New Release! (BTW V3.90)

[Azdoine]

Does anyone have a screencap of the new nether fungus?

[FlowerChild]

Oh, I get where this came from now.

- Bugger up in end, lose all gold
- builds a pig man farm, gets low output
- starts terraforming nether, realises how big a job it is
- codes lethal undergrowth to do the work instead

Brilliant.

Hehe...you actually got the process bang-on there, except in step 3 it was actually "how big and boring a job it is" :)

Paving over a huge portion of the Nether with slabs just isn't much fun, and doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Creating pathways so that a virulent moss/fungus/thing can turn it into a hostile environment for those same creatures (and prevent their spawning in the process)...much more fun. The process still has its own challenges, I just made sure to make them more interesting and entertaining than the standard method.

So yeah, I decided to invest the time I would have spent paving over the Nether making this feature instead, had a lot more fun in the process, and ensured that no-one would have to do that ever again if they didn't want to ;)

Though one question : why bump the numbers to 3.90 ? I would have thought about a 3.8X. OR is this new Nether thing more important than it seems ?

Not sure what you mean man. New block...new system...that's generally when I bump it up a 0.10 :)

[Graphite]

My home base is half in a desert that I would love to terraform to a forest biome. At some point I was considering writing a mod for some kind of plant that'd overgrow the terrain, slowly turning the biome into a different one. Having seen the fungus grow like that only makes me want to code that mod more :P

[FlowerChild]

Oh...fun fact:

As I went through the process of developing the Nether Growth, it actually went through three different names.

First, it was Blood Moss (there's still references to it by that name in the code).
Then, as it was developed further, and started getting weirder, I realized that the name really didn't apply anymore, and changed it to "Nether Fungus".
Then...it got weirder still and I realized that name didn't apply either, at which point it simply became a "Nether Growth"

The last name also appealed to me due to its other connotations :)

[Azdoine]

Holy shit, this stuff is terrifying!
I was observing the kludgy nether fungus stuff, when the Nether Fungus I was standing on turned red and began to eat me.
'Fun' for the whole family!

[orangeweaver]

Oh man. I have been searching and searching and cannot find a mooshroom island! I'm in panic mode aha. Does anyone have any tricks to finding an island or is it shear luck?

Also I think the "blood moss" has a really good ring to it but overall you made the correct choice w/ "nether growth" ... I think it works the best for what it is and sounds a lot more menacing. You have added so many new features in the last few weeks I'm feeling so scattered as to what I should be working on, these projects are just piling up, I love it!

As always, excellent work. I really appreciate your dedication to this incredibly thought out mod.

[Mac]

Well,

everything that can be said has already been said.

But nonetheless,
Great update.
Will most likely try it out at the weekend, can't seem to bother with installing it
under the week while having late-shift *sheeesh*

Oh and Fridays pay-day for me, so
*hint hint*

[morvelaira]

I feel like there needs to be a lore explaination for the Nether Growth.

"And then, when the Blood Wood trees mature, the Nether will naturally coat itself in a layer of red, homicidal growth on its own cycle. If an Enderdragon Egg fails to enter the Nether before the cycle is complete, the Zombie Pigmen will sacrifice themselves upon the Growth - continuing the cycle of utter death and abomination in hell."

Maybe a bit on the feminine, 1950s PSA side of things, but I like it.

[Calcifire3691]

Oh...fun fact:

As I went through the process of developing the Nether Growth, it actually went through three different names.

First, it was Blood Moss (there's still references to it by that name in the code).
Then, as it was developed further, and started getting weirder, I realized that the name really didn't apply anymore, and changed it to "Nether Fungus".
Then...it got weirder still and I realized that name didn't apply either, at which point it simply became a "Nether Growth"

The last name also appealed to me due to its other connotations :)

I think you can get a (magma) cream for that...


bloodwood, nether growth, nether wart, nether sludge, soul anus

it's funny how the nether started as a rocky "fire and brimstone" hell, and slowly become a double entendre dimension as the mod progressed :P

(still trying to figure out where the pork with swords, and raging...cats fit in)

(I wonder how long it will be until nether crabs are added?)


anyway, awesome update as usual FC :P

one thing I've found a use for nether growth for is in semi-auto blaze farms

Spoiler

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if you have a ceiling above the growth, the blaze will touch the growth, bounce up, then bounce off the ceiling and back into the growth until it dies (and since you need to be close by to get the blazes to spawn anyway, collection isn't usually much of a problem (especially since blaze rods aren't that useful anyway) (I guess a checkerboard of growth and hoppers could work?)

[Azdoine]

I feel like there needs to be a lore explaination for the Nether Growth.

...Steve is a nutcase who puts tormented souls into parasitic fungus?

[bazilshep]

This stuff is going to have pretty huge implications for smp.

Spoiler

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Now if you are too slow building a nether base or getting to steel suddenly the nether wants to eat you. At that point you can either get poisoned breaking it to make a tunnel, or build a path over top of it showing everyone you were there. The original person keeps control of placing the spores too, since you cannot (afaik) get the spores from the block.

[FlowerChild]

one thing I've found a use for nether growth for is in semi-auto blaze farms

Hmmm...that's interesting and something I hadn't really thought of. You might want to hold off on doing much more automation with that though as I need to make a decision about whether the growth should be attacking blazes at all.

They really don't come across as even vaguely organic in nature, so I don't think that the growth should be attempting to eat them. Then again, the growth could be attempting to devour anything with a soul, so maybe it fits.

Anyways, let me think about it a bit, as it was an aspect I failed to consider.

This stuff is going to have pretty huge implications for smp.

