The hunger bar is probably the worst thing ever to happen to Minecraft. It is a nerf on everything and quite frankly is just terrible. I'll show you how.
Our first reason is the fact that it's a constant annoyance. I don't mean to say that you have to eat every two seconds in the game, but just having it there, forever ticking down, sucks. While you're in the middle of doing more enjoyable things (hunting, mining, stuff that the game is actually meant for) you can't help but be distracted by that stupid little ticking time bomb in the corner of the screen. It really takes away any serenity and relaxation that was in the game before.
Secondly, the hunger bar just makes the game way too easy. The health bar constantly regenerates instead of only regenerating when you feed yourself. Also, it gives you the ability to sprint, which is extremely overpowered in combat. Creeper can be defeated very easily by simply sprint-attacking them, which will knock them far back and defuse them. Skeleton fighting also go from a tactical maneuver to a quick-- and much less entertaining-- affair.
The only upside there is to having this is that it evens out the playing field for people who are bad at Minecraft. Instead of skilled players not having to use as much food and not-so-skilled players having to eat a lot, all players have to eat roughly the same amount. But even this isn't such a good thing. Why would you want that? Why would you want to reward players less for being better at the game?
Half the post you say it's annoying (Using some incorrect facts), and on other half you're saying it's OP. Not quite sure what to make of this. The other stuff you talk about like sprinting don't directly relate to hunger to begin with other than having a set hunger requirement to preform.
Let's just clear one thing up though: It's not "forever" ticking down. It's not a constant rate.
It's a much more complex system than that, but the gist is more activity=faster draining. Standing still for example will not drain the hunger bar, but taking damage, moving around, naturally healing, jumping, etc will all drain it. Doing certain things increase a value from a hidden "exhaustion" meter, and when that gets full, the saturation meter begins to run out, and when that runs out, the actual hunger bar you see on screen runs out. Eating foods with a higher amount of saturation (ex. Golden Carrots) can stretch out the periods before the hunger bar begins to drain. It's not worth going into full detail, but there's just a common misconception.
Our first reason is the fact that it's a constant annoyance. I don't mean to say that you have to eat every two seconds in the game, but just having it there, forever ticking down, sucks. While you're in the middle of doing more enjoyable things (hunting, mining, stuff that the game is actually meant for) you can't help but be distracted by that stupid little ticking time bomb in the corner of the screen. It really takes away any serenity and relaxation that was in the game before.
I disagree. The hunger bar needs to be maintained, but before 1.8, so did your health bar. In order to offset that you need to constantly eat, as opposed to using food as a band-aid, most foods became stackable. This has the additional advantage of not wasting storage space for food that doesn't stack.
Secondly, the hunger bar just makes the game way too easy.
That seems to depend. You cannot just facetank a crapload of mobs anymore- you used to be able to fill your hotbar with a bunch of pork chops and just keep scarfing it down to avoid dying. Now to get that effect you need splash potions of healing. The regenerative effect isn't constant, and has a timeout value after you take damage, so in order to heal you need to remove yourself from danger. Mob armour, health, Damage, and AI have since been buffed, and many monsters will wear armour or carry weapons that do more damage than previously, as well.
The health bar constantly regenerates instead of only regenerating when you feed yourself.
The previous mechanic had food be nothing more than a magic band-aid. This meant facetanking was quite possible with enough food, the only limiting factor being inventory space. You could heal more damage more quickly in 1.7.4 and previous than you can now (with the exception of regen II).
Also, it gives you the ability to sprint
This is incorrect. the hunger bar does not give you this ability. The ability drains the hunger bar but it's not something that just magically added itself to the game after they added the hunger bar.
which is extremely overpowered in combat.
So was being able to scarf down 8 pork chops.
Creeper can be defeated very easily by simply sprint-attacking them
What is your point? Also, on hard difficulty the distance they are sent by a sprint attack doesn't put them out of range of their fuse unless you back up.. which is pretty much the same story as with 1.7.4 and earlier.
Skeleton fighting also go from a tactical maneuver to a quick-- and much less entertaining-- affair.
There was nothing 'tactical' about skeletons being unable to hit you with an arrow (did we play the same game pre 1.8? You could stand perfectly still and the arrows would miss you 90% of the time, and they had a ridiculously short range, too).
Instead of skilled players not having to use as much food and not-so-skilled players having to eat a lot, all players have to eat roughly the same amount.
