Characters / Minecraft: Overworld: Hostile Mobs

Main Character Index > The Overworld (Hostile Mobs) | The Nether
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Undead

As a Whole

The Undead are a group of mobs that share certain traits: they are healed by Potions of Harming and harmed by Potions of Healing, the Wither will not attack them, they are immune to drowning and the Poison effect, and they'll catch fire and burn to death at daybreak. Undead mobs also take extra damage from weapons enchanted with Smite. Many can also pick up and use items.

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• Bandit Mook: All types of zombies and skeletons can pick up stray items, so don't be surprised if you die and find one wearing your armor. This actually extends to any item, so it's entirely possible to find a zombie trying to beat you to death with a bundle of wheat.
• Heavily Armored Mook: All types of zombies and skeletons have a chance of spawning in a full suit of armor, increasing their durability.
• Kick the Dog: Zombies and skeletons will actively attack any baby turtles they can detect, just because. Additionally, zombies (all types) will actively seek out turtle eggs to stomp on them.
• Kryptonite-Proof Suit: If they spawn wearing a helmet then they'll be immune to sunlight, at least until the helmet runs out of durability.
• Organ Drops: Zombies (both human, human derivative, and piglin) drop their flesh, skeletons their bones, and phantoms their wing membranes.
• Revive Kills Zombie: Potions of Harming heal them, Potions of Healing harm them, and they are unaffected by Regeneration and Poison potions.
• Super Not-Drowning Skills: Zig-zagged. Prior to 1.13, all undead enemies were capable of swimming through water just like the player can. From 1.13 onwards, zombies and skeletons will now sink to the bottom of any body of water, though they cannot actually drown. Husks will transform into zombies when underwater, and zombies into drowned. The latter cannot drown under any circumstances, because they already have. Meanwhile, Phantoms can glide in and out of water to attack players without any problems.
• Weakened by the Light: Most undead (including phantoms) are set on fire by the sunlight, and torches can prevent them from spawning. ^note Husks and Zombified Piglins, however, are immune to sunlight. However, zombies and skeletons wearing helmets won't burn up in the sunlight due to their head being protected. Doesn't make them any more dangerous, but it can catch people off guard when they think all the enemies are gone. Also, if being chased by a zombie while the sun is up, and it just started burning, DO NOT escape into the water, as water also keeps them from catching on fire, and will put them out if they enter it, and worse still: if they drown they become a Drowned.

Zombies

Zombies & Zombie Villagers

The first hostile mob added to the game. They make moaning sounds and drop rotten flesh when they die, which can be used in place of other meat to heal tamed wolves. Desert Biomes spawn a variant of zombie called the Husk; these cause a hunger effect should their unarmed attacks hit. A variant called the Drowned can spawn from a body of water (either naturally or via a zombie being drowned); this variant is capable of ranged attacks.

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• Artificial Brilliance: They received a massive AI improvement in the 12w03a pre-release. They're capable of navigating mazes and can actually see the player through a window. It will also run for shelter or water when in daylight. There's also a neat quirk in that when a zombie is attacked, other zombies will chase after you even if you're outside their detection radius, this can result in something killing a single zombie in a cave only to be swarmed by other nearby zombies you haven't noticed. Minecraft 1.6.1 increased the aggro range of zombies so they can become hostile from a greater distance. This also means zombies will detect villagers from a greater distance. One person decided to test the pathfinding of a zombie by placing it in a hedge maze with a villager at the end of it. The results show the zombie going through the maze without hitting any dead ends at all, though the zombie's aggro range was modified to be higher to test the pathfinding.
• Artificial Stupidity: Beforehand, zombies would walk in a straight line, regardless of what paths they could or could not find, which made them prime testing subjects for lava traps. Even after being given improved pathfinding abilities, the fact that they will prioritize attacking you over everything else means that they can still be very easy to kill. Zombie walks towards you, you hit it before it can hit you, it flies back. Walks up to you again, you hit it before it can hit you, it flies back. Repeat. Even while on fire in the daylight, zombies will still make a beeline for you rather than trying to cool off in the shade or water, and will actively leave shelter to walk through open daylight to reach you. Also, unlike skeletons and strays, zombies won’t seek out shade or water during the day, even if they haven’t locked onto the player, instead just standing out in the open until they burn to death.
• Bad People Abuse Animals: Zigzagged. They don't usually attack non-villager mobs, but they do stomp turtle eggs and attack baby turtles.
• Elite Zombie: Zombies have a rare chance of spawning with armor and weapons, which may even be enchanted. There's also child zombies, faster and more annoying than the adult ones, chicken jockeys (see below) and, on Hard difficulty, random zombies that can spawn more zombies (see below).
• Enemy Summoner: A variation: they have a passive ability on Hard difficulty that gives them a chance to spawn another zombie nearby when the player attacks them. This mostly occurs out of sight, in crevices you can't see, but they can occasionally spawn right next to the one you're attacking.
• Everything's Deader with Zombies: They don't perfectly fit most of the usual zombie tropes — they didn't cause the collapse of civilization, can't turn the player into a zombie, and are not animated by black magic. However, their occasional sieges of villages definitely fit the typical zombie mold, and they do have the ability to convert Villagers into Zombies. In the end, though, they're just another type of monster among many, seemingly added only for the sake of having zombies.
• Fake Ultimate Mook: It's possible for a zombie to spawn with a strong, perhaps even enchanted, weapon, and tough armor. This may seem to make it a threatening opponent, but all zombies share the same slow movement speed and simplistic AI, so even a well-equipped zombie is barely more of a threat than usual.
• The Goomba: Zombies are by far the most common hostile mob. Their slow speed and straightforward attack patterns make them generally very easy to fight. As a result, they're typically only dangerous in groups, and even then only if you don't know what you're doing. However, they are not completely inconsequential or harmless: they can see the player from farther away than most other monsters, can pick up and use items like weapons and armor, can turn villagers into zombie villagers, they can spawn in massive groups near villages, are immune to drowning, and come in stronger, faster forms.
• Guest Fighter: A zombie becomes playable alongside Steve as an alternate costume in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate.
• Impossible Item Drop: They usually drop rotten flesh or whatever armour they're wearing, but there's a tiny chance they'll drop carrots, potatoes, or iron. Though they no longer do this, zombies originally dropped feathers of all things when they died, as chickens had not yet been implemented and Notch couldn't think of another way for players to get ahold of feathers.
• Infernal Retaliation: Zombies set on fire will also set you on fire when they land a hit on you.
• One-Gender Race: Zombie villagers aside, they all look like undead Steves. By extension females should look like undead Alexes, but there are none of those around in the game.
• Organ Drops: Their rotten flesh. It heals two notches of hunger, but also gives you food poisoning and makes you hungry again faster.
• Our Zombies Are Different: They have the classic arms-forward walk and green skin, and burst into flames when exposed to sunlight. They drop rotten flesh when killed. Although they can convert villagers into more zombies, they only do it upon killing them, rather than infecting them with something that slowly turns them into a zombie.
• Rare Random Drop: Zombies have a small chance of dropping iron swords, iron shovels, iron ingots, and iron helmets. The tools and armor also have a shot at being enchanted already. Snapshot 12w32a nerfed the rare drops from zombies by making the tools they drop extremely worn down to the point where they are almost ready to break.
• Super-Persistent Predator: Zombies have an aggro radius over twice as large as other hostile mobs, and may very well chase you until day rises if you can't run away fast enough. They'll even bust down doors to get to you on higher difficulties!
• Took a Level in Badass: Early in development, Zombies were just another enemy to fight and their AI was so basic that it was easy to exploit. Thanks to several updates, zombies are a lot smarter where they will actively avoid lava or steep drops when they chase you. Zombies can also break down your wooden doors (Hard difficulty only), pick up items that are dropped, use iron swords or iron shovels as weapons (or even another tool/weapon if they picked one up), wear armor, and zombies can survive in the daylight if they wear a helmet. Later updates allowed them to deal more damage as their health decreases and, on harder difficulties, get a small chance to spawn more zombies when damaged! Finally, if they die from drowning, they become a more dangerous Drowned. Needless to say, zombies have come a long way.
• Turns Red: An update made zombies deal more damage as their health gets lower.
• Would Hurt a Child: There are baby zombies. In addition, they attack baby turtles, and they can corrupt baby villagers.
• Zerg Rush: When one zombie is attacked by the player, other zombies in the area will sense it and start swarming. In Hard difficulty, zombies who are attacked have a chance to summon another zombie as reinforcements.
• Zombie Gait: They slowly shamble towards you with their arms stretched out.

Husks

A variant of zombies found only in deserts. They turn into regular zombies if they drown.

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• Elite Zombie: They're more dangerous than normal zombies, since they don't burn in sunlight and inflict you with the Hunger debuff when they hit you.
• Mummy: Seem to give off this vibe, being desert undead dressed in rags. Oddly, under the Shakespearean English option, the Stray is referred to as "Mummy", as indicated by its spawn egg, or rather "Adder Stone", while the Husk is referred to as "Fear Gortach."
• No-Sell: Unlike other zombie types, they don't burn in the sun.
• Status Infliction Attack: They're also able to inflict the Hunger debuff when they hit you, making your hunger bar decrease faster than normal.
• Underground Monkey: A desert-themed variant of the basic zombie. They cause food poisoning/hunger status should they hit the player via unarmed attack, and will not burn in the sun.
• Vader Breath: They seem to let out raspy exhales, rather than the standard zombie snarls.

Drowned

A variant of the zombie that was introduced in the Update Aquatic, Drowned are technically neutral mobs and they can either spawn naturally in bodies of water, including ocean, rivers, and aquifers in Dripstone Caves, or can be created when a regular zombie dies through drowning damage. They have a chance to drop tridents when they die.

