Minecraft and Materialism Part 5
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It is with great pleasure and a heavy heart that I present the completed Minecraft Mandala. Over 70 hours of construction have finally come to fruition. Not including the untold hours spent collecting and harvesting resources. I can’t help but look at the completed piece and smile. All my work has finally paid off. But it is an empty smile. I know there is only one thing left to do.
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First, though, I feel I need to explain a few things. I have to confess that due to in game limitations, I did have to cheat and use an inventory editor for some of the dyes. Survival single player simply does not produce enough Red Flowers, Ink Sacs, Cocoa Beans and Lapis Lazuli without me having to extend my map for many, many hours in every direction and hollow out the earth in the process since these are rare and nonrenewable. Nonetheless, all 96200 blocks of wool were collected by hand, as were all of the other dyes needed.
I spent more hours than I cared to record running around the outside of my frame shearing sheep (since I no longer needed to punch them), killing squids, harvesting cacti, cutting down/planting trees, killing spiders and skeletons, and generally gathering anything I would need. This project also required me to complete 2 other projects. One to collect all the bone meal I would need and the other to store the massive amount of blocks I was harvesting.
For the bone meal I made a fully automated monster trap. 100 by 30 by 7 in size featuring water flows to push the mobs to a lava blade and more currents to push the dropped items to a drop off point. My favorite part of the trap though was that I could take a mine cart from my base, swing close enough by the drop off point to pick up all the items, then end the ride right where I started. This was my first ever successful monster trap. The output was very nice, providing me with plenty of bone meal and lots of string which I used to make more wool blocks.
The Vault as I called it was a room filled to the brim with chests. A total of 245. I did manage to go a little overboard on it though. I didn’t really need that many chests but if I ever do a mega project like this again I will be glad I have the space. And a neat bonus was that it intersected a cave which led me to a vein of diamonds and a heap of coal. Huzzah!
I do have to admit that I was apprehensive about placing my first block. I knew that everything I was about to do wouldn’t last. That I would work so very hard on this and then it would all be gone. Why start? There really wouldn’t be any point to it. Doing my best to squelch the seeds of doubt, I pressed on reminding myself that I had done so much already. If I didn’t continue everything I had already done would be for naught. What would be the point in that? Not being a fan of starting a project and then quitting half way through I kept my head down and placed my blocks. My doomed, short lived, impermanent blocks |
