LP Episode 1: Introduction, or, For Want of a Pickaxe

I went ahead and made a YouTube video. Trying to expand this site's horizons. Let me know what you think.

Underground Sugar Cane Farm

To get all the bookshelves for my enchanting table, I've been growing the reeds along the coast near the top of the elevator. I wanted to do something with the stone brick road in order to keep my energy flowing with the underground base. I decided to make a nice little sugar cane farm down there.

Originally there was going to be a mob trap next to the water source, but that was looking much less common. That spot became the location for the reed farm.

Using a very nice Efficiency IV diamond pickaxe and TNT, I made this nice space:

Putting in the dirt, water, and glass:

There's no redstone with this. I was considering making it a piston-operated autoharvester, but looking at what I have now, it's much nicer looking. The end result is quite simple but I like it.

The jack o'lanterns do feel a little haphazardly placed but ah well, they do the job. I could easily move the stuff around. The entrance to the farm also looks identical to the pumpkin room, which I will want to change.

I went to the nearby abandoned mineshaft to grab some cobwebs for string, which will go to making bows. The mineshaft intersects a ravine, resulting in floating supports, cobwebs, and a floating cave spider spawner!

Still not much of the above ground base has been designed, but for the up/down section, I do have at least this much made:

I'm attempting to think of what kind of blocks I will use in its design. I'm currently thinking planks, logs, sandstone, and Nether brick. This may also be the permanent location of my Nether portal.

Zombie Experience Farm

I accidentally stumbled upon the dungeon that I knew was nearby. It's a rather compact zombie dungeon.

With the piston elevator complete I could go on to something new, which was to conquer this dungeon and convert it into an XP grinder. Using Minutor I attempted to plot a path from my base to the dungeon but couldn't quite figure it out. So instead I went to where the dungeon was and followed the caves to my home. The path is fairly straightforward.

First it's up the grass stairs which for some reason has remained until now.

Then through the tunnel to a gravel patch, then a patch of dirt.

Finally, and quite fittingly, I have to go up a steep path to get to the dungeon itself.

I put my armor on, with its low levels of enchantment, and prepared to race through the path. It was expected I would face at least a couple hostile mobs along the way. To make a long story short, however, there was absolutely no resistance, even though it was night time. There were only a couple zombies in the dungeon and I was hit a whole one time. How anti-climatic.

Here is the dungeon after being conquered, and how it looked after I cleared out the cobblestone in preparation to convert it.

There was a very fancy tutorial on YouTube that I looked up as my guide. It showed me how to set up the trap quite nicely. Here is a link to the tutorial. This is the only picture I took during the setup:

The room is symmetrical around the spawner, which is surrounded by the dirt and cobblestone. I have the walls of the room made of cobble since it seems most fitting. On the two corners closes to the left are small platforms the water emanates from, leading the zombies down that lowered level and into a mob elevator, then the drop. The appearance from the outside:

Yeah, that's pretty ugly. I intend on making it look nice. After all, it will be part of my ground-level base. That's where the zombies swim up and plummet down.

Figuring out how far to make them fall has been a crapshoot for me. I'm at a certain level now where they still take two hits to die, but if I lower the block by one they're guaranteed to always die. I'm going to try a half slab and see what that does. Otherwise, the trap works wonderfully.

I'm racking up the levels pretty nicely. I'm securely underground so I simply put the game on Hard, which I think maxes out the spawn rate (I could very well be wrong) and let it run in the background 10-15 minutes while I do other things. My computer seems able to handle over 100 zombies but once it gets to 150 or so, it slows down. Earlier this morning I completely forgot I was letting them accumulate and when I next looked, there were about 250 zombies in front of me. I could barely move. Perhaps I should implement a timer?

I'm being slowly overwhelmed with the iron helmets I'm getting from this thing. The shovels and swords tend to disappear quickly, as I use them to hit zombies. But the experience being gained is very nice and, with me building the books around my enchanting table, I've been able to get higher levels of enchantment. I now have a bow with Flame I and Power V.

What's next? Probably the built-in mob trap I was speaking of doing overhead. The issue with that is, what if I want to build upward? Digging into that very often would ultimately make it a waste of time.

Also, here are some unfortunate animals that have found themselves in unfortunate situations. How unfortunate.

Piston Elevator

The better part of my Minecraft gaming since I last posted had to deal with the piston elevator intended to take me to the surface and, eventually, into my above ground base. This is the entrance in all of its simplicity:

I have upgraded to 1.2.5 to take advantage of the new sandstone and plank types. I feel this could look better, however. The elevator is located on the second floor of the central hub, that sort of balcony that made me like this place.

The elevator itself is the design that Etho came up with, a compact spiral system.

These planks hold the redstone wire needed to get the pistons to extend when I step on the pressure plate. You would not believe how many times I had to tear down the wires to get it right. Originally the wire was on dirt blocks because it was just a temporary setup. I made error after error but eventually, after reviewing the model on my Creative map, I got it down pat. Just as Thomas Edison is believed to have said he found several hundred (or thousands) of ways to not make a lightbulb, I found half a dozen ways to not make a functional piston elevator!

