FlareMan, here! But if you play on the server, you know me better as "Jazz".

I've decided to open another, hopefully-stickied thread where I can share my various tips and secrets. Some of these things will be juicy tidbits everyone would like to know, whereas others will be general common-sense things for newbies.

To help you find some particular advice, this post will be updated as much as possible into a "table of contents" so you can quick-search what tips are available and have been posted.

~Basic Tips~
Tip #1: Tool Prioritizing

~Advanced Tips~
No tips, yet...

Edited by FlareMan on February 8, 2013 at 14:23:26

Edited by FlareMan on February 8, 2013 at 14:31:45

And now, to kick things off, here's some Basic Advice about tool usage and crafting.

The first tool I ever make is a wooden pickaxe, which I quickly use to find some stone and make STONE tools out of.

All throughout my survival game, I continue to make shovels and axes out of cobblestone. Iron tools tend to not be much faster, and only have an endurance advantage. In which case, keep in mind that unless you find some sinister way to farm those gentle, stalwart iron golems (you monster...), then save the iron for important stuff like picks and swords. MAYBE armor.

Eventually you'll have access to lava and buckets, at which point you should try to build a cobblestone generator.

While it's true you can get stone pretty much everywhere, having a generator at home will save you a trip to the caves just to make some new tools.

Just starting off, I use the same rules for diamonds. Picks and Swords only. Otherwise they have other uses as jukeboxes and enchantment tables.

One rule of thumb that served me well: iron armor.

If you're working outside of a town's limits, or are on a dig and want to stay alive, a full set of iron armor is a must. If you're starting up, it's quite expensive at 24 iron ingots. However, that set of armor is able to withstand even a creeper explosion at point-blank range, meaning that a single moment of inattention won't cost you your life!

Cobblestone generator is good in areas that have been well-mined. It's also a good thing to have if you don't want to stray far from home. Although I don't use it often, I have a small one in my main basecamp.

This is more of an advanced tip, as it requires you to have enchanted items and an anvil.

If you're using an anvil to repair enchanted items, the FIRST thing you want to do is spend some XP and give that item a custom name. Otherwise, what happens is every time you repair an item, it'll cost more the next time... until eventually you get that dreaded message "Too expensive." For whatever reason, naming the item makes it so that the cost for repairing remains the same each time. (Here's hoping that this isn't a bug they plan on fixing in the future.)

Which is dang amusing in person. You just don't expect to hear such language coming from someone so little and cute!

And, for those who do want to hunt for clay, in swamps or oceans, I highly recommend Night Vision potions. Not only do they help you see at night, as the name indicates, they also turn the water into an almost completely transparent blue. Deposits of clay become MUCH easier to find that way!

Edited by Dr. Cossack on February 25, 2013 at 10:38:38