Creating a new zone

In this post I want to go over the method I use to create a new zone on the map. I'm going to be doing a fairly complex mountain segment, but fortunately MCEdit can do some of the heavy lifting for us. The first step is to isolate the zone that we want to create. Each "zone" is 16 blocks wide and 10 blocks high. In my world each block is represented by a 2x2 game block. This means that each new zone will be 32 blocks wide and 20 blocks high. The first step is to select the 16x10 area on the overworld map that we want to re-create.

First step is to choose a zone to map.

As you can see I partitioned the world into nice manageable chunks by using the grid tool and selecting certain zones to recreate one at a time. The next step is going to be to set up a new section in MCEdit that I can work from, and to set up the 32x20 ground area.

Where the new section will be going.

Select one of the zones corners.

Use the nudge tool to create the 32x20 zone and then fill with sand.

The next step is going to be to create the rock formations that are in the original overworld.

The end goal.

There's no real magic here. Simply transform each 1x1 block into a new 2x2 block and then raise it 8 blocks. Let's start at the left hand side.

The first block.

Fill one column with air to create the staggered look.

Now it's time to let MCEdit make the job a little easier. We can select the formation we just created and use the clone tool and then flip the block to mirror it. This creates the first two blocks in the overworld, and we can see the same structure in other parts of the zone. After we clone and mirror this block we will select the new structure and clone it a few more times.

Flip the block to create the second section of the map.

Cloned a few more times.

The next step is going to be to create the rest of this half of the zone and then clone and flip to complete the zone.

This half is done, select it all and clone/flip.

Almost there just add the final wall.

Another one bites the dust.

Hope this post gave some insight on the basic methods I use to create the zones. I feel I'm getting pretty comfortable with MCEdit so knocking out the rest of the overworld is mostly just going to take time. There are a few more issues that I'm going to have to deal with down the road like dealing with world elevations, but  I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.