Oh, a hoodoo is the geological term for a weathered pinnacle or spire of rock. In Minecraft, they're basically the tall columns of terracotta in eroded badlands biomes.
I decided to start this update here, and for a reason. This is where a lot changes. The first images sets the stage of the upcoming area well...
Time for climbing!
As I begin climbing, I stop and look behind me part of the way up.
I'm probably about a bit over halfway up here...
...And yet, the ground looks pretty far down! It's because this climb is pretty steep, and the surrounding terrain is flat and clear of stuff like trees.
Keep in mind that "ground level" immediately at the base of the mountain is already well above sea level. Compare it to the terrain in the far distance.
Something else caught my eye here and it was due to movement. Look a bit below and to the right of my crosshair. Is that... doggies!?
That moment at the end of Final Fantasy IX where Garnet rushes towards Zidane and, after already losing her necklace with the summoning jewel fragment, throws her crown on the ground like "forget this stuff slowing me down, what's ahead is more important"? Yeah, that was me rushing down a mountain taking periodic fall damage in my rush towards the dogs.
I tamed four of them and continued climbing towards the top.
The clouds here tell me I'm around an altitude of 200, and there's higher peaks ahead.
I estimate the peak here is about the soft limit of 256, since it's halfway between the two cloud layers (which are at 192 and 320 respectively).
Seeing more ahead tells me the whole area likely becomes more mountainous, and it does.
Here's a look back at the one I just climbed...
...And another to the South! I'm not heading that direction yet.
There was more these mountains had in store; a lot of caves! This is just the first of many soon to come...
Here's another look back at the very first mountain. Yes, I'll be showing multiple pictures of the same mountain as I come and go from different angles.
Crossing it on another spot yielded more wolves. I only need two of each dog... but I already had four, so you can guess what I did with these other two.
Here's another picture of the first mountain, and near where I first started.
To conclude the map would bring us near the area with caves.
Nobody can say I'm not showing caves now!?
The start of the next map had more...
It also had hints of more mountains.
The are wasn't solely mountains though. There were some vast stretches of eroded badlands spots.
And further North revealed an end to the badlands with a savanna. This was expected as the map to the North was savanna here, but this doesn't mean the badlands ends here as I'm heading South after this map.
It did offer some nice temporary Green contrast to the lifeless badlands biome.
Heading back into it, that large mountain approached. For now, I'd be going around it. There's a surprise in a later update when I have to truly cross this spot.
While I don't typically gather resources when exploring, I did do so with all the gold that was easily accessible, such as here.
To the Northeast, between two mountains, was a ruined portal, the first structure seen in a while.
I'll end the update here. There's a lot more coming from this area.
This will be a very short update, so think of it as a complimentary half update to the prior one as it finishes the map. It will allow me to shorten the following update and get this one up quickly after the last one. I really do need to catch up.
Season 5: Episode 6
The center of the map has a "lake" (really a small ocean) and it occurs on the boundary of a desert or badlands to savanna to forest or plains and transition. These hot to temperate transitions may be my favorite, especially if mountainous terrain is among it.
This echos how back in pre-1.7 versions, one of my favorite places to build was in a desert up against an extreme hills, and if plains was bordering the desert nearby it was better.
Regardless of terrain generation differences over the years, there's certain aspects I seem to favor.
I get my dogs into boats and then go to attach leads onto the boats, which actually turns out to be a problem. For whatever reason, when attempting to attach the lead onto the final boat, it would instead attach to the front dog in the boat. I was obviously missing the boat hitbox, but it took multiple attempts from all sorts of angles to avoid attaching it to the dog so it was getting mildly frustrating. Oddly, I didn't have this issue in the first two boats (nor after this point).
That's a perfect example of how my grievances aren't exclusive to older versions with more easily encountered bugs, and how newer versions are far from perfect as well. In general, they are better overall, but this was an example of an exception to that.
North of the Lake had a village (I was aware of this from peaking South from the map to the North on the previous outing). South was the badlands mountains.
The village was partially in the river, which cut through higher altitude terrain. If I ever wanted to remodel a village that ran on a bridge, of sorts, over a river, this would be a good one to do that with. Whether I do that with it in the far future or not is uncertain.