The amount of damage you receive is more equivalent to your luck rather than "skill". But even so the idea that using less food is a reasonable reward for playing more skillfully is rather silly. The real reward for playing skillfully is not dying- because you cannot, again, facetank 48 hearts work of damage with 8 pork chops on your hotbar.
But even this isn't such a good thing. Why would you want that? Why would you want to reward players less for being better at the game?
Those who are "better" at the game have the more desirable reward of not dying in combat due to lack of planning. The threat of death if you run out of food is not something you can avoid later on by being careful to avoid damage. This is a good thing because you get punished for failing to plan ahead in the same way you end up groping in the dark if you forget to bring wood and run out of torches. Before the hunger mechanic food was basically just extra hearts.
Agreed. I started playing in 1.0 so I can't comment on what the game was like before the hunger bar was added, but I think it forces the player to secure food sources and plan ahead for long expeditions. And the regen, in my opinion, is designed to let you heal after combat without having to waste food as you would have in the old system; it's too slow to be of much use in heated combat. That said, I really can't stand the eating sound effect, which is annoyingly exaggerated.
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Threads like this are exactly why I hate most of the Minecraft community. No one can ever be happy, and they always feel the need to express it by creating a new thread. It's not going to get removed just because you hate it. Stop whining, and live with it.
This, and many other complaint threads, sicken me.
Personally, I prefer the hunger bar to the old food system. Before beta 1.8, taking any damage was a constant nuisance because unless you dedicated entire chests to storing food, you had to deal with the tedium of finding/making more food anytime you took damage. Stockpiling a decent supply of food in your inventory wasn't practical and storing it wasn't a lot better either. Food not stacking and having no natural regen made me a much more cautious player back then, which made the game a bit boring to me.
Also, just have to ask. Why are you bringing this up now, a few years after this change happened?
the hunger bar makes minecraft more fun for me! once you get carrot farms set up, or piggy farms, you'll have stacks of food! I think the hunger bar adds to the game, and makes minecraft funner. Everyone has their opinions, though.
Agreed. I started playing in 1.0 so I can't comment on what the game was like before the hunger bar was added, but I think it forces the player to secure food sources and plan ahead for long expeditions. And the regen, in my opinion, is designed to let you heal after combat without having to waste food as you would have in the old system; it's too slow to be of much use in heated combat. That said, I really can't stand the eating sound effect, which is annoyingly exaggerated.
Ok. you want to know what the food was like before? NO stacking. NO regen. it was horrible! they added the hunger bar for a good reason. sure its slow, and the food eating sound is "exagerated" ( i dont see how that works. you cant scarf down a steak in real life like minecraft. it isnt "exagerated") but that doesnt make minecraft any less fun. stop whining, and DEAL WITH IT. plus, you said it was wasting food in the old system? you said you didnt know what it was like BEFORE! what is up with that?
Half the post you say it's annoying (Using some incorrect facts), and on other half you're saying it's OP. Not quite sure what to make of this. The other stuff you talk about like sprinting don't directly relate to hunger to begin with other than having a set hunger requirement to preform.
That's not inconsistent at all. It's both overpowered and annoying, an impressive feat by Mojang. I challenge you to find one single incorrect fact in the first paragraph. If you do, I'll delete this and stop whining.
Let's just clear one thing up though: It's not "forever" ticking down. It's not a constant rate.
I know how the hunger bar works. But unless you plan on standing still for large amounts of time, it's always decreasing. I didn't say it was a constant rate.
It's a much more complex system than that, but the gist is more activity=faster draining. Standing still for example will not drain the hunger bar, but taking damage, moving around, naturally healing, jumping, etc will all drain it. Doing certain things increase a value from a hidden "exhaustion" meter, and when that gets full, the saturation meter begins to run out, and when that runs out, the actual hunger bar you see on screen runs out. Eating foods with a higher amount of saturation (ex. Golden Carrots) can stretch out the periods before the hunger bar begins to drain. It's not worth going into full detail, but there's just a common misconception.
The old system was awful. The problem with your OP is you've listed a bunch of reasons YOU don't like it, but none of those reasons are necessarily reasons why it's bad. They don't even come close to explaining how it's "the worst thing ever to happen to Minecraft". That and they are also conflicting reasons, if you reread your post.