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• Amazing Technicolor Population: Drowned have teal blue skin, with light blue eyes and mouths.
• Animation Bump: A minor example, but in Bedrock Edition, they're the only hostile mob to have a dedicated swimming animation. Java Edition wouldn't give them one until much later, although it's much simpler.
• Aquatic Mook: The water-dwelling counterpart of the common zombie, but also able to walk on land. Despite this, they're not any more vulnerable to the Impaling enchantment, because they're classified as Undead mobs and not water-based ones.
• Body Horror: They’re significantly more deformed than the other types of zombies, considering that they have glowing gaps in their skin and their nose and lips are gone and replaced with glowing pits. They also sound like they're drowning forever.
• Came Back Wrong: Lure zombies into the water to drown and they'll come back as these nasty, ugly things.
• The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard: When the player wields a trident, they can only throw one before they have to go over and retrieve it (or have their Loyalty Enchantment help them out). When Drowned wield a trident, they have an endless supply of them to throw at the player.
• Elite Zombie: They're a tougher, more challenging version of the standard weak zombie, able to move underwater indefinitely without taking drowning damage and having access to powerful ranged attacks if they spawn with a trident.
• Fantastic Race Weapon Affinity: They use tridents that they throw at the player. Killing them is the only way of obtaining these weapons in Survival mode.
• Glowing Eyes of Doom: Their eyes and mouths are lit up with a cyan glow.
• Night Swim Equals Death: Drowned are much more dangerous after dark, and will pursue their victims even past the shoreline.
• Prongs of Poseidon: Drowned, being a zombie variant found in underwater environments, are characterized by the fact that they're the only mobs to naturally spawn with tridents.
• Set a Mook to Kill a Mook: Similarly to skeletons, if a drowned hits another mob with its trident, that mob will start attacking the drowned and they will fight each other to the death.
• Underground Monkey: An ocean-themed variant of the basic zombie, capable of ranged attacks instead of being limited to a basic melee tackle.
• Unusable Enemy Equipment: Downplayed; you can loot the weapon of a trident-wielding Drowned, but only if it drops it upon death. On the other hand, tridents thrown by Drowned cannot be picked up even if they miss or are blocked by the player, presumably as an anti-farming measure similar to that used with Skeletons' arrows.

Baby Zombies

Small, fast zombies, which have a 5% change of spawning when a zombie otherwise would; husk and drowned versions also exist. First added in version 1.4, the Pretty Scary Update, baby zombies were originally only available through tools and didn't begin to spawn naturally until 1.6, the Horse Update.

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• Enfant Terrible: They're just as hostile as the adults.
• Lightning Bruiser: They have the same health and damage as normal zombies, but are much faster and can fit into areas where their big brothers can't.
• Mini Mook: They're smaller and faster versions of regular zombies.
• Pint-Sized Powerhouse: They're much smaller than regular zombies, but have just as much health and do just as much damage.
• Power Up Mount: In Bedrock Edition they can mount up on most mobs, including adult zombies.
• Undead Child: They are fairly straightforwardly undead children found alongside larger zombies.
• Zerg Rush: It's possible for baby zombies to spawn in groups. These tend to be much tougher than normal zombie hordes to fend off due to their smaller size (making them harder to hit) and far greater speed.

Chicken Jockeys

An extremely rare enemy that has a 1/2000 chance to appear since the 1.7.3 prerelease when a zombie spawns. It consists of a baby zombie riding a chicken, and has the health and abilities of both monsters (it's immune to fall damage like chickens, and moves at lightning speed, can pick up items and tracks players like baby zombies). It also tends to kill itself by accident.

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• Elite Zombie: Combines the baby zombie's speed with the chicken's immunity to fall damage.
• Enfant Terrible: They are all baby zombies and they're hostile mobs.
• Game-Breaking Bug: During 1.7. Although the zombie could despawn (or get killed by suffocation), the chicken couldn't, as it's a passive mob, so you could sometimes find chickens inside of caves. Chickens that could lay eggs indefinitely. Any zombie that picked up one of those eggs would no longer be able to despawn, which meant more and more zombies would progressively fill the area, as new zombies were being spawned and they were prevented from despawning through eggs. This is an example of such a situation. Thankfully, 1.8 fixes this by adding a special tag to these chickens, which prevents them from laying eggs, as well as allowing them to despawn along with the zombie.
• Horse of a Different Color: They ride chickens, whose ability to slow their descent when falling makes them and their riders immune to fall damage.
• Lethal Joke Character: The concept of a baby zombie riding around on a chicken and biting your ankles to death sounds like a complete joke, but they're just as lethal as normal baby zombies are.
• Lightning Bruiser: They have the same damage and speed as baby zombies.
• Mounted Mook: Chicken jockeys are baby zombies that spawn riding chickens. The primary gameplay effect of this partnership is that the zombie benefits from the chicken's immunity to Fall Damage.
• Undead Child: The rider is a baby zombie.
• Unique Enemy: You're very unlikely to encounter more than one or two in an entire playthrough, assuming you encounter them at all.

Skeletons

Skeletons

Skeletons that wield bows. They drop arrows and bones upon death. They make rattling noises when not on the attack. They're notably the only Overworld mob to occur in the Nether, as they can be found in Soul Sand Valleys following the Nether Update in 1.16. Snow Biomes spawn a variant of the skeleton called the Stray, these cause a slowing effect should their arrows hit.

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• Annoying Arrows: Downplayed if you're wearing low tier armor or no armor at all, as their arrows do hurt and they are pretty good shots with their bows. But if you are clad in quality armor (iron or higher) and lack a shield/don't bother dodging, this trope comes into effect as you can survive several shots, leaving you looking like a Human Pin Cushion following an encounter with one or more Skeletons.
• Artificial Brilliance: After the AI overhaul, they are capable of flanking and driving out players. They will also run to shelter or water during the day. Later updates increased their overall range and their fire rate in close quarters, imitating panic in the latter instance as well as allowing them to knock you back faster. Yet another update slightly nerfed their fire rate (at least on PC), but gave them the ability to strafe while shooting, making it harder to hit them with your own bow.
• Bad People Abuse Animals: Zigzagged. Like zombies, they will attack baby turtles, but don't generally go after animals.
• Bottomless Magazines: Skeletons will always have infinite arrows to shoot you with, but only drop 1 or 2 arrows when killed.
• Chill of Undeath: In 1.17 when a Skeleton is kept in powder snow for twenty-two seconds, it is converted into a Stray.
• Cold Sniper: They are completely silent other than their bones rattling, their stoic expressions never change, and their aims are nearly perfect.
• Dem Bones: The standard living skeleton, except they burn in the sun.
• Elite Mook: Skeletons have a rare chance to spawn with armor on and their bows may be enchanted.
• Fantastic Race Weapon Affinity: They all use bows, and in fact lack a melee attack of any kind.
• Human Pin Cushion: Unless you have a shield or are good at dodging, expect your character to have at least a couple of arrows sticking out of their body following a fight with one of those guys.
• Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy: Averted for the most part as they are generally good shots, forcing the player to either be creative or bring a shield if they want to dodge.
• Long-Range Fighter: In contrast to many other basic overworld/cave mobs, they attack from afar and lack a melee attack if they're carrying a bow (which is to say, almost all the time).
• Nerf: After beta 1.8, skeletons take more time to line up their shots than they used to. Before then, they'd turn you into a pin cushion rather quickly. 1.5 somewhat reverted this, as they will fire quicker at you the closer you get, and they can now fire further. As of 1.9, their firing rate was lowered again (except on Hard), but they now strafe around to make up for it.
• Organ Drops: For a given value of organ, they drop their bones.
• Rare Random Drop: Skeletons have a very small chance in dropping their bow and it may already be enchanted if you are lucky enough. They mostly drop arrows and bones as common loot. However, snapshot 12w32a now makes any bow that is dropped be heavily worn down so you won't be using the bow a lot unless you repair it on an anvil.
• Set a Mook to Kill a Mook: If a skeleton hits another mob with its arrows, they will start fighting each other instead of going for you. Handy if you happen to be chased by more than one enemy. Also, having a Skeleton kill a Creeper is how you get records. Easier said than done, since it won't count if the Creeper deliberately explodes. Thankfully, the same AI update prevents creepers from going after them if shot, making it a lot easier to find those records.
• Stock Femur Bone: The bones they drop look like stereotypical cartoon bones.
• Takes One to Kill One: In general, the most efficient way to kill Skeletons is with your own Bow, preferably from a great enough distance so that they don't even notice you. You can charge them with a Sword, just expect to get tagged with least one arrow in the process if you don't also have a shield.
• Took a Level in Badass: Similar to zombies, the skeletons received many upgrades that enhanced their AI (better path finding plus skeletons will seek you out should you hide) and gaining the ability to spawn with armor worn on their bodies. Another update extended their range by over half, and gave them the ability to shoot faster the closer you are. Their latest update actually slightly nerfed their firing rate, but gave them the ability to strafe while shooting at you to make up for it.
• Unusable Enemy Equipment: Skeletons only drop a few arrows when killed and will sometimes drop their Bows too (often in poor shape). If you're especially lucky the Bow might even be enchanted too, but usually only with a low-level Power enchantment. Any arrows that miss their target are left stuck in the wall or the ground but the player can't pick them up, just like the Drowned's trident.
• Walk, Don't Swim: They can no longer float in water as of PC version 1.13, and will slowly sink to the bottom of a body of water. This actually makes them easier to kill (provided you have a good Respiration helmet) as the water slows down their arrows.
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Skeletons will run away from wolves, without fighting back. In this case it's more justified than with creepers and cats as wild wolves will also attack skeletons (and of course you can sic your tamed wolves on a skeleton). Dogs love bones, after all.

Strays

A variant of skeletons found only in snowy biomes.

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• Chill of Undeath: In 1.17, when a Skeleton is kept in powder snow for twenty-two seconds, it is converted into a Stray.
• Elite Mook: They're more dangerous than regular skeletons, since their arrows will give you the Slowness status effect if they hit you.
• Evil Is Deathly Cold: Strays only show up around or in icy and snowy biomes.
• No-Sell: In the 1.17 update that adds in powder snow, strays are immune to taking freeze damage.
• Snow Means Death: Being literal icy skeletons, they personify this well.
• Status Infliction Attack: Their arrows inflict you with the Slowness debuff, which will drastically decrease your maximum walking speed.
• Underground Monkey: They're a variant of the standard skeleton spawned in, and themed around, icy biomes. These also have arrows that cause slowing when they hit a target.

Bogged

A variant of skeletons found in swamps, mangrove swamps, and Trial Chambers.

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• Color-Coded Elements: A green skeleton variant that appropriately fires poisonous arrows.
• Glass Cannon: Their poisoned arrows deal more damage over time than a regular skeleton's arrows, but they also have less health than regular skeletons.
• Poisoned Weapons: Bogged shoot poisoned arrows at a slightly slower rate than regular skeletons.
• Status Infliction Attack: Their arrows inflict players with the Poison debuff, which will cause players to lose health every few seconds, unless they are already at 1 HP.
• Swamp Monster: Bogged are Skeletons that live in marshy biomes that have slimy moss and fungi growing on their bodies, like typical swamp monsters.
• Underground Monkey: They're a variant of the standard skeleton spawned in, and themed around, swamp biomes as well as literally underground in Trial Chambers via trial spawners. These also have arrows that cause poison when they hit a target, but are fired at a slower speed than those of a normal skeleton (once per 3.5 sec instead of 2 sec).

Others

Phantoms

Added in 1.13, they spawn at high altitudes during the night when the player hasn't slept for more than three days, and come swooping down to attack. They were introduced as one of four possible new hostile mobs at Minecon Earth 2017, where fans could vote for the mob they would most like to see implemented into the game. The phantom, obviously enough, was the one that won the vote.

