Mods shown in the video: Mobs attempt parkour (fabric only) Spiders 2.0 Ice and Fire Savage and Ravage Nether Extension Upgrade Aquatic And my own personal testing mod

I think there should be a possibillty to put 9 poisonous potatoes in a crafting table to craft a super poisonous potato It also has no functionallity

A friend of mine who composts irl is so salty that the Minecraft poisonous potatoes are non-compostable, citing that bad potatoes irl are perfectly good for composting.

Minecraft: we should keep things fair to the player Terraria: *The air is getting colder around you*

The first time I saw an underwater temple I thought to my self: Hah! I don't need to waste my time going through the maze like I would in any other game, this is minecraft, I'll just mine right through the top. Then i brought a cow out into the middle of the ocean on a lead, filled a bunch of buckets of milk, and mined right through. At the time I felt like I had outsmarted mojang, but now I just realised that mojangs intention has always been that players should be able to play the game however they want. They made an intentional way of interacting with the temple, but didn't make it too strict because if people wanted to find a way around it, they should be allowed to. I think that is a really awesome design philosophy that some other game developers should consider a bit ***cough cough, bungie***

I hate when mods add mobs with non-cubic models that don't look minecrafty.

I disagree entirely, we need at least a dozen new ores and recolored mobs each update. Don’t ask me what makes each unique.

"...As long as the functionality is simple and intuitive" Everyone: *stares at the redstone comparator*

I think one design philosophy that Mojang likely follows is: No new feature should overshadow preexisting mechanics. They can be direct upgrades to old mechanics (diamond pickaxe -> netherite pickaxe), but they shouldn't be a new mechanic that replaces an old one. Like pipelines usually being objectively better hoppers.

An enderman once spawned into my red stone contraption, stole a granite block with red stone on it and crashed my entire system, leaving me with no clue of what had happened. The lesson of this should be to always light up your closed off systems or place red stone on unnatural blocks

I look forward to your 3 hour video essay about the mystery of the poisonous potato.

"We cant add sharks because we cant make hostile mobs based on real animals!" Mojang adding polar bears which are miles more deadly and making them neutral:

Mojang: "Avoid making things that are impossible to avoid." RLcraft: " *n o* "

In my opinion, a mod is vanilla when it doesn't provide "one block" solutions to everything, fits in with vanilla's art style, and not be unnecessarily over complicated. However I don't play mods because they are vanilla, I play them to have fun so it doesn't really matter for me.

"relatively tame lightning strike" those fuckers killed my parrot

I assumed the dolphin speedboost was based on the real world phenomena where they will sometimes aid swimmers in getting to shore or safety fast

I feel like the creeper is such an iconic part about Minecraft because it is genuinely a well designed enemy. It does a wonderful job of reminding you of the games mechanics and what made Minecraft so unique when it first came out, as well as being a unique challenge compared to other mobs.

One system I hope mojang works on I'd the environmental relationship between mobs, like how piglins only hunt hoglins when they feel hungry. They could expand it in many ways, for example, we can see ocelots hunt creepers, but the creeper runs away, rather than exploding, to explain why creepers are afraid of cats (this is also a feature in MCD). Or axolotls occasionally swimming to the surface to hunt fish, rather than being the savages the snapshots currently depict them as

I remember when poisonous potatoes looked just like regular potatoes. I’d always trick my friends into eating them by renaming them “Potato”

Regarding creepers, I'd change them to act more like tnt (drop 100% of blocks destroyed). Tnt is something the player can control, unlike creepers. I absolutely despise the idea of permanently losing items to something you cannot control.

I do think Minecraft would be much less of a standout title if it had been designed with this ideology from the get-go, but I think it’s a good way to go about adding new features in general. That said, part of the benefit of well-defined rules is knowing how and when to break them skillfully to make for a better experience. Hopefully, when a genuinely amazing idea comes across Mojang’s desk, they don’t dismiss it out-of-hand because it rides the line (or steps a toe across it).

I think Biome O'Plenty, which "only" added a humongous amount of biomes, was actually one of the most vanilla-like mods, since it didn't make the game feel unnatural.