The Northeast was hilly and forested, but this small spot caught my attention. A tiny jungle was surrounded by oak and birch forest.
A larger, more proper jungle and sparse jungle were seen further East beyond the map, so the hot region continues to extend much further even if the desert/badlands ends. This hot region may be about as large as the one near my home region, which is quite massive too.
In the Southeast of the map was where the seemingly temperate (but probably actually hot) forest met the badlands mountains.
To conclude, I'd check the ruined portal I spotted at the end of the prior update. the contents may seem unexciting, but that's a fair bit of iron. Iron is always welcome as I use it for maps (among other things).
That makes for four complete maps. Four remain on this outing. The next map will be the one South of this one, and then I'll be heading West from there.
Some impressive badlands mountains there! Wooded badlands in particular is unique in the fact that it may the only biome where trees can be found in abundance above the normal cloud layer (even high-altitude biomes like groves seem to rarely reach this altitude). And congrats on finding the arguably least common wolf variant.
Something else I liked seeing were the narrow treeless valleys between the mountains — they really resemble dried-up river valleys.
Usually, terrain that is higher than a certain altitude seems to get assigned one of the "mountain" peak biomes, with the exception of shattered savannas.
Generally, it will be frozen peaks in a colder climate (snow and ice), jagged peaks in a temperate climate (stone covered by snow), and stony peaks in a hotter climate (just stone).
However, the conditions for desert/badlands seem to not have their own type so it just generates as wooded badlands. At least, that seems to be the case in badlands; I've never seen a "mountain" in deserts so it's possible the conditions for them can't even occur there.
I do believe those are where rivers would have otherwise generated.
As for the wolves... the one that is eluding me now is the one found only in savanna plateaus. I am finding plenty of savanna areas, but few seem to be plateaus, and when I do find them, they are small and don't have any wolves. Shattered savannas, if they can even generate with the wolves (I don't think they can?) haven't had any either.
Mountain peaks occur in areas with low(er) erosion, so you will generally not (or perhaps even never?) find them in or near high-erosion biomes like deserts and swamps. If there is any high-elevation terrain in an area with high erosion, which is fairly uncommon, it's usually in the form of windswept savanna or windswept hills, depending on the climate.
Badlands biomes can generate in areas with moderate to high erosion, so it's possible (but rare) to find mountain peaks bordering one.
The factor that determines the generation of wooded badlands doesn't seem to be elevation, but humidity. I was exploring around a hot dry region a while back and noticed that after crossing a river, the biome tag on the debug screen immediately changed from "river" to "wooded badlands," despite the low elevation of the surrounding land (the surface was around sea level) and the absence of trees and coarse dirt. Apparently, wooded badlands can generate at any elevation in more humid areas; it only appears like they are limited to high elevations because the layer of coarse dirt and trees (which distinguishes them from standard badlands) only spawns from y:97. Below this elevation, wooded badlands look exactly the same as standard badlands, but without the debug screen, which you disallow on your world, there is no way to tell.
As for the wolves... the one that is eluding me now is the one found only in savanna plateaus. I am finding plenty of savanna areas, but few seem to be plateaus, and when I do find them, they are small and don't have any wolves. Shattered savannas, if they can even generate with the wolves (I don't think they can?) haven't had any either.
That feels pretty ironic as the savanna plateau wolf was the first new variant I found. But there was a large ring of stony peaks near my base, completely encircled by savanna, so that made things quick and simple. I find standalone savanna plateaus to be small and uncommon; you usually find a much larger area of that biome (even if it doesn't physically look like a plateau) around mountain peaks.
Well, that gives me peace of mind that I won't have to slow down and look for any when I come across those biomes.
Edit: Also, that's interesting about the wooded badlands. It sounds like that's a case of "it technically happens, but doesn't in practice".
But I was mostly referring to how any terrain that generates as "mountains" in badlands doesn't have a peak type biome assigned to like it does elsewhere, so I observe that either the regular badlands or wooded badlands simply continue on and cover the top.
