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Quote from Bonabopn »

Quote from Keralastic »

It'd be best if they all had their own little unique effects.

Say, Ruby armor would be immune to fire damage, Sapphire damage would increase how long you can hold your breath underwater, things like that.

It could effect weapons too, Ruby weapons can sometimes set monsters on fire, Emerald hoes would find more seeds, etc.

Methinks they shouldn't do that unless enchanted. Rubies don't set people on fire. :tongue.gif:

[EDIT] For example, ruby studded enchanted iron(Or w/e) weapons would set things on fire. Also i think a ruby sword is a bad idea, ruby studded ftw! :biggrin.gif:

[EDIT2]

Quote from bonabopn »

Quote from LightWarriorK »

MANY, but not everything under the sun.

I've suggested before that we need Rubies, Sapphires, Emeralds, Topaz, and Diamond. That'd be sufficient for me.

Although, once again madk, this should have been posted in Suggestions.

And topaz would be like "YAY I FOUND A GEM- Oh, it's just a topaz. *toss*".

[EDIT] Oops, double post! >.<

Well, if you enchant them based on elemental color, Topaz makes a great Air gem. :wink.gif:

And you should be able to delete your post by clicking the "X" next to the Edit button.

MANY, but not everything under the sun.

I've suggested before that we need Rubies, Sapphires, Emeralds, Topaz, and Diamond. That'd be sufficient for me.

Although, once again madk, this should have been posted in Suggestions.

I agree with saving health. It needs to happen.

I completely disagree with any sort of health regeneration, no matter how slow.

If we're talking realism, even a half heart lost is 5% towards death. We're talking a fairly serious gash or broken bone. That wouldn't heal in any regular amount of Minecraft time, not anything that would be useful. Realism would be half a heart restored every couple weeks.

While I'm all for complexity in Minecraft, realism for realism's sake isn't good. Regeneration of health in any game is a cripple, one that I can understand in Peaceful, but cannot support otherwise. We have two foodstuffs already to heal us (although I wish they'd stack in the Inventory), and I'm sure once chickens and cows come along there will be more.

Ok, everyone, this will be a long one....

With some threads starting to mention larger crafting tables and advanced crafting tables, as I've been advocating since crafting first reared its head: http://www.minecraftforum.net/viewtopic.php?f=35&t=6165, I thought I'd post my own thoughts on the matter I wrote up a week or two ago. There is a lot of "tl;dr" to this, so I'll start with a "Cliffnotes" version:

=================================================================================================

Proposed Initial Tech Tree:

Tier 1 (2x2 grid)
- Inventory (simple crafting and Tier 2 stations)
- Smelting (non-menu, Ore and Sand)
Tier 2 (3x3 grids)
- Workbench (Wood and Stone tools and weapons, Lesser Metal tools, and Tier 3 stations)
- Campfire (Permanent fire/light and basic cooking)
- Masonry (Basic building materials)
Tier 3 (5x5 grids)
- Furnace (Metal & Glass Refinery) (actually, a 2x2 grid is all that would be needed)
- Forge (Lesser and Regular Metal Tools Weapons and Armor, simple gadgets, and Tier 4 stations)
- Apothecary (Potions and Poisons)
- Loom (Cloth, Cloth dyeing, and Clothes)
Tier 4 (5x5 grids)
- Advanced Forge (Greater Metals Tools Weapons and Armor, Gilding, Complex gadets, and Tier 5 Stations)
- Oven (Advanced cooking)
Tier 5 (odd shaped grids)
- Alchemy (Gem and Obsidian Tools, Weapons and Armor, Water and Lava Source Blocks)

Tech Trees are useful because they:
Balance gameplay between pros and n00bs: if the pros need to follow the same tech tree, they're not going to be able to have diamond swords in 10 minutes.
Allow for customizable crafting screens per station that keep players on their toes: crafting isn't repetitive
Allows for "shops" to be set up that mimic the operation of blacksmiths and craftsmen
Crafting can be made simpler by including buttons on the menus for "Clear All" to wipe the grid, "Craft" to have a one-click crafting that places the item in a partial slot or the next available slot, and "Craft Max" to instantly craft multiples based on the resources in the grid.

Natural Materials (i.e., Rocks and Logs) should be harvested from their source.
Building materials (i.e., Brick, Cobblestone, Wood, and Glass) should need to be crafted and receive the benefits due their effort (harder to mine, increased resistance to explosion, etc.) so that buidings are safer.

