Hardcore Beacons *SPOILERS, CHEAT FREE*

[devak]

More towards actually obtaining a beacon:

is it actually possible to make an auto-witherkiller? i read it explodes all blocks around it when it takes suffocation damage, so should a cobble/melon generator not eventually kill the wither?

I so want to walk up to the wither and say "when life gives you melons..."

[odranoel]

More towards actually obtaining a beacon:

is it actually possible to make an auto-witherkiller? i read it explodes all blocks around it when it takes suffocation damage, so should a cobble/melon generator not eventually kill the wither?

I so want to walk up to the wither and say "when life gives you melons..."

id suggest makeing a seperate thread for that, as speculating and trying to come up with an answer to your question here would only serve to derail the thread into off topic territory.

that being said however, it is a good idea and while im not sure it would be feasible, i look forward to seeing what people can come up with

Edit: conincidentally, i recently finished makeing my first full stregnth beacon! :D and i realized that its perfect for capping off your mob trap, so your can then go underground and light up everything with in its range. befor it was a true pain to light up the caves underground as you easily lose sence of direction and many times iv ended up lighting a huge cave system that brough me much farther from my mob trap then nessisary, so alot of effort went to waste....but no more! if your in a cave now and dont see the spawn particles, then you know that cave dosnt need to be lighten up. also if your in a cave lighting it up and suddenly all the particles disapear, you know your reached the limit of distance you need so you dont have to keep going. this has already saved me a bunch of time as iv found my self a few times stopping half way through a cave when all the particles stopped showing up. i would have other wise kept going to great effort.

pic! (its actually two mob grinders side by side, ones a medium size piston trap, the other (incomplete) will be a larger 3x3 pads and vine traps set up.)

Spoiler

Show

[Foxy Boxes]

From what I can tell, the Lapis beacon gives true sight, which allows you to see where mobs would spawn, but only as long as you're wearing a helmet. Not sure if that condition's a bug or not though.

[FlowerChild]

From what I can tell, the Lapis beacon gives true sight, which allows you to see where mobs would spawn, but only as long as you're wearing a helmet. Not sure if that condition's a bug or not though.

Ah...the helmet thing was a bug. Just fixed it :)

[The great randomo]

Woo! Found the obsidian effect!
I have to say, that is a very neat way of dealing with it!

Spoiler

Show

[FlowerChild]

Woo! Found the obsidian effect!
I have to say, that is a very neat way of dealing with it!

Hehe...there we go :)

And thanks. Like I said, it's probably my favorite beacon of the bunch. In the past, I never used enderchests much as they always felt like cheating to me. Now though, as I mentioned in the dev-diary thread, an obsidian beacon is the first thing I built around my wither skeleton farm to aid in its ongoing construction ;)

[Battlecat]

Finally got a couple beacons built on my server at spawn, and was eager to do some full research on them with the help of friends. We started with an obsidian beacon and a glowstone beacon. The radius of the glowstone effect covers the entire spawn base and way out into the surrounding lands!

Beacon Picture

Show

I did some experiments as well. I detail our findings regarding the obsidian beacon below.

Experiment findings, spoilers within

Show

We have a massive amount of obsidian thanks to major excavation project, so one tier 4 beacon wasn't too hard to build. I felt it was important to test with friends due to the removal of the hardcore chests toggle. The changes are absolutely wonderful for a cooperative server!

The placement of the chest is absolutely critical.

Enderchest with no beacon: Behaves like a normal chest.
Placed on the 3x3 Tier: A publicly shared inventory.
Placed on the 5x5 Tier: A second publicly shared inventory, separate from tier 1.
Placed on the 7x7 Tier: A third publicly shared inventory, separate from tier 1 and 2.
Placed on the 9x9 Tier: The private storage inventory, unique to each player just like before.

So effectively we now have 2 double chests of potential item movement through these chests!

Thanks! These changes are very cool!

[FlowerChild]

Thanks! These changes are very cool!

Nice job on the discovery process man! However, you're missing some details in how the various "channels" (which is how I think of them) function ;)

Glad they function well in a cooperative context. In anarchy, they bring in a whole other host of challenges to their use, which was how this was all intended. I basically tried to unify the ender chest functionality across the different game modes in such a way that they would work in a way appropriate to the context.

