Mining diamond below lava with optifine

[uni0]

There is a way to mine diamond ores below lava lakes using optifine. Optifine lets you see through lava, ie makes lava translucent and anything below it can be seen. Without optifine you'd just see orange lava in your screen. This seems to give an advantage to those using optifine wanting to hunt for diamond. In the past I've seen cases where this practice has been allowed and it was not a factor in determining xray.

 

What I'd like to know if this is a legit practice. I've always thought this wasn't allowed and I think others may think the same, so an official comment on this would be appreciated. Thanks

Edited May 16, 2013 by uni0

[TheRandomnatrix]

I feel like this also pertains to usage of mods in general.

 

I've questioned in past the usage of mods like Rei's on P and S due to the fact that it reveals objects in a large radius of the player that wouldn't immediately be visible. This feature can be especially used to locate structures such as temples, villages, and even biomes in general, which can be a massive advantage to players in the beginning of a revision where exploration is key.

 

The feature you're talking about specifically is the clear water feature of Optifine, which makes both lava and water(obviously) clear. This has massive benefits of not just lava based mining, but also to just travel in general, such as swimming in the ocean. Before night vision potions, and even after, you couldn't mine clay effectively in oceans without clear water. This even helps in things such as the 5k, making things like the water maze much easier to navigate.

 

The answer I got in response last time I questioned the usage of such things was that these mods/features are simply too popular to disable.

 

I too would like an official response.

[CROCKODUCK]

From a vanilla4life noob, I consider this pretty surprising.  I have used Optifine before but it ate my FPS' but I would appreciate a response to this also.  I believe I have heard of mods that disable certain features of optifine by adding extra texture layers and such, but yeah this definitely seems to be an advantage over nubs like myself. 

[thrawn21]

I asked this of the Padmins way back when I first became a mod (and first got optifine), and the answer I got at the time was that "I wouldn't condem it, but I wouldn't do it myself." Though it's been over a year and a half since then, and I think it would be good to have discussion about where we'd draw the line in this case.

 

For me, I feel that having a mod that would allow you to find diamonds better than the next guy falls in a similar category as x-raying, and that we sould treat people who mine directly for diamonds under lava pools the same way as we do people who mine directly through stone.

[Jauris]

I asked this of the Padmins way back when I first became a mod (and first got optifine), and the answer I got at the time was that "I wouldn't condem it, but I wouldn't do it myself." Though it's been over a year and a half since then, and I think it would be good to have discussion about where we'd draw the line in this case.

 

For me, I feel that having a mod that would allow you to find diamonds better than the next guy falls in a similar category as x-raying, and that we sould treat people who mine directly for diamonds under lava pools the same way as we do people who mine directly through stone.

 

That seems like the best option. I know it would upset a large portion of the player base to ban optifine for just one feature, so simply punishing its use isn't a terrible idea. Just like xray though, it's virtually undetectable if used by someone that is even semi-competent.

Edited May 16, 2013 by Jauris

[buzzinbee]

I really like optifine and rei's however, after this thread I would personally be in favor of not having them. As it is a clear advantage in locating things under lava or seeing structures like temples. Just my thoughts on it though.

[unce]

I would be against removing optifine. A large portion of the userbase relies on it to make minecraft playable.

I see no reason to remove reis.

[uni0]

I see no reason to remove optifine at all for the one case I cited in the OP. I think detecting diamond mining under lava with optifine is as trackable as detecting xray if not better. If you use optifine, the entry point is the lava, ie there wouldn't be any tunnels leading to the diamond.

[Sapphric]

I definitely would not be in favor of banning optifine because I, like many other players on these servers, simply can't play the game at all without it. Just make it clear that using that feature to mine under lava is bannable.

[Tharine]

I think we've always kind of looked over this because Optifine has been one of those mods that most people use, and personally speaking I remember doing some checks for xray only a short while ago and being completely baffled by the fact that I couldn't see through the lava to check the edit I was viewing. I had thought something was wrong with my client, but it had just been the first time in ages that I didn't have Optifine installed. If you're using the mod, it's one of those things that you just take for granted and don't tend to think about, in my experience. I know of people who swim in lava to find diamonds, and it's honestly slipped my mind that you can't do that in vanilla minecraft.

 

I looked into what setting this is, and it appears to be the Fog option (Video Settings -> Fog) which you can set to off or fast (or additionally 'fancy' if your graphics card supports it - mine does not) that actually makes seeing through lava possible. It's not immediately obvious (unless you're stood in lava at the time) that changing the setting does this, but the difference between off and on is quite clear.

