Using this book to re-learn Minecraft

I’m a little bit out of practice it used to be that old work on redstone contraptions two or three times a week but now I have taken some time away I don’t know what I’m doing I’m looking at some of these Redstone builds and I’m thinking to myself

What what on Earth is going on here seriously what is going on down here I know what’s going on here and I don’t like it one bit I decided I really wanted to fix this situation so to get myself back into the groove I’ve made my first Redstone related purchase it is

This rather lovely little book Minecraft Redstone for dummies uh it was published in 2015 but you know I don’t think that’s gonna be a problem and hopefully I should be able to get some valuable information from this thing now one quick thing that I want to remind you of

I paid actual money for this book it was 10 pounds which is like 15 so just just keep that in mind I’ve made a few little bookmarks and things so I’ve got a few little pages that I want to go to and and reference all right uh Redstone do

Redstone well actually at the minute I’m just placing world but I guess that’s like half of a redstone person’s job so I’ve recreated this structure block for block from the book and yeah it’s teaching us how to actually power things in Minecraft using Redstone and for the

Most part this is valuable information I guess if I were to nitpick just a tiny tiny bit it’s it’s this Redstone line that runs into this block here doing nothing if I I was just starting out with redstone my little two brain cells would be wondering what on Earth this is

All about is this somehow powering this lamp as well but it is worth remembering I am Sergeant smooth brain so I could just be me let’s move on to the Redstone comparator which is always quite difficult to explain so let’s see how this book does uh the Redstone comparator has one property that

Functions regardless of the comparative settings it doesn’t provide an output if the charge going into the side is stronger than the charge going into the back for example with redstone dust reaches both the side and back of a comparator but the path to the side is shorter the comparative output always

Has a charge of zero right I mean I already understand how comparators work and that’s left me a little bit baffled as to how comparators work I mean yeah I guess I mean it is true you know if you want a redstone line into the side of a comparator and then

Run it into the back of the comparator the output will always be zero it does then go on to explain subtract mode which it does a much better job at you can use them to create specific levels of charge and then manipulate and combine them to produce the results you

Want and then it shows this diagram here this diagram here apparently this is me manipulating and combining them to get the results that I want I’m starting to see two little problems with this book first one is that the personal writing is obviously very very smart you know

They clearly have more brain cells than me probably a mathematician or a programmer used to explaining complicated Concepts using complicated language not having to do it for morons I just remember this book’s called Minecraft Redstone for dummies dummies so it’s meant to be for morons secondly

And I don’t want to insult the entire book industry here but books just aren’t really that good at explaining things that happen in interactive moving visual spaces okay so we’re not off to the best of starts but you know maybe things can get better there’s some advice here which is build

A blown up prototype of your machine if possible I mean that’s slightly peculiar advice but who am I to argue with a book I mean you know yeah I haven’t learned much there that was a stupid joke and I’m embarrassed I told it it’s essentially saying that you

Should build a large version of your Redstone Contraption and work out all of the different circuits and things before trying to compact it genuinely very good advice I’m going to follow that with the caveat that it is advice that I personally have never followed even when

I was first starting out in Redstone but I thought it was worth giving it a go because you know it’s been a while so I’m building up a blown up version of this small Hidden Staircase and I gotta be honest it’s oh it doesn’t work I’ve built it completely wrong that’s embarrassing you

Didn’t see anything I can absolutely see how someone who is just starting out in Redstone would massively benefit from this technique it lays it out really simply it allows you to have an intimate understanding of what each part of the circuit is actually doing two the things

That you’re trying to interact with and I’m going to be honest it also looks quite satisfying as well this is a very good tip follow it later in the book by a very bad tip I I hear this written about a lot and I don’t understand I’ve

Never heard of anyone actually doing it the recommendation to sketch out components inputs and outputs on paper or in a drawing program and connect them with lines or arrows to indicate how your machine should function this is that’s so difficult how is that in any way easier than just placing the

Redstone and like actually trying it is then interactive you then don’t have to follow a sheet of paper that you’ve got on your desk I’ve always found the best way to test the flow of inputs and outputs is just to do them using levers do a dry run making use of levers then

You work out what the input and output order has to be for your Redstone circuit way better than going out and grabbing your Etch A Sketch so from there we move on into all of the Redstone components and things which of course you know there’s not many of them

