Mob traps can be really effective, but I've noticed some guides are either too simple or not complex enough and so I put decided to post some information of what goes into making traps here.
Animal Traps
Animal traps are different than monster traps for several reasons. For instance, monsters appear in darkness or in bulk at monster spawners, so you need to either create darkness or wait for night in order to trap and kill them. Animals on the other hand spawn on undisturbed grass in daylight conditions.
Animals can be killed in several ways. For traps, the most common methods include making them fall to their death, drowning them, or burning them in lava.
In order to optimize the effectiveness of your animal traps, we'll need to know more about them.
Important Animal Information
Animals are attracted to light and grass. If there is a lot of grass nearby, they will walk toward it. If they are completely surrounded by grass, they will wander aimlessly. If they can't see any grass, they will wander toward light. This is important, because you can attract animals to your traps at night, or keep them spawning all day if your trap is enclosed and well lit.
With the exception of the chicken, animals will die from a fall of 23 blocks.
Another very important difference with animals is that you can breed them using wheat. This means that you have more control over the amount of animals you have in your traps.
Let's go into a little detail about each animal type.
Chickens: Chickens drop feathers, meat and occasionally eggs. As you may know, these eggs can be thrown and broken to create more chickens, but there is only about a 30 percent chance of success at any given time. Breeding animals with wheat is much more efficient.
Cows: Cows drop more meat than any other mob, as well as leather for armor. When approached with a bucket, they will give you milk that's needed for crafting the almighty cake.
Pigs: Pigs drop one to two pork chops, which will come out cooked if they die from fire or lava.
Sheep: Sheep are needed for creating beds. They will drop more wool when sheered than when killed.
Monster Traps
With the exception of Nether Mobs, monsters appear only at night or in dark areas. They can also appear in dungeons which have a mob spawner block inside them. Monsters can be killed by the same means as animals.
Monster Traps
With the exception of Nether Mobs, monsters appear only at night or in dark areas. They can also appear in dungeons which have a mob spawner block inside them. Monsters can be killed by the same means as animals.
Important Monster Information
Monsters will always spawn 24 blocks away from where you are during their spawn cycle, so some monster traps fail to work if you are within that amount.
While monster mobs die in the same way that animal mobs do, there are some exceptions. Most monsters will die when they fall 23 blocks, but this has changed for some mobs, so your best bet for killing them via falling damage is about 26 blocks.
Cave Spiders: Cave spiders appear only underground and are most common near their spawners, which can be found in Abandoned Mines. They drop string and spider eyes.
Creepers: This most notorious monster drops gunpowder, which is needed for TNT. Traps that collect drops from creepers are a much sought after alternative to killing creepers on your own.
Skeletons: Skeletons drop bones and arrows. Since arrows are rather time consuming to make, skeletons drops are a great thing to come by.
Slimes: Slimes have been much more elusive than other mobs, but will be much more common in the 1.9 update. Their only drop—the slime ball—is the key ingredient used in crafting sticky pistons.
Spiders: Spiders are more common than Cave Spiders as they occur above ground, but they drop the same loot as Cave Spiders (string and spiders eyes).
Zombies: Zombies are a less desired mob for traps as of 1.8, since they now only drop rotten meat. Rotten meat is sometimes an alternative food source, but will more than likely give the player food poisoning.
Hope this helps clarify what should go into designing mob traps. I made a guide using some traps as examples that you can read here.
Sick of over complicated guides to mining, branching, and finding ore? Me too! I wrote a quick and simple guide to where ores occur and to mining ore in the most efficient manner using branch mining.
Please check it out and let me know what you think.
Step 1 Go to Block Level 1
To begin branch mining, hit F3 on your keyboard. This will open the memory menu. You will see a lot of data about what's being generated in front of you, but you need not worry about the majority of it.
On the left side of the menu there is an X, Y, and Z-axis listed. You only need to worry about the Y-axis, which tells you your level from bedrock. The best place to start your mine is anywhere from level 1 to level 15, so start digging. Do not dig straight down! That's like rule number one in Minecraft. If you dig down, you could wind up in a group of monsters, fall to your death, or get consumed trying to swim in lava.
Mining from level 1 up to level 15 is the best range from which you will discover diamond, iron, redstone, and gold in the same places.
Step 2 Start Your First Branch
Begin by digging into the wall, in any direction, 20 blocks deep. Be sure you are digging horizontally, not vertically. This will be your first branch.
Now dig anywhere from 2-5 blocks to the right or left and dig 20 blocks deep again.
Here is a branch mine that is 2 blocks wide. A 2 block wide branch mine will take the most time, but you will not miss any ore whatsoever.
Here is a branch mine that is 3 blocks wide.
This branch mine is 5 blocks wide. This will take less time, but since diamond and gold ore usually only occur in groups of 2-4 blocks wide, you are liable to miss a lot.
Here is a branch mine that is 2 blocks wide. A 2 block wide branch mine will take the most time, but you will not miss any ore whatsoever.
As you can see, there are different methods as to how much you can mine in your branch mine and each has their own benefits. Decide what works best for you.
Now do you same on the reverse side, or behind you. The space in between each set of branches is your mine shaft.
Step 3 Experiment with Levels
If after about twelve or more branches you aren't finding the ore you're looking for. Experiment with going up or down a level, but be sure to alternate your branches, or they'll merge into one.
Here is an example of a branch mine with shafts stacked on top of each other:
Congratulations, you should be raking in the ore now!
I hope that was quick and easy if you'd like to learn more about finding ore quickly you can read more here.
