I'm reading all about portal placement now: http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Nether_portal
Looks like they can be closer together if you also get the Y coordinate exact, otherwise you need to space them out more for the "exclusion zone".
(split off from photo thread)
According to the wiki, this is feasible:
overworld portal at x:32, y:64, z:32
links to
nether portal at x:4, y:64, z:4
nether portal at x:4, y:80, z:4
links to
overworld portal at x:32, y:80, z:32
Then all you need is a staircase to ascend 16 blocks. Or a railway! I'm lazy.
If that doesn't work, you could always do:
overworld portal at x:32, y:64, z:32
links to
nether portal at x:4, y:64, z:4
nether portal at x:6, y:80, z:4
links to
overworld portal at x:48, y:80, z:32
I was thinking we should import some nice smooth stone into the neither and make the portal hub a little more friendly... I really hate the look of neither rack
We could also color code markers around each portal to note the over lap zones for better placement.
Well, signs definitely help.
From what I'm reading, if your coordinates are exact you can pretty much guarantee two portals linking to each other. It selects the closest portal, so if your overworld and nether portal locations line up precisely then another portal that's off by one block is, well, not the closest by one block.
I dunno if anyone has done that perfect-alignment thing yet, though.
Quote from: Thorin on May 24, 2012, 01:38:40 PM
I dunno if anyone has done that perfect-alignment thing yet, though.
Moving around the obsidian portals to do that type of cleanup goes through diamond picks fairly fast and is slow work.
I ran many random portals from the central hub in the Nether just to explore the map. I labelled most with signs in there, but up to you guys if you want to re-do them.
I _might_ have a few diamonds to spare... [looks at nearly-completed fourth stack of diamond] Also, at most it's 14 hits to the diamond pick, right? A diamond pick should be able to take apart a hundred or so portals. It's just that it takes 10 seconds per block, so two minutes to tear down a portal.
The hard part would be the perfect placement - off by one errors could really mess you up and cause a lot of re-work.
Anyway, my idea is a long way off yet. Who knows, by then all the portals might've been fixed up already, or maybe I'll just find a nice empty place for myself somewhere with no portals yet.
Hmm This got me started thinking how nice it would be to have evenly placed compass direction portals with minimum spacing, possibly rails all lined up.... hmmmm urge to build rising...
ROFL
I KNOW THE FEELING
Damn life getting in the way of Minecraft :)
I think a start would be having overworld and nether portal coordinates line up precisely. That makes it a heck of a lot easier to add other portals to as needed. Having the linked pairs then point in the same direction would help, too, as you're less likely to get disoriented. Putting railways between them is then just gravy :)
Although ask LennyLen about zombie pigmen spawning on the rails; apparently it's very common.
Quote from: Thorin on May 24, 2012, 02:36:37 PM
Although ask LennyLen about zombie pigmen spawning on the rails; apparently it's very common.
Yes the spawn at any light level and occupy the same space as a player.... an ugly fix is to place glass block at head level... You pass through it without suffocating, but it is a ugly costly hack.
Could you just put slabs on the ground to keep them from spawning? And I assume they can't spawn on the rails themselves either.
Slabs are cheap and easy to make... Plus stone slabs in a red corridor might look nice.
Quote from: Thorin on May 24, 2012, 03:13:09 PM
Could you just put slabs on the ground to keep them from spawning? And I assume they can't spawn on the rails themselves either.
Slabs are cheap and easy to make... Plus stone slabs in a red corridor might look nice.
I believe the pigmen can spawn directly on track, the wiki just says ANY 2 high space... http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Zombie_Pigman
Yeah! Feel free to build up and clean up the area. I had to build the fugly cobble pillbox around the initial portal due to a LARGE number of Ghasts spawning (seriously 4-5)
Adding labels really helps there are portals that go all over the damn place
Yup, the pigmen can spawn on any blocks, even with slabs or rails. The glass block method is the only way to stop them. What I also learnt the hard way is to make sure all of your rails are at the same y value. If two blocks next to each other are one block different in height, you can't place the glass blocks without stopping travel, which allows pigmen to still spawn on slopes.