The "One Block at a Time" principle is what also made Thaumcraft's Axe of the Stream a good tool; it was made to chop entire trees easily, but instead of breaking all logs at once, if you broke a log, it scanned the connected log, and instead broke the log the furthest away from you. A tree with 10 logs meant you just had to break the same log 10 times.

Personally, I always preferred small, light-weight mods. Mods intended to polish existing mechanics, rather than overhauling major parts of the world or gameplay. Small enough that, at times, you'd forget you've even modded your game, though that you'll absolutely miss when updating.

Its quite ironic,that the most popular sandbox game has its most iconic mob destroy your hardwork

Everyone talking about how useless the poisonous potato is when I literally just ate one today for the balanced diet advancement.

The Jeb book, aka the Jeble.

i think for vanilla artstyle the most important thing is to rely on texturing for detail and detail with voxels only when absolutely necessary

One idea I thought of while watching this for a potential way to add sharks (in an update or mod) would be to fallow the “real animals shouldn’t be miss represented or hostile” principle…in a nutshell, if I were adding sharks to Minecraft, I’d take inspiration from Subnautica’s Stalkers, which as far as I know are neutral unless attacked, have there eggs stolen, or you get to close…similarly, as far as I’m aware, shark attacks in real life are relatively rare, and there are several tips to avoid them…so I’d make it so that Minecraft sharks wouldn’t attack unless attacked, or if you’re splashing at the surface (as splashing makes the shark think you’re food) I’d also make them passively drop their teeth, which could be used to make simple weapons like swords and spears, but they’d only be about as powerful as a wood or gold tool…and to give the player a way too look above the surface of the water without splashing, I’d add a feature where if the player’s head is above the surface, they start to tread water and “hover” as if they were standing still, but if they continue going up, they start splashing……would something like this happen? Probably not…this is just how I think Mojang could make it work

Creating a mod that breaks all the principles could be a fun challenge

If I understand correctly a poisonous potato disaster mod which makes poisonous potatoes the only way to stop natural disasters is a perfect vanilla + mod. /s

I think the most important takeaway is actually that Mojang's post Microsoft design principles are fundamentally different from Notch Mojang principles. All the principles like animals not being hostile or having useful death drops, or mobs not affecting the environment, etc. All of these are not Notch's Minecraft, neither is the art style as it's deviated slightly but noticeably.

Poisonous potatoes already have a use. They’re great for filling item sorters.

Perhaps the way they could add sharks is to make them similar to goats: they rarely attack the player, and only a few circumstances allow any possibility for them to attack, like wearing shiny iron or golden armor or holding a fish. This would make them neutral, and perhaps to make them useful, they’d naturally scare off drowned, even attacking them, as sharks are naturally scavengers. This would offer an alternative to players who don’t have an axolotl bucket or tropical fish on hand. This would also offer a unique lesser of two risks type of gameplay. On one hand, swim far away from the sharks but risk drowned attack. On the other, swim relatively close to the shark to keep safe from drowned, but risk angering the shark into giving you a very bad warning bite. Alternatively, they could add an original aquatic top predator inspired by extinct fish like placoderms or lobe-finned fish, as those could easily fit the mild fantasy vibe of Minecraft, and implement the aforementioned game mechanic. Edit: it says I got a heart, but I don’t see it, lol. Maybe something’s wrong on my end.

As someone who started playing on 1.3 and stopped around 1.7, then got back into Minecraft at 1.16, vanilla Minecraft doesn't even feel like vanilla Minecraft anymore... Hell, anvils and flower pots still feel new to me.

I think there is a lot of room at this point in minecraft for mods that add functionality to existing blocks. A lot of new stuff in the game is purely decorative or, from a technical perspective, has niche uses- usually due to a lucky hitbox or accidental mechanical functionality, and there is little incentive to farm new blocks. Things like the two new crystals, copper, the recent passive animals, netherite/lodestones, phantom membranes, the crafting stations, and even whole systems like minecarts, potions and enchantment could use huge upgrades to their interact ability.

