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VOOZH | about |
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VOOZH | about |
This tutorial provides useful survival tips when going to the Nether, whether you want to just visit or make a more permanent base there. This tutorial also explains how to beat the game by starting in the Nether with nothing.
The Nether is a dangerous place for even experienced players. It is filled with a host of exclusive mobs not found in the Overworld: hostile blazes, wither skeletons, ghasts, magma cubes, hoglins, piglins, and piglin brutes, and the neutral zombified piglin, as well as one passive mob, the strider.
The terrain is much harsher to navigate than in the Overworld: one false step could mean death by fiery lava. Nether fortresses and bastion remnants both spawn in the Nether. Nether fortresses are the homes of wither skeletons and blazes, and piglin brutes, piglins, and hoglins all spawn in bastion remnants.
This guide is intended to help you increase your chances of survival in the Nether and opening up a lot of gameplay such as brewing, nether hubs, the End, and the ender dragon and wither bosses.
To make a nether portal, the player needs to make a rectangular frame of obsidian, though the corners do not have to be obsidian.
A player can cast part or all of frame in place, by placing lava source blocks and using water to convert them to obsidian.
It is also possible to place blocks to the side and "hang" water off them to make most of the frame. This video illustrates the typical "speedrun" technique.
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Being well-equipped is essential for survival in the Nether. Lacking even a seemingly useless item in an unfortunate situation can put you in serious danger. However, be sure not to bring any items that have little or no use for your objective, leaving room to carry the loot you came to the Nether to find in the first place, as well as reducing the number of items lost if you die.
Carrying backup items to handle specific emergencies can take up more inventory space than carrying the minimum supplies to craft what you need as the situation arises, provided you take into account that you need to be in a safe place for the time it takes to place, or craft, a crafting table, then go through one or more steps of crafting to get what you need. For example, gravel is common in all Nether biomes except basalt deltas, so flint and steel can be crafted if that becomes necessary, provided you are carrying iron. It is unwise to bank on finding iron, as the only ways to find it are as rare loot in generated chests or by bartering. The same supply of iron serves in lieu of carrying replacement pickaxes, buckets, or weapons, but could take too long to craft into a bucket to scoop up unexpected lava. Huge fungus stems can provide logs, and thus make sticks, a crafting table, and so on, but they are not as versatile as logs from trees and could take a while to find if you're in the wrong biome (these blocks can be found only in the crimson or warped forests). Similarly, you could rely on finding blackstone rather than carrying cobblestone, but it isn't quite as versatile and isn't as easily found as gravel. Always carry logs, cobblestone, and iron, and possibly potions of Fire Resistance. If you have a lot of iron to spare, you may want to carry it as iron blocks, and bring pumpkins or jack-o-lanterns to build an iron golem if you get mobbed.
One of the most important tools in the Nether, especially in a structure, is a weapon. A melee weapon of iron or better is almost essential. A bow or crossbow, along with at least 64 arrows (or one if you have Infinity on your bow), is enough to dispose of any enemy. Glowstone is common in the Nether and allows a dwindling supply of arrows to be extended by turning them into twice as many spectral arrows,[Java Edition only] which are beneficial in their own right. While melee weapons work well in close quarters combat, consider bringing a crossbow or a bow in addition to your melee weapon, as ghasts and blazes can be troublesome without them.
An iron pickaxe or two (or a single diamond pickaxe) can be useful, as you can use it to clear a path, or to gather some blocks if you run out. It can also be used to carve a staircase into the side of a Nether fortress to gain access to it.
Always bring along a flint and steel because even if you don't intend to build a new nether portal, a ghast fireball can easily break a portal block inside the portal frame, leaving you stranded until it is relit with fire from a flint and steel, a fire charge, burning blocks adjacent to the portal frame, or even another ghast fireball. If you forgot to bring a flint and steel, all hope is not lost -- you can bargain with Piglins for iron (or find one in a chest), or you can make a fire charge from Nether materials (Wither Skeleton for coal, a Ghast for gunpowder, and kill a blaze for blaze powder).
Ensure your tools have enough durability to last long enough for you to achieve your goal.
Armor is also important. Even if you are not planning on doing much fighting, armor reduces the amount of damage you take from being submerged in lava, making it a potential life-saver should you accidentally fall in lava. A full set of iron armor should be enough to boost your chance of survival. Consider bringing diamond armor only if you are confident in your ability to survive (or if you're playing on Hardcore Mode), or else you may die and lose it. Shields can be useful for fighting the skeletons present in Nether fortresses and soul sand valleys. Wear at least one piece of golden armor to stop piglins attacking you, as this earns you their respect.
Striders can be the best means of travel in many situations. If you have a fishing rod and saddle, you need only locate some warped fungus and head down to a lava lake to lure a strider. Fishing rods are not found in the Nether, and string to make one appears only in some bastion remnant chests or as a drop from killed striders, so it's better to carry some rather than pulling off a dangerous heist or raid, hoping for lucky finds. You have better odds of coming across a saddle in a nether fortress or bastion remnant chest, but if your plan is to use a strider to find one of these structures, you need to have brought your own ahead of time. Killing striders in desperation as a source of dropped string could work, but it isn't the most practical or reliable means to do so.
If you don't have a saddle but by chance see a zombified piglin riding a strider, you can draw it close, and ideally onto land, by wounding the rider with an arrow (or even a thrown egg or snowball), then kill it and take the pre-saddled strider for yourself. They might even drop their warped fungus on a stick for you, but the odds of that are not high. Building some walls around yourself before trying this is probably necessary, since the zombified piglins in your area are likely to turn hostile when you attack the strider jockey.
Carrying a few boats can be helpful. Boats can help you slide off high cliffs without taking fall damage, and capture angry piglins, zombified piglins or endermen rushing toward you. Remember that boats cannot be crafted from nether wood types, so you have to bring logs from the Overworld if you want to craft more boats.