OK I have been playing with the portals and manual placement works great (as long as there isn't conflict).
I am acutally thinking of adding portals in all of the transit stations however FIXing portal locations and collecting Obsidian is SLOW!!!!!!!
So I have a request...
If anyone has one or two HIGH efficiency Diamond pics I would very much appreciate it!
The first thing I plan to do is move the REALLY LOW nether portal UP... Since depth seems to be screwing up the other portals.. If the depth is the same for all portals it makes running between them in the nether MUCH faster, also if they are all the same depth then ONLY X and Z will be used for linking , making close placement MUCH easier.
I'm sure I can spare a pick or two
I'll drop 'em off at Ye Olde Community Storage
So... Would we be moving all future rails into the Nether, then?
I've got the XP farm now, I'm building an enchantment table right next to it as soon as I can, I've got a crap-load of diamonds... I'll see if I can get you some useful tools :)
Also, we need to figure out some kind of a naming / directions system for all the portals, otherwise it's too easy to get lost.
Also also, can you turn the portals so they face the same direction in both the Nether and the Overworld?
Also also also, what do you think about putting a solid wall behind one side of the portals so that it's obvious which direction you're supposed to enter / exit them?
Quote from: Thorin on May 31, 2012, 10:34:05 AM
So... Would we be moving all future rails into the Nether, then?
Only planning on doing the big stations to start, we have in between stops as well so I didn't plan on removing any track
Quote from: Thorin on May 31, 2012, 10:34:05 AM
I've got the XP farm now, I'm building an enchantment table right next to it as soon as I can, I've got a crap-load of diamonds... I'll see if I can get you some useful tools :)
Also, we need to figure out some kind of a naming / directions system for all the portals, otherwise it's too easy to get lost.
Also also, can you turn the portals so they face the same direction in both the Nether and the Overworld?
Also also also, what do you think about putting a solid wall behind one side of the portals so that it's obvious which direction you're supposed to enter / exit them?
At first I only plan on moving what I NEED to move to add new portals, even with an enchanted pick 10-14 (depending on who built it) obsidian blocks take a long time to dig up.
If you go check out the sky city portals (ignore the unlabeled on for now) I put a black catch area to turn your around... Remember depending on the direction of travel you come out facing the other way, so turning people around is something I plan on doing.
Pigmen make rail in the nether annoying so I just plan on improving things to start.
Placement is tricky.
If you go exact x/z matching then portals work perfectly however they are not alligned efficently in the nether, the are still much closer..
If you arrange them (in range) but grouped artificially in the nether, you drastically increase the odds of placing new ones in the wrong spot and having odd linking. remember portals search for the BEST MATCH at the time of transport... There is no fixed link.
I think going exact x/z placement, if they're all at the same y coordinate, will make adding new ones much easier for other players. I don't mind still having to walk between portals, it's easy enough to mine out new passages in the Nether, and travelling 8x times faster means 5 minutes becomes 34 seconds (really, about a minute because you have to walk to where the portal is).
If both portals are facing east/west, and the Overworld portal has a wall behind the east side and the Nether portal has a wall behind the west side, would that keep people from turning around? Would one always enter the OVerworld portal from the west (so facing east) and then step out of the Nether portal facing east?
PW
--> PW
....PW
WP
WP -->
WP....
W Wall
P Portal
. Ground
-> Direction of travel
I can't check out the sky portals right now, but I will in the next couple of days when I have time.
The only issue is you have to have all walls on the south side of the portal or somthing. Some over world portals make more sense facing different directions depending on land and buildings..
We can make changed to buildings and land to make this work.
Is that a game rule that the walls all have to be on the south side? Or do you mean for consistency's sake? I was just suggesting it so that if you're walking east when you head into a portal, you can continue to head east without turning when you come out the other portal. Less chance you get turned around. Then again, good signage can easily offset that turning around. We should try as much as possible to have straight paths in the Nether that all come back to 0,0, that way you come out of your portal, head to 0,0, then head to the other portal (with close portals having secondary direct connecting paths).
