As I mentioned in my last post my previous save was gone due to a small human error. In that post I said there were only a few buildings left to place before I got back to the point I stopped.
Well, figuring out where to put those huts were more of a pain than I expected. Even then I am still not sure they were placed in a good way. Time will tell!
Because of the restart and a change to my mod list everything is obviously different. Since everything changed anyway, I took this opportunity to try some new ideas, in an attempt to deal with some problems I ran in my first try.
Plan Ahead
One of the biggest problems in my previous save was that as I was new to the mod I was doing everything willy-nilly. That meant a lot of empty spaces and other oddities as I placed buildings wherever there was enough space inside the colony borders. Back then I also found the buildings preview hard to use which led to lots of problems.
This time I wanted the colony to actually look good. I also wanted to make it so building walls around it would be easy. Or as close to it as possible anyway.
To this end I used the preview to actually mark with wool how much area each building takes.
I think I did this for about half of the current buildings, some walls and roads. Eventually I just got tired of trying to plan in a vacuum. I also realized that some of the initial huts I needed might not fit in the border system if kept going like this. There was also the problem with the guard towers since colonists want them to be close to their homes and I wasn’t sure how far away they could be from each other for them to feel safe.
Planning worked for the most part. I still did make some mistakes about their placements but nothing that couldn’t be easily corrected. Another mistake I made was in terms of housing. Because I didn’t think too well how far the houses are from each work hut there might be some houses with empty rooms in the future, which makes colonists unhappy. But that is a problem for future Rakuno to deal with.
One important part that isn’t working is my “subway” system. For some reason the colonists are completely ignoring my rails. I don’t know if it is because of a bug or because they are giving preference to the roads on the surface.
I could of course try to build the rails on the surface too but that wouldn’t look good in my opinion. There might be a solution to this but I will need to try it first. If that doesn’t work then I will have to think on how to repurpose those tunnels.
Build walls
When I was starting with MineColonies I thought the walls and gates were just fluffy with no real purpose. I mean, they are in the decorations section of the building tool after all!
Then I saw how big the raider bands can get as well as how slow the guards can be to answer when you summon them with the banner. Some walls will hopefully slow the raiders down until my guards answer the call.
One problem with the walls is that there is no in-built way to climb them up. I could of course put some ladders on them but they will most likely break once I upgrade or repair the walls. I could also build stairs leading up the walls but that would look ugly and unnatural in my opinion.
The most practical solution is building some guard towers connected to them. That is if I am interpreting the level 5 of the guard towers and walls correctly. This is for the Medieval Oak style, by the way. Other styles may be different.
Another issue that came with the walls is that they are meant to be connected in a flat surface. There isn’t a piece of wall that would go up a hill or something like that.
This means that I have been flattening or raising land a lot in my colony. It leads to some ugly parts like some sheer cliff walls with some bits of land below just outside my colony among other unnatural looking bits. Not to mention it is really tedious to do. At least the Effortless Building mod makes it relatively painless.
I might try to do something to make it more natural eventually but for now I will just deal with it.
Build a player house
Another miscalculation I did in my previous save was not making sure there was enough space for my house. I did manage to find a place underground for my crafting stations, storage and create machines but it was not ideal.
This time I already planned to have my own house from the start. My two requirements were that it would be fancy, since I am the founder and mayor of the town, and have enough space for all my crafting tables. Maybe even for my storage system too. Although that later one I could compromise by building underground, outside of view.
At first I thought about using the Prefab mod to save me some time building the whole thing. But none of the houses it offered fit my requirements. The decorative houses from MineColonies also didn’t fit the bill. So off I went to YouTube to look for one that could work for me.
I soon found this fantasy mansion by BigTonyMC (also embedded up there). It looks to be big enough to fit everything I want, maybe even more. So far I’ve only built the exterior part, with almost no tweaks. The interior will be next and will have a lot more changes.
For my Create machines I was thinking of making an actual factory building behind my house. But now I am not sure if I will do it anymore. Part of the reason is because I am not sure there will be enough space for it. The other reason is because I got a nice view of the sea from behind my house. Although that view might end up blocked anyway whenever I build walls around that area. :p
If I decide not to build the factory then it will have to be built underground, probably under the house.
Current Status
My goal was to only have the same buildings I had in the previous town incarnation before I made this post. However I ended up with some new places since I had to keep my builders busy while I decided where to place the huts/build my house.
The first one is the Enchanter’s Tower. This is a building I wanted to keep for the late stage of the colony but since I needed it to level 3 to unlock the Nether Mine I decided to build it now.
Actually it was something I built in the previous save, it was at level 2 then. In this new save it is already upgraded to level 3.
The next one is the Nether Mine. The reason I wanted to build it now is because they have a chance to get ghast tear, an item required for a research at the University. It is a research that upgrades the undertaker’s chance of resurrecting colonists when they die.