I was just thinking the other day how i would like to try my hand at making a vanilla style mod. How convenient for me to stumble upon this video

"All blocks should be mined one at a time" All minecraft players: *Places torch under sand so you don't have to do the mining.*

The treefelling rule seems odd to me when you consider both Cacti, Sugar Cane, and Chorus Trees all break with one cut while trees do not

I love mods that make vanilla items or mechanics feel accessible and useful. Like a quiver that helps you more efficiently use ripped arrows, crafted through the fletching table

"Poisonous potatoes should never be given a use" Quark: I'm gonna pretend I didn't see that

I recommend the farmer’s delight to anyone who enjoys food based mods It feels vanilla while still adding many things

Maybe it's just me, and it might just be because I'm a World building nerd who like lived in worlds, but I've always felt that the villagers were lacking something... Dynamic. Like, they have their professions and everything, but something about Villages just doesn't feel lived-in to me. I think it's the fact that because villages spawn randomly throughout the world, they're all completely disconnected from each other, which to me just feels wrong somehow. It feels like there should be larger settlements or even just small single homesteads separated from the rest of the village, maybe wandering Caravans (like a village of wandering traders i guess). Just something to populate the world with human-like mobs that you can occasionally run into. I'm not really sure how that would play into anything, maybe you can find Wandering Caravans traveling between Villages and if you can successfully protect them from hostile mobs they'll show you the way or reward you with special trades. maybe different village types offer items unique to a biome, but wandering caravans offer all items for an increased price, or will lead you to want to said Villages if you follow them and protect them, making it a trade-off of farming emeralds and keeping track of them, or protecting them from Hostile Mobs. It just feels like there should be more group dynamics i guess. Theres lots of solo mobs, but I'm more interested in the groups of mobs. is that just a me thing? Or is that something people also feel about the game? I know to a certain extent the world is supposed to feel empty, but it almost feels a little too empty ya know? this doesn't even just have to go for villagers, a larger illager stronghold or something would be cool too.

you know one thing I like to argue is that dimensions like the twilight forest or aether can technically be canon, but isn't seen anywhere or implemented because lore-wise it has never been discovered.

My friends and I have been playing around with the Create Mod recently, and it’s interesting because even though it goes against the idea of having minecraft additions be fantasy related, it feels entirely vanilla. It very similar to redstone, but more simplified for the average player. Yet it can still be utilized to make advanced contraptions by more experienced players. It gives a use to andesite, making it more than just a decorative block, and although it adds a new ore, it gives it a use that isn’t new armour or tools. So, as much as I agree with following the vanilla structure to make a mod that feels ‘vanilla’, I also think there are ways to work around this, well still ending up with a ‘vanilla’ result.

So, my take away is the, "girlfriend mod" is not ok?

adding to the list of natural disasters: lava pit in a jungle

I think ore vein miners, 3x3 miners, and tree-felling is perfectly fine, even if it toes the line of the One Block At A Time principle. Anyone can intuitively understand what is happening and why if they see somone, for example, chop down a tree and the whole thing falls down. There are definitely limits to something like that, but as long as it's handled well and doesn't get too complicated or overpowered, I think it's close enough to vanilla that I'd consider it fine.

Create is the most Vanilla+ tech mod I’ve seen and the textures are very consistent with Minecraft texture design. I’m surprised to see it on the opposite end of the spectrum in that chart. Every single mechanic it adds beautifully builds on several under-utilized vanilla and create features in a way no other mod I’ve seen has. Like every single thing it adds interacts with everything to create interesting gameplay. A good example is the toolbox. They solved the problem of too many building blocks for your hot bar with a diegetic block that interacts with other toolboxes to create submenus and can be used for far more cases than building Create structures AND it isn’t overpowered because of the distance limit which also keeps it lightly fantasy. Also on top of all that they stuck rigidly to their theme of every single block using rotation in some way and no GUI menus except the tool box. Great video though.

That creeper exploding and more little creepers coming out is gonna give me nightmares

I’ve always been confused by mojangs development choices when it comes to Minecraft, but their design philosophies having changed over time explains a lot. I do think they neglect traditional gameplay in favor of sandbox mechanics but that may be personal preference clouding my judgement

I am kind of studying mods right now and this really helped. I'm trying to find out what makes mod good, and these criterias really help

I was today years old when I found out cats scare phantoms...

That's it. I'm making poisonous potatoes a currency.

Instructions unclear, accidentally made Poisonous Potatoes better than Netherite.