=================================================================================================

Here's the "tl;dr" version:

Tier 1

Inventory
Grid size: 2x2
Use exactly how it is now, but limit to items craftable at Workbench
- Level 2 crafting stations

Smelting
Fire/Lava burning off-menu
- Metal Ingots
- Glass Slag

Tier 2

Workbench
Make in Inventory (4 Wood)
Grid size: 3x3
- Wood weapons and tools
- Stone weapons and tools
- Lesser Metals tools and arrows (not weapons)
- Wood and Leather clothes and armor
- Items like torches and bowls
- Basic food making (mushroom soup)
- Wood and Stone decorative items (Bookcases)
- Level 3 crafting stations

Campfire (cooking)
Make in Inventory (3 Logs, 1 Sapling) Stays lit permanently once lit, provides light like fire.
Grid size 3x3
- Meat cooking
- Healthier Meals

Masonry
Make at Inventory (3 Rock, 1 Iron Ingot)
Grid size 3x3
- 4 Rock + 1 Sand = 4 Cobblestone
- 2 Dirt + 2 Rock +1 Sand = 4 Red Brick
- 1 Rock = 2 Gravel
- 1 Gravel = 2 Sand

Tier 3

Furnace (crucible)
Make in Workbench (4 Rock, 4 Iron Ingots)
Grid size: 2x2
- Smelting 4 Metal Ingots into 1 Metal Bar (Bars needed for forging metal weapons)
- Smelting 4 Glass Slags into 1 Glass Block (See "the Case for Crafted over Natural" below)
- Smelting 4 Metal Bars into 1 Metal Block
- Refine Metals to purer form: (i.e., 1 Iron Block + 3 coal = 1 Steel Block, and 1 Copper Block + 3 Coal = 1 Bronze Block)

Forge (anvil)
Make in Workbench (3 Logs, 2 Iron Blocks)
Grid size: 5x5
- Lesser and Regular Metals weapons and tools
- Lesser and Regular Metals Armor
- Gears and Simple Machines (?)
- Lesser and Regular Metals decorative items
- TNT
- Advanced Forge stations

Apothecary
Make in Workbench (3 Rock, 6 Wood)
Grid size 5x5
- Potions and Poisons (require Glass Slag for bottles?)

Loom
Make in Workbench (6 Wood, 3 String)
Grid size 5x5
- Cloth from string
- Cloth dyeing from flowers, etc.
- Cloth decorative items (tapestries, rugs, etc.)

Tier 4

Advanced Forge
Make in Forge (5 Logs, 5 Steel Blocks)
Grid size: 5x5
- Greater Metals weapons and tools
- Greater Metals armor
- Greater Metals decorative Items
- Gild other weapons, Armor, or decorative Items with gems, Silver, and gold
- More complex Machines (Pumps, Elevators) and Alchemy station

Oven
Make in Forge (8 Iron Blocks, 1 Log)
Grid size 5x5
- Mass cooking (for multiplayer groups)
- Great meals

Tier 5

Alchemy
Make in Advanced Forge (5 Logs, 5 Steel Blocks, 3 Gold Blocks, 2 Silver Blocks)
Grid size: 7 slots spaced around Transmutation Circle
- Gem transmutation of natural or metal weapons, tools, and Armor
- Obsidian transmutation of natural or metal weapons, tools, and Armor
- Water Source Blocks
- Lava Source Blocks

Specials that can be mined
Lesser Metals
Lead
Tin
Copper

Regular Metals
Bronze (not actually mined, but refined from Copper)
Iron
Steel (not actually mined, but refined from Iron)

Greater Metals
Silver
Gold
Mithril
Adamantium (not actually mined, but refined from Mithril)

Gems
Topaz
Sapphire
Ruby
Emerald
Diamond

Primes (for Alchemy, Apothecary, Cooking, etc.)
Sulfur
Mercury
Salt
Coal
Water
Lava/Magma
Oil

The Case for In-Menu Crafting

It's Expected - While crafting without menus is a noble idea, for gamers with any sort of experience it's expected that crafting will have menus, especially when there's not complicated mechanisms like Dark Messiah. It's become so prevalent because it's one of the best ways to get what you want to do done with a minimum of fuss.

It's Intuitive - Games use menus for so many purposes now that to not have a menu for interactions is confusing, slow, and less precise. That's not to say simple functions can't be done off-menu; Smelting in fires work great. But anything complex without the benefit of virtual-reality to do it with our own fingers pretty much requires some aid through lists, buttons, icons, etc. to assist the process and keep it fun and easy.

It's Versatile - Menus can be tailored to handle the most complex of processes. While I'm not suggesting that the crafting menu for Minecraft should be difficult-complex, many of the comments on the forums are in favor of a system that is complex enough to stay interesting....or at least keep crafting time as limited as possible to keep from getting boring.

Idea #1: Add additional buttons to the Crafting menus to increase efficiency: A "Clear All" button to wipe the 3x3 grid back into the inventory, a "Craft" button that would place the item to be crafted into an available stack or the next open slot without dragging, and a "Craft Max" button to do the same but use as many resources placed in the grid as possible to make as many items as possible with a single click.


The Case for an Expanded "Tech Tree"

It's Fair - As an example, think about any Real-Time Strategy game. Technology trees exist to moderate the flow of the game, particularly between those with great skill and those with little/none. While the crafting system is new right now, it won't be long before people learn to bypass the safeguards that keep the game in balance (thinking ahead to Survival Multiplayer). With all the crafting taking place either in your own inventory window or in a workbench you can build with only four blocks of wood, any crafting can be done anywhere at any time. I know you have plans so that harder materials need better tools to mine, but (depending on the luck of resource allocation on the map) it took me only 10 minutes to work my way up the pickaxe chain to have a diamond sword. A tech tree that is comprised of multiple stations requiring various resources of increasing difficulty to build ensures that even the most proficient players are normalized to a certain degree. The balance is going to be between fun and fair, but I would argue that many of those arguing that it's "less fun" simply want it "easier for them," which is selfish. Too easy is never good anyways. Even the best players should have to work for that diamond sword.