Okay, let's talk about this. Minecraft has various game modes: Survival, Creative, and Adventure. Of these three game modes hunger is active in Survival and Adventure. If you're playing Adventure mode then it's safe to assume you're playing an Adventure map wherein the creator has decided to allow hunger to increase the difficulty or remove it for some other reason. So we can basically ignore both Adventure mod and Creative mode. This leaves us with Survival mode. Let me stress that name for you one more time - Survival mode. This mode's name suggests that the main objective is to survive. The name implies survival-esque gameplay. This isn't supposed to be a "fun" gamemode where you casually ignore the basic necessity of survival - food.
Okay, so now let's get to your individual points.You initially state that it is a constant annoyance, well that is part of hunger. Don't you get annoyed when you're hungry? As I stated above, you're playing in a Survival gamemode where it makes sense to have a hunger system. Survival isn't about some leisurely mining trip, it's about doing monotonous chores such as eating to keep yourself alive.
Afterwards you state that it makes the game "too easy" because of the natural health regeneration. Well yes and no. While it is true that it grants you a passive regeneration effect, it only actually does this while you keep your hunger over 80%. With sprinting, jumping, mining, attacking, and every other action in the game constantly depleting your hunger this can actually become quite the chore to maintain, effectively making the game harder by removing all forms of regeneration. Prior to this I could just munch on some steak and laugh at the mobs trying to kill me. It was a really broken system, in my opinion. You then go on to say that it gives us an "over-powered" ability in the form of sprinting. Again, yes and no. Sprinting is in fact a very powerful ability in both PvE and PvP combat, but it rapidly drains your hunger while maintaining maximum speed (sprinting while jumping). This again will remove your health regeneration and, in time, your ability to sprint as well. What sprinting truly did was give you a way to momentarily escape from mobs and try to get your health to regenerate. Running, hiding, and readjusting yourself seems much more appropriate for a "Survival" gamemode than just eating your wonderful mushroom stew and becoming suddenly more healthy.
Creeper fighting; Creepers lack a walking sound. They're clearly designed to be a surprise weapon instead of a front fight anyway.
Skeleton fighting; After the skeleton buff they're actually still quite formidable in groups. God forbid you end up trapped in water with a skeleton after you.
And then in closing you state that it somehow evens the odds between more experienced players and beginners. I hate to break it to you, but this just isn't so. Regeneration actually consumes your hunger. Not only does it consume it, but it does so at a rate far more rapid than sprinting and jumping (which devours hunger). Sprinting one meter has an exhaustion of 0.1. Jumping has an exhaustion of 0.2 for every jump. Regeneration however, has a whopping 3.0 exhaustion for every half heart it regenerates. So no, beginners still have to munch down on a very large supply of food if they survive the encounter or the battle is prolonged. Even if they don't, they would still have to consume a much larger supply of potions than the more skilled player. Potions are harder to get and maintain than a simple food supply is.
All-in-all I don't really see how hunger made the game easier or ruined it. All I see is a new challenge being added to the game.
The amount of damage you receive is more equivalent to your luck rather than "skill". But even so the idea that using less food is a reasonable reward for playing more skillfully is rather silly. The real reward for playing skillfully is not dying- because you cannot, again, facetank 48 hearts work of damage with 8 pork chops on your hotbar.
Care to elaborate on this? Skill is definitely a factor; I mostly only get damage from skeletons (due to their ranged attacks) because I know how to kill mobs while avoiding getting hit by them; my "damage dealt" statistic is much higher than "damage received", while I've seen some other people post their stats and it is the opposite (there's also those people who think diamond armor is an excuse to jump into a horde of mobs and spam-click their sword, never mind if they get hurt - such tactic is total lack of skill).
Indeed, I usually eat because otherwise I'd starve, not because I need to heal, rarely losing more than a heart or two by the time I get down to one shank (three baked potatoes restore full hunger with only 1.6 saturation wasted) unless a creeper explodes in my face or I fall, like the other day, into a horde of mobs. I don't even wear full Protection IV diamond armor either, only a chestplate and leggings (actually mod armor, but just a more durable version of diamond with the same protection) with Protection IV, averaging around 70% protection (better armor reduces the damage you get, and how much hunger is consumed when healing).
Really, if you are complaining about eating all the time, even if you aren't always fighting, rethink your diet - melons may seem attractive as a food source but they have very low saturation (on the other end, my eating habit is ill-suited for foods like golden carrots, three of which will restore the same amount of hunger and saturation as three baked potatoes, but with much of the latter wasted, although if you eat when down only 1-2 shanks they are much better).
If you don't like minecraft, that means that we do not like you and you should leave the furums and program a better game. Thank you. If you can't, then once again STOP PLAYING or get used to it.
