Minecraft 1.9. What do you think?

Oh, and the recharge time only affects damage. You can still dig, swing your pick, and everything else without worrying about recharge time.

Minecraft used to be so simplistic back in my day...

Heck there was no nether for multiplayer for the longest time. I remember that update and that was a good one

Pvp was recently added recently... The only thing that kept you alive was golden apples and un enchanted armor. You prayed that their armor would break.

Now shields, lingering potions, dual wielding swords are in the mix elongating fights.
(Which is fine)

I think the Minecraft Dev team need to think more to the real life perspective of mc than add more things. That is my opinion and debuff recharge rates on skeletons

Well, you see, change needs to continue happening if they want to continue making money.
If Mojang would stop updating the game aside of a few very minor bug fix updates, its sales would drop to nearly nothing. Most people who are not in a community like we are would stop playing, because they grow bored of the game and there's nothing interesting to them anymore; it doesn't get in the news anymore, et cetera.
With every update and every snapshot, videos get created, servers get updated, mods get updated, discussion arises... those things are all needed! It makes sure that Minecraft is a hot topic.
If the updates will go, the success will go too. Example: CubeWorld. Say that game would get an update every few months. I'm sure it would be lots more popular. YouTubers start playing it again, showing off the new update, people share interesting finds with each other IRL, people bash the developers for specific choices on Twitter, people who've never heard of the game see it at recent updates...

Summary: (not TL;DR, you should read everything or nothing with my posts, sorry)
Change needs to happen for the game to remain popular.

Oh well, I suppose I might as well So what do I think about 1.9.. There are quite a few things I like and there are things I don't like. And instead of writing an essay let me just sum them up

What I really like in the snapshots

• Small thumbnail in the world load screen; makes it easier to recognize something.
• New superflat world preset: "The Void" to start with only a small stone platform; very handy if you only want to build a few structures without massive chunk / world overhead.
• Craftable End crystals; about time that we all got access to a bit of coolness.
• New boats; to me the new versions really adds up.
• Beetroot; new food, finally some soup to eat!
• Mending enchantment; "voters gear" in vanilla Minecraft. A very cool goal to set for yourself.
• Tipped arrows; shooting that creeper and poisoning him as well?!
• Purpur blocks; new building materials are always good. However, I still think that 4 popped fruit for 4 purpur blocks is a bit much. 4 fruit for 2 blocks would make more sense to me.
• Chorus plants; it gives more depth to the End world, which I really like.
• End structures; same as above.
• Grass path; it really helps you to grow from a small settlement (dirt huts with grass path) to a larger build (stone buildings with gravel paths or quartz buildings with gold paths, etc.).
• Shields & dual wielding; mining and placing torches at once, swinging a sword and hiding behind a shield, walking around while holding a map...
• Scoreboard feature to tag entities; this can really boost adventure maps and command block "programming".
  • /summon Wolf ~2 ~ ~ {Tags:["enemy"]} then you could use /kill @e[tag=enemy] (to kill all 'enemies') or (for a command block): /testfor @e[type=Wolf,tag=enemy] (find amount of 'enemy wolves').

What I don't really like

• Shields & dual wielding; using both a sword and a bow looks kind of ridiculous and I also can't help think that the game isn't balanced at all when you don't have a shield (yet).
• Map is no longer 1:1 but zoomed out by default; you see less detail and you also don't have the option to create the previous 1:1 map (you can zoom in; but only on the lower right corner of the map; making some areas completely inaccessible). This ruined map making.
  • Update: this has been reversed in the mean time
• New command blocks; they don't always require redstone to trigger.
  • My main gripe: it makes it too easy to create horrid lag machines. Right now you need some basic understanding of redstone mechanics to get the full experience out of a commandblock. Need periodic updates? => Redstone clock. In 1.9 you can simply create spam machines; blocks which will be permanently active. It has its advantages; but also many disadvantages. I foresee terrible adventure maps for the future.
• New fishing mechanics; lure doesn't lure fish anymore, now your luck effect does. So basically they nerfed fishing rods.
• Luck / Bad luck status effects; this is pure bias on my account: it doesn't sound right to have some kind of weird random effect influence your gameplay. So if I'm lucky I'll deal more damage to that zombie? And if the game determines that I'm unlucky (for no obvious reason) he simply kills me "because"? Rage quit much anyone?
  • Unfair sneer (I know): Who needs skill if luck is on your side. Oops, that primed creeper spawned right next to you, guess you had some bad luck there buddie. Well, at least you get to play our game a little longer, good luck trying to get your stuff back.
• New sound effects; I don't like the witch making sounds (and alerting the player) and I also think the new door and button sounds are horrible.

So yeah... I don't hate the new snapshots, I think there are some very interesting new developments which can definitely enhance gameplay, but I'm also a little worried about some of the changes. Good luck trying to get your stuff back with only a sword after you've been killed by 3 skeletons.

I keep hearing people bring up dual wielding of swords as a con, but that makes no sense to me. I just tried the latest snapshot and, regardless of holding two swords, only the right hand would swing the sword. Why is dual wielding a problem when you can still only use the single weapon? Having two hands only appears beneficial for having a shield or doing other tasks like cave exploration, where you can keep your torches in one hand and your weapon/pick in the other.