Consistency
each portal pair would have to be set so the entrance and exit where opposite... guess it isn't that hard.
I think you're getting what I'm saying now :) And yeah, it's a bit of OCD correctness. I love the idea of perfect portal pairs, though. None of this hoping you go to the right one, or hoping that someone else didn't mess up your portals by building in your exclusion zone.
Maybe you could just say in the Nether we're always walking from the spawn (0,0) outwards, in the Overworld we're always walking towards the spawn? You'd have to look at each location and see if it's more east, more south, more west, or more north.
For instance, an Overworld portal at +200, +704 is 200 east of spawn and 700 south, so clearly is more south. Since in the Overworld we're walking away from spawn, it'll have a wall on the north (so you walk out of it in a southerly direction). The matching Nether portal at +25, +188 is also clearly more south of spawn, and it has a wall on it's south (so you walk into it in a southerly direction).
I dunno if I'm overthinking this or not. All I know is I need sugar cane.
It doesn't always work out in side buildings where things can be cramped if you have added a portal after..
Also going all south or all north you end up with the Ikea problem of everything being more difficult if you try to go the other way.
Whaa, has anyone been confused exiting a portal?
The only time I can think of bricking up one side of a portal is because of a hazard.
Lining them all up in the same direction is a bit obsessive sounding to me...
The IKEA problem? I haven't been to an IKEA in a long time. Are you talking about how there only seems to be one good path through IKEA?
Quote from: Mr. Analog on May 31, 2012, 02:17:02 PM
Lining them all up in the same direction is a bit obsessive sounding to me...
Well, it was
my idea, I freely admit it might be a little OCD-ish.
Leaving both sides open is probably better as it allows more direction of travel, but the pairs should at least face the same way so if you're heading north into a portal, you're heading north coming out of it's partner.
Now if only we could instantly transport, instead of the four second wait.
Quote from: Thorin on May 31, 2012, 02:20:08 PM
The IKEA problem? I haven't been to an IKEA in a long time. Are you talking about how there only seems to be one good path through IKEA?
Yes, Ikea faces all there displays and path through the store facing a common direction... If you walk through the store backwards you feel like everything is a little off that is for sure because you see the back to many displays.
Hmm, since I haven't been there in, oh, eight years, I didn't remember them doing that.
Anyway, how about just making sure the portal pairs face the same direction?
I also kinda have in the back of my head this idea of two main corridors in the Nether, running north-south through the spawn (x:0,y:-1000 to x:0,y:1000) and east-west through the spawn (x:-1000,y:0 to x:1000,y:0). We can then dig from portals over to these two main corridors. If it's standard and always leads back to spawn, it might be easier to navigate.
And yes, I did spend over an hour lost in the Nether the first time I went in. I didn't know which portals led where.
I think signage is going to be FAR more useful than portal direction.
Not to mention signs are cheaper to make and take less time :)
(also don't forget to bring a flint and tinder with you when you go on a portal adventure)
Yeah, signage you're right about. That, and making sure it doesn't turn into a giant maze, or warren. If there's a default, "if lost retreat to spawn then try again", that'll definitely help. That said, it'll all be done before I get there to help, probably, so take my suggestions with a grain of salt.
However, I really was lost in the Nether, taking the wrong railway and portal several times a while back. Took me over an hour just to get home.
Quote from: Mr. Analog on May 31, 2012, 02:36:05 PM
I think signage is going to be FAR more useful than portal direction.
Not to mention signs are cheaper to make and take less time :)
(also don't forget to bring a flint and tinder with you when you go on a portal adventure)
If you are manually placing portals (instead of auto spawning them by building first in the overworld) you can all but ensure that you are always in a safe zone so burn out isn't likely.. Isn't fire, explosion or breaking the portal the only things that can put it out?
A more important thing is don't lite your self or building on fire when you have flint and tinder or lava buckets in your hot bar.
Quote from: Lazybones on May 31, 2012, 02:43:53 PMIf you are manually placing portals (instead of auto spawning them by building first in the overworld) you can all but ensure that you are always in a safe zone so burn out isn't likely.. Isn't fire, explosion or breaking the portal the only things that can put it out?
