The Yearly Content
Minecraft version 1.20 was released just over a year ago. Since then, we have not gotten any content updates aside from 1.20.5 which added the armadillo, wolf armor, and wolf variants. In what is starting to become a pattern, it is now time for the annual June content update for Minecraft, in the new 1.21 update! In this article we’ll talk about what you can expect from this new version.
The main pieces of content coming in 1.21 are the trial chambers and the crafter. There are tons of other additions coming as well, including decorative blocks and content related to and found inside the trial chambers.
Into the Unknown
By far, the biggest piece of content, and the namesake of this update, are the trial chambers. These are structures to explore, meant to challenge the player with battles and traps, and reward them with loot and adventure. The chambers are procedurally generated, so it will be a new adventure every time you enter one. They are mainly built with various forms of copper and tuff. You can enter a set of trial chambers with a "trial key", which can be obtained from pots and chests. Once you are inside, trial spawners can drop more keys. To find a trial chamber, you must purchase an explorer map from a Cartographer villager.
Trial spawners are unique spawners found inside trial chambers. It can spawn a varying number of mobs, based on how many players are with you in the chamber. The reward for beating these mobs scales with party size too. The blocks around the spawner change as well, depending on what mobs that spawner will spawn. The mobs it can spawn vary, from several familiar enemies to a couple new arrivals - the Breeze and the Bogged.
The Bogged is an ancient skeleton that has grown moss and mushrooms. It can be found in swamps, mangrove swamps, and trial chambers. Aside from normal skeleton drops, it can also drop poisoned arrows. It will shoot these same arrows at you, so be careful! Poisoned arrows combined with the treacherous terrain of a swamp makes for a very dangerous foe.
The breeze is a hostile mob that uses the power of the wind to attack. While it looks similar to a blaze, the breeze is quite different. It is immune to all projectiles, meaning bows that easily take out blazes are useless here. It also darts around while attacking, making it a difficult foe to hit. Breezes drop "breeze rods" which can be used to craft a mace or a wind charge, both new items in this update.
You may also run into a "vault" in a trial chamber. This new block contains loot and can be looted by multiple players, each getting their own unique loot. However, to open a vault, you need a trial key. Each player can only loot a specific vault once, but there is no limit to how many players can loot the vault, as long as they each have a trial key.
Back Above Ground
Now let's move on to some of the smaller additions. As mentioned above, you can craft wind charges and maces from breeze rods. The maces are heavy weapons that have a unique mechanic that deals more damage based on how far the player has fallen when the attack happens. This means jumping off high ground and slamming down onto mobs can inflict serious damage! The wind charge has several uses. It can be thrown at mobs to do some damage and send them flying backwards. It can also be used to send you flying, and you will be immune to fall damage on the next landing. The best part about wind charges, in my opinion, is that they can be used to activate redstone devices, except iron doors and trap doors. This has the potential to add some very cool twists to fancy redstone contraptions.
The next major piece of new content is just one single block; the crafter. The crafter is a block that can automatically craft items if given the right ingredients and powered by redstone. It has a 3x3 crafting grid inside, and each slot can be locked or unlocked. The crafter’s inventory can be filled with hoppers and droppers. With clever timing and automation, you can input complex recipes into a crafter. For easier recipes, like 3x3 of a single item type like coal to coal blocks, all that is required is a single hopper. When given a redstone signal, the crafter will attempt to craft if a valid recipe is in the storage, then eject it out of the front of the block. If there is an inventory block, like a chest, in front of the crafter, it will deposit the crafted item (and any byproducts like empty buckets or bottles) into that inventory. I, for one, am excited to see the crazy contraptions that people will be able to make with this new entry into the redstone arsenal.
Decorations Galore
There are many more content additions in this update, and most of the ones we have not gone over are decorative blocks and items. Notably, the copper bulb, which emits light, the copper door and copper trap door, and new paintings. Other than that, there are tons of various decorative blocks made out of copper and tuff that I won’t fully list here. They make for a nice addition to the current set of decorative blocks available for building. I am not a great designer myself, but I can’t wait to see the new styles people come up with that incorporate these new blocks. And finally, there are a slew of bug fixes and changes as well, which I also won’t list. If you want to see the full list of changes and additions, check out this wiki article on the 1.21 Java edition, or the 1.21 Bedrock edition. You can see the announcement of the release date, along with an overview of the content, on the official Minecraft website.
This build shows off some of the new blocks added in this update.
Minecraft version 1.21 will be released tomorrow, June 13th! This is a great time to spin up a server and check it out. If you haven’t touched vanilla Minecraft in a while because of modded, it’s also a great time! The last several content updates have added some great stuff, and it’s a fun time even if you’re used to the challenges and conveniences of mods. The trial chambers are cool, but I am most excited about the crafter and wind charges. I didn’t think auto-crafting would ever come to vanilla Minecraft, but here we are!