Yes, Cutthroat Caverns is inspired by Vechs' Kaizo Caverns and Spellbound caves, with the difficulty and dungeon crawling (don't worry, there are only 3 "dungeons") of Legendary and Canopy Carnage in mind. Aesthetically, lots of the colour schemes and areas of the map have been inspired by Three_Two's Vinyl Fantasy map (which you can find here: http://www.minecraft...vinyl%20fantasy), and Bogiga's Friendly Egg Hunt series (which can be found here: http://www.minecraft...ries-by-bogiga/).
Those are awesome people; you should check out their maps too.
I love all of Vech's maps. I am playing Legendary right now, too easy. I hope your maps will be harder
I was somewhat sceptical at the start. It was very Spellbound Caves, and the signs confirmed it. Fortunately it quite quickly moves away from it. Admittedly, some areas fall back into being very similar to Vechs' maps and some even -for me- even verged on getting tiresome as you played through them...
The difficulty progresses nicely and remains relatively high from the off but is generally well balanced throughout.
Favourite Areas:
That lava fall in the spawning basin (Does that count as Gateway to Illusion?) - The Blazes totally got me... I felt like such a idiot but it put a smile on my face; nice usage. Dominion Monument - As Naxza pointed out. I thought having a dangerous Monument was fantastic, I've never seen it done before! Intersection 2 - I quite like the hinting at the theme of each area with the pillars surrounding it, nice touch. Friendly Forest - Now that's what I call visually spectacular! Throne of the Colossus - Very reminiscant of what I assume is its inspiration. And as a massive SotC fan. I'm more than okay with that! Love the difficlty of this area. Really nice endgame (can't say I enjoyed the End too much; maybe I didn't 'get it', but the throne made up for it)
The thing I loved the most? Despite it being so small.
The Sheep.
I thought that was brilliant. A really nice way to just incentivise players a little more. Some of your caverns are massive and that's a really nice way of stopping them doubting themselves as to whether they've collected the wool(s) from that area or not.
Question:
How did you get the gravel to fall in one of the first chambers? Proximity sensors(which I think was done near the end of the bridge) or (my initial guess) glowing redstone? If the latter, how does that work? Does it just update when the player is near and stop glowing?
Yeah, I'm not a very good reviewer.
Thanks for the review. Other players also claim that the Friendly Forest is their favorite area (is it because of the netherrack and leaves combination?), but my personal favorite is
the frozen Hollow, especially with the ghasts flying around.
I REALLY want to play your map, but the only 1.1 jar I have is infested with an atrocious optifine shader, so I'll be hunting in my recycle bin for a different copy.
ANYWAYS
To address your question, the falling gravel in the Gate of Illusion was caused by the glowing redstone blocks. Because they're placed in MCedit, they start off glowing and remain glowing until you entire the area, as the chunk is unloaded while you're in Bedrock Flats. But once you enter, the redstone blocks will randomly turn off, which updates the gravel next to it, causing a very random effect of gravel falling and lights going out. Later, the explosion is caused by a player sensor.
I have an idea for a map of which a part relatively heavily relies on proximity sensors to denote seismic activity etc. The whole gravel falling without making an obvious sound I thought was really effective in your map and will probably utilize something similar for myself
As for my map, it's totally fixed now. You can play it in 1.2.3
And for a solution -if your maps are suffering a similar problem- delete the top bedrock layer; that's what causes all the lighting errors.
I deleted the top two layers and replaced the second from the top layer with half slabs to avoid loads of mobs spawning up there too.
Hope that helps!
Ah, I'll test it out. Thanks. Also, a tip for the Redstone Ore activation:
Ensure that the chunks you want the bombs/seismic activity/etc to occur in are unloaded until necessary, and keep in mind that the redstone is very random. Sometimes it will go off instantly, other times it will take minutes.
Well, both to bump Amalon's thread and for fellow players to see what another fellow player thought of the map, here's my review of Cutthroat Caverns. I PM'ed this to Amalon a while back, and I figured I'd post it here, just in case anyone feels like reading it. Please be warned, it contains spoilers to every part of the map. Don't read it if you haven't played the map yet.
Beware that because it's 15 pages of solid text, it might take a long time to load. Just be patient.
OK, Amalon. Here's my review of the full, entire map. Before starting this off, I want to tell you that your map is absolutely amazing! WARNING: My comments on your map are extremely long and descriptive.
Are you ready for the full review? Maybe you should get a snack, and sit down in a comfy chair. Because I wrote a (figurative) novel about your map. Here I go.
I was very impressed by the giant cavern at spawn. Unlike what you said, it doesn't really remind me of Cenote of the Apprentice, and it looks very original. I went to the loot chest in front of the coal place (the one I ragequit at earlier). It's very nice of you to give out all that stuff. I was very happy when I saw it all. You might want to think about moving that loot chest to infront of the cave with the white wool, though, because having such a conspicous chest right in front of that bonus coal place makes it seem like you want us to go in there first. Some people might actually have been able to handle that area, but I think many people would ragequit and not play the map if they died right there.
Anyway, after taking the loot, I had a little look around the starting cavern, found the hilarious piece of grass enchanted with fire aspect, and went into the white wool area. I really like your idea of using the sheep to show which wool is where. It helps you not go into unnecessary places if you don't want to.
The white wool dungeon looks beautiful. I love the combination of cobble, smooth stone, mossy stone brick, and mossy cobble, but I felt like maybe there were a bit too many spawners for a white wool dungeon in a Medium difficulty map. The enchanted iron sword in that little room with the skeletons was awesome, although it was fairly easy to get because I tunneled around the outside of the room and destroyed the spawners from the outside.
Based on that bonus coal room, when I saw that room with pillars that leads to the room with enchanting tables and potions, I figured there would be tons of spawners hidden inside the walls. Fortunately, there weren't, and I was extremely glad of the saplings, armor, wood, and coal inside the chest. You seriously timed that chest perfectly-- I had just used my last torch when I came to it.
Coming into the enchanting and potions room (the one right before the white wool) I had no real trouble, as I lit up all 5 spawners in the room before anything spawns. Although it was easy for me at least, again, you may want to reduce the overall amount of spawners in this dungeon. Thank you for all those enchanting tables and the potion kit, by the way! It's nice to get that stuff in the beginning of the map, unlike some maps where you don't get it until the end.
Coming into the room with the white wool, I wasn't quite sure what to expect. That room was pure evilness. You nearly tricked me with that hole in the glass floor coming down those stairs. I was extremely lucky, though, because I jumped over it by accident before noticing it! I had jumped because I was trying to critical hit a skeleton, so that skeleton actually saved my life from falling into lava.
The strategy I ended up using on that room was to make a walkway along the wall all the way to the wool room. It was pretty easy using that tactic, but again, still a bit too hard for the white wool, which is supposed to be fairly easy.
OK, so, after getting the white wool, (and having on an awesome diamond chestplate), I thought that the next place to go to would probably be the place behind the lava curtain. I took a stone pick and started to mine through the dang silverfish stone. The silverfish eventually killed me, but my stuff fortunately did not fall into the lava that was right there. I came back (I had set my spawn in the white wool dungeon) and got my stuff back.
Going down into that passageway before the first giant cave, I noticed your choice of blocks there. I really love how you used lapiz lazuli blocks, stone slabs, and cobblestone together. Again, I really love the sheep idea too, to show what colors of wool are in the next place.
Anyway, I came into the Bridge of Oblivian, or whatever it's called, before the first intersection. I was absolutely astounded! Your idea of having that giant cavern with the bridge through the middle was just fantastic! The redstone ore looked really cool on the walls also.
