Is there a way to make a perfect dome reasonably fast?

[Ieldra]

I have the OpenBlocks building helper, which would help with manual building but for a 24-radius dome it's going to take a while. I've tried MFFS but its domes are, can you believe it, *asymmetrical*! That's completely unacceptable. Any other methods?

I'm also looking for materials for a transparent dome. Requirements: transparent, connected textures, doesn't break if you so much as look at it sharply, doesn't vanish when broken, doesn't make "ceiling drops" when under water (I'm looking at you, AE Vibrant Glass). I don't care so much about blast resistance, which most forms of advanced glass have, rather than increased breaking resistance, which appears to be comparably rare.

So far I'm tending towards EnderIO fused quartz, except that it's expensive and slow to create and has bits of nontransparent textures in a pattern where I don't know how it would look in large structures.

 

[McJty]

Hmm, I used MFFS to make a spherical base and it wasn't asymmetrical for me. Perhaps you should try playing with the scale a bit more?

 

[Ieldra]

Hmm, I used MFFS to make a spherical base and it wasn't asymmetrical for me. Perhaps you should try playing with the scale a bit more?

Did you pay attention to the details? The asymmetry isn't visible at first glance, and I don't know if it affects all sizes equally. Also, I've had the same problems with cylinders. I had to adjust them manually. Using an equal number of scale modules in all cardinal directions should make a perfect cylinder, right? Well it doesn't.

 

[Moasseman]

Force a turtle to do it

 

[RJS]

Not sure if this produces a perfectly symmetrical dome, but you could use the rite of icy expansion from Witchery and then swap the ice for the blocks you want using the equal trade from Thaumcraft

 

[Ieldra]

Force a turtle to do it

In the time I'd spend programming it, I'd have done three domes manually.

 

[malicious_bloke]

Make it by hand, taking inordinate care to get every block placed perfectly.
Make a timelapse recording of you doing it.

 

[ThomazM]

I made a 40x40x40 sphere with the help of the Building Guide once. Manually. Without creative flight. Out of clear glass.
So, no excuses for you.

 

[Strikingwolf]

Force a turtle to do it

In the time I'd spend programming it, I'd have done three domes manually.

lies there are many pastebined programs for buildings, including domes. They are also variable. *Digs around computercraft forums* here's one http://www.computercraft.info/forums2/index.php?/topic/10089-shape-builder/

 

[Ieldra]

I made a 40x40x40 sphere with the help of the Building Guide once. Manually. Without creative flight. Out of clear glass.
So, no excuses for you.

Yeah, I did that too. It was a 60 diameter dome. That's why I want to avoid doing it again the same way

 

[ThomazM]

Yeah, I did that too. It was a 60 diameter dome. That's why I want to avoid doing it again the same way

Out of curiosity, what were you planning on doing with a dome of that size?

 

[Ieldra]

Out of curiosity, what were you planning on doing with a dome of that size?

If you want to have houses with several stories under a dome, then it must be a certain height. This time it's just my fusion reactor I want to cover with it. 42 diameter should be eeough for it. I'd love to leave it out in the open, but a key component is disabled by rain.

 

[ScottulusMaximus]

Spherical mffs works, just use half of it

 

[asb3pe]

I built my huge "Power Dome" using the OpenBlocks Building Guide. Yeah it was slow and tedious, but I just slogged thru it, mistakes and all. A lot of mistakes made, cause the Building Guide isn't always the easiest thing to see.

Get 'er dun. That's all I can tell ya.

 

[McJty]

Perhaps a solution is a combination of MFFS and the building guide. Why not let MFFS build the dome with the errors in it and then use the building guide to try to match it as much as possible and that way you can maybe correct the assymetric features.

 

[Strikingwolf]

MOAR TURTLES

 

[Ieldra]

Perhaps a solution is a combination of MFFS and the building guide. Why not let MFFS build the dome with the errors in it and then use the building guide to try to match it as much as possible and that way you can maybe correct the assymetric features.

That has worked well with non-transparent blocks and a cylindrical tower, though it's still so much work that I might've been better off building the whole thing manually.

 

[Celestialphoenix]

Anything curved is a real pain to do, just keep practicing. Some form of flight would be useful.

​

If you're struggling- try plotting it out on paper

Get a compass, and draw a circle on some graph paper- that'll do the base of the dome.
FYI- most domes/arches are actually a parabolic curve (not a radius), so you may want to make use of a spreadsheet/graphing programme for the vertical section. (you can use a semi-circle/sphere- but it'll look a little weird)​

The ceiling drips is a somewhat irritating vanilla thing- any 1 block thick layer with water/lava/fluid above and air below will produce this effect- double the glass up to cut this out.

Also AE glass looks pretty cool as it connects with the vibrant [glowing] glass; so the dome will self-illuminate.

 

[malicious_bloke]

I tend to use this:

https://neil.fraser.name/news/2006/11/17/

Plug in the radius and push the butan, it'll give you a layer-by-layer representation. To make a dome instead of a sphere, only go halfway, see?

 

[Ieldra]

@Celestialphoenix:
I don't have a problem with placing the blocks. I have the Building Helper after all, and I do want to build hemispherical. Also, the ceiling drips are a trait of certain blocks. For instance, normal glass won't have them. Modded blocks often have them because they're derived not from glass but other blocks, in order to avoid vanish-on-breaking I guess.

I will consider AE glass. I like it and . Expensive though.

@all:
This thread was about an automated or semi-automated way to make a perfect dome. I already know efficient ways to build one manually.