Inside the elevator, I went ahead and alternated between glowstone and jack o'lanterns for lighting. I hoped I could use them to indicate what level I was on but at 5 blocks per second, there's no chance of that. Ah well, the variety is nice.

Some of the beautiful terrain at the top of the elevator:

During the setup process I tried gauging where the elevator would be and where I would need to dig out. You only need a 4x4 hole for this. I miscalculated pretty miserably.

I suppose gravel does serve a purpose after all: filling up dumb holes.

Another project I underwent was trying to extend the grass paths to get up to the balcony. I also extended the bridge, which almost reaches the stone brick road.

Honestly, I don't care very much for this. I may very well tear this down and try to restore it to what it originally looked like, or something like that.

I had my share of deaths while making the elevator. A couple were simply falling into a hole, while once I forgot I removed a temporary water drop.

Next thing I want to do is conquer the dungeon near my base. I stumbled upon it while doing some walking above ground. I won't spoil what kind of dungeon it is just yet. After doing some looking and tracing, I've come up with the path I will take from my base to the dungeon. I intend on doing this on at least easy mode.

The paragraph about the planks and redstone reminded me of something. The stone brick road will eventually have plenty of wiring hiding behind it. I'd like to come up with a sort of building code for myself. It has two rules:

• Redstone wire, torches, and repeaters always go on wooden planks. 
• The part of something that is visible from the path must be mostly stone brick. The behind the scenes wiring and structure can be of any material, except the planks used for wiring. Each project should have a different block to separate it from the others around it. So if, say, I had a Slime farm, I would make it out of cobblestone. The mushroom farm next to it would be made of, perhaps sandstone. It's just to make things easier to distinguish.

Nether Trip, Tree Farm, and House Work

It's been a few days, here's a little update on the random things happening at the cave base.

First of all, I decided it was time to hit the Nether. I want to use Nether brick for future construction. There's a tunnel on the southeastern part of the central hub which is where I put the portal. I have my sound turned off, but hopefully it's far enough that the portal sounds won't bother me.

Not the most glamorous looking thing. I'll take care of that in time. If you recall in the creative map I have, there is a fancy setup that uses iron blocks as a sort of iris for the portal. When that iris is closed, you can't get out the of the portal. I'm going to eventually set up something like that for this portal. It just seems pretty cool to me.

As I exited the portal, I noticed the terrain was rather... familiar...

I don't remember when they did this, but I don't like it. My cave base portal linked with the Nether-side portal I had established a few months ago during my first trip to the Nether. Using Single Player commands I set a waypoint right here. I wanted to find the fortress I had seen so long ago.

It wasn't as difficult a find as I expected. This Nether fortress is almost entirely encased in the Netherrack terrain. You could climb the mountain it's entombed in and you have almost no chance of realizing it's there unless you see one of the few parts that jut out. This particular fortress has been the source of my Nether brick. In this next picture you can see the results of one dead end where I have been gathering brick:

Not too far from this spot and the place where I enter the fortress, there are a pair of Blaze spawners.

The left spawner is down at the end of the path, and you might not be able to see it. The right spawner is much more obvious. I have plans for these two. I wish to make an XP farm with them, as well as possibly make this the centerpiece of my future Nether base. The base itself would sport a circular design, again thanks to Single Player Commands.

Returning from the Nether, I anticipated arriving back at my cave. Instead, I arrived at a familiar place:

My old home. My intent is to start over at the cave, so I didn't take anything from this area and just returned to the cave. But when I got there, I discovered that a couple stragglers followed me!

So now I have cats in my base. We'll call them Herp and Derp.

Of course, that's not the only time in recent history that I encountered relics of my past. A couple days ago I was exploring the Extreme Hills biome I reside in, and around 250 meters from my base I saw this:

If it looks kind of spooky, it's really not. This is a house made during my failed attempt at the City Construction Challenge. I recall it being a storage building, and also one of my early attempts at designing a house that looked decent. I suppose the jury is still out on that one.

Back at home I became dissatisfied with my mining equipment. Even diamond pickaxes were just going slow. I've been avoiding doing this for a while but finally I gave in and crafted this:

The Enchantment Table! And as I had nowhere else to put it, I went ahead and just stuck it in the basement.

Then it was time for my first enchantment. Because there were no bookshelves around the enchantment table, I could not get a very high result. I am pleased with the outcome.

Even with Efficiency I, I can push through blocks in a faster pace than I've ever experienced. Can't wait to get higher XP levels.

I also worked on my underground tree farm. In order to get a good growing height, I mined the roof out to a height of nine blocks. These trees look pretty nice.

Remember the stone brick road (or whatever I decided to call it)? It's coming together quite nicely. I noticed that with the water station being recessed one block, the ceiling and floor patterns would be odd looking. So I tore that down and moved it one block further. One block makes all the difference in the world.

Now to begin with the ceiling. The stone brick road will be five meters in height, with a ceiling composed of Nether brick and sandstone stripes.

