Hardercore Spawn [Spoiler Thread]

SerraNova · Post by **SerraNova** » Wed Feb 28, 2018 6:44 pm

I hope it's not too early to start a discussion of how to handle the increased difficulty of death. I figure there aren't so many servers running that we can't work together on some strategies.

I'll admit that we were a bit behind on infrastructure, due to a quite watery starting area that caused us to get a lot of "lucky" respawns. We have a good number of new-to-btw players, though, so it was pretty nice- they got enough "unlucky" spawns to get the idea, but not get too discouraged. We do have SOME of what we need: some roads, some signposts, and some portals, but since we updated Monday it's clear that it's all too little and too small. What strategies do you guys recommend for getting things up to speed quickly?

jackatthekilns · Post by **jackatthekilns** » Wed Feb 28, 2018 8:04 pm

So I just had my first death with Hardercore spawn and I'd like to report my experience. I don't understand anything really yet but we may work it out between us.

The developments that I believe may be relevant for my progress are:

1. Diamond ingots/pick created
2. Cauldron Created
3. Nether Portal Created and used.(my guess is this is the most important but I don't know for sure)

My findings:

I play on this seed often and so I am familiar with most of the common spawning points. this spawn was completely new to me. I also found the following (which I think may be more than some people want to know even in a spoiler thread):

Spoiler

Show

pumpkins, not carved but seed bearing pumpkins. I'm pretty sure that these only spawn outside the hardcore spawn radius. this discovery was pretty jaw dropping for me and is what made me decide to start the thread

So I think this means that at some point, possibly after a player has been to the nether, or maybe used a diamond pick, spawning becomes much more varied. I love this because it injects a new challenge into this seed which I really like using. I get to this tech level pretty quick so i now can look forward to more fresh experience on an old hat of a seed.

Post by **FlowerChild** » Wed Feb 28, 2018 8:58 pm

Hope you guys don't mind that I merged these two topics in a general spoiler thread. I suspect the conversation in one would only be reflected in the other.

Psion · Post by **Psion** » Wed Feb 28, 2018 11:29 pm

as far as my own experience for this: our servers pretty developed, as we just beat the end dragon soon before this update hit. we've had luck with spawns because to the west there's an endless ocean (ok, about 50k blocks or more away there's land, but who's going to sail that f....oh thats right, IT WAS ME. -_-;) and to the north it hits ocean for a long ways as well fairly quickly as well, which only leaves mostly east and south that are in dire need of landmarks.

i've often wound up south of my own base by a few thousand blocks (horribly rough estimate eyeballing it) which is about 1k blocks south of spawn (and 3kish to the west....not so eyebally since i dug a tunnel to spawn from my base.) so i'm guessing our hardcore spawn is about 4-5k blocks radius now?

it's definitively much further than default now, i've wound up crossing unabandoned villages multiple times. it's having me nervous as well - i don't know if this spawn radius keeps increasing with the passage of time or if it's tied to "landmark achievements" that expand it. if it's the former and there's no limit, eventually infrastructure building won't be able to keep up - the area of a circle is going to increase exponentially with the radius increasing. on the other hand if it's the latter that makes both perfect sense and kind of puts a massive incentive to stop and build roads and the like before you reach for greater power.

not really easy for our server to test though since we've basically gotten hardererercore spawning due to updating while highly progressed. XD

Post by **dawnraider** » Thu Mar 01, 2018 12:33 am

I do feel like the whole thing adds to the value of steel beacons significantly. With death becoming a much larger factor even late game, getting an anchor set up becomes more and more useful.

SerraNova · Post by **SerraNova** » Thu Mar 01, 2018 8:33 am

Psion wrote:it's definitively much further than default now, i've wound up crossing unabandoned villages multiple times. it's having me nervous as well - i don't know if this spawn radius keeps increasing with the passage of time or if it's tied to "landmark achievements" that expand it. if it's the former and there's no limit, eventually infrastructure building won't be able to keep up - the area of a circle is going to increase exponentially with the radius increasing. on the other hand if it's the latter that makes both perfect sense and kind of puts a massive incentive to stop and build roads and the like before you reach for greater power.

I really hope you're right about it being tied to tech, not time. Part of the whole point of HCS in the first place (aside from making death meaningful) was to encourage us to develop the world (right?), so I'm gonna hold on to the belief that it's possible! In our world, we have crucible tech and have not found overworld fortresses yet, and we've seen a spawn at a super-rough estimate of 3-4k blocks. Other spawns at unknown distances have been near active villages, so at least far enough for that.