I walked across the bridge without much trouble, and went into the building there. After exploring the rooms in there, and getting some loot and plenty of potions, I walked down the staircase to the orange wool. Orange wool get! Yay!
OK, after that was the part where everything just failed for me. I was walking across the bridge to that gate leading to the 1st Intersection, and I heard the creeper fall onto the pressure plate. I knew it was a player sensor, but I didn't know which way to run to, so I died in my hesitation. The TNT blew up literally all of my items, and I had nothing at all stored in chests back at the white wool dungeon.
Because of this, I was angry at myself for that trap. However, I think you should maybe think about removing that trap. It's kinda a dirty trick to play on someone who doesn't really have very many tools yet. I would certainly love to see a trap like that later on in the map, though, because your player sensor is ingenious.
OK, I'm very sorry about this, but I ragequit after the trap on the bridge. I really had no chance of beating the map after that, with my zero supplies, and I didn't want to restart the map for the millionth time. On the other hand, I really wanted to look through your whole map, and I didn't want to dissappoint you and not give you any comments (because not many people do on your thread, either).
So, because of my situation, I decided to just turn to Creative mode and fly around the entire map and give you feedback about everything. I'm really very sorry that I couldn't complete it in Survival mode, but after seeing all of the areas in the map, I'm glad I was in Creative mode. The map looks impossibly hard. However, don't think even for a second that that means I hated the map, because I didn't. This is one of the best maps I've ever played, but I'll tell you more as I go on.
OK, so, in Creative mode, I flew down to that mossy cobblestone ruins below the bridge. After going through that brief dungeon and finding the magenta wool, I must say that it was too hard. This is really my only complaint for the entire map. However, your creeper trap was ingenious! That was so cool-- I flew around and looked at its workings for a little while, and it's ridiculously evil. I image those creepers were supposed to spawn after you came out of the wool room, blow you up, and make your stuff fall into the void, because the void was one block below the floor. Ingenious, really. However, I think that's a bit too hard for a map rated Medium.
After taking the magenta wool (all of this in Creative mode, of course) I flew up to the first intersection. Your attention to detail and design is amazing and fantastic! I was just staring at the pillars at the first intersection for quite a while. They're really cool, and I don't know how you can possibly design that well.
So, obviously, the first place I wanted to go to at the First Intersection was the Dominion Monument. When I saw the railway, even though I was in Creative, my first instinct was to fly along the railway instead of taking a cart. I wanted to check for traps; I guess it's just habit. I found only one, at the end, where there was that gravel under the detector rails. Hee-hee! Lots of fun, lots of fun.
Anyway, the Dominion Monument entrance was very, very cool! I loved those little prebuilt rooms to make a base in, and the actual room the monument was in was amazing! That was a very creative idea, using Nether Brick fences to create walkways around the place. I saw the half-broken Nether portal, and the Blaze spawners. Then, I went to inspect the other pathways leading out from Intersection 1.
The first one I went to was the Grotto. I'm sorry that I forget the full name, but it's the huge cavern with low ceilings, where you have to travel about by boat. Let me just tell you that when I saw this cave, I was totally astounded. How do you make your areas look that good? I love the glowstone clumps, the little islands in the middle, and all those loot chests with cool names scattered around. I flew over to the Lime wool and took it (of course, it didn't mean anything, because it was all in Creative, but...)
That was when I saw those underwater cube thingies with the spawners. I hadn't previously been flying low enough to activate them, but I did after getting the Lime wool. I was astounded all over again at those! How the heck did you make them? Your Minecraft ideas are so ingenious! Really, really, amazing!
Anyway, after that, after exploring the cavern a bit more (and being amazed and astounded a bit more) I went over to the little wood shack, which was the obvious place to go. I descended into the dungeon there. That dungeon was extremely, extremely hard (at least it would be if I wasn't on Creative) and again, my only complaint with the entire map was that it would be far too hard on Survival.
The yellow wool was insane! I was very glad I was on Creative mode when I flew over to it. Tons of blazes, spiders, skeletons, etc. spawned. I flew back up with my prize, brought it back to the Dominion Monument, and prepared to go to that sandstone cave with all the vines.
I unfortunately forgot the full name of that cave, but my third favorite place in the map. The combination of using endstone and vines and sandstone and glowstone was ingenious (I use that word a lot, don't I) and I wish I had thought of it myself. Those giant pillars were cool, all those loot chests were cool, but the sand trap at the end of that place wasn't. Hee-hee, just kidding. The more evil, the better, right?
After getting that wool (I think it was the light blue wool) I went into that hallway and found that shortcut back to the Dominion Monument. This was one of my favorite things about your map in general-- each area was so huge and detailed, but it seemed like they were all right next to each other, because there were so many shortcuts from place to place!
Anyway, I then went up those stairs, which led me to Intersection 2. Your intersection 2 housed two of my all-time favorite locations in a CTM map ever. In the same intersection!
The first place I went to was Peaceful Forest. From the name, I figured it probably wouldn't be so peaceful, knowing the type of person you are, ha-ha. When I walked into that cavern, I gasped in real life. I'm a CTM mapmaker too, and I am officially very, very, very, very, very jealous of you that you can create a cavern that well. I don't know what it was about the cavern, but it may be my favorite location in a CTM map ever. I love the combination of the leaves and the netherrack, I love the melons on the ground, those little trees down on the ground, the glowstone, and the bedrock-wrapped wool box.
This cavern was amazing. I said it before, and I'll say it again. But I need to get on from that subject, because I have more to tell. I took the wool, and went back to Intersection 2, and found it in ruins! As a side note, that I forgot to say before: I love the design of Intersection 2! I love all those different elements, making up the same statue. Really, really cool. But now, cave spider spawners were exposed, and lava was coming down from the ceiling. I don't even know how you triggered that! Did it happen when I took the wool? Or was it a proximity sensor?
The next place I went to was that castle. While I seriously loved every area in your map, the castle was one of the ones I didn't like as much. Don't get me wrong, I loved everything, so the castle I loved too, but some places were just better than others.
I really liked your use of netherbrick for the castle, but there were too many spawners for a map rated "Medium" difficulty. That is my only real critism throughout the entire map, just manifested in different ways.
However, I did love that clue that told you to swim through the lava to get to that wool. The loot you give through-out the entire map is really epic and fantastic, and this was no exception. I loved those fire resistance pants and fire resistance potions, and it made it clear where one needed to go. All those trapped Testificates in boxes made me sad, though, so of course I had to free them all.
The next place I went to at Intersection 2 was the ice place. I forget its name, but I'm sure you know which place I mean. It housed the blue and the cyan wool.
So, remember how I said that the sandstone and vines place was my third favorite place in your map? The ice place and Peaceful Forest are both vying for first. You'd shown me a spoiler pic of the ice place, but I wasn't prepared for its full beauty, coming into it. That ice ceiling was totally amazing, the parts made out of obsidian looked really cool, and the whole cavern made me extremely jealous (because I could never build anything that good!)
Really, though, I don't give you all these compliments to be polite, or because I'm trying to sugar-coat it. I don't know how you came up with all the amazing ideas for all the dazzling locations of your map, but I wish I had your imaginative mind!
Okay, getting back to the ice place, I flew across that ice walkway to the other side. Seeing the chest there, I opened it, only for TNT to explode. Of course, since I was in Creative mode and didn't die, I saw the chest that that TNT exposed. I can't imagine how much time you put into the map testing details like this! How in the world did you get it so that the TNT exploded only the front chest and not the back one? Insanely cool! I've wanted to do that in a map for so long, but I could never get it to work. You could, and did!