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• Abstract Eater: It will only hunt those who neglect their sleep for they are, in the words of Jeb, attracted to Insomnia.
• Animalistic Abomination: They look like water rays, but their ability to know when the player has been missing out on your sleep as well as the fact that they only manifest when you haven’t slept for three days, and manifest only in the dark means that these dark entities have some serious Lovecraftian overtones.
• Airborne Mook: They're the only flying hostile mob that spawns in the Overworld. They have ray-like wings and no legs, and they use them to hover above ground. This was a significant part of their concept proposal during Minecon Earth, where they were simply described as "The Monster of the Night Skies". When they were introduced, Jeb stated that fans should consider voting for them due to the Overworld having too few flying mobs.
• Chekhov's Gun: Their membranes are almost useless other than being a key ingredient in creating potions of slow falling before you gain access to Elytra, by which point you will have accumulated dozens.
• Circling Vultures: When idle, they will circle at a height above the player's position, before swooping down to attack now and then.
• Confusion Fu: When idle, phantoms will fly around in a circle at a constant height, but they have a quite large search radius, and will occasionally either swoop down or up quickly to attack their victim. After either damaging the player or being damaged, the phantom will retreat to its original elevation. Unless you have a ranged weapon, a battle against them will consist of watching them fly around the sky, until suddenly one of them dashes towards you without warning.
• Flying Seafood Special: They're basically flying, undead rays. They're also just as capable of traveling through water as they are capable of doing so through the air.
• Ghostly Animals: They vaguely resemble flying, undead rays. And unlike most of the undead, they seem to be more ethereal in nature.
• Glowing Eyelights of Undeath: Their eyes are a separate texture from their body and can be seen even in the darkness.
• Lightning Bruiser: They're extremely mobile for an enemy thanks to their flight, being the fastest non-boss mob in the game. Even worse in Bedrock edition, where they deal more damage than zombies, skeletons and spiders in one attack^note Phantoms hit harder on Normal than any of those on Hard. Unlike Ghasts they have the same amount of hit points as a regular zombie/skeleton. Add to the fact that they tend to attack in groups, and they can become a problem fast, especially if you don't have a good bow to shoot them down with.
• Organ Drops: They drop their wing membranes.
• Our Ghosts Are Different: They’re flying, wraithlike Animalistic Abominations that look like zombie manta-rays and start to manifest if you go without your sleep. They’re also purely physical apparitions and are hostile towards you, although on a fortunate note this means that a haunting by these abominations is easily solved as they can be easily corralled due to their corporeal form and can be dealt with by taking a bow or a crossbow and shooting them out of the clouds.
• Real After All: The fact that they appear only when a player misses out on their sleep can make you wonder if these creatures are actually real or simply the workings of a sleep-deprived mind playing tricks on you. But considering that one of the things a pet cat can gift to you when you wake is a Phantom membrane, it’s clear that these creatures hold an independent existence and that you’re not so much calling them into being via your lack of sleep as much as you are attracting them with it.
• Red Baron: They are sometimes referred as: "The Monster of the Night Skies".
• Sinister Stingrays: These guys are ray-like monsters that were added in the Aquatic Update and will attack any player who has insomnia. However, they don't swim, they fly.
• Super-Persistent Predator: These things will hunt you no matter what you do or where you go, and if you pop into a cave system they will track your movements from above. So don't come out of the caves until daybreak or expect to be ambushed by the very same flock of Phantoms you hid underground to avoid.
• Things That Go "Bump" in the Night: They’ll only manifest if you neglect your sleep. But if you do, keep your doors locked, your pets inside, the lights on, your Golem sentries prepared and your weapons at the ready until dawn. Or you can make sure there's an opaque block above your head at night, since they won't spawn if there's one.
• The Undead: They're classified as undead mobs, meaning they share the same traits as zombies and skeletons. Physically, they resemble a cross between specters and skeletons, with bones showing through on various parts of their bodies.
• Weaksauce Weakness:
  • Since they tend to swoop at the player at a horizontal angle to attack, just having a wall in the way will cause them to bump into the wall and cancel their attack, leaving them sitting ducks for you to unload on them. Similarly, remaining under any sort of ceiling, man-made or naturally generated, will prevent them from spawning and/or attacking players.
  • Cats can sometimes bring players phantom parts, suggesting that they can be defeated by cats. A hissing cat nearby will cause a Phantom to abort their attack mid-dive and back away.
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: As of snapshot 18w44a, they share the Creeper's fear of cats, and will avoid trying to swoop in on you if you have your cat nearby.
• Zerg Rush: When they spawn, they usually do it in groups. Besides, they're the only mob that isn't affected by the mob cap, so there isn't a limit at how many of them can exist at once.

Arthropods

Spiders

Large black spiders that jump at the player and climb up walls. During the day, they become neutral and only attack if you attack first. They drop string and spider eyes upon death. They are identified by the "skeee" noises they make.

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• Artificial Stupidity: Even after several updates, Spiders are one of the few mobs that still make straight beelines towards you. They will jump off high buildings to get to you, or even jump through lava to get to you on rare occasions, causing them to take fall damage or to burn to death.
• Big Creepy-Crawlies: Spiders the size of a man.
• Cephalothorax: Averted, unlike with real life spiders, who only have the head and abdomen. These guys have three body segments like an insect. Probably justified by the limitations of the game's character modeling and animation system.
• Darkness Equals Death: In the daytime, they’re perfectly harmless so long as you don’t provoke them, but when the sun goes down, the rules change.
• Elite Mooks: On Hard mode, they have a ten percent chance to spawn with a beneficial potion effect (such as regeneration and invisibility).
• Giant Spider: The size of man. As spiders, they take extra damage from weapons with the Bane of Arthropods enchantment.
• Magikarp Power: Their eyes are nearly useless before you can construct a brewing stand, for which they’re a useful material. By that point, you would most likely have accumulated several dozen.
• Organ Drops: When killed, they drop their eyes. You can eat them to refill a notch of hunger, but this will also poison you for a few seconds and the poison will kill you faster than the restored hunger meter can heal you... and all that damage will then leave you hungry again. Their only real use is in alchemy, where they can be used to make potions of poison or, if fermented first, weakness.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: Spider eyes glow red. All six of them. Fortunately, this makes it easier to see them in the dark.
• Wall Crawl: They can move vertically up blocks, allowing them to climb sheer walls and cliffs other mobs — and players — can't scale.
• Weakened by the Light: A variation: bright light pacifies Spiders, and they'll only attack if you provoke them or if they enter the darkness again.
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Spiders will run away from Armadillos and will not fight back when they are too close to one. Justified as armadillos are known to eat insects, including spiders.

Cave Spiders

A blueish, venomous variety of spider that only appears in abandoned mineshafts. They are much smaller than normal spiders, being able to fit through 1 block wide openings, and are capable of inflicting poison with an attack. They behave the same, becoming neutral during the day.

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• Artificial Stupidity: Like the normal spiders, they'll jump from great heights if it means getting at you.
• Elite Mooks: Although having less health than a regular spider, they are far more dangerous as they often appear in large numbers, can fit through half-block spaces and have venomous bites.
• Fragile Speedster: Their speed plus their miniature size makes hitting them more difficult.
• Glass Cannon: They are the third weakest enemy with only six hearts of health, but thanks to their poison, they are also one of the most damaging.
• Giant Spider: Even though they're about a quarter of the size of their black counterparts, they're still pretty large. As spiders, they take extra damage from weapons with the Bane of Arthropods enchantment.
• Mini Mook: They're smaller than your average spider, but no less deadly thanks to their venom, and can fit through small passages that the big ones can't go through.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: Cave spider eyes glow red. All six of them. Fortunately, this makes them easier to see in the dark.
• Status Infliction Attack: Poison in this case — it slowly reduces the player's health down to as much as half a heart, but no less. They don't cause the poison status on easy difficulty.
• Underground Monkey: Cave spiders are a blue Palette Swap of the normal spider, but are still differentiated by their smaller size and venomous bite.
• Wall Crawl: Like the normal spiders, they can move up vertical walls.
• Weakened by the Light: Like their Spider cousins, they become neutral in light levels of 8 or more. However, they only spawn in dark mineshafts, so it's incredibly rare that a player will encounter a neutral Cave Spider.
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Just like their other variant, Cave Spiders will run away from Armadillos and will not fight back when they are too close to one.
• Zerg Rush: Although they have low health, they always appear from a spawner, meaning there is very high chance that you'll be attacked by a number of them at once.

Silverfish

Rare, strange bugs that pop out of special mined stone blocks found in strongholds and occasionally in large mountain interiors.

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• Ambushing Enemy: Silverfish always hide inside blocks. Silverfish that are hiding in certain stone blocks look exactly like any other regular stone block and if you wind up exposing the Silverfish hiding inside, its cry will alert other Silverfish that are hiding and they will swarm you. While you can't visually tell what block contains the mob, the only way to know for sure is to hit the block with something other than a pickaxe. If the block starts to break quickly, it contains a Silverfish. Alternatively, if you mine it with a pickaxe and it breaks slower than usual, it contains a Silverfish. As of 1.13 however, infested blocks break instantly regardless of the tool used on them. If your pickaxe has the Silk Touch enhancement, you can actually harvest the blocks with Silverfish inside without setting it off and place the block elsewhere as a trap or prank for your friends.
• Artistic License – Biology: In real life, silverfish aren't dangerous nor harmful to humans and are much smaller in comparison.
• Big Creepy-Crawlies: Gigantic silverfish aren't that common in media, but this is an exception. Despite this, they still manage to be one of the smallest mobs (second only to Endermites), although they're still a lot bigger than real-life silverfish, which are rarely longer than a fingernail. This also means they take extra damage from weapons with the Bane of Arthropods enchantment.
• Informed Species: Real-life silverfish look like this◊.
• Zerg Rush: When attacking a Silverfish, a lot of its pals will come to help it, if they happen to be nearby.

Illagers

As a Whole

Illagers are a group of hostile former villagers who take up shelter in the distant Woodland Mansions, or nearby Pillager outposts. They're much tougher than regular hostile mobs, and have the ability to give players bad omens that will cause a raid to occur in the next village they visit.