I begin the next map to the South by heading along the Eastern edge of the map. From here on, I'm moving completely West.
In the Southeast corner of the map, the badlands ends and the Greenery of plains and forest begins. There's a village here, and higher terrain is in the immediate corner of the map, hiding jungle and sparse jungle beyond it (to be pictured on the next pass down South).
I then begin my next pass North.
Here, I finally come across that mountain which I said holds something surprising.
For it's actually a ring of mountains!
Not a very large one, but it is. It's full of caves, and has a ruined portal as well. Speaking of which...
...It's not exciting, but it's not terrible.
The caves are a little more exciting.
I take some of the more easily reachable gold.
Heading back South brings me to the jungle. So the hot zone may continue (even the mountains do!), but the dry region ends here.
There's a ruined portal here too, but it had nothing worth showing.
On the next pass North, even the outside of the ring of mountains had caves cutting into them.
To the East, the cover of woodland badlands returns.
Atop a mountain, I ran into an entirely gold covered skeleton one morning Fitting, given the biome? I think it came from a cave since the area was littered with them, rather than spawning near dusk.
Unfortunately for it, I had half a dozen doggies with me, and it stopped running for one moment to attack me, which gave them enough time to close the gap. It didn't stand a chance.
The West teased more caves and wooded badlands.
Now, the jungle itself was directly pushing up against the badlands.
You can see how hilly the jungle was, and yes, these are effort to traverse.
I did find a rather well hidden jungle temple along the side of one of those hills, hidden behind a lot of tall trees and bamboo.
This view of the terrain gives an idea of why the temple was so well hidden.
Time for the final pass North. Still mountainous, but less jungle coverage. That's far easier.
Another ruined portal was found (that's three on this map), but it also had nothing worth showing.
By contrast, and just like the earlier time, the caves in the area were the more interesting thing.
That last one in particular had me wanting to go caving... but alas.
I'll end the update here. I carried forward part of the next update so that allows the next one to conclude the region. Yes, this update started the second half of the maps and it's already ending, but most of the noteworthy stuff was in this badlands region (which isn't done being shown).
The landscape variety you can get with badlands (mountains, spires, etc.) brings it near the top of my list of favorite biome groups.
Mountainous areas of jungle are indeed a struggle to traverse, and the situation becomes worse when you are travelling with animals. Whenever I climb down a steep jungle hill, I notice that my wolves often walk or teleport on top of a tree or bamboo stalk and accidentally push each other off, resulting in them taking considerable fall damage. Just something to watch out for.
Yes, I sometimes have to feed them to heal them, but it's not too bad. In especially steep terrain, I will sometimes leave them and return for them (as I believe I did with the village).
Season 5: Episode 8
Although three maps remain, this will begin the finale of this outing. Most of this update will cover one of those three maps too.
I watch the sunrise as I head in the opposite direction to begin the next map. There's more mountains ahead, but they are getting a bit smaller and are woodland covered, so this feels like I'm moving past the grandest area now.
This upcoming area, like many before it, had a lot of caves.
As I head South, there's the jungle again. As I have been moving West in the jungle portion, the trend has been that the terrain gets steeper, and now there's rivers.
Since the North is a little easier to deal with, even if it's not completely flat either, I decided to just do a West and East pass to get this out of the way in one go.
A ruined portal was found here. The contents weren't great, but it was some gold nuggets and a gold block.
Even down here, there were some caves.
Likewise, as it shifted back to badlands.
This valley captivated me because at first I couldn't see the connecting portion in the back, and then it came into view.
If I'm not mistaken, I found another four wolves here. If it wasn't here, then it was earlier, but by this point I now had ten dogs!
Climbing this also gave me good views, and more mountains ahead.
At the bottom was an easily accessible minecart. This ended up being very welcome.
At first, I thought the iron wasn't much of a reward, but the name tag is. I have few of them and am going to want many more. Once the world shifts to survival and I do more caving and can make trade halls, I will be set on those. until then, more are very welcome.
There was another ring of mountains here, but it was so small that it could be mistaken as one mountain with a small hollow in the center.
