[represent]Please note that this suggestion makes use of its parent suggestion: Cubic Chunks.
This suggestion is an extension of the Cubic Chunks suggestion linked above. I've separated this topic because I didn't want terrain or other changes to be a deal-breaker for people reading the initial suggestion. Please read the Cubic Chunks topic to see how these are possible.
With the implementation of virtually infinite height and depth due to the Cubic Chunks system, it becomes possible to have realistic mountains, unique caverns miles underground, among much much more. This suggestion is my vision of how these abilities should be taken advantage of in the oceans of Minecraft.
Everyone agrees! Minecraft oceans are boring! I'm sure there are tons of suggestions for improving oceans, but what can cubic chunks do for it? As it turns out, a bit. However, this child suggestion will be smaller than others, since there isn't a huge amount to add in terms of things strictly accomplished with cubic chunks.
To begin, oceans would be divided into these basic terrain biomes:
•Sea Shelf(Continental 1): This biome causes the ocean to be ~10 blocks deep, the same as it is in Minecraft now. Will only form on the coasts of continental landmasses or against Sea Basin(Trench) biomes. Has a low occurrence rate for islands.
•Sea Shelf(Continental 2): This biome is the same as the previous, except with a high occurrence rate for islands. It also cannot form against Sea
•Sea Shelf(Oceanic 1): This biome is the same as the continent versions, except that it only forms out in the middle of the ocean. Has a low occurrence rate for islands.
•Sea Shelf(Oceanic 2): This biome is the same as the previous, except with a high occurrence rate for islands.
•Sea Basin(Depth 1): This causes the ocean to be 100 blocks deep, but otherwise the same.
•Sea Basin(Depth 2): This causes the ocean to be 300 blocks deep, but otherwise the same.
•Sea Basin(Depth 3): This causes the ocean to be 600 blocks deep, but otherwise the same.
•Sea Basin(Depth 4): This causes the ocean to be 1000 blocks deep, but otherwise the same.
•Sea Basin(Ridge): This biome forms inside regular Sea Basin biomes like a river biome, creating a line of underwater mountains with a trench in the middle and magma inside that. Adopts the height of the surrounding Basin biomes.
•Sea Basin(Trench): This biome forms inside regular Sea Basin biomes like a river biome, creating an underwater canyon whose maximum depth is twice that of the surrounding biome. Allows a continental Sea Shelf biome to possibly generate adjacent to it, creating a much higher underwater cliff on one side. In the case that it does, it will create a line of mountainous islands on the biome border at a 100% rate.
Next, each 100 vertical blocks of ocean is divided into a corresponding depth biome. This is used to determine mob spawning and placement of coral reefs. Sea Basin(Trench) biomes are the only possible places that the depth biomes for 1100, 1200, 1300, 1400, 1500, 1600, 1700, 1800, 1900, and 2000 blocks' depth can occur. Coral Reef biomes can occur only on the bottom of the ocean between 50 and 150 blocks depths. They simply allow sponge blocks to generate there.
For right now, I'm going to end this suggestion off here. Depending on how much support this portion receives, I may include more biomes akin to the Coral Reef biomes.
While this suggestion is associated with Cubic Chunks, if you don't support this, please don't use that as a reason not to support that. If you do support this, tap the rep button - it makes for easy count of support.
I love the idea of developing the oceans further, but thgere is no need to have realistic sizes let's concentrate on the "gameplayability" aspects.
First off, unless linked to islands, which should often be linked to underwater mountain ridges anyway, sea shelves in the middle of oceans without anything popping out of the surface are a bit useless. The oceans are way too big. Sea shelves surround continents. But having "quasicontinents" that just don't quite pop out of the water, (sea shelves without a continent in the middle), doesn't add much. It just means that if you try to cross an ocean, you go '"shelf-basin-shelf" and then suddenly instead of finally meeting up with the next continent, you just realize that you have to go "shelf-basin-shelf" before you can finally meet the next continent. Didn't we already say that oceans are too big? Why insist on doubling artificially their size, then? Most "shelf" areas should lead either to another continent, or at least a sizeable island, isnaldn chain, or archipelago of some kind.
