Java Edition 1.4.6

1.4.6 is an update to Minecraft that was released on December 20, 2012. It introduced fireworks, enchanted books and the Thorns enchantment. It also added a warning for users playing on soon-to-be unsupported systems (PowerPC and Java 5). While it was not the last update to 1.4, it was the last one before the snapshots of 1.5 started.

A pre-release version of 1.4.6 was released on December 17, 2012; this pre-release version was later re-uploaded to fix an issue with mobs spinning. The release version of 1.4.6 differs from the reuploaded pre-release by fixing a crash issue.

Blocks

 * Nether brick slabs
 * Crafted using nether bricks.

Items

 * Enchanted books
 * Enchant books to receive a single enchantment on them.
 * Can be applied to items using anvils, consuming the book.
 * Enchants can be applied to any item in Creative mode.
 * Sold by villagers and found in dungeon and village chests.
 * Can now be found in loot chests and by trading with villagers.
 * Unbreaking can be applied to anything with durability.
 * Efficiency and Silk Touch can be applied to shears, allowing the harvesting of cobwebs.
 * Sharpness, Smite, and Bane of Arthropods can be applied to axes.


 * Firework star
 * Used to create firework rockets.
 * Combine gunpowder with dyes to get a firework star with those colors used for the sparkles.
 * Add glowstone, a fire charge, a diamond, a gold nugget, feather, or a mob head to make the firework twinkling, big, trailing, star-shaped, bursting, or creeper-shaped, respectively.
 * Craft a firework star with dye to change the color that the sparkles fade to.


 * Firework rocket
 * Non-destructive, rise up in the air, and create colorful patterns when shot by dispensers or placed by players.
 * Combine paper with gunpowder to craft a firework rocket.
 * Add a firework star to add effects, or gunpowder to increase the flight duration.

Gameplay

 * Thorns
 * A new armor enchantment.
 * Deals damage depending on tier to attackers.
 * Wears armor out faster.

Blocks

 * Monster spawners
 * Can now spawn differently configured mobs with different spawn chances

Items

 * Bows
 * A high pitched sound is now played when a player hits another player from far away with a bow.

Mobs

 * Ghasts
 * Fireballs' blast radius can now be customized


 * Skeletons, zombies, and zombie pigmen
 * The armor and enchants they spawn with now are even harder on harder difficulties.

Non-mob entities

 * Arrows
 * Now render from farther away.


 * Items and item frame entities
 * Now render in 3D when using fancy graphics.

World generation

 * Dungeons and villages
 * Now have a random chance to have enchanted books in their chests.

Gameplay

 * Inventory
 * Items can now be dragged and dropped.
 * Long pressing will halve the stack before dragging.


 * Hotbar
 * Items now show their name when switching in the hotbar.
 * Can be disabled by changing  to false in options.txt.
 * Dropping items while holding now drops the whole stack.


 * Enchantments
 * Fire Protection now extinguishes fire more quickly.
 * Blast Protection now reduces explosion recoil.
 * Protection is not as protective as it used to be in order to make specific enchantments more worthwhile.


 * Sneaking
 * Pressing while sneaking now uses the held item instead of the currently selected block.


 * Death messages
 * Now appear in server log files.

General

 * Display
 * Added a default resolution setting to options.txt :  and.


 * Options
 * Added an option to toggle touchscreen mode.

General

 * Distance effects
 * Falling block behavior has changed - they are no longer capable of infinitely producing dropped items at high coordinate values.

Fixes
64 bugs fixed
 * – [1-9]-clicking an item out of a furnace does not give XP
 * – Mobs walking slow when you hit them
 * – Graphical issue with trading
 * – Mobs can still revert farmlands to dirt even if mobGriefing gamerule is set on false
 * – Item textures of spawn eggs and firework stars not aligned properly when stacked
 * – Bats get stuck when flying through water
 * – Setting an enderman on fire with flint and steel or lava will not make it teleport away
 * – Items that are different only in damage cannot be swapped
 * – Water splash sound gets overridden by other sounds
 * – Animals on fire do not flee
 * – Player not shown in actual location after breaking boat
 * – Inventory items are lost
 * – Mis-identified server version
 * – Fresh install of 1.4.2 on fresh install of OSX 10.6.8 hangs
 * – Boats always get placed in the same direction and not based on how they get placed
 * – Endermen are set on fire when trying to dodge arrows on fire
 * – When you enter the Nether, the game auto-selects the first item on the toolbar
 * – Items do not "update looks" when stacked on ground
 * – Dropped items only auto-stack when moving, not when going through portals
 * – File Handle leak in RegionFileCache (MCP)
 * – Z-fighting in beacon block's bottom.
 * – Duplicating falling blocks (sand, gravel, dragon eggs...) still works with tweaks to an existing design
 * – Leaves have an incorrect tooltip
 * – Destroying a Jukebox NPE&Kick
 * – Minecraft graphics messed up
 * – Placing double slabs ignore damage values
 * – Minecarts cannot travel through nether portals
 * – "Drowning" in creative
 * – Bug with redstone's direction
 * – Enchant cannot enchant with ID 0 (Protection)
 * – Ghost block bug
 * – Game freezes at the start of a previously saved game
 * – Cannot modify the render distance setting - stays at "Far" regardless of changes.
 * – Shift-clicking smelted ores out of furnace cause minor visual bug
 * – Cannot look around while walking/sprinting unless jumping at first (happens on all gamemodes)
 * – Minecraft client crashes when connection times out
 * – Minecarts disappearing
 * – Error 50% of the time when trying to join a server.
 * – Zombie pigman's knockback stunlocks iron golem's defeating their intended purpose
 * – Cannot change texture packs
 * – Crash due to blaze fireballs
 * – Some textures appear as dark terrain.png images
 * – The XP sound doesn't play after getting each 5th level
 * – Minecraft crashing every time I get on for a little while
 * – Minecarts and falling entities flickering / jittering (updated 1.4.5)
 * – Passive mob spawn eggs don't consume
 * – Endermen don't open their mouth when attacked by other mobs
 * – Lightning doesn't flash
 * – Game only loads the chunk I'm currently standing on when I log in, and then freezes and crashes.
 * – Client crashes when underground near a piston-and-redstone machine
 * – Skeletons will come close to attacker
 * – Particle overload when returning from AFK
 * – Slime audio bug
 * – Chest glitch - Server/Client desynchronization
 * – Pressing F3+B displays hitboxes.. rendering invisibility potions useless
 * – Wither can sometimes destroy its own star due to the posthumous detonation of wither skulls
 * – Minecart goes off track and into walls
 * – Beacon tiers don't work at y=0
 * – Enchantments not showing in item frames
 * – Flaming arrows take a moment to burn
 * – Cannot remove XP bars from the command when between level 0 and 1
 * – Skeletons not retaliating to iron golems or wolves
 * – Minecraft crashed, exception world
 * – Game client gets stuck on 'building terrain' screen

Release fixes
These fixes occurred between the last snapshot for 1.4.6, 12w50b, and the full release of 1.4.6.


 * Other fixes
 * Fixed mouse wrongly positioned in fullscreen.

Trivia

 * 1.4.6 is the first minor update to have snapshots.