 

We've allowed this method so far, but not necessarily in any official sense, so you're quite right to bring it up for discussion so that we can settle on something as a group. I think I would be in favour of moving to make this method of locating diamonds into the category of 'not fair gameplay' as it does require you to use an external mod, however popular it might already be. I'd like to keep this discussion going, as I see we've breached into discussing other mods as well (such as Rei's minimap), and i'm keen to hear player feedback on such things in general. Additionally, if anyone has any counterpoints to the original topic please voice them! There's usually two sides to every argument, so I think it would be good to hear both the reasons for and against allowing using Optifine to locate diamonds under lava.

[edk]

I've questioned in past the usage of mods like Rei's on P and S due to the fact that it reveals objects in a large radius of the player that wouldn't immediately be visible. This feature can be especially used to locate structures such as temples, villages, and even biomes in general, which can be a massive advantage to players in the beginning of a revision where exploration is key.

 

[...]

The answer I got in response last time I questioned the usage of such things was that these mods/features are simply too popular to disable.

 

people always think I'm trolling when I bring this up, but I've always been pretty sure using Rei's is cheating. A lot of players say things like "you can't ban it, it's too useful", which makes me more convinced that it's too game changing to still count as "vanilla".

 

Regarding ores under lava, can't we somehow tweak fire resist so it lets you burn if you start mining?

[cmdrtebok]

> tweak fire resist so it lets you burn if you start mining?

 

I think having yet another plugin to solve what is most likely a very minor problem is overkill. Anyway if you were mining under lava with fire resist the item would burn up no? Frankly I had no idea this feature existed on Optifine and in my opinion by the time I gravelled out an area of lava, then dug it out, then mined out the ore I would have found diamonds doing regular branch mining much faster. Also before I built my new PC I was completely unable to play Minecraft with out Optifine. On my old AMD X2 with 1 ( I eventually upgraded to 2) GB of ram minecraft would run at like 4 fps but with Optifine run at a playable 20. I also happen to know a lot of people playing are on shitty computers also I would hate to tell everyone Optifine is not allowed because of one of the most edge of edge cases of its use.

 

In terms of Reis, I don't see how we could possibly stop anyone from using is. Are we going to go into witch hunt mode? I mean it just seems like more work then needed or necessary. 

[GMMan]

IMO Rei's is quite useful for its waypoint feature alone, and displaying coords without the rest of the debug data is quite useful. I usually can't remember where I last dug, and even if I could find it, I'd have a hard time getting back out. Rei's can act as a breadcrumbs system without notifying anyone else you have been there, if you use it properly.

 

Question regarding OptiFine: what about the fog near bedrock? I have it turned off because I'm mostly on C and digging out a large block of stone is a pain if you can't see where you're going and what's left. I also have fog turned off in general because it's fugly.

[totemo]

I think for the most part being able to see in lava is a non-issue.  There's usually nothing in there worth getting anyway and the tedium of slow movement in lava acts as a deterrent.  The majority of diamond mined out of lava tends to be of the illicit variety, and those people usually give themselves away and get banned.  For the people who actually do legitimately swim in lava and just use optifine to see further, I don't see how we would have any hope of detecting that and so I don't think it's productive to care.

[Darkelmo]

Well, i don't believe the intention of lava was to hide diamonds, it is meant to be an obstical. Lava usually proves a pain when looking for diamonds and not many people tend to bother looking around lava areas (well I don't) because even if i do see it, too much risk and hassle to get it anyway and i'm a competent miner who can spend that time turning a larger gain than if i stopped for every visable diamond around lava. Now, think of the effort you'd need to go to for a diamond vein covered up in lava, frankly those who can gain diamonds in lava pools, aren't really gonna end up with that much of a gain anyway. And of course not all mods are designed to bring players to have the same experience as vanilla players with good computers. But optifine does this in so many good ways for players that need a little extra 'help' in order to make the game playable. If we had a very strict vanilla policy we would say 'Lagging with vannila? Tough toenails!' But no we do accept these mods even though it taints the vanilla illusion we have. So, we could say 'You don't have to play with optifine but if you want to that's ok'. Besides vanilla players don't get the luxuary of waypoints but it still assist the p.nerd and s.nerd experience.

