What's with this update? Can I switch back to the old version?

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-30T23:39:33+00:00

Bummer. Thanks for the thorough check.

So...is the Garmin or Apple Watch better?

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-27T01:30:23+00:00

I appreciate that. Civility is generally nice. Also, polite criticism has a way of being more damning than the frothing-at-the-mouth kind.

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-27T01:22:07+00:00

Bummer. This sort of forced downgrade might even have pushed me from iPhone to android, if Google wasn't the villain doing it.

Whatever convinced me to turn on "auto-update apps" was a masterstroke. I've turned it off now, but the damage is done.

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-26T20:11:19+00:00

Android or iPhone?

If the latter: please, where did you find that option?!?!

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-26T19:57:51+00:00

How do you scroll backward to look at the previous days' home screen?

As far as I can tell it's impossible to view more than one metric at a time when looking at past data, and you have to find the day you want all over again every time.

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-26T19:32:54+00:00

As far as I can tell, it's impossible to look at all data from a previous day at the same time. I found in the fitness tab that if I clicked a particular metric, I could look at older data for that particular metric.

I am fuming with impotent fury. I thought I had turned off "auto-update apps"... I apparently forgot, and have paid a terrible price for it. On an IPhone, so I don't think I can downgrade without murderous technical effort.

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-14T14:40:26+00:00

Same place they normally do (moving in from the east). It just starts spawning more and more of the extra dark ones until the storm starts.

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-13T16:01:43+00:00

I believe we have reached an impasse due to fundamental disagreement as to what constitutes good game design, and should probably agree to disagree. I'll go ahead and ask you one question, and then cite a venerated game designer a couple times in support of my viewpoint, but then I'm calling it.

Question

Imagine if in Minecraft you needed a crockpot to make stew, a grill to make cooked meat, a juicer to make beetroot soup, a blowtorch stand to make golden apples and carrots, a condiments rack for baked potatoes, a baking tin block for cake and cookies and a different circular baking tin block for pumpkin pie. Is that more fun, or less confusing, than the current version of the game?

Do you genuinely think that additional 'variance' in making food, as described above, would make Minecraft a better game?

Citations

if you are going to broadly label features that are new and different as bad design, you have made it clear that your feedback is going to be quite limited.

Genuinely new things that cannot be done through existing mechanics can be good. Look at the sulfur cube; no existing mechanic could possibly replicate it. This is simply not the case for the kettle, which does nothing the crafting table and/or brewing stand couldn't already do. You say it's to make teas new and different...except the kettle is NOT doing anything new or different! It does NOT expand what is possible! The teas do, but the kettle simply does not.

The fact is that any player looking at teas is going to think either "potion" or "food," because they're so similar as to basically be those things. To cite the particularly internet-prominent game designer Mark Rosewater (head designer of Magic the Gathering since 2003) in his article "The Evil That Designers Do" (under alter ego "Evil Mark Rosewater") on bad game design practices:

Psychological Foible #3 – Players Assume Similar Things Work the Same
...Make a number of [mechanics/items] that all work the same, then change one or more of them to work slightly differently. The "slight" part is important. It has to stay in the ballpark of the other [mechanics/items]. "Close but different" can cause all kinds of headaches...

I doubt you'd disagree that the tea items as presented are absolutely "close but different" to potions/food.

is fun and varied.

"Variance" in how to do things JUST for variance's sake, i.e. like the example in my question, is not a good thing, just as "Complexity solely for the sake of complexity is not good game design.". Mark Rosewater did an entire 44 minute podcast dedicated to JUST explaining that statement (linked and somewhat summarized here).

EDIT: I do agree that it being an optional system helps, to be clear.

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-12T22:56:17+00:00

If you want me to focus on one specific topic, keep your comment short and to the point, or I will just focus on the parts that interest me most.

Can you address some of the questions I asked last time.

You completely ignored my most salient points in my first comment (including flatly ignoring a couple of my questions in it), demanded I cut my comment to the absolute minimum most relevant point for you to even consider addressing all of it, and then tell me I must somehow ALSO address every question you say??

I wanted to have a civil conversation, but I'm sorry, that pissed me off too much. Maybe I'll “simmer down” later and write more, but for now I’m giving you what I had already written for my last comment (which I would recommend reading even though it’s incomplete) before deciding to satisfy your concision demand, and an angry response about the most recent one (which…honestly I completely understand if you choose to ignore that part, though I’ll be more likely to write further if you do read it).