Next, I flew up to the wool box at the top of that high tower thingy. I found the feather falling boots in the chest there, and turned to Survival mode for a second so I could jump off that tower with the boots. I turned it back to Creative after that, and went in the castle.
Maybe you should change around the castle a bit. It looks literally exactly like the Blackened Library from Spellbound Caves, just without the books. (Well, and of course, there are those boxes with Testificates hanging from the ceiling). Personally, I don't mind that this area was so similar to Vechs' area, but maybe you should change it. A lot of people will accuse you of copying, otherwise.
Anyway, I went through the mini-dungeon in that place, got either the cyan or blue wool (don't remember which) and came out. Then, I saw the entrance to Intersection 3. But, going back to the topic of the dungeon that had the blue or cyan wool (don't remember which, again) in the ice cavern, I'll say what I've said for a lot of other locations in this map-- too many spawners. I loved that room with all the creeper spawners, with the door made out of half slabs and stairs, but I think the entire dungeon is just too hard. Again, this is my only complaint with the entire map.
On to Intersection 3! That's what I told myself at that point. So, to Intersection 3 I went. Once seeing the names of the places there, I knew it was going to be a very, very evil intersection. So I went to Venom Lock first, because it sounded the least malicious. I descended through that tunnel, down to the level where there was lots of fog.
I know you said yourself that you were copying Vechs' Skittering Mines a bit with Venom Lock, but I don't really think so. They didn't bear much resemblance to each other in the end, and I would have had no issue if you had copied him anyway. I went and got the wool in Venom Lock, and was highly surprised to see a shortcut there! Flying upwards and digging through, I absolutely could not believe that I was back at the Dominion Monument! How the heck did you make that shortcut come out there? Your map seems so large and full of adventure, but I love that you can easily access every location in the map without too much effort.
Anyway, I headed back to Intersection 3 to go to Nightlock, or whatever it was called. I absolutely love your design of this area too-- probably my fourth favorite area in your map. I loved the design a lot, and I found the lit up area with the beds and chests full of TNT, but I could find no wool here. The sheep at the entrance said that brown wool could be found there, but after a lot of searching, I couldn't find the wool. I did find the entrance to that dungeon, but I couldn't find a wool in there. Maybe I'll fly around in MCedit later and see if I can't scrounge something up.
And now, on to one of the last areas-- the Throne of Oblivion, or whatever it was called! (My apologies for forgetting the name). I knew this was going to be an endgame area when I saw the red and black sheep above the entrance, and walking down the hallway towards it, I knew you were serious. All those flaming arrows were a really nice touch, and you made them much more troll-y by the fact that they were wrapped in bedrock. Ha-ha, take that, player!
So, I went into this area. And I was very, very, very, very, very glad I was in Creative mode! That giant structure in the middle, made out of obsidian and bedrock, looked very imposing, and I was scared to even enter it in Creative mode! I explored some of the little towers with spawners around the big place in the center of the cavern, before I decided to go inside there. I found red wool in the chest at the top of there, and it was enchanted! Ha-ha!
I've been typing for quite a long time now, just for you (nearly an hour) so I need to start to wrap this up. I unfortunately didn't download the version of the map with the black wool, and I've typed so much and I'm so tired from typing that I probably won't right now. I may later, though, and report back to you on the black wool area.
After getting the red wool, I remembered about the Nether portal, so I went back to the Dominion Monument and lit the portal! I stepped through, to adventure!
Those soulsand grave islands were just amazing. I loved the loot in each grave, and I especially enjoyed the references to people like Joe Hills. Those were really hilarious. Some people won't get those references, unfortunately, but my favorite part was all the signs in Joe's grave. All the loot in those graves was very, very epic.
After exploring the islands with the graves for a while, I flew up to the top of the castle and got purple wool! I had totally forgotten about this color (because I wasn't placing my wools on the Monument). So where is the brown wool in the map? I know black was accidentally taken out, but I couldn't find brown?
So, with purple wool obtained and my journey complete (albeit in Creative mode) I traveled back to the Dominion Monument and finished off right there.
So, that was it! I would just like to end this review of your map with a few closing notes. One of these is about the difficulty of the map. Pretty much the only flaw with this map was that I thought it was too hard. But this is easy to fix without even removing any spawners-- just upgrade the map's difficulty to Hard on the front page! I think that would be a more accurate description of it.
Also, may I be a beta tester of any of your future maps? I think, if I wrote a longggg, detailed, post like this one, it would help you out a lot in any future maps you make. So can I, please? I admire your maps very, very much. By the way, I'm sorry about any parts of this post where I sounded critical. I really am not, and I love your map so much!
I'm really sad that your post gets nearly no attention on the forums, compared to most CTM maps that have about 30 pages of replies, while yours only has 4 pages. But don't give up! You're actually a lot better than most of the mapmakers out there that have 30 pages of replies! So just keep on making maps and you'll get noticed. And then I will be proud to say that I was one of your first supporters!
So, before I end this post, you may be wondering, "Why? Why did Isaac take an hour of his life to write this post for some person on the forums he probably won't ever even know in real life?" Well, I like to make people happy. It makes me happy when other people are happy, and I hope you're happy that you have all this feedback from me. I know I would be if someone played my map and told me tons of details about every part.
Anyway, to wrap this up, your map was amazing! Fantastic! One of the best I've ever played! Thanks for making it.
Hawt damn. That makes my 'review' seriously pale in comparison.
And although I'm sure Amalon will thank you. I'm going to... even though it doesn't pertain to me. That level of detail in a review really shows devotion to wanting to help the map maker, and that's damn commendable.
Why thank you! I love to be called commendable.
As for you, Amalon, I saw your new YouTube channel, AmalonLP. Will you pleaseeeee post videos there? I'd love to hear you doing an LP.
Well, both to bump Amalon's thread and for fellow players to see what another fellow player thought of the map, here's my review of Cutthroat Caverns. I PM'ed this to Amalon a while back, and I figured I'd post it here, just in case anyone feels like reading it. Please be warned, it contains spoilers to every part of the map. Don't read it if you haven't played the map yet. Beware that because it's 15 pages of solid text, it might take a long time to load. Just be patient.