A more important thing is don't lite your self or building on fire when you have flint and tinder or lava buckets in your hot bar.
Haha, way too true! Oddly enough my first foray into this servers' Nether a Ghast put out the portal and I was stuck as I didn't have a flint and tinder. I actually had to get a Ghast to fire another fireball at me while standing on the the portal frame to relight it. That was the worst thing ever, that's also why no matter what I'll always visit the Nether with a flint and tinder...
Quote from: Thorin on May 31, 2012, 02:42:31 PM
Yeah, signage you're right about. That, and making sure it doesn't turn into a giant maze, or warren. If there's a default, "if lost retreat to spawn then try again", that'll definitely help. That said, it'll all be done before I get there to help, probably, so take my suggestions with a grain of salt.
However, I really was lost in the Nether, taking the wrong railway and portal several times a while back. Took me over an hour just to get home.
The Nether is just really easy to get lost in as it all looks the same.
Quote from: Mr. Analog on May 31, 2012, 02:52:20 PM
Quote from: Lazybones on May 31, 2012, 02:43:53 PMIf you are manually placing portals (instead of auto spawning them by building first in the overworld) you can all but ensure that you are always in a safe zone so burn out isn't likely.. Isn't fire, explosion or breaking the portal the only things that can put it out?
A more important thing is don't lite your self or building on fire when you have flint and tinder or lava buckets in your hot bar.
Haha, way too true! Oddly enough my first foray into this servers' Nether a Ghast put out the portal and I was stuck as I didn't have a flint and tinder. I actually had to get a Ghast to fire another fireball at me while standing on the the portal frame to relight it. That was the worst thing ever, that's also why no matter what I'll always visit the Nether with a flint and tinder...
Quote from: Thorin on May 31, 2012, 02:42:31 PM
Yeah, signage you're right about. That, and making sure it doesn't turn into a giant maze, or warren. If there's a default, "if lost retreat to spawn then try again", that'll definitely help. That said, it'll all be done before I get there to help, probably, so take my suggestions with a grain of salt.
However, I really was lost in the Nether, taking the wrong railway and portal several times a while back. Took me over an hour just to get home.
The Nether is just really easy to get lost in as it all looks the same.
My first real trip, I just died. That got me back home quick. Then I came back, picked up my stuff, and left ;D
Not sure if you've seen the first portal entrance, it was on a floating island so I had to be very careful not to fall into the lava pit below. It was all exposed to 3 Ghasts as well, I was capable of dodging for the most part but stupidly my hunger bar was low and I had no food on me. I didn't want to risk the jump to kill zombie pigmen for either as I had on a full set of armor and had all my diamond implements (which, in retrospect, was dumb to bring)
Quote from: Mr. Analog on May 31, 2012, 02:57:54 PM
Not sure if you've seen the first portal entrance, it was on a floating island so I had to be very careful not to fall into the lava pit below. It was all exposed to 3 Ghasts as well, I was capable of dodging for the most part but stupidly my hunger bar was low and I had no food on me. I didn't want to risk the jump to kill zombie pigmen for either as I had on a full set of armor and had all my diamond implements (which, in retrospect, was dumb to bring)
Haven't seen that one. The one I went into there were like 4 ghasts firing at me the moment I exited. gate was blown out, and I panicked. :(
Quote from: Tom on May 31, 2012, 03:08:03 PM
Quote from: Mr. Analog on May 31, 2012, 02:57:54 PM
Not sure if you've seen the first portal entrance, it was on a floating island so I had to be very careful not to fall into the lava pit below. It was all exposed to 3 Ghasts as well, I was capable of dodging for the most part but stupidly my hunger bar was low and I had no food on me. I didn't want to risk the jump to kill zombie pigmen for either as I had on a full set of armor and had all my diamond implements (which, in retrospect, was dumb to bring)
Haven't seen that one. The one I went into there were like 4 ghasts firing at me the moment I exited. gate was blown out, and I panicked. :(
I built a bunker around it: http://mc.tomasu.org/#/2/64/-5/max/1/1
It was a bit panic inducing when I realized that if I couldn't get the portal re-lit I'd basically have to hope I died from starvation so I could get my stuff back.
