is it cheating/bending rules too far? Opinions wanted

I am curious what others think of things like MC edit and going in to alter a biome to be better for things..

My first opinion/thought is that its no diffrnet then using a in game mod to do it.. just faster and simpler?

or is it that its external to the game that makes it more cheaty?

is a map program that can look into caves bad because you can view it outside of the game a cheat or is it a tool to get information better?

I made 2 edits to my world and feel they are ok because it allowed 1 major headache to be fixed and allowed better crops to happen for another! ( had i planned better i would have put myself in a swap area/had one nearby to grow crops in.. so i changed that.

the other is a more drastic one but it should solve a major headach i am having with a mob spawner... namely that it works but there are alot of caves unlit.. so this filter goes in and puts torches all over !

( i could have used a terriformer flatification for this because it would have filled in the spaces with dirt, but felt this was faster/easier)

I can see this being too much.. IE being able to edit willy nilly ruins some of the game!
but sparingly used it can make things a bit better?

Quote from blub01

lighting up caves is definitely a cheat to me - a), it gives you torches(which are renewable resources, but meh), b), you can just build the mobgrinder on top of an ocean(i think, deep ocean was the thing without mob spawns, right?), as there isn't any ground for the mobs to spawn on there but for the grinder. Also, as you said, you could have used a terraformer.

For the Biome thing, exploring can be a nuisance, so i don't think it is that bad. You could've changed the biom(in a small area) with blood magic, but that would've required a lot of infrastructure to be set up and cost a lot of stuff.

I have spent like 20+ hours finding "unlit caves" in a ocean.. i did not build near a deep one so i am having that issue ( wiki does not state they don't do caves so maybe it is deep ?)

i don't have that mod that does the blood magic but it makes me happier to know

Quote from GregoriusT

Nope, Deep Ocean just has less Caves due to the depth of the Ocean. Mushroom Island was the thing without Mob Spawns (aside Mooshrooms), but a Mobgrinder there is useless unless you want Leather and Steak.

giggles

yep not a good place to grind

Quote from _Tim_

I occasionally "cheat" if the game crashes and things go missing, or I accidentally dump/drop expensive items into the void.

I use BC quarries to create giant holes and then fill 'em with stone giving me a blank canvas for creating underground areas, great! Occasionally things'll go goofy when I'm filling in the holes (via BC filler), so I use MC Edit to see if a bat or cow made an empty space just to make sure the hole is 100% full.

Another is switching into creative while items are processed or something so I don't starve to death. I only do this when I need a ton of something that requires hours of processing as a result.

Those are just a few things I cheat on and am ok with, it keeps the game from being too monotonous.

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makes sense.. not huge cheats but removes the silly time wasting stuff you would have to deal with normally!

Quote from SpwnX

I say anything is fine as long it is still fun for you. The only rules there are the ones you create.

Quote from blub01

creative is for testing/playing around. survival is about working for what you have, accomplishing something. if (at least that''s the case for me) i want to seriously play survival(not the semi-creative i do as i hate plaaing in creative), cheating just makes it boring. so there actually is a point in not cheating when plaing survival, otherwise it is boring.

and what you both say here is i think the best point.. i have a creative world.. that i play with to run experiments on because with nukes for example its too dangerious/costly to make mistakes.

i play survive on peacefull for the most part.. lately i have been leaving it on easy since its not too difficult with the tech levels i have.

I am constantly learning .... the farm issue i did not realize when i built my base it would be a issue.. i woulda tried to have found a better place.

I do have fun figureing things out.. last two days i have been messing with a fermenter setup.