Minecraft Construction For Dummies, Portable Edition

Chapter 3

Setting Up Your Building Site

In This Chapter

Building on different landscapes

Preparing the land for construction

Redesigning natural areas

Before you start building, you need to figure out where to build. Plains and deserts generally make for usable, flat building ground, but what if you want to build your structure on a mountain? Or what if you can’t find a flat area that’s large enough to build a mansion?

This chapter explains the two ways of solving topographical issues: Adapt to the landscape, and make the landscape adapt to you. In Minecraft, almost everything is changeable — you can use that knowledge to your advantage.

Building on Interesting Landscapes

A building doesn’t have to stand on its own — lots of interesting structures build from their surroundings. For example, you can build a fortress inside a cave, a city around a mountain, or a swamp town connected by bridges. Plus, using your surroundings as part of your building can save you a ton of building time because you’re taking advantage of the thousands of blocks that have already been placed for you.

For example, Figure 3-1 shows a bunch of little houses built in an Extreme Hills biome with ladders and ...