rhn's continued adventures: a build journal, guide collection etc.

[rhn]

I'm rather enjoying that green leaf with black stick woven through it that you've got going on. Sort of thing I wish I had the skill to copy with mine.

Honestly it was not that hard to make. I just put a block/slope shape down of the green material(here its bamboo), then set the Dark wood bits to replace. Then I marked some spots around the edge so I knew the lines would match up with the stripes on the adjacent blocks. I chose 4 spots along the top and bottom edge, and then one in the middle on the sides. Would have made it easier if I had made it the same number of spots on all edges, but I liked the pattern better this way.
Then all it took was free-handing some random lines between the marked spots.
For the most common slopes I created two variants to swap between, to avoid obvious patterns. But perhaps 3 would have been better, you can still see some patterns in the large surfaces.
The Bit Wrench from Extra Bit Manipulation came in handy for rotating and mirroring blocks/slopes, so I avoided having to design all the slopes from scratch.
On the larger huts, the non-rotation symetric pattern required a few extra patterns, to join the horizontal and vertical arranged patterns. But that was also super easy to just freehand join the spots

Spoiler: Workspace for patterns

HOnestly, I am not very creative or original when it comes to designs like this. But being a bit methodical and planning it out helps a lot

 

[rhn]

Been a bit since I posted, but have actually been playing a lot recently.

I have mostly been focused on the Bosmer village recently:

All the huts now have leaves on them. Still need some on smaller stuff here and there, and possibly the entire dock area(still trying to figure that out).

I put a lot of time into doing various beautifications, including fences around the village and the fields:

They are of course all made with C&B

Plan to do a branch/leafy arch here in the foreground, to separate the residential area from the rest. Just not gotten around to building it. Takes ages with OCPD and C&B
Also played around a bit with some street lamps. Of course also in a "living" theme. Not 100% sold on the texture for the Glowstone, but was the best I could initially find.

Beach exit:

Plan to do another arch here. Maybe close to the well, or down at the beach exit. Or both...

Also fenced off all the fields for animals:

Despite not being able to lure animals over the fences, sometimes I find one on the wrong side. So not really sure what is going on there. Maybe they "phase" through during loading. I stopped putting the rest of the top parts on the fences until I can experiment with it some more. Might have to make it taller, or thicker or something...

Played around some more with the docks:

Initially I just planned on it being logs and planks, and that would be it. However I really love the "living" tree theme, so I have now rebuilt it entirely a few times. Plan is now to make the tall risers into actual trees with canopies sheltering the docks from the rain. And possible making a little semi closed off warehouse of sorts on the raised platform in the middle.

As to some non-cosmetic additions:

A little Dark Oak tree farm. Needed a lot of logs for all the trees I am building(btw. thank god for Quark Bark logs)
Since 2x2s aren't so simple to automate with something like Botania, so just made this super simple one using the Extra Utility Ender Porcupine. Really love that thing. So handy for automating, mining etc.

I chose to put the treefarm in this spot basically because it was already chunkloaded. There happened to be a little dungeon here with a spawner:

BetterWithMods makes vanilla spawners convert nearby cobble and bricks into mossy variants, so I decided to use it for some automated production of Moss stone. Again I used the Ender Porcupine to remotely place cobble and mine up the Moss stone. Currently not doing anything, hence why the pit is empty. It already produced 300+ stacks for me, so I stopped feeding it cobble

 

[rhn]

Also put some work into the grove part of the Bosmer settlements:

Made a guard with CustomNPCs and the MoCreatures Ent model/skin. It basically just wanders around and swats occasional monsters that get too close I really like them, so might make more to supplement the Bosmer guards.
(Also, as mentioned in last post, I stopped putting the top cap on the rest of the fences. Dont want to have to redo it all, so waiting until I am sure about if they needed changes or not. So most of this area doesnt have the top caps.)

At the foot of the giant tree, I put in a little pond:

(Grrr, forgot to change the blocks underwater to something other than dirt. Hate grass underwater...)

On the island in the pond I put in my Alfheim portal:

Of course inside another tree
Not turned on right now, since I am still working on Mana production and distribution(more on that in next post).


While I was working my way through Roots, I realised I needed a dark place for various mushrooms etc. While probing where to build a basement under the giant tree, I dug into an existing cave system. So I decided instead to embrace it and use it with some modifications instead.
Back entrance to the cave:

This tree still need leaves. Getting really tired of making tree crowns entirely by hand. Should probably have looked into painting some blocks to look like leaves, so they could be placed by other means. Oh well...

