to the right of the sugarcane pond is native, as is the smaller one by the crops. I built the obelisk before the camp and at one time, had a full enchanting station right beside it. The enchanting station was later moved to a base far to the north.
Obviously, everything in camp is placed haphazardly with basically no regard to aesthetics, though the brewing stand proudly displays my first ever (in any world) bottle of dragon's breath.
One might think, with this being a hardcore world, that I would want the defense and safety of four walls and a roof, not an open-sky camp! However, again, this being hardcore, if I'm not asleep in bed the instant the sun sets, it's intentional. I don't accidentally find myself doing something I can't immediately quit and go to bed. At the same time, the whole area is lit with torch spam, so none of the usual suspects can spawn anywhere near the camp. Other than the phantoms, I've never seen a monster from my work area.
Thanks for reading!
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That was a very exciting read. You are a fantastic writer!
All the exposure to outlandish monsters through videogames has completely dulled my senses to the excitement that can come from encountering new creatures. I'd never thought of phantoms as anything more than slow moving nuisances with useful loot. Your post casts a whole new light on them.
This got me thinking... Have you ever considered building archive in either your Hardcore world or in castle Midgard?
I've seen you leave plaques to mark events like your recent wither fight, and you have your first bottle of dragon's breath displayed on an item frame. What if all these objects were kept in a room documenting the historical moments of the world?
That was a very exciting read. You are a fantastic writer!
Thanks!
All the exposure to outlandish monsters through videogames has completely dulled my senses to the excitement that can come from encountering new creatures. I'd never thought of phantoms as anything more than slow moving nuisances with useful loot. Your post casts a whole new light on them.
Glad to hear. Now that I've met them, I won't pay them much mind either. I wholeheartedly agree that they should dive quicker. Their damage is good, but they need buffed, at least in hard/hardcore.
On that subject, I was flying around aimlessly a few days ago when I found a suspicious stew in a shipwreck's submerged hull. I'd never eaten one. I was vaguely aware they had a bunch of different, very-short-duration effects, and I knew some percentage were undesirable. I doubted it would kill me no matter what, but this is hardcore, so I felt at least a little twinge of doubt when I slugged it down.
Suddenly, the whole world went black except for an area around me, like a spotlight from the heavens was centered on my location. I later learned this was Minecraft's version of blindness, but it didn't seem at all like blindness. It was very eerie.
It occurred to me that it would be a really fitting status-effect attack for a phantom. Imagine how scary it would be to fight a swarm of phantoms if you couldn't see them until they came swooping out of a curtain of shadow only a few meters away!
This got me thinking... Have you ever considered building archive in either your Hardcore world or in castle Midgard?
I've seen you leave plaques to mark events like your recent wither fight, and you have your first bottle of dragon's breath displayed on an item frame. What if all these objects were kept in a room documenting the historical moments of the world?
Castle Midgard is just a decorative traffic controller. It's corridors take me from one immovable location to the next, but like "all roads lead to Rome," all its halls run to Old Tower. Old Tower is my "base." Castle Midgard in the environs surrounding Old Tower.
Old Tower is also where I display most of my sentimental ornaments as decorations.
However, each of the decorations on display in Old Tower is a piece of memorabilia or a trophy of some sort. The banner would be of no value at all to me had it not been taken from a Woodland Mansion—that is the entirety of its worth. Now, when I look at it, I can say, "I found a mushroom island between here and the Woodland Mansion that banner came from."
As further example, the equipment hanging on the walls (except the sword and bow) is all the first of its kind to run out of durability and hit the level limit for repair (and thus, other than the pick, likely the first diamond tools I ever made on any world). Of course, that was before Mending. They all would have been retired in 1.8.x, I believe, as I don't think I had any diamond tools in 1.7.10, the version in which the world was created. The bow is a Mending and Infinity "blank" and it replaced what I believe was my first "good bow." Of course, its value is that one cannot place Mending and Infinity together on a bow any longer, after the 1.12 update. The diamond sword is now the oft-mentioned Witherbane and it replaced what might have been my first. The jungle sapling in the pot atop the furnaces is from the first and only jungle found in this large-biome world. The dragon head is from the first End Ship I raided and the End City Banner is from the main tower of the first End City I conquered. The Totem is the first I ever collected. So on and so forth.
The suits of enchanted iron armor are made of mob drops, but I keep it available for use as I do wear it from time to time. Worth noting perhaps, one of the boots and one of the pants are Protection IV, Mending, Unbreaking III! The boots also have Depth Strider III. Missing Feather Falling IV, but otherwise god-tier iron.
Back when I wrote that in '17, I skipped mentioning the potted jungle sapling on the furnaces is from my epic journey to find the jungle back in '15.
I've never explicitly said so, but that's my first bed, furnaces, and crafting table of this world, too! I've never picked them up once placed with another in my inventory. First four frames hold the maps. First banner I ever made in any world. I'm still using my first set of elytra, "Wings"—those on the wall area backup but also stored there because that's where I formerly kept my first pair. I didn't always wear elytra once I first got them. Before rockets, and before I knew about Punch-bow flight, they weren't my essential method of transportation.
Other decorations are on display throughout the castle where appropriate. For example, the vault treasury is lined with enchanted diamond armor, all of which was enchanted in the End in version 1.8, back when enchantments were random.
In my hardcore world, I'm no where near so sentimental. I rarely put up signs. I never keep a journal whereas my main world's is always up-to-date. However, I do still have all my "first" tools and equipment, such as my wooden starter pick, as well as my first stone and iron ones. I made new ones, never repairing the first. Wish I had thought of that in my main world, but I never knew I'd still be playing it after five years!
