nostagia

You know how it is, going through stacks of old photos, and you know you've gotta toss them or at least thin them out. I'm needing to wipe my launcher and reload it, and instead of moving my screenshot hoard pile to a saves folder, I'm going through it pitching stuff.

A sample of what I do in realm play when I'm bored and no one else is around. Imagine months of stuff scattered all over someone's realm and no one else even knows. The dates on this are from before Christmas, before we looked for the woodland mansions.

This looks like a vacation selfie, cracks me up. Kai at one of the woodland mansions. I feel like the entrance needs a hotel check in desk and a continental breakfast room off to the side or something.

This cracks me up even more. Wonder what that little kid was talking to Kai about.

I'm pitching all this stuff as I go. This is from months ago on my own realm world StarrStrukk. I found 3 ocean monuments close enough together to start constructing an underwater city. This is the beginning of linking them together. Kinda looks like a constellation.

Or the time I discovered Alien's secret hell game build on the old moc. I was so inspired by this.

...and then I FOUND IT...

...and behold, hell creatures spawned upon me, and I felt worthy of praise in a void where no creatures should ever have spawned by themselves.

And then I promptly desecrated the temple twins by putting torches in their eyes and roses in their hands. I wrote more extensively about it at in hell on Halloween.

I still miss this place...

Don't worry, for every pic I share here, I'm deleting at least 140 more. 💜

If a picture speaks a thousand words, this is a 10K word essay on my feels. This is essentially what I've been breaking through with my psychologist this last fall and winter. 💔

Did the person/people who built this pour some of their soul(s) into what looks like a church that contained special chest that no one could get into? It may just be a game, but every expression from inside ourselves carries weight of meaning that we often don't even notice. I noticed that this was one of the first places to have TNT installed all over it, even 'magically' appearing around us as someone must have surely been able to mod invisibly. Were we the last players to appreciate this build before it was wiped, along with everything else on that server? Did anyone else take the time to really appreciate the soul that went into the art? Living art, that we could walk through, like walking around inside someone else's head.

*200 items deleted POOF*

Oh, check it, that time I got into creating Potatohoe.

World spawn is a golden room. The blue room beneath is a map room or coordinate library.

That was where I first learned the fill command and how to grow giant mushrooms.

It's a creepy backward kind of place with a spaceport above it.

Still working with the locals. I kinda think Order had been experimenting on plant-human hybrids and knew all about the 'Lyekka' pods long before we ever met her.

That time I found a huge mineshaft under our jungle treehouse and saved the coordinates for when someone in my town would come back on and play before the server was wiped.

And no one ever did until long after I abandoned it. I'm coming to see through many other players' eyes that experiences are tossable, like used paper towels or something. The implications are hard for aspienado to grasp. I'm about as Kip Drordy as it gets, holding onto fragments for months. Pathetic, huh?

But then I see THIS and everything is ok again. 😊💙💗💚💓💜😋 I know I can wait forever because that's real.

Ooooh, I definitely wanna do more stuff like this, maybe make some mandalas and sacred circles and stuff.

Down to the final stretch on this folder, less than 300 left. At one time I had 1600. I am horrible for digital hoarding. I'm trying to stop that.

Ok, where were we, I ran off to eat some cheese. 250 left. Too bad I didn't get to keep this as a souvenir when the server got wiped. I think it was a Notch original, won it in a game.

This is one of the coolest parts of Mo Creatures, from the old server.

I definitely miss this. All of minecraft should have flying options in survival.

*wow*, I am suddenly done. Now I wait to hear about how to save a world before I finish wiping all the folders out of exisence. I've gotta take a break, this was pretty grueling.

For those who don't understand the significance of #aspienado robot plugging into shared play and both appreciating and expressing creativity after a lifetime of "Does not play well with others", this is my most personal bridge.

the uprising of the peasants- a documented history

That moment when you turn around and someone is right there looking at you.

Well, truth in journalism prompts me to explain 'uprising' in a greeting the dawn kind of way. There's no way these cowards would join me in a rampage storming the mansion, even though they're all in very real danger.

Good morning! Beautiful day.
Good morning! Sleep well?
Not a wink, what with those ol' growly zombies lurking about. How's your potato patch coming?
Nearly ready for harvest, might need to craft a new hoe since I lent mine out and never saw it again.
Ug, village idiots, they never return anything. Welp, I'm off to the cleric for an acne potion. Good luck with your potato harvest!
Ha, do they ever even actually work? But thanks, and good luck at the cleric!

Little uprising convos like these happen all over the village all day long. They can't wait to rise up at dawn and yap their tiny little A-I brains out.

Meanwhile, I have breached perimeter, middle floor level, and am slowly seizing, securing, and occupying militarized zones.

My secret entrance. So far I've not been discovered using it.