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• Ambiguously Human: They all seem to be the same species as or a subspecies of the villagers, which may or may not be human, but have grey skin.
• Armor-Piercing Attack: The Evoker's fang attack always does six hearts of damage no matter what armor the player wears (unless it's enchanted). Vindicators are also able to temporarily disable shields with their attacks as well, although armor does affect their damage output.
• Attack on One Is an Attack on All: Considering the only way to procure a bad omen is to wipe out an Illager outpost or patrol, it’s not hard to think that the resulting raid should you go into a village is a retaliatory strike for your assault on them earlier.
• Beard of Evil: Depending on how you interpret the pixels. Compared to the Villagers' mouth, the two pixel thick dark patch on the Illager's mouth is easily interpreted as a beard.
• Big Ol' Eyebrows: They seem to sport some very bushy eyebrows.
• Cult: Given the strange layouts of the rooms and mansions where they live, their secretive nature and their habit of killing any player or villager who comes near, it's not hard to think of them as cultists. However, the Evoker (and to a lesser extent, the Illusioner) fits this vibe even moreso than the others with their powers and robes.
• Door Dumb: For whatever reason, most Illagers are incapable of opening doors, making it a little easier for players and villagers to hide from them. Averted with Vindicators however, as they’re capable of forcing them open with their axe.
• The Dreaded: In contrast to the way they deal with the undead, Villagers are utterly terrified of these guys, as they emit sweat particles and will refuse to breed the moment the Illagers stage a hit on their home.
• Elite Mooks: All of the Illagers are especially difficult enemies that can't be found normally, and pack much more of a punch than your average undead mob. It's not uncommon for players to suffer multiple deaths while fighting them due to the damage they deal and the numbers they come in. In particular, Evokers and Ravagers are tough enough to be borderline Boss in Mook Clothing.
• Evil Feels Good: If they successfully murder everyone in the village or destroy every bed, all of the surviving Illagers will laugh cruelly just to rub it in your face that you failed.
• Fantastic Terrorists: They are close to a large terrorist group Minecraft can have, though they generally don't have any cause at all.
• Fighter, Mage, Thief: The Vindicator, Evoker, and Pillager fill these roles nicely. The Vindicator tends to fight up and close with their axe, the Evoker uses its magic to deal loads of damage from far away, and the Pillager is known for instigating the Bad Omen and patrolling the world.
• He Who Fights Monsters: They are descendants of Villagers who took up arms to defend themselves against the vicious monsters of the Overworld, and over time they became just as vicious themselves.
• Kick the Dog: They were already pretty horrible to begin with, but starting with the Wild update, they keep Allays locked up in cages near their outposts and in their mansions.
• Lightning Bruiser: Vindicators and Ravagers move incredibly fast and can deal devastating damage to players. Even worse, Ravagers often have a Pillager or an Evoker riding them in the later waves of a raid, which makes them even more difficult.
• Long-Range Fighter: Pillagers, Evokers, and the unused Illusioner all rely on arrows, magic, and both at the same time for their respective forms of combat, while still keeping their distance from the player.
• Loophole Abuse: An Illager patrol can be defeated without incurring a Bad Omen effect as long as the Captain isn't killed by a player. This includes fire, lava, drowning, thorns, explosions, suffocation, and positioning yourself such that the other Pillagers shoot the Captain instead of you.
• Omnicidal Maniac: When they conduct a Raid on an innocent village, they don’t accept surrender, and they will not leave anybody in the settlement alive unless you take matters into your own hands and wipe them out to the last. It’s kill or be killed, and there’s nothing suggesting they will have it any other way.
  • Exaggerated with the Vindicators in particular, as naming them "Johnny" with a name tag will cause them to kill anything that happens to be nearby. Even worse is if the Vindicator is part of a Pillager patrol, as the whole patrol will take those characteristics as well.
• Punny Name: They're collectively referred to as the "Illagers". This pun goes twofold for the Pillager, since it's also "Illager" with a P or "Villager" with a P instead of V.
• Roaming Enemy: All of the Illagers were initially this, but later patches limited this trope to the Pillagers (and Vindicators on Hard mode), who roam the world in patrols. Killing the captain is what causes the Illagers to stage a raid on a village.
• Rape, Pillage, and Burn: During a raid, all Illagers will attack and kill villagers, wandering traders, players, and anything else that may stand in their way. Ravagers in particular will also destroy crops by trampling and roaring at them. Thankfully, they don’t do the first part.
• Short Range Guy, Long Range Guy: Vindicators, Vexes, and Ravagers consist of the former, while Evokers and Pillagers (and the unused Illusioner) make up the latter.
• Took a Level in Badass: Compared to the regular villagers that supposedly cast them out, Illagers are some of the most dangerous enemies in the game, being proficient in battle, capable of using magic and summoning enemies, and having trained beasts that are almost as tough as an Iron Golem.
• Weaksauce Weakness: Once an Illager captain is killed, a Bad Omen status is planted on the player which lasts for a good 100 minutes, and causes a raid to occur should the player enter a village during then. This lingering vindictive ire that can lead to the utter destruction of a village will be completely nullified by simply drinking milk, which removes all status effects including Bad Omen.
• Wicked Cultured: Vindicators and Evokers are shown to live in a large, dim mansion far away from the player's spawn point that contains libraries, woolen sculptures of animals, a mini-garden, a master bedroom, and even a poorly-constructed Nether portal.
• Wolfpack Boss: Basically what their raids amount to. Raids have multiple wave that are marked by a shared health bar. Killing every member of the raid causes the bar to go down, and it refills to signal the next wave. However, the bar does not equal the same amount of health each wave, as they get progressively larger and more difficult. On easy there are three waves, on normal five waves, and on hard mode there are seven waves.
• Wouldn't Hurt a Child: As of 1.18 and in Bedrock edition, Illagers only attack adult villagers and leave any baby villagers alone. Averted in Pre-1.18 versions and other versions.

Vindicators

A mob added in 1.11 that resembles a gray-skinned, evil, axe-wielding Villager. Spawns in Woodland Mansions.

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• Armor-Piercing Attack: Downplayed. A Vindicator's axe is capable of breaking through a players shield, which will temporarily disable it, but not destroy it. It's still a dangerous ability however, so players should be wary of them.
• Axe Before Entering: Vindicators can use their axes to open doors. Notably, other Illagers are incapable of opening and closing doors during a raid, meaning the players have to take extra precautions with Vindicators.
• Ax-Crazy: They will attack even villagers on sight without hesitation. No questions asked. Exaggerated if it's named "Johnny", at which point it'll try to butcher anything except for other Illagers.
• Elite Mooks: Described by the developers as "end-game" level enemies.
• Evil Gloating: If a raiding Vindicator successfully murders all Villagers present in a Village, or manages to destroy all of their beds, then they will stop and raise their hands and laugh.
• Face–Heel Turn: Like the other illagers, they're apparently "outcast villagers".
• Fighter, Mage, Thief: The "fighter" of the Illagers, focused on attacking you through weapons and physical attacks.
• King Mook: They can spawn as a captain with an Illager banner over their head. While this doesn't make them any more powerful, killing them will give a bad omen status to the player, which will cause an Illager raid to occur if they enter a village.
• Lightning Bruiser: They are capable of sprinting, and they can easily kill an unarmored player in two hits with their axes. Not to mention they can also disable shields.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: If you value your life, don't give a Vindicator a name tag with the name "Johnny" on it.
• Omnicidal Maniac: While the Illagers as a whole represent this trope quite well, Vindicators take it to a whole new level if a name tag with the name "Johnny" is used on it. At that point, nothing, barring other Illagers, is spared the axe.
• Roaming Enemy: On Hard difficulty, Vindicators have the off chance of spawning within a Pillager patrol.
• Shout-Out: If named "Johnny" it will attack everything that isn't another Illager.
• Short Range Guy, Long Range Guy: Illager Raids and Illager Patrols primarily consists of the melee axe-wielding Vindicators and the ranged crossbow-toting Pillagers.

Evokers

A mob added in 1.11. Spawns in Woodland Mansions, also resembling a grey, evil Villager. It spawns Vexes to attack you.

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• 1-Up: It drops the Totem of Undying when killed, which will resurrect you if your health drops to zero while holding it (this can happen to allays, foxes, piglins, skeletons, and zombies, too).
• Armor-Piercing Attack: The "evocation fangs" attack does three hearts worth of damage regardless of armor.
• Combat Pragmatist: It's very aware that he stands no chance against you at close quarters, so when you close in, he books it until he's out of melee range. You can also take the same approach with him, considering that the easiest way to kill him is to equip your bow, stay out of range of his attacks and turn him into a pincushion from a safe distance.
• Elite Mooks: They're described by the developers as "end-game level" enemies.
• Enemy Summoner: He summons Vexes to attack you.
• Evil Sorcerer: Judging by his attacks, it seems that he primarily uses magic to attack you.
• Face–Heel Turn: Like the other illagers, they're apparently "outcast villagers".
• Fighter, Mage, Thief: The "mage" of the Illagers, fighting with spells and summoned creatures.
• Flunky Boss: He spawns Vexes to fight along with him.
• Glass Cannon: His Spikes of Doom pack a nasty punch, but he can easily be picked apart when you start retaliating.
• Lovecraftian Superpower: The Spikes of Doom he summons have mouths full of barbed teeth at the tip which rise out of the floor and snap shut to damage you.
• Mook Maker: It summons hostile Vexes and a bear trap-like "fang attack" to defend itself, but itself does not attack.
• Necromancer: They carry this vibe, as they spawn the ghostly Vexes when they become aware of you and drop a totem that brings you back to life if you die.
• Shout-Out: If placed near a blue sheep, they will turn it into a red sheep while saying "wololo".
• Spikes of Doom: Its other attack is to launch a line of spikes at you out of the floor.
• Squishy Wizard: It possesses strong attacks, but only has four more hitpoints than the common skeleton archer.

Illusioners

A mob added in 1.12 but not actually implemented in the game. It's an Illager in a colorful robe, equipped with a bow and with the ability to create illusionary copies of itself and to strike players blind.

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• Combat Pragmatist: They use previously unseen skills to avoid getting hit by the player, such as inflicting Blindness on the player or create fake copies while turning themselves invisible so that one can't spot the real enemy. Additionally, just like the Evoker, he'll try to keep a constant distance between himself and the player, and will run away if you get too close.
• Confusion Fu: He runs on this, as per his forte as a Master of Illusion. He’ll blind you, summon four fake copies of himself, and even turn himself invisible to try and get the drop on you.
• Face–Heel Turn: Like other Illagers, they're apparently "outcast villagers".
• Fighter, Mage, Thief: The "thief" of the Illagers, focused on archery and confusion tactics.
• Mage Marksman: They attack using a regular bow, but they also use support magic to avoid getting hit.
• Master of Illusion: The Illusioner can create four copies of itself while turning itself invisible. The copies all perform the shooting animation, but only the real Illusioner can actually shoot and be damaged.
• Status Infliction Attack: They're able to inflict Blindness on the player.

Pillagers

Added in 1.14, the Village and Pillage update, Pillagers are Illagers who move in patrols and periodically attack villages. They wield crossbows to attack from afar and have a chance to drop them upon death.

