B
Check out the Community Showcase. Some true works of art floating around in there.
http://forum.feed-the-beast.com/forum/community-showcase.114/
http://forum.feed-the-beast.com/forum/community-showcase.114/
Be careful. I try to avoid some threads cuz they'll just bum me out about my cobble-forts. Anything from @rhn is strictly off-limits.
Start small and look up builder guide from Open blocks in NEI and experiment with combining shapes.
Try and use 3 separate block types for your floor walls and ceiling, maybe a 4th if you want detail.
Follow those rules and even 9x9s can look neat.
Try and centralize your builds around a feature, for example; A thaumcraft area. You can if you want make the arcane altar a center peice of the area in a large round sanctum like room with separate wings branching out. You can have one room houseing all your nodes and chargeing equipment. And you can have another room with all your alchemy junk.
You can do the same with tech mods too although they all tend to blend together. But for example; you can make a room for your BigReactor and another for your ME drives and controllers.
Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk
Try and use 3 separate block types for your floor walls and ceiling, maybe a 4th if you want detail.
Follow those rules and even 9x9s can look neat.
Try and centralize your builds around a feature, for example; A thaumcraft area. You can if you want make the arcane altar a center peice of the area in a large round sanctum like room with separate wings branching out. You can have one room houseing all your nodes and chargeing equipment. And you can have another room with all your alchemy junk.
You can do the same with tech mods too although they all tend to blend together. But for example; you can make a room for your BigReactor and another for your ME drives and controllers.
Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk
I have been struggling with the layout for a Thaumcraft complex. Essentia processing and storage, needs to be adjacent to the arcane matrix room, AND the alchemy / automated alchemy area. A library for research (probably bundle in vanilla enchanting), wand recharging, and a Energized node are no longer relevent, but an infernal furnace area to smelt the mineral clusters produced by the automated alchemy section is requred. Oh, and a bathing area. To relax and wash that warp off.
The best advice I can possibly think of, is let the buildings follow the terrain. Do not flatten it! Better yet go find some awesome unique terrain, be inspired by it and then build there.
It is ok to start in a cobble cave or 9x9, but try and get out of it when you have the means to explore the landscape for better spots.
If the terrain is sloped, then build terraces for your buildings, farm plots, etc. with small staircases leading up and down. Is it a mountain side, then you can have your different parts of the base stick in and out of the side and be connected through tunnels. In a ravine/canyon you can have small windows/houses on each side with bridges spanning the gap. A bluff/peak overlooking some nice looking sea/landscape is perfect for a mansion.
Oh and sometimes the terrain just isnt perfect, but close. Maybe it is not "natural" enough. Or it needs a lake. And then you need to break out the dirt and floodgate and train your landscaping skills.
The 9x9 isn't bad as a starting point. The thing to do, is resist the temptation of Dire. When you need more space, expand organically, don't just build another 9x9. Branch upwards instead of flat on the ground, or dig down out of it and build under ground.
One of my favorite bases I ever had was a 6x11, on two levels, which hung off of a mountain side. You either had to fly up to the hatch on the underside, or climb a set of stairs carved through the mountain.
My latest one is inside a converted village. I started off living inside the blacksmith, and then slowly expanded and redesigned it for my own purposes. It no longer looks anything like a blacksmith. On the other hand, one of the big L-shaped buildings which are empty, was converted for my use into a Pneaumaticraft building. When it wasn't tall enough, I just stretched the walls higher and added a custom roof to it.
Lets See Some Bases! Give Us a Tour! from Community Showcase is a particularly good repository of base designs.
One of my favorite bases I ever had was a 6x11, on two levels, which hung off of a mountain side. You either had to fly up to the hatch on the underside, or climb a set of stairs carved through the mountain.
My latest one is inside a converted village. I started off living inside the blacksmith, and then slowly expanded and redesigned it for my own purposes. It no longer looks anything like a blacksmith. On the other hand, one of the big L-shaped buildings which are empty, was converted for my use into a Pneaumaticraft building. When it wasn't tall enough, I just stretched the walls higher and added a custom roof to it.
Lets See Some Bases! Give Us a Tour! from Community Showcase is a particularly good repository of base designs.
Even dire has given up on his 9x9 - his latest forgecraft series just has bunches of chests and machines laying about in the open.
As other have said 9x9's are good starting points. You could at depth in it using stairs and make detailed roofs for them.
I've fallen into this in some regards. My first base on my new world was a one high cobble wall around some chests and my bed. As I began experimenting with Rotarycraft setups, I cleared some if the forest around me and just plopped things down. As I got systems that worked, I made them a bit more pleasing to the eye, while at the same time I started scouting for a place to call home for good.
I've found that if try to make my starter hovel look nice, I get trapped in in. If I'm ashamed of my base, it makes moving on to a better locale easier when I find it. The only real problem with this method is the stage (where I'm at now) when half your gear is moving forward, while all of your crops and infrastructure is back at the support camp. But, as new buildings are made to house everything, the trips back are fewer and fewer.
Then there's hope for him yet on giving up the legendary DireCube design.
I should take some pictures of LethTech sometime soon, I recently started filling out the walls of the main processing room. Still need a roof--I figure some nice grey Lime plank slabs would work, but getting the bees to mutate the trees are a pain as it is.
Sent from my Puzzle Box of Yogg-Saron using Tapatalk 2
Instead of your nice Lime planks, use a material you absolutely despise. This will make for a nice motivator until you reach the point where you have access to the materials you need. Then after you've changed it out, the love will be even greater.
I'm lazier than that. Also, I messed up--it was Teak that I wanted. After that would be the rooftop house and garden, then the basement power complex (which requires a boatload of diamonds for that Zetta Battery, so that comes last.)
Sent from my Puzzle Box of Yogg-Saron using Tapatalk 2
I don't necessarily move. I tend to hunt around and find the area I want to setup in, and then I don't leave. So my starter house always ends up being pretty nice. I've moved twice in my playing days. Both in Ultimate. First time was out of my small starter hole into a pair of towers in a valley, spanning across a ravine. White marble for my living tower, and basalt for my Thaumatorium.
The second was when I lived in another valley and moved up from my reasonably nice starter house into my Basalt cliffside power station. The starter became my enchanting room.
The second was when I lived in another valley and moved up from my reasonably nice starter house into my Basalt cliffside power station. The starter became my enchanting room.
Celestialphoenix
Too Much Free Time
9x9 are lame tbh... Any cool bases or blocks you guys have?
Sometimes Its best to experiment with different ideas/designs, and after you find one you like tinker a little more. Sometimes a slight change really finishes the effect.
If you're really stuffed for inspiration; do something you've never done before. Build something entirely out of obsidian and glass, or elegant and open drifting in the sky.
Say hell with the norm; be brave and dive in.
Good advice for life, not just MC.
B