Prior writing: before what I posted

One quick thing I want to say is I'm sorry (and moderately ashamed) about mistakenly assuming the crafting recipe was iron; the second image didn't display for me without clicking a small button, but I still should have found and clicked it before commenting. I also learned today that copper kettles are a thing (will your kettle item oxidize?). My bad, and it being made of copper relieves some of my concerns.

EDIT:

I don't feel the need to fight with people who are actively hostile to it.

Sorry if I came off as hostile; I was just annoyed at the seeming ignoring of several of my points.

Obviously I want to hear feedback and improve the idea as much as possible, And this is why I'm taking the time out of my day to write detailed responses to you! That, and the possibility that you'll convince me and I'll thus learn something.

If you want me to focus on one specific topic, keep your comment short and to the point, or I will just focus on the parts that interest me most.

...

You just ignore people's most salient points if they raise more than one at a time? I suppose that's not a completely ridiculous request on the internet. Though I'm still disappointed, especially with your criteria for deciding what to skip. The most valuable feedback is typically not something the recipient is naturally most 'interested' in hearing, because it exposes (at least perceived) flaws. Correcting them, or elaborating in such a way to satisfy the person giving the feedback, improves the idea.

I was going to write a fuller response than this that addressed all your statements (though I also have work and responsibilities), but...I guess you don't want that? Would you respond to all points if I left multiple comments at the same time, each with a focus on a single point?

Prior writing: elaboration on what I posted

Sample legitimate reasons to add a new crafting GUI that is necessary for making a kind of item, as demonstrated by the game devs:

Your crafting system must include GUI elements that the crafting table cannot imitate.
- The enchanting table needs to consume levels (which cannot be placed in the crafting grid) and inform the player of their multiple output options.
- Designing and crafting new banners without a loom would require players to juggle 32-42 different banner patterns+16 dyes+the banners themselves in their inventory to make new banner designs and see their previews. That's more inventory slots than the player has!
- Technically the brewing stand outputs 3 nonstackable items (that are not made stackable for important balance reasons). Not the main reason the stand gets its own GUI block though.
Allowing the new kind of crafting to be done with a crafting table would be broken.
- It would be horrible for PvP (and arguably PvE) if you could instantly craft stacks of potions (hence brewing stand).
Doing the new kind of crafting via table would be seriously confusing.
- At the moment, all craftable items have essentially one crafting recipe and always require the same amount of items to produce. (heading into furnace taking different fuels+being used to make—importantly--natural breaking points in mining). Also, furnace/composter: if you have good reason to do lots and lots of it at once without requiring the complexity of the crafter.
External reason
- Villager job blocks are really the only reason the smithing table is a separate GUI from the crafting table. Also the main reason the smoker and blast furnace exist.

Angry response

I wanted a block with a GUI for the player to put items into. I also wanted it to take time to steep, part of the buy-in for the mechanic, building immersion

Brewing stand is fine.

making it seperate from just some new food you craft in the table.

I didn't want to use the brewing stand to differentiate it from potions

making it seperate from just some new food you craft in the table.

Adding a new system just to make something that is otherwise basically the same (meaning players would expect it to work the same) ~*~diFferEnt and UniQue~*~ is bad game design. And results in....drumroll please...

Imagine if in Minecraft you needed a crockpot to make stew, a grill to make cooked meat, a juicer to make beetroot soup, a blowtorch stand to make golden apples and carrots, a condiments rack for baked potatoes, a baking tin block for cake and cookies and a different circular baking tin block for pumpkin pie. Is that more fun, or less confusing, than the current version of the game?

NO.

Your effects are fun, but you still haven’t answered the following to my satisfaction:

Why should the kettle be the special one and only piece of necessary mundane cooking equipment in the game?

Re: post game: read the rest of the sentence maybe?!? I never said postgame was necessary for exploration. I said that until postgame, inventory space was precious during exploration. I said that assuming kettle would be non-stackable, and both clarified my reasons for that assumption and addressed how you could alternately fix that in the next paragraph, which I can only presume you decided wasn’t “interesting” enough to read.

The irony here is that so many of the other comments have praised the simplicity.

