The problem here is that people are control freaks. If the Enderman moves some blocks then don't have a cow man . Deal with it :cool.gif:.
I wonder if some of the people in this thread got angry at the fact that they couldn't get exactly the blocks they wanted in Tetris and it messed up their line or something :laugh.gif:!
I agree, people are control freaks.
I'm trying with my best of intentions to understand what Notch ultimately wants for this game. His Twitter posts and personal quotes are the only things I have to go by.
Whichever direction he wants to take the game with, it is his choice to make and I won't try to oppose it. UNLESS the new implementation interferes with an already pre-existing game mechanic, then I feel that I have to point it out as a beta tester. My argument is purely from a gameplay mechanic point of view and not from a personal dislike of the Enderman. I want the game to run smoothly alongside the other game mechanics with the least amount of conflict between them.
I know Notch's vision of the Enderman didn't quite turn out the way he wanted it to be, so I hope we can come up with some help with some ideas for him.
and furthermore, i'm done fighting the cry babies, you've won, he's nerfing them.
all i'm here for is to let the modding community know that we're ready and waiting when they get around to un-nerfing them.
No it isn't won. The Enderman is still weak. That's the problem.
I still don't understand what is wrong with the brooding attitude you have.
We've solved one problem with the game mechanics of block removal, now we can focus on having the other facets of the Enderman improved. Like his health and damage and perhaps improve on his AI behavior.
do you always assume incorrectly that the person you're talking to is ignorant and unaware of the points that they just finished telling you they were aware of long before you even mentioned them?
yes, their health is weak, yes their AI is retarded, yes they gain an infinite stack of whatever block they pick up, yes you can totally own quite a few of them with a stone sword.
you've informed me of none of these, quit being such a condescending asshole and then pretending it means you're winning a debate.
That post wasn't directed at you, it was for The13thRonin. I was responding to someone who didn't quite understand what my post was about.
So no. You can't simply jump into a post addressed to someone else, where I'm slowly taking my time to explain something to someone else and assume I'm being condescending against you. I really don't see what you are trying to get at here. Not everyone on this thread is as up to date as you are on the issue, and there's nothing wrong with explaining the points to someone who hasn't had the time to read the entire thread yet.
currently no.
now that notch is going to nerf them to hell and back because of cry babies never.
at least give him a chance to refine them so they can really properly grief you before you all cried enough to make them totally ruined, that's all i ever asked.
also, i did read the entire post, it was a redundant collection of everything else said and whined about in this thread, i responded to the one actual question and you assume i didn't read it all.
trust me, this thread is a hell of a read, i'll give you that, but i read the entire bug report thread for all three pre-releases so far before submitting the bugs i found, i did no less here.
You are too set in your mind to think that everything is whining.
You responded to a rhetorical question that had the answer posted in the paragraph immediately below it. Of course I am led to believe that you haven't read the post.
Yes the whole point of the post was to summarize what's been said in the past pages because the new posters obviously haven't read them. I felt it's the responsible thing to do, which was to let them keep up on where the discussion has gone to.
Redstone and railway tracks are made extremely impractical under the current Enderman conditions. I don't see how this is redundant or whining.
It's also prudent that we point out that NPC villages are also getting picked apart. Which is a very valid point, because Notch intends to implement villages to be functioning in some capacity.
I don't understand how you can simply dismiss them as whining.
You just effectively argued that the Endermen need a buff. Nerfing the Endermen is going in the wrong direction. They should immediately be buffed to be more powerful.
Yes the Enderman needs a buff. However, the nerfing of their block removing abilities doesn't make them weaker, because they are already weak to begin with.
Their block moving abilities have nothing to do with making them weaker or stronger. That ability is simply causing problems with the game mechanics, which is why the ability, not the Enderman itself, is getting a nerf.
The Enderman needs to have their health buffed and their attacks buffed. What also needs buffing is their AI coding to make them smarter. If their AI can be improved to have a useful purpose when moving blocks, then the block moving ability can be returned.
Please remember it's not their block moving abilities that makes them weak or strong. They were weak to begin with. Their AI is retarded and their health is too low. No amount of buffed up block shuffling is going to help them live longer or make you fear them.
Do you understand what I'm trying to tell you? I'm still making a very consistent argument here.
it's been explained, discussed, cried over, debated and dragged through the mud enough in this thread, read the thread before posting please :smile.gif:
Believe me, I've read all the pages. The problem with their arguments is that they are confusing challenge with monotony.