It can be helpful to carry some bone meal (or bone blocks if you have a lot). When applied to weeping and twisting vines, these vines can grow downward and upward rapidly with a few clicks. Then the player can climb the vines as a reliable, reusable method of vertical transport.
Enchantments offer huge advantages for surviving in the Nether, if you have access to a means of obtaining them. For your weaponry, you should consider damage-boosting enchantments on your weapons (e.g. Sharpness and Power). Be aware that all mobs in the Nether (except for regular skeletons, piglins, hoglins and endermen) are immune to fire damage, so enchantments like Fire Aspect should not be a priority. Infinity is absolutely a great bow enchantment, as it saves you inventory space carrying arrows, as well as the constant worry of running out of them.
For armor, a combination of both Protection and Fire Protection are helpful. Most water-related enchantments such as Aqua Affinity and Respiration offer no use in the Nether at all; however, Frost Walker allows you to walk normally across magma blocks without taking damage, which can sometimes make traveling in the Nether easier. However if you are patient you can Sneak across magma without having taking damage ; Swift Sneak can help. Enchanting your boots with Feather Falling can save your life by allowing you to drop down onto low terrain more safely. You may also enchant your boots with Soul Speed to traverse soul sand valleys at higher speeds, since walking on soul sand slows you down if you lack that enchantment; but keep in mind that moving too quickly means an easier time walking off ledges (and worse, into lava).
Enchanting your pickaxe with Efficiency II allows you to instantly break netherrack, however mining netherrack too quickly can expose hidden lava that rapidly flows out and engulfs you, so if you do not have fast reflexes, it is recommended that you use unenchanted pickaxes instead. Other pickaxe enchantments useful in the Nether are Unbreaking and Silk Touch. Unbreaking can save you bringing multiple pickaxes (but again, you can choose to devote on quantity instead of quality, and just craft new pickaxes when you need them). Silk Touch ensures that Nether gold ore drops the ore itself, guaranteeing you one gold ingot per ore block (instead of 4 nuggets on average with unenchanted pickaxe), as well as obtaining nylium, useful for farming nether wood and foliage.
In general, blocks are handy to bring along with you in the Nether. They can allow you to pillar jump to reach high places, block off mobs from reaching you, and allow you to bridge across to different masses of land over the lava oceans. Two or three stacks of cheap, non-flammable blocks (e.g. cobblestone) should be enough for a normal trip in the Nether. Blocks that are affected by gravity (e.g. sand or gravel) can be useful to get down from a high place; for example, from the top of a nether fortress bridge. The Nether's terrain is tough to navigate, so bringing these blocks can prove highly useful. A pickaxe can be useful in the event you run out of blocks, as it can be used to mine some of the abundant netherrack.
Bringing 10-14 obsidian is a good idea too, in the event you get lost and lose your portal home. Bear in mind that you also need your flint and steel to light this emergency portal.
Food is as important in the Nether as it is anywhere else in the game. If you run out of food, you lose your ability to sprint, and, more importantly, regenerate health. Running out of it can be fatal. Think about how long you are planning to be in the Nether, and how much fighting you might do, and bring an appropriate amount of food for it. Keep in mind that different foods provide different amounts of saturation, which is the most important thing for healing. The more saturation a food has, the more health you regenerate from eating it. Steak and porkchops are among the best foods for early gameplay, with bread, mutton and cooked salmon being acceptable alternatives.
Mushroom stew is also a good option, which can be crafted from mushrooms and "wood" found in the Nether. Bringing a few suitable flowers from the Overworld allows you to upgrade that to suspicious stew Using oxeye daisies provides 7 seconds of Regeneration, which can save your life if you are low on health with enemies nearby, or if you have been afflicted with Wither from a fight with a wither skeleton. Suspicious stew crafted from dandelions or blue orchids provides much more saturation than regular foods, which can also be used to heal a lot of health in a short amount of time. However, it is worth noting that stew cannot be stacked, and even the ingredients take up three (mushroom stew) or four (with a flower) inventory slots. Consider bringing around half a stack of "regular" food, in addition to the aforementioned ingredients that can be crafted into suspicious stew as you need. Use the regular food for maintaining your hunger, and the stew as a method of quickly regenerating health in dangerous situations.
Food sources in the Nether are rare but do exist, such as porkchops dropped by hoglins, and red and brown mushrooms that can be found scattered throughout the Nether. However these food sources are usually hard to find consistently, so don't expect to be able to keep yourself fed without bringing food from the Overworld.
If you have already explored the Nether and gotten some blaze rods, and can thus brew potions, you should do so. Fire Resistance potions are extra valuable in the Nether, as falling into lava is always a possibility. Splash potions of Healing can also save your life if you find yourself low on health in combat, like the suspicious stew (mentioned above). If you planned ahead and brought one or more water buckets, enough iron to make a cauldron (you can put water in a cauldron to put yourself out (Java Edition only), some bottles, and some cobblestone or blackstone (to craft brewing stands), before searching out a nether fortress, you can find everything else you need there to begin brewing potions, putting you in a much stronger position. A few stacks of torches can provide a means of leaving a trail, allowing you to find your portal again if you lose it. (Although, in this case, the use of coordinates is often a more practical solution.) Remember that compasses do not work in the Nether, so do not bring one intending to use it to find your way home unless it has been aligned to a lodestone. Torches are also useful for marking the parts of a nether fortress you have already visited, so less time is wasted exploring areas of the nether fortress you have already exhausted.
A small handful of empty buckets can be useful for removing lava in awkward places. They can also save your life if you run into one of the many single blocks of lava while digging through the netherrack.
Ender pearls can be extremely useful if you fall into lava. They are also useful for crossing lava pits, or reaching otherwise hard-to-access areas. However, you should consider that ender pearls are relatively hard to get, and you may want to save them for activating the end portal later (if you have not already done so). There are two easy ways to obtain ender pearls in the Nether: killing endermen that spawn abundantly in warped forests or bartering with piglins, which can give you almost a stack of ender pearls.
