Minecraft’s Love of New Wood Types Needs a Spiritual Successor

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As a seasoned Minecraft player with countless hours spent exploring, mining, and building in the pixelated world, I can’t help but feel that the stone blocks have been left wanting in comparison to their wooden counterparts. Don’t get me wrong, cobblestone, granite, andesite, diorite, and all the other types of stone blocks are essential for survival and crafting, but they lack the variety and charm that wood blocks bring to the game.

In the realm of Minecraft, an abundance of blocks and items abound, ranging from common dirt cubes to the precious Ender Dragon Egg. These blocks and items found within Minecraft serve various purposes such as tools, equipment, sustenance, construction materials, or mere adornment. As new players embark on their journey in fresh worlds, they often start by constructing their initial abode using a variety of wood types, from the ubiquitous birch and spruce to the newly introduced pale oak. Among the building materials, wooden planks are exceptionally versatile in Minecraft, but it’s worth considering expanding the selection for another type of block: stone.

An Exploration Into Minecraft’s Current Stone Catalog

Once players construct their initial wooden structure in new realms, they often switch to mining stone and its related blocks as their main building material next. Stone is a crucial block type in Minecraft, enabling players to mine iron ore and subsequently access rarer ores and minerals. The rock can also be utilized for constructing furnaces, stonecutters, and redstone mechanisms along with cobblestone. Smooth stone, when heated from cobblestone, can further be employed in creating buttons, plates, slabs, stairs, and stone bricks that can then be fashioned into slabs, stairs, walls, and chiseled stone bricks. Additionally, cobblestone can be transformed into slabs, stairs, walls, as well as brewing stands, pistons, and dispensers.

Regular gray stone isn’t the only type of stone players can find underground and in other environments, however. In deserts and the badlands, players can find either regular white sandstone or red sandstone just below the sandy surface. Near the surface, commonly around regular stone, players may find chunks of andesite, diorite, tuff, and granite. As players mine deeper and deeper underground towards bedrock and lava, they may encounter dripstone or obsidian before becoming surrounded by the dark deepslate stone type. All of these stone types can be crafted into slabs, stairs, and walls, while only sandstones can be made into smooth and chiseled blocks and deepslate can be made into cobble, cracked, polished, and brick blocks.

In Minecraft, cobblestones were the initial kind of stone blocks introduced, and they were the sole blocks discoverable beneath the ground when the game was launched for the first time in 2009.

Minecraft’s Potential Stone Expansion

Over the past 15 years, the types of building materials in Minecraft have grown significantly diverse. As it stands now, there are nine distinct kinds of stone, not counting cobble variations, contrasted with ten assorted tree species, such as oak, birch, spruce, jungle, acacia, dark oak, mangrove, cherry, and pale oak, each featuring unique shaded logs and planks. Players can also obtain colored wood-like planks in hues of crimson, teal, or chartreuse from massive fungi in the Nether and bamboo in jungles. With a total of 13 different colored plank blocks available, introducing a few more stone block variants could balance out the number of types and provide additional choices for building homes and bases.

In a potential update, Mojang could introduce Kimberlite, a type of igneous rock that originates from deep-source volcanic eruptions, into the game. This rock typically appears black with golden flecks or spots, and is often associated with diamond deposits in the real world. Since finding diamonds can be challenging among deepslate in Minecraft, adding Kimberlite sporadically deep underground could serve as a guide for players searching for diamonds. Additionally, Mojang might consider introducing other stone types like Tachylite, Jaspillite, and Gossan into the game. These vibrant rocks could provide interesting alternatives to wood or wool, as they are not combustible.

Potential Updates to Minecraft’s Stone Blocks

In a potential new update, not only might Mojang introduce new stone types, but they could also enhance some previously existing stone features and crafting options. For instance, stones like Andesite, Diorite, and Granite could be made into bricks or chiseled blocks, providing more building choices for players. Similarly, the Dripstone blocks might gain more utility by allowing them to be turned into brick, chiseled, smooth, slab, stair, or wall blocks. Additionally, the long-mined Obsidian and Crying Obsidian could see further development, enabling players to craft obsidian bricks, stairs, and so on.

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2024-12-19 21:53