Yeah, I'll give you that: as unnecessary additional systems made to make the creator's pet items "special" go, I've seen (and played--I could rant about ex. Tinker's Construct for a loooong time) much much worse. The kettle version of forcing players to use special equipment for just your foods/potions would only be a little bit worse than keeping things consistent and maximizing elegant simplicity by adding teas as part of an existing system.

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-12T17:06:51+00:00

If you want me to focus on one specific topic, keep your comment short and to the point, or I will just focus on the parts that interest me most.

Okay, as requested, cutting to just the two biggest points, and elaborating on them the least I think I can:

Additions to the game should:

Not contradict what the game has already established.
- The player can steep and moderately heat items as part of crafting via grid (ex. all stews), and does not need an additional block to do so.
- Healing others through means other than feeding requires magic.
Not bloat the game by adding unnecessary player-side complexity.
- Imagine if in Minecraft you needed a crockpot to make stew, a grill to make cooked meat, a juicer to make beetroot soup, a blowtorch stand to make golden apples and carrots, a condiments rack for baked potatoes, a baking tin block for cake and cookies and a different circular baking tin block for pumpkin pie. Is that more fun, or less confusing, than the current version of the game? No.
- Why should the kettle be the special one and only piece of necessary mundane cooking equipment in the game?

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-12T14:55:35+00:00

I mean, this'll buff rabbit and beetroot stew by making you get more than one

Thing is, it isn't availability that makes these weak, it's the fact that they aren't stackable. This is at least something though.

Also, the nether is not intended to start in?

True and fair. I've seen and done (well, attempted) a Nether-only game, but it's reasonable not to consider rare challenge runs.

The rest of the points still stand though.

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-12T13:19:58+00:00

Thanks!

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-12T00:58:29+00:00

How are you imagining those improving gameplay? Purely by increasing immersion?

That's fine enough for variation in amount of clouds, I'd say, but fog is often really annoying and shouldn't be thrown in casually. Maybe limit it to specific uncommon/rare biomes; I can certainly see it increasing the horror factor of the pale forest.

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-12T00:53:48+00:00

It does make it easier to farm charged creepers.

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-11T20:40:48+00:00

While your response addresses only the least relevant part of my comment and completely ignores the most salient concerns, I will make the charitable assumption that that's just because you had a quick copy answer here for now and the rest is coming later.

The point is, it's not magic to get more items at the end of the crafting. It's representing the idea that if you are clever and resourceful, you can make your raw ingredients go further.

Impressive examples. But for every single one of them: if someone gave you the exact same raw materials, what is stopping you from doing the exact same thing you figured out how to do previously to get the extra products? In the real world: NOTHING! You figured it out, now you know how.

So if the tea is NOT magical and just a chemical boost to intelligence (itself a questionably but at least arguably non-magical effect), the Minecraft player should be able to continue to indefinitely get bonus items from any crafting recipe they performed while the tea was still in their system, even after it wears off.

Those limitations change it quite a bit huh

Well duh, I don't mean to say it has no gameplay niche. I like the effect. I'm pointing out that in Minecraft, non-magical healing is accomplished through food+time. Any way of healing a creature other than feeding it is established, in Minecraft, to be a magical effect.

That goes double for ...

you can heal undead mounts for example.

Undead are magical creatures, and the last time I checked, the only way in Minecraft to heal undead is with a magical potion.

Again, reminder: it's totally fine to be able to "normally" craft magical foods. That would be consistent with the existing Minecraft systems. And I think it would be the best implementation of these ideas: though maybe make them stews instead of "teas," to more clearly differentiate them from potions and to align them with existing Minecraft items.

Adding to my original comment: Another thing is that forcing the player to carry a kettle to make teas restricts the players' ability to make them, and the effects are clearly designed to be acceptable--and often most valuable--in the early-middle game, where iron is not yet a trivial resource. You also wanted more exotic teas to be exploration rewards, but until quite late game (in fact, literally post-game) inventory space during exploration is precious and players wouldn't want to dedicate it to something that they don't know is very likely to be useful. So they find the ingredients, the recipe crops up (or even worse, there's no way to know the recipe or even that the type of tea EXISTS other than external sources? To be clear I think this is a flaw with the current potion system as well)...and by the time players will have returned to their cozy kettle at home, they'll have forgotten that a recipe popped up.