I really must get more lighting. Actually, lighting is just one of many things that need to be worked on. This is quite a huge project for me! You'll also see the unused side of the road has been turned to stone brick, just for consistency's sake. I don't know, I almost feel like I want to expand the width of this spot. It feels rather claustrophobic.

In a bid to start getting more XP for enchanting, I went nighttime mob hunting. Most of the monsters downed were skeletons, with Creepers coming in second. I needed just one more string to make a bow, but it took three nights to find a spider that would drop string on death. Another spider happened to survive until daytime, but it found itself in quite a predicament:

Trapped on a little bit of floating dirt. I could not get close enough to hit it. I also experienced my first instance of passive mobs spawning in my base. This sheep appeared atop a dirt block for the tree farm:

Right now, I would love to get an XP farm going. In order to accomplish that I want to get a spawner. There's a dungeon hidden somewhere near me under a beach, and there's also an abandoned mineshaft some distance away that has a couple cave spider spawners. But if I'm going to get any of these for myself, I want to do that the proper way: getting at least on Easy mode and taking out any of the monsters spawned from them. I most certainly won't loot any dungeon chests unless I defeat the spawner that way.

Cave Base Expanding

Yeah... it's been a while since I wrote anything here. In the mean time, the cave base (I suppose that's what I'm calling it) has expanded. I'm drawing inspiration and design from Etho, more than I think I'd like but ah well. Tearing stuff out and rebuilding is part of the game.

Let's start with the central hub. Here's a newer picture of it:

You'll notice that a couple parts have changed in shape. The southwest side, which this picture aims toward, has had a couple additions:

The thing on the right is an infinite water source station. The pool in the grass floor has been closed up since I don't need it anymore. There's another water station which we will see shortly.

I also added a small chest room. The sandstone border gives it a look like it was cut out the side of the wall, which I rather like.

I think I might relocate the workbenches and furnaces. I would rather those be stone dividers.

A look inside the resources chest. This comes from examining the caves as well as plenty of strip mining, using the branch-1,000 method.

Overhead, you will notice that I've started building a bridge. The logs on either side are in different places because I'm trying to decide which looks better. What do you think? The bridge connects to the central hub's upper level, which I haven't touched yet.

As we move west, where most of the construction outside the central hub has been, you'll notice several new additions.

You can see these areas are pretty well lit, right? But where are the torches? Easy - there aren't any! Like the one I am imitating I'm seeking to not use torches. Instead I have been using jack o'lanterns. The upper picture takes advantage of how light will pass through a piston. Each one of those pistons has a jack o'lantern underneath it. The piston arm texture blends in quite nicely with the plank texture.

In the lower picture, which is the secondary hub, the center of the platform wouldn't be sufficiently lit with the piston trick so instead I have the glowing pumpkins a level higher with a pressure plate on top of them. Does the trick for me.

Walking north you encounter the beginnings of what I call the stone road. Things built along here are made with stone brick. Not very interesting yet.

There are two parts so far: the pumpkin farm and the other water station. The pumpkin farm is well lit, using lava streams along the sides.

The iron bars simply help me not fall in the water when collecting pumpkins, and also reduces the chances of drops going into the water. I tested the look with glass panes and it didn't look nearly as nice. I plan on replacing the left side with melons once I find seeds. And once I get sticky pistons this will become automated.

And the water station:

This is going to be another long-term thing if I stick to it. Unlike the ravine project this is not nearly as monotonous. I have plenty of things I want to do in it. Some things:

• Get a mob farm nearby which would be quite tall and provide a good source of mob drops. I've been playing mostly on Peaceful because, well, I'm a wuss.
• I know there is a dungeon just underneath a nearby beach. I wish to conquer that on Easy mode or harder then convert it to an XP farm. 
• Lava core in the middle of the central hub. Not only would it provide torchless lighting, it's look good.
• Looking at Starshadesjack's map, I wouldn't mind setting up an above-ground structure that would be the topside expansion of my home.
• Spiral piston elevator to the surface, as well as a water drop back down. These would go nicely with the house idea.
• A refill room. This would be a small room lined with dispensers. In case I die while exploring or whatnot, I could walk into this room and step on a pressure plate. It would activate redstone and each dispenser would shoot out something. Right now I'm thinking a set of iron armor, iron sword, iron pickaxe, and iron shovel. Perhaps a piece of cooked meat too.

You may be wondering, what about the Ultimate City? I haven't forgotten that project. I might return to it soon. That's not something I intend on giving up. I guess I just got bored with it. In about two months I may be able to play SMP and if so I will definitely be seeking out a server where I can do the project, perhaps starting over with it. If I can do that, I will certainly be needing a team. Some positions which will be open include assistant project manager, redstone specialist, design specialist, foreman, and workers.

In the project's thread on the Minecraft forum, I am getting a lot of comments about how visually unappealing it is. I get it. I can't help it. I just don't have much skill with design. But if you all are so good with design, why don't you sign up as a design specialist? ;)