In no way does it put the player in danger. It doesn't take skill either, to fill in several holes in a wall. What it does however, it occupy the player's time completely to just repairing stuff all day. Repairing stuff all day, especially the scenery and floating trees and holes in the wall, does not challenge your survival. It's a massive time sink.
Also, I would appreciate that you read the entirety of the last post instead of picking out one sentence and misquoting it's meaning. It's a rhetorical question, as the paragraphs below answers the original question for you. I wanted the reader to think carefully to themselves if the Enderman are really that much of a challenge with their block removing abilities as they stand.
so that whiners can have the game the way they want, too easy.
and the rest of us can have the game the way we want.
:smile.gif:
Explain to me how the Enderman's block removal skill challenges the player's survival?
The Enderman removes blocks in such a haphazard fashion in walls that they are never big or wide enough to allow mobs through. It does however, makes the wall look very ugly, while doing nothing to weaken the defense the wall provides. They take blocks out of trees leaving floating logs. How does floating logs and potholes in the landscape challenge the player's survival?
The Enderman has very low HP (dies in 2 hits), does very little amounts of damage, and gets stuck in hallways and doors. How does keeping the block moving ability supposed to make them more dangerous? Shouldn't their teleport AI be improved and their health and damage buffed instead of keeping a broken random AI for picking up blocks?
Enderman destroys redstone and railway tracks. It essentially makes 2 very large parts of Minecraft Survival mode, unusable. It's pointless making rails in creative mode when you can fly everywhere anyway, so obviously rails are meant to be for survival mode to link bases.
Enderman also destroys NPC villages. The same villages Notch wants implemented but aren't possible when the Endermen are picking them apart.
Endermen forces the player to camp in his base to repair the damage caused by endermen, because leaving the base for any extended periods of time will cause the base to be ruined by the time you get back. Forcing the player to camp in their base to repair stuff goes against the nature of the adventure update where it is supposed to encourage you to go outside to explore and have an adventure.
This is just a summary of the pages and pages of legitimate points raised in this thread. I hope this enlightens you on the main issue and that this isn't merely senseless whining.
It's not about "I hate the Enderman and they should be nerfed". It's about the fact that their block removing ability conflicts with some very basic core mechanics of the Minecraft game. Their AI needs improving if the block carrying ability were to return. As the AI stands now, it's not feasible to give it the ability to pick up blocks.
Well, no it's nothing like toggling difficulty. It's triggering them to suddenly and intelligently build, then spawn endermen that b-line to your position. It's a different monster. I wouldn't mind seeing more complicated scripts like that though. I hope boss monsters might have them. It's way too extreme for Endermen though. Maybe an Endermen boss; Rare enough that killing him erects one shrine; Instead of hundreds of shrines where you will inevitably kill Endermen at some point.
I'm not against it, I just don't like them destroying terrain. It's also not our job to come up with a solution that retains Endermen moving blocks. It's a problem RIGHT now, there is no sign of an immediate update for it RIGHT now, the game would be better off with it gone RIGHT now. We never asked for it, why are we stuck with it?
That's the point I've been trying to make in this thread, that the Enderman block moving ability is better off nerfed until a better solution comes along. I really hate how they destroy the map and player build structures.
But I also want to be considerate to the people who do like this ability to get their piece of the pie, so I'm helping come up with ideas. It's a lot better than whining on both sides and I'd like that there be some form of constructive ideas that come out of this instead. Wether Notch sees this idea or not doesn't matter, but all that matters is if there is a possible solution, it will be here in case he ever needs it.
It's a whole lot better than "I like the Enderman and that's why they must keep the block removal" argument that's been recycled again. Those are unproductive comments and adds nothing to the discussion. I might as well post that I like frogs. :wink.gif:
P.S. Oh and about toggling them to intelligently build, it's been done in a mod called Millenaire, where it has been proven that it's possible to code NPCs to build very complex buildings on their own. They even build buildings according to their population and resource demands.
Just taking the very basic of that concept and have enderman build a 5 block shrine is as simple as it gets. You should check out that mod though, that is where Notch got his idea for NPC villages. It's a very impressive mod.
That sounds like a vicious cycle. You kill one endermen (likely a few since they spawn in packs), they erect a few shrines. Every Endermen within range suddenly attacks you, you kill them. Several dozen shrines are erected. Thousands of Endermen approach you the following night.