I'd say we'll by necessity be holding at this tech level until we get our infrastructure sorted, so more data'll be incoming, I'm sure. As far as infrastructure, recently someone made a nether roof tunnel in one direction (to explore and settle), so we're working on branching off that and placing portals.

magikeh · Post by **magikeh** » Thu Mar 01, 2018 11:09 am

Few things here
First off, Holy fucking shit FC. I was going to post in the observations forum a few weeks back about how easy HCS was and how it was possible to just run jump back to base from nearly any point within the HCS range without any real issue. Then you went out and fixed that hunger/running/jumping problem, at that point I held off so I could play around and get a new feeling of HCS with the new mechanics. While on Gates to Hell server I noticed that even with the new change to movement it was yet again trivially easy to wait for morning, get someone at spawn to toss some soul sand then whizz bang you could still just walk home (only real problem being the biome specifics on the journey) And to note, these recoveries are all without any food nor tool gathering. Just respawn and walk.

But now, oh baby yes! I hopped onto Gates to Hell last night having just raged last time from a death. So I figured it'd be a good time to start toying with the new mechanics of HCS. One quick creeper later I respawned and nearly added a couple pounds to my drawers. I saw passive mobs. For those unaware, Gates to Hell had been completely depleted of all passive mobs from within the old HCS range and then some.. Naively I went about my business as I usually do with a new HCS, just run jump around to find suitable settling grounds, die once more and only then, begin my journey to recovery.
However, it was while working out my recovery (and doing a pretty terrible job at that) I died a few more times and noticed that I kept respawning in the same general area, even after the server had had a couple days pass. So I have some speculation into the new workings of HCS are not only relevant to player progress, but also something else.

I'll elaborate in that HCS used to work in that every 24H (MC time) the HCS location was reset, from there, the player was spawned at a position +-100 blocks or so around that HCS location. But that was the thing, it was insanely predictable. You could throw yourself off a cliff the morning after dying and get a new HCS location if you didn't recognize or like the current. The new mechanics seem to tie a 24H timer to the player's last death instead and will continuously respawn the player at their last HCS location (again +- some random number of blocks).
I have yet to die enough and actually time it out but I kept seeing the same frickin tree on my respawns while attempting recovery which is making me wonder.

Speculative Speculation

Show

Gotta say that with this speculation it's kinda nice to think that you can work towards a good recovery and if you cock up within 24H of your last death you don't lose a huge amount of progress at that one location. You can go back and keep working towards a proper recovery. At the same time, this opens a new avenue to exploits as the player can count out the 20 real life minutes per day and pre-plan deaths so they don't have to worry about hunger throughout the respawn process. However again, that's if you want to cheese it.

RalphKastro · Post by **RalphKastro** » Thu Mar 01, 2018 2:50 pm

magikeh wrote:Few things here

I have yet to die enough and actually time it out but I kept seeing the same frickin tree on my respawns while attempting recovery which is making me wonder.
Speculative Speculation
Show
Gotta say that with this speculation it's kinda nice to think that you can work towards a good recovery and if you cock up within 24H of your last death you don't lose a huge amount of progress at that one location. You can go back and keep working towards a proper recovery. At the same time, this opens a new avenue to exploits as the player can count out the 20 real life minutes per day and pre-plan deaths so they don't have to worry about hunger throughout the respawn process. However again, that's if you want to cheese it.

Hmm, that is very interesting, as, until you've advanced enough technologically to have a reasonable hidey hole, respawning in the same place is more of a punishment than spawning somewhere else.

I do wonder how that would behave if you respawned near some trail back to spawn, and didn't actually have to progress in tech until the compass. Would it still keep respawning you on the same spot? Or are we assuming that progression means different things than it actually is?

jackatthekilns · Post by **jackatthekilns** » Sat Mar 03, 2018 6:05 pm

I have realized that hardercore spawn now encourages you to build up beyond a compass. I know that my base is surround by a lot of water so boat travel is a likely necessity. So I am growing hemp. I will probably build up to a full windmill because I will need to make another sail if I ever spawn here again.

BTW: have we discovered the likelihood of respawning at one on these places? I have died a few times and it is a new spot each time. I'm sure it is possible but do we think it is less likely than what we experienced with hardcore spawn?

Post by **dawnraider** » Sat Mar 03, 2018 8:00 pm

I'm pretty sure hardcore spawn was always meant to be fully (pseudo-)random. There was just a bug for a while that it would choose the same few places. So afaik it's probably slightly less, given the larger area. It's certainly possible to respawn in the same location, but only by the incredible luck of having the RNG give you a similar spawn.

Taleric · Post by **Taleric** » Mon Mar 05, 2018 8:23 am

After portal I just HCS and pretty sure as guessed it is progress gated.

I wonder, how close does it put the player to non abandoned places.

jackatthekilns · Post by **jackatthekilns** » Mon Mar 05, 2018 1:04 pm

Taleric wrote:I wonder, how close does it put the player to non abandoned places.

I spawned in view of a live village on 2 separate occasions.

My question now is - I build a nether portal at one of these locations. what happens when I die now?

Taleric · Post by **Taleric** » Mon Mar 05, 2018 1:14 pm

jackatthekilns wrote:My question now is - I build a nether portal at one of these locations. what happens when I die now?

I don't think it would be centered on further portals.