Honestly, I disagree with a few of those design principles. Interacting with one block at a time makes sense in a multiplayer setting, but in a singleplayer world, creating a large build or clearing out a large area is slow and tedious. In my current 1.16.5 forge setup, I'm building dragon enclosures (Dragon Mounts Legacy mod) and they're _big._ Being able to build all four walls at once with builder's wands, dig up stone, dirt, and gravel with Tinker's Construct hammers and excavators, quickly replace large quantities of blocks with Exchangers, and filling up holes and lakes with Hole Fillers makes these projects much more enjoyable to build. Maybe having them as part of survival is too much, but things like what's added by those mods should definitely exist as creative mode utilities.

Im my opinion, if you are able to use the poisonous potato to get the advancement “How did we get here”, then it technically has a “use”, being an item used to get said advancement. Of course, it could be argued that just because poisonous potatoes may be used as an item to get the advancement when there is a better alternative (pufferfish) or just at all does not count as being useful. But I believe that because it could be used to get this advancement, it does technically have a use!

Thats so true 1.16 felt so modded and now I feel use to it The same thing is with 1.17 it changed the hole game but i can see me getting use to it

A mod that adds poisonous potato ore, it wouldn’t add a use just make them more abundant

This was an incredibly insightful video. The video editing wasnt flashy or high production, but it didnt need to be. Your words and thoughts were valuable and important completely independent of what was on the screen. The video also didnt include anything obnoxious like a jarring dubstep intro or weirdly high energy cold open. This was just a really well done discussion of a topic I hadn't thought much about until now. Very well done, I'll definitely subscribe and might even join the discord.

"Real life animals shouldn't be misrepresented", yeah because polar bears are definitely not aggressive predators that will eat you for the sake of eating you and will literally just ignore you until you get at 5 blocks from them.

Me: I totally agree with this video's points. Also me: *takes an M4 assault rifle, hops on a Humvee and invade Nether with a ton load of mods*

One thing to note on how vanilla does things is how it deals with refinement and block creation. Nearly every item in Minecraft either is either usable immediately (blocks, saplings) or requires 1 step of crafting to make something usable (furnaces, ore smelting), exceptions to this are either rare (books used to require another crafting step to be useful, now with librarian trades they're useful as a currency) or only provide aesthetics (stone bricks require two steps to make (smelting cobblestone, then making bricks) but aren't significantly different from cobble). So mods that aim to be vanilla like shouldn't have several layers of useless items that only exist to make the recipe "more realisitc" or act as a way to balance the cost of the thing against it's use.

For April fools they should make the poisonous potato the best item in the game.

If pipeline are ever added, id like em to be like the ones we see in the modded community, that way, hoppers will still have a use (they are usually a sort of entry into a system) and copper can find more space in the vanilla game

100% agree with the magic statement. I have yet to find magic outside of expanding enchants or potions that feels vanilla. If you look at existing magic in MC, the stronger it is, the weaker the mob. Creepers and Ghasts have volatile explosions, but one dies when it attacks, while the other is a huge target that barely stomaches a couple arrows. Ghasts can blow up from range, but it's reflectable. The perfect magic system mod in MC personally would be similar to how it is now in vanilla. Spells require material components, since the pc is not innately magical. The more powerful the spell, the more expensive it is to produce, topping of with non generated items for the powerhouse spells. There is one mod that adds these pillars that stop hostile mob spawn. It is really expensive to build and I love it. It gives me a way to protect my complex towns without making them ugly from 1 million lightsoures and specific designs, all the while making the vanilla way to mob proof ALOT cheaper in comparison

I really like when they tie features together. I was disappointed when they didn't add target blocks to the pillager outpost targets

I really liked this video, it gave me a lot to think on for designing rules for a games features. Recently i've had trouble trying to ground all of the features of a game i'm making under a few rules, but this has helped! Thanks, great video!