In the previous save I tried to hunt a ghast myself but being under equipped and in a bad biome for hunting, it didn’t go well. So I am being lazy and letting someone do that for me.
Another reason for the Nether Mine is because I wanted to see if I could just use their Nether Gate. I can but the gate isn’t open all the time. The Nether Miner only opens it when he goes to work.
Obviously I could lit it myself, and maybe I will do it eventually. But you know, it would be more convenient if I didn’t have to do it every time I want to travel to the Nether!
I also built an Alchemist Tower. This one is because I wanted some druids to support my barrack knights. I thought they would need potions to actually do their job but so far it doesn’t seem necessary.
However there is a research at University that seems to use potions to upgrade the druids or something like that. I am not entirely sure what it does but that is probably when I will need the alchemist!
Not active yet but built are the bakery and flower shop. The crusher hut is also under construction. I will probably put some employ some people in those places once I can upgrade my houses to level 4.
Also, not active but built is the Combat Academy at level 3 and the Archery Range at level 1.
While I was placing huts I accidentally made the Library and Restaurant level 3. I only realized the mistake after I checked the interior and realized it. Since breaking it down and placing it again at the correct level would be too much work I left it as is. It is not that much of a cheat, after all. :p
Oh, I also built a Mystic Site just to raise the colony’s happiness as well as to raise the undertaker’s mana skill which increases their chance to resurrect. Not sure if that second part is working to be honest. The MineCraft Wiki says they will hang around the Mystical Site when not working but my undertaker has been only hanging around the graveyard.
More mods!
In the last post I forgot to mention a few other big mods. I might as well do it now before I forget again.
The first one is Chipped by terrariumearth. Basically it allows you to get some regular vanilla blocks and change their textures. I like it because it adds more block variety without cluttering my inventory/storage with a bunch of new ones.
Whenever I want something different I can just change one of the existing blocks instead!
To spruce up the overworld, I am giving a try to Ecologics by SameDifferent. It adds a few more trees, plants and creatures to certain biomes.
What I liked about it is that it makes the beaches feel a lot less empty. It adds coconut trees, shells and crabs to them, making them look more natural. It is also nice to see squirrels in the plains biomes. But that is the extent I’ve seem of this mod changes so far.
For my inventory sorting needs I am giving Inventory Profiles Next by mirinimi a try. I decided to use it because I thought Quark was the one causing problems to my Minecraft installation. It wasn’t and I re-enabled it but might end up dropping Quark in the future since I have very little reason to keep it around anymore.
Anyway, what I really like about Inventory Profiles Next is that it works with MineColonies’ racks. This makes organizing the Warehouse so much easier!
One mod that I keep forgetting about but shouldn’t is the Magitek Mechs by DigiDigi_. As a fan of Final Fantasy VI I had to give it a try. I only tested it in my Creative world and loved it!
I can see it making it easier to mine for netherite whenever I explore the Nether properly.
Those are all the more important mods for now. There are a few other mods but I will keep those for the future, once I have tested them more.
Next goals
My next priority is to upgrade the Builder’s Huts to level 4. Then I can upgrade the houses to level 4 as well which should help a bit with the housing problem.
After that I will probably build one or more farms and employ someone at the bakery. Maybe in the flower shop too. Then after that I will see what I build next.
I also want to finish building the house and rebuild my storage system and Create machines. AGAIN.
The storage part shouldn’t be too much work (famous last words) but the Create machines could take a while depending on how I approach it.
Here is a map of how the colony is looking so far:
Current Colony Progress:
- Town Hall – Level 3
- 2x Builder’s Hut – Level 3
- Warehouse – Level 3
- 4x Courier’s Hut – Level 3
- 8x House – Level 3 (One of them is actually in the process of being upgraded to level 3)
- Tavern – Level 2
- Fisher’s Hut – Level 3
- Forester’s Hut – Level 3
- Mine – Level 3
- Restaurant – Level 3
- University – Level 3
- Hospital – Level 3
- Lots of Guard Towers – Level 3 (I will make an actual count next time)
- Farm – Level 3
- 4x Farm Field
- Sawmill – Level 3
- Barracks with 3 towers – Level 3
- Smeltery – Level 3
- Blacksmith – Level 3
- Mechanic – Level 3
- Fletcher – Level 3
- School – Level 3
- Graveyard – Level 3
- Composter – Level 3
- Library – Level 3
- Stone Smelter – Level 3
- Stonemason – Level 3
- Combat Academy – Level 3
- Archery Range – Level 1
- Bakery – Level 3
- Enchanter’s Tower – Level 3
- Nether Mine – Level 3
- Alchemist – Level 1
- Mystic Site – Level 3
- Flower Shop – Level 1
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