It's Interesting - What's so special about a single workbench block (or given the ease of building, many workbench blocks) sitting around anywhere? An expanded tech tree that includes multiple stations starts making bases look like living, breathing places with shops, workshops, forges, etc. When you need at least three different stations to forge a decent sword, it's beneficial to have them in close proximity to each other, thus creating a Blacksmith's Shop. And with the creativity of this community, no two would ever be exactly the same.

It's Natural - Natural as in intuitive, not simply realistic. I agree that Minecraft should not be "realistic for realism's sake," but there is a leap of logic when forging an iron sword on a wooden workbench that I, at least, can't quite reconcile. That's not to say that many things can't be made at the workbench, but at some point it simply ceases to be effective.

Idea #2: See the above Tech Tree

The Case for Unique Crafting Station Screens

It's Identifiable - If you enter into a Forge menu, and you meant to enter a Furnace menu, you should be able to spot your error. It'd be apparent that this station exists for a specific purpose. No one should be confused when trying to make wool from string doesn't work when you're in the Forge menu

It's Fun - It adds flavor to the menu, keeps crafting fresh, and prevents it from becoming repetitive and boring.

Idea #3: Have a simple greyscale graphical backdrop behind the crafting grid to identify what station you're in (i.e., an anvil for forging or a transmutation circle for alchemy). Vary the size and arrangement of the grid dependant on what the station does (i.e., more advanced stations have bigger grids). Have a unique sound play for each station when crafting is done (i.e., wooden mallet striking wood for workbench, hammer on anvil for forging, liquids pouring for apothecary. [If it's hard to picture, I could to mockups of the screens I'm thinking of.]


The Case for Alchemy

I thought I'd talk a little bit separately about including an Alchemy station. By this I mean alchemy more similar to the show Fullmetal Alchemist or Zachtronic's Codex of Alchemical Engineering game, not alchemy as it was done in Oblivion which was really just Apothecary (potion making). The reasons to include this are:

1) Diamond forging: diamonds comprise the strongest items in the game and should require extra effort to create.
2) Impossible forging: diamonds, any other gemstones added, and any other "impossible" or "incredibly complex" item in the game would not be forgable by normal means. They would require some arcane help to bend the laws of physics to suit the needs of the game.
3) It's a way to insert some fun mystical component to the game without resorting to magic, which I'm not sure is appropriate.


The Case for Crafted above Natural

One of the problems that I would love to see avoided with crafting is that building supplies (Wood, Cobblestone, Glass, etc.) should not be a 1:1 ratio with their natural components, and they should all be crafted. Their properties as building materials should reflect the materials and effort put into them.

Idea #4: Harvesting natural materials should always result in their natural form. Harvesting rock should yield a rock, not cobblestone, and harvesting logs should yield a log, not wood:
1) You should then craft the building materials from the natural ones.
2) You can still use the natural materials if you want. I use logs as pillars all the time, but that doesn't work if I can't harvest it.

Idea #5: Adjust crafting of building materials
- 4 Rock + 1 Sand --> 4 Cobblestone: Harder to mine than Rock, and more resistant to explosion.
- 2 Dirt + 2 Rock + 1 Sand --> 4 Red Brick: Harder to mine than Rock, and more resistant to explosion.
- 1 Log --> 4 Wood: Weaker and burns faster
- 1 Sand smelts to 1 Slag (melted glass blob, like a ingot)
- 4 Slag --> 1 Glass: Harder to mine than Sand, and more resistant to explosion

=================================================================================================

Anyways, I've been writing all that since crafting was announced. This, to me, makes more sense than any sort of off-menu crafting, and is a lot more interesting than crafting everything at a single station.

I know that there will be a some people against this idea, but please keep it civil.

From his Blog Post about an hour ago, it seems like this is a great update, once we're able to play it. I'm really looking forward to the stuff he's going to be working on this weekend.:smile.gif:

Yeah, I recommended a bottom-dweller like the Mantis Shrimp

Cavitation bubbles, incredible striking power, block destruction, pain....

Dang it, you got me! D:

Mod Edit: NO ONE IS SAFE FROM THE ARM OF THE LAW!

:tongue.gif:

Since these keep popping up in other threads, and are not inherently against the rules, but could easily go that way...


What are your fetishes? Post what you secretly enjoy, but no images. If something needs explanation, use words. If that doesn't work, they can use Google images with safe search off...

My personal ones would be:
Blood. Ingesting and seeing both work for me.
Restraint. I prefer having my range of movement hindered.
Fear. Being afraid for some reason I get "excited" while calming down.

These are my main ones. There are, of course, others. I might list more if I feel like it later.