Obviously you could limit it, but one shrine for any endermen killed gets ridiculous. If there was a shrine for every creeper I've killed...It's also introducing scripted events which is much beyond any AI that exists right now in minecraft.
Perhaps during the night where they all come after you, the game would not log those kills. It's a simple fix.
During normal days and nights, if you kill 1 enderman, the game logs it as a positive kill. If you kill any more enderman it still registers as a positive kill, it doesn't keep tabs on the amount you kill, only that you killed one and an event is set in motion until the next subsequent reset.
As it stands currently, there's no reason to kill the Enderman as they don't drop anything useful. The Ender Pearl has no use of yet. So there's no incentive to go out and kill them.
Scripted events could be very simply structured. It's like having the difficulty settings changed in the main menu in an instant, causing mobs to spawn, you could have it where the event is triggered like a difficulty setting, except this spawns hostile enderman for 1 night only.
I mean, I'm not trying to push any agenda for the Enderman, I'm only trying to help give ideas to solve the current AI problems they have with block removal and helping to give them purpose and player-triggered events. I mean you can contribute to this idea as well, there's no need to put it down when you find a small problem with it, think of a solution and add to it. Who knows, it could be implemented and you would have contributed in improving the game for both sides of the Enderman argument.
In order to build structures they require blocks. Those blocks will come from the terrain around them. If they aren't provoked into building, and simply do it at random, dozens; hundreds of structures around you will inevitably be erected when given time, which also leaves dozens; hundreds of craters where they got the blocks from. Taking into account the fact they will use any block they can pick up to build and will inevitably start tearing eachother's structures down, over time the entire world will become a mass of scattered Endermen shrines. The only solution is to create a limit of shrines per x*x chunks, and i'm not even sure thats possible.
They can't recognize the death of another Endermen. If you walk out of range of an Endermen building before he finishes and he despawns, does another Endermen somehow continue the task? Is there now a universal AI at large manipulating the world, rather than monsters who are otherwise disposable; thinking for themselves?
Well first off, the Enderman removing blocks in my idea is player triggered.
Secondly, the death of an Enderman due to the player killing them would be logged as a game event.
The game just registers that an Enderman was killed by a player, which isn't too hard to do since the game registers the things you do in the game as achievements. This then triggers a mode for the Enderman in your surroundings to build only 1 shrine, and when they have done building the shrine (time to completion may vary) they will come after you, in a raid that will last 1 night. After which, the game resets to the normal mode.
Of course if you walk away when you trigger them, you may be able to avoid the oncoming payback. But if this happened around your base, are you willing to leave it for one night and set up camp elsewhere until the event is over?
I think that would add a nice element of survival choice. Do you stay and fight for your survival, or go somewhere and wait it out for one night?
Idea: Ender Pearls can be used to fortify blocks. You hold the pearl in your hand, right click the block, and it's Endermen proof. Nothing about the outward appearance of the block changes, and you have unlimited uses of the pearl. If Endermen are messing up your world, kill one, and you can protect yourself. If you're too lazy to kill an Enderman you deserve to have holes in your buildings. If there is a problem with this suggestion, other than whatever people would rather have Ender Pearls do, I fail to see it.
It's a nice idea, but for large structures that use literally thousands of blocks, this is unrealistic. However, I think the main problem is not the block removing, it's the fact that the Enderman is too weak. His block removal has nothing to do with survival.
My previous post has a nice idea though. I'm suggesting that they get a damage and health buff and also some improved AI in terms of their block moving behavior that makes it more relevant to the survival challenge.
Anyway, at this point I agree, Endermen need some fixing up, I just disagree that removing their block moving is the be all end all way to do it.
As much as people may think that I dislike the Enderman moving blocks, I actually liked the idea, it's just not very refined and the people arguing to keep the random, unintelligent AI of the Enderman just don't put fourth a good enough case.
If people want their block moving skills back, which I do too, it will need a complete overhaul and to have their AI coding improved.
They could look for specific blocks and work together to build a cobblestone shrine for example. They could take 1 or 2 torches from your house to light their shrine, which would add to the creepyness factor of having small parts of your base suddenly plunged into darkness and having a creepy lighted shrine in the distance with your torches. To keep your place permanently lit, encase your torches in glass or use glowstone.