OK, Amalon. Here's my review of the full, entire map. Before starting this off, I want to tell you that your map is absolutely amazing! WARNING: My comments on your map are extremely long and descriptive. Are you ready for the full review? Maybe you should get a snack, and sit down in a comfy chair. Because I wrote a (figurative) novel about your map. Here I go. I was very impressed by the giant cavern at spawn. Unlike what you said, it doesn't really remind me of Cenote of the Apprentice, and it looks very original. I went to the loot chest in front of the coal place (the one I ragequit at earlier). It's very nice of you to give out all that stuff. I was very happy when I saw it all. You might want to think about moving that loot chest to infront of the cave with the white wool, though, because having such a conspicous chest right in front of that bonus coal place makes it seem like you want us to go in there first. Some people might actually have been able to handle that area, but I think many people would ragequit and not play the map if they died right there. Anyway, after taking the loot, I had a little look around the starting cavern, found the hilarious piece of grass enchanted with fire aspect, and went into the white wool area. I really like your idea of using the sheep to show which wool is where. It helps you not go into unnecessary places if you don't want to. The white wool dungeon looks beautiful. I love the combination of cobble, smooth stone, mossy stone brick, and mossy cobble, but I felt like maybe there were a bit too many spawners for a white wool dungeon in a Medium difficulty map. The enchanted iron sword in that little room with the skeletons was awesome, although it was fairly easy to get because I tunneled around the outside of the room and destroyed the spawners from the outside. Based on that bonus coal room, when I saw that room with pillars that leads to the room with enchanting tables and potions, I figured there would be tons of spawners hidden inside the walls. Fortunately, there weren't, and I was extremely glad of the saplings, armor, wood, and coal inside the chest. You seriously timed that chest perfectly-- I had just used my last torch when I came to it. Coming into the enchanting and potions room (the one right before the white wool) I had no real trouble, as I lit up all 5 spawners in the room before anything spawns. Although it was easy for me at least, again, you may want to reduce the overall amount of spawners in this dungeon. Thank you for all those enchanting tables and the potion kit, by the way! It's nice to get that stuff in the beginning of the map, unlike some maps where you don't get it until the end. Coming into the room with the white wool, I wasn't quite sure what to expect. That room was pure evilness. You nearly tricked me with that hole in the glass floor coming down those stairs. I was extremely lucky, though, because I jumped over it by accident before noticing it! I had jumped because I was trying to critical hit a skeleton, so that skeleton actually saved my life from falling into lava. The strategy I ended up using on that room was to make a walkway along the wall all the way to the wool room. It was pretty easy using that tactic, but again, still a bit too hard for the white wool, which is supposed to be fairly easy. OK, so, after getting the white wool, (and having on an awesome diamond chestplate), I thought that the next place to go to would probably be the place behind the lava curtain. I took a stone pick and started to mine through the dang silverfish stone. The silverfish eventually killed me, but my stuff fortunately did not fall into the lava that was right there. I came back (I had set my spawn in the white wool dungeon) and got my stuff back. Going down into that passageway before the first giant cave, I noticed your choice of blocks there. I really love how you used lapiz lazuli blocks, stone slabs, and cobblestone together. Again, I really love the sheep idea too, to show what colors of wool are in the next place. Anyway, I came into the Bridge of Oblivian, or whatever it's called, before the first intersection. I was absolutely astounded! Your idea of having that giant cavern with the bridge through the middle was just fantastic! The redstone ore looked really cool on the walls also. I walked across the bridge without much trouble, and went into the building there. After exploring the rooms in there, and getting some loot and plenty of potions, I walked down the staircase to the orange wool. Orange wool get! Yay! OK, after that was the part where everything just failed for me. I was walking across the bridge to that gate leading to the 1st Intersection, and I heard the creeper fall onto the pressure plate. I knew it was a player sensor, but I didn't know which way to run to, so I died in my hesitation. The TNT blew up literally all of my items, and I had nothing at all stored in chests back at the white wool dungeon. Because of this, I was angry at myself for that trap. However, I think you should maybe think about removing that trap. It's kinda a dirty trick to play on someone who doesn't really have very many tools yet. I would certainly love to see a trap like that later on in the map, though, because your player sensor is ingenious. OK, I'm very sorry about this, but I ragequit after the trap on the bridge. I really had no chance of beating the map after that, with my zero supplies, and I didn't want to restart the map for the millionth time. On the other hand, I really wanted to look through your whole map, and I didn't want to dissappoint you and not give you any comments (because not many people do on your thread, either). So, because of my situation, I decided to just turn to Creative mode and fly around the entire map and give you feedback about everything. I'm really very sorry that I couldn't complete it in Survival mode, but after seeing all of the areas in the map, I'm glad I was in Creative mode. The map looks impossibly hard. However, don't think even for a second that that means I hated the map, because I didn't. This is one of the best maps I've ever played, but I'll tell you more as I go on. OK, so, in Creative mode, I flew down to that mossy cobblestone ruins below the bridge. After going through that brief dungeon and finding the magenta wool, I must say that it was too hard. This is really my only complaint for the entire map. However, your creeper trap was ingenious! That was so cool-- I flew around and looked at its workings for a little while, and it's ridiculously evil. I image those creepers were supposed to spawn after you came out of the wool room, blow you up, and make your stuff fall into the void, because the void was one block below the floor. Ingenious, really. However, I think that's a bit too hard for a map rated Medium. After taking the magenta wool (all of this in Creative mode, of course) I flew up to the first intersection. Your attention to detail and design is amazing and fantastic! I was just staring at the pillars at the first intersection for quite a while. They're really cool, and I don't know how you can possibly design that well. So, obviously, the first place I wanted to go to at the First Intersection was the Dominion Monument. When I saw the railway, even though I was in Creative, my first instinct was to fly along the railway instead of taking a cart. I wanted to check for traps; I guess it's just habit. I found only one, at the end, where there was that gravel under the detector rails. Hee-hee! Lots of fun, lots of fun. Anyway, the Dominion Monument entrance was very, very cool! I loved those little prebuilt rooms to make a base in, and the actual room the monument was in was amazing! That was a very creative idea, using Nether Brick fences to create walkways around the place. I saw the half-broken Nether portal, and the Blaze spawners. Then, I went to inspect the other pathways leading out from Intersection 1. The first one I went to was the Grotto. I'm sorry that I forget the full name, but it's the huge cavern with low ceilings, where you have to travel about by boat. Let me just tell you that when I saw this cave, I was totally astounded. How do you make your areas look that good? I love the glowstone clumps, the little islands in the middle, and all those loot chests with cool names scattered around. I flew over to the Lime wool and took it (of course, it didn't mean anything, because it was all in Creative, but...) That was when I saw those underwater cube thingies with the spawners. I hadn't previously been flying low enough to activate them, but I did after getting the Lime wool. I was astounded all over again at those! How the heck did you make them? Your Minecraft ideas are so ingenious! Really, really, amazing! Anyway, after that, after exploring the cavern a bit more (and being amazed and astounded a bit more) I went over to the little wood shack, which was the obvious place to go. I descended into the dungeon there. That dungeon was extremely, extremely hard (at least it would be if I wasn't on Creative) and again, my only complaint with the entire map was that it would be far too hard on Survival. The yellow wool was insane! I was very glad I was on Creative mode when I flew over to it. Tons of blazes, spiders, skeletons, etc. spawned. I flew back up with my prize, brought it back to the Dominion Monument, and prepared to go to that sandstone cave