At the lowest point of the cave, there was a little pond:

I enlarged the area around the pond quite a bit. I made the cave large enough to house an Ent from MoCreatures. My hopes was that it would walk around and plant mushrooms on stone(since it will do that on grass along with flowers). But cannot get it to actually plant on anything other than grass, which is a problem since it will also do saplings then. Had to chop down a tree to take pic. So, I might just ditch the idea and make some regular mushroom farming, and then have a CustomNPC Ent be the "gardener" for it.
Might use the real Ents for a flower farm up top later, coupled with some Roots standing stones. Just need to figure out how to make sure it doesnt place saplings, or at least a way to remove them before they can grow.

Part of the cave lead almost entirely in under the giant tree:

When I dug a staircase down, it met up nicely with this bend of the cave. I then decorated the relevant parts of the cave with some roots from the tree above.
There are a few other smaller areas and dead ends of the cave, so I might put more things downhere. Maybe a Botania Thermalily setup or something.
And of course, still need loads of decoration. Envisioning some glowy fungus, Twilight Forest bugs etc. for lighting.


Staircases inside the giant tree:

The leftmost staircase leads down to the previous picture. The right staircase leads up to another floor, as well as the balcony that surrounds the tree(and connects with the huts).

Looking up the trunk:

Bit hard to see even with Nightvision on. However the planks and circle of leafy railings is the upper floor. Further up you might just be able to make out a spiral staircase leading all the way up the tree.

At the top of the trunk, I made a little observation platform in the crown of the tree:

Here looking out towards the ocean.

Other side:

Looking down on the path from the village, with the village itself just visible in the distance.

 

[rhn]

Oh, there's more....

Been working on some Botania automations for the grove:

Decided to use the this hut(the left, highest most one) since it is closest to the tree, where I plan to house my main mana storage.


Initially only really intended for this hut to have my Endoflames, however I managed to fit things in much better than I thought:

Main floor has 4 Gourmaryllis and 2 Kekimurus.

Closeup of the Gourmaryllis and their Droppers:

On the upper floor:

Managed to fit in 16 Endoflames. Could have added lots more if I used floating variants, but I really came to love using these Planters from BetterWithMods.

My initial plan was to use the sub-floor below the main floor, as well as the trunk and possible underground area for the automation of it all. Especially the Gourmaryllis. However after testing some redstone setups in a creative world, I realised I would either have to compromise on the automation, or it would not fit well. Good thing I added Compact Machines! (Read: Handy magical pocket Oblivion dimensions).
So I decided to relegate almost all the automation to a Compact Machine placed in the little sub-floor:

The four sides of the machine output a timed rotation of food items for each Gourmaryllis. The bottom output Cake for the Kekimurus. And the top is used to stop the output of food once the Mana Pool is full(comparators just outside of the frame to the left).

Compact machine:

(almost none the Redstone automation show up here)
I made the max sized machine, since I was not sure how much all the Redstone contraptions would take up. But managed to streamline it a lot, so had ample room for some basic farming and crafting of food.

The machine works by having four exporter setups, which each draws from four pools of food:

The Ender Chests just make it easy for each Gourmaryllis to be fed from the same four pools of food. Each Ender Chest have unique foods.
Hoppers under the Ender Chests only output a single item, once the redstone signal to it is pulsed off. That way I can control all 4 "exporters" from a central redstone system. The Ender Chests and redstone signals are staggered, so each of the "exporters" draw a separate Ender Chest each pulse(so the system doesnt just empty one of the chests in one go and stops again).



Main part of the Redstone automation:

On one of the "exporters", I am using Comparators to monitor the contents of the Ender Chests. Through all the circuits on the right side wall, it basically makes sure that there is contents in at least 2 Ender Chests. If not, then it stops and wait for more varied food(preventing the Gourmaryllis from producing less than full mana per item).
The middle part then use a Timer and Toggle Latches to toggle through each of the four outputs, pulsing them off for a tick. This signal is what triggers the Hoppers on the "exporters"

Under all the Redstone wiring mess:

Since there was plenty of room, I put in some basic ingredient production. The plan is still to supply the whole system with items from outside though, once I set up various farms and a proper central item sorting network.
Each corner has a little farm for crops, using the Roots soil to auto harvest. Also put in a few chickens for eggs(Cake!).
In the background I also put in a simple Immersive Thermoelectric Generator, for a bit of RF to power furnaces etc.