[Cyotie911]

Using a modification to see through a block that you wouldn't be able to see through without the mod is a form of xraying, plain and simple.  If you are caught using it you will subsequently be banned.  However, we aren't going to ban optifine due to the fact that one, just like an xray mod, it's undetectable until it's used, but optifine makes the game playable to a lot of players where it wouldn't be otherwise.  Just be aware that if you are caught using optifine to see through lava you'll be gone for a month and it counts as xraying.

[32ndFlava]

I see no reason to remove optifine at all for the one case I cited in the OP. I think detecting diamond mining under lava with optifine is as trackable as detecting xray if not better. If you use optifine, the entry point is the lava, ie there wouldn't be any tunnels leading to the diamond.

 

This is where it can get tricky. You can place a block of ice in lava and see directly through the lava until the glass melts. You can also take a fire resistance potion and swim in Lava. Both of these are perfectly acceptable ways of finding diamond in lava but can also look like xraying by the mods. How do you go about using those two ways without being accused of xraying?

[Cyotie911]

This is where it can get tricky. You can place a block of ice in lava and see directly through the lava until the glass melts. You can also take a fire resistance potion and swim in Lava. Both of these are perfectly acceptable ways of finding diamond in lava but can also look like xraying by the mods. How do you go about using those two ways without being accused of xraying?

 

I won't go into the method I would use to be able to tell the difference, however, there are going to be ways to tell. 

[32ndFlava]

I won't go into the method I would use to be able to tell the difference, however, there are going to be ways to tell. 

 

No worries! I just wanted to make sure that I don't get banned for using the two ways I posted above!

[NatalieIsNot]

Honestly you can do this without optifine. Before I used it, I would take a Fire Resistance potion and go diving through the lava for a while. You are very short sighted while you are doing it, but eventually you can find them.

 

Now granted, I can see how this could be seen as xraying using optifine, as the short sightedness wouldn't be there, but how would you tell the difference?

[tc_chris]

Is mining for clay at the bottom of the ocean using clear water regarded to be the same as diamond hunting in lava? or quartz hunting in the nether with the same feature? 

 

[luke_gardner]

I don't know where we're falling on this but I've definitely done it when I had spare fire resists, unexplored lava pools and time to spare (and didn't feel like mining).

 

It's pretty easy to lose the diamonds to lava unless you're clever about setting up your retrieval mechanism (I just created a cobble room around the diamonds).

 

You can usually get more diamonds doing traditional branch mining in the same amount of time & effort, by the way. It's not so profitable, as it costs potions and armor to do effectively (and there's a very real risk you will, y'know, die in lava).

[Cyotie911]

I don't know where we're falling on this but I've definitely done it when I had spare fire resists, unexplored lava pools and time to spare (and didn't feel like mining).

 

It's pretty easy to lose the diamonds to lava unless you're clever about setting up your retrieval mechanism (I just created a cobble room around the diamonds).

 

You can usually get more diamonds doing traditional branch mining in the same amount of time & effort, by the way. It's not so profitable, as it costs potions and armor to do effectively (and there's a very real risk you will, y'know, die in lava).

 

I believe the point they are trying to make is, being able to see the diamonds on the bottom without entering the lava.  There for knowing where they need to clear lava in order to get the diamonds.

[WayneByNumbers]

Being one of those who needs Optifine in order to play MC effectively, I'm definitely for keeping that one.  I wasn't aware at all about the fact that it could make lava easier to see through, but from what's been discussed so far, it doesn't seem to make things easy enough to be much of a temptation to otherwise rule-abiding players, I agree with totemo that it's probably a non-issue.  Anyone who tries to take significant advantage of this feature will, firstly, be treated as a texturepack xrayer, and secondly, probably get impatient with the difficulty of lava swimming and opt for cheatier methods, making them easier to catch.

 

As for Rei's Minimap, I will confess it has sometimes occurred to me that it does seem to offer potentially unfair/non-vanilla advantage.  For instance, it allows you to see the surface even when underground, and, as has been mentioned, allows you to see certain features you might not be able to see otherwise, like villages and temples hidden by landscape.  However, I greatly enjoy having the map myself, and it seems to have become so popular and widely used that attempting to ban it would not only be cumbersome, but perhaps even result in player loss.  P has even enabled Rei's player radar to promote social interaction (and I've been throwing around the idea to do the same on C as well).  And after all, even at minimum zoom, it only gives a view distance of up to about 120 blocks, which is less than someone on far distance.  While we ultimately might have to define Rei's as something of an exception to the principle, I don't find it feasible or desirable to try to phase it out.

[graymansnel]

My thoughts.