Gold ingots can be useful for bartering with piglins (as well as distracting them if they are angry with you) if you visit the nether wastes or crimson forest. You can get useful items like fire resistance potions, ender pearls, obsidian, and crying obsidian. If you have more than a stack of gold ingots, you can store them as gold blocks. Be careful not to drop gold blocks, as piglins pick them up and without giving you anything in return.
Netherrack is very abundant in the corresponding biomes in the Nether, but is also found in the Overworld around ruined portals. It can be used as a building block replacement in case of running out or smelted into Nether brick. This can be crafted into blast-resistant Nether bricks and Nether brick fences. Since Nether brick fences are also transparent, they offer a good use as windows and/or perimeters when building your first shelter around your portal. A quick way to craft 60 fences is as follows:
While the Nether's scenery is captivating, remember the Nether is a dangerous place. For the player's first visit, the main threats are falling, fire, getting lost, hoglins, and ghasts. The first two can be handled in the usual ways, but the most urgent threats are most likely ghasts and hoglins on account of the fact that the other hazards don't move or shoot at the player, excluding piglins (although they do not attack a player wearing at least one piece of golden armor who is not attacking or opening containers.) That said, don't be careless; sudden drops and holes can be hard to spot in the confusing netherrack landscape. Fire in the Nether is more dangerous than in other dimensions, as water cannot exist or be placed there. Magma cubes are also a threat considering their natural armor and the fact that they multiply like slimes, although the little ones still deal damage.
When you first arrive at the Nether, stay in the portal until the chunks around you load so that you can see what the immediate surrounding area looks like. Often, a Nether portal generates right next to a giant lake of lava or a high drop-off. If this is the case, then walking out of the Nether portal upon arrival likely results in death.
With a slower computer, the player may encounter a massive lag spike upon entering the Nether. The workaround involves doing the following: after the player steps out of the portal, turn on the debug info, then to pause the game. Note the "Chunks Updated" line—even while paused, the game is continuing to load chunks and update them. (This is not possible as of 24w09a, since the background is blurred.) It is wise to also note down the coordinates of the portal. The player can then wait for the chunk updates drop to zero, meaning the game has finished loading the region around them. Then, the player can resume play. This trick is also useful when the player changes their render distance.
Even though hunting, exploring, and mining may sound fun, it is unwise to start doing this as soon as the player steps into the Nether for the first time. The player's first order of business is to build a cobblestone shelter around the portal. Brick, stone, and other blast-resistant blocks also work, but cobblestone is cheapest in the Overworld. As noted above, nether brick fences can be crafted even before entering the Nether at all (by mining ruined portals for netherrack), and these are both transparent and blast-resistant.
Take the quickest possible look around, just enough to see what kind of ground the player is building on, then start building as fast as is practical. Unfortunately, a first portal has a disproportionate chance of coming out next to an abyss, lava lake, or netherrack wall, and even if it spawns in the open, there may be multiple ghasts in view.
Your shelter needs to be at least 5 blocks high, but the portal itself can be part of the roof. While it's tempting to do the same with a wall, it's probably safer to be able to walk around the portal on both sides. Use iron bars for windows. Make sure to leave enough space for a crafting table and a chest or two. The chests are important if the player does not want to lose too many of your items whenever you happen to die. Don't forget the door, either; wood suffices until you figure out where an outside button or lever could be placed where it is safe from fireballs. Note that if the player is building against a netherrack wall, you need a cobblestone back wall in front of that. If you want to dig there later, you can always put a door in. Once the player got the walls and ceiling up, likewise cover or replace the floor with cobblestone, extending it to under the walls. The walls should extend a block below floor level, and a little further under the doors. The shelter also needs a few blocks of cobblestone floor outside the doors, in case a ghast shoots the player while they're entering or leaving. You should end up with a space completely enclosed by cobblestone, iron, and perhaps a bit of obsidian.
Make sure you know which biome you're in:
Later on, you can start to make nice houses and bigger bases in the Nether, but for now, a cobblestone shelter with the portal, a chest, and a crafting table is sufficient. The only necessities are iron armor, a pickaxe, sword, and shovel (all iron), food, bow and arrows, cobblestone for making quick shelters, dirt or gravel for pillar-jumping or stopping lava, and your trusty flint and steel. The rest of the items or extra supplies can be stored in the chests. If the player is going any distance, bring enough obsidian to make an emergency portal.)
To prevent mobs from spawning in the player's Nether home/base, one can use transparent items or half-blocks as the floor. However, be warned that mobs can spawn on the Nether portal itself. Now that your Nether portal is safe, the player can start doing what they came to the Nether for!
The player's first resource should be their flint and steel. If for some reason the player does not have one, relighting the obsidian portal frame becomes much more difficult. If the portal was exposed enough to get hit by a ghast fireball, the player could persuade a ghast to hit it with another fireball by getting into the line-of-sight long enough to shoot the fireball. If the player dodges the fireball quickly enough and it hits the obsidian of the portal, the portal gets re-lit.
Another possible method is to take any flammable block and place it on one side of the block. By getting lava close to the flammable blocks, the lava can eventually light the wood, thus lighting the portal frame. Having the lava right on the opposite side of the frame of the flammable block is the fastest method. Also, the higher the difficulty, the faster the blocks catch on fire, so this method is more difficult in Easy or Peaceful difficulties. If the player also lacks a bucket, one can channel lava past the portal, or even build a trail of flammable blocks (planks are cheap, but wooden slabs are cheaper) to the nearest fire. That last method is especially tricky, as fire doesn't always catch. If this happens, try making it wider than one block.
A new set of flint and steel can be acquired. Looking in Nether fortresses or ruined portals, there is a chance of finding a flint and steel in a chest. Also, gravel occurs naturally in the Nether, so a player can collect flint from there. Iron nuggets can be bartered from piglins, even or made from smelting down armor or tools. This process requires having a furnace and fuel source (such as a bucket of lava). Iron nuggets can also be obtained from bartering with piglins.
