Alright, so there's this idea I've been working on for the past few weeks. You heard me, weeks. Basically, it's boats. Boats than you can make bigger, slap a name on, armor, choose what propulsion system it has, and carry stuff in.
Full idea in spoiler:
Boats Evolved; bigger, modular boats (Watch out --- huge!)
Okay guys. Just a slight disclaimer, the explanation for this idea is going to be *HUGE*. The idea itself may be simpler, but the description will take a long time to explain. In a nutshell, it's bigger boats that are also modular.
So we'll start with a slight modification of a game mechanic. Otherwise, the idea won't work very well. So just keep in mind that in this idea, you can't push a boat around by standing on top of it. At least just for the higher-level classes, which we'll get to in a minute.
Also, upon entering a boat, a GUI will appear somewhere around the bottom-right or so that displays the ships 'health', and speed.
Before we go overboard (no pun intended), let's begin with some basic principles that can be applied to the current boat. Let's call it the Dinghy. You can't do too terribly much with the Dinghy, but you CAN do some things.
Dinghies can be crafted just like they normally are. However to modify a boat, a new tool will have to be brought into the game. Let's say it's a Hammer. Right-clicking on a boat with a hammer, granted you're the one that built it will open up a GUI.
Like I said before the abilities with the Dinghy are limited, so you have limited things that pop up in the GUI. All that displays for now is the hull, propulsion system, and their respective health bars. You can also give your boat its own custom name that appears on its hull (But this probably won't be for the Dinghy). You will also notice two numbers at the top. On the left (12/12), is the boat's hitpoints. I doubled their damage resistance because I thought it was kind of silly to kill a boat with one arrow. To the right (1) is the ship's base speed attribute. That is to say, the speed capability of a boat, excluding the propulsion system. Boat stats will vary upon each construction. Therefore someone can be proud of themselves if they have made a fast/strong ship.
Normally, you have your standard, nonreinforced plank hull. However, you could change that. Let's start with a Reinforced Wood Hull. In the crafting table, put in 9 pieces of log together to form a piece of Reinforced Wood Plating. Dinghies will probably only need one plate to reinforce themselves. Plating will probably not be stackable for gameplay purposes.
Reinforced wood will provide a higher defense for the dinghy. Two more types of hull include Steel and Gold. Steel Plating requires 4 Iron blocks in the crafting table, and Gold likewise. With a steel-plated hull, the boat can take considerably more damage than Plank or Wood. Steel hulls can possibly withstand lava. Gold plating is only slightly stronger than Reinforced Wood and is not feasible as battle armor. However, just in case you were thinking these hulls are easy to reinforce, keep in mind higher levels will need more plating as they get bigger.
When a boat is damaged, simply right-click with the Hammer to open up the GUI. There should be a slot for extra plating to go in should the ship need repair. To ensure fair fights, the repair will be timed, like a furnace. Each repair uses up the Hammer some. It would also be nice to see some sort of visual cue for an almost-destroyed ship, like fire or a broken, damaged texture.
And now, the propulsion systems.
With the default dinghy, you have your Hands. Hands for a dinghy are basically neutral, however they will be slower than in previous versions of the game.
An alternative solution, is craftable Oars. Oars are very maneuverable and faster than hands, however they do not grant a steady speed and require you to hold down the forward button whenever you want to move. They may even 'tire' you out more (using up more Hunger).
The last one for the Dinghy, is the sail. Sails can provide very fast speeds, however they have low thrust and are not easy to slow down and speed up easily. A steady speed is required for traversing around land-covered areas. Sails can also possibly be made with different colored wool, to help a boat stand out. Sails grant a steady speed as you can leave them unattended with very little deceleration.
So now we move on to a bigger boat. Not too terribly big, but we're getting there.
To construct larger ships and propulsion systems, you're going to need an alternative to the crafting table. Let's just call it the Shipwright. This block ONLY crafts boats and takes up more blocks of space.
I think for a new level of boat, you're going to need some Blueprints. Blueprints can most likely be created by interacting with the Shipwright by combining a blueprint (Or in this case, a solid Dinghy) and investing your Experience Points to come up with a new 'idea' for a bigger boat. The 'studying' is timed, again, like a furnace, and with each clump of EP filled, the progress bar is filled some. You can also find Blueprints in dungeons, but only rarely.
After that will be done, the Blueprints can be put in a separate slot, with another slot under it. The slot under it is for the wood required to build the boat. Every time you put more wood into the slot under it, the progress bar for the ship increases. I'm not sure if this should be the way but it sounds pretty good.
I think that for each class of boat, a bigger mast will need to be crafted. That, or just have one single mast that, for bigger boats, you need to pack in more Sails. Kind of like how plating works.
So now, the next level: the Skiff.
The skiff is *about* 2 1/2 times the length of the Dinghy. However, with the next level comes new features. First off is a second slot, a passenger seat if you will. But besides that, there are two more features.
Here, there will be special lots to place blocks at. These could be something decorative like gold blocks, or practical, like chests.
To place a block in there, logically you would right click on that one place with the block. It's possible the block lot will be highlighted by the Hammer to show you where you can place things. To get it out, leftclick with the Hammer and it will appear in your inventory. If blocks aren't your fancy, perhaps animals are. Here is where the extra space in the GUI comes in. There would be a list of all the entities in the boat. If they are NPCs, you can choose to move them to another slot, or evict them. You can also evict players,but not move them[amended].
With the Skiff, you have an additional propulsion system. I'm not sure about this one so I'm going to need you guys' approval. Essentially, it is a steam-powered paddlewheel. The steam engine will need to be powered by coal, which will either have a furnace-like GUI or not. It is also be slightly less maneuverable than the Sail. The steam engine, like Sails, grant a steady speed and can be left unattended. They have perfect acceleration, however they are much slower than Sails.
For armoring, the Skiff will need more plates to sufficiently armor the boat. Possibly two or three.
The skiff will most likely be the largest boat to successfully navigate shallow marshlands and the like.
Now, for the adventurous sailor, we're going to go one step up. Meet the Cog. The Cog is a fair-sized boat, but it is hardly big. What is does have though is a top deck large enough to walk upon. Now, we're going to introduce another feature. This time, the Cog will have a lower deck. You could be able to place a few blocks in that bottom deck, such as beds and chests. This will be good for long adventures. If you aren't spoiled, you would be happy with a Cog for your adventuring needs. Hands are now unusable.
For gameplay, an invisible, penetrable box will be in the interiors of the ship that hides water and its effects when water blocks go near it, but as soon as they leave the water blocks return to normal.
Now here, starting with the Cog, is the boat's main means of offense and defense. You guessed it, the Cannon. I believe the cannon could be made with a crafting table. To fire (And right now I'm making most of this up as I go along), you must first craft a Cannonball (Maximum of 16 allowed in hand), and right click on the cannon. The cannon will fizz for about 2.5 seconds or more before firing the cannonball. You must wait an additional second to fire again. To adjust the angle of a cannon, rightclick it (without a cannonball) to point the cannon up or down.
Now with ships and other entities, contact with the cannonball will just equal damage being dealt. But with blocks, there is a chance (Depending on their blast resistance) that the block being hit, and/or the blocks around it will be pushed forward and respond to gravity. And in rare cases, break upon falling.
That, or it would just be a weak form of TNT. But I like the former better. Mostly because it's my idea. Good gosh I think I'm vain or something.
So like I said, if you aren't spoiled, you would be happy with a Cog for your adventuring needs.
But sometimes, you ARE spoiled. Or, just requiring a bit more power. That's where the fourth level comes in, behold: the Carrack. Significantly larger than the other boats, this one can actually be called a ship. It has 3 decks. The first being the top deck (Which comprises of the main deck, quarter and poop, naturally), the second the gun deck, which to the back holds the captain's quarters, and the bottom deck is mainly for cargo. If the Carrack is steampowered the boiler room will be in there.