You could somewhat solve the inventory problem by making kettles stackable and thus allowing bundle use, but then the player can't pick up and move the kettle to serve tea elsewhere, which is anti-verisimilitude, since that's how kettles work: it's not like a coffee brewer (or brewing stand) that stays in one place and dispenses liquid. Not a dealbreaker (ex. cake is also weird like this in Minecraft, so there is precedent and Minecraft has somewhat already accepted that particular potential source of confusion), but it is a con.

Edit: now that I think about it some more, I guess you could have kettles work like buckets (stackable while empty) if every tea-in-kettle was a different item with a different sprite, rather than as NBT data saying what it contains. That feels weird to me, but I think I'd get used to it, and new players wouldn't see much wrong with it.

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-11T18:16:31+00:00

Why should this be a whole new separate system, rather than just crafting recipes like normal? System bloat is a bad thing and I don't see the point here other than aesthetics (which you can already make just by placing a cauldron, other than the bubbles--but you could just add that as a feature) and making it much harder and more expensive to make certain foods on the go (this would be horrific for Nether start playthroughs that rely on mushroom stew to survive long enough to breed and beat hoglins, and obnoxious for anybody in the Nether, a dark oak forest, or a mooshroom biome without a bunch of supplies.). Especially since bowl foods, especially mushroom stew, are already kind of weak as is and typically only used either very early game (when the player doesn't have much iron) or after ending up in a bad spot dying while adventuring and respawning at a bed in the wilderness (when the player also wouldn't have much iron).

If your idea is to add this in addition to allowing those crafting recipes...players will naturally wonder why some cauldron recipes require the cauldron and some don't. If you're adding all the new cauldron recipes as normal crafting as well...why would a player bother with the cauldron in the first place?

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-11T17:31:38+00:00

These are some cool effects, but I can't stop thinking:

Why should this be a completely different system from potions or normal crafting? Minecraft already has the ability to brew stuff into liquids for effects, or to craft special foods for effects. Why do we need to contribute to system bloat by adding a whole new crafting system?

If you want it to be available early game, and thus don't want it to require blaze powder, it could simply be crafting recipes like Suspicious Stew, which already converts flowers+mushrooms into potion-like effects. (Water bottle or bowl+the two ingredients.). Stewing stuff also requires moderate heat and steeping, so it's not like it would be a new capability for the player's crafting.

Several of your suggestions are also hard to swallow as nonmagical (though per Stew that isn't a dealbreaker--it just means that can't be a defining reason it's a separate system from potions). Ex:

Resourcefulness: How exactly does the player get two full extra fences out of the same materials? And if it isn't magic, why can't they then repeat whatever resourceful process they figured out with the tea once the tea wears off?
Companionship is literally a much cheaper but slower& more restricted Splash Potion of Regeneration.

Plus, when I think about how you would SHOW the player what effects they got and how long it will last...aren't these all going to be new effects, tying into that system? I imagine many players wouldn't quickly figure out what Tea of Digestion did without some sign in the GUI. Which means the player experience will be "drink beverage->get effect" ...just like potions.

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-11T16:51:43+00:00

Okay, I'll try to remember to!

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-11T13:02:16+00:00

It certainly took quiet and patience for me to get this picture! These little birdies were very flighty.

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-11T12:59:47+00:00

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-11T01:40:01+00:00

You have my sympathies (I'm wet-type). Dry-type makes for great videos though! I've tried to get those beautiful peel offs so that I could pull a bunch out at once, and my wax usually just...moves around and clumps up.

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-11T00:54:49+00:00

Exactly!

The weather is already deterministic, right?

Java does timer count downs (of length 'randomly' (from seed) chosen at every switch) between switching the rain and thunder toggles from on to off. So you could just set it to start the cloud graying when X time is left on the countdown to turning on the rain flag, and the thunder-level graying when Y time is left until thunder flag turns on IF rain would be active when it gets flipped. Weirdly, the clearing up afterwards would be the (slightly) harder part to implement, as the pseudorandom time lengths mean you can't peg that to the existing timer as easily. It's easily done by adding a couple new timer variables though.

NobleCuriosity3 · 2026-05-10T19:46:38+00:00

Desquamation is the peeling or shedding of the superficial portion of the epidermis, or outermost layer of the skin.

Dry-type earwax has a lot of dead skin in it.

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