Another option is to create a fire charge. This is trickier as it requires gunpowder, coal, and blaze powder, so the player may have to kill a ghast, wither skeleton and blaze to collect all three of these items. Fire charges work just like flint and steel, except each use uses up one item. Fire charge may also be found in ruined portal chest. Fire charges can also be obtained from bartering with piglins.
As a last resort, if the player has (or can make) a chest or two (they appear in nether fortresses, so you might be able to locate one), the player can stuff all their equipment into the chests (not forgetting armor), and then commit suicide. However, you lose your XP levels if you do this. Assuming the player is not playing on Hardcore and has not used a respawn anchor, they respawn in the Overworld, and can re-equip themselves at leisure (this time, not forgetting the flint and steel) before going back through the portal to collect their items. Note that this is more difficult on a multiplayer server because another player can come by and steal your items. If you have previously brought blaze rods back to the Overworld, you might even be able to use an ender chest, which can let you stash your stuff and pick it up back home from another such chest.
Additionally, if the player is holding a diamond pickaxe, they can break a block of the portal, replace it, and relight the portal.
Ghasts are one of the hardest and most annoying mobs to fight in Minecraft, mainly because of their floating ability and their long-ranged fireball, which does considerable damage to both players and the landscape. If you are bridge-building across a lava sea, they might shoot you off. (One direct hit can kill an unarmored player.) That said, they do have several weaknesses:
Hoglins have high health and a lot of knockback resistance. However, they can be burned, and they fear warped fungi. Some ways to get away from them are:
If there is nothing around to scare off a hoglin and your armor is low, you are best using ranged weapons or fire to kill hoglins.
Once the player finds a Nether fortress, they can obtain several other resources:
Once player finds a bastion remnant, they can obtain several other resources:
Piglins can be bartered with for a variety of resources:
When exploring the Nether, there are a few things to remember:
One of your main objectives in the Nether is to locate a Nether fortress. To see all the features of the Nether fortresses visually, try this video "here". Basically, their straight walkways and tall pillars are unmistakable but may be dimmed by distance. Be sure to look carefully into the abyss beyond the edges of the areas you explore; if you're not using Far render distance already, you can occasionally switch to it to see farther. If you do not see any, remember that the lava seas that generate in the Nether allow the player to spot more land, and a saddled strider can help in this regard. Be aware that sometimes, most of the fortress is engulfed in netherrack. Therefore, open your eyes and look for signs of fortress-like Nether bricks, blazes, and wither skeletons.
Even after spotting one, you may well need to find a way to get to it, or even build a bridge to it. (Suggestion: three-wide cobblestone, with two-high iron bars or nether brick fences for railings, and a roof. Those ghasts get really annoying when you're out on a bridge… you might even put in a couple of turrets for sniping at them, too.)
Once you do find one, it is a good idea to make sure you have the necessary supplies to gather its many resources. So, head back to your base, or even back to the Overworld, and get, at a minimum, a stone pickaxe, an iron sword and lots and lots of food. An enchanted golden apple is handy when it's time to take on a blaze spawner, but you may want to stash that nearby and go back for it when you actually find the spawner. Trading with piglins can also get you potions of fire resistance before the fight. Lots of walls of any non-flammable material or Nether brick fences are handy too: safety railings on the walkways are really nice when a ghast starts taking potshots at you and blocking off unused areas and broken bridges helps cut down on fights.
There are a few things that are of the utmost importance when exploring a Nether fortress:
Thebest way to navigate through a Nether fortress is with torches. When you finish a part of the Nether fortress, put a torch at the entrance of the room to help you explore the Nether fortress easily. Alternatively, you could block off the entrance with a certain block (like cobble). Wither skeletons can give you the Wither effect——a health draining status effect made by both a wither projectile or wither skeletons hitting you. Blazes are extremely dangerous and can be in the hallways and rooms, so make sure you are aware of that.
While a blaze spawner can be destroyed as usual with a pickaxe, you probably shouldn't do that unless you're sure you'll never, ever, want to hunt there. Blazes can spawn up to light level 11, up to 4 blocks away from the spawner (and a block above or below it), so simply placing torches on the spawner doesn't stop them from spawning. You'll need to plaster the area with a mix of jack-o-lanterns (or glowstone, shroomlight).
This lighting pattern should suffice to squelch a Blaze spawner: (Top view, all on the same level.)
An additional light block is needed above the spawner, as shown in the 3D image. If the area around the spawner is to be cleared, another light block is needed below the spawner as well.
There are many hints for fighting blazes on their page. Here are some useful ideas:
If you've mastered the Nether, you can go in and start making a Nether fortress more habitable. If you can have control of a Nether fortress on a multiplayer server, you can control who enters the area, and also control who gets blaze rods (as blazes spawn only in Nether fortresses). Mine down most (if not all) the netherrack covering the fortress. Make any surface where you don't want mobs with trapdoors or slabs. With the addition of Nether quartz, the one who controls a fortress can also control who gets Nether quartz from the area.
First, you should repair any bridges. This can prevent falling deaths in the Nether, but keep in mind it gives mobs more access to the Nether fortress as well. In many places, lava may be leaking in, so it is advisable to close off the area.
Almost all forts have a single roofed, large building, which you can use as the main building, where you can store all the necessities. You should put doors on the building, to prevent destructive mobs from entering.
DO NOT make a bed; beds explode in the Nether if you try to sleep on them. Otherwise, crafting tables are needed, and an ender chest might be useful (if one leaves the Nether in a hurry, they can get their items via another chest). Use a respawn anchor instead.
You should disable blaze spawners, so you can use them for mob grinding purposes later on, but also prevent blazes from overrunning the Nether fortress, as they are extremely hazardous.
Some parts of a Nether fortress have been filled in with netherrack and it can be a pain to dig it out. TNT is useful, though this risks damaging the fort, creating more hassle for the user. However, digging netherrack can give you a good source of Nether bricks——a good source of building material back home in the Overworld.