Because this book was published in 2015 so most of them are in fact missing which seems like an easy thing to pick on but remember I paid 10 pounds 15 for this book in 2022 they’re still selling it now luckily for the creators of the book there aren’t actually that many

Complete redstone contraptions in it this is about the biggest circuit that’s featured so that means they don’t really run into many issue issues with things not working anymore due to changes the way Minecraft Redstone works this is the only one I can think of that probably

Won’t work what’s meant to happen is all of the Redstone lamps are meant to turn on as the item falls through the Hoppers but that doesn’t happen but it’s probably now a good time to mention that over half of this book is dedicated to command block stuff now this is this is

All command blocks just all various different commands and things that commands do and it goes into extreme detail they build like giant mini games and everything like that it’s look how much better this is analog Redstone gets this Hopper chain that doesn’t work anymore on a bud switch the command

Blocks get entire custom worlds that will no longer work because all of the command block information is completely outdated as obviously they’ve updated command blocks since then and that breaks pretty much everything in there which is probably my biggest issue with selling books about games that are constantly updating and having game

Changing updates I mean look it seems like an easy target but I paid for this I want to explode something hopefully there’s a little section in the book about TNT cannons and when I say little section I mean very very little but you know this is

It’s a very basic design of course it still works and TNT cannons are never not satisfying however I was just flicking through the book and I discovered this little machine here that looks like a TNT cannon that kind of fires TNT about 10 blocks this is worth

Trying building this yeah but I’m closer inspection this is a very curious little design yeah well that’s already an issue this this Redstone is powering this dispenser here what a masterpiece now I have no doubt this is going to work well this is I I have some questions on some

Of the design choices oh that is satisfying there there’s no doubt that’s satisfying but like why am I having to control the timings manually but then also there’s an eight-pick delay like that that makes things difficult for my little brain because I’m having to time things manually which is fine it

Means I can choose where my TNT to explode but then I’m having to factor in this extra delay here so I need to flick off the lever like a little while before I actually want the TNT to drop down I’m nitpicking I know but I paid for this

The explanation of all of the different logic gates and the ways that they work is very good and clear in this book so I’ve got to give it credit there using their diagrams I was able to create a not gate I was able to create an or gate

I was able to create a nand gate and an and gate which is absolutely fantastic but I can’t imagine a beginner At Redstone then wondering what on Earth do I actually use these things for you see that’s one thing that the official Minecraft Redstone Handbook does very

Well at it kind of puts it puts things into perspective you know you have you have redstone contraptions that you can build you can at least kind of understand how you would use them in a redstone Contraption this is just always giving you the theory for example

There’s a decent amount of time spent explaining One X organ 8 which is an exclusive or gate so it has to be one or the other but not both or neither for us to get an output it’s a very Niche Redstone circuit it’s a redstone logic

Gate that to be honest I use very infrequently so I was curious to know how they suggested I use it in my Redstone circus because maybe I’ll learn something but all I found is the xor gate is complicated but it’s also quite useful that’s that it stops there and

Then on this page uh it is useful in devices that involve comparisons which frankly I don’t know what that means and I don’t think any so-called dummies would know what it means either okay this is this is just funny because this this structure here just falls into the

Uncanny valley of builds so we’ve all done large-scale chest storage systems right you kind of Stack Up the chests like this and then you connect them up with Hoppers like this so it creates a snake for the items to go down through if you were to put items into the top it

Would gradually fill up this chest and this chest and this chest and this chest and so on but the book features the design where the Hoppers goes straight down so you have to have this little strange thing up at the top and then and then the items flow through in a really

Weird order which actually makes a little bit of sense if you have a double chest up at the top but then when do you ever just put items directly into the top of a bulk storage system normally they’d be flowing in and then that just wouldn’t work you’d

Get the left side filling up right the way to the top and then this would eventually start filling up and then it would start filling up the right hand side that’s bizarre this book is filled with Oddities like this and outdated information mixed in with occasional nuggets of genuinely good advice when it

Comes to building redstone contraptions so have I relearned Redstone from reading it no uh no fancy it has got me placing Redstone for the first time in a few months so I guess that’s a massive positive and I can say I’ve read a book this year which makes me seem smart so

All in all I’d consider this an absolutely enormous win