1.9 pre-release feature discussion

[Stormweaver]

Anyone found a mushroom biome yet? Spent ages searching, all I got were a few deserts and swamps >.<

Seed: 4504911559719506496

X: 520
Z: -470

Found that one on the MC Forums.
There's a few others too, but I'm too lazy to find them.

The grey stuff spreads like grass to plain dirt blocks, you can't plant trees on them, and monsters don't seem to spawn on it. It won't grow over a grass block (like I assumed it would via infection or something).

Hmm, gonna have a look tomorrow then.

I just want a mooshroom farm for the free mushroom stew on-demand. Seems far better than just carrying a stack of cooked chicken >.>

[gftweek]

I just want a mooshroom farm for the free mushroom stew on-demand. Seems far better than just carrying a stack of cooked chicken >.>

Unfortunately, mushroom soup doesn't stack, and chicken is the best, easily replaceable, stackable food. It's not as good as beef, pork or mushroom soup, but better than everything else.

Edit: Ah I didn't realise you could milk mooshrooms with a bowl to get mushroom soup! Now I see the appeal.

[the_fodder]

Enderman move array says they can pickup:
grass, dirt, sand, gravel, flower, rose, mushroom, mushroom, tnt, redstoneDust, oreDiamond, pumpkin, melon, mycel

MOTHER FUCKING YES! I have been going though my 1.8 forest and fixing all the trees that Endermen fuck up. It would be creepy if Notch coded them to leave flowers on dirt with adjacent plank or cobble stone.



I am unsure about the mushroom cows, will wait and see.

I will definitely be building on a snowy peak next time have some snowmen guards like DaveYanakov mentioned. hopefully they will turn water to ice.

New effects
I quite like the Tree/altitude change. Although it does not really change gameplay, it does give you that "feel" of being on top of a large mountain.

I would guess that only certain biomes that get snow covered mountains probably the one with Pine.

In addition I like the idea of dripping blocks in caves if there is water below, gives you a good indication where water is etc. Helpful, and gives a good atmosphere. I do wonder if it does anything apart from a particle effect though, and I guess people with roof top gardens or water ways might want to double line their floors/ceilings to make sure you don't have water dripping in your bedroom! =D

I hope its falls slower than rain. I had some glitches on a 1.8 MP that made it rain in my house, it was really annoying. May be it was a supersecret update? *tinfoil hat*

I love the nugget thing, makes visiting the nether a bit more rewarding.

I am a little iffy on this one. Gold was an underused resource to begin with IMO, and not sure what the intention is of adding a second source.

Perhaps the uses for gold will be expanded in the near future. My best guess at this point is that it'll be used to trade with villagers or something.

I actually hope this is a sign that ore drops are going to change. I would rather have ore drop like redstone then carry around a block of stone, sure you would end up caring less but think of the excitement of not knowing how many drops you are going to get each time you find a vein. I Don't like 3x3 crafting of them into ingot you need a furnace damnit! Maybe crafting into cobblestone of solid ore. Gives the game more depth in my opinion.

[FlowerChild]

Edit: Ah I didn't realise you could milk mooshrooms with a bowl to get mushroom soup! Now I see the appeal.

Sigh...this is getting sillier and sillier. I really want to give Notch (and I say Notch, because he's the designer) the benefit of the doubt here, but seriously...wtf? I'm really finding that a lot of the new features being added are going overboard in the whackiness department and dramatically altering the feel of Minecraft as a result.

I could seriously do without the giant mushrooms, fungal cows, and animated snowmen. I really get the impression he's lost interest in Minecraft (which is rather sad because nothing else coming out of Mojang seems very interesting and is unlikely to make them much money IMO, meaning the continued success of Minecraft is likely to be the only thing that keeps them afloat) and is just throwing in any old thing that comes to mind now.

Please don't turn this thread into rampant Notch-bashing as a result of this post. While I respect Notch a great deal, I've obviously had problems with the direction he's been taking Minecraft in which was one of the motivating factors behind me creating this mod. I think it worth mentioning, that I find those problems have only gotten worse with time.