My comments in gray

There's new door sounds? I hadn't noticed that...

I don't mind the new button sound (only the wood button seems different, to me). Did they change the duration between wood and stone buttons? I haven't tried them in 1.8, but I just noticed that the wooden buttons stay down longer.

Do you have documentation of the "luck" thing? I hadn't heard about that yet.

No, I think the duration has been like that for a while.

Do you have any info on the 'Luck' thing? I haven't heard anything about it.

Sorry for the double post but....

So much this. I played a 1.9 survival world in hard difficulty with no natural regeneration (suicide disallowed) and was dying constantly even in enchanted gear with a bow, arrows, sword, and shield. I'll attribute that to my inexperience with the new 1.9 combat mechanics (I'll certainly improve in the future).

However, even when I died right above my base (a small cave at the time), I had a really hard time getting my stuff back. I'd have to rush up and try to ignore the mobs while getting the stuff - and if there was a skeleton, RIP me. I quit that world after my stuff despawned because I couldn't reach it when I was next to it. It just wasn't even fun.

There is good luck and bad luck (I believe the wiki said -1024 to 1024).

Good luck increases your chances at getting great loot from dungeon chests, abandoned mine shaft chests, and player killed mob drops

Bad luck obviously does the opposite.

It's all wrapped together with these fancy new loot tables.

Eww, that sounds disgusting. Is luck random, or can players 'earn' luck somehow?

Oh, look, Xisuma covered a part of it: http://youtu.be/lInA_gJtDYk

Just by reading, it looks like it is only via potion. (Unless you do some fancy code stuff)

As a person who loves Terraria: 1.9 is not Terraria. Terraria is an fun open-ended Metroidvania with actual game to it. Minecraft was an open-ended sandbox building game, then it became a survival simulator, and then a survival-building-simulator with RPG elements - which, I feel, wound up ruining the game entirely. Minecraft was at a perfect place at 1.6 - it is now a game that doesn't know what it wants to be or do and is packed full of needless content added since full release in 2011. 1.9 is the continued beating of a horse that should be dead, but keeps hanging on to life for some reason. I hate it.

Absolutely, but you missed the point I tried to make: I referred to the situation where you don't have access to shields (yet). Either because you got killed or because you haven't struck iron yet.

In 1.8 you can also block attacks (sort off) but the game isn't fully dependant on it. With 1.9 it is my impression that there's too much weight being put into shield usage. With 1.8 it can also be hard to get your stuff back from 3 skeletons at once with nothing more than a sword, but it's not impossible either.

Yet with 1.9 that changed; skeletons still shoot faster at closer range (doing less damage, but more shots with less damage are almost just as bad (if not worse) than slower shots with more damage) but you can't always anticipate on that any more because of that blasted 'recharge' time, putting you in a massive disadvantage.

Of course this depends on circumstances. In the desert this will become more of an issue than in a forest. Even so; you're always at a major disadvantage with 2+ skeletons and one sword.

That's a beautiful quote you have there.

I guess so. I guess so. On a side note at least we can all agree luck is a bad idea.

My Opinion on 1.9
Warning May be Spoilers to 1.9 Update!!!

Command Blocks...

I personally like the command blocks, they are easier to use, however I also think that the lag is a bit much.



Cooldown...

I didn't like it when it first came out, This was not because of pvp as I am not a pvper, but because it changed the spam part of combat in general. However, Mojang added the ability to remove the cooldown, (NOTE: this is done through the give command, which means you would have to replace each weapon, still a bit of a hassle, but it is possible...) which made it a little more forgiving for me anyways. However, I think that it could be used to make some great adventure maps, commands, etc...



Shields...

I love the shields and I think my skin as well as my castle makes it obvious as to why...
I will miss the sword blocking however...



Dual Wielding...

This is amazing!!!
The ability to mine and place torches at the same time or hold both sword and shield at the same time is Epic...



The Dragon Fight...

I can't say much as I have not fought her yet. However, I have studied it a good bit to say I think I like the changes, especially the respawn mechanic.



The End Islands...

An infinite End, I did not expect this...
I find this really cool though, and Chorus Fruit?
I find it dangerous yet still interesting, I know it can't teleport you inside of lava, etc... However, that doesn't mean that it can't teleport you next to a hoard of Zombies as unlikely as it may be...


The End City's and Ships...

This was impressive... I always love it when Mojang adds a new structure, but this one is huge! xD
The Rewards inside were kind of OP, but I don't mind that at all... The Shulkers added the new Levitation potion effect which blew my mind away... Now lets not forget the "Dragon Head", hard not to laugh when I see that thing...
The Elytra is an epic reward, one which I plan to use often...


Potions...

Lingering Potions last a while... cool.
As for the Potion of Luck, I found this to be odd, but hey, might use it sometime...



Favorite Part...

The Command Blocks for me were my favorite part... I've been messing with them a lot lately,
and I find them really easy to use... However like I said above, I wish they were not as laggy.

I know I did not mention all the features, but this is getting pretty long, and I think I should stop here...

Overall, I really like the update and can't wait for its release...