S5 E5: Better Storage

Fort Lookout started out rather simple. One large room, and then the cave front with the glass facing. I had hoped that perhaps furniture would be added soon(heh) and did not really plan any kind of creature comforts. I had one real true need at the time, safe storage and production facilities.



The back room was just a place to put a double chest, a crafting bench, and a furnace. I guess I did not even attempt anything fancy until my furnace/stove at the treehouse. I did not need much storage yet because when the Fort had been finished waaaay back when, I still had not truly mined, and certainly had not farmed.



The area I now call the Observation Deck was really only contoured to match the cave. No function to it except to make sure I could get some torches to act as a guiding beacon.



My storage system at the Tower was a bit better. I separated the storage according to the "building" it was in. The shed had tools and landscaping, the cellar had cured meats and stuff needing to be cold, the furnace area had ores. It was Sugarland where my favorite categorization was established, so Sugarland stood for my template for the Fort Lookout refurbish.



Taking further inspiration from Sugarland, I went up to the transition area between Observation Deck and the storage room. There I created a stove based on the grill I had outside at Sugarland. I added a "chimney" block above it for the heat to go. Half blocks were recently added, so I took the half blocks of wood plank and made some cabinets beside the stove, I'm rather happy about them, I felt creative.



Still on my shelving kick, I made a work bench and some overhead shelving for the space. I am now super happy about Fort Lookout. I have bunks, and officer's quarters, some furniture, extensive storage, and now a stove and crafting area to be proud of. It went from my most primitive dwelling to the one dwelling that contains all current "comforts" in Minecraft. Beds, bookshelves, paintings, carpeting, shelves, all the nice stuff.

Next up! Episode 6. I need to secure the area around Fort Lookout!

S5 E4: Problem Areas

Well since I had been away from this area for months, there were a few things I let slip. When I noticed these things I always said "I'll fix it later". Well, I guess its time for that "later" to be now. Here's a few of my fixes...



I put these up in trouble spots on my river so that I could traverse it at night in dire situations. Just some blocks of man-made cobblestone and some torches all around. It looks kind of medieval, which I guess fits with the Tower area.



I am trying to find new uses for the single stack fences that I experimented with at Sugarland. Here is one of those uses I've seen, legit lamp posts. I kind of wish I could use a smaller block, but I guess I'll have to just wait for better materials to show up.



Once I had a nice gradual cove here. It was a nice and pretty cove that I enjoyed having here. Then a creeper caught me one morning and blew up that nice scenery. "I'll fix this later", and then I had a glitch that lost me lots of glass that I needed for something. I dug up the beach because... well its not like it was pretty anymore.



FANCY! Yeah, I'm playing around with some more carpentry, finding what works, what looks good, what is function. This is fairly functional, but I do find myself just jumping down it on return trips. Oh well, it looks nice.



I'm fallen down this thing like 3 times while not paying attention. Look at the picture, you can see the ladder up to Fort Lookout just next to it. I always thought I'd explore these areas, but eh.



I'd rather feel like less an idiot, so I've boarded this one, and several other holes in the "backyard". Now its pretty safe to travel behind the Fort.

I harvested a good bit of materials during all of this. I realized that compared to Sugarland, the Fort was rather lacking in facilities.

Next time we'll fix that.

March 26 2011 Weekend update

Hmm.

Well they are adding soon that beds will be your new spawn point after you sleep in them. That's pretty cool I guess... kinda makes my river seem silly now :P Oh well haha, I really enjoyed and was proud of my river work. The compass will still be pegged to your original spawn. I really like that, so you can still always get "home".

I still have plenty of Episodes set up and ready to go for a few weeks. I'm refining my idea of what I'm doing. I have really liked the idea of "Skypp" being a scout for the area and preparing it for "occupation". Sort of a advance astronaut preparing a planet for habitation or some such. So I may be making some more "stations" soon.