Oars are now unusable for the Carrack, as are Hands for Cogs. (The Oars for the Cogs would be weaker than on the Skiff and Dinghy, as would hands with the Skiff. However with the Steam engine and Sail, they just get faster with each level, with exceptions [amended])
Another neat thing you get to do with the Carrack is you get to live up to the naval definiton of a ship. On the Carrack, you can place another boat inside it for scouting/lifeboats. But it can only be a Skiff or Dinghy.
Okay, next one. Here we go.
(This level is optional. You guys tell me if it should be ingame.)
Now sometimes, your lust for power is so great no measly Carrack can hold it; not even when it is steel-hulled and armed to the teeth. No, you wish for the very seas to obey your will. Well, you psychopath, here's the fix for you: Feast your eyes sir, on the Galleon. Over twice the size of a Carrack, four long decks and plenty of guns, you would not want to war with this vessel. It is essentially a Carrack on steroids; bigger, stronger (but not faster [amended]), and scarier. But, slightly slower. Should you decide to armor it, keep in mind it will need 8 Platings to armor (Maybe more). And considering each plating requires 4 blocks to fill, you're going to need a LOT of iron.
When a ship finally loses all of it's 'health', it will sink to the bottom of the sea. Here, it is subject to despawn, but will stay there as long as there is a player near it. Although dangerous, it would then be available for looting, if you haven't plundered the ship while it was afloat already. < --- This entire paragraph is subject to discussion and alternative options. It's also been proposed that the ship turn into it's block counterpart, only leave chests, or like in the Amendment Posts, leaves a Ship's Bell that can serve as a savegame for your ship.
Now, I understand that such a feature is going to be *HUGE*, possibly requiring its own update, and would be just a massive undertaking. But I for one believe it will be an undertaking worth the effort. It would heighten the spirit of Minecraft adventure and exploration, people could trade vast amounts of resources over long distances, and plunder other ships for their booty. So I'm not 100% expecting this to be accepted entirely (But if it is, thankyouthankyouthankyou!), but in the future if any modders were curious about how to go about doing their ship mod, this could be a good example. But I really hope this would at least be seen by Mojang. Just two-thirds into completing this idea, I read an old tweet of Notch saying that he might add something like this in the future. So, if you are, this could be one of the ways to go about it.
Any questions?
Amendment Post 1:
- In the Shipwright GUI, the product slot of the boatbuilding section is now a button. I've updated the image.
- Craftable ship components should have been expanded. In addition to a Galley, an Anchor component (probably most vital) is also one of them. Also proposed by the community are tables, crows' nests (That basket thing on the top of masts), icebreakers, and if the NPC crew idea is implemented, a sea captain's desk to chart courses for the helmsman.
- I actually think you should be able to move players. I mean, if they actually decided to choose to lock themselves in a mob slot rather than move around freely I think the captain should be free to move them wherever.
Amendment Post 2:
- Galleons really shouldn't be the fastest ships out there, it would be unfair. Instead, their base speed capability should be a tiny bit slower than a Carrack, probably. Updated.
- Right clicking on a cannon without a cannonball could point the cannon up/down. Updated.
- Different types of ships that do not follow the linear 5-level path of upgrades. Instead, 'extra' ship blueprints could be found in dungeons in strongholds, but they would be rare. Could be a way to get Caravels and viking ships or whatnot.
- I'm not sure about the decay process of sunken ships. Perhaps after someone leaves the ship's general area, a timer starts and eventually the ship will despawn. Or maybe it just stays there forever but can be 'mined' away to recollect valuable materials.
Amendment Post 3 (Note: These are not as important as the first 2) :
- Flags. Although I'm sure colored sails can do a good job of faction identification, custom-made flags would be really great to have. They could be used outside of boats, too.
- Extra ammo types. The standard cannonball would be made of stone and gunpowder, but others could be made out of iron and other materials. The new usable fireball coming 1.2 would also make a neat incendiary addition. Other types can inclde grapeshot and chainshot.
- Sea monsters. Pretty straightforward, I'd like to see some minor sea bosses when roaming the sea. But in my opinion, they should be restricted to certain sizes of ships (Dinghies have no bosses). For example the ship the size of a Skiff would probably only get a shark or something, whereas something Cog-sized would get sharks and sea serpents, medium-sized ships like the Carrack would get sea serpents and maybe giant octopus (Will wrap tentacles around the ship and begin to tug down unless tentacles are damaged), etc...They are, however, uncommon.
- A ship's bell. Yes, they can be used as a normal bell, but there's something that makes them special. Once placed on a ship, it bears the ship's name and can ONLY be placed on that ship (e.g Bell of the S.S Whatchamacallit). Then, if a sunken ship despawns, that bell is turned into a block at the bottom of the ocean and contains all of the ship's data. Then, it can be used to recreate the ship.
- Sea obstacles. The ocean would be made that much better if occasionally you stumbled upon a mini-biome within an ocean. These could be mysterious sea rocks, or icebergs made of pack ice where a tundra or arctic biome would usually be.
Okay guys. Just a slight disclaimer, the explanation for this idea is going to be *HUGE*. The idea itself may be simpler, but the description will take a long time to explain. In a nutshell, it's bigger boats that are also modular.
So we'll start with a slight modification of a game mechanic. Otherwise, the idea won't work very well. So just keep in mind that in this idea, you can't push a boat around by standing on top of it. At least just for the higher-level classes, which we'll get to in a minute.
Also, upon entering a boat, a GUI will appear somewhere around the bottom-right or so that displays the ships 'health', and speed.
Before we go overboard (no pun intended), let's begin with some basic principles that can be applied to the current boat. Let's call it the Dinghy. You can't do too terribly much with the Dinghy, but you CAN do some things.
Dinghies can be crafted just like they normally are. However to modify a boat, a new tool will have to be brought into the game. Let's say it's a Hammer. Right-clicking on a boat with a hammer, granted you're the one that built it will open up a GUI.
Like I said before the abilities with the Dinghy are limited, so you have limited things that pop up in the GUI. All that displays for now is the hull, propulsion system, and their respective health bars. You can also give your boat its own custom name that appears on its hull (But this probably won't be for the Dinghy). You will also notice two numbers at the top. On the left (12/12), is the boat's hitpoints. I doubled their damage resistance because I thought it was kind of silly to kill a boat with one arrow. To the right (1) is the ship's base speed attribute. That is to say, the speed capability of a boat, excluding the propulsion system. Boat stats will vary upon each construction. Therefore someone can be proud of themselves if they have made a fast/strong ship.
Normally, you have your standard, nonreinforced plank hull. However, you could change that. Let's start with a Reinforced Wood Hull. In the crafting table, put in 9 pieces of log together to form a piece of Reinforced Wood Plating. Dinghies will probably only need one plate to reinforce themselves. Plating will probably not be stackable for gameplay purposes.
Reinforced wood will provide a higher defense for the dinghy. Two more types of hull include Steel and Gold. Steel Plating requires 4 Iron blocks in the crafting table, and Gold likewise. With a steel-plated hull, the boat can take considerably more damage than Plank or Wood. Steel hulls can possibly withstand lava. Gold plating is only slightly stronger than Reinforced Wood and is not feasible as battle armor. However, just in case you were thinking these hulls are easy to reinforce, keep in mind higher levels will need more plating as they get bigger.
When a boat is damaged, simply right-click with the Hammer to open up the GUI. There should be a slot for extra plating to go in should the ship need repair. To ensure fair fights, the repair will be timed, like a furnace. Each repair uses up the Hammer some. It would also be nice to see some sort of visual cue for an almost-destroyed ship, like fire or a broken, damaged texture.
And now, the propulsion systems.
With the default dinghy, you have your Hands. Hands for a dinghy are basically neutral, however they will be slower than in previous versions of the game.
An alternative solution, is craftable Oars. Oars are very maneuverable and faster than hands, however they do not grant a steady speed and require you to hold down the forward button whenever you want to move. They may even 'tire' you out more (using up more Hunger).
