Miller - Hacks for Minecrafters. Redstone: the unofficial guide to tips and tricks that other guides wont teach you: an unofficial Minecrafters guide

This book is not authorized or sponsored by Microsoft Corp., Mojang AB, Notch Development AB or Scholastic Inc., or any other person or entity owning or controlling rights in the Minecraft name, trademark, or copyrights.

Copyright 2015 by Hollan Publishing, Inc.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without the express written consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles. All inquiries should be addressed to Sky Pony Press, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018.

Sky Pony Press books may be purchased in bulk at special discounts for sales promotion, corporate gifts, fund-raising, or educational purposes. Special editions can also be created to specifications. For details, contact the Special Sales Department, Sky Pony Press, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018 or .

Sky Pony is a registered trademark of Skyhorse Publishing, Inc., a Delaware corporation.

Minecraft is a registered trademark of Notch Development AB.

The Minecraft game is copyright Mojang AB.

Visit our website at www.skyponypress.com.

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

Cover photo credit: Megan Miller

Print ISBN: 978-1-63450-665-6

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-63450-666-3

Printed in the United States of America

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

R edstone is one of the most amazing and complicated aspects to Minecraft. With it you can invent brand-new, working in-game machines, from an automatic door to a flying machine or calculator. Some of the most popular contraptions to make are:

Automatic farms, to help harvest crops

Mob farms, to gather and kill large numbers of mobs and get their drops

Automatic doors

Automatic lighting

Item sorting and storage

Where Do You Get Redstone?

You get redstone by mining redstone ore at levels 16 and lower. Each block of ore will get you 4 or 5 redstone, and more if you are mining with a Fortune-enchanted pick. Witches sometimes will drop redstone when they die, and priest villagers may also trade it.

Redstone machines, or contraptions, have three main elements: devices, power, and the signal that transmits power to the device. A redstone device is an object that performs an action when it receives power. Redstone power comes from specific power source blocks, such as redstone blocks and torches. You can extend the reach of this power through trails of redstone dust.

Here is the one of the simplest redstone contraptions, a trapdoor activated by a button.

This trapdoor is activated by a button on the next block.

The power source is the button, which gives out a temporary power signal when it is pressed. While that signal exists, the trapdoor opens. When the signal disappears, the trapdoor closes. You dont need any redstone dust if the power source is right against the device. However, if you want the button to be farther away from the trapdoor, you would have to connect the trapdoor and the button through redstone dust.

This button is placed farther away from the trapdoor, so you use redstone dust to carry its signal.

The best way to understand redstone is to learn by doing. When you read about the devices in the first three chapters, play around and hook them up together to see what happens. When you make one of the projects and it works, make it again and add your own changes to see what works and what doesnt.

Redstone dust and devices like torches, repeaters, and comparators can be uprooted by water, destroying contraptions. Make sure when you finish a contraption to protect it from accidental water placement by walling it off.

It is much easier to start learning redstone in Creative mode, where you have access to all items to play with. If you dont, each project has a complete list of components so you can gather these before beginning.

Placing blocks and items for a contraption can sometimes be tricky. In the projects, in order to place a block in a certain location, you may need to first place other temporary blocks that the first block can rest on. Youll want to remember to remove any temporary blocks, so it can help to choose a specific type of material for these blocks, like red wool.

Sometimes to place objects, like hoppers, on top of others, you may need to shift-right-click (holding the shift button while right-clicking). Some objects always place to face you (like pistons). You may need to move around a bit, or place some temporary blocks to stand in the right place, in order to place these correctly.

Use a special block, like red wool, for temporary blocks you use to stand on or to help place objects. This will help you remember to remove them later.

If you complete a project, but it isnt working the way you think it should, go through the steps to check if everything is in place and pointing in the right direction. Important first things to check when a contraption doesnt work include:

Are repeaters, comparators, and redstone dust pointing in the right direction?

Are any blocks being powered that shouldnt be?

What isnt receiving power that should be?

Is a redstone torch turning off a signal?

Should any repeaters have delays?

Many of the contraptions in this book are based on mechanisms that other Minecraft players have created and shared online, in forums, or on video-sharing sites like YouTube. Making contraptions following other peoples designs is a great way to start understanding redstone. However, you will start to understand even more when you take these contraptions apart, and put them back again slightly differently, to figure out exactly how they work.

Note: This books projects were created in Minecraft 1.8.1 for PC. If you are playing with a different version of Minecraft, you may find some differences. For the latest information on a device or item, check the Minecraft Wikipedia, at Minecraft.gamepedia.com.

CHAPTER 1

REDSTONE POWER

F or a redstone contraption to work, there must be a source of power or redstone signal. Some power sources send power constantly, like redstone torches. Other sources only emit power when they are turned on, like a switch. Some, like buttons, may only send a redstone signal for a short period of time.