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• Bows Versus Crossbows: They spawn with crossbows which have better range but a longer charge time as compared to bows.
• Canon Immigrant: According to a Q&A, Pillagers were originally created for Minecraft Dungeons, but were then introduced to the base game before Dungeons was released.
• Death Glare: If any Pillagers in a patrol spot a player nearby, they will stare them down ominously (even if under the effects of invisibility) until they move away from their range. If a player gets any closer to them, they'll start going on the offensive. If the player encounters any Pillagers near their outpost, they'll bypass this trope and go straight into shooting them with arrows.
• Determinator: Once Pillagers starts pursuing a player, they can be incredibly tough to shake off. They have the same tracking range as a Zombie (that being 40 blocks), move incredibly fast, and aren't afraid of following you into caves or waiting outside your home to kill you.
• Exactly What It Says on the Tin: They're Illagers who specialize in pillaging and raiding villages.
• Fighter, Mage, Thief: The "thief" of the Illagers (if the Dummied Out Illusioner doesn't count), being ranged units that attack from afar.
• King Mook: They can spawn as a captain with an Illager banner over their head. While this doesn't make them any more powerful, killing them will give a bad omen status to the player, which will cause an Illager raid to occur if they enter a village.
• Lightning Bruiser: Are a little tougher than the rank and file mobs, possessing two hearts more health than the usual monsters you run into on your nocturnal forays, but are surprisingly quick on their feet and their crossbows hurt. Underestimating them is a good way to get yourself turned into a pincushion.
• Long-Range Fighter: They mostly rely on their crossbows to fight, only switching to melee if submerged.
• POW Camp: Some of the Pillager outposts have Iron Golems imprisoned in them. You can choose to free them, which will result in them attacking any Pillager they see.
• Punny Name: The "Illager" pun goes twofold for the Pillager, since it's "Illager" with a P or "Villager" with a P instead of V.
• Rape, Pillage, and Burn: Minus the rape part, of course. They will periodically form raid patrols to attack villages, trying to destroy their crops and structures.
• Roaming Enemy: Unlike the other Illagers, Pillagers can randomly spawn in any biome in the world as a "patrol" of sorts. They mostly wander about aimlessly, but they will attack any villagers or players they come across if provoked.
• See the Invisible: Played with. Pillagers who spawn as part of a patrol are somehow able to see through the effects of a player's potion of invisibility, but the ones who spawn near their outposts can't (unless you attack them).
• Short Range Guy, Long Range Guy: Illager Raids and Illager Patrols primarily consist of the melee axe-wielding Vindicators and the ranged crossbow-toting Pillagers.

Other

Creepers

^{Click here to see the charged creeper.}

Mean, green, "oh crap" machines that possess the ability to explode, Creepers will make your life miserable. They drop gunpowder if killed before they can explode. If struck by lightning, they will become "supercharged" and will have a much larger blast radius and detection radius. Their face is part of Minecraft's logo and of all the mobs they feature the most on Mojang's official merchandise.

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• Action Bomb: Their signature attack is to rush the player until they're within the blast radius, then explode.
• Artificial Brilliance: They are notorious for waiting in ambush around corners and the like. Patch beta 1.9 made it so that an un-primed Creeper will haul ass to get away from another Creeper that's exploding at a speed much greater than they can usually travel, nerfing one of the easiest ways to kill multiple Creepers chasing you.
• Artificial Stupidity: They can see you through transparent blocks or fence-like blocks but never explode, even if the blast would hit you. This was intentional so that making structures Creeper-proof wasn't nigh-impossible.
• Botanical Abomination: Although they’re implied to be plants, they’re deformed, mobile stalk-like creatures with twisted faces, possess a predilection for explosive-related murder-suicide, are intelligent enough to ambush their targets and to carry a sense of self preservation, only appear in darkness, and drop music discs when they’re killed by a skeleton’s arrow. Whatever is the nature of these creatures poses more questions than it answers.
• Combat Pragmatist: Their camouflage color makes them blend in with tree leaves and thick patches of grass (at first glance) and the make zero sound as they approach? Why? Because fighting fair would make them far less successful at ambushing players.
• Close-Range Combatant: Their only way of attacking is to get in your face and blow themselves up. If you attack them at range, they are completely helpless, charging at you desperately as you shoot them to bits with arrow barrages.
• Critical Existence Failure: Remember, a Creeper with one heart left when it's primed to explode will still explode. If you're not confident that you can finish it, just run for the hills.
• The Croc Is Ticking: Their famous hiss serves as a warning that one is near.
• The Dreaded: Creepers are so powerful that even other mobs are scared to fight them. Whether they be hostile Zoglins, tamed wolves, or mighty Iron Golems, there are no creatures that are willing to tango with a Creeper, and for a damn good reason. The only mobs that attack Creepers are Vindicators named "Johnny", the Warden, the Wither, and as of 1.8, Snow Golems. ^note  With the exception of Snow Golems, they're all surprisingly good at it too, with the former two reliably being able to quickly kill Creepers with their axes or sheer strength (combined with sheer HP) respectively, and the Wither usually being in flight and as such out of retaliation range.
• Glass Cannon: A supercharged creeper has a much deadlier blast than the norm. However, the fact they took damage from the lightning strike that supercharged them means you can be certain they at least have less than full health.
• Impossible Item Drop: If a Skeleton kills a Creeper, it'll drop a vinyl music disc.
• Instakill Mook: An exploding Creeper will almost certainly kill an unarmored player immediately — depending on how close they are when they detonate, they can even instant-kill through a full suit of diamond armor. A Charged Creeper is even more powerful, and will happily take out players from much farther away.
• Lightning Can Do Anything: When a creeper is struck by lightning, it becomes supercharged, giving them a blue aura and a much more powerful explosive attack. When skeletons, zombies, or other creepers are killed by the blast of a charged creeper, they drop their heads, and this is the only way to acquire these specific mob heads.
• Logical Weakness: The explosion takes a second to charge, meaning creepers are less effective in the open where the player can clearly see them coming. An effective way to kill one is to hit it with a sword, back up, causing the creeper to cancel its explosion, then come back and hit it again, repeat until the creeper dies. They also be ignited against their will with flint and steel, blowing them up as well as any mobs near them.
• Made of Explodium: Literally. Creepers drop gunpowder upon death (as long as they don't die by exploding). Since all the other mobs drop body parts when they die, this implies that Creepers have gunpowder as part of their anatomy.
• Mascot Mook: Creepers are the most well-known of all the mobs, to the point where a Creeper face is part of the Minecraft logo.
• Meaningful Name: They creep up to your character while making no noise, then they *SSSSSSSSS*... Perhaps an unintentional example: creepers are bunches of foliage whether plants or vines, that grow around other plants and / or up walls and trees. The Creeper is heavily implied through their texture and Word of God to be a Planimal of some kind and can be found even after midnight around, you guessed it, trees and other foliage.
• Murder-Suicide: Exploding is a Creeper's only way to attack, meaning this trope is in effect whenever one successfully scores a kill.
• Nightmare Face: Every Creeper's face is a botanical, pixelated and mosaic pastiche of Ghostface.
• Noiseless Walker: Creepers make absolutely no sound when they move.
• Oh, Crap!: They get a version of this post-AI overhaul, where if they find out that one of their fellow Creepers is about to detonate and they're close enough to be affected, they will run for the hills until they think they're out of the blast zone.
• One-Hit Kill: Beginning with patch Beta 1.9, a Creeper's explosive power was buffed enough to one-shot players not wearing a full set of Iron Armor. Stay wary. It also works the other way around with use of a Flint and Steel on them. It'll force them to self-destruct right then and there. However, this will surrender any Experience, Gunpowder, and if you're too close, your health/life, so only do it if you're out of options.
• Planimal: Creepers look very similar to vines and tall grass.
• Spanner in the Works: They will appear when you least expect them to, and they will destroy the one thing you want to preserve the most.
• Stealth Expert: Although they can be fairly easily spotted when compared to trees, they emit no sound aside from footsteps and the noise they make when hurt, they love to hide and have been the sneaky Arch-Enemy of many players.
• Suicide Attack: They blow themselves up to attack the player.
• Taking You with Me: Their entire modus operanti. Creepers don't survive their own explosion (obviously) but, due to their stealthy nature, they can make damn sure that neither does any player unlucky enough to aggro one without noticing. Unlike most examples of this trope though, the Creeper will start the fight like this instead of using it as a last-ditch attempt at killing the player.
• The Voiceless: They make no sound other than footsteps, making locating one by sound difficult. For those unfamiliar with the series, the "ssssss" is the sound of a fuse burning, not an actual hiss.
  • They make a faint slithering noise when hurt, but otherwise they're soundless.
  • They used to make a loud hiss while chasing you. This was Dummied Out to make them stealthier.
• When Trees Attack: They're green, they have multiple legs but no arms, and according to Word of God if someone were to touch a Creeper, it would feel "crunchy, like dry leaves" (which actually makes sense, given their green texture). This makes them strongly resemble mobile, explosive plants.
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Starting with Snapshot 12w05a, in part to balance out their new AI, they are terrified of cats and ocelots and will run away as soon as they notice one. This is very helpful to players, as this panic overrides their drive to approach players and explode.
• You Are Already Dead: Creepers emit their signature fizz and explode after 1.5 seconds. Considering they only start the detonation when close to a player, chances are when you hear their fizz, it's already too late.

Spider Jockeys

A rare enemy that has a 1/100 chance to appear when a spider spawns. It consists of a skeleton riding a spider, and has the health and abilities of both monsters. It also tends to kill itself by accident.

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• Bread, Eggs, Breaded Eggs: We have skeletons and we have spiders; now we have skeletons riding spiders.
• Dem Bones: The skeleton riding the spider.
• Elite Mook: Combines the skeleton's range attacks with the spider's speed and ability to climb.
• Giant Spider: The spider being ridden by the skeleton, which is around the size of a wolf if it spawns as a cave spider and the size of a human if it spawns as a regular spider.
• Horse of a Different Color: They ride giant spiders, which allow them to climb directly up vertical surfaces.
• Huge Rider, Tiny Mount: If the Spider is spawned as a Cave Spider (which are smaller than regular ones) and the Skeleton is spawned as a Wither Skeleton (which are larger than regular ones), then you get a rather comical pair of a huge skeleton on a tiny spider◊.
• Lightning Bruiser: It combines the Skeleton's range and damage output with the spider's speed, and both of their health.
• Mounted Mook: Skeleton jockeys are skeletons that spawn riding Giant Spiders, joining the skeleton's ranged attacks to the spider's speed and ability to climb up vertical surfaces.
• Organ Drops: They have all the drops of its constituent mobs, bones and eyes included.
• Set a Mook to Kill a Mook: The shield's ability to deflect arrows allows you to do this. Good use of shield blocking throws the arrows shot towards you back to the skeleton, injuring it. However, in the case of spider jockeys, the arrows may hit the spider instead. The spider treats this as if the skeleton had attacked it directly, and turns hostile towards the skeleton riding it, attacking it. This, in turn, turns the skeleton hostile towards the spider, so they attack each other until one of them dies. It's really hilarious.
• Underground Monkey: Depending on where it spawns, a spider jockey has the chance to spawn with any of the varieties of spider or with any variant of skeleton, thus resulting in variants with access to a cave spider's poison, a wither skeleton's melee attack and Wither status effect, and/or a stray's slowing arrows, depending on the combination.
• Unique Enemy: You're very unlikely to encounter more than one or two in an entire playthrough, due to the specifications on how they spawn.