Of course also keep their block removing abilities focused on specific materials for their shrine/structure/house. Maybe have it where if you stare at an Enderman and you happen to kill it, over the following few nights the Enderman will erect a shrine in remembrance of their fallen comrades. Then when the Shrine is finished, the following night, they will all attack you regardless of you looking at them or not at any time. This seige will last 1 night with them teleporting everywhere in your base and trying to get you. This event resets itself the following day. That would be kinda scary knowing that an attack is coming but not knowing when.
This is where I would approve of the Enderman removing blocks, because that adds to the survival factor as building a shrine means 'I'm coming to get you' and is player triggered by looking at and killing an Enderman.
I agree with you totally i mean how is an enderman stealing one block worse than a creeper blowing up your whole house
i think there are 2 year olds scared of enderman not because they steal blocks but because they're "scary".
Try to think of it this way.
Imagine that when a creeper explodes, it deletes one block under it.
Now imagine a group of 20 creepers. They explode and each remove 1 block. Your map now has 20 holes.
Now imagine the creepers exploding without you being anywhere near them. They just explode as soon as they spawn, taking the one block with them.
Now imagine this happening every night. 20 creepers. Every night. Regardless of where you are or your interaction with them.
Basically, just because you don't like the challenge that this feature could (potentially) create, doesn't mean Notch should just scrap it for everybody.
It's not really a challenge having to replace blocks that were taken out of your structures. I've explained in the above few posts that the Enderman removing blocks are quite irrelevant to the nature of Minecraft Survival because it doesn't put the player in any actual danger or challenge your survival.
What it does however, is force the player to camp in their bases to replace blocks. Keep in mind that this is an adventure update and being forced to stay in your base to maintain the blocks prevents players from going out and exploring, which was not Notch's original intention.
We need dragons, a quality creature that blows up whole houses. This sad complaining over endermen just shows how the creative community are trying to take over survival. The game has been about making pretty houses for long enough, we want monsters that can actually mess up, you know, a wooden door and make you have to build the odd iron one. Or a monster that means you need to build your house out of something other than earth.
At least endermen gave people making giant monster traps a reason to think and make some changes. As it is, it was way too easy to farm mobs by the thousands. Thats how pathetic they are, that they are being treated like herd animals. We need mobs, rare ones certainly, that need effort to take on and which can cause some hassle for simple defences.
I think you're not considering that the Enderman was not originally designed around ruining mob traps. They were principally designed around being creepy and making you fear them. Notch even made an entire Twitter post about his design choices on making the Enderman creepy. He didn't mention anything about the block moving ability apart from a few short sentences saying that they would move blocks.
The first thing I want to address is that the Enderman destroys anything, including redstone, and railway tracks. Removing one redstone block, even when underground, would mean entire redstone circuits are ruined, and it's not a simple 'replace one block' and you're set either. Usually depending on what redstone circuit you made and it's complexity, you will have to dig through other redstone circuits to just fix the one broken redstone. Railway tracks also get destroyed by Enderman so it makes long distance travel and networking between bases unfeasible. Essentially, the Enderman makes redstone and railway networks, the two very large aspects of Minecraft survival gameplay, impossible to play with.
Second aspect is that Notch wanted to fully implement NPC villages in his upcoming 1.9 update, they would be impossible in the current 1.8 state the Enderman is in. The Enderman would pick apart the NPC villages and they would not function the way Notch intended it to be. In this point, the Enderman's ability to move blocks conflicts with Notch's plan to have intact functioning villages.
The third is that although I love survival mode in Minecraft, the Enderman in no way threatens my survival. They only take one block at a time from my walls and structures, leaving holes in them, but never holes high or wide enough to allow any mob through. These haphazard holes means that they only served to make the walls look ugly while actually doing nothing to weaken it's defensive capabilities. It's just an eyesore and a hassle to clean up.
Enderman are also incredibly weak. They die from a few swings of the sword or from 2 well placed shots from the bow and arrow. They don't even deal a lot of damage either, and will get stuck in hallways and at door entrances. This does not make them scary or threaten the player's survival.
tl;dr
To summarize though, having the Enderman's ability to remove blocks doesn't affect the player's survival difficulty because they are already very weak mobs to begin with. However, the choice to remove them was related to the conflict of the gameplay mechanics that made large portions of the game unplayable. Notch made the right step nerfing the ability because he probably saw how it affects redstone and railway tracks too.