with all the vines. I unfortunately forgot the full name of that cave, but my third favorite place in the map. The combination of using endstone and vines and sandstone and glowstone was ingenious (I use that word a lot, don't I) and I wish I had thought of it myself. Those giant pillars were cool, all those loot chests were cool, but the sand trap at the end of that place wasn't. Hee-hee, just kidding. The more evil, the better, right? After getting that wool (I think it was the light blue wool) I went into that hallway and found that shortcut back to the Dominion Monument. This was one of my favorite things about your map in general-- each area was so huge and detailed, but it seemed like they were all right next to each other, because there were so many shortcuts from place to place! Anyway, I then went up those stairs, which led me to Intersection 2. Your intersection 2 housed two of my all-time favorite locations in a CTM map ever. In the same intersection! The first place I went to was Peaceful Forest. From the name, I figured it probably wouldn't be so peaceful, knowing the type of person you are, ha-ha. When I walked into that cavern, I gasped in real life. I'm a CTM mapmaker too, and I am officially very, very, very, very, very jealous of you that you can create a cavern that well. I don't know what it was about the cavern, but it may be my favorite location in a CTM map ever. I love the combination of the leaves and the netherrack, I love the melons on the ground, those little trees down on the ground, the glowstone, and the bedrock-wrapped wool box. This cavern was amazing. I said it before, and I'll say it again. But I need to get on from that subject, because I have more to tell. I took the wool, and went back to Intersection 2, and found it in ruins! As a side note, that I forgot to say before: I love the design of Intersection 2! I love all those different elements, making up the same statue. Really, really cool. But now, cave spider spawners were exposed, and lava was coming down from the ceiling. I don't even know how you triggered that! Did it happen when I took the wool? Or was it a proximity sensor? The next place I went to was that castle. While I seriously loved every area in your map, the castle was one of the ones I didn't like as much. Don't get me wrong, I loved everything, so the castle I loved too, but some places were just better than others. I really liked your use of netherbrick for the castle, but there were too many spawners for a map rated "Medium" difficulty. That is my only real critism throughout the entire map, just manifested in different ways. However, I did love that clue that told you to swim through the lava to get to that wool. The loot you give through-out the entire map is really epic and fantastic, and this was no exception. I loved those fire resistance pants and fire resistance potions, and it made it clear where one needed to go. All those trapped Testificates in boxes made me sad, though, so of course I had to free them all. The next place I went to at Intersection 2 was the ice place. I forget its name, but I'm sure you know which place I mean. It housed the blue and the cyan wool. So, remember how I said that the sandstone and vines place was my third favorite place in your map? The ice place and Peaceful Forest are both vying for first. You'd shown me a spoiler pic of the ice place, but I wasn't prepared for its full beauty, coming into it. That ice ceiling was totally amazing, the parts made out of obsidian looked really cool, and the whole cavern made me extremely jealous (because I could never build anything that good!) Really, though, I don't give you all these compliments to be polite, or because I'm trying to sugar-coat it. I don't know how you came up with all the amazing ideas for all the dazzling locations of your map, but I wish I had your imaginative mind! Okay, getting back to the ice place, I flew across that ice walkway to the other side. Seeing the chest there, I opened it, only for TNT to explode. Of course, since I was in Creative mode and didn't die, I saw the chest that that TNT exposed. I can't imagine how much time you put into the map testing details like this! How in the world did you get it so that the TNT exploded only the front chest and not the back one? Insanely cool! I've wanted to do that in a map for so long, but I could never get it to work. You could, and did! Next, I flew up to the wool box at the top of that high tower thingy. I found the feather falling boots in the chest there, and turned to Survival mode for a second so I could jump off that tower with the boots. I turned it back to Creative after that, and went in the castle. Maybe you should change around the castle a bit. It looks literally exactly like the Blackened Library from Spellbound Caves, just without the books. (Well, and of course, there are those boxes with Testificates hanging from the ceiling). Personally, I don't mind that this area was so similar to Vechs' area, but maybe you should change it. A lot of people will accuse you of copying, otherwise. Anyway, I went through the mini-dungeon in that place, got either the cyan or blue wool (don't remember which) and came out. Then, I saw the entrance to Intersection 3. But, going back to the topic of the dungeon that had the blue or cyan wool (don't remember which, again) in the ice cavern, I'll say what I've said for a lot of other locations in this map-- too many spawners. I loved that room with all the creeper spawners, with the door made out of half slabs and stairs, but I think the entire dungeon is just too hard. Again, this is my only complaint with the entire map. On to Intersection 3! That's what I told myself at that point. So, to Intersection 3 I went. Once seeing the names of the places there, I knew it was going to be a very, very evil intersection. So I went to Venom Lock first, because it sounded the least malicious. I descended through that tunnel, down to the level where there was lots of fog. I know you said yourself that you were copying Vechs' Skittering Mines a bit with Venom Lock, but I don't really think so. They didn't bear much resemblance to each other in the end, and I would have had no issue if you had copied him anyway. I went and got the wool in Venom Lock, and was highly surprised to see a shortcut there! Flying upwards and digging through, I absolutely could not believe that I was back at the Dominion Monument! How the heck did you make that shortcut come out there? Your map seems so large and full of adventure, but I love that you can easily access every location in the map without too much effort. Anyway, I headed back to Intersection 3 to go to Nightlock, or whatever it was called. I absolutely love your design of this area too-- probably my fourth favorite area in your map. I loved the design a lot, and I found the lit up area with the beds and chests full of TNT, but I could find no wool here. The sheep at the entrance said that brown wool could be found there, but after a lot of searching, I couldn't find the wool. I did find the entrance to that dungeon, but I couldn't find a wool in there. Maybe I'll fly around in MCedit later and see if I can't scrounge something up. And now, on to one of the last areas-- the Throne of Oblivion, or whatever it was called! (My apologies for forgetting the name). I knew this was going to be an endgame area when I saw the red and black sheep above the entrance, and walking down the hallway towards it, I knew you were serious. All those flaming arrows were a really nice touch, and you made them much more troll-y by the fact that they were wrapped in bedrock. Ha-ha, take that, player! So, I went into this area. And I was very, very, very, very, very glad I was in Creative mode! That giant structure in the middle, made out of obsidian and bedrock, looked very imposing, and I was scared to even enter it in Creative mode! I explored some of the little towers with spawners around the big place in the center of the cavern, before I decided to go inside there. I found red wool in the chest at the top of there, and it was enchanted! Ha-ha! I've been typing for quite a long time now, just for you (nearly an hour) so I need to start to wrap this up. I unfortunately didn't download the version of the map with the black wool, and I've typed so much and I'm so tired from typing that I probably won't right now. I may later, though, and report back to you on the black wool area. After getting the red wool, I remembered about the Nether portal, so I went back to the Dominion Monument and lit the portal! I stepped through, to adventure! Those soulsand grave islands were just amazing. I loved the loot in each grave, and I especially enjoyed the references to people like Joe Hills. Those were really hilarious. Some people won't get those references, unfortunately, but my favorite part was all the signs in Joe's grave. All the loot in those graves was very, very epic. After exploring the islands with the graves for a while, I flew up to the top of the castle and got purple wool! I had totally forgotten about this color (because I wasn't placing my wools on the Monument). So where is the brown wool in the map? I know black was accidentally taken out, but I couldn't find brown? So, with purple wool obtained and my journey complete (albeit in Creative mode) I traveled back to the Dominion Monument and finished off right there. So, that was it! I would just like to end this review of your map with a few closing notes. One of these is about the difficulty of the map. Pretty much the only flaw with this map was that I thought it was too hard. But this is easy to fix without even removing any spawners-- just upgrade the map's difficulty to Hard on the front page! I think that would be a more accurate description of it. Also, may I be a beta tester of any of your future maps? I think, if I wrote a longggg, detailed, post like this one, it would help you out a lot
in any future maps you make. So can I, please? I admire your maps very, very much. By the way, I'm sorry about any parts of this post where I sounded critical. I really am not, and I love your map so much! I'm really sad that your post gets nearly no attention on the forums, compared to most CTM maps that have about 30 pages of replies, while yours only has 4 pages. But don't give up! You're actually a lot better than most of the mapmakers out there that have 30 pages of replies! So just keep on making maps and you'll get noticed. And then I will be proud to say that I was one of your first supporters! So, before I end this post, you may be wondering, "Why? Why did Isaac take an hour of his life to write this post for some person on the forums he probably won't ever even know in real life?" Well, I like to make people happy. It makes me happy when other people are happy, and I hope you're happy that you have all this feedback from me. I know I would be if someone played my map and told me tons of details about every part. Anyway, to wrap this up, your map was amazing! Fantastic! One of the best I've ever played! Thanks for making it. Your friend, Isaac
Hawt damn. That makes my 'review' seriously pale in comparison. And although I'm sure Amalon will thank you. I'm going to... even though it doesn't pertain to me. That level of detail in a review really shows devotion to wanting to help the map maker, and that's damn commendable.
Yup. Isaac is the best.
[Edit] Whoops, that was from a page from last night - I didn't see the two recent posts!
As for you, Amalon, I saw your new YouTube channel, AmalonLP. Will you pleaseeeee post videos there? I'd love to hear you doing an LP.
I would like to post some videos, but I don't have a mic. Although, I do now own a minecraft multiplayer server, so if you're interested in playing minecraft with me, feel free to PM me and I'll send you the link.