A surprise desert was encountered here. This confirmed the badlands was beginning to end, although the desert was actually small. It does eventually shift back to desert to the West, as I already know, but fragments of badlands does remain even to the very West. Maybe the opposite was going on here. I don't know.
The caves weren't done yet though.
The next map had relief at the Southern jungle portions; the terrain was getting flatter and the jungle was sparse now. This made exploration speed up a lot.
To the very South, the jungle even shifted to regular forest, and a ruined portal was found here. The chest had nothing worthwhile, but the portal itself had a gold block.
Like last time, I did a West to East pass along the Southern edge and it was mostly forest. Another ruined portal was found in the opposite corner as well. Likewise, no worthwhile chest contents but a gold block.
The rest of the outing wasn't all too noteworthy. The badlands ends and much of it was ocean along the North, and the South was forest or scattered islands.
So I finished and headed home with my ten dogs! This was a bit tough, actually.
By time I returned home, I finally had another map update...
I looked at it, excited for a moment that I finally has another long overdue hot and dry region on my map! And then, after a few seconds, I couldn't believe what I was noticing...
"Oh, come on! Again!? For real!?"
Those were just about my words. What is wrong with my world!? Haha.
Oh well...
That leaves the Western half of this micro region.
I like how the humidity system causes the badlands to shift to its wooded variant when bordering jungle; it creates a smoother, more natural transition.
Does it always do that? I thought I saw spots where it went from badlands right to jungle but maybe I'm mistaken.
Trying to split the content into updates is sometimes a struggle. I want to keep them short enough, while also making sure each update feels like it doesn't begin and end so abruptly. That doesn't always happen.
The next two outings are both very short (around 15 pictures each) so I'm considering merging them into one update. The updates after that are about 25 to 30 pictures each and work as I have them sorted. So there's 5 or 6 updates left to finish the region I'm in now.
Does it always do that? I thought I saw spots where it went from badlands right to jungle but maybe I'm mistaken.
Technically, yes. But since the terrain of wooded and standard badlands are identical at lower elevations (i.e. have no trees or grass), this transition only visibly occurs at higher elevations. Most of your pictures demonstrated it, though, since you were mapping a mountainous region.
For the next outing, I'll be heading West and doing three maps.
While I was out of the dry region that I just finished, it was still a hot region all the way over here.
I found this really tiny savanna in the middle of a mangrove swamp. I've found this before (maybe it's not uncommon?), but last time it wasn't as small.
Like last time, there was a village, but unlike last time, this one was also in the swamp! That might come in useful for trades later?
In the North was another savanna in the clearing of a mangrove swamp, but this one wasn't entirely circled. It was on the shore of an ocean. This one also had a village.
Much of this map was mangrove swamp, which I didn't enjoy.
As I headed South though, even more of it was ocean, which I did because it made it much faster. There was enough ocean to allow me to continue mapping at night... and right over a water temple. Oops. I'm fairly sure I got the debuff but I forget.
A regular swamp meeting up with one of the many mangrove swamps I've been doing signaled the hot zone might finally be ending at this point.
In the furthest South of the final map there was taiga, so this was indeed shifting even cooler now.
A number of structures were found on this final map. First was a ruined portal... with a lot of golden carrots.
Very nearby was a shipwreck.
South in the ocean was another.
And while returning home (I missed it while mapping) was a witch hut.
The next outing will be another column of maps.
I was going to include it with this update since both are short, but I've been forgetting or losing motivation so I just did a short one.
I've never found savanna within a mangrove swamp before, only vice versa.
Coincidental that both clearings have villages. I particularly like the shot of the first village within the swamp; you can feel a sense of safety in a (seemingly) forbidding setting.
Swamp librarians exclusively offer Respiration, Depth Strider and Mending books. Since you already have the first two enchantments, you'll only need them if you decide to drop your restriction on Mending.
I've noticed that a lot of the dramatic terrain in your world seems to occur in taiga biomes. Wondering if this is intentional design, or merely coincidence.
Your reply reminded me I still have to get caught up. The last update was short, and so is the upcoming one, so I was intending to do a fast turnaround and... forgot.