Yeah, that was definitely one of my intentions with it: it basically allows people higher in the tech-tree to claim and to some extent defend portions of the Nether against people that are lower in it.

I'm very interested in seeing how that part plays out in SMP, as it's the kind of thing with so many implications that I'm sure I can't predict them all :)

[Itamarcu]

Has anybody tried to plant a Bloodwood Tree on the Nether Growth? It won't make much sense considering the height of the block - but having a fungus that infinitely grows and covers the terrain along with a tree that uses it for its life cycle sounds horrifying, symbiotic and very FlowerChild-ish.

[Sarudak]

They really don't come across as even vaguely organic in nature, so I don't think that the growth should be attempting to eat them. Then again, the growth could be attempting to devour anything with a soul, so maybe it fits.

The idea of blazes having souls is interesting in itself considering they seem so mechanical. Some kind of soul infused automaton perhaps? But who made them and why?

[Calcifire3691]

They really don't come across as even vaguely organic in nature, so I don't think that the growth should be attempting to eat them. Then again, the growth could be attempting to devour anything with a soul, so maybe it fits.

The idea of blazes having souls is interesting in itself considering they seem so mechanical. Some kind of soul infused automaton perhaps? But who made them and why?

my personal theory was that they're defense drones made by the previous inhabitants of the strongholds, the spawners are the machines used to make/deploy/animate them (the reason it's a spawner is for game mechanics) by infusing blaze rods with souls to give them a basic AI, after all, something would need to defend the inhabitants against the ghasts, pigmen and lava slimes :P (hence why they only have a chance to drop a blaze rod when they die, they normally are too damaged from fighting, and steve just grinds them into dust because 1: the material it's made from is useful anyway, and 2: we haven't reached nanotech in the tech tree yet)

[DaveYanakov]

Carniverous dragon-hemorrhoids. What will you think of next?

I'm also seeing the interesting potential for problems if you aren't careful about keeping the bloodwood away from the growth. Allowing bloodwood to spread across the entire nether naturally instead of just on soul sand patches has terrifying implications. Unfortunately part of that terror is based on what that would do to ones processor. Probably why nether growth is incompatible with the spread of bloodwood seedlings.

[FlowerChild]

You have to visit a mushroom island (and get Mycelium) in order to obtain those...things.

I wanted to make a quick point on this:

Note that Nether Growth is not currently part of the tech-tree. As such, it's a "convenience" (as much as such an abomination is convenient ;) ) feature that acts as a reward for those that have gone through the trouble of finding Mycelium, but it's in no way required.

I will likely change that in the future by providing an alternative source of Mycelium, so that it can be properly integrated into the tech-progression, but at present it's just too rare to do so, and I'd encourage people not to undertake that task unless they *really* want to do so.

It probably took me a good 20 hours (no joke) of searching to find Mycelium in my world. I wouldn't intentionally inflict that requirement on anyone :)

At the same time though, it does strike me as a shame that mushroom biomes can not really be properly integrated into BTW given the extreme rarity, so like I said, I will likely "fix" that in the future by providing an alternate (but still very challenging) source at the upper end of the tech-tree.

So yeah, if you currently have Mycelium: have fun with this stuff. If you don't: don't sweat it.

[Sarudak]

So kinda like how slime balls could be used in place of glue so if you found slimes then you have a bit of a boost on the tech tree but it's not required since once you get to stoked fire you can easily render glue from other materials?

[FaceFoiled]

I absolutely love BTW, but as with all single player games, I tend to lose focus after a relatively short amount of time. I enjoy games that I can actively play with others the most. (Hence my <3 for SMP, and hosting a server for it :P)

But damn FlowerChild, every update you do I am absolutely torn away from everything else and dig back into BTW, to discover and play with the new things. That is quite an amazing thing :D, well done you. :P

I may actually settle down now, and "save" my new world once and for all, and stick with it through all the various updates instead of starting over all the time. (I do like starting new worlds ^_^) :P

[FlowerChild]

So kinda like how slime balls could be used in place of glue so if you found slimes then you have a bit of a boost on the tech tree but it's not required since once you get to stoked fire you can easily render glue from other materials?

Yup, it's a similar concept I'm thinking of here. The Mycellium equivalent will be discovered later in the tech-tree than the current top, so if you found Mycellium, you can use the Nether Growth now. If you haven't, you'll have to wait until later.

The equivalent will also be behind an SMP bottle-neck, so the regular mushroom biomes will provide an alternative to players if they can't get to the alternative.

[Azdoine]

If we could get even one block of this stuff fully grown in the overworld...
We could sort rotten flesh from iron ingots.

[Foxy Boxes]

It looks so pretty <3

Of course, now my entire nether is overrun with the stuff but...

[FlowerChild]

If we could get even one block of this stuff fully grown in the overworld...
We could sort rotten flesh from iron ingots.

How exactly? As far as I can tell, the half-block nature of it prevents it from working as a straight filter. It can't be pushed or placed with a piston or BD either, which prevents that option. I don't get the impression you're thinking it through fully.

I'd also ask you to take thinly-veiled suggestions over to the suggestion forum.

[bazilshep]

It is possible to push an item on top of the edge of a half block with water, with the item on the boundary between the half block and water. Destructively sorting rotten flesh and iron was already possible with wolves or crucibles though, so its a moot point.

[FlowerChild]

It is possible to push an item on top of the edge of a half block with water, with the item on the boundary between the half block and water. Destructively sorting rotten flesh and iron was already possible with wolves or crucibles though, so its a moot point.

Yeah, I'm not a fan of using glitches as gameplay mechanisms either.