The last one for the Dinghy, is the sail. Sails can provide very fast speeds, however they have low thrust and are not easy to slow down and speed up easily. A steady speed is required for traversing around land-covered areas. Sails can also possibly be made with different colored wool, to help a boat stand out. Sails grant a steady speed as you can leave them unattended with very little deceleration.
So now we move on to a bigger boat. Not too terribly big, but we're getting there.
To construct larger ships and propulsion systems, you're going to need an alternative to the crafting table. Let's just call it the Shipwright. This block ONLY crafts boats and takes up more blocks of space.
I think for a new level of boat, you're going to need some Blueprints. Blueprints can most likely be created by interacting with the Shipwright by combining a blueprint (Or in this case, a solid Dinghy) and investing your Experience Points to come up with a new 'idea' for a bigger boat. The 'studying' is timed, again, like a furnace, and with each clump of EP filled, the progress bar is filled some. You can also find Blueprints in dungeons, but only rarely.
After that will be done, the Blueprints can be put in a separate slot, with another slot under it. The slot under it is for the wood required to build the boat. Every time you put more wood into the slot under it, the progress bar for the ship increases. I'm not sure if this should be the way but it sounds pretty good.
I think that for each class of boat, a bigger mast will need to be crafted. That, or just have one single mast that, for bigger boats, you need to pack in more Sails. Kind of like how plating works.
So now, the next level: the Skiff.
The skiff is *about* 2 1/2 times the length of the Dinghy. However, with the next level comes new features. First off is a second slot, a passenger seat if you will. But besides that, there are two more features.
Here, there will be special lots to place blocks at. These could be something decorative like gold blocks, or practical, like chests.
To place a block in there, logically you would right click on that one place with the block. It's possible the block lot will be highlighted by the Hammer to show you where you can place things. To get it out, leftclick with the Hammer and it will appear in your inventory. If blocks aren't your fancy, perhaps animals are. Here is where the extra space in the GUI comes in. There would be a list of all the entities in the boat. If they are NPCs, you can choose to move them to another slot, or evict them. You can also evict players,
With the Skiff, you have an additional propulsion system. I'm not sure about this one so I'm going to need you guys' approval. Essentially, it is a steam-powered paddlewheel. The steam engine will need to be powered by coal, which will either have a furnace-like GUI or not. It is also be slightly less maneuverable than the Sail. The steam engine, like Sails, grant a steady speed and can be left unattended. They have perfect acceleration, however they are much slower than Sails.
For armoring, the Skiff will need more plates to sufficiently armor the boat. Possibly two or three.
The skiff will most likely be the largest boat to successfully navigate shallow marshlands and the like.
Now, for the adventurous sailor, we're going to go one step up. Meet the Cog. The Cog is a fair-sized boat, but it is hardly big. What is does have though is a top deck large enough to walk upon. Now, we're going to introduce another feature. This time, the Cog will have a lower deck. You could be able to place a few blocks in that bottom deck, such as beds and chests. This will be good for long adventures. If you aren't spoiled, you would be happy with a Cog for your adventuring needs. Hands are now unusable.
For gameplay, an invisible, penetrable box will be in the interiors of the ship that hides water and its effects when water blocks go near it, but as soon as they leave the water blocks return to normal.
Now here, starting with the Cog, is the boat's main means of offense and defense. You guessed it, the Cannon. I believe the cannon could be made with a crafting table. To fire (And right now I'm making most of this up as I go along), you must first craft a Cannonball (Maximum of 16 allowed in hand), and right click on the cannon. The cannon will fizz for about 2.5 seconds or more before firing the cannonball. You must wait an additional second to fire again. To adjust the angle of a cannon, rightclick it (without a cannonball) to point the cannon up or down.
Now with ships and other entities, contact with the cannonball will just equal damage being dealt. But with blocks, there is a chance (Depending on their blast resistance) that the block being hit, and/or the blocks around it will be pushed forward and respond to gravity. And in rare cases, break upon falling.
That, or it would just be a weak form of TNT. But I like the former better. Mostly because it's my idea. Good gosh I think I'm vain or something.
So like I said, if you aren't spoiled, you would be happy with a Cog for your adventuring needs.
But sometimes, you ARE spoiled. Or, just requiring a bit more power. That's where the fourth level comes in, behold: the Carrack. Significantly larger than the other boats, this one can actually be called a ship. It has 3 decks. The first being the top deck (Which comprises of the main deck, quarter and poop, naturally), the second the gun deck, which to the back holds the captain's quarters, and the bottom deck is mainly for cargo. If the Carrack is steampowered the boiler room will be in there.
Oars are now unusable for the Carrack, as are Hands for Cogs. (The Oars for the Cogs would be weaker than on the Skiff and Dinghy, as would hands with the Skiff. However with the Steam engine and Sail, they just get faster with each level, with exceptions [amended])
Another neat thing you get to do with the Carrack is you get to live up to the naval definiton of a ship. On the Carrack, you can place another boat inside it for scouting/lifeboats. But it can only be a Skiff or Dinghy.
Okay, next one. Here we go.
(This level is optional. You guys tell me if it should be ingame.)
Now sometimes, your lust for power is so great no measly Carrack can hold it; not even when it is steel-hulled and armed to the teeth. No, you wish for the very seas to obey your will. Well, you psychopath, here's the fix for you: Feast your eyes sir, on the Galleon. Over twice the size of a Carrack, four long decks and plenty of guns, you would not want to war with this vessel. It is essentially a Carrack on steroids; bigger, stronger (but not faster [amended]), and scarier. But, slightly slower. Should you decide to armor it, keep in mind it will need 8 Platings to armor (Maybe more). And considering each plating requires 4 blocks to fill, you're going to need a LOT of iron.
When a ship finally loses all of it's 'health', it will sink to the bottom of the sea. Here, it is subject to despawn, but will stay there as long as there is a player near it. Although dangerous, it would then be available for looting, if you haven't plundered the ship while it was afloat already. < --- This entire paragraph is subject to discussion and alternative options. It's also been proposed that the ship turn into it's block counterpart, only leave chests, or like in the Amendment Posts, leaves a Ship's Bell that can serve as a savegame for your ship.
Now, I understand that such a feature is going to be *HUGE*, possibly requiring its own update, and would be just a massive undertaking. But I for one believe it will be an undertaking worth the effort. It would heighten the spirit of Minecraft adventure and exploration, people could trade vast amounts of resources over long distances, and plunder other ships for their booty. So I'm not 100% expecting this to be accepted entirely (But if it is, thankyouthankyouthankyou!), but in the future if any modders were curious about how to go about doing their ship mod, this could be a good example. But I really hope this would at least be seen by Mojang. Just two-thirds into completing this idea, I read an old tweet of Notch saying that he might add something like this in the future. So, if you are, this could be one of the ways to go about it.
Any questions?
Amendment Post 1:
- In the Shipwright GUI, the product slot of the boatbuilding section is now a button. I've updated the image.
- Craftable ship components should have been expanded. In addition to a Galley, an Anchor component (probably most vital) is also one of them. Also proposed by the community are tables, crows' nests (That basket thing on the top of masts), icebreakers, and if the NPC crew idea is implemented, a sea captain's desk to chart courses for the helmsman.
- I actually think you should be able to move players. I mean, if they actually decided to choose to lock themselves in a mob slot rather than move around freely I think the captain should be free to move them wherever.
Amendment Post 2:
- Galleons really shouldn't be the fastest ships out there, it would be unfair. Instead, their base speed capability should be a tiny bit slower than a Carrack, probably. Updated.
- Right clicking on a cannon without a cannonball could point the cannon up/down. Updated.
- Different types of ships that do not follow the linear 5-level path of upgrades. Instead, 'extra' ship blueprints could be found in dungeons in strongholds, but they would be rare. Could be a way to get Caravels and viking ships or whatnot.
- I'm not sure about the decay process of sunken ships. Perhaps after someone leaves the ship's general area, a timer starts and eventually the ship will despawn. Or maybe it just stays there forever but can be 'mined' away to recollect valuable materials.
