Snow Golem

Snow Golems are the game's first utility mob.

Creation
To create a snow golem, the player must vertically stack two snow blocks on the ground and then place a pumpkin or jack o'lantern on top of them. The pumpkin must be placed last in order for the golem to spawn.

The creation of snow golems can be automated in vanilla survival since pumpkins can be placed by a dispenser. They can also be created by spawning in a falling sand entity with a tile ID of 86 and dropping it onto two snow blocks (/summon FallingSand x y z {TileID:86,Time:10}). Endermen are capable of creating snow golems by placing the necessary blocks, although this is an extremely rare event because they do not do so deliberately.

Drops
Snow golems drop up to 15 snowballs upon death.

Behavior


Snow golems move towards hostile mobs and throw snowballs at them up to 10 blocks away, provoking them; however the thrown snowballs do not do any damage, except to blazes. Snow Golems do not attack aggressive wolves, although in the event of a misfire, all wolves in the vicinity will attack the snow golem. Snow golems attract most enemies and do not follow the player, making them useful for luring enemies into traps. They are also useful for dispatching endermen, as the snowball will cause them to teleport away.

Snow golems have good path-finding skills, and will not jump off cliffs or into lava. Snow Golems "melt" (take damage) in deserts, mesas, jungles, savannas, the Nether, and when in contact with rain or water; however they do not take fall damage.

As they move, they leave a trail of snow on the ground if the blocks can support it. If it walks over a mushroom, the mushroom will be destroyed and dropped as an item.

Snow golems can be put on leads and tied to fences.

Defense
A snow golem's primary purpose is to defend the player from hostile mobs. Four snow golems throw snowballs quickly enough to continuously push a zombie back. Due to their small health (, which is 20% of the players health), players are advised to use many at once. They will attack zombie pigmen regardless of whether or not they attacked the player, but will not trigger any others in the area, either towards the golem or the player.

Since both pumpkins and snow can be found in cold taiga, ice plains and extreme hills biomes, it may be a nice idea to build a few when first starting out if one is desperate.

Here are a few examples of efficient ways to defend yourself and your valuables:

A horde of Snow Golems kept between two lines of fence provides a wall that constantly pushes back mobs at a distance, and in an emergency, they can be released to push back approaching enemies. Another way is to place them into guard towers, shielding them from damage. To create such a guard tower, make a small 3x3, 1-4 block high tower. Add another block 4 blocks up from the center to protect it from rain. Surround the top with fencing and create a Snow Golem in the center.

Attack
Snow golems deal no damage to most mobs, except Blazes. Given enough splash potions of Fire Resistance, they can be used to farm Blaze rods from Blazes, as long as the player deals the final blow.

Farming


Since snow golems leave a constant trail of snow cover as they move (except in Plains, Swamps, Deserts, Beaches, Jungles, Oceans, Mushroom Islands, and the Nether), it is possible to farm that snow. However, because of their habit of attacking hostile mobs, it would be wise to ensure the Snow Golem is in an enclosed, safe place in the beginning. The simplest method is to create a 1x1 hole that is 2 blocks deep, and to put both the player and the Snow Golem in. Then the player would look straight down and dig the snow layer beneath the golem. This creates an unlimited number of snowballs very quickly, because the snow layer regenerates as quickly as it is mined. A shovel must be used to collect the snow as snowballs—with other tools or none, it is simply destroyed. (Note that the shovel will wear out quickly—a diamond shovel will be completely used up in 2 minutes 30 seconds.) Since snowballs only stack to 16, they can quickly fill the inventory, but of course they can be condensed into snow blocks (which do stack to 64, and store 4 snowballs each). If one wants to farm snow in a Desert, Beach, Jungle or Mushroom Island, the golem can sometimes be put on a platform above a river, as rivers count as a separate "River" biome.



Appearance


Snow Golems look similar to real-life snowmen. They have two snow blocks for a body, each having three seemingly coal buttons in the middle, and a snow block as a head with coal dots in the shape of a slightly wonky smiley face. The head block is covered by a pumpkin helmet. They also have sticks for arms. There are no apparent legs, and they seem to just glide around on the bottom snow block.

Trivia

 * Although Snow Golems will attack most hostile mobs, they will only agitate skeletons, spiders, cave spiders, witches, blazes, silverfish, endermites and creepers. Endermen simply teleport away.
 * Certain mobs act strangely when attacked by Snow Golems, namely zombies, spiders, cave spiders, silverfish, endermites, and wither skeletons. That is, they will only retaliate if hit while chasing a player, and the player did not hit the mob first. After that, the mob has a random chance to stand completely still, or hit the golem once before standing still. They will resume chasing the player if the snow golem is killed. This same behavior occurs when a zombie is chasing a villager, or when a mob is chasing an iron golem.
 * Iron golems can be agitated if the Snow Golem accidentally hits one or a villager while aiming at another mob. The same applies for wolves.
 * Snow golems wear their pumpkin as a helmet just like the player does. Their actual snowman-type head is hidden beneath it. If the player occupies the same space as a Snow Golem, its pumpkin helmet will be seen through, revealing their snowman-style face.
 * The throwing sound is actually the bow firing sound.
 * Snow golems cannot be made by pistons because the code for generating snow golems are found in the pumpkin`s "OnBlockPlace" (when placed by a player) event, and also pumpkins will be dropped as an entity when pushed by a piston.
 * Since the damage snow golems take in hot biomes is considered fire damage, a splash potion of fire resistance thrown immediately after the creation of one will make it survive.
 * Snow golems do not leave behind snow when they move on slabs.