And I think whatever conditions result in the shattered savanna biome also cause the taiga terrain like that? One just seems to be the biome result when it occurs where its warmer, and the other is the biome result where it's colder. That's my guess. So "same thing, different temperature". That's going purely on observation so it might only be partly correct, but there is definitely a recurring trend of it being those two biomes whenever that excessively wild terrain occurs.
I also noticed that both of those examples tend to occur right along (or at least near) ocean shores.
Oh, a hoodoo is the geological term for a weathered pinnacle or spire of rock. In Minecraft, they're basically the tall columns of terracotta in eroded badlands biomes.
Sorry for the slight delay.
Season 5: Episode 5
I decided to start this update here, and for a reason. This is where a lot changes. The first images sets the stage of the upcoming area well...
Time for climbing!
I'm probably about a bit over halfway up here...
...And yet, the ground looks pretty far down! It's because this climb is pretty steep, and the surrounding terrain is flat and clear of stuff like trees.
Keep in mind that "ground level" immediately at the base of the mountain is already well above sea level. Compare it to the terrain in the far distance.
Something else caught my eye here and it was due to movement. Look a bit below and to the right of my crosshair. Is that... doggies!?
That moment at the end of Final Fantasy IX where Garnet rushes towards Zidane and, after already losing her necklace with the summoning jewel fragment, throws her crown on the ground like "forget this stuff slowing me down, what's ahead is more important"? Yeah, that was me rushing down a mountain taking periodic fall damage in my rush towards the dogs.
I tamed four of them and continued climbing towards the top.
The clouds here tell me I'm around an altitude of 200, and there's higher peaks ahead.
I estimate the peak here is about the soft limit of 256, since it's halfway between the two cloud layers (which are at 192 and 320 respectively).
Seeing more ahead tells me the whole area likely becomes more mountainous, and it does.
Here's a look back at the one I just climbed...
...And another to the South! I'm not heading that direction yet.
There was more these mountains had in store; a lot of caves! This is just the first of many soon to come...
Here's another look back at the very first mountain. Yes, I'll be showing multiple pictures of the same mountain as I come and go from different angles.
Crossing it on another spot yielded more wolves. I only need two of each dog... but I already had four, so you can guess what I did with these other two.
Here's another picture of the first mountain, and near where I first started.
To conclude the map would bring us near the area with caves.
Nobody can say I'm not showing caves now!?
The start of the next map had more...
It also had hints of more mountains.
The are wasn't solely mountains though. There were some vast stretches of eroded badlands spots.
And further North revealed an end to the badlands with a savanna. This was expected as the map to the North was savanna here, but this doesn't mean the badlands ends here as I'm heading South after this map.
It did offer some nice temporary Green contrast to the lifeless badlands biome.
Heading back into it, that large mountain approached. For now, I'd be going around it. There's a surprise in a later update when I have to truly cross this spot.
While I don't typically gather resources when exploring, I did do so with all the gold that was easily accessible, such as here.
To the Northeast, between two mountains, was a ruined portal, the first structure seen in a while.
I'll end the update here. There's a lot more coming from this area.
This will be a very short update, so think of it as a complimentary half update to the prior one as it finishes the map. It will allow me to shorten the following update and get this one up quickly after the last one. I really do need to catch up.
Season 5: Episode 6
The center of the map has a "lake" (really a small ocean) and it occurs on the boundary of a desert or badlands to savanna to forest or plains and transition. These hot to temperate transitions may be my favorite, especially if mountainous terrain is among it.
This echos how back in pre-1.7 versions, one of my favorite places to build was in a desert up against an extreme hills, and if plains was bordering the desert nearby it was better.
Regardless of terrain generation differences over the years, there's certain aspects I seem to favor.
That's a perfect example of how my grievances aren't exclusive to older versions with more easily encountered bugs, and how newer versions are far from perfect as well. In general, they are better overall, but this was an example of an exception to that.
North of the Lake had a village (I was aware of this from peaking South from the map to the North on the previous outing). South was the badlands mountains.