Cutthroat Cavern has been updated to be played in minecraft version 1.2! I suppose the difficulty should now be "hard" with those smart creepers and skeletons. Could pose a bit of trouble in the white wool dungeon.
Ah don't worry about that - just get a cheapo mic and focus on getting recording levels sorted and get rid of any silliness with an audio editor afterwards..so, no excuses! ;o)
I came , I saw , I died in a lava induced fire . I guess you're to be congratulated . < GRUMBLE >
[EDIT] It appears that there are some terrible lighting bugs in Cutthroat Caverns V1.2. Ignore these.
[EDIT # 2] Actually, the final area of Cutthroat Caverns is completely ruined due to lighting bugs. I suppose that it will only be playable in minecraft 1.1 until Mr. Jeb fixes the lighting glitches.
I insist that you put a Fred the Furnace in your next map. There must be a sign next to him that says "Fred the Furnace". And I will be very, very angry if you don't put Fred in your next map. You need to commemorate him. He died an awful, watery death.... *sniff*... I loved that furnace.
I insist that you put a Fred the Furnace in your next map. There must be a sign next to him that says "Fred the Furnace". And I will be very, very angry if you don't put Fred in your next map. You need to commemorate him. He died an awful, watery death.... *sniff*... I loved that furnace.
Maybe you'll see "Fred the Furnace" get blown up from a landmine, or him stuck in a cage. Or maybe, just maybe, he'll be at the bottom of an ocean...
If he is to die, though, I hope he has a noble end. Maybe he should explode while smelting iron, or something. Furnace trap, maybe?
Perhaps including a furnace named "Fred" would further support your named-furnace delusions. So, maybe a Fred Furnace, or maybe not.
Anyways, in terms of news of my next map, here's the facts: It will start a new series. Also, due to the unstable version of MCedit, it is considerably less powerful than CodeWarrior's MCedit, and therefore crashes when handling large processes. It's quite difficult to create the initial chunks to work with when the map crashes before I'm able to save.
Perhaps including a furnace named "Fred" would further support your named-furnace delusions. So, maybe a Fred Furnace, or maybe not.
Anyways, in terms of news of my next map, here's the facts: It will start a new series. Also, due to the unstable version of MCedit, it is considerably less powerful than CodeWarrior's MCedit, and therefore crashes when handling large processes. It's quite difficult to create the initial chunks to work with when the map crashes before I'm able to save.
Hmmmm... That's interesting. I personally found it even more powerful than codewarrior's...
Alright. I, personally, would suggest playing Cutthroat Caverns. It has a lot more content, and you're less prone to ragequitting.
I have no intention of making money off of a passtime like this - maybe when my maps become more popular will I might make an adfly link.
Yes, Cutthroat Caverns is inspired by Vechs' Kaizo Caverns and Spellbound caves, with the difficulty and dungeon crawling (don't worry, there are only 3 "dungeons") of Legendary and Canopy Carnage in mind. Aesthetically, lots of the colour schemes and areas of the map have been inspired by Three_Two's Vinyl Fantasy map (which you can find here: http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/884199-ctmcollection-three-twos-vinyl-fantasy-series/page__hl__vinyl%20fantasy), and Bogiga's Friendly Egg Hunt series (which can be found here: http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/1008050-ctm-olympus-friendly-egg-hunt-series-by-bogiga/).
Those are awesome people; you should check out their maps too.
I love all of Vech's maps. I am playing Legendary right now, too easy. I hope your maps will be harder
Eh, Cutthroat Caverns is less grindy than Vechs maps.
I've also taken time to change the difficulty rating on my maps. They're more accurate now.
Thanks for the review. Other players also claim that the Friendly Forest is their favorite area (is it because of the netherrack and leaves combination?), but my personal favorite is
ANYWAYS
To address your question, the falling gravel in the Gate of Illusion was caused by the glowing redstone blocks. Because they're placed in MCedit, they start off glowing and remain glowing until you entire the area, as the chunk is unloaded while you're in Bedrock Flats. But once you enter, the redstone blocks will randomly turn off, which updates the gravel next to it, causing a very random effect of gravel falling and lights going out. Later, the explosion is caused by a player sensor.
Ah, I'll test it out. Thanks. Also, a tip for the Redstone Ore activation:
Beware that because it's 15 pages of solid text, it might take a long time to load. Just be patient.
OK, Amalon. Here's my review of the full, entire map. Before starting this off, I want to tell you that your map is absolutely amazing! WARNING: My comments on your map are extremely long and descriptive.
Are you ready for the full review? Maybe you should get a snack, and sit down in a comfy chair. Because I wrote a (figurative) novel about your map. Here I go.
I was very impressed by the giant cavern at spawn. Unlike what you said, it doesn't really remind me of Cenote of the Apprentice, and it looks very original. I went to the loot chest in front of the coal place (the one I ragequit at earlier). It's very nice of you to give out all that stuff. I was very happy when I saw it all. You might want to think about moving that loot chest to infront of the cave with the white wool, though, because having such a conspicous chest right in front of that bonus coal place makes it seem like you want us to go in there first. Some people might actually have been able to handle that area, but I think many people would ragequit and not play the map if they died right there.
Anyway, after taking the loot, I had a little look around the starting cavern, found the hilarious piece of grass enchanted with fire aspect, and went into the white wool area. I really like your idea of using the sheep to show which wool is where. It helps you not go into unnecessary places if you don't want to.
The white wool dungeon looks beautiful. I love the combination of cobble, smooth stone, mossy stone brick, and mossy cobble, but I felt like maybe there were a bit too many spawners for a white wool dungeon in a Medium difficulty map. The enchanted iron sword in that little room with the skeletons was awesome, although it was fairly easy to get because I tunneled around the outside of the room and destroyed the spawners from the outside.
Based on that bonus coal room, when I saw that room with pillars that leads to the room with enchanting tables and potions, I figured there would be tons of spawners hidden inside the walls. Fortunately, there weren't, and I was extremely glad of the saplings, armor, wood, and coal inside the chest. You seriously timed that chest perfectly-- I had just used my last torch when I came to it.
Coming into the enchanting and potions room (the one right before the white wool) I had no real trouble, as I lit up all 5 spawners in the room before anything spawns. Although it was easy for me at least, again, you may want to reduce the overall amount of spawners in this dungeon. Thank you for all those enchanting tables and the potion kit, by the way! It's nice to get that stuff in the beginning of the map, unlike some maps where you don't get it until the end.
Coming into the room with the white wool, I wasn't quite sure what to expect. That room was pure evilness. You nearly tricked me with that hole in the glass floor coming down those stairs. I was extremely lucky, though, because I jumped over it by accident before noticing it! I had jumped because I was trying to critical hit a skeleton, so that skeleton actually saved my life from falling into lava.
The strategy I ended up using on that room was to make a walkway along the wall all the way to the wool room. It was pretty easy using that tactic, but again, still a bit too hard for the white wool, which is supposed to be fairly easy.
OK, so, after getting the white wool, (and having on an awesome diamond chestplate), I thought that the next place to go to would probably be the place behind the lava curtain. I took a stone pick and started to mine through the dang silverfish stone. The silverfish eventually killed me, but my stuff fortunately did not fall into the lava that was right there. I came back (I had set my spawn in the white wool dungeon) and got my stuff back.
Going down into that passageway before the first giant cave, I noticed your choice of blocks there. I really love how you used lapiz lazuli blocks, stone slabs, and cobblestone together. Again, I really love the sheep idea too, to show what colors of wool are in the next place.