Slimes

The fifth mob added to the game, Slimes are gelatinous cubes that spawn in specifically-designated caves or swamps. They drop slime balls upon death. They hop around making slimy slapping sounds.

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• Asteroids Monster: In the wild, they can spawn with three specific sizes: Small, Medium, and Big, and Huge size slimes could spawn naturally until the v1.0.12 alpha. However, with console commands, the player can spawn slimes with a size value anywhere between 0 and 256, the latter even dwarfing the Ender Dragon. Larger slimes will split into smaller ones half their size when they take enough damage.
• Blob Monster: They're large, animated cubes of slime. In addition, their health scales with their size.
• Cute Is Evil: They're so frickin' cute! And they try to murder you.
• Harmless Enemy: The smallest slimes. The big and normal slimes both deal damage on collision, but small slimes cannot deal any damage, and in addition have the least health of any mob in the game (1 hit point, or half a heart). They will still tackle the player, but they cannot do more than lightly push them back through the knockback all in-game entities give when they collide with each other. This can still be a threat if the player is standing next to a cliff or another high drop, but the small slimes are utterly harmless otherwise.
• Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain: Small Slimes are incapable of harming you, instead just following you around and pushing you back slightly. Many players actually take them as pets!
• Organ Drops: While it's unclear if they have anything that could properly be called distinct organs, the slime balls they drop were obviously some sort of bodily tissue.

Witches

A hostile mob that first appeared in snapshot 12w38a. Witches look like villagers, but wear pointy hats, have a wart on their nose, and use a variety of potions to attack like any other stereotypical witch. Witches are the second Overworld mob that can attack from a distance and its potions can be quite deadly to the player or any other mob that gets in its way. Drops various brewing materials^note Empty glass bottles, redstone powder, glowstone powder, gunpowder, spider eyes, and sugar, sticks, or rarely a potion upon death. Beginning with the Village & Pillage update they can spawn during raids and can join Pillager patrols.

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• Ambiguously Human: Witches seem do be even more related to villagers than illagers.
• Armor-Piercing Attack: All of the Witch's attacks are this, since potions don't have any effect on armor. Thus, a player with full netherite armor is just as vulnerable to a Witch's attack as one with no armor at all. Enchanted armor can defend against potions, though.
• Forced Transformation: When a Villager is struck by lighting, it will transform into a Witch. Swamp Villagers (who only spawn when a village is built for them in a swamp biome) are the only Villagers to wear the same purple color as Witches, suggesting that the Witches found in swamps are the transformed remaining population of a swamp village and that every Witch is a transformed Villager.
• Dark Action Girl: They are wicked witches that attack on sight.
• Healing Potion: A Witch will drink a Potion of Healing if its health is low.
• Helpful Mook: Although Witches are not considered to be true Illagers (as Johnny Vindicators will still attack them), they will start showing up in the third and fourth waves of a raid and throw splash potions of healing at the Illagers to help them. This can turn right around on them, as players can be healed by them as well.
• Immune to Fire: The Witch doesn't burn in the sunlight and, if you attempt to set the Witch on fire, it will drink a Potion of Fire Resistance to become immune to fire.
• Lightning Can Do Anything: They're the result of a villager struck by lightning.
• Long-Range Fighter: Witches have no useful ability when it comes to CQC, but will toss potions like hand grenades at any possible threats. It helps that they also possess a semi-immunity to their own potions.
• Minion with an F in Evil: Averted with Witches that spawn in the Overworld, but played straight with the ones that spawn in raids. They exclusively throw splash potions of healing for the Illagers but, due to the chaotic nature of raids, they end up hitting the player just as often as they may hit the Illagers they’re trying to help. They also don’t try to fight back if players attack them.
• Metal Slime: They're one of the rarer overworld mobs, and thanks to their high health and use of various potions in combat they're also one of the most dangerous. They also have a very bountiful drop table, carrying all sorts of brewing-related loot on them, and can drop four types of potion if killed while drinking.
• Rare Random Drop: The Witch has the most potential drops out of all the mobs (all of them are used for potion brewing), but if you kill it while it's drinking a potion, it has a chance to drop it.
• Set a Mook to Kill a Mook:
  • Because it uses Splash Potions of Harming in combat, it's entirely possible to get pretty much any hostile mob that isn't undead to attack a Witch, and they'll duke it out to the death.
  • A subversion can also occur if a Skeleton accidentally shoots it — the Witch will set its sights on the Skeleton and begin fruitlessly chucking potions at it, and the Skeleton will simply shrug them off without ever turning its attention to the Witch. The same thing happens if it gets hit by a Drowned's trident.
  • Another subversion can occur in Bedrock Edition if it hits another Witch with its potions. The two Witches will start fighting, but because they are resistant to potion effects and use Potions of Healing, neither Witch will be able to kill the other unless the player intervenes or they despawn. No longer the case for Java as of version 1.14, however.
• Status Infliction Attack: The Witch's potions that it throws at you can cause poison or slowness. The Witch can also throw Potions of Harming at you for instant damage. It is also highly resistant to most negative potion effects.
• Suddenly Voiced: One of, if not the only, completely silent mobs for several years. As of 1.9, they now cackle evilly and grunt in discomfort when hurt.
• Super Not-Drowning Skills: Beginning in 1.7.2, they drink Potions of Water Breathing if they get stuck underwater.
• Swamp Monster: Witches have their own unique hut, located in the swamp.
• Throw Down the Bomblet: They use Splash Potions of Harming in combat, which are effectively grenades.
• Wicked Witch: They're witches who are definitely not friendly towards players or other Villagers.
• Witch Classic: They've got the pointy buckled hats and big warty noses, brew various types of potions that they use in combat, and live in wooden huts in the middle of swamplands alongside black cats.

Guardians

A fish-like aquatic creature, introduced in snapshot 14w25a, that attacks by sending out a large laser beam which harms the player. It only spawns underwater in ocean monuments. Drops prismarine shards or crystals upon death.

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• Aquatic Mook: One of three hostile aquatic enemies alongside their elder counterparts and Drowned, and in fact cannot move properly on land. This also means they take extra damage from Tridents with the Impaling enchantment.
• Combat Pragmatist: When approached or attacked they will swim a distance away where the player can't reach them, but they can reach the player using their Eye Beams.
• Corridor Cubbyhole Run: Fighting them essentially amounts to a form of this, since the player has to hide behind a wall to avoid being in their line of sight and thus cancel their attack.
• Cowardly Mooks: Whenever they attack or get hit by the player, they quickly retreat out of sight to wait for another opportunity to strike. If the player approaches them, they usually tend to swim away, even if it means interrupting their own attacks to do so.
• Cyclops: They only have a single, large eye. They will also constantly stare at the player if one is nearby.
• Eye Beams: Their main weapon is a technicolor, beam-like Charged Attack they shoot from their single eye.
• Hitscan: Their Eye Beams will instantly hit their targets as soon as they fire.
• Impossible Item Drop: They can drop raw cod when they die. This made sense back when that item was still simply the non-specific "fish," since the implication was that it was the actual flesh of the guardian itself, but nowadays one can only assume that Guardians have a mouth of some description hidden somewhere on their body and that the cod was their stomach contents. It's anyone's guess where the prismarine crystals are coming from, though.
• Kick the Dog: Besides the player, guardians also attack squids. Unlike Villagers, who at least have Iron Golems to defend themselves, Squids have no way to defend from Guardians.
• No Eye in Magic: For them to use their ranged attack, they need a line-of-sight to their target. Hiding behind any terrain will cause them to cancel their attack.
• Painful Pointy Pufferfish: Their bodies are covered with large spikes that they can extend and retract. When their spikes are extended, striking them with a fist or any melee weapon will deal you a heart of damage. Physically speaking, they resemble large, cyclopean pufferfish with long tails.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: Their single eye is red and they're hostile mobs.
• Schmuck Bait: They become the subject of this around a Conduit. Guardians tend to congregate around light sources (hence the large schools of them around the Sea Lantern-lit entrances), and an active and fully-powered Conduit is especially bright. Such a Conduit will also attack and kill any Guardian that draws close, making the Conduit function like an aquatic bug zapper.
• Spikes of Villainy: Their body is covered with spikes, which work like the Thorns enchantment (hitting them with a sword will harm you as well).
• The Spiny: Attacking them when their spikes are out will deal damage to the player ala Thorns.
• Stealth Hi/Bye: Whenever they attack or get hit by the player, they quickly retreat out of sight to wait for another opportunity to strike.
• Unblockable Attack: The Guardian’s eyebeams cannot be deflected with shields. The only way to get them to avoid it is to swim away from them to get out of their range, or swim towards them to get them to run away from you.
• Vocal Dissonance: In the water, they make low-pitched droning sounds that befit their look. Outside the water... they make cute, high-pitched squeaks.

Elder Guardians

A stronger, larger, gray variant of the Guardian, also introduced in snapshot 14w25a. Three of them can be found in each ocean monument, and unlike regular Guardians they will not respawn once killed. Drops prismarine shards and a wet sponge when killed.