Right, well, we're hoping to avoid open areas, with portal rooms and connecting corridors instead. Sounds like it makes sense to have a chest at each Nether portal with some supplies (food? flint and steel? a couple of swords, picks, and shovels? anything else?) And if we dig corridors and they come out in caverns, we should cover over our corridor so that ghasts can't get at us (I hear glass works good for that?)
Lazy, what y coord are you planning to use for all the fixed portals in the Nether?
Well, that's one lesson I learnt from the old server, dig into the ceiling and make your portal network through connecting tunnels, I'm just saying if you plonk your portal down in the overworld and connect to the Nether that way be prepared
Why the ceiling?
Quote from: Thorin on May 31, 2012, 03:16:56 PM
Lazy, what y coord are you planning to use for all the fixed portals in the Nether?
I would have to go look, but the spawn city portal and the north, south, east, west signs all seem to be at the same level (not including the portal below there...
lava is everywhere in the nether so having everything at a standard height might be hard, but I plan on building off of what we have so far.... Some variation in height isn't bad, as long as you are not too close to other portals...
on the over world there will be lots of variation, I only plan on trying to standardize the nether for quick transport between them.
Quote from: Thorin on May 31, 2012, 03:22:20 PM
Why the ceiling?
If you dig straight down you'll likely run into lava and everywhere else is caves with dangerous stuff.
Digging up in the Nether is the easy way to get a group of fast travel portals going. You can also build forts and stuff but it's a bit tricky, nothing worse than getting knocked off a wall you're building and landing in lava or something.
Oh, it's all solid near the top? I kinda figured it was one big cave up there.
Maybe that's an idea, to dig right under the ceiling (I just read something about going above the bedrock, but it sounds like it'll only _maybe_ work). Moving everything up to close to the ceiling sounds like a fair bit of work, though. Maybe we need to do a couple of joint builds in the next week or something :)
Starting to sound like lots of work...
I was just planning on leveling out the portals, aligning them better with the overworld where needed and maybe creating a cobble stone generator to line the halls because nether rack is the only block worse to look at than cobble.
Quote from: Lazybones on May 31, 2012, 03:54:09 PM
Starting to sound like lots of work...
I was just planning on leveling out the portals, aligning them better with the overworld where needed and maybe creating a cobble stone generator to line the halls because nether rack is the only block worse to look at than cobble.
Nether brick?
Quote from: Tom on May 31, 2012, 03:55:06 PM
Quote from: Lazybones on May 31, 2012, 03:54:09 PM
Starting to sound like lots of work...
I was just planning on leveling out the portals, aligning them better with the overworld where needed and maybe creating a cobble stone generator to line the halls because nether rack is the only block worse to look at than cobble.
Nether brick?
http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Netherrack
(http://www.minecraftwiki.net/images/7/72/Netherrack.png)
is uglier than
http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Cobblestone
(http://www.minecraftwiki.net/images/6/67/Cobblestone.png)
Actually it sounded like lots of work right from the start :) Levelling out is fine, I'm just wondering what y-coord you're going to settle on in case I finally get my butt into the Nether and want to help out.
Although I do maintain that a backbone east-west and north-south corridor going through 0,0 would help. But maybe I'll just have to put up or shut up :)
Hey, so, on those blocks do you see the L?
Quote from: Lazybones on May 31, 2012, 04:06:18 PM
Quote from: Tom on May 31, 2012, 03:55:06 PM
Quote from: Lazybones on May 31, 2012, 03:54:09 PM
Starting to sound like lots of work...
I was just planning on leveling out the portals, aligning them better with the overworld where needed and maybe creating a cobble stone generator to line the halls because nether rack is the only block worse to look at than cobble.
