Tutorials/Achievement guide

This guide is intended for people who are interested in completing the Achievements.

This tutorial is all about the Achievements and how to complete them. It is divided into the starting three Achievements and the three paths afterwards. It should be noted that every achievement is optional and therefore not necessary to gameplay.

All Achievements
Currently there are 33 different achievements in the PC game.

[Taking Inventory]
Goal: Open your inventory. This one is pretty straightforward. Press . A fairly big screen should pop up. This is the inventory and crafting menu.

Players before the Beta 1.4 update have their default inventory key as, so if you played before Beta 1.4, then press I.

If you changed your inventory key to something else, press that key instead.

Unlocks: Getting Wood.

[Getting Wood]
Goal: Pick up a wood block.

This one is easy as well. Just hold down the left-click on a wood block until it breaks, then collect the dropped block by walking over it.

Wood blocks are found on trees, which are very easy to find (as long as you didn't start out in an ocean or desert biome). Just look around.

Unlocks: Benchmarking.

[Benchmarking]
Goal: Construct a crafting table.

Use the wood block you just got from the tree and open your inventory. You will see a grid near the top-right corner, place your wood block in any of those grids.

Then click on the wood planks that appear to obtain them.

At last put one of the four wood planks you got into each container of your grid (a 2x2 square of wood planks). You can right click to place a single plank into the grid, instead of all four.

Unlocks: Time to Farm!, Time to Strike!, Time to Mine!.

[Time to Farm!]
Goal: Construct a wooden hoe.

Place the crafting table you just made on the ground, and right click with your mouse on it, to use it. If you changed the use item/place block key to something else, use that instead.

Then make some sticks, note that this can also be done in your inventory crafting grid: Now arrange your sticks and some planks in the crafting table to make a hoe: Unlocks: Bake Bread, The Lie

[Bake Bread]
Goal: Make bread.

Break several blocks of tall grass until you gain three seeds. You can do this with one seed but it will take longer.

Then right-click with your hoe on three dirt, mycelium, podzol, or grass blocks to create farmland, preferably near water, so the seeds get hydrated, and grow faster.

Next, hold the seeds, and right-click on all the farmland blocks. Wait 1-3 ingame days for the seeds to grow into wheat. Alternately, using bone meal on the seeds will cause it to grow into wheat faster.

After that, break the wheat.

Arrange the wheat like so to craft bread: Dead-End Achievement

[The Lie!]
Goal: Make cake.

This achievement is a reference to the video game Portal which spawned the meme phrase "The Cake Is A Lie".

Collect the following:
 * One Egg.
 * Three Milk buckets.
 * Two Sugar.
 * Three Wheat.

Click on the items to see how to obtain them.

Arrange the ingredients like so to craft cake: Dead-End Achievement

[Time to Strike!]
Goal: Construct a wooden sword.

Make sure that you have one stick, and two wooden planks in your inventory. Better materials for the blade work for this achievement too.

Arrange the ingredients like so to craft a wooden sword: Unlocks: Cow Tipper, Monster Hunter.

[Cow Tipper]
Goal: Pick up leather.

Find a cow or horse. They can appear at any place with grass and enough light, unless it is an ocean biome. Horses can only rarely spawn in a plains biome. You may have to wander a bit to find one, so make sure you'll be able to find your way back.

Then when you find one, stand next to it and left-click to hit it. You will need to hit it a lot to kill it. They can drop one or two leather (cows along with raw beef). If you did not get any, try the same with another cow/horse.

Another way to obtain the achievement is to find and kill some rabbits until you have at least four rabbit hides. Then craft a leather and throw it on the ground. When you pick it up, you'll get the achievement.

Unlocks: Repopulation, When Pigs Fly.

[Repopulation]
Goal: Breed two cows with each-other.

Use wheat on two cows to make them breed.

Dead-End Achievement.

[When Pigs Fly]
Goal: Take a lot of fall damage when riding on a pig.

Get a saddle and a carrot on a stick.

Use the saddle on a pig, which should be near a cliff. The easiest way to get it to jump off a cliff is to hold a carrot on a stick in your hand, and walk, like you normally would, in the direction of the cliff until you and the pig falls.

Alternatively you can put the pig on a piston, trapdoor, fence gate, or any kind of opening mechanism. Then ride the pig up there and open the mechanism so you and the pig will take fall damage.

Dead-End Achievement.

[Monster Hunter]
Goal: Kill a hostile mob (monster).

Find a hostile mob. In the overworld, they can only spawn in darkness, so you should wait until night, or find a dark area like a cave. In the nether, most can spawn in bright areas. In the end endermen can only spawn in darkness. You can also find a spawner in a dungeon, abandoned mineshaft, stronghold, or nether fortress, and wait for a monster to spawn. Silverfish can be hidden in stone blocks in mountain biomes, and will spawn when the stone is broken.