[Beemlord]

Edit: Ah I didn't realise you could milk mooshrooms with a bowl to get mushroom soup! Now I see the appeal.

Sigh...this is getting sillier and sillier. I really want to give Notch (and I say Notch, because he's the designer) the benefit of the doubt here, but seriously...wtf? I'm really finding that a lot of the new features being added are going overboard in the whackiness department and dramatically altering the feel of Minecraft as a result.

I could seriously do without the giant mushrooms, fungal cows, and animated snowmen.

I do agree with you on the giant mushrooms and mooshrooms, which seem totally bizarre and out of place even though they are only supposed to spawn very very rarely on islands in the middle of the ocean, the snow golems actually have their uses. As of right now they do not melt (which may or may not be changed in the full 1.9 release) and can be used to create some awesome methods of household defense via things like pill boxes (I can even upload some pictures if you want of this kind of thing) which can knock mobs directly into lava pits. Silly? Yes. Useful? Absolutely.

[Brethern]

Edit: Ah I didn't realise you could milk mooshrooms with a bowl to get mushroom soup! Now I see the appeal.

Sigh...this is getting sillier and sillier. I really want to give Notch (and I say Notch, because he's the designer) the benefit of the doubt here, but seriously...wtf? I'm really finding that a lot of the new features being added are going overboard in the whackiness department and dramatically altering the feel of Minecraft as a result.

I could seriously do without the giant mushrooms, fungal cows, and animated snowmen. I really get the impression he's lost interest in Minecraft (which is rather sad because nothing else coming out of Mojang seems very interesting and is unlikely to make them much money IMO, meaning the continued success of Minecraft is likely to be the only thing that keeps them afloat) and is just throwing in any old thing that comes to mind now.

Please don't turn this thread into rampant Notch-bashing as a result of this post. While I respect Notch a great deal, I've obviously had problems with the direction he's been taking Minecraft in which was one of the motivating factors behind me creating this mod. I think it worth mentioning, that I find those problems have only gotten worse with time.

It really seems like he's trying to outdo terraria. I wouldn't mind an infection style thing that you had to fight but that should be a game mod not in the main game.

But frankly it's not notches fault. He's trying to appease a fanbase that has no clue what the word work means. MCF isn't helping any if the admins would start using the banhammer and cutting down on the crap there things might start settling down.

I know that there's allot on MCF that feel the same way I do about 1.8 we are drowned out by the buzzing of the sheep.

What would be great is if the sensible ones united as one then maybe minecraft would get on the right track. I've seen what happens when people want easy games.


You get dinosaurs with robot parts that breath fire.

[FlowerChild]

I do agree with you on the giant mushrooms and mooshrooms, which seem totally bizarre and out of place even though they are only supposed to spawn very very rarely on islands in the middle of the ocean, the snow golems actually have their uses. As of right now they do not melt (which may or may not be changed in the full 1.9 release) and can be used to create some awesome methods of household defense via things like pill boxes (I can even upload some pictures if you want of this kind of thing) which can knock mobs directly into lava pits. Silly? Yes. Useful? Absolutely.

There are better ways to provide that utility man.

Not to mention, I don't even want to think about what this is going to do to SMP considering this allows people to create unlimited numbers of bandwidth-hogging snowmen.

I'm hoping at the very least that there's some enchantment involved in the process when it reaches final form and that the current "stack two blocks of snow and a pumpkin and it creates a cute little undead army!" thing doesn't represent the way it's meant to be.

[Beemlord]

There are better ways to provide that utility man.

I guess with Dispensers. But the snowmen do have unlimited ammo, unlike dispensers, but conversely are extremely vulnerable to arrow fire.

Not to mention, I don't even want to think about what this is going to do to SMP considering this allows people to create unlimited numbers of bandwidth-hogging snowmen.

This may be my only real concern with this addition, but I don't play much SMP so I just tend to overlook things like that (outta sight, outta mind i guess lol)

I'm hoping at the very least that there's some enchantment involved in the process when it reaches final form and that the current "stack two blocks of snow and a pumpkin and it creates a cute little undead army!" thing doesn't represent the way it's meant to be.