Nether brick?
http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Netherrack
(http://www.minecraftwiki.net/images/7/72/Netherrack.png)
is uglier than
http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Cobblestone
(http://www.minecraftwiki.net/images/6/67/Cobblestone.png)
I realize that. I was suggesting you could make nether brick rather than import a bunch of stuff. and it looks better than cobble IMO.
Quote from: Tom on May 31, 2012, 04:17:09 PM
I realize that. I was suggesting you could make nether brick rather than import a bunch of stuff. and it looks better than cobble IMO.
http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Nether_Brick
(http://www.minecraftwiki.net/images/6/62/Nether_Brick.png)
"Nether Bricks are a type of block used to form generated structures in The Nether, making up a majority of Nether fortresses, forming their walls and supporting pillars. Nether Brick does not generate anywhere else in the nether. Currently, the
player cannot craft Nether Brick. "
'cept that's non-renewable whereas the cobble is renewable, so easier to generate, no?
lol
Lazy beat me to it :)
Cobble's pretty ugly, too. Maybe we need to employ Melbosa Heavy Manufacturing and Lucky Charm's Refining to smelt a bunch of cobble into smooth stone.
A smooth stone generator and a silk touch pick to make stone brick would be efficient however.
Heh, maybe I need to spend some time xp grinding and making a silk touch diamond pickaxe. I'm finally at a point where I can do stuff like that.
Of course, with that tree farm going it might be just as easy to smelt cobblestone into smooth stone.
Quote from: Thorin on May 31, 2012, 05:34:39 PM
Of course, with that tree farm going it might be just as easy to smelt cobblestone into smooth stone.
Mining a smooth stone generator with silk touch would save two steps assuming you don't already have cobblestone and harvested fuel .
Err, I have 45-50 stacks of cobble and 40+ stacks of coal :) When I couldn't think of what to do, I just went mining.
Quote from: Lazybones on May 31, 2012, 04:23:12 PM
Quote from: Tom on May 31, 2012, 04:17:09 PM
I realize that. I was suggesting you could make nether brick rather than import a bunch of stuff. and it looks better than cobble IMO.
http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Nether_Brick
(http://www.minecraftwiki.net/images/6/62/Nether_Brick.png)
"Nether Bricks are a type of block used to form generated structures in The Nether, making up a majority of Nether fortresses, forming their walls and supporting pillars. Nether Brick does not generate anywhere else in the nether. Currently, the player cannot craft Nether Brick. "
You in a bad mood or something?
Quote from: Tom on May 31, 2012, 06:20:08 PM
You in a bad mood or something?
Quoting the wiki and highlighting the relevant info is moody?
Quote from: Lazybones on May 31, 2012, 07:24:47 PM
Quote from: Tom on May 31, 2012, 06:20:08 PM
You in a bad mood or something?
Quoting the wiki and highlighting the relevant info is moody?
The way you replied the last couple times seemed snippy.
Quote from: Tom on May 31, 2012, 07:30:24 PM
Quote from: Lazybones on May 31, 2012, 07:24:47 PM
Quote from: Tom on May 31, 2012, 06:20:08 PM
You in a bad mood or something?
Quoting the wiki and highlighting the relevant info is moody?
The way you replied the last couple times seemed snippy.
provided the links to the images because the comments seemed confused, so I elaborated..
Quote from: Lazybones on May 31, 2012, 09:14:43 PM
Quote from: Tom on May 31, 2012, 07:30:24 PM
Quote from: Lazybones on May 31, 2012, 07:24:47 PM
Quote from: Tom on May 31, 2012, 06:20:08 PM
You in a bad mood or something?
Quoting the wiki and highlighting the relevant info is moody?
The way you replied the last couple times seemed snippy.
provided the links to the images because the comments seemed confused, so I elaborated..
Maybe I'm the negative one, but it seemed a bit condescending. I may be slow sometimes, but I'm not that slow :P
FYI: Illian (sp?) wants to trade obsidian for gold
I'll do the trade if you're not on, Bones, and I'll pass the obsidian on to you.
Stack of 64 Obsidian is now in Common Storage, right next to the diamond pick.
We left a slip at your door but you weren't there so you can pick up your delivery at our one convenient (if you live in Spawn City) location!