Then hit it until it dies. With a sword or some tools this goes faster.

Unlocks Sniper Duel.

[Sniper Duel]
Goal: Kill a skeleton by shooting it from a distance of at least 50 blocks.

Find a large flat area on the surface. Dig a trench one and a half blocks deep, two blocks wide and several blocks long. Line the trench with light. Just over 50 meters away from the lip of the trench, make a tower 15 blocks high. When night comes, wait for a skeleton to fall into the trench or lure it in. Then from your tower, aim just above the skeleton, about halfway between it and the horizon, and fire from full charge until it dies. With a flame enchantment you can see where your arrows landed better and can adjust your aim easier, but the skeleton might die of the fire, not giving the achievement.

Dead-End Achievement.

[Time to Mine!]
Goal: Construct a Wooden Pickaxe.

Make sure that you have 3 wood planks and 2 sticks in your inventory.

Arrange the ingredients like so to craft a wooden pickaxe: Unlocks: Getting an Upgrade, Hot Topic.

[Getting an Upgrade]
Goal: Construct a cobblestone, or better, pickaxe from sticks and cobblestone, or other better ingredients.

Use your new wooden pickaxe to mine some stone, which in return you will receive cobblestone. Make sure that you have two sticks in your inventory. Unlocks: Overpowered.

[Overpowered]
Goal: Craft a Notch Apple using Blocks of Gold and an Apple.

Mine enough (72) Gold to craft 8 Blocks of Gold using your Crafting Table. Afterwards, use your Crafting Table again and arrange the items like this: Dead-End Achievement

[Hot Topic]
Goal: Construct a furnace.

Mine 8 blocks of cobblestone and open your crafting table. Arrange the cobblestone like so to craft a furnace: Unlocks: Delicious Fish, Acquire Hardware.

[Delicious Fish]
Goal: Obtain the item that gets created after cooking fish.

Craft a fishing rod to catch a fish or salmon,

Then right-click so the "bait" lands into the water, and wait till a lot of water bubble particles come closer to the rod and right-click again when you hear a splash sound. The fish will fly towards you and probably will be picked up by you too.

At last put the fish or salmon you got in the furnace with fuel like so:

Dead-End Achievement

[Acquire Hardware]
Goal: Pick up an iron ingot.

Mine iron ore with a stone pickaxe, and put it in the furnace like so:

Unlocks: On a Rail, DIAMONDS!.

[On a Rail]
Goal: Travel 1000 blocks with a minecart from where you started.

It will take at least 378 iron ingots as well as 63 sticks to craft 1000 rails. Alternatively, you can find and break them in abandoned mineshafts. Then build a continuous track so that a minecart can travel the full distance. Afterwards place a minecart on the start of the track, then travel from the start to the end without leaving the minecart. The achievement does not allow you to repeatedly loop the same section of the track.

You will most likely need powered rails to get this achievement. These will take additional resources. You can also make a spiral from bedrock to 1 block below the sky limit with only regular rails on it, this is going to create natural speed, and if this doesn't go 1000 meters, make a long line with regular rails. Maybe with powered rails too.

Dead-End Achievement

[DIAMONDS!]
Goal: Pick up a diamond. Search below layer 16 for diamond ore and destroy it using your iron pickaxe. Creeper or TNT explosions have a chance of dropping the diamond as well. Shaft mines are extremely useful for this achievement.

Arrange the ingredients like so to craft an iron pickaxe: Unlocks: Diamonds to you!, We Need To Go Deeper, Enchanter.

[Diamonds to you!]
Goal: Throw a diamond at another player or mob that can pick it up.

Drop/throw a diamond using Q or the key that you use, at another player or mob that can pick it up.

Dead-End Achievement

[Enchanter]
Goal: Craft an Enchantment Table

Make a diamond pickaxe so you can mine at least four obsidian: Then get three paper and one leather, the paper being made from sugar canes like so: Then craft a book like so: Arrange the ingredients like so to craft an enchantment table: Unlocks: Librarian, Overkill.

[Librarian]
Goal: Construct a bookshelf.

Make sure you have six wood planks and 3 books in your inventory,

Arrange the ingredients like so to craft a bookshelf: To achieve the maximum potential from the enchantment table, place 15 bookshelves 1 block away from the enchantment table (in a box shape), like this:

Although not required, this is the most efficient method to acquire the highest enchantment possible. Any additional bookshelves around the enchantment table beyond 15 will not increase the maximum level beyond 30 and will only serve aesthetic purposes.

Dead-End Achievement

[Overkill]
Goal: Deal 9 hearts of damage in one hit.

Enchant a sword with Bane of Arthropods, Smite, or Sharpness with a level high enough to deal together with the sword's base damage at least nine full hearts of damage (or 18 Hit Points) in one hit to a mob/player. Dealing critical hits greatly helps for this achievement.