Finally, crafting ingredients into food:

Various crafters, a furnace and a Sag Mill then produce various food for the Gourmaryllis and Cake for the Kekimurus. Since the pack have Pams, it will require a lot of crafting for food that actually produce decent Mana. However I have not bothered to balance certain foods from other mods to Pam's level, mostly because Minecolonies only care about Hunger and not Saturation(colonists constantly go hungry or stuck eating for ages due to the low hunger values). So these same foods work nicely with the Gourmaryllis too, so I am definitely just going to leave them as they are. Pam's still works great for players due to its much higher saturation values, so it is actually the best of both worlds this way
In the future, ingredients will be input through the attached Ender Chest.

 

[ICountFrom0]

I'm intending to just automate cake with astral transformation from pumpkins, but this is LOVELY. If I can find a place to wedge in something like this, but made with the completely different set of mods in my own pack I'm making... well... I certainly must.

 

[GamerwithnoGame]

Once again, I'm absolutely blown away I don't know how you do it, but what you do is truly remarkable!

 

[rhn]

So...

Building have been great. I am really satisfied with how the Bosmer settlement is turning out, and I am really enjoying decorating and adding detail work to it.
However, while building I have also been researching the lore some more. Reading lots of wiki's, watching videos and even started ESO back up for the first time since I quit at launch. And in the research of Bosmer religion, I of course read up on the Green Pact...
Wow, that was not how I remembered it. I remembered all the "nature loving elf" things, but not the fact that true Bosmer are exclusively carnivorous and any harm to (Valenwood) nature is forbidden. Oh boy.

So, time for some changes to what I had built. Gone are the fields and the orchards. Gone are all the (easy Decocraft and Rustic) wooden furniture. The living wooden structures are still fine, as that is part of the Green Pact(by not harming the plants, the gods shape the plants to serve the Bosmer). But now its time for more animals, meat, bone, fur and leather.

Furniture and various decorations:

As a bonus to all these changes, is that I have really discovered the value of using LittleTiles in addition to C&B. I still find the actual building easier and more intuitive with C&B, but then I can save and copy the structures with LittleTiles and even make beds, chairs etc. functional! Specially copying structures spanning multiple block spaces with a single pattern is amazing!

Still pondering how to make Botania and Roots compatible with the Green Pact, since it heavily relies on using plants. But maybe I can just rationalize it with the priests/druids having special dispensation to act in the interest of the gods. /shrug

Anyhoo, more pics and stuff once I get things changed around to match the lore better

 

[ORANG4]

Just finished reading this thread.
Dude, you making really awesome atmospheric projects. I enjoy your attention to details in different building styles. Honestly, sci-fi setting is closer to me but medieval projects also looks wonderful! (By the way if you like creating overdetailed medieval cities you should try conquest reforged modpack. It's powerfull tool only for creative mode, but it's worth it.)
P.S. Still hope that you'll have found free time to make a world downloads for old projects. Interactive world save still not comparable to any photo walkthrough Old mods isn't a problem, personally I'm ready to spend a few days in the web to find the necessary mods versions, even considering I myself loaded with studies in magistracy. You've done a huge job, I think it will be worth to keep best projects alive!
Sorry for bad english, I'm Russian.

 

[Walker510]

hello! So I have a question so what mods you use for this things

and what mods you use for inclined blocks?

 

[rhn]

hello! So I have a question so what mods you use for this things View attachment 39014 and what mods you use for inclined blocks?

They are simply Iron Walls. Behave just like regular vanilla walls, just with Iron blocks skin. Not sure which mod added them, but a guess would be ProjectRed.
The inclined blocks from back then are Carpenter's Blocks. Mod has been semi abandoned and not made playable updated into more modern MC versions. Try ArchitectureCraft for something similar(but more annoying to use), or build them yourself with Chisel&Bits or better yet LittleTiles. LittleTiles can make perfectly smooth custom slopes, C&B will be jagged due to bit sizes.

 

[GamerwithnoGame]

They are simply Iron Walls. Behave just like regular vanilla walls, just with Iron blocks skin. Not sure which mod added them, but a guess would be ProjectRed.
The inclined blocks from back then are Carpenter's Blocks. Mod has been semi abandoned and not made playable updated into more modern MC versions. Try ArchitectureCraft for something similar(but more annoying to use), or build them yourself with Chisel&Bits or better yet LittleTiles. LittleTiles can make perfectly smooth custom slopes, C&B will be jagged due to bit sizes.

Yay, glad to see you're still about!

 

[Psychicash]

looks fantastic. also looks like it's been a minute. hope rhn is doing well