Blaze

Blazes are mobs with a yellow skin and brown eyes found in The Nether. They primarily spawn from Monster Spawners found mostly inside Nether Fortresses. Their bodies are made up of a head atop a central column of smoke, and three rotating sections. Each rotating section contains four floating yellow rods. Blazes can fly and shoot Fire Charges. They make a metallic breathing sound.

Spawning
Blaze spawners can be found only in Nether Fortresses, and will start spawning Blazes once the player gets within 16 blocks. The spawners have a chance of spawning 1-4 Blazes at once. Blazes can only spawn in light level 11 or lower (at the lower half of their body). Blazes can also spawn naturally elsewhere in Nether Fortresses.

Behavior
Although Blazes are able to fly, they will stay on the ground or sink down slowly in the air when not attacking. Blazes will attempt to swim upwards in lava much like regular mobs behave in water. When they see a player, they will start flying and shooting. They will catch fire briefly before shooting a three round burst of Fire Charges. A short cool down period occurs between attacks.

It is recommended not to use a Wolf to kill it due to its danger of fire and its amount of health. If you do try to do this though, remember to bring meat to heal your dog.

In addition to normal weapons, Blazes can be hurt by water and snowballs, as well as rain, if they have found a way into the overworld. They are not damaged by fire or lava. If killed, they drop Blaze Rods.

Strategy
Blazes are considerably difficult mobs to fight, due to their ranged, unblockable attacks and rapid rate of fire. Their ability to fly usually leaves the player's sword useless, while a player's bow's charging time and move speed leaves the player highly vulnerable to attack. On the other hand, Blazes have a much shorter attack range than the player, which makes it more feasible to snipe them from afar. Also, the player can run behind a corner and ambush them once they get close, or place blocks to take cover between attacks as they advance.

The best weapon to kill Blazes is Snowballs, as snowballs will do 3 points of damage each to the Blaze and snowballs can be thrown a lot more quickly than a bow can be charged up. Plus, snow is easy to find in any snowy biome and is even renewable, therefor you can collect an ample supply of them. In case inventory is tight, you can make Snow Blocks to store snowballs until you need them, but you must bring a shovel to break the blocks, otherwise they will not yield a single snowball.

Much like Ghasts, the Blaze's ability to fly can make it difficult to recover their loot after killing them. However, a viable tactic of combat is to fight them at close range by reeling them in with a fishing rod first. The use of a potion of fire resistance is extremely helpful when fighting Blazes, as their attacks usually wind up dealing more fire damage than initial impact. Using a Splash potion on you and an Iron Golem can make blaze rods an easily renewable resource.

'Camping' at a Blaze spawner is an effective way to gather Blaze Rods, as they will always appear close enough to attack with a sword, and there is a delay in their attack after they spawn because they have to charge first. This is best done in combination with the fire resistance potions in effect.

You can try to build a farm, in several ways. If you can build a box around the entire spawn zone (tip: the fences around the spawner are not far enough away), you can make a doorway to kill them as they come down, or a single hole in the bottom where you can pelt them with arrows or snowballs. Again, stay within 16 blocks of the spawner to keep it going. You can also make a blaze trap by digging a shelter under their balcony, then mine a 1&times;3 hole up to their balcony. (Sometimes a natural version of this will appear, when a narrow staircase leads up to the spawner room.)

Iron Golems can be used to kill blazes, as they will attack them with melee attacks that deal 7 to 10.5 hearts of damage to the Blaze. However, there are several drawbacks to this:
 * They do get set on fire by the Blaze's fireballs, and can otherwise be attacked. As noted above, a splash potion of Fire Resistance can help, and they are pretty sturdy to begin with.
 * More seriously, Blazes won't drop the Blaze Rod unless the Player deals the killing blow (or perhaps has attacked the Blaze within 3 seconds before its death).
 * Also, the golem's immense knockback is likely to toss Blazes off the balcony entirely. If they die, the experience and probably the Blaze Rod is lost; if they survive, they will hang around sniping at you from a distance.
 * Iron Golems don't follow you very well, and may wander off between spawns. (Perhaps in pursuit of nearby Zombie Pigmen, who at least won't attack you over it, but don't carry Blaze Rods.

Blazes are also an efficient way to farm experience. They drop 10 experience points when killed by the player, as opposed to only 5 dropped by most other hostile mobs. The above camping method, combined with potions of fire resistance, can generate an average of about 65 experience per minute.

History
Blazes were introduced in Beta 1.9 Pre-release 1 and could cause contact damage even when the player had fire resistance. The bug was fixed in a later version.(confirm and need version)

Starting from Beta 1.9 Pre-release 4(verify version) they only dropped items when they aren't on fire (about to attack); This has since been fixed, and they will now have a chance to drop Blaze Rods any time they are killed.

As of Beta 1.9 Pre-release 5, Blazes only drop a Blaze Rod when killed by the player.

Sounds specific to Blazes were introduced in version 1.0.0RC2. They make "breath" sounds and make metallic clunks when hurt.

Trivia

 * Blazes will not shoot if trapped in a Cobweb, since the web blocks the Fire Charge path.
 * Unlike Ghasts, projectiles fired by a Blaze cannot be deflected.
 * Fire Charges will set whatever they hit on fire, including solid blocks, mobs, and the player.
 * With a 'fire resistance potion' in effect, the blaze is the only mob whose attacks are capable of being completely neutralized, including their knockback effect. However, they are able to hit players when up close with a melee attack.
 * The player and Snow Golems can kill a blaze with snowballs, although Snow Golems will melt in the Nether. Even outside of the Nether, they will be killed quickly by the Blazes' attacks.
 * Each snowball deals damage, so it takes 7 snowballs to kill one Blaze.
 * Blazes will take damage from rain and snowy weather if spawned into The Overworld.
 * Blazes, despite their almost alien morphology, share a recolored face with The Player and other humanoid mobs.
 * When this mob is not in pursuit of the player, they are bound to the ground. One can observe this as they may jump to get onto higher blocks and drop when going off an edge.
 * One may also observe that when they make contact with a block below they make footstepping noises appropriate to the block, as any earth-bound mob with feet would make, despite being a floating mob.
 * Blazes drop the most experience aside from the boss mobs (the Ender Dragon and the Wither).
 * Blazes, when not in pursuit of the player, are affected by gravity, but like a chicken, take no fall damage.
 * If a blaze is struck by lightning it will disappear inside the lightning, then reappear as soon as the lightning finishes.
 * Their texture is called "fire.png." This likely refers to their ability to shoot fireballs or that they light on fire when ready to attack.
 * Blazes make a metallic sound when hit.

Gallery
Lohe Blaze Incendiaire Őrláng Blaze Blaze Blaze Ифрит 烈焰人