Better Than Wolves Forum

Version 4.A5 Pronged Poking of Better Than Wolves is ready for download!

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This release contains the following changes:

-Added Hardcore Poking. This allows you to stick shafts into soft ground, primarily to test to see if it's stable before walking on it (falling blocks like sand will behave exactly as if a player had walked on them). You can also place torches on top of them if you're planning a luau.

-Added the Dormant Soulforge as a new block which can be found in newly generated nether fortresses. It may also be crafted with 10 gold in an "I" pattern in the crafting grid (requires an Anvil/Soulforge), and may be melted down in the Crucible. This will hopefully make finding and exploring nether fortresses a more interesting and rewarding experience, and also inserts an additional fortress dependency into the progression.

-Added the ability to cure zombie villagers back into the game, but it's now done with Soul Urns so that it's not accessible too early on. Note that unlike in vanilla, surrounding blocks like beds and iron bars do not affect the cure rate.

-Changed Soul Urns to have a maximum stack size of 16 to better match other throwable items, and got rid of their summoning of ghasts since that conflicts with their new role in curing zombies.

-Changed the Anvil's name to "Soulforge", and changed its recipe to require a Dormant Soulforge, Nether Star, and Soul Flux. As before, it may also be acquired through trading.

-Changed (tweaked) the types of villagers that spawn in the different village variants (abandoned, semi, etc.) to make the progression a bit more interesting.

-Changed the blacksmith building in villages to have a Dead Weight, even when abandoned. This makes it a little more rewarding to find villages as you travel about.

-Fixed problem that was causing potion particle effects to not display properly on mobs.

-Fixed vanilla crash when loading the options file from versions newer than 1.5.2. Unfortunately, this won't help on the first run of 1.5.2 when first installing the mod, but should at least prevent crashes if you switch back and forth between an existing BTW install and newer versions of Minecraft.

-Fixed some issues with leaves decaying when they shouldn't have. I think this may have also improved performance on chunk generation slightly.

-Fixed a progression bypass I had accidentally built into Blacksmith trades in the last release.

-Removed ability to melt down the Flint and Steel item in the Crucible, as it just resulted in annoying gamey behavior for the sake of negligible returns.

-Removed a bit of nothing to worry about from the last release that didn't really work well with some of the other changes in this one, so I guess now would be a good time to totally freak out. On the bright side, there's still at least one thing left not to be the least bit concerned with.

Poke 53281, 0!

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If you'd like to say thanks for this release and help contribute to the further development of Better Than Wolves, please consider making a donation:

I'M FREAKIN' OUT MAN!!! I can count the amount of pokes on one hand! Thank you FC!!!!!

I'm not sure what to expect less: another update, or tiki torches :D

* pours one on the curb for porta-ghasts *

The Soulforge change sounds interesting, I like it!

Really interesting changes, in particular the villager stuff. I also like that one more death vector has an option to be avoided. The collapsing sand in the dessert is interesting, but I think it's nice that now when people die because of it they know they could have easily avoided it by walking carefully with a stick. Looks like the dead weight's back to being useless with this new dormant soul forge item being used for the anvil.

Mason11987 wrote:Looks like the dead weight's back to being useless with this new dormant soul forge item being used for the anvil.

Hardly useless. It's a tech dependent lootable 7 iron ingots :)

SYS64738

Thanks for another update FC. Gonna enjoy getting all stabb...err pokey.

destineternel wrote:SYS64738

And there you go resetting my nice gothy setup :)

my gods, another update already? and it shows up right as hardcore spawn puts me in walking range of my base with the most progression so far!
...yeah, its not much. but at least it had enough iron for a replacement iron pick, and i have a mill and hemp growing...plus pumpkins, carrots, wheat, and chickens! also some sheep, a cocoa bean, and all 4 kinds of sapling for later growing. <,.<

i uh...guess you can tell i'm not very good at this survival thing.

Well, I guess I have a new favorite choice for marking the routes back to my base :)

Which I'll need, since I've finally gotten to the nether and will probably die looking for the new shiny.

Stormweaver wrote:Well, I guess I have a new favorite choice for marking the routes back to my base :)

If you've got the sticks to spare, yeah, they make a great way of marking a safe route through a desert as well :)

Wow, cranking them out!

FlowerChild wrote:-Added the ability to cure zombie villagers back into the game, but it's now done with Soul Urns so that it's not accessible too early on. Note that unlike in vanilla, surrounding blocks like beds and iron bars do not affect the cure rate.

This I did not expect. Dirt to bread here I come!

So nice to see the flurry of updates continue. I can't wait for the end of the semester so I can have time for games again.

Wow!!! so many changes and all so awesome... except that I am worried that I don't know what I should or shouldn't be worried about... Man this last update changes sooo many things that I really want to restart my world!

But looking at the recent updates and how fast they have been coming I think I may wait a little longer just in case ;).

Way to go FlowChild! It is great to see that you're back to your old self and enjoying creating a better MineCraft for all of us :D

Really great quality of life changes! This will take some of the sting out of exploration where your target spawns but does not have what you wanted.

I wonder if that leaf update will stop the random saplings when new chunks spawn.

Is there a go between the sail and base boat? Like using the spoon or shovel?

Thanks for another update FC!

Taleric wrote: Is there a go between the sail and base boat? Like using the spoon or shovel?

I'd stop right there... cause that kind of talk will get you banned...

Thanks for all the good vibes guys! It's a real pleasure to see the community for the mod spring back to life like this.

Xaedblade wrote:I'd stop right there... cause that kind of talk will get you banned...

I think it was intended more as a joke than anything else, hence the spoon. That's the way I took it anyways, so no need to get preemptively upset about stuff for me :)

Absolutely loving the latest updates. We've been on a break from BTW for a while now (it ebs and flows with other games) but I'm keeping an eye fixed on the forums and following updates. We're gonna be ready to start up again in a few months and this is just getting me more excited to play. Particularly loving the Anvil change to pre-end, Ethin and I have discussed at length how we miss out on a lot of aesthetic options with the Anvil being so far down in the progression so I can't wait to get my hands on that. Blacksmith trading will be a priority in our next world!

Thanks for your hard work FC, I've played this mod exclusively since it was the first 6 blocks and we'd be content hopping into the same old mod, but you've truly given it an unexpected lease of life so it's exciting times ahead.

i suddenly realized the hard way why hardcore poking is so useful. walked across a short span of desert to get to more mobile terrain... and sank down, promply buried without a shovel under sand. i suffocated before i could dig out, and now i respawned...in the middle of a jungle. ;;

Sorry about that FC. Won't happen again...

Awesome to see new updates, it's giving me the itch again. Does this sudden outpouring of updates perhaps represent a change in your previous eyesight situation? I would be very happy for you if it were the case. :)

Sarudak wrote:I would be very happy for you if it were the case. :)

All I can say is... maybe :)

I've had a number of false starts over the past few years, where I tried something new, things were better for awhile, then went tits up a short while later. So, I just try to take it as it comes now, and try not to think about it too much. Things are going good right now, and that's all I can really ask for.

Thanks for the positive sentiments man!

Xaedblade wrote:Sorry about that FC. Won't happen again...

Not at all man. It's all good all round.

Man the community is exploding after so long, I'm so happy to be back and to see so much activity. And FC, thanks a ton man. What you've created is fantastic!

Definitely glad to see that (hopefully for a while) your eyesight is doing better FC. Let's hope it stays this way!

you should just get rid of those old eyes and cobble together a better set made of redstone logic and the souls of the damned. :P