Our first reason is the fact that it's a constant annoyance. I don't mean to say that you have to eat every two seconds in the game, but just having it there, forever ticking down, sucks. While you're in the middle of doing more enjoyable things (hunting, mining, stuff that the game is actually meant for) you can't help but be distracted by that stupid little ticking time bomb in the corner of the screen. It really takes away any serenity and relaxation that was in the game before.
Secondly, the hunger bar just makes the game way too easy. The health bar constantly regenerates instead of only regenerating when you feed yourself. Also, it gives you the ability to sprint, which is extremely overpowered in combat. Creeper can be defeated very easily by simply sprint-attacking them, which will knock them far back and defuse them. Skeleton fighting also go from a tactical maneuver to a quick-- and much less entertaining-- affair.
The only upside there is to having this is that it evens out the playing field for people who are bad at Minecraft. Instead of skilled players not having to use as much food and not-so-skilled players having to eat a lot, all players have to eat roughly the same amount. But even this isn't such a good thing. Why would you want that? Why would you want to reward players less for being better at the game?
Let's just clear one thing up though: It's not "forever" ticking down. It's not a constant rate.
It's a much more complex system than that, but the gist is more activity=faster draining. Standing still for example will not drain the hunger bar, but taking damage, moving around, naturally healing, jumping, etc will all drain it. Doing certain things increase a value from a hidden "exhaustion" meter, and when that gets full, the saturation meter begins to run out, and when that runs out, the actual hunger bar you see on screen runs out. Eating foods with a higher amount of saturation (ex. Golden Carrots) can stretch out the periods before the hunger bar begins to drain. It's not worth going into full detail, but there's just a common misconception.
When the bar does that "tick", that means the saturation meter is at 0, indicating that you will need to eat soon.
I disagree. The hunger bar needs to be maintained, but before 1.8, so did your health bar. In order to offset that you need to constantly eat, as opposed to using food as a band-aid, most foods became stackable. This has the additional advantage of not wasting storage space for food that doesn't stack.
That seems to depend. You cannot just facetank a crapload of mobs anymore- you used to be able to fill your hotbar with a bunch of pork chops and just keep scarfing it down to avoid dying. Now to get that effect you need splash potions of healing. The regenerative effect isn't constant, and has a timeout value after you take damage, so in order to heal you need to remove yourself from danger. Mob armour, health, Damage, and AI have since been buffed, and many monsters will wear armour or carry weapons that do more damage than previously, as well.
The previous mechanic had food be nothing more than a magic band-aid. This meant facetanking was quite possible with enough food, the only limiting factor being inventory space. You could heal more damage more quickly in 1.7.4 and previous than you can now (with the exception of regen II).
This is incorrect. the hunger bar does not give you this ability. The ability drains the hunger bar but it's not something that just magically added itself to the game after they added the hunger bar.
So was being able to scarf down 8 pork chops.
What is your point? Also, on hard difficulty the distance they are sent by a sprint attack doesn't put them out of range of their fuse unless you back up.. which is pretty much the same story as with 1.7.4 and earlier.
There was nothing 'tactical' about skeletons being unable to hit you with an arrow (did we play the same game pre 1.8? You could stand perfectly still and the arrows would miss you 90% of the time, and they had a ridiculously short range, too).
The amount of damage you receive is more equivalent to your luck rather than "skill". But even so the idea that using less food is a reasonable reward for playing more skillfully is rather silly. The real reward for playing skillfully is not dying- because you cannot, again, facetank 48 hearts work of damage with 8 pork chops on your hotbar.
Those who are "better" at the game have the more desirable reward of not dying in combat due to lack of planning. The threat of death if you run out of food is not something you can avoid later on by being careful to avoid damage. This is a good thing because you get punished for failing to plan ahead in the same way you end up groping in the dark if you forget to bring wood and run out of torches. Before the hunger mechanic food was basically just extra hearts.
This, and many other complaint threads, sicken me.
Also, just have to ask. Why are you bringing this up now, a few years after this change happened?
Ok. you want to know what the food was like before? NO stacking. NO regen. it was horrible! they added the hunger bar for a good reason. sure its slow, and the food eating sound is "exagerated" ( i dont see how that works. you cant scarf down a steak in real life like minecraft. it isnt "exagerated") but that doesnt make minecraft any less fun. stop whining, and DEAL WITH IT. plus, you said it was wasting food in the old system? you said you didnt know what it was like BEFORE! what is up with that?
Aww, someone already beat me to it...
