Am I just really picky or is good real estate hard to come by.

[Jeff Fisher]

I've have to recreate the world like 3 times now doe to certain things And I really really liked the area my base was at on the first two worlds but in this world I have went over 2k from the spawn and I just cannot find any areas like my on my old world or any that I like at all.

I have been on this world for a good few weeks and made a ton of progress but I made my base on a red rock mountain and its just pure ugly the base is just a ugly huge rectangle. There just isnt enough room and flat land to make anything nice.

Is it just me or is finding a nice flat grassy area big enough for a large base extremely rare.

 

[Guswut]

Is it just me or is finding a nice flat grassy area big enough for a large base extremely rare.

It is not just you. With Extra Biomes XL and LARGEBIOMES set up on my server, you can have kilometers of redwood forest to look through before finding a place. What I did was colonize a volcano in the middle of the ocean.

If you are using the DireWolf20 pack, or can install MystCraft, it can help greatly by allowing you to create custom "ages".

 

[Jeff Fisher]

And Of course after searching for hours a few times with no luck and afraid to go to far from spawn because I thought it would increase server load I finally decided after posting this to go really far from spawn (2600) and found the PERFECT area its a Huge meadows area... Its going to be hell to remake a base and move everything but I cant stand living in a red rock hell hole anymore.The only downside is my old base is next to 3 villages the new area I didnt see any near it but I have mastered villager breading so I will make one.

Old Base:

New Area for base : This flat land goes on for quite a while I def wont run out of space for a while. I should have went further from spawn from the start but was afraid to make the world to big.

 

[Antice]

Good areas are hard to find. I tend to want to settle mountains, but i don't want just any mountain. it has to have steep sides, and be surounded on at least 2 sides by something flat.
The area Bdubs and GenericB found on the mindcrack server is nearly perfect imho. I really hate that they have snow, so i would have kept looking myself, but the hill they got is nice.
I never found any problems with building bases in steep places either. just have to use height to your advantage, and space things a bit farther apart if needed. bridging separate areas together nicely makes for a nice little extra challenge.

Added bonus points for making the base look like something you would expect to find built on top of a mountain. like a medieval fort.

 

[Guswut]

I see some basalt! Good choice.

 

[Antice]

I see some basalt! Good choice.

Everyone and their mother uses basalt nowadays... it's one of the most abused building materials.
Basalt is nice, but not when used extensively everywhere. but what do i know?. i just like to see nice varied buildings more than i like seeing min/maxing contraptions.
looks > efficiency in my book.

 

[Freakscar]

Everyone and their mother uses basalt nowadays... it's one of the most abused building materials.

And thats bad because of.. what?

Fact is, a black/white building material (apart of wool, which is awkward as a material to build houses with) is far and few, apart of exactly these two: Marble and Basalt. And I would say quite enough "medieval" brick/cobblestone/cleanstone buildings have been built over the times.. so it's not surprising that people jump at the oportunity to use "something different". Similar thing goes for the red cobblestone - you can build some nice stuff with it. But it has no contrasting color as obvious as black/white (green red house anyone? ewww ^^). And really, an all red building complex is a bit too much "in ya face" for me. And finally.. even though everyone and their uncle may use basalt and marble like no tomorrow.. that does not keep anyone from using a different material than "everybody else". It's a simple matter of taste.

I predict, if ever some mod implements "real" mirror-blocks ... you'll see a new age of "glass skyscraper'ism" dawn. By the way: Reading your post I imagined myself standing in the Acropolis and yelling "Why does it have to be marble, use more gray bricks!" at the old greeks.

 

[Bibble]

There's also the quite nice aspect of the blast resistance of basalt. The Xycraft blocks have given a little more colour to the world, but if you still want something to look "built", then I prefer bricks, which gives the options of stone, red stone, marble and basalt.

Also, yeah, real estate is difficult, not least because finding the particular biome crossover that you want is tricky, depending on what you want. Especially as some of the mods struggle with gen in non-vanilla biomes (looking at you TC3).

 

[Antice]

And thats bad because of.. what?

Fact is, a black/white building material (apart of wool, which is awkward as a material to build houses with) is far and few, apart of exactly these two: Marble and Basalt. And I would say quite enough "medieval" brick/cobblestone/cleanstone buildings have been built over the times.. so it's not surprising that people jump at the oportunity to use "something different". Similar thing goes for the red cobblestone - you can build some nice stuff with it. But it has no contrasting color as obvious as black/white (green red house anyone? ewww ^^). And really, an all red building complex is a bit too much "in ya face" for me. And finally.. even though everyone and their uncle may use basalt and marble like no tomorrow.. that does not keep anyone from using a different material than "everybody else". It's a simple matter of taste.

I predict, if ever some mod implements "real" mirror-blocks ... you'll see a new age of "glass skyscraper'ism" dawn. By the way: Reading your post I imagined myself standing in the Acropolis and yelling "Why does it have to be marble, use more gray bricks!" at the old greeks.

Well.. we also have sandstone, clay, clay bricks, an a entire line of stone brick types, A whole host of woods, (many many more when you start treebreeding as well) and all the xycraft stuff and well.. we have plenty of options, but still a see more black/white cubes than anything else.