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• Animalistic Abomination: A giant fish-like animal that can shoot energy beams from its eye and can induce hallucinations and weakness by merely being close to you, and has been guarding an underwater temple for what's implied to be ages.
• Aquatic Mook: The last of three hostile aquatic enemies. This also means they take extra damage from Tridents with the Impaling enchantment.
• Boss in Mook Clothing: They have the second-largest health out of all non-boss hostile mobs, deal quite a lot of damage, and their Thorns and Mining Fatigue abilities make them hard to fight. And to add to this, they now count as a boss in pocket edition.
• Corridor Cubbyhole Run: Fighting them essentially amounts to a form of this, since the player has to hide behind a wall to avoid being in their line of sight and thus cancel their attack.
• Cyclops: They only have a single, large eye. They also stare at nearby players just like their smaller brethren.
• Dungeon Bypass: The Mining Fatigue debuff actively defies the trope by greatly increasing the time it takes to break blocks.^note 27 times longer, to be exact; you will struggle to break even dirt with this. This forces the player to navigate the massive labyrinthine monument instead of tunneling through it.
• Eye Beams: Like their regular counterparts, their main weapon is a technicolor, beam-like Charged Attack they shoot from their single eye.
• Hitscan: Their Eye Beams will instantly hit their targets as soon as they fire.
• Impossible Item Drop: In addition to dropping raw cod like basic Guardians, Elder Guardians will always drop a sponge. There's no part of the Elder Guardian that looks sponge-like or appears soft, so it's most likely a rare item reward for players who kill them.
• Jump Scare: When they cast the Mining Fatigue debuff, a ghostly image of the Elder Guardian appears on screen with a loud sound akin to a bell's toll, which may surprise players. The Elder Guardian has a very large radius from where it can inflict this debuff, extending just outside the Monument's boundaries, so players simply passing through can get an unwelcome surprise. This is especially true when walking on a frozen ocean - visibility below the ice tends to be very limited, so it's completely possible to not notice an Ocean Monument under the ice, which can lead to a nasty and sudden shock for unaware players when they set up their debuff.
• King Mook: They're basically much bigger and stronger Guardians.
• No Eye in Magic: For them to use their ranged attack, they need a line-of-sight to their target. Hiding behind any terrain will cause them to cancel their attack.
• Painful Pointy Pufferfish: Their bodies are covered with large spikes that they can extend and retract. When their spikes are extended, striking them with a fist or any melee weapon will deal you a heart of damage. Physically speaking, they resemble large, cyclopean pufferfish with long tails.
• Permanently Missable Content: One of their more annoying aspects is that they never respawn, meaning that if you use the "set game to peaceful when about to die" tactic at any point after the monument generates in the world, they just don't come back.
• The Spiny: Attacking them when their spikes are out will deal damage to the player ala Thorns. These hurt more than regular Guardians.
• Status Infliction Attack: They're able to inflict the Mining Fatigue debuff whenever the player is within the perimeter of the Ocean Monument, slowing the player's attacking and mining speed. They're currently the only source of that debuff.
• Stronger with Age: Their name suggests that they're elderly guardians, and they're much more powerful than regular guardians.
• Vocal Dissonance: In the water, they make low-pitched droning sounds that befit their look. Outside the water... they make cute, high-pitched squeaks.

Vexes

^{Click here to see the old version of this mob before version 1.20.}

A mob added in 1.11. While not illagers themselves, they're spawned by Evokers during combat.

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• Airborne Mook: They possess wings and make good use of them.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: Given that you only find Allays in Pillager Outposts and Woodland Mansions, always imprisoned, and that Vexes look like evil versions of Allays, it's implied that Vexes are Allays forcibly converted by the Evokers.
• Confusion Fu: Their fighting style is to dive or fly up at you from various angles while using their Intangible Man powers to phase through walls and make themselves difficult to track.
• The Fair Folk: They are an Evil Counterpart to the Allay, a fairy-like mob with a much more sinister appearance.
• Fragile Speedster: Have just over half the health of a zombie or skeleton, but they fly very quickly and their iron swords can take half your health in one swing if you're unarmored and on Hard difficulty.
• Intangible Man: They can pass through any block as if it wasn't there.
• Meaningful Name: They're meant to be an annoyance and distraction when fighting the Evoker, rather than a threat on their own.
• Mini Mook: Vexes are only about the size of a baby zombie.
• Ontological Inertia: Downplayed. While they will persist after the Evoker who spawned them dies, they continually take damage, so eventually, they will all die off even if you ignore them.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: A vex gains temporary red markings when it charges at you.

Ravagers

Added in 1.14, the Village and Pillage update, Ravagers are hulking beasts trained by the Illagers and set loose on villages during raids. They destroy crops and attack villagers, and in combat they are resistant to knockback while having a roar attack that knocks back entities while dealing damage to players and villagers.

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• Anti-Structure: The Ravager's charge attack will trample crops and break leaves.
• Beast of Battle: Trained beasts used by the Illagers to assault villages.
• Beast with a Human Face: Their faces look almost like the Illagers', with a similar Gag Nose as theirs.
• Boss in Mook Clothing: They have the highest health of all non-boss hostile mobs, deal nearly twice the damage of an Enderman, and use Knock Back very often.
• Evil Counterpart: To Iron Golems. They have the same amount of health and can deal huge amounts of damage; further, while one is a protector of Villagers, the other is sent by Illagers to destroy them.
• Giant Mook: Huge enemies with high attack power and a lot of health.
• Horse of a Different Color: They can be spawned with a Pillager or Vindicator riding them.
• Immune to Flinching: A downplayed example. Ravagers only take 25% of knockback thanks to their heavy weight.
• Immunity Disability: Their 75% knockback resistance makes them even more vulnerable against Iron Golems, since an Iron Golem's knockback pushes enemies away into the air requiring them to fall back into the Golem's range for another attack. Thanks to being knocked back less, a Ravager hit by an Iron Golem allows the Golem to get into range and attack it again more quickly.
• Knock Back: Their charging attack deals high amounts of knockback.
• Lightning Bruiser: They're relatively fast, have a massive amount of health like an Iron Golem, and can deal a lot of damage. They are one of the very few mobs that can go toe-to-toe with an Iron Golem and even win if the Iron Golem had taken prior damage from other Illagers.
• Meaningful Name: They're beasts that ravage the crops of villagers by trampling them.
• Mighty Roar: Ravagers have a roar attack that knocks back mobs and players around them while damaging villagers and the player (but not Illagers).
• Mix-and-Match Critters: Four-legged, cow-like beasts with the head of a horned Illager.
• Use Your Head: Ravagers attack with a headbutt that deals heavy damage and knockback.
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Ravagers used to be afraid of rabbits of all things, and would flee when they saw them.

The Warden

The Warden is an incredibly dangerous mob that can two shot the player even while in Netherite armor. It is located in the Deep Dark underground biome. Although incredibly dangerous, it is also blind, only able to "see" using sculk blocks to detect the player's movement. As such, it can also be tricked using things to set them off in the other direction.