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My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
Glad you made good on your 'threat'…
Evidently quite a different playstyle from my own, but interesting to see what time, dedication, and a very different 'take' on things will produce.
Quite like the design of the cloister/loggia in the last pic (although I'd want to it -proof against teleporting endermen) :cheers:
Tonight's story isn't very interesting and certainly isn't exciting, but at least it is short! I just wanted to get this written down as it is a fairly significant day in my world's history. I also make this post as something of an intermission between the first and second part of the "Shadowspire and the Twilight Watchtower" post.
The first time I sought out a stronghold was in 2014. Very unfortunately, my records don't show it, but it was almost certainly Aug. 28, Dragon's Death, the day I first slew the Ender Dragon on this world, and only the second time I had ever done so on any world. [EDIT: It was actually two days prior, Aug. 26: Pic 1, Pic 2.]
The second time I raided a stronghold was April 23, 2016. At that time, I also established a small outpost above it, but not without being brought to half a heart while also poisoned and without any weapons after I suddenly fell through a river bottom and into pitch black darkness surrounded by monsters.
Tonight, I found the third and final (original) stronghold. Like the second one, this one was generated in version 1.8.
I'm seeking the same thing as I was last time: library book shelves. This time, they're for the enchantment station in the Twilight Watchtower, which is undergoing heavy renovations as I make it a full-fledged base of operations.
I don't want the bookshelves because I lack multiple double chests full of resources to craft them, but because I simply want bookshelves from a stronghold. All enchantment stations in Midgard are made from stronghold bookshelves. Of course it doesn't matter. Stronghold bookshelves are no different than any other. But, anytime I enchant a book, I know the bookshelves that surround me came from a stronghold.
These aren't books made from sugarcane pulp auto-farmed by a robot minecart below the castle sandwiched between the hide stripped off a defenseless cow's dead corpse. No, these are otherworldly gimoires liberated from a labyrinth guarded by monsters deep beneath the the world.
It's the same as the plain gray-and-white Illager banner that hangs on the wall of Old Tower. It's not that I can't make one, but then it wouldn't be a banner from a Woodland Mansion. That's its whole entire value, like I've said before:
Unlike the first and second stronghold, the trip to this one and the search for a library once inside went without a hitch. That doesn't make for a legendary tale . . . but it is what it is.
(Above) I started out at the Twilight Watchtower. I was worried that after having found two other strongholds, the eye would wander toward one of those making it difficult, but it ended up being the easiest to find yet. It took six eyes to find. I don't know if that's many or few. I have multiple double chests full of pearls and blaze rods, so it didn't really matter either way.
(Above) The eyes led me to a spot beneath that plains-colored swamp oak in the Brinemire Swamp. The Brinemire Grotto base isn't far to the right (west) of the screenshot. Those are the Olympian Mountains jutting out of the horizon to the south. I'm standing atop the Witherfell Mountains, named after the underground base to the north, the place in which I've killed all three Withers.
(Above) For some reason, I was surprised to see an oak door in a stronghold. As this world is locked in hard difficulty, I would never put a wood door in a place where zombies could tear it down. I realize that the stronghold designers don't share my concerns—it just struck me. In my opinion, spruce would look a lot better than oak in a Stronghold.
(Above) Here's what I came here to find! It took less than five minutes.
(Above) All the books have the same enchantment thanks to an old bug. Absolute garbage. After Witherbane, the max-enchant sword I use solely to kill wither skeletons and the Wither, I'll never again put Fire Aspect on a sword—not because it affects drops, but because the fire rarely does significant damage. However, at the same time, flaming mobs become a much greater threat to a player in melee. I wouldn't put Flame on a bow, either, but the tracer-like effect on arrows in flight balances its impracticality, and monsters out of melee range on fire are no more dangerous. Plus, they're easier to see. As for Lure, I have multiple max-enchant fishing rods, though I don't think I'll ever lose the first, "Lucky," due to Mending.
While I said the whole trip went without a hitch, I did manage to forget my Silk Touch axe back at Castle Midgard. So, I had to fly back there and fetch it. With rocket-powered elytra, it took less time to do that than use my pick to collect the shelves. The axe came out of an End city chest with "just" Silk Touch and Efficiency IV. As there's no difference (lacking Haste II) between Efficiency IV and V on an axe meant only for use on bookshelves, and as it's in no danger of running out of durability for the next ten decades, I never maxed out its enchantments. Just no need at all. The regular axe I carry is called Arborcide and is enchanted with Sharpness V, Fortune III, Mending, and Unbreaking III.
(Above) I only harvest the shelves in the center. I always leave the ones set in the walls. If times get tough in a couple years, I may change that policy, but it's more likely I'll strike out in search of a new stronghold many kilometers from home.
If you read through all of that, congratulations, you've reached the end!
Thanks for reading!
My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
My Quest for Elytra Complete! (Pic Intense, End-Game Spoilers)
[Journal & Pics] After a Year and a Half, I Finally Found a Jungle
FrozenCore: Hardcore Death; 3/20/15 to 5/3/15; Eight Weeks on a Frozen World in Pictures
Some fine evocative prose…
Worthy of special note:
Many a DM could benefit from learning to construct sush descriptions….
My Discord name is Stripe#9270
My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
My Quest for Elytra Complete! (Pic Intense, End-Game Spoilers)
[Journal & Pics] After a Year and a Half, I Finally Found a Jungle
FrozenCore: Hardcore Death; 3/20/15 to 5/3/15; Eight Weeks on a Frozen World in Pictures
I found your posts a couple of days ago and I'm hooked. I absolutely love the way simple desires and ideas have evolved to make such amazing buildings that seem to be both functional and beautiful. The way you weave a story into your worlds and buildings is really inspiring.