Anyway, I came into the Bridge of Oblivian, or whatever it's called, before the first intersection. I was absolutely astounded! Your idea of having that giant cavern with the bridge through the middle was just fantastic! The redstone ore looked really cool on the walls also.
I walked across the bridge without much trouble, and went into the building there. After exploring the rooms in there, and getting some loot and plenty of potions, I walked down the staircase to the orange wool. Orange wool get! Yay!
OK, after that was the part where everything just failed for me. I was walking across the bridge to that gate leading to the 1st Intersection, and I heard the creeper fall onto the pressure plate. I knew it was a player sensor, but I didn't know which way to run to, so I died in my hesitation. The TNT blew up literally all of my items, and I had nothing at all stored in chests back at the white wool dungeon.
Because of this, I was angry at myself for that trap. However, I think you should maybe think about removing that trap. It's kinda a dirty trick to play on someone who doesn't really have very many tools yet. I would certainly love to see a trap like that later on in the map, though, because your player sensor is ingenious.
OK, I'm very sorry about this, but I ragequit after the trap on the bridge. I really had no chance of beating the map after that, with my zero supplies, and I didn't want to restart the map for the millionth time. On the other hand, I really wanted to look through your whole map, and I didn't want to dissappoint you and not give you any comments (because not many people do on your thread, either).
So, because of my situation, I decided to just turn to Creative mode and fly around the entire map and give you feedback about everything. I'm really very sorry that I couldn't complete it in Survival mode, but after seeing all of the areas in the map, I'm glad I was in Creative mode. The map looks impossibly hard. However, don't think even for a second that that means I hated the map, because I didn't. This is one of the best maps I've ever played, but I'll tell you more as I go on.
OK, so, in Creative mode, I flew down to that mossy cobblestone ruins below the bridge. After going through that brief dungeon and finding the magenta wool, I must say that it was too hard. This is really my only complaint for the entire map. However, your creeper trap was ingenious! That was so cool-- I flew around and looked at its workings for a little while, and it's ridiculously evil. I image those creepers were supposed to spawn after you came out of the wool room, blow you up, and make your stuff fall into the void, because the void was one block below the floor. Ingenious, really. However, I think that's a bit too hard for a map rated Medium.
After taking the magenta wool (all of this in Creative mode, of course) I flew up to the first intersection. Your attention to detail and design is amazing and fantastic! I was just staring at the pillars at the first intersection for quite a while. They're really cool, and I don't know how you can possibly design that well.
So, obviously, the first place I wanted to go to at the First Intersection was the Dominion Monument. When I saw the railway, even though I was in Creative, my first instinct was to fly along the railway instead of taking a cart. I wanted to check for traps; I guess it's just habit. I found only one, at the end, where there was that gravel under the detector rails. Hee-hee! Lots of fun, lots of fun.
Anyway, the Dominion Monument entrance was very, very cool! I loved those little prebuilt rooms to make a base in, and the actual room the monument was in was amazing! That was a very creative idea, using Nether Brick fences to create walkways around the place. I saw the half-broken Nether portal, and the Blaze spawners. Then, I went to inspect the other pathways leading out from Intersection 1.
The first one I went to was the Grotto. I'm sorry that I forget the full name, but it's the huge cavern with low ceilings, where you have to travel about by boat. Let me just tell you that when I saw this cave, I was totally astounded. How do you make your areas look that good? I love the glowstone clumps, the little islands in the middle, and all those loot chests with cool names scattered around. I flew over to the Lime wool and took it (of course, it didn't mean anything, because it was all in Creative, but...)
That was when I saw those underwater cube thingies with the spawners. I hadn't previously been flying low enough to activate them, but I did after getting the Lime wool. I was astounded all over again at those! How the heck did you make them? Your Minecraft ideas are so ingenious! Really, really, amazing!
Anyway, after that, after exploring the cavern a bit more (and being amazed and astounded a bit more) I went over to the little wood shack, which was the obvious place to go. I descended into the dungeon there. That dungeon was extremely, extremely hard (at least it would be if I wasn't on Creative) and again, my only complaint with the entire map was that it would be far too hard on Survival.
The yellow wool was insane! I was very glad I was on Creative mode when I flew over to it. Tons of blazes, spiders, skeletons, etc. spawned. I flew back up with my prize, brought it back to the Dominion Monument, and prepared to go to that sandstone cave with all the vines.
I unfortunately forgot the full name of that cave, but my third favorite place in the map. The combination of using endstone and vines and sandstone and glowstone was ingenious (I use that word a lot, don't I) and I wish I had thought of it myself. Those giant pillars were cool, all those loot chests were cool, but the sand trap at the end of that place wasn't. Hee-hee, just kidding. The more evil, the better, right?
After getting that wool (I think it was the light blue wool) I went into that hallway and found that shortcut back to the Dominion Monument. This was one of my favorite things about your map in general-- each area was so huge and detailed, but it seemed like they were all right next to each other, because there were so many shortcuts from place to place!
Anyway, I then went up those stairs, which led me to Intersection 2. Your intersection 2 housed two of my all-time favorite locations in a CTM map ever. In the same intersection!
The first place I went to was Peaceful Forest. From the name, I figured it probably wouldn't be so peaceful, knowing the type of person you are, ha-ha. When I walked into that cavern, I gasped in real life. I'm a CTM mapmaker too, and I am officially very, very, very, very, very jealous of you that you can create a cavern that well. I don't know what it was about the cavern, but it may be my favorite location in a CTM map ever. I love the combination of the leaves and the netherrack, I love the melons on the ground, those little trees down on the ground, the glowstone, and the bedrock-wrapped wool box.
This cavern was amazing. I said it before, and I'll say it again. But I need to get on from that subject, because I have more to tell. I took the wool, and went back to Intersection 2, and found it in ruins! As a side note, that I forgot to say before: I love the design of Intersection 2! I love all those different elements, making up the same statue. Really, really cool. But now, cave spider spawners were exposed, and lava was coming down from the ceiling. I don't even know how you triggered that! Did it happen when I took the wool? Or was it a proximity sensor?
The next place I went to was that castle. While I seriously loved every area in your map, the castle was one of the ones I didn't like as much. Don't get me wrong, I loved everything, so the castle I loved too, but some places were just better than others.
I really liked your use of netherbrick for the castle, but there were too many spawners for a map rated "Medium" difficulty. That is my only real critism throughout the entire map, just manifested in different ways.
However, I did love that clue that told you to swim through the lava to get to that wool. The loot you give through-out the entire map is really epic and fantastic, and this was no exception. I loved those fire resistance pants and fire resistance potions, and it made it clear where one needed to go. All those trapped Testificates in boxes made me sad, though, so of course I had to free them all.
The next place I went to at Intersection 2 was the ice place. I forget its name, but I'm sure you know which place I mean. It housed the blue and the cyan wool.
So, remember how I said that the sandstone and vines place was my third favorite place in your map? The ice place and Peaceful Forest are both vying for first. You'd shown me a spoiler pic of the ice place, but I wasn't prepared for its full beauty, coming into it. That ice ceiling was totally amazing, the parts made out of obsidian looked really cool, and the whole cavern made me extremely jealous (because I could never build anything that good!)
Really, though, I don't give you all these compliments to be polite, or because I'm trying to sugar-coat it. I don't know how you came up with all the amazing ideas for all the dazzling locations of your map, but I wish I had your imaginative mind!
Okay, getting back to the ice place, I flew across that ice walkway to the other side. Seeing the chest there, I opened it, only for TNT to explode. Of course, since I was in Creative mode and didn't die, I saw the chest that that TNT exposed. I can't imagine how much time you put into the map testing details like this! How in the world did you get it so that the TNT exploded only the front chest and not the back one? Insanely cool! I've wanted to do that in a map for so long, but I could never get it to work. You could, and did!