Nether wart plantations are in most Nether fortresses, with many warts in one plantation. They usually generate behind staircases, so keep an eye out when hunting for them. For more about Nether wart, see Tutorial:Nether Wart Farming.
If one finds a nearby fortress that is not attached to the first one, Nether bricks can be looted to repair the Nether fortress if in survival. Large parts of the fortress itself such as the pillars for bridges are solid, and Nether bricks can be looted from the inside of these pillars.
Killing the various mobs that spawn there is tricky. Blazes, zombified piglins, wither skeletons, and occasionally ghasts all pose a threat. Mobs spawn at a faster rate in a Nether fortress, and trying to kill all the zombified piglins is impractical, so it is best to just leave them alone, as a large pack of zombified piglins could knock you off into a lava ocean. A few of these mobs can be prevented from spawning at all with proper light levels. Blazes spawn at light level 11 and under and wither skeletons at 7 and under, so lighting up the entire area with torches is recommended. Ghasts need a large space to spawn, 5×4×5 blocks with a solid block beneath them, so light sources should prevent all those mobs except zombified piglins from spawning. The zombified piglins are neutral, so avoid accidentally hitting them and you'll be fine.
If imported farming does not work, you should use the naturally growing mushrooms to make soup, so you have a bit to eat, though it is preferable to make better food, such as bread, with imported dirt and wheat seeds. This, however, may prove difficult, due to the inability to hydrate farmland in the Nether. Chickens can also be brought in using eggs to provide raw chicken.
Lava is plentiful in the Nether, in huge lakes (a sea of lava is near the bottom) rivers, and falling from the ceiling. You must be careful around lava as water buckets do not work in the Nether, and ice disappears instead of melting into water. Also, lava spreads much faster and farther in the Nether than in the Overworld (7 blocks instead of 3). Two ways of crossing lava are to make a potion of Fire Resistance or eat an enchanted golden apple; while this effect is active, you can swim through lava without taking damage. However, lava is incredibly viscous compared to water, so swimming isn’t the ideal method of crossing. Fire Protection on your armor can also protect you from lava: if using iron armor or better with the maximum possible protection, you take only half a heart of damage every couple seconds (with higher tier armor reducing how often you take damage), which is small enough that it can be outpaced by the natural regeneration you receive from a full hunger bar. This level can be achieved by wearing 1 armor piece with Fire Protection IV and 3 with Protection IV, or by wearing 2 armor pieces with Fire Protection IV and 1 with Protection IV. Note, however, that this rapidly damages your armor's durability. This can be mitigated with the Unbreaking and/or Mending enchantments, or completely negated by using Netherite armor, which doesn't lose any durability from fire and lava damage. It also uses up food as you'll need to keep eating in order to keep healing, so it's not as suitable as a Fire Resistance potion for crossing large bodies of lava, but it does remove the danger of dying from accidentally falling into lava without having to constantly drink potions "just in case." Fire Protection also has the side benefit of reducing the amount of time it takes for you to stop burning if you catch on fire from the lava. If any lava is in the way of your builds, simply clear it out using a bucket or fill it with blocks, and then continue on.
If you can find and reach a lava flow's source block, you can bucket it just like in the Overworld. Unfortunately, in the Nether, much of the lava is pouring down from great heights. Normally, use cobblestone, or iron bars to contain lava or direct it away from you (if you use flimsy blocks like dirt or netherrack, a ghast fireball can undo your work in a moment!) As always, if you mine upward, then watch for dripping red particles (if you have particles turned on). The drip itself does no damage, but if you mine a dripping block, lava pours down. If you wish to get rid of lava flowing from the ceiling (in your way, or immediate hazard), you must block jump up to the source (or simply aim at the ceiling), and cover the hole with any non-flammable block (if it's flowing straight down from a flat ceiling, you may need an extra block next to the flow to place the dam). One must be extremely careful about the placement of the block, however—if misplaced, the block can just spread the lava wider.
You can ride a saddled strider and control it with warped fungus on a stick to cross a lava ocean. Make sure you know how to get back, though. Lava oceans are sometimes big and easy to lose direction in. If you want, you can drink a combination of Night Vision and Fire Resistance potions while exploring lava seas, because you can swim across lava to the bottom to scan the ground for ancient debris, which can rarely generate under lava seas.
Zombified piglins are common in the Nether wastes and crimson forests, and roam in packs of 4-10. Before 1.16, zombified piglins were instead known as zombie pigmen. They are neutral mobs, meaning that they don't attack unless you attack them. However, if you attack one zombified piglin in a group, the whole group (and any others in a wide range) swarms you like wolves, easily killing any unprepared player. When a zombified piglin is attacked, all others in a wide range (33 to 55 blocks horizontally and 10 blocks vertically) of the victim become hostile and give chase if you are within 40 blocks of them. This can be avoided if you kill the zombified piglin in one blow, but that's easier said than done. Do this by using a diamond sword enchanted with Smite IV or above and a critical hit[note 1]. They can see you only in a 40-block radius — any zombified piglins between those distances are turned hostile, but do not move toward you (instead of wandering as normal) until you come into sight. This can be a nasty gotcha: When you defend yourself, any zombified piglin within a new 33 to 55 block range become enraged. As of version 1.8, zombified piglins forgive you over time if you leave them alone for 20 to 39.95 seconds, although if you are still within their 40 block pursuit radius, they continue to attack. If you really need to get gold from them, stand on a two-block high pillar in an open space and then kill them. However, piglins and ghasts get really annoying on the platform.
It is usually better to leave these creatures alone, but if you want gold nuggets, or you want to increase your level (killing many zombified piglins gives you a lot of experience), you can safely attack the zombified piglins in various ways. Also, if you have to fight zombified piglins, make sure there isn't much (or even better, no) lava or fire surrounding you. You may have to move around a lot to fight all of them at once, and distractions make it worse (also, you may need to collect your stuff after getting killed).