Amendment Post 3 (Note: These are not as important as the first 2) :
- Flags. Although I'm sure colored sails can do a good job of faction identification, custom-made flags would be really great to have. They could be used outside of boats, too.
- Extra ammo types. The standard cannonball would be made of stone and gunpowder, but others could be made out of iron and other materials. The new usable fireball coming 1.2 would also make a neat incendiary addition. Other types can inclde grapeshot and chainshot.
- Sea monsters. Pretty straightforward, I'd like to see some minor sea bosses when roaming the sea. But in my opinion, they should be restricted to certain sizes of ships (Dinghies have no bosses). For example the ship the size of a Skiff would probably only get a shark or something, whereas something Cog-sized would get sharks and sea serpents, medium-sized ships like the Carrack would get sea serpents and maybe giant octopus (Will wrap tentacles around the ship and begin to tug down unless tentacles are damaged), etc...They are, however, uncommon.
- A ship's bell. Yes, they can be used as a normal bell, but there's something that makes them special. Once placed on a ship, it bears the ship's name and can ONLY be placed on that ship (e.g Bell of the S.S Whatchamacallit). Then, if a sunken ship despawns, that bell is turned into a block at the bottom of the ocean and contains all of the ship's data. Then, it can be used to recreate the ship.
- Sea obstacles. The ocean would be made that much better if occasionally you stumbled upon a mini-biome within an ocean. These could be mysterious sea rocks, or icebergs made of pack ice where a tundra or arctic biome would usually be.
And the Reddit post is here:
http://www.reddit.co..._modular_boats/ (Archived)
*EDIT*
Due to popular demand, I give you this:
Add this to your signature if you like it!
<a href="../../../topic/699830-boats-evolved-bigger-modular-boats/"><img src="http://i569.photobucket.com/albums/ss136/elitemandalorian48/besig-1.jpg" alt=""></a>
Important Things to Know for the Unfortunate Few Without Common Sense (aka posts I've gotten a million and one times and wish to halt):
- This is NOT A MOD. The illustrations may look convincing (for a bunch of photoshopped models made in Sketchup :p) but I have repeatedly, in this suggestion, mentioned it as an idea and rarely even mentioned the word 'mod'. Please stop asking how to install this. Plus, we're in the Suggestions forum. That tell you anything?
- Yes, I have SEEN the Zeppelin Mod. You're just about the 508th person to show me this. Yes, I've seen it. YES, I think it's a great mod, but in my opinion it's best to leave it at that, and this idea is about the vanilla Minecraft ships made of predefined modules, not blocks, as that seems to be more congruent with the current game mechanics. Saying "There's a mod for that" is a warnable offense, in any case.
- You see that little link up there? Yeah, the idea is in the link (or the spoiler). I've explained rather thoroughly how the boats work. While I would really like it for you to give me your two cents, this thread is not for people to make up entirely their own ideas on how the boats work. That part's already here, mostly
- "This would be great, but the oceans need to be bigger!" <-- Say this and you're gonna get a smack. >=(
Download link to the original SketchUp models: http://www.mediafire...55l1cnm1npgkbgl
--- See Also: ---
by JasonG5!
[represent]
[/spoiler]
[/spoiler]
:
1
A third thing I though would be cool would just be to have the nether and end not be other dimensions. Sure you could no longer use it as a shortcut, but if you where having trubble making or finding the portal you could all ways just dig down deep enough or build up high enough.
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The next step of it is basicaly each block is 16x16x16(+1) with an exstra plane at the top of the chunk that is just a copy of the lighting data from the bottom plane of the chunk above. Any time a chunk update happens it updates lighting (but only that lighting plane) on every chunk bellow it till there is 0 light. This means one chunk has the light data of all the chunks above it.
Now to deal with floating structures and overhangs created by the world gen that's easily delt with by making a limit to how much a shadow a block can cast..... eventually a block high enough is going to be high up enough that you can just in it. (perfect showding would just be imposable) so it only has to load chunks the first time up so many chunks (maybe around 10? thats still less than normal) so going into a new area above ground will have the same lag as normal minecraft, but once it's loaded your back to having less lag.
You can also work with the way lighting works so that light from a sorce decreases going down if the block above was surounded (8 blocks on level with it) by less fully light blocks than non fully lit blocks.... and goes up or stays max if surounded by more fully light blocks than non fully light...... .
I know i'm not describing it well, but it's a some what complicated but not too laggy work around for lighting.
That's likely not EXSACTLY how it works I know, but that was the Idea I had that people worked off of and some with the codding know how has figured it out i'm told.
But the main thing to take from it is, one chunk has the lighting of every chunk over it factored into it and saved on it in a simple format.
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This is why I designated some things as what i saw as musts, and others just suggestions..... the suggestions are things that could be mods.... while the others are things that if worked into the game from day 1 will lead to a much better game.
The biggest being the first two on the list, making the game better optimized, and building the game around the use of modding tools so the game is easier to mod and mods have more options available to them as to what they can affect.
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Minecraft as an MMO
Rebuilt from the ground up with better optimization and modding capability. So yah.... I'm sure this has been thought of before but I want to put the ideas together.
I will be listing things that I see as a MUST in Purple.
I will be listing things that are just my suggestions In this shade of blue/green.
So lets dive right into it. I said I got some ideas from other games, yes I'll list them when I post them, and I have a lot of my own.... well I'll get to those later, first lets talk about how to make minecraft better.
Optimization
Number one thing? DON"T USE JAVA!!!!! Seriously though, this is the number one complaint, that java eats up so much resources. A big appeal is that it can be plaid by most anyone. The settings have to be WAY down though even on fairly good computers because the scripting is poorly optimized and java is a resource hog. The bigger your game world gets, the worse it gets till you can't play anymore.
Java may be easily moddable but it is a horrible system to run a game like this off of. You want to make the game easily modifiable, but it needs to run well too. Even if it means excluding people on some slower computers, you need a coding system that makes for a very well oiled machine. Lag will always kill a good gaming exuberance, particularly when it gets you killed over and over. This is the number one reason people want to see a new version of minecraft too. It is something very important to any game.
You are also building from the ground up so make things better, like my 3D chunks Idea. It cuts lag, removes a height/depth limit, and needs to load more than half as many blocks less than normal: http://www.minecraftforum.net/forums/minecraft-discussion/suggestions/77631-cubic-chunks-reduced-lag-infinite-height-and-more
Modding Friendly
Probably ties for the most important point or least comes in a very close second. People LOVE to mod games, and easily moddable games can become good even if the game itself is bad. People will always improve a game in ways the developer could never foresee if given room to do so. Take an example from companies like Bethsta and create your game from the ground up with modding in mind. Heck make the moding system and codding first and USE IT to make the game as some have done.... What ever you do make sure that people can, with some understanding, mod next to everything... if not plain out everything, in the game.
You ask, but how can you mod an MMO? I'll get to that later, you will see! (under Vast 'Limitless' Worlds)
Learn From Past Mods and Games
Here is something else Bethsta is good at doing. Look at the most popular mods and aspects from other games and integrate aspects of such into your game. If not out right add them (with credit to and permission from the modder). If you see a trend among mods consider working it into the game.
On the other hand some things BELONG in mods. It is every clear that people want to use modern guns in minecraft.... do modern guns fit into minecraft? no... not really. Maybe some clockwork/steampunk flintlock or something, but not a glock 9mm. Leave modders to make those mods.
One good example.... make cutting down the base block of a tree cut down the whole tree.
But lets look at some of minecrafts most successful mods.
mo' creatures- Variety Variety Variety
TMI - considering an item/object cheat toggle in the options screen might save people time.
Chickenbones (better dungeons) - cookie cutter dungeons are ok, but the more kinds you have the better.
Rei's Minimap - imersive maps are grate but a usefull map is better lol
Millénaire - NPC cities are good, NPC cities that evolve with you are better!
The Twylight Forest / Mystcraft / MisticRPG / games like starbound - The more planets / dementions that you have to explore the better.