I installed a mod for easier tree chopping where the whole tree disappears/breaks when one bottom block is broken and I think that's pretty cool

Here is another thing: A mob's texture should fit their scale (with the exception of babies which are always a downscaled version of the adult, and cave spiders which were added in the early versions, and for some strange reason bats have more detail than they should), Ghasts are 4×4 so they have a large texture, same deal with ravagers, big mob with big texture, zombies are more player sized so they have a player sized texture, unpuffed pufferfish have a tiny texture because they are tiny. If you look at one of the mobs in RubberRoss' latest group effort to make a new mod you'll see a highly detailed "skeleton spider" mob that has a humanoid skeleton at the front, with arms, and many smaller skuls all around, just the head already has a texture close in size to a ghast, so how big is this mob? Is it a massive boss? Nope, just a common enemy that's as tall as a default spider; That's how big that super detailed model is. One. Block. Tall. with a more detailed texture than a ghast just for the main head, meanwhile their beautifuly gorgeous plant deer with fungal antlers has about the same detail scale as a default minecraft mob, which makes it look like they are from completely different mods

5:08 In that case. Please make it where creepers can no longer start their timer while falling onto a player, instant death by falling creeper is often times unavoidable because of the time from when you see the creeper to when it explodes. Look how many Hardcore runs have ended because of falling creepers that nearly instantly explode when landing on you. Edit: You all make great points and I now accept the creeper kamikaze.

I wish valheim would take a note from the minecraft design principles. "Disaster only happens as a result from player actions". For some reason in valheim, enemies will directly attack certain structures you place, it's so annoying. The most annoying one is boats. You make a boat, you can't just store it within walls, because, well, it's a boat. But enemies who see the boat will go over to it and attack it. You can't dive, so the materials that drop from the boat, just sink and if you don't have a late game item, you can't get them back and you're just fecked.

Some of their ideologies on making a good game really shine a light on why so many others fail

this video makes me want a mod that expands upon vanilla magic. that would be amazing

There's a mod called "Comforts" that adds sleeping bags that skip to day without setting your spawn. It's a tiny addition that I wish was in vanilla because it's amazing for exploration and multiplayer (though I don't play multiplayer on Java.)

The elytra was such a big change, it would never be a vanilla style mod before 1.9 😂

Jeb is a really good developer. He understand what makes minecraft good very well.

A few ideas I'd love to see: -Being able to make cheese "wheels" with milk (that function like cake but are easy to make) that in turn could attract (non-hostile) mice, that in turn are kept at bay by having an occelot nearby. -Having dust devil type mobs in deserts that will knock you back or launch items into the air, so if you box them in with blocks they can act as either a mob barrier, or a sort of express mail system higher elevations

5:13 is exactly why they should add more bosses, it would be awesome to have more player based bosses like the wither

2:26 "They dont want to misrepresent animals" well just add the shark with real-world behavior and not the hostile version of it

"The challenge of bastions come from their state of disrepair." Piglin Brutes:

So here's what I took from this video Rules of vanilla-style mods: 1. Modifications should fit with the fantasy theme of Minecraft (e.g. some sort of magic, not robotics) 2. Real life animals shouldn't be hostile* (e.g. slime monsters, not piranhas) 3. Stereotypes**, gender, and unbreakable blocks** should be avoided (e.g. a gender neutral animal, like a worm, but not a bull***) 4. Players can only change one block at a time (e.g. an acid, not instant vein mining) 5. Players are the cause of all disaster in the world (e.g. a summoned boss, not a random unpreventable boss fight) 6. NEVER EVER give poisonous potatoes a use (e.g. leaving potato alone and respect Jeb's wishes, not adding a use) *This rule does not apply to fantastical versions of real life animals, such as giant ant, or a creature with similar behavior to actual animals **Stereotypes as in real life cultures, like an existing nation or such. A good example is that Millenaire mod adds real life culture, making it non-vanilla style ***Unbreakable blocks should be avoided unless breaking them would cause a catastrophe, like breaking the end portal frame ****Avoiding bulls causes some strange things, meaning all cows are female yet can produce babies. Maybe that makes cows fantasy Guidelines that vanilla style mods should at least attempt to follow: Add a new feature, not just a clone of a vanilla feature (e.g. an ore with a special property, not just a new equipment material) Have blocks interact with each other (e.g. something similar to campfires and beehives, enchantment tables and bookshelves) Add something that you think Mojang might add (e.g. vertical slabs, not guns. Mojang said no) And something I think that should be followed as well that wasn't covered in the video- Try to have models of blocks and entities similar to that of Minecraft, y'all. Circles don't look right. If any of you are considering doing a vanilla style mod that adds a feature Mojang might add, consider browsing the Previously Considered Suggestions on Mojang's website. Here's the link: feedback.minecraft.net/hc/en-us/articles/360005029872-Previously-Considered-Suggestions

12:15 the create mod is definitely the closest I've seen to a vanilla style true tech mod. Instead of electrical power, it's based around mechanical motions.