Note that zombified piglins wield and carry golden swords, which can sometimes be enchanted, but they usually drop only rotten flesh and gold nuggets, rarely dropping gold ingots or their swords. Their swords can sometimes be enchanted, with the level of the enchantment varying depending on the difficulty.
As mentioned earlier, ghasts shoot deadly fireballs at you when you're in their sight of 100 blocks, so stay alert for incoming fire any time you're in the open, or exposed to open space. Their noises can give some warning, but their fireballs travel even farther than their sounds, in fact the fireballs travel for one minute before despawning (or until the ghast is dead), so this isn't a reliable warning. Cobblestone resists the fireballs, which is why you should bring a lot.
However, ghasts can give you trouble with zombified piglins around! If you bounce back one of their fireballs, the fireball now counts as your attack, and if a zombified piglin so much as gets touched by the blast, it becomes provoked (along with all its buddies in and out of sight).
Pro tip: when the fireball is within the player's reach, aim at the ghast and punch. As long as the fireball is in your FOV you can hit the ghast. NOTE: If surrounded by multiple ghasts, constantly hitting attack while aiming at a Ghast throws all fireballs in that direction, regardless of which direction they are coming from (they still need to be within reach). Do be careful, however, with bouncing fireballs back at ghasts on the ground, as the explosion from the fireball can not only damage the vicinity, but provoke zombified piglins as above.
Remember that unlike shulker bullets, ghast fireballs do not follow the player. If you are in a difficult situation, just run to a safe place. You can always outrun the impact area.
Although they cannot be found in the "general" Nether, blazes can spawn in Nether fortresses, both naturally and through spawners. For the first run, it is strongly recommended to find an enchanted golden apple. As of the Minecraft 1.9 update, these can no longer be crafted but can be found in chests in various locations: monster rooms, desert pyramids, mineshafts, woodland mansions, etc. Failing that, loading your armor up with Fire Protection and Protection enchantments can help; maximum protection comes with 10 levels total of Fire Protection, with each two levels of regular Protection counting as one of Fire Protection.
After that first run, your first two blaze rods (and some nether wart) let you brew potions of fire resistance; use the first one to make a brewing stand, then craft the second into blaze powder. The first piece of blaze powder fuels the brewing, the second can make magma cream if you haven't picked any up yet, but if you do have some it can be used to make Potions of Strength (with a bit of redstone, your potions last even longer). At this point, you can run away and come back with potions of Fire Resistance. This makes you completely immune to their fireballs, and if you keep a block or so distance, you can avoid their melee attack.
Once you've gotten more comfortable with the blazes, you can build one of the spawners into a farm, by casing over the spawner area with Nether brick fence, and digging a hole underneath for the blazes to slowly descend into.
Magma cubes are slime-like mobs that spawn in the Nether wastes and spawn abundantly in basalt deltas, generally near lava (hence the name magma cube). They look like burnt slimes with yellow eyes, and seem to have springs under them (they jump fairly high and the "springing" is visible). Their properties are much like slimes, as killing a large one results in it splitting into 2-4 medium-sized ones, which splits into 2-4 small ones. The large and medium magma cubes have a chance of dropping magma cream and experience when killed. You can prevent magma cubes from spawning in your base by making the floor out of transparent blocks. As mentioned earlier, you can stand on a pillar to kill magma cubes, but any ghasts or crossbow-wielding piglins might really annoy you.
Wither skeletons are tall, dark skeletons, wielding stone swords. They inflict the Wither effect for 10 seconds with a hit. They walk when idle, but sprint toward a player when they see one. However, they can't pass through a two-block-high space, which makes them somewhat easy to deal with. They drop bones, coal, and occasionally their stone sword. They also have a small chance to drop a wither skeleton skull, which are essential to summoning the wither boss. These types of skeletons are found only in Nether fortresses. They can roam in groups in fortress hallways, so be careful of blazes and the Wither effect in this situation. Knockback is good for packs where you want them as far away as possible.
Piglins commonly spawn in Nether wastes, crimson forests, and in bastion remnants and are armed with either golden swords, golden spears, or crossbows. The adults are by default hostile, but if you have at least one piece of gold armor on they become neutral toward you, and the babies are always passive. Throwing a golden item at them pacifies them for a moment. When killed, they have a small chance of dropping their golden sword or crossbow, any armor they naturally spawned with, and they drop any picked up items. If you barter with them by throwing or using[1] a gold ingot on them, they throw something back, as seen on the bartering page. You can prevent them from spawning by thoroughly lighting up the area as they spawn at light levels 11 or below. They also run from soul fire related blocks and zombified piglins. If they go into the Overworld through a Nether portal, they start to shake and turn into zombified piglins shortly after.
Hoglins are large pig-looking mobs, which drop raw porkchops, leather, and experience upon death. They spawn in crimson forests and bastion remnants. They are naturally hostile with 40 health points. They run from warped fungus, Nether portals, and respawn anchors. They run toward players and fling the player into the air upon hitting. Unlike most hostile mobs, hoglins can be led with leads and bred with crimson fungi. If they go into the overworld through a nether portal, they start to shake and turn into a zoglin shortly after. Hoglins make good sources of food when you run out of them in the Nether for long periods of time or if you get lost.
Many resources in the Nether are essential for brewing potions:
Living in the Nether can be a challenging yet rewarding option. There are many resources that can only be obtained easily in the Nether. The Nether's unique coordinate system could provide an advantage in transport, particularly on multiplayer servers.
You can start by importing some dirt to grow plants. You can even use a hoe to till it into farmland, but there's a catch: With no water available, you need to till the ground, then plant your seed immediately, before the farmland reverts to dirt. Likewise when harvesting wheat, replant immediately and keep the hoe on your hotbar. This works for all the farmland crops: wheat, melons, pumpkins, carrots and potatoes and beetroot. Melons would be the most reliable as after the stem is fully grown, hydration does not affect the rate at which melons grow. Wither skeletons can provide bones for bone meal to speed this process. Cocoa plants are farmable on jungle logs as usual, so that gives you cookies too. You can also farm sweet berries. While you're at it, you can layout a few blocks of soul sand for a Nether wart farm.