Industrialcraft - technology and automation are well loved (my sugestion go with clockwork and steampunk)
Thaumacraft - magic is well loved
You don't HAVE to add anything to a game, and keeping to a theme is important, but looking at other games and mods forms and there popularity gives an idea of how much people like or dislike aspects of a game and lets you include or keep out these aspects.
LOTS and LOTS and LOTS of Exploration Options.
This is not so important as the others, but people like to explore, giving them new and exciting ways to explore makes that even better. A large variety of biomes to explore, a must! Deep underwater areas with shipwrecks, caves, and scuba gear to let you stay there? People would kill for it! Flying islands high in the sky and ways to fly and glide.... LOVE IT. Strange alternate realities where the rules you have come to understand are turned on there head.... woot!
The more you give people to explore the longer they will spend doing it, and the more they will love the game.
The popularity of mods like Better Dungeons (that adds extensive and interesting biome based dungeons) and mods like Mistcraft and MythicRPG that add alternate realities, show just how must people love going to new and exciting places. For this I bring you:
Vast 'Limitless' Worlds
This idea mostly comes from Oort Online but has some of my own mixed into it, as you will see. Well everyone can't be on the same server together now can they? So the Minecraft Online world will be split up into many worlds/dementions that vary in size and biome sets. Most worlds will be like minecrafts overworld, some however will be like the nether, some will be like the eather mod, some will be nothing but vast oceans, others in the branches of vast tree's. While about 3/4s the worlds with be some what normal the rest will be quite interesting to visit or live in. They will be able to be linked through portals or you can access them through a server list. Portals will appear naturally or you can make them appear with some level of crafting.
Modding and Private Servers
But I promised modding right? Ok, well you can list your own severs on the server list and in these worlds you can have whatever mods you want active. If you try and leave with items that only belong to a mod on that world and it's not in the world you are going to you will be warned that the item will be lost if not stored in that world. If a mod is flagged a cheat mod, then anyone leaving that world can not take anything at all from that world to another. You can require a white list or make a black list for these servers once they are open and will be generated from what ever world generation set you chose.
As for single player game play, you can play offline and use what ever mods you like, and form off-line worlds as much as you like. Though it would likely be set up that your online and offline PCs are totally different and can't share items.
Premium Paid Servers
Don't have a server, have a GRAND idea for a world but don't know how to carry it out? Then you can rent one from Microsoft on a monthly fee. If you buy a world generation package a Microsoft Development team will build you a world from the ground up to your specifications. (Can range from fairly affordable to simple changes to normal generation, or some controlled generation. To exstreamly expensive for complex massive requests like a 1:1 scale modle of NY city.)
Connectivity
Some UI needs to be in place for public, world, and whisper chatting, along with friend and guild/clan tracking. Ways to tell when your friends are online and what world they are on, and where they are in that world. All standard MMO stuff, but maybe adding built in voice chat would be nice. In game mail should be added to, with various craftable mailboxes you can sit outside your house or PO boxes you can have in your guild/clan house. The game should have capital worlds where NPC cites offer guidance, help, and shops.... which brings me to:
Economy
There needs to be some sort of currency in the game for both NPCs and PCs to use. Only humanoid mobs should drop it, but you should be able to trade with NPCs for it in towns or capital cities. Having open markets or auction houses in the capitals could help drive a player economy. Or the ability to hire NPCs to sell your stuff for you.
Land Ownership
Anti greefing, ah the eternal problem. Oorts solution for this is beacons that mark an area around it as your land, and you can set up a fair amount of them with a good range. In the range only you and people you set are allowed to use any item or brake/place anything. My addition though is that when you place a beacon you can set it so that chosen people can set beacons that overlap into yours and/or that no one (but chosen people) can set a beacon anywhere near yours. (thus preventing some one but greefing by surrounding your calmed land with calmed land.)
PvP
Face it, every MMO HAS to have it... it's almost a law or something. Most worlds will be PvE only, however there will be the occasional ones (usually with better loot to be had) that are PvP... you will be warned before entering them though. When killed by PvP the result could vary from world to world and the rules would be listed in the prompt before entering. Options could be: dropping a % of your money, dropping your items, dropping everything you gathered on that world.
Instances / Dungeon Worlds
Another idea of mine would be Instance Worlds. These temporary worlds could be created by anyone but remove themselves after a time to save server load. My idea on how this would work:
World Gates and Keystones
While the blocks of the gates must be crafted individually and can be resource demanding to make gates larger than just big enough to walk through, they all have a similar formula. They are made up of 3 kinds of blocks: frame blocks, power blocks, and a control pedestal. The kind of gate is determined by the marital used and the power source the power blocks use. The gates also need keystones to open them.
Community World Gate - This is the easiest to make and could probably made of copper or some other reliably available material. No keystones would be needed to open a world just used the pedestal to open up a community world UI. Here you can make your own worlds and submit them for approval. If approved anyone can use the UI to open your world and give it a try, you could have the option of charging a small fee of in game currency to use there realms so they can profit from all there hard work.
Moderation would be key tough, wouldn't want people making worlds that are just an open field full of treasure and charging out the **** for it.
Colosseum World Gate - This works exactly like the community gate, however the UI is loaded with worlds designed just for PvP in mind. (mostly friendly in-guild/clan PvP games)
Iron World Gate -First of the keystone gates, this one opens up the simplest of worlds, fit for one or two people. They are the least challenging and will not allow more than 3~5 people in.
Golden World Gate - Second of the keystone gates, this one opens up to worlds fit for small groups of around 5 or so, and will not let more than 10~15 people in at a time and will require at least some teamwork.
Crystal/Diamond World Gates - The last of the keystone gates, this one opens up to worlds fit for communities of 20 or more people. They have no real limit on how many people can go into them and are the most challenging of all requiring tight teamwork and command structure.
Keystones - These need to be crafted and will usually require at least one item that is only used for the keystone(s). You place them into the pedestal and lock them in to open the world. Once this is done you can chose who can use the portal (individuals, any friend, clan, ect) and who can close it. Once the portal closes though the keystone will in most all cases shatter into fragments that can be fused together to make the crystals needed to make new keystones.
Keystone Crystals - Found in the world they should be some what rare, and there could be different qualities of them for different keystones.... however creating a keystone will require at least one. They can also be crafted by combining keystone fragments (which would be more commonly found).
Keystone Fragments - While Keystone Fragments can not be taken through a gate with you. In survival worlds and others where you can only enter once, some could give you these. Acting like extra lives they keep you linked to the world but shatter each time one is used. When you run out next death will send you packing. They can be dropped on the spawning of a new arrival, found scattered around the world, dropped by particularly nasty baddies, or as a reward for beating a wave.
While you can't take keystone fragments with you into a gate you can take them with you when you leave as a reward for not using them.
Keystone shards could be for sell if the daily/weekly/monthly world is survival.
They will open up into set pice built dungeon or worlds that are far more dangerous but have catches of grate rewards or rich veins of metals.
There should be no real difference in the kind of rewards between the tier level, just the volume and number there are. The iron gate will have rewards good enough for one or two people.... while the crystal gate will have rewards enough for a whole clan.
Once the timer (a few days maybe) runs out or the gate is turned off early the world is removed from the game, and another can be created with that gate.
You could have it that the portal will not take you anywhere unless you have no items on you (have to use the ones provided inside).
Castle attack - Kinda a reverse of survival, rather you have as many tries as you want or just one try, there is some fortification that's under heavy guard and you have to take it over to claim your reward.
Standard Dungeon -well yah.... fight bad guys, kill bosses, get loot.
Hostel World - A world with ether a very hostel environment or local wild life, maybe both. However it is rich in resources, you will just have to be fighting for your life to gather them. This could be anything from a ruined city FLOODED with zombies, to a jungle full of large amount of diamonds but also just as many dinosaurs that want to eat you.
Time Trials - You have a FAR FAR FAR more limited time to get through these worlds to your reward before the world collapses.