The village was partially in the river, which cut through higher altitude terrain. If I ever wanted to remodel a village that ran on a bridge, of sorts, over a river, this would be a good one to do that with. Whether I do that with it in the far future or not is uncertain.
The Northeast was hilly and forested, but this small spot caught my attention. A tiny jungle was surrounded by oak and birch forest.
A larger, more proper jungle and sparse jungle were seen further East beyond the map, so the hot region continues to extend much further even if the desert/badlands ends. This hot region may be about as large as the one near my home region, which is quite massive too.
In the Southeast of the map was where the seemingly temperate (but probably actually hot) forest met the badlands mountains.
To conclude, I'd check the ruined portal I spotted at the end of the prior update. the contents may seem unexciting, but that's a fair bit of iron. Iron is always welcome as I use it for maps (among other things).
That makes for four complete maps. Four remain on this outing. The next map will be the one South of this one, and then I'll be heading West from there.
Some impressive badlands mountains there! Wooded badlands in particular is unique in the fact that it may the only biome where trees can be found in abundance above the normal cloud layer (even high-altitude biomes like groves seem to rarely reach this altitude). And congrats on finding the arguably least common wolf variant.
Something else I liked seeing were the narrow treeless valleys between the mountains — they really resemble dried-up river valleys.
Usually, terrain that is higher than a certain altitude seems to get assigned one of the "mountain" peak biomes, with the exception of shattered savannas.
Generally, it will be frozen peaks in a colder climate (snow and ice), jagged peaks in a temperate climate (stone covered by snow), and stony peaks in a hotter climate (just stone).
However, the conditions for desert/badlands seem to not have their own type so it just generates as wooded badlands. At least, that seems to be the case in badlands; I've never seen a "mountain" in deserts so it's possible the conditions for them can't even occur there.
I do believe those are where rivers would have otherwise generated.
As for the wolves... the one that is eluding me now is the one found only in savanna plateaus. I am finding plenty of savanna areas, but few seem to be plateaus, and when I do find them, they are small and don't have any wolves. Shattered savannas, if they can even generate with the wolves (I don't think they can?) haven't had any either.
Mountain peaks occur in areas with low(er) erosion, so you will generally not (or perhaps even never?) find them in or near high-erosion biomes like deserts and swamps. If there is any high-elevation terrain in an area with high erosion, which is fairly uncommon, it's usually in the form of windswept savanna or windswept hills, depending on the climate.
Badlands biomes can generate in areas with moderate to high erosion, so it's possible (but rare) to find mountain peaks bordering one.
The factor that determines the generation of wooded badlands doesn't seem to be elevation, but humidity. I was exploring around a hot dry region a while back and noticed that after crossing a river, the biome tag on the debug screen immediately changed from "river" to "wooded badlands," despite the low elevation of the surrounding land (the surface was around sea level) and the absence of trees and coarse dirt. Apparently, wooded badlands can generate at any elevation in more humid areas; it only appears like they are limited to high elevations because the layer of coarse dirt and trees (which distinguishes them from standard badlands) only spawns from y:97. Below this elevation, wooded badlands look exactly the same as standard badlands, but without the debug screen, which you disallow on your world, there is no way to tell.
That feels pretty ironic as the savanna plateau wolf was the first new variant I found. But there was a large ring of stony peaks near my base, completely encircled by savanna, so that made things quick and simple. I find standalone savanna plateaus to be small and uncommon; you usually find a much larger area of that biome (even if it doesn't physically look like a plateau) around mountain peaks.
And no, shattered savannas don't have wolves.
Well, that gives me peace of mind that I won't have to slow down and look for any when I come across those biomes.
Edit: Also, that's interesting about the wooded badlands. It sounds like that's a case of "it technically happens, but doesn't in practice".
But I was mostly referring to how any terrain that generates as "mountains" in badlands doesn't have a peak type biome assigned to like it does elsewhere, so I observe that either the regular badlands or wooded badlands simply continue on and cover the top.
Season 5: Episode 7
I begin the next map to the South by heading along the Eastern edge of the map. From here on, I'm moving completely West.