I have to say that I like my new Fort Lookout. You guys have just now seen some of the changes I've made, but I've been "living" there for 2 weeks now. Really fun and great place. I don't know how I lived in that tree or even that tower for sooooo long now haha. Even Sugarland is feeling sparse in comparison.

Well, thanks for reading, I hope you enjoy my further persuits.

-Skypp aka Rick_no7, aka Rick

S5 E3: Classing up the joint

The bunkhouse turned out to be a bit smaller than I had thought it would take to allow for 3 bunks and 3 storage containers. This leaves us with a long, yet direct, hallway through to the observation deck. I decided that the Fort is not a socialist regime, so an Officer would have to occupy the place. Putting the officer the closest to the observation deck would make sense, whoever was on guard could get to the officer very quickly.



While clearing out the room, I quickly find that there is an error in its placement. The walls are the literal walls of the mountain, and I would not be able to "finish" the room out with wood planks like the rest of the fort. I decided that with executive privilege of having your own room, also comes the executive duty of living in a drafty, cold room because it is closest to the observation deck. But that doesn't mean the officer will be a cave man. We can do some stuff to help out.



My best comfort resources are at Sugarland, that is where I decided to make my first "homely" house after all. So I went there and I collected some wool I had acquired, and then I went and picked some roses on side of a non-landmark hill.



The officer quarters now has a nice decorative rug so that the officer isn't living on stone floors. He gets his bed, and I put a bookshelf beside it. I figure he may be doing some work or writing his reports as he lay in bed.



After exploring the area on the other side of the mountain, I decided some windows would not hurt anything as they are hard to observe from anywhere, the area outside the officer's quarters is yet another "hollow" volcano like structure in a mountain. Next, I knew that tapestries hung in castles kept the warmth in, so I arranged for a large tapestry... apparently of kung fu fighting men, to be hung beside the bed.



On the other side I fashioned a sort of desk and bookshelf in a nook for the officer to use. Another, much classier, painting would reside on the wall next to the door, and executive privilege allowed for a double chest in the room instead of a single.



I was very happy with the room. The highest quality furnishings, yet a little bit of austere compromising by the officer would keep some respect of the junior officers. Then I read the sign we had made up for the room... apparently someone can't spell. Oh well, that'll have to wait till we can procure another sign.

Next we work on some problems areas of The Bay, get it into a bit better shape for an area befitting the fort.

S5 E2: Lookout Renovations

I arrived into Fort Lookout through the back door... the only real entrance I guess. I still like that there is only one real entrance. Anyway, I see that I had NO plan for function for this place. Zero.



I have looked out into this area many times, waiting for dawn before I had a watch. I decided I needed a chair here to sit. Once it was there, I realized it had this kind of Star Trek captain's chair about it. I like that. I imagine if someone was on guard duty they would need a place to sit and watch out over the entire bay for boats and such.



There was always a wall here of natural rock that I thought would make the place look more.. natural form afar. Minecraft just does not support that kind of detail because of the glass graphic, so I decided this would be the start of the new area.



I was not sure that the area here was solid. I had heard creatures before and did not know if it was from the roof or a hidden cave somewhere around Fort Lookout. Luckily it went solidly through.



Just as I planned. Turns out that the observation deck is on the level with the back storage room. This hallway leads directly to it, connecting the observation platform.



Directly from the back room I hollowed out the area next to the chest. It too was solid, something of a surprise considering this whole Fort was built inside natural hollow cavern.



I widened it a bit and then proceeded to cover it all with wood so that it looked classy and finished. I kind of like the finished look of this former cave, so I am going to keep it where I am able.



Here's some TMI for you... I am a "HGTV Home of the Year" sweepstakes junky. Whenever they have it, I enter daily like a mad man thinking I even have a chance. Well this year's home featured a ski lodge, something I "planned" to turn into a movie theater when I won(yea right). Well I like the idea of bunk rooms in my Forts now.



Fin

Now to the next room... but you'll have to wait till next post!