World(s) of the Day/Week/Month - The crafting materials for the keystone are not easy to get (harder and harder if there are one of each!), but like the Colosseum you only need one as it won't be used up.
This world is created by the staff every day/week/month and lasts just for that amount of time before it dissapears forever. There would be a warning this is going to happen (even if it's just the world starting to fall apart), so you can grab any gear you set down. After that the same portal will still be open but it will be open to the new world of the day/week/month.
They are more rewarding than other worlds, but they are PvP, and everyone has access to the same one the same way you do.
Event Worlds - Everyone gets the key stones for this or the parts to make them drop commonly. They will open up to themed event worlds like a Christmas world.
Survival: drop - the ever popular falling through environments maps.
Survival: stranded - these you and/or your friends come out into a temple on some world of dev/modded designs in a shrine of some sort. They can only enter with nothing on them, and while the shrine will have an exit portal if you use it you can't return. The world will have two timers, one to show how long you have to stay there for a reward, and the second to show how long you have to collect your rewards and anything you made that you want to keep and leave before the world collapses.
You could even have some cool affects for a world collapsing when your inside it. Like in mystcraft how corruption would spread from block to block to block and they crumble lose and fall to the ground, spreading it as they broke apart into nothing or feel out of the world.
Would be especially neat for time trials.... would give you a few extra moments to get to the rewards jumping over corrupted ground as it crumbled under your feet.
Resource Refinement
This is something I saw in a game called Windborne, who's development seams to have died. This had quite the potential I tried to point out but, well there is no development going on so I'll explain here.The basic idea is though that all the wood, stone, wool, meat, veggies, what have you that you collect are raw and need to be refined. They only had two stations for this in the other game but this unlocks a very good option for tiered crafting. Now how it works is basickly this (and it gets a little complicated so i'm going to cut it):
1 raw wood has a chance of becoming: crude wood planks at a rate of 50%; wood planks at 35%; fine wood planks at 15%; suburb wood planks at 9%; pristine wood planks at 1%; and no chance of producing any immaculate wood planks
BC_Programming adds that making a ratio that if you refine so many blocks with out getting a particular rarity or above, you will automatically get it when that ratio is meet.
Also to note that various forms of refinement could also produce byproducts and have room for attachments of sorts to extract items that you normally wouldn't get. There are all sorts of possibilities here. Some good examples are getting coal or gem dust from ore/stone/gemstone refinement, getting sap or sawdust from wood refinement, and flint from ore.... lots of possibilities.
Now this is fine for the start of the game but high end items will need suburb or better and your going to be wasting a lot of wood like this! So what do you do? Well you could replace the copper axe with a steel or diamond axe, and it would move the %'s up to higher qualities, but that's only a temporary solution. You however have ore refined to enough a quality to make saw blades, and you saved quality wood enough to make a wood cutter. So you build and replace your old cutting block with the table and lock the saw blade in..... now you don't even make curde wood planks anymore and always have a chance of making immaculate wood planks (all be it probably low).
On a side note, something that only needs crude wood (like burning it for fuel) can use any higher quality, or putting a quality of refined material back in the refinement object produces two or so of the refinement bellow it. Ether way there should be a way to use the higher quality goods on less quality productions.
This goes on in say 3 ~ 5 tiers of refinement station, each with various quality refinement tools to use in them (that like the axe and saw blade can be used for other things), Each type of material has it's own station: Wood, cloth, stone, gems, ore, weapon parts, paper, glass, chemicals (for alchemy), food. Likely a few more I'm not thinking of.
That or you could just combine a few together... like stone, gems, and wood.... all requiring cutting and cupping away at, and glass and ore... both melting.
This can make something as simple as being able to craft a window with silk drapes make you feel good, knowing all the work that went into getting the refinement stations that let you produce the quality of glass and silk to do it. Also it means some one can't just give you a diamond axe and say go at it little buddy, and your into end game stuff. They would have to go through some trouble to help you out, needing to produce a few crafting stations for you and make the tools they need. Then continue to supply those tools until you can make them yourself. Or they could just let you use there stuff till they can make it on there own. Ether way, helping some one out isn't as easy as giving them some gear and sending them off.... you have to actually put effort into helping them.
Finally with using this adding a general rarity system to the game for organizations sake and being able to tell the quality at a glance is a good idea. Different colored names aren't really necessary, just the boarder around the item and the now standard RPG rarity system works fine: crude - gray / standard - white / fine - green / suburb - blue / pristine - purple / immaculate - orange
Another use for the refinement idea is to have a catch-all item or items that can produce various results. An exsample:
In the game this is from you can find gemstones blocks that can be refined producing rubies, sapphires, diamonds, emeralds, and the like all at diffrent %'s and rarities.
Or you could say use it in the Dino mod where currently you brake various fossils into sets of DNA samples. Instead you could crush the samples up and put them in a centrifudge or something like that for a refinement process.
Tier 1: copping block - uses axes
Tier 2: log cutter - uses blade/edge/weapon part?
Tier 3: cutting table - uses saw blade
Tier 4: steam powered cutting table - uses saw blade and attached steam pump/sorce
Fabric
Tier 1: manually - uses spindle
Tier 2: loom - use wood lomb wand
Tier 3: mechanical loom - uses metal wand and attached steam pump/sorce
Metal working
All variations of a forge - requires fuel uses fluids (water, perhaps potions for primitive enchanting)
Gem cutter
Much of the same - requires magnification uses chisel
You could have some refinement methods that only have one tier but get higher tiers of quality by adding items that instead of some enhancement, when put in they disappear and are added to the table knocking it up a tier like say:
Alchemist table
Alchemist table with mortar and pestle
Alchemist table with mortar, pestle, and calcinatior
Ect ect ect
Or
Gem cutters table
Hem cutters table with magnifying lens, and grinder
Gem cutters table with magnifying lens, grinder, and lapidary
Ect ect ect
More than one form of refinement per item could be posable too depending to what you take it too
Say: grass
You take grass to alchemical refinement you get powder and seeds
You take grass to a grinder or some such you get mulch and seeds
You take grass to an exstracter of some sort you get a pore quality bio fuel
Or... Raw gemstones
Taken to a gemcuter you get cut stones and gem dust
Taken to a glass cutter you get a crystal lense and gem fragments/dust
Taken to a forge you get crestel edge/blades and gem dust
Wood...
Taken to a cutter you get planks an sawdust
Taken to a carver you get decritive blocks and kindling
Taken to an exstractor of some sort you get britle wood (only good for crude tools and fire) and sap
Research and Development
Having to research how to make items (besides a few basic knowledge items, maybe available in a crafting book you start with?) is another way to tier the game and/or slow the pace, and you can do it with the refinement too. The thuamacraft mod is an grate example of a very good method for this. It has a research tree that you can work though by braking down items at a research table to examine the base qualities that make that item up. It creates research notes then from paper and ink and you can use those notes to further the research by braking down more items until you understand enough about properties in the notes to make a brake through and the notes become papers you can use to unlock part of the research tree.
Now this kinda method don't need to be used but what ever method of research is used requiring some one to do there homework so to say before they can make something helps pace the game. Allowing people to write down notes on how to make various items can let people teach research topics to other people, however having to do it one at a time in an order that fulfills the requirement of said research makes helping some one do so a good bit of an effort. On the other hand sharing research notes can help a group of people learn a lot faster. (I have done this with thuamacraft, it is a very rewarding social exspirance that is fun.)
I will probably go into more details on my ideas for this later.
Object to Object Communication
Ok so this is another idea I got from something in Windborne, it has a lot of modding potential though. In the game There are some objects in the crafting table that require a refinement object to be nearby. There was also ideas about refinement objects being enchanted to produce higher qualities at higher %'s with empowering crystals near by.
This idea of an object to be able to look for an object around it, search the inventory of objects around it for various items, be able to look for a set property in a near by object, and/or detect gear you are wearing and items you are carrying.... this well is an amazing thing when it comes to modding.