There are some problems that are still bad after 2 1/2 years. Personally, I haven't experienced it for so long because I don't have the PC version.
Mechanics like this is what ruins the game.
Okay, let's talk about this. Minecraft has various game modes: Survival, Creative, and Adventure. Of these three game modes hunger is active in Survival and Adventure. If you're playing Adventure mode then it's safe to assume you're playing an Adventure map wherein the creator has decided to allow hunger to increase the difficulty or remove it for some other reason. So we can basically ignore both Adventure mod and Creative mode. This leaves us with Survival mode. Let me stress that name for you one more time - Survival mode. This mode's name suggests that the main objective is to survive. The name implies survival-esque gameplay. This isn't supposed to be a "fun" gamemode where you casually ignore the basic necessity of survival - food.
Okay, so now let's get to your individual points.You initially state that it is a constant annoyance, well that is part of hunger. Don't you get annoyed when you're hungry? As I stated above, you're playing in a Survival gamemode where it makes sense to have a hunger system. Survival isn't about some leisurely mining trip, it's about doing monotonous chores such as eating to keep yourself alive.
Afterwards you state that it makes the game "too easy" because of the natural health regeneration. Well yes and no. While it is true that it grants you a passive regeneration effect, it only actually does this while you keep your hunger over 80%. With sprinting, jumping, mining, attacking, and every other action in the game constantly depleting your hunger this can actually become quite the chore to maintain, effectively making the game harder by removing all forms of regeneration. Prior to this I could just munch on some steak and laugh at the mobs trying to kill me. It was a really broken system, in my opinion. You then go on to say that it gives us an "over-powered" ability in the form of sprinting. Again, yes and no. Sprinting is in fact a very powerful ability in both PvE and PvP combat, but it rapidly drains your hunger while maintaining maximum speed (sprinting while jumping). This again will remove your health regeneration and, in time, your ability to sprint as well. What sprinting truly did was give you a way to momentarily escape from mobs and try to get your health to regenerate. Running, hiding, and readjusting yourself seems much more appropriate for a "Survival" gamemode than just eating your wonderful mushroom stew and becoming suddenly more healthy.
Creeper fighting; Creepers lack a walking sound. They're clearly designed to be a surprise weapon instead of a front fight anyway.
Skeleton fighting; After the skeleton buff they're actually still quite formidable in groups. God forbid you end up trapped in water with a skeleton after you.
And then in closing you state that it somehow evens the odds between more experienced players and beginners. I hate to break it to you, but this just isn't so. Regeneration actually consumes your hunger. Not only does it consume it, but it does so at a rate far more rapid than sprinting and jumping (which devours hunger). Sprinting one meter has an exhaustion of 0.1. Jumping has an exhaustion of 0.2 for every jump. Regeneration however, has a whopping 3.0 exhaustion for every half heart it regenerates. So no, beginners still have to munch down on a very large supply of food if they survive the encounter or the battle is prolonged. Even if they don't, they would still have to consume a much larger supply of potions than the more skilled player. Potions are harder to get and maintain than a simple food supply is.
All-in-all I don't really see how hunger made the game easier or ruined it. All I see is a new challenge being added to the game.
Care to elaborate on this? Skill is definitely a factor; I mostly only get damage from skeletons (due to their ranged attacks) because I know how to kill mobs while avoiding getting hit by them; my "damage dealt" statistic is much higher than "damage received", while I've seen some other people post their stats and it is the opposite (there's also those people who think diamond armor is an excuse to jump into a horde of mobs and spam-click their sword, never mind if they get hurt - such tactic is total lack of skill).
Indeed, I usually eat because otherwise I'd starve, not because I need to heal, rarely losing more than a heart or two by the time I get down to one shank (three baked potatoes restore full hunger with only 1.6 saturation wasted) unless a creeper explodes in my face or I fall, like the other day, into a horde of mobs. I don't even wear full Protection IV diamond armor either, only a chestplate and leggings (actually mod armor, but just a more durable version of diamond with the same protection) with Protection IV, averaging around 70% protection (better armor reduces the damage you get, and how much hunger is consumed when healing).
Really, if you are complaining about eating all the time, even if you aren't always fighting, rethink your diet - melons may seem attractive as a food source but they have very low saturation (on the other end, my eating habit is ill-suited for foods like golden carrots, three of which will restore the same amount of hunger and saturation as three baked potatoes, but with much of the latter wasted, although if you eat when down only 1-2 shanks they are much better).
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