I think the best course of action now is to focus on making the Enderman actually more scary and a mob to fear instead of being seen as a household pest. Buff up their damage, increase their hitpoints, and maybe make your vision blurry (like going into a nether portal) whenever you stare at them. Then perhaps when they teleport to you, they teleport behind you. Then on the screen you will slowly see 2 dark blocky hands close in on your screen, as your character walks slower and you are slowly getting strangled....
0
I agree, people are control freaks.
I'm trying with my best of intentions to understand what Notch ultimately wants for this game. His Twitter posts and personal quotes are the only things I have to go by.
Whichever direction he wants to take the game with, it is his choice to make and I won't try to oppose it. UNLESS the new implementation interferes with an already pre-existing game mechanic, then I feel that I have to point it out as a beta tester. My argument is purely from a gameplay mechanic point of view and not from a personal dislike of the Enderman. I want the game to run smoothly alongside the other game mechanics with the least amount of conflict between them.
I know Notch's vision of the Enderman didn't quite turn out the way he wanted it to be, so I hope we can come up with some help with some ideas for him.
0
No it isn't won. The Enderman is still weak. That's the problem.
I still don't understand what is wrong with the brooding attitude you have.
We've solved one problem with the game mechanics of block removal, now we can focus on having the other facets of the Enderman improved. Like his health and damage and perhaps improve on his AI behavior.
0
That post wasn't directed at you, it was for The13thRonin. I was responding to someone who didn't quite understand what my post was about.
So no. You can't simply jump into a post addressed to someone else, where I'm slowly taking my time to explain something to someone else and assume I'm being condescending against you. I really don't see what you are trying to get at here. Not everyone on this thread is as up to date as you are on the issue, and there's nothing wrong with explaining the points to someone who hasn't had the time to read the entire thread yet.
0
You are too set in your mind to think that everything is whining.
You responded to a rhetorical question that had the answer posted in the paragraph immediately below it. Of course I am led to believe that you haven't read the post.
Yes the whole point of the post was to summarize what's been said in the past pages because the new posters obviously haven't read them. I felt it's the responsible thing to do, which was to let them keep up on where the discussion has gone to.
Redstone and railway tracks are made extremely impractical under the current Enderman conditions. I don't see how this is redundant or whining.
It's also prudent that we point out that NPC villages are also getting picked apart. Which is a very valid point, because Notch intends to implement villages to be functioning in some capacity.
I don't understand how you can simply dismiss them as whining.
0
Yes the Enderman needs a buff. However, the nerfing of their block removing abilities doesn't make them weaker, because they are already weak to begin with.
Their block moving abilities have nothing to do with making them weaker or stronger. That ability is simply causing problems with the game mechanics, which is why the ability, not the Enderman itself, is getting a nerf.
The Enderman needs to have their health buffed and their attacks buffed. What also needs buffing is their AI coding to make them smarter. If their AI can be improved to have a useful purpose when moving blocks, then the block moving ability can be returned.
Please remember it's not their block moving abilities that makes them weak or strong. They were weak to begin with. Their AI is retarded and their health is too low. No amount of buffed up block shuffling is going to help them live longer or make you fear them.
Do you understand what I'm trying to tell you? I'm still making a very consistent argument here.
0
Believe me, I've read all the pages. The problem with their arguments is that they are confusing challenge with monotony.
In no way does it put the player in danger. It doesn't take skill either, to fill in several holes in a wall. What it does however, it occupy the player's time completely to just repairing stuff all day. Repairing stuff all day, especially the scenery and floating trees and holes in the wall, does not challenge your survival. It's a massive time sink.
Also, I would appreciate that you read the entirety of the last post instead of picking out one sentence and misquoting it's meaning. It's a rhetorical question, as the paragraphs below answers the original question for you. I wanted the reader to think carefully to themselves if the Enderman are really that much of a challenge with their block removing abilities as they stand.
2
Explain to me how the Enderman's block removal skill challenges the player's survival?
The Enderman removes blocks in such a haphazard fashion in walls that they are never big or wide enough to allow mobs through. It does however, makes the wall look very ugly, while doing nothing to weaken the defense the wall provides. They take blocks out of trees leaving floating logs. How does floating logs and potholes in the landscape challenge the player's survival?
The Enderman has very low HP (dies in 2 hits), does very little amounts of damage, and gets stuck in hallways and doors. How does keeping the block moving ability supposed to make them more dangerous? Shouldn't their teleport AI be improved and their health and damage buffed instead of keeping a broken random AI for picking up blocks?