Next, I flew up to the wool box at the top of that high tower thingy. I found the feather falling boots in the chest there, and turned to Survival mode for a second so I could jump off that tower with the boots. I turned it back to Creative after that, and went in the castle.
Maybe you should change around the castle a bit. It looks literally exactly like the Blackened Library from Spellbound Caves, just without the books. (Well, and of course, there are those boxes with Testificates hanging from the ceiling). Personally, I don't mind that this area was so similar to Vechs' area, but maybe you should change it. A lot of people will accuse you of copying, otherwise.
Anyway, I went through the mini-dungeon in that place, got either the cyan or blue wool (don't remember which) and came out. Then, I saw the entrance to Intersection 3. But, going back to the topic of the dungeon that had the blue or cyan wool (don't remember which, again) in the ice cavern, I'll say what I've said for a lot of other locations in this map-- too many spawners. I loved that room with all the creeper spawners, with the door made out of half slabs and stairs, but I think the entire dungeon is just too hard. Again, this is my only complaint with the entire map.
On to Intersection 3! That's what I told myself at that point. So, to Intersection 3 I went. Once seeing the names of the places there, I knew it was going to be a very, very evil intersection. So I went to Venom Lock first, because it sounded the least malicious. I descended through that tunnel, down to the level where there was lots of fog.
I know you said yourself that you were copying Vechs' Skittering Mines a bit with Venom Lock, but I don't really think so. They didn't bear much resemblance to each other in the end, and I would have had no issue if you had copied him anyway. I went and got the wool in Venom Lock, and was highly surprised to see a shortcut there! Flying upwards and digging through, I absolutely could not believe that I was back at the Dominion Monument! How the heck did you make that shortcut come out there? Your map seems so large and full of adventure, but I love that you can easily access every location in the map without too much effort.
Anyway, I headed back to Intersection 3 to go to Nightlock, or whatever it was called. I absolutely love your design of this area too-- probably my fourth favorite area in your map. I loved the design a lot, and I found the lit up area with the beds and chests full of TNT, but I could find no wool here. The sheep at the entrance said that brown wool could be found there, but after a lot of searching, I couldn't find the wool. I did find the entrance to that dungeon, but I couldn't find a wool in there. Maybe I'll fly around in MCedit later and see if I can't scrounge something up.
And now, on to one of the last areas-- the Throne of Oblivion, or whatever it was called! (My apologies for forgetting the name). I knew this was going to be an endgame area when I saw the red and black sheep above the entrance, and walking down the hallway towards it, I knew you were serious. All those flaming arrows were a really nice touch, and you made them much more troll-y by the fact that they were wrapped in bedrock. Ha-ha, take that, player!
So, I went into this area. And I was very, very, very, very, very glad I was in Creative mode! That giant structure in the middle, made out of obsidian and bedrock, looked very imposing, and I was scared to even enter it in Creative mode! I explored some of the little towers with spawners around the big place in the center of the cavern, before I decided to go inside there. I found red wool in the chest at the top of there, and it was enchanted! Ha-ha!
I've been typing for quite a long time now, just for you (nearly an hour) so I need to start to wrap this up. I unfortunately didn't download the version of the map with the black wool, and I've typed so much and I'm so tired from typing that I probably won't right now. I may later, though, and report back to you on the black wool area.
After getting the red wool, I remembered about the Nether portal, so I went back to the Dominion Monument and lit the portal! I stepped through, to adventure!
Those soulsand grave islands were just amazing. I loved the loot in each grave, and I especially enjoyed the references to people like Joe Hills. Those were really hilarious. Some people won't get those references, unfortunately, but my favorite part was all the signs in Joe's grave. All the loot in those graves was very, very epic.
After exploring the islands with the graves for a while, I flew up to the top of the castle and got purple wool! I had totally forgotten about this color (because I wasn't placing my wools on the Monument). So where is the brown wool in the map? I know black was accidentally taken out, but I couldn't find brown?
So, with purple wool obtained and my journey complete (albeit in Creative mode) I traveled back to the Dominion Monument and finished off right there.
So, that was it! I would just like to end this review of your map with a few closing notes. One of these is about the difficulty of the map. Pretty much the only flaw with this map was that I thought it was too hard. But this is easy to fix without even removing any spawners-- just upgrade the map's difficulty to Hard on the front page! I think that would be a more accurate description of it.
Also, may I be a beta tester of any of your future maps? I think, if I wrote a longggg, detailed, post like this one, it would help you out a lot in any future maps you make. So can I, please? I admire your maps very, very much. By the way, I'm sorry about any parts of this post where I sounded critical. I really am not, and I love your map so much!
I'm really sad that your post gets nearly no attention on the forums, compared to most CTM maps that have about 30 pages of replies, while yours only has 4 pages. But don't give up! You're actually a lot better than most of the mapmakers out there that have 30 pages of replies! So just keep on making maps and you'll get noticed. And then I will be proud to say that I was one of your first supporters!
So, before I end this post, you may be wondering, "Why? Why did Isaac take an hour of his life to write this post for some person on the forums he probably won't ever even know in real life?" Well, I like to make people happy. It makes me happy when other people are happy, and I hope you're happy that you have all this feedback from me. I know I would be if someone played my map and told me tons of details about every part.
Anyway, to wrap this up, your map was amazing! Fantastic! One of the best I've ever played! Thanks for making it.
Your friend,
Isaac
Why thank you! I love to be called commendable.
As for you, Amalon, I saw your new YouTube channel, AmalonLP. Will you pleaseeeee post videos there? I'd love to hear you doing an LP.
Thanks, Isaac. Your bump is greatly appreciated.
Yup. Isaac is the best.
[Edit] Whoops, that was from a page from last night - I didn't see the two recent posts!
I would like to post some videos, but I don't have a mic. Although, I do now own a minecraft multiplayer server, so if you're interested in playing minecraft with me, feel free to PM me and I'll send you the link.
Yay! You're back. This makes me happy.
I'm too busy with map making. [/excuses]
[EDIT] It appears that there are some terrible lighting bugs in Cutthroat Caverns V1.2. Ignore these.
[EDIT # 2] Actually, the final area of Cutthroat Caverns is completely ruined due to lighting bugs. I suppose that it will only be playable in minecraft 1.1 until Mr. Jeb fixes the lighting glitches.
Aw, I just saw this in the original post, as I was looking through it again. Thanks for crediting me!
Yup. I think I also give credit to you in the 1.2 version of Cutthroat Caverns, but don't quote me on this.
I insist that you put a Fred the Furnace in your next map. There must be a sign next to him that says "Fred the Furnace". And I will be very, very angry if you don't put Fred in your next map. You need to commemorate him. He died an awful, watery death.... *sniff*... I loved that furnace.
Maybe you'll see "Fred the Furnace" get blown up from a landmine, or him stuck in a cage. Or maybe, just maybe, he'll be at the bottom of an ocean...
If he is to die, though, I hope he has a noble end. Maybe he should explode while smelting iron, or something. Furnace trap, maybe?
Perhaps including a furnace named "Fred" would further support your named-furnace delusions. So, maybe a Fred Furnace, or maybe not.
Anyways, in terms of news of my next map, here's the facts: It will start a new series. Also, due to the unstable version of MCedit, it is considerably less powerful than CodeWarrior's MCedit, and therefore crashes when handling large processes. It's quite difficult to create the initial chunks to work with when the map crashes before I'm able to save.
Hmmmm... That's interesting. I personally found it even more powerful than codewarrior's...
Huh, maybe the version I downloaded was older. Mine crashes when I try to generate anything larger than 200x200x200.