Because minecraft is intimidating and confusing

[prof]

How to Survive at Minecraft

A brave new world awaits you, filled with adventure, excitement, and resources!

Your first goal in Minecraft is to make sure that you can survive the first night. Accordingly, you are already working against the clock - if you aren't properly prepared by nightfall, you WILL die. Several times.

Let's start surviving! What are your resources?



Dirt!



Trees!



Sand!



Water!

All right, this is more than all we need to start surviving.

Next objective: Find a place to put your house!



This is a good place to put a house. You want something decently wide and level, without a lot of stuff near it. If it's not perfectly level, don't worry, you can fix that.



Behold: The first core mechanic of Minecraft! MINING.

Point your crosshairs at any block and hold down left click to start digging it out.



Once the block is destroyed, you can pick it up by walking over it! You are now the proud owner of one BLOCK OF DIRT.

Picked up items, by default, are stored in the quickbar at the bottom of the screen. You can cycle between them with either the number keys 1-9 or the middle mouse wheel. For an empty hand, cycle over to an empty slot.



And this is the second core mechanic of Minecraft!

Once you own a block, point at any surface and right click to place it. Using these two mechanics, you can reform the world to your will.



All right, time to get busy! Multiple blocks of the same type can stack, so start harvesting dirt like crazy.

Note that you can dig even if your hand is full.



Mining should always be done with a modicum of caution - sometimes what's under a block isn't what you expect. On this save, I found a lake hidden under a thin layer of dirt. Glad I didn't fall in!



Our first construction project will take 72 dirt, so go a little nuts. This is plenty of dirt.



Now to begin our first crude hovel!

Place dirt blocks in a square, measuring 7 blocks on a side. The space created inside it should be 5x5.



Once you've done that, jump up on it and start building a second layer on top of it!

Leave one space open, though - this will be your doorway.



When you're done, the building should be three blocks tall, with a door two blocks high in one side.



Here it is! Your safe haven for the night.

There should still be daylight left, though, so let's use it.



Remember those trees! Valuable resource!

Trees can be harvested using just your hands, so just point and click.



Behold: WOOD. One of the most important resources in the game.

Note that the tree doesn't fall - gravity doesn't work like that in Minecraft.



There are three different types of trees in the game! Each produces its own wood, which won't stack with other wood species.



Once a tree has no wood left, the foliage around it will start to fall apart. As it does, it may drop saplings, like the one here on the right. Pick these up - they can be used to plant your own trees later.

In the background, we can see one of the other denizens of this world! A COW. This is as good a time as any to practice combat.



Combat is simple! Point at a creature and left click to swing whatever you're holding at it. If it's not a weapon, anything is just as powerful as your fist.



Killing a cow nets you leather! This can be used for... something, which will be elaborated on later in the tutorial.



Got your hut and your wood? Great, spend the rest of day 1 exploring. Get a feel for the land, but be sure not to lose track of where your house is.



Seriously, you can find the coolest shit just lying around.



BUT EVENTUALLY, the sun will start to set. Time to head back to your base!



Once you're indoors, use some of your remaining dirt to seal up the door, trapping you inside. You will stay here all night.

DO NOT STAND TOO CLOSE TO THE WALLS.



Since we're stuck here all night, let's check out some further game mechanics! I brings up the Inventory screen.

You can cary 36 slots of items, but only 9 can be in the quickbar at a time.



Most important here, though, is the crafting area at the top of the screen!

Let's put some wood in there. Left click to pick a pile up, left click to put it down.

(For more fine tuned controls: Right click to pick half a pile up, and right click while something is picked up to drop a single unit.)



Via crafting, WOOD can be turned into WOOD PLANKS.

The 4 there means that, in exchange for one block of wood, I get four planks.



No need to make multiple trips - just keep left clicking on the output box and you'll keep converting wood into planks. We now have 24!



Note that, while the three kinds of wood don't stack together, they all produce the same kinds of planks, so they can stack at that point.

But wait! There is a third form of wood!



Most of crafting is based on putting different combinations of things in specific positions within the crafting area. Here we put two blocks of planks in, one above the other, and can convert them into four STICKS.

But that's not the most important craft you can do!



Place one plank in each slot of the crafting area to make one CRAFTING TABLE.

This is the most important item in the entire game.



The Crafting Table is a block, so place it in a corner somewhere, as you would a dirt block. Then, right click on it to open it!



This is the crafting table interface!

Note that our area we can craft with has increased from a 2x2 block to a 3x3 block. This gives us much more flexibility and power.



Place some sticks and planks in this configuration, and get your first tool! The WOODEN PICKAXE.

It is a tool we will only build once.



Next, a full ring of 8 blocks forms a CHEST. Place it like you would a crafting table!



The chest allows you to store more than 36 slots of items at a time. If you place two chests side by side, they'll combine into one large chest!



Anyway, that's about it for the first night. Go ahead and watch the moon as it crosses the night sky, indicating when day is breaking.

This would be a good time to catch up on email or whatever, it takes a long time. Early game nights are a bit dull.



Eventually, the sky will start to light up again! But don't go outside.

You're in here because there are monsters out there. No doubt you will hear them. When the sun is high enough, you'll hear them making a huge ruckus as the sunlight sets them on fire. When this ruckus stops, it's safe to go out.

Probably.



Dig out one block of your door to check for surviving monsters.