Enderman destroys redstone and railway tracks. It essentially makes 2 very large parts of Minecraft Survival mode, unusable. It's pointless making rails in creative mode when you can fly everywhere anyway, so obviously rails are meant to be for survival mode to link bases.
Enderman also destroys NPC villages. The same villages Notch wants implemented but aren't possible when the Endermen are picking them apart.
Endermen forces the player to camp in his base to repair the damage caused by endermen, because leaving the base for any extended periods of time will cause the base to be ruined by the time you get back. Forcing the player to camp in their base to repair stuff goes against the nature of the adventure update where it is supposed to encourage you to go outside to explore and have an adventure.
This is just a summary of the pages and pages of legitimate points raised in this thread. I hope this enlightens you on the main issue and that this isn't merely senseless whining.
It's not about "I hate the Enderman and they should be nerfed". It's about the fact that their block removing ability conflicts with some very basic core mechanics of the Minecraft game. Their AI needs improving if the block carrying ability were to return. As the AI stands now, it's not feasible to give it the ability to pick up blocks.
0
That's the point I've been trying to make in this thread, that the Enderman block moving ability is better off nerfed until a better solution comes along. I really hate how they destroy the map and player build structures.
But I also want to be considerate to the people who do like this ability to get their piece of the pie, so I'm helping come up with ideas. It's a lot better than whining on both sides and I'd like that there be some form of constructive ideas that come out of this instead. Wether Notch sees this idea or not doesn't matter, but all that matters is if there is a possible solution, it will be here in case he ever needs it.
It's a whole lot better than "I like the Enderman and that's why they must keep the block removal" argument that's been recycled again. Those are unproductive comments and adds nothing to the discussion. I might as well post that I like frogs. :wink.gif:
P.S. Oh and about toggling them to intelligently build, it's been done in a mod called Millenaire, where it has been proven that it's possible to code NPCs to build very complex buildings on their own. They even build buildings according to their population and resource demands.
Just taking the very basic of that concept and have enderman build a 5 block shrine is as simple as it gets. You should check out that mod though, that is where Notch got his idea for NPC villages. It's a very impressive mod.
0
Perhaps during the night where they all come after you, the game would not log those kills. It's a simple fix.
During normal days and nights, if you kill 1 enderman, the game logs it as a positive kill. If you kill any more enderman it still registers as a positive kill, it doesn't keep tabs on the amount you kill, only that you killed one and an event is set in motion until the next subsequent reset.
As it stands currently, there's no reason to kill the Enderman as they don't drop anything useful. The Ender Pearl has no use of yet. So there's no incentive to go out and kill them.
Scripted events could be very simply structured. It's like having the difficulty settings changed in the main menu in an instant, causing mobs to spawn, you could have it where the event is triggered like a difficulty setting, except this spawns hostile enderman for 1 night only.
I mean, I'm not trying to push any agenda for the Enderman, I'm only trying to help give ideas to solve the current AI problems they have with block removal and helping to give them purpose and player-triggered events. I mean you can contribute to this idea as well, there's no need to put it down when you find a small problem with it, think of a solution and add to it. Who knows, it could be implemented and you would have contributed in improving the game for both sides of the Enderman argument.
0
Well first off, the Enderman removing blocks in my idea is player triggered.
Secondly, the death of an Enderman due to the player killing them would be logged as a game event.
The game just registers that an Enderman was killed by a player, which isn't too hard to do since the game registers the things you do in the game as achievements. This then triggers a mode for the Enderman in your surroundings to build only 1 shrine, and when they have done building the shrine (time to completion may vary) they will come after you, in a raid that will last 1 night. After which, the game resets to the normal mode.
Of course if you walk away when you trigger them, you may be able to avoid the oncoming payback. But if this happened around your base, are you willing to leave it for one night and set up camp elsewhere until the event is over?
I think that would add a nice element of survival choice. Do you stay and fight for your survival, or go somewhere and wait it out for one night?
0
It's a nice idea, but for large structures that use literally thousands of blocks, this is unrealistic. However, I think the main problem is not the block removing, it's the fact that the Enderman is too weak. His block removal has nothing to do with survival.
My previous post has a nice idea though. I'm suggesting that they get a damage and health buff and also some improved AI in terms of their block moving behavior that makes it more relevant to the survival challenge.
I hope you like the idea though.
0
As much as people may think that I dislike the Enderman moving blocks, I actually liked the idea, it's just not very refined and the people arguing to keep the random, unintelligent AI of the Enderman just don't put fourth a good enough case.