My thought is after that first portal it bumps the possible range from 0.0 to 2000x2000 or more?

Then maybe further once you open the end.

Off this spawn I know for certain the best bet will be to tech up to iron and a compass then travel to 0.0 with a nightly monument. This will be much better than a diamond hunt each time, IMO.

Gilberreke · Post by **Gilberreke** » Mon Mar 05, 2018 3:45 pm

Total guesswork, but it seems like the farthest someone spawned was about 4000 blocks out post-end.

My guess is that making a nether portal makes the maximum spawn go to 3000 and then the end makes it go to 4000

Now what I'm wondering is if there's also a minimum distance from spawn, for example:

- New world: [0, 2000]
- Post nether: [2000, 3000]
- Post end: [3000, 4000]

I'm pulling these numbers out of my ass btw, but here's some math using them (I'm bad at calculating, feel free to correct me):

2000 block radius: 12.6km²
3000 block radius: 28.3km²
4000 block radius: 50.3km²

Now if the minimum radius stuff is correct, here's the area for each tech step:

[0, 2000]: 12.6km²
[2000, 3000]: 15.7km²
[3000, 4000]: 22km²

Now these numbers are close enough that it means you would still be able to get benefits from a road network and/or landmarks. It also seems to incentivize rail networks and nether portals to get back home after you die, where previously, a HCS involved getting a compass.

TheGatesofLogic · Post by **TheGatesofLogic** » Mon Mar 05, 2018 5:02 pm

I am pretty certain I have HCS further than 5000 blocks out tho. Ended up spawning in a location that I explored searching for carrots, and I was pretty familiar with the distance.

I do want to do some testing to figure out if a minimum distance exists though.

Gilberreke · Post by **Gilberreke** » Mon Mar 05, 2018 7:32 pm

If you can figure out some better numbers, my post still holds up, just recalculate the areas, etc. It's the ratios between the different tiers that we really need to figure out for strategies, to see if roads and safehouses are still viable, 3-way biome crossing navigation, necessity for nether portal to get back to spawn, etc.

SerraNova · Post by **SerraNova** » Tue Mar 06, 2018 9:27 am

We're holding at crucible tech, getting portals up before working on strongholds and the end. I have a solid number of 3100 blocks for one spawn point, and to my knowledge nobody has spawned close enough to be within the old HCS range.

EDIT: That "solid" number is NOT 3100, because I forgot to include one leg of the trip. It's about 3450.

Taleric · Post by **Taleric** » Tue Mar 06, 2018 9:32 am

So on the HCS after portal creation I reached a mineshaft near bedrock and it has melon seeds.

Unsure if this aids how far out I must be or it is always a roll of the dice.

Post by **dawnraider** » Tue Mar 06, 2018 2:38 pm

I don't believe mineshaft loot is tied to hardcore spawn.

jackatthekilns · Post by **jackatthekilns** » Tue Mar 06, 2018 5:34 pm

I have found melon seeds in the mineshaft below my base at spawn

Taleric · Post by **Taleric** » Tue Mar 06, 2018 6:46 pm

jackatthekilns wrote:I have found melon seeds in the mineshaft below my base at spawn

dawnraider wrote:I don't believe mineshaft loot is tied to hardcore spawn.

Well good to go then, just surface changes, which makes sense because of the depth element and rarity.

Edit:

Well whole pumpkins post portal HCS are a thing, hooray! Side note, did I totally miss that it is mandatory to drop the pumpkins now for seeds?!?!

Spoiler

Show

Mason11987 · Post by **Mason11987** » Tue Mar 06, 2018 9:26 pm

did I totally miss that it is mandatory to drop the pumpkins now for seeds?!?!

Craft the pumpkin to get a carved pumpkin, and seeds pop out, like bark/dust when you cut logs with an ax.

Taleric · Post by **Taleric** » Tue Mar 06, 2018 9:38 pm

Mason11987 wrote:
Craft the pumpkin to get a carved pumpkin, and seeds pop out, like bark/dust when you cut logs with an ax.

Oh phewww thank you. I only have three to my name and when the only option I saw was the carved one there was no way I was going to click it :D

Fret · Post by **Fret** » Mon Mar 12, 2018 4:34 am

So I haven't had the chance yet to experience the new Hardcore Spawn mechanic, although I must say it looks super cool. But I have been thinking, if the suggested way to get back to spawn from thousands of blocks away, is via the Nether. How do you guys navigate within the Nether? I'm talking pre-iron beacon of course, since that is late game tech. I've heard about the crafting table trick, but it feels super gamey and I have a hard time imagining that it's the intended gameplay. So how do you guys get back via the nether? Or do you just travel the overworld with a compas?

Taleric · Post by **Taleric** » Mon Mar 12, 2018 10:54 am

After you get your overworld direction by compass it should be the same in the nether. So just pay attention to your direction when you enter and make frequent marks to keep direction as you travel.

For myself I am going to head back in the over world to make more outposts on the way back.