Oh hey, there's one.



This CREEPER is the most dangerous thing in the world. It will move towards you when you get too close, and when it reaches melee range, it explodes like a goddamn bomb. It can knock down walls, carve holes in hillsides, and kill you very easily.

If you can, RUN when you see a Creeper. Engaging them is not worth it, and if you get away for a while, they'll de-spawn on their own.



Time to get some new resources! Pick a stone wall anywhere, doesn't matter where, so long as you can reach it easily.



Technically you CAN dig out stone with your hands, but it takes a very long time, and you won't get the block from it - it'll just be destroyed. You need a pickaxe to mine stone.

Got a bit? Good, back to base.



By the way, this is a zombie. Even though they burst into flames in sun, be careful early in the day - a rock outcropping or tree are enough shade to keep them alive long enough to give you a real scare and take out half your health.



Back to base! With your newly found bounty, you can build a STONE PICKAXE. This is much sturdier and faster than a wooden pickaxe. Now you should never have to build a wooden tool again.



This is a pig.

More on that later.



The world is frequently overflowing with natural caves like this one. Trust me: DON'T GO IN. Not yet, you're not equipped for the task. Natural caves can be EXTREMELY dangerous, and you could end up losing all your items.



A nice easy way to start mining is to pick a spot on a hillside somewhere and start digging diagonally into it! Doesn't matter where; eventually, you'll strike rock.

Your goal here is to get a healthy supply of stone in your inventory.



As a side note, NEVER DO THIS. Tools should only be used for what they're designed for - pickaxes should only be used on stone. Mining other things with them wears them down much faster.



You may notice that it's getting darker as you dig inwards. This is because you are straying from natural sunlight.

Also note the small meter underneath the pickaxe icon at the bottom of the screen. That's its durability - wooden tools wear out very quickly.



Eventually, that wooden pickaxe will break, and you can move on to using only stone tools or better from here on out. To the surface!



This is what pigs are for! If you kill them, steaks come out. By equipping and right-clicking the steaks, you can eat them to recover health.



Back to the base! We have work to do.



This is the recipe for another item of great value, the FURNACE.



Place it somewhere in your hut once you've built it. There should be three special blocks in here now!



Right click it to open the furnace interface!

It works like this: FUEL goes in the bottom slot, and other items go in the top slot. Once you have both, it'll light up automatically, cooking the upper item and turning it into something else.



The standard fuel source (although there are others) is WOOD PLANKS. Cram some down there, and then put WOOD in the top.



The result is charcoal! A recently-added but very, VERY valuable item.



Even if you leave, the furnace will keep cooking whatever's in it. You could drop a stack of 64 fuel and 64 items, then leave for a day while it burns.



This is why charcoal is important! Charcoal + stick = 4 TORCHES.



Speaking of torches, the sun is setting again!

Time to try these things out.



Attach a torch to any surface and it will automatically light up, bathing the area in light.

Aside from the obvious use, monsters can't spawn in the light. It won't burn them like sunlight does, but if you have an isolated area that is well-lit, no monster will ever appear there.



So! You're stuck here all night, so might as well put the time to use! If you want, you can start building a basement now.

Be sure to light the tunnels you build with torches.



Eventually, in your digging, you may find blocks that look like this! This is IRON ORE, another item of great value.



Mine it, and take it back to the surface!

If you aren't finding any iron, digging deeper is usually a good bet. There's lots of it underground.



Now, take the iron ore to the furnace and burn it!

This will get you...



IRON INGOTS.

The stone age is officially over.



With iron ingots, you can make even stronger tools, which mine faster and last longer!

Speaking of which, let's check out some other things you can build at a crafting table!



An AXE cuts through trees with great speed. Useful for when you need a lot of wood.



A HOE can be used to till ground and produces seeds by right clicking on grass spaces. This can ultimately earn you WHEAT, which can then be used to make BREAD.



A SHOVEL is very useful for digging up dirt or sand quickly.



A SWORD does about what you'd expect - not good at mining, but it does much more damage than your fists when you hit monsters with it.

All the above tools can be made out of wood, stone, iron, or maybe something stronger...



A FENCE can be placed on the ground to keep monsters out! It's 1.5 spaces high, and monsters, like you, can only jump 1 space. Except for maybe spiders.



A LADDER can be placed on the side of a surface to allow you to climb up it. Useful for if you want very tall structures!



A DOOR can make your house easier to keep secure! One punch opens it, one punch closes it. Monsters can't use it.



A STONE SLAB is half a block high, allowing you to make gradual inclines that you can travel without jumping!



A HELMET can be equipped from the inventory screen to give you armor against enemy attacks. Also buildable is BOOTS, SHOES, and SHIRTS.

These can be made using the leather you get from cows, if iron is too expensive.

Finally, a couple furnace recipes...



One of the most important is cooking sand, which creates GLASS!



With this you can create windows out into the world, without letting monster attacks in. There ARE enemies with ranged attacks out there at night.



Finally, you can cook the cobblestone blocks you get from mining to make true, refined STONE blocks! These are more resistant to damage than cobblestones, and also look nicer.


So! You've survived, and have your basic toolset.

Where do you go from here?

Alas, this is a question I cannot answer for you. It is crucial to get some kind of project. Explore the underground! Expand your house into a castle! Build a floating fortress! The sky's the limit!

HAPPY MINECRAFTING!