If people want their block moving skills back, which I do too, it will need a complete overhaul and to have their AI coding improved.
They could look for specific blocks and work together to build a cobblestone shrine for example. They could take 1 or 2 torches from your house to light their shrine, which would add to the creepyness factor of having small parts of your base suddenly plunged into darkness and having a creepy lighted shrine in the distance with your torches. To keep your place permanently lit, encase your torches in glass or use glowstone.
Of course also keep their block removing abilities focused on specific materials for their shrine/structure/house. Maybe have it where if you stare at an Enderman and you happen to kill it, over the following few nights the Enderman will erect a shrine in remembrance of their fallen comrades. Then when the Shrine is finished, the following night, they will all attack you regardless of you looking at them or not at any time. This seige will last 1 night with them teleporting everywhere in your base and trying to get you. This event resets itself the following day. That would be kinda scary knowing that an attack is coming but not knowing when.
This is where I would approve of the Enderman removing blocks, because that adds to the survival factor as building a shrine means 'I'm coming to get you' and is player triggered by looking at and killing an Enderman.
1
Try to think of it this way.
Imagine that when a creeper explodes, it deletes one block under it.
Now imagine a group of 20 creepers. They explode and each remove 1 block. Your map now has 20 holes.
Now imagine the creepers exploding without you being anywhere near them. They just explode as soon as they spawn, taking the one block with them.
Now imagine this happening every night. 20 creepers. Every night. Regardless of where you are or your interaction with them.
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It's not really a challenge having to replace blocks that were taken out of your structures. I've explained in the above few posts that the Enderman removing blocks are quite irrelevant to the nature of Minecraft Survival because it doesn't put the player in any actual danger or challenge your survival.
What it does however, is force the player to camp in their bases to replace blocks. Keep in mind that this is an adventure update and being forced to stay in your base to maintain the blocks prevents players from going out and exploring, which was not Notch's original intention.
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I think you're not considering that the Enderman was not originally designed around ruining mob traps. They were principally designed around being creepy and making you fear them. Notch even made an entire Twitter post about his design choices on making the Enderman creepy. He didn't mention anything about the block moving ability apart from a few short sentences saying that they would move blocks.
The first thing I want to address is that the Enderman destroys anything, including redstone, and railway tracks. Removing one redstone block, even when underground, would mean entire redstone circuits are ruined, and it's not a simple 'replace one block' and you're set either. Usually depending on what redstone circuit you made and it's complexity, you will have to dig through other redstone circuits to just fix the one broken redstone. Railway tracks also get destroyed by Enderman so it makes long distance travel and networking between bases unfeasible. Essentially, the Enderman makes redstone and railway networks, the two very large aspects of Minecraft survival gameplay, impossible to play with.
Second aspect is that Notch wanted to fully implement NPC villages in his upcoming 1.9 update, they would be impossible in the current 1.8 state the Enderman is in. The Enderman would pick apart the NPC villages and they would not function the way Notch intended it to be. In this point, the Enderman's ability to move blocks conflicts with Notch's plan to have intact functioning villages.
The third is that although I love survival mode in Minecraft, the Enderman in no way threatens my survival. They only take one block at a time from my walls and structures, leaving holes in them, but never holes high or wide enough to allow any mob through. These haphazard holes means that they only served to make the walls look ugly while actually doing nothing to weaken it's defensive capabilities. It's just an eyesore and a hassle to clean up.
Enderman are also incredibly weak. They die from a few swings of the sword or from 2 well placed shots from the bow and arrow. They don't even deal a lot of damage either, and will get stuck in hallways and at door entrances. This does not make them scary or threaten the player's survival.
tl;dr
To summarize though, having the Enderman's ability to remove blocks doesn't affect the player's survival difficulty because they are already very weak mobs to begin with. However, the choice to remove them was related to the conflict of the gameplay mechanics that made large portions of the game unplayable. Notch made the right step nerfing the ability because he probably saw how it affects redstone and railway tracks too.
I think the best course of action now is to focus on making the Enderman actually more scary and a mob to fear instead of being seen as a household pest. Buff up their damage, increase their hitpoints, and maybe make your vision blurry (like going into a nether portal) whenever you stare at them. Then perhaps when they teleport to you, they teleport behind you. Then on the screen you will slowly see 2 dark blocky hands close in on your screen, as your character walks slower and you are slowly getting strangled....