I have one question though. What is your process for adding each of those buildings on to the castle? In Minecraft I struggle to really feel like it's worth my time to make any more than a single tower in each location, but I love the look of a sprawling castle.
A castle tour video would be really interesting.
Once I learned the forum wasn't going to shut down, my urgency to work on this journal greatly declined. Instead, my efforts shifted to finishing a number of projects around the castle before the upcoming 5th birthday, July 2, 2019. You know, I have to clean the place up a bit for the anniversary—sweep the halls and such.
I'd like to manage to actually have some sort of "celebration" this go around. What I would really like to do is upload a short series of 10- to 20-minute videos giving a tour of the castle. I found that walking through the castle just briefly looking around with almost no commentary at all took about 45 minutes to do any sort of justice at all for the subject. That was the time it took me on my third attempt after the first one took just over an hour. Regardless, 45 minutes is too long. I wouldn't think anyone would set through that and listen to me blather about my Minecraft world. So, instead of one long video, I'd like to make a short series of the castle's various locations, the list of which has been in the Table of Contents for a very long time now. Looks like there's eight locations.
The original post is a work heavily in progress, but it's currently the place to go for an overview of the world. I'd like to answer questions and reply to individual posts, but it's late. I just have enough in me to make a short post.
This was once again going to be a What Have You Done Recently post, but I decided to format and post it here, instead.
Tonight, I took a brief respite from the labors of terraforming by gliding around just above cloud level, circling Bleach Bone Forest and the Olympian Mountains surrounding the castle. I still enjoy the simplicity of flying around, looking for an interesting place to explore. Usually, I'm looking for a fun new adventure in the deepest, darkest recesses at the bottom of a cave or edging along the sheer face of a ravine, lava bubbling far below me.
Most might consider it a boring waste of time, but sometimes I like to retrace my steps, enter a shadowy cave I've previously explored, but left only dimly lit, riddled with dark branches that still spawn monsters. I almost always know which routes I took because of my method of placing torches—I hang them on the right-hand wall, but I also have a number of idiosyncrasies when doing so. Often, I can tell a lot by the way in which a torch is placed.
I also leave a lot of signs for myself, usually just a date. It gives me a chance to reminisce, not just about Minecraft, but about life in general. A whole lot of changes have happened in my life in the five years since Midgard came into existence July 2, 2014. For example, since I started this world, my father was killed in a car wreck. I had returned to college late in life, and have since finished. I've moved across the country. I met my girlfriend and she moved in with me. I could probably go on, but I digress. This is the history of Midgard, not my autobiography!
As I was rocketing around tonight, I found a sign that I hadn't seen in a while; one dated March 20, 2016. That sounded familiar, but I couldn't quite recall the era in which it was placed. It was four days after I upgraded from Java Version 1.8.9 to 1.9, a significant change in Minecraft. With 1.9 came an off-hand and a redesigned combat system. The game was much different back then. For example, healing potions were commonly used and hunger had a whole lot less of an effect on combat against mobs. Shields didn't exist and weren't needed because skeletons weren't nearly such a threat. Hard to imagine monster AI was even worse than it is now.
But for me, the biggest change 1.9 brought was the introduction of elytra—but I hadn't yet acquired a set by March 20, 2016. No, turns out that would happen three days in the future as chronicled in my short journal, My Quest for Elytra Complete! (Pic Intense, End-Game Spoilers)
(Above) Just south of Castle Midgard and north of Hook Mountain on the ridge where the Olympian Mountains meet Bleach Bone's tree line, flying past the lava falls of Mount Doom (not the same as Leangreen76's Mount DOOOooom), the large cave mouth in the center-left of the screenshot is what caught my eye. However, I also noticed the three wooden fences touching my cursor in the picture. I would have placed those to tie a horse, so it's not hard to deduce I explored this area before elytra turned my equine transportation into little more than pasture ornaments. The chunk border errors in the picture are where 1.8 terrain meets 1.7. That was the only upgrade so far where I had any sort of issues with new chunk borders.
(Above) After landing, I jumped down into a crack in the ground to find this tree with a sign beneath it dated March 20, 2016 around the day I began constructing the castle's highest tower.
Seeing the tree in the cave tonight sparked a vague recollection of the day.
It might sound fanciful, but I remember wondering what it would look like growing inside a cave if the tree were really alive. It could get rain and reach sunlight through the crack in the ceiling overhead, but I'm not sure how nourishing the shallow and rocky soil would be. Still, I lived in Colorado where one can regularly see trees seemingly growing out of soil rock, and Colorado isn't the only place I've personally seen trees growing in caves. I day dreamed about it a little bit, then figured it was a nice enough area to do some light terraforming around the entrance from the surface and put up a horse tie-down outside.
It's only 750 meters to the castle, but that was a fair enough distance through rough country by horseback that I wouldn't come here often. Even at 32-chunk render distance, the Tower of Midgard isn't quite visible from here, but by elytra, of course, it's nothing at all to glide 750 meters on a whim. Even 7,500 meters isn't much of a trip anymore. Back then, I think I considered distances around 1,000 meters to be short, 3,000 to be medium range, 6,000 to be long range, 12,000 to be extra-long, and 20,000 or more to be epic. I rode more than 20 km to find a jungle, and I undertook that voyage in December of 2015.
Anyway, this is the type of thing that's important to me. I'm not a good builder. The castle is massive and imposing, but it's about as plain as can be. I've said it in my videos and wrote it many times: it's just a decorative traffic controller. I don't much enjoy mining or making redstone contraptions. Farming is a chore; I'm down to just one potato harvest in a real-time year. The adventures I take aren't all about slaughtering monsters or surviving the darkness. They're about finding something that sparks my interest in some way, either in my imagination or memory.
