SUBSTELLAR

Dev log

01

What works

  • The NeoForge 26.2 project builds, and a dedicated server loads `substellar`. The client was not launched for this pass.
  • A normal new Overworld generates from Y=-224 through Y=319. Sea level stays 63. That is 160 blocks under the vanilla floor. `large_biomes` and `amplified` keep that taller column. Only the normal preset selects the depth biomes, and only that preset was probed.
  • The surface ground still matches the checked inland columns. Seed 1 is ocean water at Y=63. Seed 2 keeps grass or dirt at the same heights. At Y=-48 the sampled biomes are still vanilla.
  • Under the vanilla floor there are three layers: tuff, dripstone block, then polished deepslate. A 4-to-8-block band separates each pair. The upper band is calcite, diorite, and andesite. The lower band is obsidian and crying obsidian. Seed 1 had both bands in range on all five probe columns. Seed 2 had the light band on four columns and the dark band on all five.
  • Each depth has three biomes. Deepwilds: fracture halls, river lowlands, and the grove. Underreach: drip galleries, still lakes, and the tunnel maze. Abyss: the close warren, magma vents, and quiet vaults. The probe saw all nine. Edges follow the strata warp, so a biome can cross a band.
  • Each biome dresses the layer block with a vanilla palette. The generated ores are still the placeholder set: `deepwilds_ore`, `underreach_ore`, `abyss_ore`, and one vanilla ore accent per biome. They are blocks with a simple model. There are no tools, armor, or machines. The decided chart lives in `docs/ORES.md` and is not in the world yet.
  • The grove is only the Deepwilds grove. It places vanilla moss, azalea, rooted dirt, spore blossoms, and glow lichen.
  • Rivers and lakes are water, and only there. On the probe's fresh cut, seed 1 had 4851 river-water blocks and 3136 lake-water blocks, with no air inside those masks and no stray water. Seed 2 had 3924 and 1330, the same way.
  • Magma vents are pockets. Seed 1's abyss sample had no lava layer; a wider scan found 172 lava blocks. Seed 2 had 377 lava blocks in the abyss sample and 394 in the wider scan. The thin lava band under Y=-208 stays: 202 blocks on seed 1 and 832 on seed 2, with no air. The seal at Y=-214 stayed solid.
  • Extra caves are tighter than the earlier two-thirds-air cut. On 29952 samples, seed 1 had 15530 Deepwilds openings (11757 air and 3773 water), 9063 Underreach openings, and 2492 Abyss openings. Seed 2 had 10898, 7448, and 3847. The Abyss is the tighter of the two cave bands on both seeds.
  • Two small loot rooms per depth, tagged to that depth's biomes. Chests use a depth loot table. A rarer settlement can also generate in any of the three depths, in that depth's stone: rooms, a path, light, and one chest from `substellar:chests/settlement`. No spawners and no new mobs.
  • `/substellar excavate` and `/substellar excavate <radius>` clear a cylinder under the player down to the bedrock floor. Radius is 1 to 128. Cheats are required.
  • Bedrock is at Y=-224. Seed 1 is deterministic across two worlds and survives save/reload. The reload of the nine fresh chunks took 158 ms.
02

In progress

  • Nothing. The depth experiences in this column are in the current world.
03

Known problems

  • The first fresh chunk in a cold area took 2724 ms on seed 1 and 4254 ms on seed 2. The nine-chunk batches took 5251 ms and 7177 ms. Later chunks on the reload stayed under 1 second.
  • The Deepwilds sample is still open: about two fifths of that cut is air, before counting the river. The Abyss cut is about 8 to 13 percent open. Cave sizes are still a working hypothesis.
  • Leaf litter and some trees can differ from an older snapshot even when the ground height does not.
  • `run/server.properties` is created by the first dedicated-server launch. The probe script expects that file to exist.
  • Worlds under `run/` are disposable. A world created before this change will not grow the new biomes, water, or structures.
04

Next milestone

  • Keep this column. The settlement is in the world. Mantle and Core are the next depth expansion, not started and not a change to this height. The Moon and rockets stay later.
05

Confirmed product decisions

  • The mod is SUBSTELLAR: a deeper Overworld first, space exploration later.
  • The normal Overworld surface stays recognizable. Extra vertical space goes underground.
  • World generation comes before progression, equipment, or planets.
  • Early experimental worlds are disposable. Existing vanilla saves are not a compatibility target yet.
  • No mandatory gameplay dependency on another mod.
  • Dedicated servers matter, but local generation comes first.
  • Final world height is not locked. A mentioned 512-block span is a hypothesis, not a chosen coordinate.
  • The ore chart in `docs/ORES.md` is decided for the Overworld column and is not generated. An ore belongs to a whole depth. The light band and the dark band have no ores of their own.
  • The site reads `docs/ROADMAP.md`, `docs/STATE.md`, `docs/ORES.md`, and the confirmed product decisions in this file from `master`. It does not keep a second copy of them.