I don't have any response for this, I just find it interesting that you consider them undead haha


EDIT: Okay, I'm beginning to concede to your viewpoint on the Snow Golems. The more I use them, the more I find their mechanics broken and pointless. There are points where they won't even throw snowballs at mobs rendering them completely useless.

[JWA]

Personally I think one of two things is happening.
1) Notch has ideas he wants to implement but wants to test the code and the reaction by players. So hes thrown in a bit of everything to see what people latch on to and what causes riots. Hopefully this means later on these things will be heavily refined, but it could also be like FC said, that hes getting bored and thus lazy/wacky. One thing that made me think this was the weird looking NPC, cuz there is no way that is the finished product.

2) My personal theory(no bashing honest) is that Notch got frustrated by all the complaining about 1.8 and decided to troll us hard. That might sound like an immature assessment but when I saw a video of the prerelease my first reaction was that this must be a mod. Its all just so far off the beaten path from what I expect of minecraft.

If nothing else, what backs up both these theories to me is simply the amount of content added in such a short amount of time, and how little most of it has to do with what was added in 1.8.

[FlowerChild]

I guess with Dispensers. But the snowmen do have unlimited ammo, unlike dispensers, but conversely are extremely vulnerable to arrow fire.

No, I mean if you want that kind of functionality, there's probably better ways to put it in the game than with the snowmen.

Heck, I'd probably put a self-pleasuring turd-throwing chimp in before I would the snow men. At least that would be funny.

[Urian]

The mushroom biome is actually kinda nice. You can "cure" mooshrooms and turn them back into normal cows by shearing them. It would be a bit similar to Terraria but having mushroom biomes slowly spread and infect other biomes could be kinda nice, provided you could also counteract the infection of course.

The snowmen are... interesting. On the one hand they are pretty silly, on the other hand they're closer to what you could have expected a year ago. I mean, is an exploding green penis really any less silly? No but they've become iconic and the mascot of MC anyway. It might be that snowmen are based on some code that's not been used yet which would explain why Notch implemented them "because [he] wanted to do something other than AWS", anyhow, they're a source of snow in non-snow biomes :p

1.9 brings a lot of new drops, we might need to start figure out mobtraps in the nether soon... Nethermobs are (almost) immune to fire and lava, perhaps the faster flowing lava could be used to move them and then kill them by... saws? (not near lava) Piston suffocating? (might be best but takes a long time and difficult to automate) fall damage? (some of them can fly)

[Mrchaim]

So...

Ugh. I'm really not sure what to make of 1.9 other than lots of swearing over the swamp-water border, and the fact that it apperntly is hardcoded in, rather than being based off a png. (For those unaware, i study illustration, graphic design, ectera... And yes, i do think default minecraft looks pretty hideous. It's so grainy. Ewwwrghls.)

Seriously, that just really pisses me off on a huge level - It's incredibly visually ugly, and it's not even easy for the playerbase to change. Ick ick ick. And i don't actually believe it's hard to spot that it's really, seriously visually unappealing. (Then again: I think the majority of minecraft is visually unappealing on a huge level, with it's base textures. Not the models them selves, the block asthetic is fine, but the textures)

More seriously: Nether ruins are cool in theory, I'm yet to find one. similarly shroom biomes. The addition of snow back into the game is good, and i like the little tweak of water/lava "leaking" through blocks, giving you some indicator of things. That said...

I'm just not convinced that there's anything of dramatic vaule added. More biome reasons to explore is great. The new mobs... well, Magma slimes frankly just seem like a re-colour from all i've heard. I'm yet to find any blazes, so i cannae comment on what they're like to fight. Combine that with a bunch of additional useless drops (I mean, i assume something's planned for them... but if that's the case, why not just hold off putting them in till they'll have an actual use?) and yeah, frustrating.

Back to 1.81 for me, i think.

[Magmarashi]

The simple explaination for the changes is that the idea Notch had for the direction of the game wasn't what most people assumed it to be. I, personally, don't see anything wrong with some silliness.