Disclaimers-

• If you don't play minecraft, these will be boring 'after the action' pix and not mean a whole lot, but the action itself felt very much like making chess moves in a vintage war film.
• If you do play minecraft and have seen a woodland mansion, you might be shocked at the sheer aggressive vandalism required to secure a building this size, but believe me, it's insanely rigorous to play a mansion for the first time in survival only.
• I will probably play the next mansion I find in survival very differently. I'm noticing as I go that some of the walls are double thick, which means I'd be able to create inner stealth hallway tunnels between walls, if I threw out one more block thickness of wall, stuff like that. Might also take truckloads of glass blocks next time so I can see what I'm doing without being attacked.

The main problem is lighting. The mansion is worse than a mineshaft for spawning a veritable hive of scum and villainy, as it were. Nothing can be done with all the carpet preventing block placement, so I immediately started ripping it up and throwing torches and fencing around, creeping along section by section. The overall goal is to wrest power away and secure the entire structure. The two main strategies are 1- more light to prevent regular aggressive mob spawn, and 2- beds spread throughout the mansion for closer respawn as I work through it, because I'm pretty sure I'll be dying a lot. Obviously, a few sections need to remain completely sealed against spiders while I'm doing this, because part of the plan is to open up as much space as possible for more light with all this really dark wood around. I would love to see minecraft create a headlamp option for darker forays.

I hauled in a ton of food from the village, but everything else I need is right here in the mansion. I can cannibalize walls for woodworking and even furnace cooking, and since raw log blocks can cook into charcoal, I can keep making torches. Once in awhile I run back out to the village for a break or to mine a little for some iron ore or something, but mostly I stay in the mansion breaking down stair blocks and other furniture to use in furnaces. Bringing in coal just has no positive cost/benefit here.

It's was funny watching a spider drop right onto that fire and burn up.
Otherwise, fire pits are useless.

I learned very early on while I was securing the corridor in this next pic that vindicators can kill in one or two blows, and died 7 times in a row when 2 of them cornered me and I kept bursting back through a gate after nearby respawn to keep punching at them and picking up my stuff. Eventually I just punched them to death, and not only did I NOT lose anything, I gained two emeralds and one of their iron hatchets, so that was cool.

And this is why I cordon off like crazy with fencing as I go. My first creeper was a surprise. Once that breached, I had an evoker and a skeleton hot on my heels to my next gate, so I'm really glad I'm using the gates. No idea how I didn't die with all those crazy blades popping up out of the floor. My only thought was RUN.

In this next pic you can see I've already secured the other side of this room I'm currently working on securing. This room is full of baddies, but I can discreetly break a block here or there, stick a torch in, and then fence the hole. Alas, I learned a new baddie called a vex can come right through walls and deal out substantial hit damage, and the evoker that chased me after the creeper incident was still lurking around doing the summoning. Not sure yet how I'm going to win this room, except by advancing my perimeter block by block until I have that evoker cornered behind some fence.

I'm learning to do aerial recon, plus it gives me more room to lean out and throw more torches around the upper walls. Well, until the time I was so surprised by a vex that I fell right in there and totally DIED, but I totes got all my stuff back because I'm a badass, too.

Meanwhile, at the other end of the mansion coming around the other side of that giant chicken room, I have secured several more areas.

Again, one area is completely enclosed and secured against spiders.

Loads of preparation has gone into invading the next room over, which here is the opposite catty-corner of that middle level of the mansion. I'm slowly pushing the vindicators and evokers that are left (they don't naturally despawn) back into smaller areas, so the danger is exponentially increasing. I've breached the room with torches and about to use the catwalk (part of the original decorative trim, how handy) to advance on another catwalk.

Awesome, there's already a built in catwalk and a cool chest full of goodies, but it was inky black in here, so lighting it up was imperative. You can see the hallway beyond is NOT secure yet.

LOL, you couldn't see these guys lurking beneath me in the last pic. 😄They look pretty benign until they start coming after you. Don't let the old butler with liver spots look fool you.

With all those ladders I'm slapping up, it was inevitable at some point to pop out onto a bit of roof, and sure enough, ran around a corner and right into a creeper. Thank goodness, I was still running and didn't get caught in the blast or I'd have lost all my stuff into that nameless dark room below.

I ran around lighting up the part of the roof I could reach, a wraparound 'porch' to the third floor as much as anything, so I'll be able to use it to create another way in besides braving the stairs, like I did the first time. Was able to see one of my direction beacons back to my original village while I was up there.

And, of course, along a different side I was able to look back at the village I use as a launch, fallback, and supply base for mansion excursions.

LOL, after that it occurred to me to look out the windows...

And now I prepare to secure the back half of the middle floor...