Second, the sheer scale of your ideas is so far off the scale of gameplayability it's hard to take them seriously. A *thousand* blocks? That's quite insane. Boo for realism. Choose better numbers. No need for such regular "steps" and complexity for ocean basins 1 2 3 and 4, especially considering that it would not really help make the oceans more interesting at all.
Instead, we should have true variety that is *explorable* without absolutely needing to breathe underwater *except* for the deepest "middle of ocean" parts. And those shouldn't be thousands of blocks wide.
Just like I want ravine that are deeper that 64 blocks, and I want mountains that are higher than 64 blocks, that does not mean I want them to go from a mere half-hundred blocks to suddenly *thousands* of blocks. I don't want to have to play for half an hour just to climb up ONE mountain. Your idea is going from "too little" straight to "too much".
The validity of cubic chunks for performance (which Mojang does a bit of already =- chunks are split into sixteen 16x16x16 "sections", but that is not the same as true cubic chunks), isn't related to how big things need to be. At all.
Before even continental shelve, we should have "shore" biomes. Depth is very shallow here, only a handful of blocks, lots of corral, fishes, varying stuff! Some shores would be straight deep cliffs going into rocky outcroppings, others would be very smooth and quite wide beaches, etc.
The very shape of the continents beside the oceans should vary more: archipelagoes, peninsulas, "broken cliffface", rocky outcroppings, stone arches, big islands, bays, you name it.
Continental shelves should be just deep enough so that you need to swim a bit but CAN reach the bottom and have time to do something there before having to go up. And allow you to easily see the bottom from the surface. 10 blocks is quite okay. This should tend to become a bit deeper when moving away from the continent, but not by much. The transition from shore to shelf is simply a slope of varying intensity. sometimes smooth enough that it's hard to know where the shore ends and the shelf starts, and at the other extreme a drastic 60 degrees slope drop of a few or several blocks.
Ideally, there should be two kinds of water blocks: the water we know, and "sea water", slightly different color and most of all seemingly much more "stormy". Boats would bobble when on it. This separation would occur somewhere in the continental shelf. You'd definitely know you really left the shore and are now sufficiently away from the continent because of this "wave" effec (which occurs only at the surface, not when you're completely underwater). Seawater and water form infinite water blocks (when mixing both, air blocks also get filled in, but only by normal water).
Then, after the shelf we have the continental slope, which often should look like a nearly vertical cliff more than a slope. This should be a quite notable drop, big enough that you CAN reach the bottom of it with one breath... maybe... and while taking suffication damage, you place say a door to create an air bubble, because you don't have enough air to go back up. So a depth going from 10-20 blocks at the top of the slope to about 40-50 blocks at the bottom. That continental slope should not be smooth but be all "craggly" and "broken", with often steep cliffs intertwined with very thin "walking plateaux" every 5 to 10 blocks (a bit like the walkways on the sides of ravines). Most of all, the cliff face is not smooth (like in ravines) but looks quite broken up.
The slope could sometimes be a straight up cliff. This is a good place to place all kinds of special features. The shelf border for example would have lots of ravines (placed more or less a bit perpendicularly, rarely along in the same direction as the shelf). The slope itself could have "ravines lines" too, placed along the length of the slope, so that the cliff could be in several "deep, undeep, then quickly deep again" zones there.
Remember that underwater dimensions don't need to be quite as big because of the movement slowdown and the low visibiility. It's a game, not a reproduction of reality.
Then you have the continental rise. A very smoothly sloping down area, with some occasional rocky features. It should slope noticeably but confortably, say an average drop of 1 block every 6 blocks. It should bring down the average depth from 40-50 blocks, down to 70-80 blocks. There should be LOTS of clay on the ridge.