[DaveYanakov]

The impression I get from the snow golems is testbed. It gives Notch a way to play with NPC ally code that was guaranteed to not be overpowered and could be considered fun. They also add the trail mechanic which could just as easily be added to a mob that spreads fungus infection, for example.

[echo off]

well, it's not really pre-release discovery, unless they release another pre-release with this in it, but notch just tweeted this image, and i wanted to share it here XD

so at least he's getting something right. hardcore will be awesome.

Also, i'm hoping DaveYanakov is correct. Alot of the new features really feel like they open up a world of content that isn't being created yet, and I can only hope the features as they appear are for testing purposes. Fingers crossed, hey :)

[Shengji]

I really don't like the idea of the giant mushrooms and the infected cows, that being said, I will get a great deal of satisfaction from curing area's, eliminating all the giant mushrooms and bringing the cows back to normal. I guess I will have my own mini-adventure, whether it was what the team at Mojang had in mind or not!

I like the snowmen, not for their mob knockback or whatever. Come the 20th december, I'll be building one or two and enjoy a little festive decoration! After the 1st January, I'll herd them to a desert and say goodbye to them for the year.

[Runesmith]

I personally understand the general purpose behind the implementation of giant mushrooms, being that they can serve as a way to farm mushrooms reliably. However, I do agree that, as they are, things should be tweaked; the mushrooms shouldn't be as big as pine trees. I'd say three blocks high at most. Additionally, adding the "mooshroom" just seams silly and redundant. Why add a mob source of mushrooms when you can either harvest them directly with small mushrooms or farm them with the large versions?

My view on the villagers is that the current model will most certainly not be final. The nose is horrendous (though I can just make it invisible by changing the skin), and their complete lack of arms is just confusing.

The additions to the nether certainly aren't fundamentally bad, as they at least provide diversity to an otherwise empty dimension. The new items may currently be useless, but they add great possibility for future recipes (the community won't have any lack of ideas). The argument others have given about the Zombie Pigs dropping gold nuggets is logical, assuming that gold will be usable as a currency with villagers. Lastly, the new "nether wart" plant just screams "POTION REAGENT" to me, along with the more abundant mushrooms, if one considers the new hunger/health system.

Finally, I'd have to go along with FC on the snowmen. Its current "function" as a lure/decoy for combat and mob traps could be done more efficiently; a static decoy entity seems better. I've heard suggestions of Scarecrows, which would make more sense if using pumpkins (unlike current snowmen), and could alternate between mob attraction and repulsion functions depending on the type made.

[echo off]

My view on the villagers is that the current model will most certainly not be final. The nose is horrendous (though I can just make it invisible by changing the skin), and their complete lack of arms is just confusing.

hehe yeh, the current villagers are very aptly being named "squidward" after the character from spongebob squarepants:


oh, btw that water drops coming through the ceiling thing... it's the same for lava. first time i saw it i thought i was a bunch of spiders eyes in the distance lol, but it'll be useful for expanding the roofs of underground caverns :) it might generate a tiny bit of light too, though i didn't notice any.

[shifty]

I really get the impression he's lost interest in Minecraft (which is rather sad because nothing else coming out of Mojang seems very interesting and is unlikely to make them much money IMO, meaning the continued success of Minecraft is likely to be the only thing that keeps them afloat) and is just throwing in any old thing that comes to mind now.

Please don't turn this thread into rampant Notch-bashing as a result of this post. While I respect Notch a great deal, I've obviously had problems with the direction he's been taking Minecraft in which was one of the motivating factors behind me creating this mod. I think it worth mentioning, that I find those problems have only gotten worse with time.

Instead of a lack of interest in the game as a whole I think Notch just loses interest in his ideas in addition to not thinking them out fully. Looking back at the previous releases, most additions to the game are half finished with potential to be much more. However with subsequent updates these additions are rarely improved upon. I may be proved completely wrong but it wouldn't surprise me if the next release does little to finish the recents additions to the game. Strongholds and mineshafts will be cool place to check out a few times but offer nothing more than a high density of spawners. Villages and villagers will have little in the way of interaction other than just being scenery ect

I just get the impression Notch sits in his office and gets an idea like mushroom cows and thinks "that would be a cool thing to add" rather than having a big whiteboard with a tech tree laid out and a plan for the game.