Season 5 Return to the Bay! Ep: 1 Season Opener!

Season 5 Return to the Bay!

Episode 1: Season Opener



This is my exact spawn area. Sometimes I forget why I spent all this time making a river and I have to remember how far away my spawn point is from the oceans on my map. If I press myself just a little too far and I end up losing a lot of something valuable, I need a way to get back quickly. For you newer readers, it was a coincidence that my first shelter was literally right beside my spawn point. I explored the area a bit to decide if I liked the place.

I consider it a happy coincidence.



This is the kind of terrain that surrounded the Bay. This was the flattest part really, everywhere else is hollow mountains that drop into endless craters at the top, it is an incredibly hard terrain to traverse.



The few pools that I would soon connect did in fact lead to a kind of valley between the rough terrain. The river now goes through there. This was a big time consuming detour to stay to the valley, but in the end I consider it worth it for the amount of dirt it saved me from having to break through.



At the end of my river is vast oceans. I come roaring out of the river on my boat, and generally I can get to anywhere of interest(I.E. places I die) very quickly. It really expands my mining opportunities.



This is what is above my spawn point. I barely ever lived up there, and usually used my little shack of a first shelter because there was no reason to really go "upstairs" It was fun and neat and high on concept when I made Fort Lookout, but lacking in practical use.



The little shack is pitiful. There's a stove, a craft bench and a double chest. That's it. I've literally made dirt shelters for one night that was as equipped. This will not do. I need to make Fort Lookout a true central hub.

Next up is Episode 2: Make Room! Make Room!

Season Finale Season 4: Success.

Months ago, around 6 months ago, I embarked on a journey in my new world. I wanted to see the ocean. I had gotten a glimpse of it over Rose Point, but the mountains were too large and too steep to ever be practical to me. So I set forth following a series of ponds, and between several mountains, and I made it to the ocean.

On the way back to the bay I came across this site.



I thought it remarkably looked like a river bed. There was no water around, so the idea in my head was that this valley was indeed once a course of a river. This idea sparked the thought to trace my way back to The Bay and see if there was a logical course a river once flowed from it to the ocean, and I actually did find a nice course an ancient river could have traveled.

That was when I started my river. I had practical reasons for it, those reasons will be recounted at a future date, for now only one thing was left.



The area in red signifies how close I am to the upper part of the river. I am standing on the last piece of sand of the dry river bed, and about 4 blocks below the red area there is the river.



That last part worried me. I had known that the river was ocean level, but I did not know if the sand went down to ocean level. I suddenly got worried that if I dug the sand to the correct depth that there wouldn't be a river bed anymore... luckily as the screen shot demonstrates, the sand was quite deep.

Perfect.

I cleared some sand to ocean level, and then set on the final tasks.



This is the delta side of the river, the one near Sugarland. If you look at the screenshot you can see that the river is flowing toward a small earthen dam.



Now we have quarry side broken and rushing to the riverbed, the river is so close to living again it can feel it. The waters rush toward each other with only one last hurtle.



But I can't just let them meet yet. There needs to be ceremony. There needs to be opulence. This is the most important event in the history of The Bay.



That's more like it. Just like the East and West of the US was united by a golden railroad spike, a golden shovel shall burst the dams...



Oh what a long time and oh what effort it has taken to get this far. How far?

Here's a sample:



I do not have a map of the original world untouched, so I colored in the areas that had been altered in this map from around November. You can see though, the massive effort this took.

Season 5 to come! We're going back to The Bay!!! Its time to upgrade the facilities, and prepare for colonization of the oceans!!!

March 20, 2011 weekend update

Dogs! Well, the next best thing: Wolves.



I think the main "squee" part of the video is when they shook the water off. This instantly made these creatures the most complex creatures in all of Minecraft. I think, right then, it gave a lot of people hope for a redo of creature behavior in game.

I for one can't wait. I know that it is not going to be the pet that I wish for(I would need a seperate UI and the ability to name them), but it will definitely add something new to the game.