Don't want to flam too hard but, what's hilarious is I seem to remember posting about this at least two or three times several months ago and was only met with the hive mind telling me that raising the height limit will either A. Never ever happen, or B. Was irrevocably impossible to do (you know who you f$*%ing are). It obviously wasn't impossible and was a good idea at looky looky it's being implemented soon. Just goes to show guys, if you have good idea that you think is even relatively possible don't let hating DB's ruin it's support. Honestly that's one the reasons I left the Minecraft Forums in the first place, things seem to have changed though with Minecraft's demographic. Thanks to everyone who flooded Get Satisfaction and supported various Reddit posts about this impossible thing which "will never happen, sorry".
3
Animal Traps
Animal traps are different than monster traps for several reasons. For instance, monsters appear in darkness or in bulk at monster spawners, so you need to either create darkness or wait for night in order to trap and kill them. Animals on the other hand spawn on undisturbed grass in daylight conditions.
Animals can be killed in several ways. For traps, the most common methods include making them fall to their death, drowning them, or burning them in lava.
In order to optimize the effectiveness of your animal traps, we'll need to know more about them.
Important Animal Information
Animals are attracted to light and grass. If there is a lot of grass nearby, they will walk toward it. If they are completely surrounded by grass, they will wander aimlessly. If they can't see any grass, they will wander toward light. This is important, because you can attract animals to your traps at night, or keep them spawning all day if your trap is enclosed and well lit.
With the exception of the chicken, animals will die from a fall of 23 blocks.
Another very important difference with animals is that you can breed them using wheat. This means that you have more control over the amount of animals you have in your traps.
Let's go into a little detail about each animal type.
Chickens: Chickens drop feathers, meat and occasionally eggs. As you may know, these eggs can be thrown and broken to create more chickens, but there is only about a 30 percent chance of success at any given time. Breeding animals with wheat is much more efficient.
Cows: Cows drop more meat than any other mob, as well as leather for armor. When approached with a bucket, they will give you milk that's needed for crafting the almighty cake.
Pigs: Pigs drop one to two pork chops, which will come out cooked if they die from fire or lava.
Sheep: Sheep are needed for creating beds. They will drop more wool when sheered than when killed.
Monster Traps
With the exception of Nether Mobs, monsters appear only at night or in dark areas. They can also appear in dungeons which have a mob spawner block inside them. Monsters can be killed by the same means as animals.
Monster Traps
With the exception of Nether Mobs, monsters appear only at night or in dark areas. They can also appear in dungeons which have a mob spawner block inside them. Monsters can be killed by the same means as animals.
Important Monster Information
Monsters will always spawn 24 blocks away from where you are during their spawn cycle, so some monster traps fail to work if you are within that amount.
While monster mobs die in the same way that animal mobs do, there are some exceptions. Most monsters will die when they fall 23 blocks, but this has changed for some mobs, so your best bet for killing them via falling damage is about 26 blocks.
Cave Spiders: Cave spiders appear only underground and are most common near their spawners, which can be found in Abandoned Mines. They drop string and spider eyes.
Creepers: This most notorious monster drops gunpowder, which is needed for TNT. Traps that collect drops from creepers are a much sought after alternative to killing creepers on your own.
Skeletons: Skeletons drop bones and arrows. Since arrows are rather time consuming to make, skeletons drops are a great thing to come by.
Slimes: Slimes have been much more elusive than other mobs, but will be much more common in the 1.9 update. Their only drop—the slime ball—is the key ingredient used in crafting sticky pistons.
Spiders: Spiders are more common than Cave Spiders as they occur above ground, but they drop the same loot as Cave Spiders (string and spiders eyes).
Zombies: Zombies are a less desired mob for traps as of 1.8, since they now only drop rotten meat. Rotten meat is sometimes an alternative food source, but will more than likely give the player food poisoning.
Hope this helps clarify what should go into designing mob traps. I made a guide using some traps as examples that you can read here.
1
Please check it out and let me know what you think.
Step 1 Go to Block Level 1
To begin branch mining, hit F3 on your keyboard. This will open the memory menu. You will see a lot of data about what's being generated in front of you, but you need not worry about the majority of it.
On the left side of the menu there is an X, Y, and Z-axis listed. You only need to worry about the Y-axis, which tells you your level from bedrock. The best place to start your mine is anywhere from level 1 to level 15, so start digging. Do not dig straight down! That's like rule number one in Minecraft. If you dig down, you could wind up in a group of monsters, fall to your death, or get consumed trying to swim in lava.
Mining from level 1 up to level 15 is the best range from which you will discover diamond, iron, redstone, and gold in the same places.
Step 2 Start Your First Branch
Begin by digging into the wall, in any direction, 20 blocks deep. Be sure you are digging horizontally, not vertically. This will be your first branch.
Now dig anywhere from 2-5 blocks to the right or left and dig 20 blocks deep again.
Here is a branch mine that is 2 blocks wide. A 2 block wide branch mine will take the most time, but you will not miss any ore whatsoever.
Here is a branch mine that is 3 blocks wide.
This branch mine is 5 blocks wide. This will take less time, but since diamond and gold ore usually only occur in groups of 2-4 blocks wide, you are liable to miss a lot.
Here is a branch mine that is 2 blocks wide. A 2 block wide branch mine will take the most time, but you will not miss any ore whatsoever.
As you can see, there are different methods as to how much you can mine in your branch mine and each has their own benefits. Decide what works best for you.
Now do you same on the reverse side, or behind you. The space in between each set of branches is your mine shaft.
Step 3 Experiment with Levels
If after about twelve or more branches you aren't finding the ore you're looking for. Experiment with going up or down a level, but be sure to alternate your branches, or they'll merge into one.
Here is an example of a branch mine with shafts stacked on top of each other:
Congratulations, you should be raking in the ore now!
I hope that was quick and easy if you'd like to learn more about finding ore quickly you can read more here.
2