Having said all this I have been impressed with the biome code changes. The landscape is a lot more interesting than it used to be.

[Brethern]

So...

Ugh. I'm really not sure what to make of 1.9 other than lots of swearing over the swamp-water border, and the fact that it apperntly is hardcoded in, rather than being based off a png. (For those unaware, i study illustration, graphic design, ectera... And yes, i do think default minecraft looks pretty hideous. It's so grainy. Ewwwrghls.)

Seriously, that just really pisses me off on a huge level - It's incredibly visually ugly, and it's not even easy for the playerbase to change. Ick ick ick. And i don't actually believe it's hard to spot that it's really, seriously visually unappealing. (Then again: I think the majority of minecraft is visually unappealing on a huge level, with it's base textures. Not the models them selves, the block asthetic is fine, but the textures)

More seriously: Nether ruins are cool in theory, I'm yet to find one. similarly shroom biomes. The addition of snow back into the game is good, and i like the little tweak of water/lava "leaking" through blocks, giving you some indicator of things. That said...

I'm just not convinced that there's anything of dramatic vaule added. More biome reasons to explore is great. The new mobs... well, Magma slimes frankly just seem like a re-colour from all i've heard. I'm yet to find any blazes, so i cannae comment on what they're like to fight. Combine that with a bunch of additional useless drops (I mean, i assume something's planned for them... but if that's the case, why not just hold off putting them in till they'll have an actual use?) and yeah, frustrating.

Back to 1.81 for me, i think.

To be fair the swamp water transition is pretty accurate to what it looks like in real life sometimes. But MC isn't real life it's a game.

[FlowerChild]

Instead of a lack of interest in the game as a whole I think Notch just loses interest in his ideas in addition to not thinking them out fully. Looking back at the previous releases, most additions to the game are half finished with potential to be much more. However with subsequent updates these additions are rarely improved upon. I may be proved completely wrong but it wouldn't surprise me if the next release does little to finish the recents additions to the game. Strongholds and mineshafts will be cool place to check out a few times but offer nothing more than a high density of spawners. Villages and villagers will have little in the way of interaction other than just being scenery ect

Well, I agree with you there, but at the same time I think Minecraft itself is just a higher level example of this happening. It is an "idea" in itself, and from his work patterns, and how he keeps shifting attention to other projects, I think the same thing that you describe is just happening on a larger scale.

Minecraft is Mojang's cash-cow. It's what is keeping the company going. I sincerely doubt that other members of the company are encouraging him to split his efforts like that as a result. If a person is bored with something, yet they feel obligated to keep working on it, I think you start to see the kind of "out there" additions getting slapped on as the person tries to retain there own interest by doing something "different".

Having said all this I have been impressed with the biome code changes. The landscape is a lot more interesting than it used to be.

Yup, I agree with you there. While I haven't tried 1.9 yet, I really loved the biome changes in 1.8. Everything felt a lot more epic IMO.

[Magmarashi]

I just see it as Notch has always been a really goofy person, and He has reached a point where he can start to insert some of that character into his game. If it was anyone else, anyone that is mostly serious, I could agree that, yeah, it's slipping someplace odd. Notch has always been an oddball, though, so I just don't see the same dread and portent.

[DaveYanakov]

Lilypads don't seem to require shears. I harvested several with a sword while generating a large area to revert to a 1.73 map.

[Haidaes]

I have to say I like the new stuff alot actually. While I think splitting it into two updates was a waste of a lot of ppls time, it still upgraded the world significantly. Alot of the things that were added might be useless by default but I'm pretty sure guys like FC will find a use for them :).

[Caboose]

I think the new swamp texture is both hideous and unnecessary. The original rich green color is infinitely preferable to the new stuff.

Other than that though, I rather like the new update.