Then finally, the ocean bottom, relatively flat at a depth of 70-80 blocks.
Of course, we'd have extra biomes for different depths. Ridge chains, lots of ravines of varying depths, and finally big sea canyons and some gigantic ravines (like a ravine, only much wider and deeper). Those canyons and ravines would bring the depth to maybe 200. A giant ravine right inside a canyon would thus allow the ocean depth to reach about 320 max.
Trust me, combined with pillars going up to the surface, volcanic islands, and stuff, that is more than enough depth.
Same thing, surface mountains don't need to go higher than a couple hundred blocks.
Remember that sight range is a by default 160 blocks up to 240 blocks (sight loads 10 chunks distance, can be changed up to 15 chunks in an out-of-game game configuration file). So having mountains that you could not even see the top of, would be a bit useless.
Current feature sizes for oceans and mountains lack a factor of maybe 2 to 4, not a factor of 20!
It's a bit deep...100 blocks? 1000 blocks?!?!? Maybe if there was a way to breath underwater...
Ladders.
Back to topic.
Why not have bioluminiscent fish spawn starting at Ocean depth 600? And all of these guys would be hostile.
Also, why not a fantasy Oceanic biome named the Luminous Cavern which is an underwater biome which generates at depth 800 and below? The entrance, and every part is flooded with water. There is very little light which comes from the Ocean Crystals in the cave. Also, bioluminiscent fish spawn here which makes the caves threatening (You cant just steal all those crystals without dealing with the guardians)
I agree with Ouatcheur that the basic premise of the suggestion is fine, but the overall scale is too extreme. 1000 blocks is so deep that it's not even fun.
I'd prefer the nod to realism, without actually trying to be real (besides, even 1K meters deep isn't as deep as real life sea basins anyway). So I like the idea of most water being about <10 blocks deep around the coast with ocean "cliffs" that can drop maybe down to 50 blocks or so. Occasionally, a ravine should be able to form on the sea floor that creates a trench which can go down another 50-100 blocks. That seems pretty reasonable to me. Especially considering the rather empty state of oceans in MC at the moment.
Ideally, some new sea life could be added to the game to go along with the new sea features.
I think that the middle ground between the OP suggestion and yours, patday, is the place to be. 1000 blocks is way too deep. 10-50 is way too shallow. I suggest making them similar to real oceans, on a small scale, and obviously shallower. 10 within 20 blocks of a beach, then progressing from there down to 100 blocks, with the ravine and other features you suggested.
am i the only one posting that the higher that minecraft can get is 250 blocks so don't expect deep oceans anyway unless is 250 blocks of water and no land and no bedrock
Please read. It clearly said that you have to check the main topic first which is Cubic Chunks.
It would be so fun diving down a 2000 block deep trench with a whole lot of water breathing potions, and a whole lot of Forgotten Beasts to fight, which would spawn rapidly in a trench due to some clever spawn mechanics. You could get the one thing worse than Laser Sharks: Laser Carp.
This suggestion is an extension of the Cubic Chunks suggestion linked above. I've separated this topic because I didn't want terrain or other changes to be a deal-breaker for people reading the initial suggestion. Please read the Cubic Chunks topic to see how these are possible.
With the implementation of virtually infinite height and depth due to the Cubic Chunks system, it becomes possible to have realistic mountains, unique caverns miles underground, among much much more. This suggestion is my vision of how these abilities should be taken advantage of in the oceans of Minecraft.
Everyone agrees! Minecraft oceans are boring! I'm sure there are tons of suggestions for improving oceans, but what can cubic chunks do for it? As it turns out, a bit. However, this child suggestion will be smaller than others, since there isn't a huge amount to add in terms of things strictly accomplished with cubic chunks.
