I’ve found 27 amazing facts you probably didn’t know about in version 1.18. Here are some of the coolest things you missed in the Caves and Cliffs update.
1. Everyone loves the normal Minecraft font, but Mojang has added a secret way to write in 1.18. It looks like the enchantment table language, but it’s actually a NEW way to encode messages! Currently, this font can only be seen with commands but these runes might be used in the wild update for the deep dark and have been seen before in Minecraft Dungeons, where they’re called “illageralt”. Is this what the illagers are actually saying?
2. Mojang has tried to sneak in a few texture changes without you knowing in the 1.18 update. Most of the door items have changed slightly; the hammer in the anvil has changed, and the regular item frame has been brightened a bit. But that’s not all! They’ve removed a single pixel from the texture of stage 3 carrot crops. Literally unplayable before.
3. Here are some secret changes that happened to the axolotls. Before 1.18, axolotls were able to spawn anywhere with enough water and darkness. Yep, that includes the End and the Nether if you could somehow get water in there. Now, they can only spawn in lush cave biomes with clay beneath the water. Why do they have to be so picky now?! Also, the brown ones have had their texture changed very slightly because their back wasn’t centered before!
4. This update stretches worlds up to 320 blocks tall, but that’s NOT the highest that a Minecraft version has ever allowed you to build. This screenshot is from an unreleased version that lets terrain generate up to five hundred blocks up in the sky. It was probably scrapped because, yeah, that doesn’t look natural. The smallest a world has ever been was 64 blocks tall, meaning, your towers could only go about 30 blocks up before they hit the limit. I mean, it’s technically scraping the sky…
5. Is five hundred blocks not tall enough for you? Well, with datapacks in 1.18 and 1.17, you can actually go further. Mojang lets you make your Minecraft worlds up to four thousand blocks tall. Now THAT’S what I call a skyscraper. Although, it’s still not as tall as Mount Everest. You can technically make it so that you can build even further under the world, but blocks won’t save, and the game completely breaks after going sixty-five thousand blocks down.
6. Illagers hate villagers. They were created to be a villager’s worst nightmare, but the 1.18 update actually makes them nicer? Before the update, they would attack any kind of villager. Now, they’re kind to babies and no longer attack them! They’re so kind! The unused illusioner mob also got its texture updated, and witches don’t have an invisible hood in their texture anymore.
7. 1.18 does a load of things that have never been done to Minecraft, like being the first update in ten years to be split into two, or being the first update in ten years to have no snapshot versions ending in the letter B! No seriously, I checked them all. However, this isn’t the first update to be called 1.18! Back in 2015, the PlayStation versions of Minecraft got this update. It added acacia and dark oak wood stuff to the creative inventory. You’re probably expecting more but that’s all it did. Groundbreaking.
8. You might be thinking that you’ll only find the regular hostile mobs while mining in 1.18, but that’s where you’re wrong. These guys might jumpscare you when you’re least expecting it because infested stone now generates in all six new mountain biomes. They can even hide in deepslate, so don’t be surprised when you’re ambushed by a gang of silverfish. I’ll give you my money, just let me keep my stuff!
9. While caving in 1.18, you should know Mojang’s official names for each type of cave, and they’ve picked some pretty weird ones. The long thin caves are SPAGHETTI caves, NOODLE caves are the even thinner ones, and CHEESE caves are ones with large stone towers! I guess I can see why?
10. Another new underground feature you need to learn about is the aquifer, because they’re surprisingly great for finding diamonds! These are those flooded cave systems you find that can even take the shape of massive underground lakes. Diamonds are less likely to generate touching air but because they’re full of water, aquifers make diamonds more common and you can still see them!
11. Speaking of underwater lakes, squids are gonna be a lot less annoying now. Before, they’d spawn in water at any height in Bedrock Edition. Now, they’re restricted to just 14 possible “y” coordinates. Glow squids now only spawn beneath y=30, instead of 63. Both also have a five percent chance to spawn as a baby in Bedrock Edition, which I’ve actually never seen before.
12. The new Otherside disc plays an amazing song, but the disc itself has some odd properties. Placing a comparator next to a jukebox playing it will emit a stronger signal than any other disc in the game. Also, creepers can’t drop Otherside or Pigstep, even though they do drop all the other discs. It makes sense not to drop Pigstep, since that one’s unique, but why not Otherside? Song’s so good they wanna keep it for themselves!
