Minecraft Forums

Quote from Violette123»

I just started a new world in 21w08a.

The first thing I noted, I have hard time to find iron ores.

I can find coal/copper ores easily. But for iron, it's very hard.

Either I have bad luck or iron ores became rarer.

That's a bug in this version. They're planning a 'b' snapshot to fix the iron levels, according to SlicedLime's video.

I've done a bit of flying around caves in Creative, and wow, I'm impressed! They range from "claustrophobic" to "you need Night Vision to fully appreciate their grandeur" to "dude, it's the frickin' Mines of Moria!" I'd almost be tempted to live in one of the bigger ones, except lighting one properly would be a never-ending job! Plus, as mentioned, you can't really get the full effect without Night Vision.

Sometimes one encounters entire submerged cave systems. Water Breathing potions will help yield a lot of ore, since one isn't likely to be bothered by mobs.

Once the new biomes start generating, things should get even better. And come to think, the cave vines will probably help a lot in illuminating caves!

Quote from GerbilCrab475»

The problem with that is potential old world compatibility issues. I personally think it's really cool we're getting -Y values. Makes seem like you're going somewhere you're not supposed to.

With the changes to world height and generation, I hope they take the opportunity to renumber the levels. Sea level would be 0, and the world would go from -128 to +256. I think that would be much more useful than what we have now.

Personally I really enjoy branch mining - I find it wonderfully relaxing. I haven't had time to play with the snapshot yet, but the ore distribution looks like there will be a fair bit less variety, but more ore to be found overall. And that you're probably going to want multiple mines at different levels. I can live with that, I think... Though I'll want to try it out.

It looks like coal will be quite a bit less available, though. That could put a crimp in a bunch of things. It might become more attractive to tree-farm for charcoal.

A taller Nether would be even easier to get lost in. Thank goodness for lodestones!

I'm very much inclined to doubt that the Deep Dark is going to be a new dimension. They have consistently called it a biome, and the whole point is of the update is to improve Overworld underground generation.

Quote from zemerick13»

That being said, there's a sizable performance hit very fast. It's mainly dependent on how much height you can see at once, so if most of your added height is down it's nowhere near as bad. That being said, if you split the up and down, most peoples computers will probably handle 512 total height just fine, with decent computers managing 1k well. 2k+ will take a quite powerful rig to not have a slide show.

I would be definitely inclined to make the depths even deeper... but I worry that could throw off the balance for ores and the like.

Whoa!! In this week's snapshot, the world generates from -64 to 320! 64 extra blocks both up and down! This is a *big deal*! I've always felt that Minecraft's underground is pathetically shallow, and now it's doubled just like that!

I can easily see how this change is going to need massive rebalancing of ores, caves, and mountain generation, so some of the delays make a lot of sense in retrospect.

...I wonder if the Nether will be getting taller too? But then, the upper half has never been used as it is. (I've thought for a while it could be used for another dimension.)

This has been an odd few weeks for 1.17. While it's not unprecedented for snapshots to skip a week, I can't readily recall a time when there were skips twice in a row.

And, given the wait, the content of the snapshots seems a bit thin. What's there is interesting, mind you, but there doesn't seem that much of it. On the other hand, we've already gotten a big chunk of the new material that was revealed at Minecon, enough that it seems odd that they gave themselves until summer to finish. And given that I'm the one who traditionally always gives Mojang the benefit of the doubt, this may mean something.

Now, it does seem likely that the sculk sensor has taken much more coding than is obvious from the outside, and it underwent a major overhaul in the last snapshot. Perhaps that's at the root of the delay.

As for the projected finish date, 1.16 definitely set a precedent for delivering significantly more material than expected: An extra biome, a new mob, netherite, the lodestone, blackstone, and so on. So it seems likely that 1.17 will end up giving us more than expected too. What, though? Here's some guesses:

1. An extra cave biome, or more than one, seems like a no-brainer. We already know there are new cave styles we haven't seen yet; expanding some of them into full-blown new biomes wouldn't seem that difficult. 1.16 spiced up the new Nether with four new biomes; it's hard to believe that Overworld caves would rate only three. (Lush, Dripstone, and Deep Dark, I'm not counting the geodes.) Perhaps the Dripstone cave will get a new mob also.

2. Archeology might end up significantly bigger and more complex than what we've seen thus far. In what way, I can't imagine - except it seems odd to spend so much effort to make pots with cool designs *solely* for the aesthetic effect. While I can imagine making one or two, I can't see it sustaining my interest for longer than that, unless there's some further motive for doing so.

3. There might be significant technical changes under the hood. In particular, perhaps we'll see a further extension of data packs - duplicating the abilities in Java that already exist for Bedrock add-ons would be a great start! Certainly Mojang has been running hard with the new data tags introduced in 1.13, and it's been good to see.

4. While it's good to see the new tinted glass, amethyst and copper could both use several more diversified uses. (Please no copper armor, though. Copper as an element in tools... maybe. Only if there's something unique about them though, otherwise - since they presumably would have less durability than iron - what would be the point?)

5. I'm *not* particularly expecting anything more for the mountain biome. Except probably an item or two made from goat horns.

Quote from ZaffreAqua»

...Funny that it should be coming in considering Minecraft Earth is going to be kicking the bucket before long.

Maybe we should think of the glow squid as a refugee.

Quote from Ptolemy2002»

How often are signs (with text on them) and item frames even used in the dark to justify this addition?

It's not just in the dark, signs aren't very high contrast in any case. The glowing ink really pops out at you even in the light.

The glow item frames have a nice texture regardless of visibility. And I'll have to test it, but using them may allow displaying maps without having to put light sources behind them to prevent ugly seams.

I'm often out at night. You don't have to sleep every night to avoid phantoms. Also, one encounters darkness during the day - in caves, for example.

And a few niche uses are a few more than I was expecting the glow squid to have.

The fact that glow squids drop something unique and useful does a lot to reconcile me to their existence.

I wish they had been more explicit about this for the vote.

Quote from DaBiggman»

Incorrect. It's been almost eight years, but both Notch and Jens said that the engine cannot support dynamic lighting or glow effects. Fast forward about a week after they say this and modders made it happen.

My recollection is that it was said that adding dynamic lighting would be too resource-intensive for the range of computers they want to support. They want people with potatoes to be able to play Minecraft.