So I am excited. Supposedly they are going in with 1.4 but you never know, we were supposed to get lamps at Holloween till he "forgot" to put them in with the patch, and we still haven't seen those.

Well anyway. That's the update really. There some achievement stuff that doesn't really excite me for this particular blog. Some stats too, telling me how many blocks I've broken. Still, not really interested.

UPCOMING BLOG STUFF

I am really thinking over my exit of this world from the blog. I am sure it will stay my main world while playing, but it really does limit me a bit when it comes to patches and stuff. I still haven't made a portal and they've been in since Holloween. I still have about 3 weeks worth of posts to go from this point on, saved and ready to upload, so I'll at least do that. So my friends, The Bay may be coming to a close, but the Blog would live on in a new world... but its not certain, I am having loads of fun right now in this world, so we'll see if it stays interesting.

S4 E11 Cutting

My sugar cane farm is real simple. When I go along the rows and cut the cane, it all falls into the water. Simple manipulation of the water makes it a sort of conveyor belt bringing all the cane into one spot by flowing on the water.



My first use for sugar cane has nothing to do with sugar. My original intent for propagating cane along the river was to make my homes a bit more classier. Cane can be processed into paper. Paper can be collected into books, and books can be assembled into bookshelves.



Right now they are purely decorative, but they do look nice. I put some along the wall next to my chair at Sugarland. Now I can sit and read with a nice view on either side of me.



Next up is that giant block of about 90% dirt that is next for clearing. It is a very nice shape, so I took this time to really think about my explosives usage here. I studied up on how deep and far an explosive can go in dirt, and how it generally acts around normal stone. I a few holes down and set the explosives...



Two should get the job done enough. The outsides should stay intact, keeping any of the explosion from damaging the surroundings. The floor also should be fine, leaving almost no fill in work for me to do. That is my guess anyway.



The explosion was a little smaller than I planned between them, but the sides do look very very nice. From up here I think I did fine on the floor as well. I went down to get a better view.



What is left is really not that bad to clean up, and I think I saved myself considerable time and annoyance as compared to going line to line, row to row clearing this out.



I am absolutely proud of my job on what will be the river bottom. There was a couple of stones I had to clear, but NONE of the explosion went below the river level. You can see, that is all natural stone, no dirt or cobblestone filler for any accidental holes.

Up ahead is the final stretch. The inspiration for the route I took with this river, and a large part of what inspired this project in the first place. The ancient riverbed.

S4 E10 Moooving

That's pretty much my main trip from the tower to the new house. I've been living in the new house for about a week, but did not feel it had been "finished" enough. I moved over whatever I thought may be essential for working in this area. Finally this felt like a home.



To celebrate I had all my neighbors over for a housewarming cookout. Cow took to the grill and cooked us up some nice vitals. He is lucky Notch hasn't put hamburgers in game...



This is what I named my little cottage at the mouth of the river. Sugarland at Bearded Trees sounded all fancy. I liked it better than what I had named my tower. Tartarus doesn't really roll off the tongue, nor does it really inspire fear, but come on... Cheron's Tower or Cerebus Tower or any other widely known mythical names pertaining to the gateway of hell just sounds cheesy. Anyway, yea, time for more work.



I actually cut this area here out while I was doing all the sugar cane farming. It did not take long as it was only about 4 blocks deep. I kind of regret doing it this way as you can see the hill I was tearing in to on that side, it looks like a flat picture now or something. I'll work on "naturalizing" that later.



This is my next plateau and this time I am going to save me some wasted time by cutting it out in a way that will not look so unnatural.



That will be a ton better looking as you can see I graduated the edges upward on the side where the river will flow. Now I just have to get rid of this giant block of land that is cut all the way around, but still a pain in the neck to remove. I need a shove, a BIG shovel, and luckily I know the recipe for the big shovel.

Oh you don't know? Here's a screenshot of the BIG shovel.