Note of interest-

In my real family history, Corfe Castle came under siege while my ancestor John Bankes lived there, and according to genealogy documents, the lady of the castle, Dame Mary, may have been pregnant with my direct ancestor William during part of the sieges, which lasted for years. (It's difficult sorting that out, since history lumps so much into so few sentences, but I may have a copy of this in my house. It's been a few years since I looked at it, but even if I have it part wrong, every bit of it is fascinating.)

If you find this interesting, there are lots more links from there, plus the history of King Charles I and the subsequent wars and later Restoration is quite harrowing and riveting.

You know, in case you think military planning and strategy taking over a woodland mansion in Minecraft is a waste of time...

uffda- committing to hardcore survival in singleplayer

Looking down from 3 stories on top of a high plateau
contains core work floor, enchantment floor, portal floor
extensive Japanese style gardens

From Pinky vs @bonenado. 1-7-17

The minecraft part- I had wiped all my worlds down to just a handful of worlds. This week it hit me that, even after all this time, I had still never successfully created a singleplayer where I start with nothing and survive without cheats. So I created "uffda" survival default with no other changes. I am on a regular up to date minecraft world in regular difficulty surviving off the land from pure scratch, and I'm finally pulling it off. I haven't found obsidian and made it to the nether yet, but I know enough now to outwit the mobs and execute a series of survival steps to a point where base camp is secure and I can go do whatever I want, even if I'm killed over and over because I'm smart enough now to carry beds around with me and set up new spawn points. Yesterday a creeper got me in a river and I had to go back and get all my gear spread out in the river between two banks while I was being chased by a zombie (they can swim) and shot at by a skelly and it was fun again. I remember when I used to get so angry and really go after those mobs trying to hack them to death with my bare hands because I didn't know how to recover all my stuff on the run under attack. By the way, I think wearing armor automatically triggers more mob spawning. Couldn't help noticing that abrupt change when I put armor on. The more you gear up, the more the game levels up with you. Hmm.

From wikipedia-

"Uff da can be used as an expression of surprise, astonishment, exhaustion, relief and sometimes dismay. Within Scandinavian-American culture, Uff da frequently translates to: "I am overwhelmed". Uff da can often be used as an alternative for many common obscenities."

It's funny how things in mc show up in peripheral. Neither one of these are visible to each other looking straight on.

From down the rabbit hole. 1-17-17

I made a new singleplayer world called 'uffda', which I mentioned the other day, and I have been playing sans cheats nonstop. I started with absolutely nothing, and aside from using F3 coordinates to see where I am once in awhile, and using beds I make to force the night to switch to day, I haven't cheated once. I haven't switched to creative mode at all. I went hard- missed meals, ignored TV, stopped bathing. I immersed myself until I was minecrafting all night in my sleep.

Until I had built that skyway from another biome, I didn't know how this looked at a distance because I'm not using creative and can't fly around.

From Alice in Lava Land. 1-18-17

uffda- Singleplayer, no cheats except being able to see my F3 coordinates. Everything is from scratch. I've had the launcher open in play mode (not paused) for 52+ total hours over the last two weeks, first mentioned in Pinky vs @bonenado. During those 52 hours I have died 10 times, slept in a bed 111 times, harvested 2K+ coal blocks and made 3,573 torches, established my dominance at world spawn and several perimeter outposts covering almost 1000 square blocks, and have lately finished building a sweet very big 3- story house on the edge of an extreme plateau. I killed 18 horses to make books until I found a village and swiped all theirs, set up a library, then went about learning how to make obsidian from scratch (which involved very dangerous climbs to lava sources with buckets), and last night made my first enchantment table from scratch. I have yet to run into a single cow, so I don't have milk for cake, but I did make my first pumpkin pie yesterday, also.

Finally made it into the nether.

This is now 1-20-17. I had spent nearly a year in other worlds doing so much stuff and still hadn't learned the basics of enchantment and the nether in survival. I've been reading a whole bunch of wikis and doing things the hard way. Notch has a cool statement about achievements, and I'm enjoying the challenges, the lengthy planning and strategies, and traveling around to gather and collect in order to advance another step, and another.

The recent updates changed the spawner rooms a little, the chest is bigger and full of cool goodies, so it was totally worth getting sidetracked.
That witch in the corner took forever to die hitting her feet with a pickaxe, but I got uber goodies from her, too.

After establishing my nether portal, I remembered there are woodland mansions now and wondered how hard it would be to start trading up with villagers. It's arduous enough in creative, but would take actual planning in survival, so I studied villager wikis and started gathering all the tradeables from all my provinces. And then one day ran over the next hill out of boredom and ran right into one...

That's right, you are seeing a village right next to a woodland mansion, and I have so taken over that place... By the way, if you haven't done woodland mansion in survival, that is a b*tc#, so more planning and strategy coming. And yes, I cannibalized a villager hut and used the foundation for a nether firepit. Gearing up to take over a mansion...