[Battlecat]

I love subtle details! I've got a couple theories already which I'll have to test out later. First I need to get enough obsidian together to build a second one (we did the initial tests on that single beacon, no remote work yet) which means building a gold beacon at my obsidian mine to reduce the drudgery first. :-)

I'd also like to mention, these changes to beacons have amped the value of mining an incredible amount. I'll be doing more intense resource gathering over the next weeks to get the needed materials than I've done in months and months.

[FlowerChild]

I love subtle details! I've got a couple theories already which I'll have to test out later. First I need to get enough obsidian together to build a second one (we did the initial tests on that single beacon, no remote work yet) which means building a gold beacon at my obsidian mine to reduce the drudgery first. :-)

Aha...that explains things. Yeah, there are a few more surprises in store for you yet then :)

I'd also like to mention, these changes to beacons have amped the value of mining an incredible amount. I'll be doing more intense resource gathering over the next weeks to get the needed materials than I've done in months and months.

Excellent man. Yeah, that was definitely one of the sub-goals with my work on beacons, and illustrates a lot of what I've been going on about with my statements on MC's design becoming "homogenous gruel". It's pretty sad when mining has become pointless in Minecraft.

[dawnraider]

It's pretty sad when mining has become pointless in Minecraft.

By now they might as well call it DoWhateverTheHeckYouWantToDoWeSuckAtDesigningSoWeSuckUpToTheWhiningKidsScreamingAboutMoarPowar ;)

[BlackCat]

Finally made myself a glowstone beacon :)

It's pretty sextastic to be able to make videos in which I am in pitch black without having to worry about people not being able to see.

Oh and my beacon is also a large mushroom.

[Foxy Boxes]

Personally I'm surprised that there's not a beacon that acts as an end portal, for those with older worlds.
Then again I might just have not found it. In othrr news gold beacons give you haste.

[FlowerChild]

Personally I'm surprised that there's not a beacon that acts as an end portal, for those with older worlds.

That doesn't exactly fit into the multi-level design of the beacons, given you either go to the end dimension, or not.

It would basically be representing an on/off condition with a multi-state switch.

[Foxy Boxes]

So I'm to take it there's not? I was thinking perhaps an Endstone beacon would corrupt ordinary portals in its aoe.

[FlowerChild]

So I'm to take it there's not? I was thinking perhaps an Endstone beacon would corrupt ordinary portals in its aoe.

Yeah, take your thinly veiled suggestion elsewhere please. What your implying just doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

[Foxy Boxes]

Yeah on second glance it does seem OOC for how beacons are. Still, going to see if end stone works in a beacon.

[kjbrona]

I put a glowstone and lapis beacon on top of my mob trap to make it easier to see while building all the levels and placing all the vinetraps. My output seemed OK if maybe a little slower then I expected. I took down those beacons (havent rebuilt them yet) to move them inside my base and I swear that my mob trap output has noticeably increased.
Has anyone else noticed that possible side effect? Not sure how to "scientifically" test this but thought I would throw it out there.

[Conscript Gary]

I do believe FC mentioned there would be 'side effects' from beacon usage...

[BlackCat]

So upon completing the 4th layer of my glowstone beacon my nightvision effect turned into nightvision II, anyone know if that is just to signify that the beacon is full or does it have some specific effect?

Picture

Show

[Mikko_blu]

Oh wow... nicely done with the SFS beacon. I think you know exactly what I'm talking about. I caught it before it was too late ;)

[Azdoine]

Well, that's rather foreboding.

[odranoel]

iv seen a few hints now of apperently disasterous side effects from beacon use, i feel as tho we will slowly start seeing a series of horror stories form various players after they finally get some beacons set up. as is i dont think there are many of us with more then one or two going (i have yet to get my second beacon, nevermind the raw matireals) and even less of us who have a full SFS beacon up and running.

i imagine stories of horrid creatures suddenly spawning, or the world slowly converts into something horrible (like the nether leaking into the overworld) and no idea of how to counter act these horrible effects. im sure my imagineations running away with me now, but i gota find out what happens xD.

[FlowerChild]

Oh wow... nicely done with the SFS beacon. I think you know exactly what I'm talking about. I caught it before it was too late ;)

<queues spooky music>

And thanks, although I'd be very surprised if you've seen all of it ;)

[userzero]

Oh wow... nicely done with the SFS beacon. I think you know exactly what I'm talking about. I caught it before it was too late ;)

I second that. The whole thing is amazingly well done.