This is an incredibly interesting video! Vanilla+ is such a general term used to describe mods nowadays, so it's nice to see what they should be so people can identify them a bit better.

The day the poisonous potato gains a use is the day Minecraft truly dies

Poisonous potatoes can have a use in a roleplay. Imagine a world where Poisonous Potatoes are considered the gift of the Gods and the government has a secret potato farm of enormous size. You pay with them, you get paid with them, you rob people for them. There's a lot you can come up with in rp when you have a useless item...

I don't think creepers count as unavoidable destruction. They can only explode with player input, specifically 3 inputs. 1) Getting near one, or one getting near you. 2) Causing another mob to agro the creeper. 3) Igniting the creeper with a flint and steel. These are all pretty easily avoided during standard gameplay. The most damage a creeper can do is destroy your chests or blow up your items, but simple base design should be enough to ensure that can not happen.

Back when I played Minecraft in 2015, my mod list consisted of QOL stuff such as recipe books, optifine, knocking down trees by removing their base, held torches providing light etc. As well as backpacks, ruins or dungeons, middle ages and renaissance era weapons (remember when balkon's was a thing?) and expansions to on-foot mobility like Smart Moving. Things that didn't affect the intended pre-industrial, light-fantasy survival feel of the game. When texture packs are used, I tend to prefer 32x32 packs that add detail and perhaps some randomizer texture variety but without losing the intended feel the game was going for, nothing photorealistc, but not too cartoony either. As one that checked all the boxes did not yet exist, this often resulted in me having to assemble my own texture pack from scratch using bits and bobs from others, even cracking open GIMP2 or Paint if it proved nessesary. A part of why I retired from Minecraft is that all the mods I considered mandatory had depreciated with most of them having no suitable replacements made. Some not until years later, others never. Back after they depreciated, the mod scene got oversaturated with stuff that went too far into modern aspects, crossovers, or huge resource and biome expansions that had no proper rhyme or reason in how they merged into the world. Nothing was subtle, and it kind of alienated me. Overall, you could say I was a Vanilla+ player before Vanilla+ was a thing. Now that things have calmed down and settled, I might take a look back at Minecraft if I get a feel for survival sandbox gaming again.

I like how the shulker is not going to be replaced by pouches.

"Bedrock is unbreakable" Meanwhile rays work laughing with bedrock in his inventory

Endermen shouldn’t pick up any block that’s placed by the player. I had so many holes in my ocean monument in my old hardcore world where the endermen took away grass blocks I placed

Okay now they said they wouldn't add shark as a hostile mob, but what if they add it as a Natural mod? Like in real life sharks are natural and I'd be perfect to the game, same as grizzly bears. If you ask "but sharks will attack dolphins, squids an fishs" Yeah, axolotl does it too.

i am actually really proud of mojang for trying to create features that looks like a mod but still feels and looks vanilla

I was searching this video for months!

I do only select mods that has vanilla style, mods like Pixelmon models feels weird and mods that actually make you overpowered is not funny at all. Abnormals mods and Create are really good

Creepers aren't antithetical to Minecraft's design because they could be reasonably avoided by sleeping or lighting up an area.

One of my favorite mods is actually showcased here. Ice and Fire. The iconic mod that adds dragons and sea serpents (among others) to Rlcraft. And watching this video made me realize. The dragons are not vanilla. They can cause untold damage to your world without your interaction, spawn areas are entirely random, and unless you're ready, you'll likely be unfairly killed by a dragon without being able to prevent it, and they gave the poisonous potato a use in growing dragons (or not growing them to be more accurate). But I love the mod and LOVE the dragons. I'm a bit confused on why but it doesn't really matter

What a well thought out and research video!

Dude I really love your content! you're super underrated

Jeb: The only natural disaster is the *tame* lightning bolt. The lightning bolt: Strikes and burns my house down.