It is also possible to build an 8×8 platform, plant mushrooms on two opposite edges, and then use bone meal. This can provide you with a steady source of mushroom stew, and you can put torches or saplings in the other corners. On dirt or grass, mushrooms need a light level of 7 or below, but on podzol, mycelium, or nylium, applying bone meal causes them to grow into their respective huge mushroom type at any light level. Nylium is also the only block in the Nether on which you can farm mushrooms, and that is crucial (or alternatively, bring podzol or mycelium from the Overworld).
Once you've gotten used to Nether dangers, you can invade and repair a nether fortress, as it provides many Nether commodities, such as blazes and nether wart. However, falling is a real danger, as there might be a lava ocean below you. If you're in survival, and you've found multiple Nether fortresses (not connected but nearby) you can loot Nether bricks to repair your favorite Nether fortress. You can smelt netherrack into individual Nether bricks, then craft your own walls, stairs, and fences. You can also transform bastion remnants in similar ways. For bastion renmants, block off any lava, and fill in any gaps. Try to fix up the jagged edges of the bridges/walkways. Make the bastion into an bartering farm/magma cream farm. Add decorations and fix up the bastion.
You'll want wood for tools and torches (and perhaps to smelt into charcoal), so make a tree farm as well. Wood also provide charcoal for torches and smelting. Oak trees also provide the occasional apple for golding, but that's not really a food supply. If you want Nether woods variants, you can grow huge fungus as they don't need dirt, but nylium to grow. Also, Nether wood is inflammable.
Another catch: Trees need space to grow, and ghasts need space to spawn. Happily (and contrary to popular belief), ghasts do spawn on blocks, and they need a 5×5 space free of transparent blocks and slabs. You can scatter slabs, glass and glowstone around the floor of your tree farm. You can plant saplings with glowstone adjacent, and slabs on top of the diagonal blocks. You can do this in rows for max efficiency. If you're low on glowstone, jack o'lanterns and torches suffice. You also need at least 4 blocks of air above the sapling. Using this method of tree farming, you can have a large enclosure for mass wood farming without ghasts! If not too densely lit, your tree farm also serves for bone-meal assisted huge mushrooms, which is useful for mushroom stew. The most basic way to safely farm trees is to have a 5×5×7 room with a floor made out of glowstone or glass (if you are using glass, make sure to put torches next to the sapling) and have a single block of dirt in the middle of the floor.
Chickens can also be farmed in the Nether (by bringing in eggs or by killing chicken jockeys), but likewise, take space, and warrant anti-ghast measures. There is gravel around for flint and Nether wood for sticks, so with the chickens for feathers, you can make arrows.
Cows, pigs and sheep can be brought through the portal, which can provide you with wool, leather, and meat. Sheep require special measures: You'll need to get a grass block with a Silk Touch tool or killing an enderman holding one and use that to start grass on a well-lit dirt floor, so they can regrow their wool. You can also just breed the sheep until you have a lot, and then shear some of them and kill the sheared ones. However, the sheep do not re-grow their wool.
Villagers can be brought into the Nether through a portal, either using a boat or minecart. Make sure the portal is protected, so ghasts don't fireball you or damage the villager. Villagers can use beds without blowing them up, allowing for artificial villages and iron golem farms to function properly. They do run away from zombified piglins even though zombified piglins don't attack them.
Some things can't be produced in the Nether, and need to be brought in from the Overworld: There are no ores, besides nether quartz ore, ancient debris, and nether gold ore. There is no diamond supply unless you import it from the overworld or you find it in bastion remnant or nether fortress chests. Emerald, iron, redstone and lapis lazuli are renewable through villagers, and gold is renewable through zombified piglins. Iron is also renewable from bartering, as well as water, though it has to be stored in cauldrons. Coal is renewable from wither skeletons or smelting overworld wood. Blackstone can be used as an alternative to cobblestone. You can get the Pigstep music disc and the snout banner pattern from a bastion remnant, and diamonds and horse armor can be obtained through a nether fortress.
Paper and sugar is crafted with sugarcane, which can't grow without water. You can get string from killing striders or bartering with piglins. Fishing rods cannot be used for fishing as there no water, but can be used to craft warped fungus on a stick to ride striders or reel in mobs. The same applies to some ingredients for brewing: Besides sugar, there are no spider eyes. They must be brought in from the Overworld. However, the piglins can provide occasional water bottles.
A bone meal farm is essential to obtaining mushroom stew through a mushroom farm, and farming trees and fungi. Most vegetation items in the Nether can be composted in a composter, including nether wart, shroomlights, nether wart blocks, warped wart blocks, weeping vines, twisting vines, warped roots, crimson roots, nether sprouts, crimson fungi, and warped fungi. However, weeping vines and twisting vines, found in the Nether forest biomes, are arguably the easiest to grow in large quantities because they grow to a maximum length of 25 blocks, and the twisting vines specifically grow up from the ground like sugar cane or bamboo which makes it simple to harvest. Twisting vines and weeping vines can therefore both be farmed in a manner similar to sugarcane, with the whole plant growing from one single source block.
Farming these vines is quite simple. For twisting vines, plant them on any solid block on the ground. After it has grown tall enough that you'd like to harvest it you can break the second block off the ground, to destroy the entire stem but leave the one from which the plant is growing and avoid having to replant them. Weeping vines can be a bit more challenging to farm because they grow down instead of up. But, ideally you plant them on the ceiling and make a platform to reach them and collect your harvest (again, using the second block from the source block from which the whole plant is growing), and then the plants fall onto the ground. You can then use the items on a composter to create bone meal. When farming either one of these be sure to allow your plants plenty of space to grow.