To begin, oceans would be divided into these basic terrain biomes:
•Sea Shelf(Continental 1): This biome causes the ocean to be ~10 blocks deep, the same as it is in Minecraft now. Will only form on the coasts of continental landmasses or against Sea Basin(Trench) biomes. Has a low occurrence rate for islands.
•Sea Shelf(Oceanic 1): This biome is the same as the continent versions, except that it only forms out in the middle of the ocean. Has a low occurrence rate for islands.
Next, each 100 vertical blocks of ocean is divided into a corresponding depth biome. This is used to determine mob spawning and placement of coral reefs. Sea Basin(Trench) biomes are the only possible places that the depth biomes for 1100, 1200, 1300, 1400, 1500, 1600, 1700, 1800, 1900, and 2000 blocks' depth can occur. Coral Reef biomes can occur only on the bottom of the ocean between 50 and 150 blocks depths. They simply allow sponge blocks to generate there.
For right now, I'm going to end this suggestion off here. Depending on how much support this portion receives, I may include more biomes akin to the Coral Reef biomes.
While this suggestion is associated with Cubic Chunks, if you don't support this, please don't use that as a reason not to support that. If you do support this, tap the rep button - it makes for easy count of support.
Putting the CENDENT back in transcendent!
Helmets with Auqua Respiration, as I believe it is called, HELP with that. Plus, 1,000 Mc Blocks is related to 1,000 real meters.
First off, unless linked to islands, which should often be linked to underwater mountain ridges anyway, sea shelves in the middle of oceans without anything popping out of the surface are a bit useless. The oceans are way too big. Sea shelves surround continents. But having "quasicontinents" that just don't quite pop out of the water, (sea shelves without a continent in the middle), doesn't add much. It just means that if you try to cross an ocean, you go '"shelf-basin-shelf" and then suddenly instead of finally meeting up with the next continent, you just realize that you have to go "shelf-basin-shelf" before you can finally meet the next continent. Didn't we already say that oceans are too big? Why insist on doubling artificially their size, then? Most "shelf" areas should lead either to another continent, or at least a sizeable island, isnaldn chain, or archipelago of some kind.
Second, the sheer scale of your ideas is so far off the scale of gameplayability it's hard to take them seriously. A *thousand* blocks? That's quite insane. Boo for realism. Choose better numbers. No need for such regular "steps" and complexity for ocean basins 1 2 3 and 4, especially considering that it would not really help make the oceans more interesting at all.
Instead, we should have true variety that is *explorable* without absolutely needing to breathe underwater *except* for the deepest "middle of ocean" parts. And those shouldn't be thousands of blocks wide.
Just like I want ravine that are deeper that 64 blocks, and I want mountains that are higher than 64 blocks, that does not mean I want them to go from a mere half-hundred blocks to suddenly *thousands* of blocks. I don't want to have to play for half an hour just to climb up ONE mountain. Your idea is going from "too little" straight to "too much".
The validity of cubic chunks for performance (which Mojang does a bit of already =- chunks are split into sixteen 16x16x16 "sections", but that is not the same as true cubic chunks), isn't related to how big things need to be. At all.
Before even continental shelve, we should have "shore" biomes. Depth is very shallow here, only a handful of blocks, lots of corral, fishes, varying stuff! Some shores would be straight deep cliffs going into rocky outcroppings, others would be very smooth and quite wide beaches, etc.
The very shape of the continents beside the oceans should vary more: archipelagoes, peninsulas, "broken cliffface", rocky outcroppings, stone arches, big islands, bays, you name it.
Continental shelves should be just deep enough so that you need to swim a bit but CAN reach the bottom and have time to do something there before having to go up. And allow you to easily see the bottom from the surface. 10 blocks is quite okay. This should tend to become a bit deeper when moving away from the continent, but not by much. The transition from shore to shelf is simply a slope of varying intensity. sometimes smooth enough that it's hard to know where the shore ends and the shelf starts, and at the other extreme a drastic 60 degrees slope drop of a few or several blocks.
