5 best things to do before Minecraft 1.21 update releases

Minecraft 1.21, also known as Tricky Trials, is presumably right around the corner. Mojang historically announces the release dates for major updates near the end of May, with the actual update releasing in the months after that. That also makes this the perfect opportunity to start preparing a survival world for the transition into the next major update.

Detailed below are five of the best things players can do in their survival worlds to prepare for the exciting and challenging content that 1.21 is bringing to the game.

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5 things to do before the release of Minecraft Tricky Trials

1) Stock up on weapons and gear

Any spare armor collected can also be displayed as decoration on armor stands (Image via Mojang)

The trial chambers that Tricky Trials are partially named for are Minecraft's most dangerous structure, meaning players going to take them on must be adequately prepared.

There are a few different things that players can do in 1.20 to prepare for the next major Minecraft update. This includes tracking down extra diamonds to make spare weapons and armor, crafting an abundance of arrows, gathering milk and honey to neutralize poison, and brewing some of Minecraft's best potions to self-buff.

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2) Build good crafter farms

Crafters will revolutionize many different farms, including the iconic generic mob farm (Image via Mojang)

Tricky Trials is set to introduce automated crafting via Minecraft's revolutionary new crafter block. This is a redstone component that can input raw materials and output completed items. There is no shortage of farms that this block could connect to make it more efficient. Building the farms now is good for saving time in 1.21 and will also help players by gathering resources in the meantime.

For example, Nether-based gold and bartering farms, already some of the best loot farms in Minecraft, could be connected to constantly processing gold nuggets into ingots, which are then fed into the bartering farm. Additionally, sugar cane can be processed into paper and combined with the gunpowder from a generic mob farm to make a fully automated firework rocket farm.

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3) Mess with Armored Paws' content

Wolves are much better combat companions thanks to Armored Paws' wolf armor (Image via Mojang)

With Tricky Trials nearing its release, now is the perfect time to experiment with any Armored Paws content that has been ignored so far. Armored Paws is the minor update immediately preceding 1.21 and is unique in being the first minor Minecraft update to get a name. Some of this content will also be very useful for taking on Tricky Trials' content.

For example, the wolf armor added by Armored Paws makes tamed wolves much harder to defeat in combat. This is especially noticeable when combined with the other change that made healing tamed wolves twice as efficient. These beasts are way harder to kill now, making them great allies to bring into the otherwise deadly upcoming Minecraft trial chambers.

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4) Set up an enchanting area

A basic level 30 enchanting setup (Image via Mojang)

Enchantments are one of the most powerful ways players can augment their gear. Tricky Trials is making this even more true thanks to the different unique mace enchantments being added alongside the weapon type. Two of these enchantments, density and breach, are obtainable from the enchanting table, making it vital to create a Minecraft enchanting area before 1.21.

Feather falling is also a very useful enchantment in Tricky Trials, due to the mace weapon type encouraging large falls to get bonus damage. The new breeze mob found in trial chambers also makes feather fall a better enchantment to have, as the wind charges it attacks with can send players flying.

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5) Collect copper and tuff

The new copper blocks are particularly exciting (Image via Mojang)

A fun part of Tricky Trials for builders is a huge expansion of both copper and tuff as blocks. Copper is getting doors, trapdoors, bulbs, grates, and chiseled variants, along with oxidized versions of each of these. Tuff, on the other hand, is getting stairs, slabs, and walls, as well as polished and brick versions of each of these blocks.

That makes now the perfect time to start gathering these resources for potential builds. Copper is best collected when using fortune, one of the best enchantments in Minecraft, which can cause a single copper ore to drop 20 raw copper at max level. Tuff generates between Y levels -64 and 0, in ore blobs, making it harder to collect in large numbers than copper.