Mob grinder help

[Katrinya]

Despite around a year of modded Minecraft experience, up until this point I've never actually built a mob grinder- of any kind. It's a consequence of sticking to peaceful mode for so long. But now I'm slowly edging my way into higher difficulty settings and was trying to come up with some cool designs. I've considered a number of mechanisms and would like some help weighing the pros and cons.

-Fall trap: Based on my google results, fall traps are a popular way of setting up a vanilla mob grinder. Have some running water on the platform with your spawner push your enemies to their doom and scrap their loot off the floor by hand, or with transposers. (I was under the impression that mobs won't spawn on a surface with running water, but I guess I was wrong. Does your mob spawner or soul cage need to be touching the spawning platform in order for this to work?) Google also says that a 23 block fall will kill most enemies while 22 blocks will leave them with half a heart remaining, so you could conceivably set up some pistons to convert your mob grinder into an xp farm with the push of a button. That versatility is definitely a plus. On the downside, a 23-block structure is awkward and unsightly. Besides, killing mobs with gravity seems a little mundane.

-Lava trap: Apparently if you run water over a one-block gap with a ladder and lava beneath the ladder, monsters will die in the lava and their drops will be washed away by the water, into whatever collection mechanism you have in mind. I don't really understand why that works, but I suppose it makes "Minecraft sense".

-Tesla Coils: This option has the advantage of being badass and the disadvantage of being seriously inefficient in terms of power usage. Tesla coils hog a lot of power, and would probably require a nuclear reactor or large supply of lava to run. You could set up a system to only run the coils periodically, but it will still be more expensive than other alternatives.

-MFFS: This is one of those mods I never got around to learning well, given its limited utility in single player on peaceful mode. But I think you can make a forcefield that will automatically kill all hostile mobs inside it? Can someone confirm that? Potentially this is a really cool option, but I don't know how MFFS stacks up in terms of power usage and expense.

-Portal gun turrets: Turrets are simultaneously adorable and badass, will look really cool lining the border of your spawning area, and require no fuel source that I'm aware of. On the downside, they don't do a lot of damage, and I've seen skeletons break them by returning fire with their arrows. You might consider setting up your grinder so that the turrets are behind some pistons on a timer. When the cycle starts, the room is dark, the pistons are extended, and mobs can spawn unmolested. Then after some time (will need to be tweaked according to the tier of your soul shard), the lights go on, the pistons retract, and the turrets have a clear line of sight into the mobs massed in the spawning area. Turrets don't do a lot of damage, so they'll need some time to mop up before the lights go out and the cycle starts again. This is the system I'm leaning towards, but it's probably best automated with a computer... I really need to learn how to use Computercraft properly.

-Turtles: Speaking of needing to learn Computercraft better, how does one make an infinite attack loop with a turtle? I could do something like (ignore the syntax errors, I'm still new to lua):
"local x=1
for x=1,100 do
turtle.attack()
sleep 2
x=x+1
end"
I think this will make the turtle attack every 2 seconds 100 times, but I don't know how to have the turtle just keep attacking forever. Help?

-A note on blazes: It seems to me the easiest way to set up a blaze grinder is to run around the Nether sucking up their spawners with your soul shard until it hits tier 5, then bring it back to the overworld and have them spawn in a wet room. I actually thought blazes wouldn't drop their loot if you kill them with water, but I guess based on Direwolf's recent video that I was wrong about that too. Since they fly I don't think you can use the drop trap with them, and I have no idea if they're immune to lava (I'm guessing they probably are). Therefore I'm assuming that blazes must be killed with mod items or with a piston trap, since they're impervious to environmental damage.


So there are a lot of options. If you're a mob grinder veteran, what advice do you have? Are there other, better mechanisms I haven't considered? Do you have a screenshot or video of a grinder you're particularly proud of? Please, share with the class!

 

[Poppycocks]

More like

while true do --repeats as long as the condition is true, true is true, therefore it always runs
turtle.attack()
turtle.suck() --just in case
sleep(0,1) --to decrease lag
if turtle.getItemCount(16)>0 then do --if there's something in the last slot...
for i=16, 1, -1 do --dump everything from all of the slots in the inventory beneath you
select(i)
turtle.dropDown(turtle.getItemCount(i))
end --for 1-16
end --if itemcount
end --while true

Naming the program startup will make the program run again after you reload the map.