This tree reminded me of a good time in my life. I can still hear the river waves beat against the sandy banks, echoing in a cave and in my mind. In my memory, I was in my early twenties, siting on a rock drinking beer and watching the barges float down the Ohio river. My best horse—then a young filly—was tied not far away. We were all resting after a long horse ride in the rocky Shawnee National Forest. One of the things I remember about that cave was that it had a crack in the ceiling and a gnarled, tough old tree growing up in its center. It was a good time, and I enjoyed thinking about it. So, on March 20, 2016, I stuck a sign in front of that Minecraft tree knowing that if I were to ever return, it might spark that same good memory in me.
I was glad it did then, and I was glad it did again tonight. So, I took a screenshot and wrote this post real quick before bed.
It's a bit hazy now, but I think I fell asleep in my chair while proofreading the above post. I woke up a few hours later with a dry mouth, headache and some dizziness. I very nearly closed the browser window and turned off my computer, but I left it running until I next sat down at the computer. As if someone else had written it, I just now went over it well enough to turn at least turn incoherent ramblings into complete sentences, and clear out the personal lamentations one sometimes writes late at night when too deep in one's cup. Even though it's much to do about nothing, I'm going to go ahead and post it in hopes some reader out there might at least find some mote of entertainment in it.
At the same time, this post highlights the gradual divergence from the New Castle Era (Dec. 7, 2015 to May 29, 2016) and the Age of Flight (May 30, 2016 to July 11, 2017)—a dramatic transformation in my play style, accomplishments, and objectives. It isn't nearly enough to say the biggest difference between the two was that I rode horses everywhere in the New Castle Era and glided on eyltra using a Punch II bow for propulsion in the Age of Flight. Not to mention the big changes Java version 1.9 brought(!), the way I played, the things I did, and places I went were distinct.
More importantly, it strikes at the intangible quality that makes Midgard a special survival single player Minecraft world—and it's certainly not the castle! The rich history of its natural locations and my exploration of them in this large-biome world seed is what makes it a unique place. This thread is the chronology of that journey, so in that way, I suppose this post is as important as any.
Thanks a lot for reading. I appreciate the interest and replies and I promise some day I'll get around to answering questions and the like!
My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
My Quest for Elytra Complete! (Pic Intense, End-Game Spoilers)
[Journal & Pics] After a Year and a Half, I Finally Found a Jungle
FrozenCore: Hardcore Death; 3/20/15 to 5/3/15; Eight Weeks on a Frozen World in Pictures
If you don't post again before the 2nd, HAPPY 5TH ANNIVERSARY!!
I'd gladly watch those videos!
I'm glad you've not been too hindered by the old chunk borders, they can be terribly troublesome!
(Above) After landing, I jumped down into a crack in the ground to find this tree with a sign beneath it dated March 20, 2016 around the day I began constructing the castle's highest tower.
That's the beauty of long worlds like ours, every place/building holds a significant memory or event or just the history of how that area/place came to be! Instead of signs and dates mine s more just folders and folders by year of screenshots! So I can always look back on a certain date and see what I was doing then or how old a build is/when the last time it was developed.
Thankfully there hasn't been an update yet that has made me want to stick to keeping my world in one version I.E. 1.7.3/1.8/1.9. I always wonder if there will be one, I don't know if you feel the same?
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Like Minecraft forums or interested in my world? Try My message board, it's better moderated because I run it directly and have run Internet message boards for 21+ years! Better software and I have much more control to keep the content more up to date. Free to join, 13 years+.
16yrs+ only
Again this year, I'm just too tired to do much with Minecraft. But, I did take pictures for the Old Fort Becomes Old Tower section of first post, adding another snapshot to the history books. Quite a noticeable change from last year on this day, with the retaining walls and terraforming behind the castle.
Here are the pictures I took, plus the same with shaders:
Thank you!
Thankfully, mine, unlike some of yours, are out in the wilderness. I consider them to be like interdimensional rifts where one reality meets another.
So true! With more than 12,000 screenshots, I do the same.
I was greatly looking forward to OptiFine's release of 1.14 . . . Until they changed the patrol-spawning mechanics to all biomes. At the same time, having played a hardcore world in 1.14.2, I was looking forward to the Vindicators being included in the groups. Finally, something that could actually cause a little damage to a careless player in diamond armor! Why they took those out I have no idea. The traders look like they're going to be an annoyance as well.
All that aside, I think all of us with multi-year worlds are at least a little afraid each time a major update comes along.
As much as I despise Jeb and Mojang, that's due to the terrible, longstanding bugs and poor programming practices (among other reasons), not the creative direction the game is going. I've liked every update so far, even the ones I've skipped. The new combat update looks really promising. I've said it countless times: just make Minecraft combat Skyrim combat with the serial numbers filed off. All they had to do was make the weapons swing as fast as they can do damage . . . And that's what they did. Step in the right direction at least.
Uh-oh! 1 min to midnight! Posting!
My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
My Quest for Elytra Complete! (Pic Intense, End-Game Spoilers)
[Journal & Pics] After a Year and a Half, I Finally Found a Jungle
FrozenCore: Hardcore Death; 3/20/15 to 5/3/15; Eight Weeks on a Frozen World in Pictures
Rants seldom go well on Internet forums. Instead of sympathizing, respondents often find ways to disagree with the complaint and focus on whatever detail doesn't fit their experience or match their opinion. Cunningham's Law probably has a lot to do with it, I think.