Ideally, there should be two kinds of water blocks: the water we know, and "sea water", slightly different color and most of all seemingly much more "stormy". Boats would bobble when on it. This separation would occur somewhere in the continental shelf. You'd definitely know you really left the shore and are now sufficiently away from the continent because of this "wave" effec (which occurs only at the surface, not when you're completely underwater). Seawater and water form infinite water blocks (when mixing both, air blocks also get filled in, but only by normal water).
Check this image:
http://www.physicalgeography.net/fundamentals/images/margin.gif
Then, after the shelf we have the continental slope, which often should look like a nearly vertical cliff more than a slope. This should be a quite notable drop, big enough that you CAN reach the bottom of it with one breath... maybe... and while taking suffication damage, you place say a door to create an air bubble, because you don't have enough air to go back up. So a depth going from 10-20 blocks at the top of the slope to about 40-50 blocks at the bottom. That continental slope should not be smooth but be all "craggly" and "broken", with often steep cliffs intertwined with very thin "walking plateaux" every 5 to 10 blocks (a bit like the walkways on the sides of ravines). Most of all, the cliff face is not smooth (like in ravines) but looks quite broken up.
The slope could sometimes be a straight up cliff. This is a good place to place all kinds of special features. The shelf border for example would have lots of ravines (placed more or less a bit perpendicularly, rarely along in the same direction as the shelf). The slope itself could have "ravines lines" too, placed along the length of the slope, so that the cliff could be in several "deep, undeep, then quickly deep again" zones there.
Remember that underwater dimensions don't need to be quite as big because of the movement slowdown and the low visibiility. It's a game, not a reproduction of reality.
Then you have the continental rise. A very smoothly sloping down area, with some occasional rocky features. It should slope noticeably but confortably, say an average drop of 1 block every 6 blocks. It should bring down the average depth from 40-50 blocks, down to 70-80 blocks. There should be LOTS of clay on the ridge.
Then finally, the ocean bottom, relatively flat at a depth of 70-80 blocks.
Of course, we'd have extra biomes for different depths. Ridge chains, lots of ravines of varying depths, and finally big sea canyons and some gigantic ravines (like a ravine, only much wider and deeper). Those canyons and ravines would bring the depth to maybe 200. A giant ravine right inside a canyon would thus allow the ocean depth to reach about 320 max.
Trust me, combined with pillars going up to the surface, volcanic islands, and stuff, that is more than enough depth.
Same thing, surface mountains don't need to go higher than a couple hundred blocks.
Remember that sight range is a by default 160 blocks up to 240 blocks (sight loads 10 chunks distance, can be changed up to 15 chunks in an out-of-game game configuration file). So having mountains that you could not even see the top of, would be a bit useless.
Current feature sizes for oceans and mountains lack a factor of maybe 2 to 4, not a factor of 20!
Ladders.
Back to topic.
Why not have bioluminiscent fish spawn starting at Ocean depth 600? And all of these guys would be hostile.
Also, why not a fantasy Oceanic biome named the Luminous Cavern which is an underwater biome which generates at depth 800 and below? The entrance, and every part is flooded with water. There is very little light which comes from the Ocean Crystals in the cave. Also, bioluminiscent fish spawn here which makes the caves threatening (You cant just steal all those crystals without dealing with the guardians)
I'd prefer the nod to realism, without actually trying to be real (besides, even 1K meters deep isn't as deep as real life sea basins anyway). So I like the idea of most water being about <10 blocks deep around the coast with ocean "cliffs" that can drop maybe down to 50 blocks or so. Occasionally, a ravine should be able to form on the sea floor that creates a trench which can go down another 50-100 blocks. That seems pretty reasonable to me. Especially considering the rather empty state of oceans in MC at the moment.
Ideally, some new sea life could be added to the game to go along with the new sea features.
Please read. It clearly said that you have to check the main topic first which is Cubic Chunks.