 

[MrZwij]

A melee turtle plus a brain in a jar to collect the XP is hard to improve, IMO. The challenge is in funneling the mobs to the turtle. It can be as easy as water streams or as complicated as a system of synchronized pistons. Might be fun to incorporate an Aerial Faith Plate or Arcane Levitator somehow as well, or to transport the mobs around in minecarts first. The possibilities are endless.

 

[Poppycocks]

A melee turtle plus a brain in a jar to collect the XP is hard to improve, IMO. The challenge is in funneling the mobs to the turtle. It can be as easy as water streams or as complicated as a system of synchronized pistons. Might be fun to incorporate an Aerial Faith Plate or Arcane Levitator somehow as well, or to transport the mobs around in minecarts first. The possibilities are endless.

ARCANE LEVITATORS, MY MAN, I LOVE YOU.

That's how I'm goin' to do whack-the-zombie . Such a simple solution!

Dropping the monsters and funneling them after is slightly more efficient, as the spawner checks how many creatures of its type are in its vicinity and doesn't spawn more unless they're killed. Removing them as fast as possible is your best bet for increasing spawner efficiency and dropping works great for that. Also, water on the bottom usually leaves the mobs with just enough health for a one hit kill from a turtle.

 

[MrZwij]

Can't wait to see what you come up with!

 

[Abdiel]

Despite around a year of modded Minecraft experience, up until this point I've never actually built a mob grinder- of any kind. It's a consequence of sticking to peaceful mode for so long. But now I'm slowly edging my way into higher difficulty settings and was trying to come up with some cool designs. I've considered a number of mechanisms and would like some help weighing the pros and cons.

I am sorry, but there is a huge number of misunderstandings and things just plain wrong in your post. I'm not going to go through it bit by bit. Here is some reading for you instead:

http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Spawn
http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Monster_Spawner
http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Damage#Fall_damage
http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic...recipe-remover-v11-updated-122013/#soulshards
http://feed-the-beast.wikia.com/wiki/MFFS

Once you have a basic understanding of how things work, come back to ask specific questions.

 

[Katrinya]

Thanks for the turtle example, Poppy. That was very helpful.

I am sorry, but there is a huge number of misunderstandings and things just plain wrong in your post. I'm not going to go through it bit by bit. Here is some reading for you instead:

http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Spawn
http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Monster_Spawner
http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Damage#Fall_damage
http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic...recipe-remover-v11-updated-122013/#soulshards
http://feed-the-beast.wikia.com/wiki/MFFS

Once you have a basic understanding of how things work, come back to ask specific questions.

That response seems a little rude, given that a) I was interested starting a broader discussion of effective techniques used in mob grinders, rather than looking for answers to specific questions (except with regards to how to get a turtle to attack constantly) and b) a cursory read through those links doesn't reveal a "huge number of misunderstandings" in my original post. I watched several tutorial videos which set up a convertable mob grinder/xp farm with pistons as I described. I may have gotten the precise number of blocks required to kill via fall damage wrong- the author said that mob health varies anyway. From the wiki: "falling 4 blocks causes damage. From 5 blocks, damage. From 6 blocks, points are lost and so forth with, assuming full health, a 23 block fall being fatal". Some of those videos were rather old however, so some of the information may have been out of date. For example, according to one video, it was possible to harvest a naturally occurring mob spawner using a silk touch pickaxe, but the wiki now says it's only possible to obtain them through use of the /give command. Maybe that's the sort of thing you meant? You definitely can right click on a blaze spawner with a soul shard dedicated to blazes to get an immediate 200 or so kills and repeat this until your shard reaches tier 5- I know because I've done this part already. MFFS does add an "NPC defense upgrade", meaning you could theoretically use it to kill mobs that have spawned in an enclosed area. That part was accurate, anyway. Other bits of misinformation I'd heard from other players i.e. 'mobs won't spawn in running water' are clearly labeled as such.

...so yeah, I'm not seeing the sea of inconsistencies you've accused me of swimming in. Could be I'm just too tired to notice them. Anyway, I can always reproduce someone else's design block by block, but that wasn't really the point of this thread. The point was to get people talking and sharing their builds, much like the "post your base" thread. That thread has given me some nifty ideas to steal, er, I mean adapt.

Perhaps I should have titled the thread "mob grinder discussion" instead of "help", but I didn't think the phraseology would matter that much.