This is a rant, so I doubt it will be one of this journal's more popular entities, but it's also a very important part of my world's history, so I'm chronicling it.
Around midnight between July 7 and 8, I side-graded from 1.12.2 to 1.14.2 after about two hours of converting my world's 1.25 million chunks. I was eagerly anticipating all the new features of the game. Having listened to many of the big-name Minecraft Youtubers out there, I knew 1.14 was full of glitches and performance problems, but I believed I could look past its flaws.
I'm not sure if that's actually going to be the case.
While nothing looked wrong with 1.13 to me, I only play Minecraft about six months out of the year, and that version was released during my break. When I came back, I didn't want to immediately put forth the effort to retrofit my skeleton XP farm to the new water mechanics. At the same time, the I knew the game's performance took a hit, as usual, and I didn't see anything in the update that really interested me. So, I waited for 1.14, but then I saw the complaints and videos showing that the full release version was so rife with potentially world-damaging bugs that there was no way I was inflicting that on my five-year-old world. I know Mojang's programming practices are deplorable, but I've never seen them release an update in a such a sorry state. They should be ashamed. I know they aren't, but they should be.
Castle Midgard did not fare well in the transition, I would find. It uses a great deal of under-piston lighting because that's been the common way one lights wooden and cobble floors for practically as long as Minecraft has been around. Like carpets, pistons have always allowed light to pass through them. The last time Mojang was so callous to change that (I think in a 1.9 pre-release), I thought they listened to the community backlash on Reddit, but it turns out, the game's new-and-not-improved lighting system doesn't allow light to pass through pistons. Again, like carpets, transparency doesn't make sense, but there are a whole lot of aspects of Minecraft and how it handles light that doesn't make sense—at least the piston lighting allowed us to keep spawns from happening without spamming torches or covering the floor with garish blocks. So infuriating.
(Above) Before clearing the castle of its monster infestation, I went outside to look at my disfigured horses. There they are, my steeds of five years, but they don't look like the ones I knew all this time. Sorry, Kitt and Frostwind. Nothing I can do. Jeb can't fix the multiple glitches surrounding horses, but he could find time to change their model. Never mind that horses turn invisible when the player dismounts sometimes.
(Above) Back inside the castle, this was my first indication that something was wrong. There are NO places anywhere within the massive castle's walls that allow mobs to spawn. This central corridor and staircase was built in early 2016. I have never seen a mob other than endermen in it.
It was war inside the castle for the first time ever. That might sound fun, but it wasn't. It was heartbreaking seeing groups of creepers, skeletons, and zombies in Castle Midgard's halls. As all mobs have pitiful AI and are far to weak to ever hope to give a player with top-tier equipment a meaningful threat or challenge, it was also a slaughter. Ember Reach in one hand, Frost Fate in the other, I burned and hacked through the intruders like kindling. Thankfully, there were no creeper explosions, the only thing I worried about happening. I didn't take pictures because I knew I would never be able to look at them without my blood boiling. Just walking through the castle doing nothing at all takes about 45 minutes to enter every room, but only a few of them—the biggest chambers, mainly—are lit by piston lighting.
The villagers in the villager farm were safe being protected by two-block-thick glass bubbles—though the glass isn't for defense against zombies. Zombies can't get to them no matter what; both slabs and lighting prevent that. It's to keep them from disappearing due to the #1 most up-voted bug on the bug tracker, the only bug with 1,000+ votes; the bug that's been around since at least version 1.4.2; the bug that the community fixed six years ago but Mojang is too stupid, too lazy, and too apathetic to do the same: MC-2025. So, I wasn't worried about the villagers, but I did go to check on them.
Of course, they're now all brown coats, including my Mending vendor, so I was none too happy about that.
At least I don't think it's that big of a deal considering how terribly easy the new mechanics make changing their profession. I've watched videos and seen several posts on Reddit about getting Mending vendors down to single-digit prices (even 1 emerald) with ease.
I'll move on before I blow a gasket.
(Above) I knocked out more than a stack of pistons so that the light from the glowstone could shine again. The floors are riddled with open holes all throughout the castle.
Right now, Castle Midgard's appearance is heavily damaged. The largest areas were built around the concept of under-piston lighting. Carpet is no replacement for pistons and it doesn't help at all that an extended piston's wooden surface remains transparent as I only used the cobblestone side.
I'm not sure what I'm going to do about the situation. I'm not going to mod the game. I don't even like to use a texture pack, and it only consists of clear glass and reverting the game's green carpet back to its original hue before the "World of Color" update de-saturated it, doing the exact opposite of that update's stated purpose. I'm not going to retire the world, either . . . but I am considering sticking with 1.12.2 or at least skipping 1.14.
The chunk loading performance is just inexcusable, even with OptiFine. The rubber banding and block lag is unbelievable considering this is a single player game. My frame rate constantly bounces from around 400 to less than 40. It's ridiculous.
Add to all that the wrong direction the illager patrols took between 1.14.2 and 1.14.3 and I just don't know if I can put up with it all. We'll see.
Thanks for reading. I hope my next post is more positive.
My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
My Quest for Elytra Complete! (Pic Intense, End-Game Spoilers)
[Journal & Pics] After a Year and a Half, I Finally Found a Jungle
FrozenCore: Hardcore Death; 3/20/15 to 5/3/15; Eight Weeks on a Frozen World in Pictures
Minecraft is not a difficult game by any stretch of the imagination. I cut my teeth on Ghosts & Goblins. A Google search made right now put that game on every single list of hardest games on the entire first page of results. I've beaten Doom ][ in a single life and I was a murderer in my teens on DWANGO where I deathmatched the likes of its front-man John Romero and at least one now-famous pro who I see was born one day after me. Skipping ahead more than a decade to the last time I played Call of Duty—or even held a controller—was years ago, but I was pushing a very high-300's SPM/2.5 KD or so. I've beaten Diablo II and Torchlight II, its easier spiritual successor, both in hardcore on the highest difficulty. Aging hands and waning reflexes keeps me from being the digital warrior I was decades ago, but no one who knows me would ever question I'm a talented and skilled veteran gamer.