In the Southeast corner of the map, the badlands ends and the Greenery of plains and forest begins. There's a village here, and higher terrain is in the immediate corner of the map, hiding jungle and sparse jungle beyond it (to be pictured on the next pass down South).
I then begin my next pass North.
For it's actually a ring of mountains!
Not a very large one, but it is. It's full of caves, and has a ruined portal as well. Speaking of which...
...It's not exciting, but it's not terrible.
The caves are a little more exciting.
I take some of the more easily reachable gold.
Heading back South brings me to the jungle. So the hot zone may continue (even the mountains do!), but the dry region ends here.
There's a ruined portal here too, but it had nothing worth showing.
On the next pass North, even the outside of the ring of mountains had caves cutting into them.
To the East, the cover of woodland badlands returns.
Atop a mountain, I ran into an entirely gold covered skeleton one morning Fitting, given the biome? I think it came from a cave since the area was littered with them, rather than spawning near dusk.
Unfortunately for it, I had half a dozen doggies with me, and it stopped running for one moment to attack me, which gave them enough time to close the gap. It didn't stand a chance.
The West teased more caves and wooded badlands.
Now, the jungle itself was directly pushing up against the badlands.
You can see how hilly the jungle was, and yes, these are effort to traverse.
I did find a rather well hidden jungle temple along the side of one of those hills, hidden behind a lot of tall trees and bamboo.
This view of the terrain gives an idea of why the temple was so well hidden.
Time for the final pass North. Still mountainous, but less jungle coverage. That's far easier.
Another ruined portal was found (that's three on this map), but it also had nothing worth showing.
By contrast, and just like the earlier time, the caves in the area were the more interesting thing.
That last one in particular had me wanting to go caving... but alas.
I'll end the update here. I carried forward part of the next update so that allows the next one to conclude the region. Yes, this update started the second half of the maps and it's already ending, but most of the noteworthy stuff was in this badlands region (which isn't done being shown).
The landscape variety you can get with badlands (mountains, spires, etc.) brings it near the top of my list of favorite biome groups.
Mountainous areas of jungle are indeed a struggle to traverse, and the situation becomes worse when you are travelling with animals. Whenever I climb down a steep jungle hill, I notice that my wolves often walk or teleport on top of a tree or bamboo stalk and accidentally push each other off, resulting in them taking considerable fall damage. Just something to watch out for.
Yes, I sometimes have to feed them to heal them, but it's not too bad. In especially steep terrain, I will sometimes leave them and return for them (as I believe I did with the village).
Season 5: Episode 8
Although three maps remain, this will begin the finale of this outing. Most of this update will cover one of those three maps too.
I watch the sunrise as I head in the opposite direction to begin the next map. There's more mountains ahead, but they are getting a bit smaller and are woodland covered, so this feels like I'm moving past the grandest area now.
As I head South, there's the jungle again. As I have been moving West in the jungle portion, the trend has been that the terrain gets steeper, and now there's rivers.
Since the North is a little easier to deal with, even if it's not completely flat either, I decided to just do a West and East pass to get this out of the way in one go.
A ruined portal was found here. The contents weren't great, but it was some gold nuggets and a gold block.
Even down here, there were some caves.
Likewise, as it shifted back to badlands.
This valley captivated me because at first I couldn't see the connecting portion in the back, and then it came into view.
If I'm not mistaken, I found another four wolves here. If it wasn't here, then it was earlier, but by this point I now had ten dogs!
Climbing this also gave me good views, and more mountains ahead.
At the bottom was an easily accessible minecart. This ended up being very welcome.
At first, I thought the iron wasn't much of a reward, but the name tag is. I have few of them and am going to want many more. Once the world shifts to survival and I do more caving and can make trade halls, I will be set on those. until then, more are very welcome.
There was another ring of mountains here, but it was so small that it could be mistaken as one mountain with a small hollow in the center.
A surprise desert was encountered here. This confirmed the badlands was beginning to end, although the desert was actually small. It does eventually shift back to desert to the West, as I already know, but fragments of badlands does remain even to the very West. Maybe the opposite was going on here. I don't know.
The caves weren't done yet though.