I could go into some detail about it, but having this built into the base coding of the game and the modding tools..... just...... wow. A very simple thing this could allow is say a crafting table that uses items from your inventory, OR nearby chests. Imogen all the time and hassle you would save if you could just dump your items into chests and then craft with them instead of having to sort through chests for what you need every time you want to make something.
Use a Crafting UI
The minecraft crafting system is inventive and I love it, but it's limiting. It forces several modders to use complicated steps in crafting or making there own means of crafting. Crafting tables with a UI that lets you sort through what items you have and what items you need to make it. This opens crafting up for much more complex crafting recopies.
Now you can still use the minecraft crafting system for more simple crafting stations and let people have there 2x2 wondering around or 3x3 / 4x4 if
they have the proper items on them. It IS a good system after all, and quite useful for stuff like crafting weapons and tools.... hilt - guard - blade blocks for weapon crafting is a good example.
Transportation
Besides from going world to world, there needs to be ways to get around in worlds. Being able to set up forms of mass transit like automated trains/buses/boats would be nice, but having vehicles of some sort is almost a must.
Micro Payments
Lets face it, some one is going to want to add them some where in the line....even if your have to pay for the game, if your not paying for a subscription they want to throw these at you. It is likely to happen rather it is liked or not.... so some suggestions on what could be done here.
Outside of premium worlds. It seams to make the most sense to just let people buy in game money with real life money.
Buying in game money and items you can get normally is often seen as a necessary sin. But adding premium items to a game is going to tick some people off. Maybe not more than It's worth but I just don't think it's a good idea. Premium worlds are a little different because your just renting server space and you would have to do that anyway if you wanted a world of your own. The options for building one from scratch are do it yourself or pay some one to do it too, so no foul there ether.
More to come.
Yah I know there is a lot here already but i'm just getting started. If you have any ideas of your own you would like to add just tell me!
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There are some problems seeded into minecraft from creation and it's enviable a new version must eventually be created. So I have put some ideas together from myself and other people that I think would help in making it better, or at least lead to some cool updates. That or help some one trying to make a better version because minecraft is kinda focused more on porting to every system available and bug fixing them than development right now. Don't get me wrong I love minecrat but it HAS stalled off in development of updates sense it hit the release version.
Optimization
Number one thing? DON"T USE JAVA!!!!! Seriously though, this is the number one complaint, that java eats up so much resources. A big appeal is that it can be plaid by most anyone. The settings have to be WAY down though even on fairly good computers because the scripting is poorly optimized and java is a resource hog. The bigger your game world gets, the worse it gets till you can't play anymore.
You want to make the game easily modifiable, but it needs to run well too. Even if it means excluding people on some slower computers, you need a coding system that makes for a very well oiled machine. Lag will always kill a good gaming exuberance, particularly when it gets you killed over and over. This is the number one reason people want to see a new version of minecraft too. It is something very important to any game.
Modding Friendly
Probably ties for the most important point or least comes in a very close second. People LOVE to mod games, and easily moddable games can become good even if the game itself is bad. People will always improve a game in ways the developer could never foresee if given room to do so. Take an example from companies like Bethsta and create your game from the ground up with modding in mind. Heck make the moding system and codding first and USE IT to make the game as some have done.... What ever you do make sure that people can, with some understanding, mod next to everything... if not plain out everything, in the game.
Learn From Past Mods and Games
Here is something else Bethsta is good at doing. Look at the most popular mods and aspects from other games and integrate aspects of such into your game. If not out right add them (with credit to and permission from the modder). If you see a trend among mods consider working it into the game.
On the other hand some things BELONG in mods. It is every clear that people want to use modern guns in minecraft.... do modern guns fit into minecraft? no... not really. Maybe some clockwork/steampunk flintlock or something, but not a glock 9mm. Leave modders to make those mods.
One good example.... make cutting down the base block of a tree cut down the whole tree.
But lets look at some of minecrafts most successful mods.
mo' creatures- Variety Variety Variety
TMI - considering an item/object cheat toggle in the options screen might save people time.
Chickenbones (better dungeons) - cookie cutter dungeons are ok, but the more kinds you have the better.
Rei's Minimap - imersive maps are grate but a usefull map is better lol
Millénaire - NPC cities are good, NPC cities that evolve with you are better!
The Twylight Forest / Mystcraft / MisticRPG / games like starbound - The more planets / dementions that you have to explore the better.
Industrialcraft - technology and automation are well loved
Thaumacraft - magic is well loved
You don't HAVE to add anything to a game, and keeping to a theme is important, but looking at other games and mods forms and there popularity gives an idea of how much people like or dislike aspects of a game and lets you include or keep out these aspects.
LOTS and LOTS and LOTS of Exploration Options.
This is not so important as the others, but people like to explore, giving them new and exciting ways to explore makes that even better. A large variety of biomes to explore, a must! Deep underwater areas with shipwrecks, caves, and scuba gear to let you stay there? People would kill for it! Flying islands high in the sky and ways to fly and glide.... LOVE IT. Strange alternate realities where the rules you have come to understand are turned on there head.... woot!
The more you give people to explore the longer they will spend doing it, and the more they will love the game.
The popularity of mods like Better Dungeons (that adds extensive and interesting biome based dungeons) and mods like Mistcraft and MythicRPG that add alternate realities, show just how must people love going to new and exciting places.
My suggestion for 3d chunks to allow deeper oceans/caves and higher mountains/flying islands.... and reduce lag... it's now the #1 suggestion. So this REALLY shows how important it is, this was my main selling point on the suggestion.
Now, Some Suggestions From Me
Some simple concepts but they matter a lot and make a big difference between a good game and a bad game. Now on to some ideas that I've seen and read about.
Skills / Stats
Now you don't have to add skills or stats to the game, but you should put skills into the codding of the game so that modders may add them if they wish. However I think having same basic skills built into the game would allow a universal base for modders to use. Things like having woodcutting having a chance of getting you extra wood when you cut down a tree is something simple. But generally just having it there incase modders want to use it is better more likely.
Skills are rather easy to work with in any game, the more you do something the better you get at it, and crafting various items could require levels in skills.
Stats have a good example in games like windforge. Strength doing things like affecting how fast you mine and how much you can carry, wisdom/intelligence helping you train animals and breed them better and with research, speed/agility making you move faster or dubble jump and the like, stanima increasing your health or how much you can carry.... All in all stats don't have as much an in pact on a game like this as skills could.
Tiered Crafting
Something that makes the game become boring is when you reach a point when you have no more progressive, it's up to you to make your own goals. This is all fine and dandy but after a while, unless your in a multilayer server, you start running out of things to do.... or you start ending up doing things like stripping and just things get old the less effort you have to put into things. Some people like skipping ahead and there are cheat mods for that and there always will be. But outside that there some ideas here on how to slow the pace of the game a little to make things more interesting outside of required skill levels.
Resource Refinement
This is something I saw in a game called Windborne, who's development seams to have died. This had quite the potential I tried to point out but, well there is no development going on so I'll explain here.The basic idea is though that all the wood, stone, wool, meat, veggies, what have you that you collect are raw and need to be refined. They only had two stations for this in the other game but this unlocks a very good option for tiered crafting. Now how it works is basickly this:
You have say a wood cutting block, you lock a copper axe into it and that copper axe has a durability bar for uses, then you stack wood into it and cut them into planks of wood. However the planks do not all come out the same, and it works out something like this:
1 raw wood has a chance of becoming: crude wood planks at a rate of 50%; wood planks at 35%; fine wood planks at 15%; suburb wood planks at 9%; pristine wood planks at 1%; and no chance of producing any immaculate wood planks
BC_Programming adds that making a ratio that if you refine so many blocks with out getting a particular rarity or above, you will automatically get it when that ratio is meet.
Also to note that various forms of refinement could also produce byproducts and have room for attachments of sorts to extract items that you normally wouldn't get. There are all sorts of possibilities here. Some good examples are getting coal or gem dust from ore/stone/gemstone refinement, getting sap or sawdust from wood refinement, and flint from ore.... lots of possibilities.