Sure. stone's been done to death too. but there is this thing called accenting. like. instead of making a black cube with white borders, make a stone brick structure. (with some cracked brick intersperesed to give it texture), and then use say. basalt for the roof, and some marble accenting pilars around the entrance to give it some character. the wall filler could be done with wood. use spaced stone brick pillars to give it depth. the fact that we have a selection of stone materials that fit together color wise helps a lot when trying to build interesting buildings.

It matters not what material you choose if all you do is make clean straight surfaces with it. the human eye is capable of picking out repeating patterns easier when there is a lot of repeats. one has to work on getting depth and feel when building a wall. and never be afraid of using wool for it's color. Yes it has a somewhat poor texture, but inset it in the wall, with pillars standing a bit out from it, and nobody will notice the wool texture, simply because the texture is not repeated enough for the pattern to be as apparent, it's broken up by the pillars.
It's the same with cobble. cobble has a noisy texture by default, and this makes it an ugly block on it's own... but if you use it here and there to make something look a little worn and aged, then it becomes an excellent material for adding some noise to the boring repeating pattern of stone bricks.

And if all else fails, get a texture pack that has better textures.

And yeah. if all the houses in the area around the acropolis were made from marble, then the old Greeks would not have used it for a building dedicated to the Gods.
The thing is. marble is supposedly a somewhat rare and expensive material to make a building from.. but it's common enough in minecraft, that most players are drowning in it.

 

[Guswut]

looks > efficiency in my book.

Basalt means there is a volcano nearby, and I enjoy living near volcanoes. I've got a forward base for my thaumcraft stuff which is in a valley made by three and a half (little shortly fourth) volcanoes. I've made them look more interesting by adding additional lava flows, and the like.

I don't like building with basalt, though. The bricks aren't too bad, but I'd much rather use smooth stone.

 

[Antice]

Basalt means there is a volcano nearby, and I enjoy living near volcanoes. I've got a forward base for my thaumcraft stuff which is in a valley made by three and a half (little shortly fourth) volcanoes. I've made them look more interesting by adding additional lava flows, and the like.

I don't like building with basalt, though. The bricks aren't too bad, but I'd much rather use smooth stone.

the volcanoes are nice like that. when fixed up good and proper they give a nice sinister feel to the area.

 

[DoctorOr]

Any area is flat with the proper application of brute force.

 

[DZCreeper]

OP, I see 2 silver wood trees in that picture. Build your TC3 stuff near them. That means there is for sure a small pure node nearby, treat it carefully, perhaps try to make it bigger. You will find it useful and a fun project to aid you in your magical efforts.

 

[DoctorOr]

And thats bad because of.. what?

Fact is, a black/white building material (apart of wool, which is awkward as a material to build houses with) is far and few, apart of exactly these two: Marble and Basalt.

Construction foam defaults to a light grey and can be painted any of the 16 colors.

Also, "slag" from TE creates non-flammable wool that can be colored in the normal manner.

Later game, Aluminum (the Xycraft kind, thus the bad spelling), Tin and Machine Blocks are white. Lead, Dark Iron, and Tungsten, blocks are blue-black to black. Of course, because RedPower refuses to be inter-mod compatible, only the Tin will be able to be microblocked. (Unless you install Immibis microblocks)

 

[Entropy]

Guys, marble and basalt are way OP plz nerf. They are good looking blocks, so I will continue to use them. to the OP: good find, I see some sweet cliff house style dwellings popping up there.

 

[Guswut]

[...]Aluminum (the Xycraft kind, thus the bad spelling)[...]

American English spelling, you mean, of course.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/aluminum

 

[tyler f]

American English spelling, you mean, of course.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/aluminum

I am american, and it's actually ultimately incorrect as this spelling derived from the typo of a shipping company a hundred years ago.

 

[Guswut]

I am american, and it's actually ultimately incorrect as this spelling derived from the typo of a shipping company a hundred years ago.

From the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry:

- “Aluminum” and “cesium” are commonly used alternative spellings for “aluminium” and “caesium.”

And read through this, too: http://scienceblogs.com/worldsfair/2009/04/08/aluminum-versus-aluminium-wher/

Sir Humphry made a bit of a mess of naming this new element, at first spelling it alumium (this was in 1807) then changing it to aluminum, and finally settling on aluminium in 1812. His classically educated scientific colleagues preferred aluminium right from the start, because it had more of a classical ring, and chimed harmoniously with many other elements whose names ended in -ium, like potassium, sodium, and magnesium, all of which had been named by Davy.

Technically, both British English and American English spell it wrong as it was originally spelt "alumium". Great, you just made us ALL wrong!

 

[DoctorOr]

American English spelling, you mean, of course.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/aluminum

I am American, but also educated. Like Ebonics, I don't recognize such travesty in words as acceptable.

 

[Guswut]

I am American, but also educated. Like Ebonics, I don't recognize such travesty in words as acceptable.

Alright, I can see where this is going (again). Have a wonderful day, mate, and best of luck to you!