The next map had relief at the Southern jungle portions; the terrain was getting flatter and the jungle was sparse now. This made exploration speed up a lot.
To the very South, the jungle even shifted to regular forest, and a ruined portal was found here. The chest had nothing worthwhile, but the portal itself had a gold block.
Like last time, I did a West to East pass along the Southern edge and it was mostly forest. Another ruined portal was found in the opposite corner as well. Likewise, no worthwhile chest contents but a gold block.
The rest of the outing wasn't all too noteworthy. The badlands ends and much of it was ocean along the North, and the South was forest or scattered islands.
So I finished and headed home with my ten dogs! This was a bit tough, actually.
By time I returned home, I finally had another map update...
I looked at it, excited for a moment that I finally has another long overdue hot and dry region on my map! And then, after a few seconds, I couldn't believe what I was noticing...
"Oh, come on! Again!? For real!?"
Those were just about my words. What is wrong with my world!? Haha.
Oh well...
That leaves the Western half of this micro region.
Nice establishing shot at the beginning there.
I like how the humidity system causes the badlands to shift to its wooded variant when bordering jungle; it creates a smoother, more natural transition.
Does it always do that? I thought I saw spots where it went from badlands right to jungle but maybe I'm mistaken.
Trying to split the content into updates is sometimes a struggle. I want to keep them short enough, while also making sure each update feels like it doesn't begin and end so abruptly. That doesn't always happen.
The next two outings are both very short (around 15 pictures each) so I'm considering merging them into one update. The updates after that are about 25 to 30 pictures each and work as I have them sorted. So there's 5 or 6 updates left to finish the region I'm in now.
Technically, yes. But since the terrain of wooded and standard badlands are identical at lower elevations (i.e. have no trees or grass), this transition only visibly occurs at higher elevations. Most of your pictures demonstrated it, though, since you were mapping a mountainous region.
Season 5: Episode 9
For the next outing, I'll be heading West and doing three maps.
While I was out of the dry region that I just finished, it was still a hot region all the way over here.
I found this really tiny savanna in the middle of a mangrove swamp. I've found this before (maybe it's not uncommon?), but last time it wasn't as small.
In the North was another savanna in the clearing of a mangrove swamp, but this one wasn't entirely circled. It was on the shore of an ocean. This one also had a village.
Much of this map was mangrove swamp, which I didn't enjoy.
As I headed South though, even more of it was ocean, which I did because it made it much faster. There was enough ocean to allow me to continue mapping at night... and right over a water temple. Oops. I'm fairly sure I got the debuff but I forget.
A regular swamp meeting up with one of the many mangrove swamps I've been doing signaled the hot zone might finally be ending at this point.
In the furthest South of the final map there was taiga, so this was indeed shifting even cooler now.
A number of structures were found on this final map. First was a ruined portal... with a lot of golden carrots.
Very nearby was a shipwreck.
South in the ocean was another.
And while returning home (I missed it while mapping) was a witch hut.
The next outing will be another column of maps.
I was going to include it with this update since both are short, but I've been forgetting or losing motivation so I just did a short one.
I've never found savanna within a mangrove swamp before, only vice versa.
Coincidental that both clearings have villages. I particularly like the shot of the first village within the swamp; you can feel a sense of safety in a (seemingly) forbidding setting.
Swamp librarians exclusively offer Respiration, Depth Strider and Mending books. Since you already have the first two enchantments, you'll only need them if you decide to drop your restriction on Mending.
I've noticed that a lot of the dramatic terrain in your world seems to occur in taiga biomes. Wondering if this is intentional design, or merely coincidence.
Your reply reminded me I still have to get caught up. The last update was short, and so is the upcoming one, so I was intending to do a fast turnaround and... forgot.
And I think whatever conditions result in the shattered savanna biome also cause the taiga terrain like that? One just seems to be the biome result when it occurs where its warmer, and the other is the biome result where it's colder. That's my guess. So "same thing, different temperature". That's going purely on observation so it might only be partly correct, but there is definitely a recurring trend of it being those two biomes whenever that excessively wild terrain occurs.
I also noticed that both of those examples tend to occur right along (or at least near) ocean shores.