13. It’s so much easier to get powder snow, but that means it’s much easier for it to catch you off-guard. So, while in groves and snowy slopes, avoid the freezing effect by wearing leather boots. Skeletons turn into strays in powder snow and polar bears don’t take damage, so watch out. Interestingly, goats are the only mobs that avoid powder snow, meaning that goats truly are the smartest mobs in Minecraft. Somehow.
14. On the 1.17 title screen, you might have spotted this random splash text saying “[this splash text has been delayed until part 2]”. Well, now that Caves and Cliffs Part 2 is finally out, we can see what the text was gonna say! Here we go! (*drumroll*) The splash says: “[this splash text is now available]”. Expected a little more, but that’s alright.
15. 1.18 is not supposed to be adding new blocks, but the new biomes mean that the spore blossom can now be found in Survival. Remember never to break them with shears, though. Breaking them with shears uses up the durability when they can be broken instantly with your hand and still drop. Spore blossoms can be placed under any block but not leaves for some reason, even though they’d blend in better under leaves than they do under glass.
16. Another item that didn’t naturally generate before this update is the dripleaf, so here are some interesting facts you need to remember about them. Powering a big one makes it not flop down. You can turn a small one into five big ones, but you can’t turn them back. Bonemeal makes a big one grow. The big ones can now only be placed on certain blocks. An axe is best for breaking big ones and small ones only drop when mined with shears.
17. Now that the lush caves biome actually generates, we can also finally find azaleas. Placing an azalea within two blocks of an oak or birch sapling will have a 5% chance of the tree having a bee nest (hive?) with bees inside! This actually works with all flower types too.
18. The moss blocks you find in lush caves used to let you break bedrock. Using bone meal on them will cause certain types of nearby blocks to be converted to moss blocks. When Mojang was adding this feature, they forgot to make sure to only change certain blocks, meaning that they could even change bedrock. Moss is stronger than you think. Another weird thing about these blocks is that they let you put nether fungi on them, but not mushrooms.
19. Nothing beats the satisfaction of completing a difficult achievement and 1.18 adds four new advancements to Java Edition. They include things like riding a strider in the overworld, playing a jukebox in a meadow, or my favourite, trading with a villager at the new height limit. Just when you thought trading prices were high enough! The “Adventuring Time” advancement has also increased from 30 required biomes to 50, which is gonna need some serious trekking.
20. Amongst the major changes being made to Minecraft, this update also brings a few tiny details that you didn’t notice but will appreciate. When you find a buried treasure chest in Java Edition, you’ll ALWAYS get a potion of water breathing now! Some new things like water droplets making splash particles and temples being banned from generating in the water just make the game that little bit more accurate.
21. Most new mountains are really snowy, but that wouldn’t make sense right next to a warm biome like a savanna or jungle. Luckily, Mojang thought this through! When a mountain tries to generate next to a warm biome it becomes a “STONY peaks” biome. Instead of having goats like the jagged peaks biome, stony peaks have no mobs at all. Well, apart from monsters.
22. 1.18 has added a bunch of biomes and that’s no secret. However, you likely didn’t know that Mojang has removed a couple of biomes as well. One of these is the deep warm ocean, which you’ve probably never seen before because it never naturally generated for some reason. Mojang also removed fifteen more biomes! Explains why they’re called bye-omes! Get it?
23. Mountains can now go REALLY high, but how tall can they actually get? A 1.18 mountain can be up to two hundred and sixty blocks tall. That’s literally higher than you could even build before, plus you’re still left with over sixty more blocks to build really cool stuff! I know this is the Caves and Cliffs update but, wow, that’s a tall mountain.
24. There’s a big feature that got cut from 1.18 that I really liked. Hostile mobs were only going to spawn in complete darkness. This really would’ve helped with making nice dimly lit builds in Survival but these changes got reverted probably because they broke too many mob farms. I’ll just stick to peaceful for now, then.
25. Mojang changes the title screen background with every update. However, they keep the seeds for these images secret. But you guessed it, the seed-finding experts from Minecraft At Home managed to work out the exact seed for the new background. It turns out that it’s exactly the same seed as the original one from over ten years ago. Look how much it’s evolved! They grow up so fast.
26. Lightning bolts have been improved for 1.18 in a small but weird way. In Bedrock Edition before the update, lightning bolts would have shadows. Aren’t lightning bolts supposed to be made of LIGHT? Mojang eventually figured this one out and fixed it for the update. Come on, Mojang. It’s in the name…
27. Getting a horse, mule, llama, or donkey to follow you has always required a lead or a particularly annoyed llama. With 1.18, you can get around that sometimes painful limitation with a hay bale for a llama or some golden food for the other mobs. They have very expensive tastes.