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• Animation Bump: Wardens have very fluid and flexible animations compared to other mobs, which further distinguishes their alien nature.
• Anti-Escape Mechanism: Its sonic blast attack defies conventional means of securing safety by players. As a ranged attack that penetrates terrain, it doesn't matter if the player's blocked the Warden off with a trench, hid into a space it can't fit in, or completely blocked themselves off on all sides; the Warden can still attack them if they're in range. As an added bonus, it also penetrates through all shields, armor, and enchantments.
• Anti-Frustration Feature: As they're meant to be run from and not killed, they do not count towards the Monsters Hunted advancement, which has killing every hostile mob type as part of its requirements.
• Armor-Piercing Attack: The Warden's sonic boom attack pierces all amounts of armor as well as the damage reduction from Protection enchantments. Not even a Shield will protect a player from this. The only way to mitigate this is the Resistance potion effect.
• Bioluminescence Is Cool: The patches in the middle of the Warden's chest glow in pulses, which is accompanied by a heartbeat sound. As it gets more agitated, they'll pulse more quickly to let the player know it's about to attack.
• Blind Mistake: Wardens are completely blind and sense sounds to navigate, meaning players can take advantage of this and create noises elsewhere to distract them. Their reveal trailer shows a player throwing a snowball to lure one away from him. When spawned outside of Ancient Cities, they are also prone to walking off cliffs. This is one of the few ways the environment can damage them, although they are so absurdly tough that they can shrug it off easily.
• Blind Weaponmaster: The Warden may not be able to see you, but if it senses your movements, you better hope you can either take it down or get away from it before it catches up to you.
• Body Motifs: Multiple structures in Ancient Cities, including the massive frame in the city center, are reminiscent of the Warden's eyeless face, with a gaping, rectangular orifice in the middle and protrusions on the side that appear similar to the Warden's "antlers".
• Bootstrapped Theme: "Fizz" from Minecraft Dungeons has become more commonly associated as the Warden's theme thanks to its usage during the reveal footage at Minecraft Live 2020.
• Boss in Mook Clothing: The most extreme example in the entire game. The Minecraft Live 2020 trailer shows them soaking up a lot of damage from the player, and even two-shotting them despite wearing Netherite armor. In fact, despite lacking a boss health bar, it has as much health as the Wither and the Ender Dragon combined.
• Chest Blaster: If the Warden somehow can't reach its target to throttle it at close range, it will unleash an extremely powerful "sonic boom" attack from its gaping chest cavity (complete with its ribs flipping outward), which can also penetrate through walls, while ignoring all shields, armor and enchantments.
• Damage-Sponge Boss: Specifically to discourage even trying to fight it: Wardens have 500 hit points, as much as the Wither and Ender Dragon combined.
• Dark Is Evil: Not just its colour, but lights will dim as it approaches. It's also one of the toughest and most aggressive hostile mobs in the game.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Though the devs heavily discourage this, someone sufficiently well-versed in technical Minecraft could definitely invoke this trope. Your best bet is to either build an impractically large army of Iron Golems, or bombard these creatures with either a firework barrage or end crystals, two insanely explosive items that can out-damage even the warden itself. Of course, you still have to damage it quickly enough that it doesn't get enough time to get a counter attack in, while at the same time being careful not to kill yourself or your Iron Golems from the explosions. Even then, you'll almost certainly lose at least seven or eight Iron Golems (if you use them), and you might even end up having to go through two or three Totems of Undying tanking the Warden's attacks in the process.
• Dug Too Deep: It's only found in the deep dark biome, located directly next to/on the bedrock layer.
• Early-Bird Cameo: Potentially eight years early. If you listen to the infamous Music Disc -- 11, you can hear sounds similar to that of what the Warden makes. (The developers have since confirmed that the Warden was indeed inspired by disc 11.)
• Eldritch Abomination: It shares traits that make it a Humanoid Abomination, a Botanical Abomination and an Undead Abomination. Let's recap, shall we? It's a three meter ogre-thing that is born from the sculk (itself a parasitic organism that feeds on souls). It possesses Super-Senses and can dim light around it, as well as shoot a sonic attack from its chest. Furthermore, it is implied to be the sculk's defense mechanism, a Flesh Golem induced with souls that the sculk create's to ensure its safety.
• Evil Is Bigger: One of the largest mobs in the Overworld (official screenshots show that it's larger than even the Iron Golem) and also one of the toughest hostile mobs in the game period.
• Eyeless Face: There's no obvious features on the Warden's head beside a gaping mouth and a pair of antler-like growths. Since it has no eyes, it can't see, and navigates by hearing and smell.
• Faster Than They Look: Despite being a huge hulking monster, upon detecting the player, they will make a beeline towards them at high speeds.
• Fluffy the Terrible: In the sixth episode of "The Secrets of Minecraft", it was jokingly revealed that the Warden's personal name was William, similar to how the Wither, Ender Dragon, and Player all have personal names.
• Heartbeat Soundtrack: When the Warden is nearby its heartbeat can be heard clearly, quickening if it becomes aware of a target.
• Hopeless Boss Fight: Taking it on directly is supposed to be near-impossible even with endgame-level equipment due to its whopping 500 total health, surprisingly fast running, and high damage outputs — it's intended to recreate the feeling of the first night later on in the game.
• Horrifying the Horror: Implied to do this to every other monster in the game. Minecraft has a slew of monsters that will manifest themselves anywhere that has darkness; the Deep Dark, which is the Warden's natural habitat, will not see any other type of monster spawn within its boundaries.
• Immune to Fire: Similar to most Nether mobs, the Warden takes no damage from fire or lava in order to be an even more challenging foe to flee from.
• Implacable Man: If it detects a player, it will not stop hunting them until they or it are dead. Considering that it’s the strongest creature in the game, bosses included, can move as fast as a sprinting player when at full tilt and is strong enough to turn even those equipped with netherite gear into a stain on the floor with little effort makes fighting one without the mother of all trump cards a death wish. Most notably, it can ignore several obstacles that most other mobs avoid, such as rails, water, powder snow, magma blocks and lava, while being immune to damage from the last three.
• Instakill Mook: In the reveal trailer, the Warden takes only two hits to kill a player wearing full Netherite, the most protective armor in the game. Indeed, the Warden does the most non-explosion damage of any mob in the game: a whopping 45 hit-points in Hard Mode, enough to kill an unarmoured player more than twice over.
• "Instant Death" Radius: Don't even think about standing near the Warden — if you make any direct contact with it, it will immediately turn on you and tear you to shreds in seconds. And even if you don't touch the Warden, it has the ability to smell you at close proximity, completely ruining any stealth you may have been practicing up to that point.
• It Can Think: The Warden is not a blind idiot. If a player thinks of Throwing the Distraction too often, the Warden will catch onto this ruse and earn a greater amount of ire towards the shooter. If it's angry, it will prioritize players over other other mobs that distracted it. And if it's angry but cannot reach an intended target, it will use a move that cannot be avoided and passes through walls and armor.
• Kill the Lights: When the Warden is nearby, it inflicts the Blindness status effect on players, making it impossible to see more than a few blocks in front of you, regardless of how bright it is. It also completely removes the player’s night vision potion.
• Lightning Bruiser: Extremely strong, stupidly tough, and frighteningly fast when it wants to be, easily chasing down and keeping up with the player in the trailer before it corners and kills them swiftly, punching through their netherite armor in just two blows.
• Lord British Postulate: Killing a Warden is an achievement in itself, as all the tropes regarding its strength and hardiness can attest to. And for the longest time, players weren't really intended to do so — for most of their lifetime in the update snapshots, they flat out had no items for players to desire them for, only dropping a pithy 5 experience orbs.
• Made of Iron: Its 500 hitpoints, along with numerous immunities, allow it to tank almost anything.
• Meat Moss: In a way. Its body appears to be made out of Sculk, which is much more fleshy and organic than stone and drops xp when mined without silk touch. Sculk spreads when a mob dies next to a Sculk Catalyst, infesting and changing blocks into more Sculk and even Sculk sensors and shriekers. In the very unlikely chance a Warden dies, it drops a Sculk Catalyst, which could be planted to start the cycle over again.
• Non-Standard Character Design: Or "non-standard animation". Unlike most mobs in Minecraft, which have stiff animations, the Warden lumbers about in motions and ways most Minecraft mobs don't. This was specifically to play up its eldritch nature.
• The Nose Knows: Even if the player doesn't move or make any noise, the Warden will actively sniff the air to determine their location.
• Obvious Rule Patch: The devs have gone out of their way to enforce that the Warden is meant to be run from, not fought:
  • In the snapshots, the Warden was initially vulnerable to being pushed around by water, stuck and burned in lava, and unable to pass rails, but it now bypasses all of them without taking damage or knockback.
  • As many players in the snapshots could easily hide from the Warden by getting behind a wall or higher elevation, it not only gained a longer attack reach, but can also now fire a ranged sonic boom that bypasses blocks, shields, and armor.
• Omnicidal Maniac: Once a Warden detects any mob or player nearby, it can and will utterly annihilate them without prejudice.
• Outside-Context Problem: There are significant implications from the abandoned cities where the Warden spawns that it's not a native of this dimension. Rather it arrived through the now disable portal in the center of the city along with the sculk before proceeding to go about its business acting as an unstoppable bouncer for the sculk allowing it to get a foothold.
• Roar Before Beating: Once it's pin-pointed an enemy, it'll arch back and let out a guttural yell before charging forward to demolish whatever made a noise. However, if the target is within very close distance, it skips this immediately and gives chase.
• Rule of Three: The player can trigger Sculk Shriekers thrice without harm. Once those three chances are up, the fourth trigger will cause the Warden to spawn.
• Run or Die: The Warden has been stated by the developers to not be a boss, and instead to be more like a force of nature that players have to hide from. You have effectively no chance of beating in a straight fight without some questionable explosive tactics, so you instead distract it if you don't know, which is most of the player base. It's also the only hostile mob that does not count towards the Monsters Hunted advancement, which has a requirement of killing one of every hostile mob type.
• Sense-Impaired Monster: It's completely blind, to the point of having no eyes of any sort. Instead, it hunts primarily by sound — its native biome is filled with organic growths that make noise when they detect movement, and the Warden will respond to both these and noises made directly by other beings by heading over to them and trying to kill whatever it finds. Moving through the Deep Dark involves a lot of careful sneaking to avoid alerting it; if its attention is drawn, it's possible to distract by throwing eggs or snowballs to send it off to investigate the noise. However, if it's having trouble tracking down its quarry by hearing, it will resort to sniffing the air to triangulate a silent player's location by smell.
• Soul Eating: The glowing entities in the Warden's gaping ribcage are souls, implicitly those of beings that it has killed.
• Starfish Alien: It comes from the Sculk, which is implied to come from another dimension. It's unnaturally tall, has no eyes, soundwaves sensing organs and it's made of sculk and souls fused together.
• Strong Enemies, Low Rewards: Despite being one of the most powerful enemies in the game, killing the Warden doesn't drop anything besides a meagre amount of experience points and a single sculk catalyst (which aren't too rare in the Deep Dark). This is intentional, since the point of the Warden is to be avoided, not fought.
• Super-Persistent Predator: Once it's detected a target, it'll keep chasing even through hazards that other mobs would normally shy away from, like lava or cactus blocks.
• Super-Toughness: The Warden has 500 HP, the most of any mob in the entire game — as much as the Ender Dragon and the Wither combined. It's also immune to fire and lava.
• Throwing the Distraction: The trailer shows the player throwing a snowball to activate some sculk blocks to lure the Warden away from them. You can also shoot arrows to achieve the same effect. However, if you shoot or throw entities too quickly, the Warden won't be fooled and home in on the thrower instead.
• Tunnel King: When summoned by a sculk shrieker, it will gradually pull itself out of the ground nearby, although it won't leave a tunnel behind. If nothing disturbs it for a minute, it will burrow back into the ground (even bedrock). If you activate a sculk shrieker, but not enough to summon a Warden, you'll sometimes be able to hear rumbling underground, as a warning.
• Unblockable Attack: Its sonic boom attack will not only penetrate blocks, but also shields as well. If that's not enough, no amount of armor or enchantments will protect against it too.
• Weaksauce Weakness: Its incredible hearing, while allowing it to catch players, can also easily be turned against it. And nothing makes a bigger racket to Wardens than bats, whose flight and constant squeaking make them very difficult for a Warden to deal with. Unfortunately, no other mobs spawn in the Deep Dark biome that the Warden is native to, so getting a bat into the same area as one is more effort than it deserves. It can also be drowned and takes fall damage, though both of those methods take forever to kill it due to its high HP.

Breeze

A flying mob, added in snapshot 23w45a, that appears from spawners inside trial chambers. It attacks using wind energy, which do very little damage but produce a huge amount of knock-back, as well as having the unique ability to activate numerous types of nearby interactable mechanisms, like doors, buttons, and levers.

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• Big Ol' Eyebrows: They've got massive Peter Capaldi brows.
• Blow You Away: As its name implies, all of the Breeze's attacks have something to do with wind. One of these attacks is to shoots out a "wind charge," which does one hit point of damage with tremendous knock-back, and another to create an explosion of wind that only inflicts knock-back.
• Immune to Bullets: Its swirling, tornado-like body will deflect any projectile weapon—forcing the player to engage it in melee combat.
• In a Single Bound: By coiling its body like a spring, the Breeze can launch itself five blocks high and fifteen blocks horizontally in one leap.
• Organ Drops: Like its cousin the Blaze, the Breeze drops its rods upon death, which can be crafted into wind charges or a Mace.
• Pushy Mooks: Downplayed. Breezes can do damage with their wind charge attacks — a measly one hit point before armor damage reduction. The real danger is their capability of Knock Back, as their wind charges deal significant knockback that can cause players to be pushed into hazards or other enemies.
• Technicolor Wind: Breezes have a mauve coloration along with their wind charge attack.
• The Speedster: Speed is the Breeze's main focus, as their offensive abilities are almost non-existent (with its wind charges dealing only 1 damage). The Breeze is more of an annoyer, who prefers to use its speed to dodge attacks, knock back players, and set up traps from a distance (especially considering that it usually won't be alone). However, it's not a Fragile Speedster, as it has 30 health points (meaning that it's more durable than other hostile mobs, who tend to have only 20).
• Underground Monkey: It's basically just a Blaze equivalent in the Overworld (including appearing only from spawners in a specific generated structure), but based on wind instead of fire. Even their names are similar, starting with B- and ending with -ze.

Removed Mobs

Giant

A completely unused type of zombie, the Giant, first appearing in Java Edition Indev 0.31 20100205. As opposed to most other hostile mobs, the giant doesn't have AI.

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• Took a Level in Badass: Downplayed, early in development, Giants used to have the zombie AI, being faster and stronger than the player, but in the next update this was removed, and Giants have been unused since then.

The Killer Bunny

A secret (now completely unused) type of rabbit named for the Rabbit of Caerbannog, first appearing in snapshot 14w27a. As opposed to most rabbits, this one is hostile, and will attack the player without provocation.

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• Glass Cannon: Though its attack is pretty strong, it only has one and a half hearts of health, and will die in one hit to just about any weapon, or to a Wolf's retaliatory attack.
• Hair-Raising Hare: It's a hostile rabbit that can deal a good chunk of damage to an unarmored player (up to six hearts on Hard mode).
• Killer Rabbit: Literally. Bonus points for being a reference to the Trope Namer.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: Its narrow red eyes are the only significant physical feature that will allow you to tell it apart from normal, harmless rabbits.
• Shout-Out: To the identically-named rabbit in Monty Python and the Holy Grail.
• White Bunny: It always appears as white.

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