Vegetation farming is essential to tree farms, hoglin farms, and strider farms. When you bone meal nylium of any type, it generates vegetation on that nylium block and surrounding nylium blocks. The vegetation includes fungi of both types, roots of both types, and nether sprouts. Certain types of nylium generate more of their color type of vegetation, for example crimson nylium generates mostly crimson fungi and roots, but can generate warped vegetation. The only thing you need to obtain from these farms is warped and nylium fungus, used for breeding animals and growing trees. All other items are used only as decoration. There is no setup for this, but make sure you are doing it on the maximum amount of nylium possible so that there is space for it to generate. If your area of nylium is not wide enough, you can spread it by putting bone meal on netherrack adjacent to nylium. You can also obtain nylium in the warped forest, where endermen are often found holding it
When a fungi is placed on its corresponding nylium and then fertilized with bone meal, it can turn into a huge fungi. Warped (blue) fungi can turn only into a huge warped fungi if placed on warped nylium (blue nylium), and vice versa with crimson. There is no special setup, but you need to destroy the nether wart blocks (fastest with a hoe), because it needs space to be able to generate a huge fungi. Also, after it grows into a huge fungus, the nylium below it decays into netherrack, and you need to apply bone meal to it, which turns it back into nylium if there is adjacent nylium next to the netherrack.
Mushroom stew is the easiest food to farm. When bone meal is applied to a mushroom placed on any nylium, it can grow into a huge mushroom. They can be placed on nylium only to be fertilized, and unlike other blocks like dirt, they do not require a low light level to grow. Setup:
After the establishing food and wood farms, you can begin the next stage of progression. Next, you need to explore. Exploring is the most essential part to the next step of your progression. While exploring, you need to
Next, you want to do bartering with the piglins. Hopefully, you have around two stacks of gold ingots, which can be a grind to get. You can drop a gold ingot near piglins or use it on them. They'll pick it up and drop you a random item.
You are looking for several items in particular:
That's all you should need for exploring the bastion remnant or the Nether fortress. However, you can receive many more good things. Visit the bartering page for more information.
Find a Nether fortress and break in. Use the right hand torch rule for exploring. Take the loot from the chests and try to find diamonds. Get Nether wart and blaze powder. Make some ender chests and put your loot inside. Have some spare eyes of ender if you don't yet have Silk Touch. Avoid blaze spawners, as you don't have a lot of armor. Kill lone blazes and as many wither skeletons as possible. You need 3 wither skeleton skulls to spawn the wither. There is no way to craft enchanting tables, so you can get Looting only through ruined portals. When fighting, make sure piglins, other skeletons, other blazes, and endermen cannot get to you when you are fighting.
Find a bastion remnant. Be careful with piglins. When looting chests, block yourself in or place hoppers under the chests. If you have one, put the loot in an ender chest. Kill the piglin brutes as they aren't distracted or scared by anything, and they always pursue the player. If the bastion is a treasure bastion, you can get diamond armor, tools and diamonds. Keep raiding bastions until you get enough diamonds.
Once you get enough diamonds, make only a diamond sword and pickaxe. Don't make the other tools. If you can, make some diamond armor. The next step is upgrading your items to netherite. Make a smithing table and start mining. If you have a strider farm, breed striders and kill them for string. Make as much wool as possible and prepare beds. Go underground, and use beds to blow up areas. 4 ancient debris yield 4 netherite scraps. 4 netherite scraps + 4 gold ingots makes an netherite ingot. Using the smithing table, upgrade your equipment to netherite. Next, find a good place to spawn the wither. It is recommended to spawn it in a large flat area. Reinforce the area with obsidian, as many layers as you want. You should reinforce the base with as much obsidian as possible, just in case the wither flies away and hits your buildings.
Potions are not necessary but vital if you are taking on the wither. Craft a brewing stand with a blaze rod and 3 blackstone. You need nether wart to brew potions, so set up a farm with soul sand. You also need blaze powder to fuel it. Now, Water Bottles are obtained through bartering with the piglins. The only way to obtain water bottles in the Nether is through bartering. Piglins have a 2.18% chance to give you a water bottle when bartered with. Using water bottles, you could make potions with the ingredients limited to those that occur only in the Nether, which include blaze powder for potion of strength, ghast tears for potion of Regeneration, glistering melon slice for potion of Healing, golden carrots (from various loot) for potion of Night Vision, and magma cream for potion of Fire Resistance. You can use glowstone dust to to increase the potency of your potions, however reducing the duration, or gunpowder to turn it into splash potions you can throw, taking less time to use the potion on yourself.
After you got the skulls and soul sand needed, and have picked the place to spawn the wither, place 4 soul sand in a T shape, and place 2 skulls on top, but don't place the 3rd one until you are ready to fight. Prepare at least a full set of iron/diamond armor with a piece of gold armor. Bring fire resistance, and a netherite sword/pickaxe. Bring a bow with as many arrows as possible. (You can get arrow from bastions, or you can barter for spectral arrows.)
Go to the wither spawning location, and block up dangerous areas with obsidian, including the floor. If you can, fight in a warped forest, as withers attack endermen. A crimson forest is also a good place to fight the wither as the wither will attack hoglins and piglins and the piglins are hostile and will attack the wither, aiding you in the fight.
At the start of the fight, fire fully charged arrows at it. Watch out for the skulls and hide to restore hunger/health. If the wither breaks the obsidian, reinforce it. At half health, use your sword to hit the wither until it is dead. Do critical hits to kill faster. Once the wither is dead, pick up the nether star, and prepare the beacon base. (You cannot make the beacon yet because there is no way to obtain glass). Once you have all the mineral blocks you need, build the portal to the overworld. Set up your beacon to show you beat the Nether survival challenge. You can continue on this world and do what you want.
Watch the Nether survival challenge on Pixlriffs' channel on youtube. Pixlriffs
Also Watch the Nether survival challenge(Season 2 ) on Binary Vigilante’s Channel on YouTube [1]