I've hinted for a while here on the forums that I've been playing hardcore, but that's nothing new for me. I've always played hardcore when Midgard wore on my patience, and I've advised many to do the same when asked how I've maintained playing the same world for more than five years. It breaths fresh life into the game when softcore becomes a bore.
I've always wanted to legitimately slay the dragon in hardcore, but I've never seriously tried to do so. Despite having multiple worlds (at least three) where I could have challenged her, I've never made the attempt, though those worlds are all still around somewhere on a hard drive.
It's not a difficult battle; easy in fact. Getting there is tougher, but if one plays it safe and is willing to invest the time and effort, the dragon fight should be a snap.
Unless it's not. Any number of things can suddenly go very, drastically wrong. The dragon's wing buffet can swat one high in the air to crash onto the ground—or over the edge and into the endless abyss. Just getting to the island without being knocked into the void can be the hardest accomplishment in the game, and it was by far my biggest worry when, about three hours ago, I made my first attempt ever to slay the dragon in hardcore.
At eight minutes past midnight, July 28, 2019, I slew the Ender Dragon in legit vanilla hardcore in my large-biome world created 20 days and eight minutes earlier.
My last post to this journal was one of the darkest moments in Midgard's history. My great castle was invaded after Mojang perniciously rendered its longstanding defenses useless. It was a painful reminder that while I am an immortal in Midgard, there are gods more powerful than I, and that those gods are fickle and apathetic.
As I've said in this journal and elsewhere on these forums many times, the castle that stands at what was once the center of my world is not its most important feature. However, it's far from inconsequential! It's my home and the seat of my power; it fuels my adventures and is the jewel of my crown. Lighting is the most vital priority of any build in Minecraft, and cobble is one of if not the most common building material; to take away a lighting method that's been around since before release 1.0 with matching aesthetics to cobble and other stone would be downright stupid of Mojang, so I wasn't expecting it to be removed. A chill ran down my spine when they did so without warning in a snapshot, but I thought the outcry settled that as a bad idea. I was wrong. Unfortunately, much of Castle Midgard was designed around under-piston lighting, so Mojang's absurd and reckless aberration was devastating.
I strongly considered abandoning my world, but then I had an idea. I remade Midgard as a hardcore world. Using Midgard's seed, I started a new large-biome world in 1.14.2 and began anew.
Furthermore, I decided to raise the ante. This time, I wouldn't just quit when I felt like returning to Midgard on a whim, abandoning my hardcore endeavor. This is Midgard, a parallel reality chained in fate to the other—if I die here, the original Midgard is likewise no more.
I swore I wouldn't return to Midgard Prime until after I slayed the Ender Dragon in New Midgard—and if I died trying, I could never return home.
Thankfully, the shadow has passed. I am ready to return home and attempt to salvage or repair the damage Mojang has wrought.
I recorded the fight in a 30 minute video which I will post when I get a chance. It won't be anytime soon, but I'm eager to share it. At the same time, I hope to upload a complete tour of the castle in version 1.12.2, before I upgraded to version 1.14.2.
Thanks again for reading my journal! I took several screenshots and will detail my hardcore adventure in New Midgard soon.
Until next time!
My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
My Quest for Elytra Complete! (Pic Intense, End-Game Spoilers)
[Journal & Pics] After a Year and a Half, I Finally Found a Jungle
FrozenCore: Hardcore Death; 3/20/15 to 5/3/15; Eight Weeks on a Frozen World in Pictures
Congrats Sharpe!
I'm not sure what you mean about the lighting - covering up a light block with something where light would normally pass through it i would assume? The upgrade to 1.14.2 isn't too bad, it's where I'll be staying for a while as there's nothing that makes me want to rush to 1.14.3 or 4.
Closed old thread
Like Minecraft forums or interested in my world? Try My message board, it's better moderated because I run it directly and have run Internet message boards for 21+ years! Better software and I have much more control to keep the content more up to date. Free to join, 13 years+.
16yrs+ only
Thanks!
Until 1.14, light passed through pistons. Since some rooms in Castle Midgard are so large, much of my light must come from the floor, not walls or ceilings. I designed much of the castle to be lit by an upside-down piston with glowstone beneath it. The back of a piston looks very much like cobblestone, the same block I use for most of my walking surfaces, so there was no garish light blocks like glowstone or sea lanterns to draw the eye downward. As a builder, I'm sure you'll understand my concern; drawing the eye to a focal point is an important aspect in all aesthetics.
An example:
I could carpet over the blocks or use slabs or 1,000 other techniques which I've used in many parts of the castle—but that's not as desirable to me, and it's not how the castle was designed years ago, and it's not how it's been for the last few years. I have a lot of work to do, and as I was agreeing with you in your journal, in a large castle, you can't just change one thing; one change causes a chain reaction where a lot of things need reworked. I'm not even sure how I'm going to fix some of it.
