I currently play in minecraft 1.11.2. I've tried many different hardcore challenges and recently I've been trying to create a customized map that is only desert, as it has been claimed to be the ultimate hardcore experience without entering to downloaded maps territory. I created the first few with random structures on, and found myself running into multiple villages, or even worse, river trees that gave me saplings, let alone the ocasional temple. When finally I disabled structures, I still managed to find multiple trees on the same map, within 1000 blocks from the spawn zone. There is close to no struggle to get my first set of tools and from there the game is a piece of cake. I've tried to vary the size of rivers of the map, but even at size 5, with a significant amount of less water, I still spot trees. Is there any way to make it way harder to find wood or trees without making it imposible to find dirt even in caves and such?