 

[Yusunoha]

I always end up using drop farms, but the problem is that it can't be used for all mobs. mobs where it could give a problem are for example blazes, spiders, cave spiders and ofcourse endermen.
in the last map I played with the DW pack I ended up remodelling a thaumcraft dungeon into a zombie/skeleton drop trap, I put the spawners in the corners using a gravigun and filled it up with 4 water sources in the corners aswell, leading the mobs to the center where they'd drop 22 blocks down. at the bottom I had a mystcraft portal using mystrcraft crystals leading the mobs back up into a 1x1x2 area where I could easily kill them. and the plusside of using a mystcraft portal is that they keep their falling distance. so when they are teleported back up, they are still damaged to half a heart left.

also, a downside with lava blades is that the drops might get destroyed in the lava, had it happen to me quite often.
all your other option are not that good, except the turtles, because often you want to farm the XP from mob farms. but if you only care about the drops, then you can easily make a mobfarm using quicksand and a couple of transposers.

 

[Boomaholic]

An Idea that just came to me with the mention of the MFFS. it kinda makes me want to make a branching MFFS hallway. With several rooms each with its own Mob spawner. With the flip of the switch, assuming tier5 spawner, turn on the spawner & the individual room's square X by X mffs defense station... would need some decent power to run, & probably not the most effective. Alas I still think this would be a fun way to go.

 

[Celestialphoenix]

Pure vanilla drop farms can be difficult, as different mobs have different hit points.
-Generally, if your water stream goes over a 1 block wide gap, skeletons/creepers/zombies will drop through- leaving spiders.

Combine with a 1 block high space, spiders will fit under and taller mobs get stuck.​

Endermen dont like water, and will tele out. But they don't spawn that often so its no big deal- build a drop trap in the end.​

(similar mechanisms will also work in the nether).​

​

Soul shards will make things a lot easier, a water trap works very well for blazes- and quicksand (mini jungle biomes) kills the taller mobs very quickly.

If you want easy EXP, pulverise/macerate gold and cook the dust in a vanilla furnace.

 

[steve g]

try cursed earth

make a box room with MFR mob grinders on the sides, lay down cursed earth for the floor (do this in total darkness, it tends to ignite into flames when exposed to light, hard to keep up with the fire spread =) and seal off the room. the beauty of this: you get slimes, ender and cave spiders spawning as well the other main mobs. and they will spawn at a fairly consistent rate regardless of mob counts already in the chunk. great source of materials for machines that need bonemeal, or recipes that need string. never mind the sticky resin from the massive amounts of slime balls. or recycle it all to feed that mass fabricator

 

[Azzanine]

Pure vanilla drop farms can be difficult, as different mobs have different hit points.
-Generally, if your water stream goes over a 1 block wide gap, skeletons/creepers/zombies will drop through- leaving spiders.

Combine with a 1 block high space, spiders will fit under and taller mobs get stuck.​

Endermen dont like water, and will tele out. But they don't spawn that often so its no big deal- build a drop trap in the end.​

(similar mechanisms will also work in the nether).​

​

Soul shards will make things a lot easier, a water trap works very well for blazes- and quicksand (mini jungle biomes) kills the taller mobs very quickly.

If you want easy EXP, pulverise/macerate gold and cook the dust in a vanilla furnace.

Wait that actually works?

 

[Celestialphoenix]

Wait that actually works?

The furnace thingy?- yeah, the exp is dealt out when you remove items from the furnace. more valuable the item the more exp you get.

If you want to be really cheaty- routers and diamonds are a good mix​

 

[Poppycocks]

The furnace thingy?- yeah, the exp is dealt out when you remove items from the furnace. more valuable the item the more exp you get.

If you want to be really cheaty- routers and diamonds are a good mix​

Mix it up with that one block from open peripherals that can manipulate YOUR inventory(as in suck the diamonds out and stick 'em into a router)...

 

[Celestialphoenix]

Mix it up with that one block from open peripherals that can manipulate YOUR inventory(as in suck the diamonds out and stick 'em into a router)...

Now you're cooking with gas!

 

[Azzanine]

The furnace thingy?- yeah, the exp is dealt out when you remove items from the furnace. more valuable the item the more exp you get.

If you want to be really cheaty- routers and diamonds are a good mix​

I actually tried it, it didn't work. Could be one of the mods the the modpack I'm using though. I do remember back in MindCrack using transposers and tubes feeding in to the back of a furnace places the item in the output slot making it think it's processed it. Like your router trick but cheaper. Wonder if BC pipes work the same.