Now this is fine for the start of the game but high end items will need suburb or better and your going to be wasting a lot of wood like this! So what do you do? Well you could replace the copper axe with a steel or diamond axe, and it would move the %'s up to higher qualities, but that's only a temporary solution. You however have ore refined to enough a quality to make saw blades, and you saved quality wood enough to make a wood cutter. So you build and replace your old cutting block with the table and lock the saw blade in..... now you don't even make curde wood planks anymore and always have a chance of making immaculate wood planks (all be it probably low).
On a side note, something that only needs crude wood (like burning it for fuel) can use any higher quality, or putting a quality of refined material back in the refinement object produces two or so of the refinement bellow it. Ether way there should be a way to use the higher quality goods on less quality productions.
This goes on in say 3 ~ 5 tiers of refinement station, each with various quality refinement tools to use in them (that like the axe and saw blade can be used for other things), Each type of material has it's own station: Wood, cloth, stone, gems, ore, weapon parts, paper, glass, chemicals (for alchemy), food. Likely a few more I'm not thinking of.
That or you could just combine a few together... like stone, gems, and wood.... all requiring cutting and cupping away at, and glass and ore... both melting.
This can make something as simple as being able to craft a window with silk drapes make you feel good, knowing all the work that went into getting the refinement stations that let you produce the quality of glass and silk to do it. Also it means some one can't just give you a diamond axe and say go at it little buddy, and your into end game stuff. They would have to go through some trouble to help you out, needing to produce a few crafting stations for you and make the tools they need. Then continue to supply those tools until you can make them yourself. Or they could just let you use there stuff till they can make it on there own. Ether way, helping some one out isn't as easy as giving them some gear and sending them off.... you have to actually put effort into helping them.
Finally with using this adding a general rarity system to the game for organizations sake and being able to tell the quality at a glance is a good idea. Different colored names aren't really necessary, just the boarder around the item and the now standard RPG rarity system works fine: crude - gray / standard - white / fine - green / suburb - blue / pristine - purple / immaculate - orange
Another use for the refinement idea is to have a catch-all item or items that can produce various results. An exsample:
In the game this is from you can find gemstones blocks that can be refined producing rubies, sapphires, diamonds, emeralds, and the like all at diffrent %'s and rarities.
Or you could say use it in the Dino mod where currently you brake various fossils into sets of DNA samples. Instead you could crush the samples up and put them in a centrifudge or something like that for a refinement process.
Research and Development
Having to research how to make items (besides a few basic knowledge items, maybe available in a crafting book you start with?) is another way to tier the game and/or slow the pace, and you can do it with the refinement too. The thuamacraft mod is an grate example of a very good method for this. It has a research tree that you can work though by braking down items at a research table to examine the base qualities that make that item up. It creates research notes then from paper and ink and you can use those notes to further the research by braking down more items until you understand enough about properties in the notes to make a brake through and the notes become papers you can use to unlock part of the research tree.
Now this kinda method don't need to be used but what ever method of research is used requiring some one to do there homework so to say before they can make something helps pace the game. Allowing people to write down notes on how to make various items can let people teach research topics to other people, however having to do it one at a time in an order that fulfills the requirement of said research makes helping some one do so a good bit of an effort. On the other hand sharing research notes can help a group of people learn a lot faster. (I have done this with thuamacraft, it is a very rewarding social exspirance that is fun.)
From the mods I've played here is
Tier 1 research
This is basic mine craft stuff that go beyond the basics like rail carts, boats, diamond or other gem items, or just anything beyond stone ... ether way.... simple stuff shouldn't be to much here really. This tier ends with stuff like alchemy/enchanting, decorative blocks/paintings, and stuff like hoppers and the minecart with an engine.
Tier 2 Research
This brakes into 3 groups... Art, tech, and magic... all with there own research stations.
Art is the crating of items that are a matter of skill and quality. Ornate blocks, cooking, and the like.
Tech flows into steampunk or clockwork things that fit into minecraft style, less techy versions of the kinda stuff in industrial craft.... automation coming in forms like clockwork machines, and steam powered pneumatic tubes with routing stations and punch cards! Or the like.... ^.^;;; Electricity coming off a lot less industrial and a lot more Tesla and mad science.
Magic flows into alchemy, enchanting, magical gear, and the like.... all the stuff people love about mods like thaumacraft.
Tier 3 Research
Now things brake into even more trees with research stations....
Cooking gets it's own.... decorations get there own..... ornate blocks (though you really only have to research each type of block once or twice to get various ways of cutting it)
Tech splits into the various types of tech... and the like... don't really have to split things up to much, main point though is more advance stations for more advance research....
Each of the tree's will have research in them some where that will give points to unlock there universal crafting stations. They should take up a few blocks space, but they will craft anything in their tree (art, tech, magic). Visually they would have aspects of various crafting stations present in them...
The tree's can keep going on well after there crafting station is unlocked, and tier 3 can go well into tier 4.
Tier 4 Research
Unlocking all 3 universal crafting stations will unlock a final crafting station and research station. This tier is for the exstreamly complicated items and objects that require high quality craftsmanship, technological expertise, and/or knowledge of the arcane. Magically infused meals? Check. Ornate clockwork birds? Check. Arcane to electrical power stations? Check. This is where all you research comes together into the most complex of items in the game.
Object to Object Comunication
Ok so this is another idea I got from something in Windborne, it has a lot of modding potential though. In the game There are some objects in the crafting table that require a refinement object to be nearby. There was also ideas about refinement objects being enchanted to produce higher qualities at higher %'s with empowering crystals near by.
This idea of an object to be able to look for an object around it, search the inventory of objects around it for various items, be able to look for a set property in a near by object, and/or detect gear you are wearing and items you are carrying.... this well is an amazing thing when it comes to modding.
I could go into some detail about it, but having this built into the base coding of the game and the modding tools..... just...... wow. A very simple thing this could allow is say a crafting table that uses items from your inventory, OR nearby chests. Imogen all the time and hassle you would save if you could just dump your items into chests and then craft with them instead of having to sort through chests for what you need every time you want to make something.
Use a Crafting UI
The minecraft crafting system is inventive and I love it, but it's limiting. It forces several modders to use complicated steps in crafting or making there own means of crafting. Crafting tables with a UI that lets you sort through what items you have and what items you need to make it. This opens crafting up for much more complex crafting recopies.
Now you can still use the minecraft crafting system for more simple crafting stations and let people have there 2x2 wondering around or 3x3 / 4x4 if they have the proper items on them. It IS a good system after all, and quite useful for stuff like crafting weapons and tools.... hilt - guard - blade blocks for weapon crafting is a good example.
If You Use Chunks, Use 3D Chunks!!
I came up with an idea a long long long long long time ago to add height to the game, and even requested a mod for it..... some one made a mod but the mod died out after some patches that broke it badly. Generally minecraft current uses 16x16x127 chunks. I suggested to instead use 323 chunks these cubic chunks would not only allow infinite height and/or depth, but it would also greatly reduce lag as you would be loading much fewer blocks at a time. It would also take up less space to save game worlds.
After a few years of the topic being dead and attempts to relive it not going to well I got pissed off and went into a grate deal of detail about it and some one translated my ranting into a much more reader friendly explination of the system and the topic blew up. There idea is currently a 163 chunk system, and there is a MASSIVE amount of detail from several molders and programers now that all agree my system if far better. ^.^;
Anyway you can read all about it on Calacbolg's thread, it's awesome:
http://www.minecraftforum.net/forums/minecraft-discussion/suggestions/77631-cubic-chunks-reduced-lag-infinite-height-and-more
This is now the #1 most popular topic, so 2d chunks..... bad idea... go 3d so people can build at high and as deep as they want!
More To come later
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http://www.minecraftforum.net/forums/off-topic/general-gaming/2280779-minecraft-2-0-ideas-for-the-future-or-making-a
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If you want to and complain about things do it in discussion, there is not a single suggestion here... there is a hint of one but its worded like more of a demand.