My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
My Quest for Elytra Complete! (Pic Intense, End-Game Spoilers)
[Journal & Pics] After a Year and a Half, I Finally Found a Jungle
FrozenCore: Hardcore Death; 3/20/15 to 5/3/15; Eight Weeks on a Frozen World in Pictures
Ooh i'm not sure, when you've got a mostly cobble floor there isn't really much that will compliment it where light will pass through. Both glass and leave blocks would look out of place, it's possible just to red carpet down the middles so it doesn't look too out of place but even then that would be entirely your call.
I might have a play in a test copy of my world and get back to you on that.
EDIT:
What about cauldrons?
As well as removing all torches from this room I made sure there were none in the empty space below as well.
EDIT EDIT:
Maybe add the cobble walls to hide them:
Only trouble with this is there'll be a bit of a bump when you walk over them :-/
Closed old thread
Like Minecraft forums or interested in my world? Try My message board, it's better moderated because I run it directly and have run Internet message boards for 21+ years! Better software and I have much more control to keep the content more up to date. Free to join, 13 years+.
16yrs+ only
The reason I went with under-piston lighting rather than being forced to use more aggressive measures is because it's almost perfectly the same as cobble. I'm pretty sure it literally is cobble, but slightly darker shade with a dark outline. No matter what I use otherwise, it's going to be out of place. I'm either going to have to cover it with carpet, or go with another method of lighting or preventing spawns. Elsewise, I'm always going to see it as a flaw.
Thanks a lot for taking the time to help me out, though.
My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
My Quest for Elytra Complete! (Pic Intense, End-Game Spoilers)
[Journal & Pics] After a Year and a Half, I Finally Found a Jungle
FrozenCore: Hardcore Death; 3/20/15 to 5/3/15; Eight Weeks on a Frozen World in Pictures
The reason I updated past 1.12.2 was because I read the (sometimes-permanent) lighting bugs in 1.14.0 were supposedly fixed in 1.14.1, along with all the other scary stuff like all items in chests, item frames, armor stands, etc., being deleted.
Here I am in 1.14.2 and all of a sudden half of Castle Midgard goes white light. Reading on Reddit, I'm not the only one to have this happen; people are still reporting the same in 1.14.4. Upgrading to 1.14.4 didn't fix (knew it wouldn't), nor did removing all light sources in the area and blocking it off. I already took 2 hours to optimize my chunks while deleting the cache. If they mean I have to remove all light sources in the chunk, there's no way. The castle goes down to bedrock.
My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
My Quest for Elytra Complete! (Pic Intense, End-Game Spoilers)
[Journal & Pics] After a Year and a Half, I Finally Found a Jungle
FrozenCore: Hardcore Death; 3/20/15 to 5/3/15; Eight Weeks on a Frozen World in Pictures
MC day 260 or so in my large-biome hardcore world created July 8 with the same seed as my main world, Midgard, and I decided I would do some caving and mining below the current center of my operations. Located on the western edge of this world's version of Bleach Bone Forest, it's really more of a campsite than a "base."
However, what I'm seeking isn't located far below the ground, where I battle through endless caves, hack through spider-infested mine shafts, and edge along lava-bottomed ravines. Nevertheless, it's within the depths I pass three Minecraft days—an hour of game play—in my quest for a potion of slow-falling. That potion is made from phantom membranes, and those shrieking horrors come from the night sky high above me—but only after three days of sleeplessness.
I had never battled a phantom. Though I'd seen pictures, I'd never seen, nor even heard one in the game before. All I knew about them before tonight was that they fly and somehow appear in the sky if the player doesn't use a bed for three days.
Spoiler alert, I was in for quite a scare!
Captions are below the images.
After I emerged from the stairs down to the system of caves, ravines and abandoned mineshaft below my "base," I looked up to see a sinister black moon. I've always felt this should be when the monsters are strongest, though I realize it's the opposite.
I had no idea how many Minecraft days I had been below the surface. It didn't feel like an hour of real time to me . . .
. . . But it was!
As you can see from the above image, I'm desperately backpedaling away from the horrific flying menaces while holding two pick axes. What you can't see is that I'm also not wearing any armor! I was taking steak out of the ovens to repair my Mending picks!
Their first dive sent me running for cover, down half my hearts. I had no idea how rapidly they would return for more of my blood, so I scrambled to quickly don my armor.
The attack began after I heard this terrifying wail in my headphones. Having never head such a thing before, I was petrified; I had no idea what was going on. I looked all around, but not up! Mentally, I was in "safe mode" rather than "danger mode" and phantoms were far from my mind.
They made another strafing run just as I drew my weapon. This time, I met their dive with a slash of my diamond Sharpness V sword. One swing wasn't quite enough to down it, but it did make the damn thing turn-tail and start flying back towards its kind circling above me in the night sky. Before it could make good its retreat, I sprinted forward, jumped into the air, and batted it back down. Two hits and my first phantom was no more. The rest were soon to follow.
They look mean and sound really scary, but in the end, I (formerly) thought they did too little damage to be much of a threat. However, after now having looked at their wiki page, I see they do the same damage as endermen, so that's actually pretty good. Perhaps they're not very accurate? Their weird spawning mechanics seem to gradually allow a whole lot of them to spawn over time, especially if the player continues to skip sleep. The murder that spawned tonight had about five in it, I think. I can see them probably being a threat in larger numbers.
My prize for forced insomnia: nine membranes! Time to make some potions of slow-falling!
Though I probably consider my main base to be in this world's version of the Witherfell Mountains far to the north, I very well may have spent more time on the western edge of what would be Bleach Bone Forest in a small campsite:
The bamboo comes from a wandering trader who later mysteriously disappeared—villager authorities suspect foul play, but I swear I had nothing to do with it. I've never seen bamboo before in any world, and knowing this world, a jungle is probably some 25 km away.
The cows are my primary source of food, though I have potatoes. In my main world, I've eaten basically nothing but potatoes for five years. I forgot how saturating steak is! I might actually switch to it in my main world. I considered eating golden carrots, but couldn't really tell a difference between them and steak.
The cane was mainly for paper to make my first bookshelves, but now it mostly sells at market, though I keep a little back for firework rockets.
The food crops are all to sell for emeralds to use for enchanted books. Half of the fields are alternating rows of potatoes and wheat; the other half is carrots and wheat. (The way Minecraft works, you want to plant in alternating rows; it grows much faster.) I harvest with my Fortune III pick. In the first town I discovered in this world—and it's basically in the same location as the first town I discovered in my main world—I have a dozen or so master-level farmers who buy what I reap.
I make about a stack of emeralds each trip to town, though I'm very close to running out of things to buy. I have max-enchant armor, and with Mending, that means I'll never need another set. I'll eventually finish out the rest of my equipment, but haven't yet bothered with anything other than my two picks (one being Fortune III and the other Silk Touch). My Sharpness V sword ("Sworde") has Looting II; otherwise it's maxed out (minus Fire Aspect, which I don't want). Another Looting II or Looting III book has so far eluded me! My bow is simply Power V, Unbreaking III.
A view while gliding. The very western edge of Bleach Bone Forest surrounds three sides of the small "peninsula" of plains biome in which I am camped. That large oak tree to the right of the sugarcane pond is native, as is the smaller one by the crops. I built the obelisk before the camp and at one time, had a full enchanting station right beside it. The enchanting station was later moved to a base far to the north.
Obviously, everything in camp is placed haphazardly with basically no regard to aesthetics, though the brewing stand proudly displays my first ever (in any world) bottle of dragon's breath.
One might think, with this being a hardcore world, that I would want the defense and safety of four walls and a roof, not an open-sky camp! However, again, this being hardcore, if I'm not asleep in bed the instant the sun sets, it's intentional. I don't accidentally find myself doing something I can't immediately quit and go to bed. At the same time, the whole area is lit with torch spam, so none of the usual suspects can spawn anywhere near the camp. Other than the phantoms, I've never seen a monster from my work area.
Thanks for reading!
My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
My Quest for Elytra Complete! (Pic Intense, End-Game Spoilers)
[Journal & Pics] After a Year and a Half, I Finally Found a Jungle
FrozenCore: Hardcore Death; 3/20/15 to 5/3/15; Eight Weeks on a Frozen World in Pictures
That was a very exciting read. You are a fantastic writer!
All the exposure to outlandish monsters through videogames has completely dulled my senses to the excitement that can come from encountering new creatures. I'd never thought of phantoms as anything more than slow moving nuisances with useful loot. Your post casts a whole new light on them.
This got me thinking... Have you ever considered building archive in either your Hardcore world or in castle Midgard?
I've seen you leave plaques to mark events like your recent wither fight, and you have your first bottle of dragon's breath displayed on an item frame. What if all these objects were kept in a room documenting the historical moments of the world?
Thanks!
Glad to hear. Now that I've met them, I won't pay them much mind either. I wholeheartedly agree that they should dive quicker. Their damage is good, but they need buffed, at least in hard/hardcore.
On that subject, I was flying around aimlessly a few days ago when I found a suspicious stew in a shipwreck's submerged hull. I'd never eaten one. I was vaguely aware they had a bunch of different, very-short-duration effects, and I knew some percentage were undesirable. I doubted it would kill me no matter what, but this is hardcore, so I felt at least a little twinge of doubt when I slugged it down.
Suddenly, the whole world went black except for an area around me, like a spotlight from the heavens was centered on my location. I later learned this was Minecraft's version of blindness, but it didn't seem at all like blindness. It was very eerie.
It occurred to me that it would be a really fitting status-effect attack for a phantom. Imagine how scary it would be to fight a swarm of phantoms if you couldn't see them until they came swooping out of a curtain of shadow only a few meters away!
Castle Midgard is just a decorative traffic controller. It's corridors take me from one immovable location to the next, but like "all roads lead to Rome," all its halls run to Old Tower. Old Tower is my "base." Castle Midgard in the environs surrounding Old Tower.
Old Tower is also where I display most of my sentimental ornaments as decorations.
Back when I wrote that in '17, I skipped mentioning the potted jungle sapling on the furnaces is from my epic journey to find the jungle back in '15.
I've never explicitly said so, but that's my first bed, furnaces, and crafting table of this world, too! I've never picked them up once placed with another in my inventory. First four frames hold the maps. First banner I ever made in any world. I'm still using my first set of elytra, "Wings"—those on the wall area backup but also stored there because that's where I formerly kept my first pair. I didn't always wear elytra once I first got them. Before rockets, and before I knew about Punch-bow flight, they weren't my essential method of transportation.
Other decorations are on display throughout the castle where appropriate. For example, the vault treasury is lined with enchanted diamond armor, all of which was enchanted in the End in version 1.8, back when enchantments were random.
In my hardcore world, I'm no where near so sentimental. I rarely put up signs. I never keep a journal whereas my main world's is always up-to-date. However, I do still have all my "first" tools and equipment, such as my wooden starter pick, as well as my first stone and iron ones. I made new ones, never repairing the first. Wish I had thought of that in my main world, but I never knew I'd still be playing it after five years!
My short story-like journals; quick-and-easy reads:
My Quest for Elytra Complete! (Pic Intense, End-Game Spoilers)
[Journal & Pics] After a Year and a Half, I Finally Found a Jungle
FrozenCore: Hardcore Death; 3/20/15 to 5/3/15; Eight Weeks on a Frozen World in Pictures