Dead-End Achievement

[We Need To Go Deeper]
Goal: Enter through a nether portal.

Collect at least 10 obsidian with a diamond pickaxe and build a nether portal. If you cannot get obsidian in item form, create a mold and pour water next to lava source blocks. Open the nether portal with flint and steel, and then step inside the purple portal blocks.

Place your obsidian blocks like so, upright:

You can make nether portals up to 23x23, but it is not recommended as it requires a lot of obsidian.

Unlocks: Return to Sender, Into Fire.

[Return to Sender]
Goal: Kill a ghast with a fireball.

Aim at the ghast then punch the fireball when it is close enough to you to deflect it. If you are extremely lucky, a shot arrow or fishing rod bobber may hit the fireball and deflect it.This is a reference towards Half Life 2 Episode 2 by Valve.

Dead-End Achievement

[Into Fire]
Goal: Pick up a blaze rod.

Kill a blaze and collect its dropped blaze rod. An easy way to do this is to find a nether fortress, then find a blaze spawner. Armed with over 7 snowballs, attack the blaze from range. Upon the blaze's death, collect the rod.

Unlocks: Local Brewery, The End?

[Local Brewery]
Goal: Pick up a Potion from one of the 3 lower Brewing Stand's slots.

Get a water bottle, Place it in one of the 3 lower brewing stand's slots, Then put a potion ingredient in it, and wait until it is done brewing.

Arrange the ingredients like so to craft a Brewing Stand: Dead-End Achievement.

[The End?]
Goal: Enter an end portal.

Throw ender eyes and follow them to locate a stronghold.

Then find the stronghold's portal room.

After that activate the portal by using an eye of ender in every empty end portal edge block slot, then jump into the portal.

Arrange the ingredients like so to craft an eye of ender: Unlocks: The End., Adventuring Time.

[Adventuring Time]
Goal: Set foot in all biomes

Travel and step into all the biomes in the game.

Dead-End Achievement

[The End.]
Goal: Enter the portal created after killing the Ender dragon.

Here is how to slay it.
 * Destroy the Ender crystals using projectiles (like snowballs, eggs, bow with arrows, etc.)
 * After they are destroyed, hit the Ender dragon using projectiles (like snowballs, bow with arrows, etc.) An enchanted bow would probably be best option.
 * When you kill the Ender dragon, you will gain 60-80 levels of experience and a return portal will generate. Get the experience, and (optionally) the dragon egg. Then, enjoy the credits. (You can press Esc to skip the credits.)

Unlocks: The Beginning?

[The Beginning?]
Goal: Spawn the wither.

Here are some tips for how to spawn it.
 * Soul sand is not that difficult to acquire. It can be found in the nether in large quantities. Just watch out for ghasts and other hostile mobs that spawn in the nether.

Wither Skulls on the other hand are difficult to obtain. Here are the best tips available.
 * To increase spawn rates, break down the walls to have more floor space
 * Remove any blazes and their spawners, (unless you are skilled in making experience farms using them.)
 * Wear diamond armor and bring a fire resistance potion (for blazes and accidental lava deaths).
 * It is also helpful to have a diamond sword with the looting enchantment.
 * Bring lots of patience. You'll need it since wither skulls are a rare drop and you need three.
 * Be careful of the wither skeleton's attacks. They give you the wither effect, which is poisonous and extremely deadly. It may be a good idea to bring milk.
 * Snowballs are also a terrific way to defeat blazes.
 * Every 15 blocks or so, put a bar so the walkway is only two blocks high. Wither skeletons cannot walk under anything that is less than three blocks tall.

Once you have three wither skeleton skulls and four soul sand, you are ready to complete The Beginning.

Unlocks: The Beginning.

[The Beginning.]
Goal: Kill the wither.

This is the easiest way to defeat the wither, however, some would say it takes the fun out of killing the Wither. It's your game, so play it how you want to play. but this is the most efficient way.
 * 1) Go to the nether.
 * 2) Dig up until you reach the top bedrock.
 * 3) Look for a 3 by three area of bedrock with the center block so it has nothing behind it.
 * 4) Exactly Three blocks down, place a piston. Next to it place a lever.
 * 5) Spawn the wither on the piston and pull the lever before it blows up. Run out of the blast radius.
 * 6) Once the wither blows up, it will be stuck in the bedrock ceiling and can't do anymore damage. At this point hit it with whatever you like. It's kind of funny to do it with fists, but you could do it with anything. A diamond sword is quickest.
 * 7) Once the wither is dead, pick up the Nether Star.

Unlocks: Beaconator.

[Beaconator]
Goal: Create a full beacon.

This is the second most tedious achievement because you will need 164 blocks of gem/metal, or 1,476 gem/metal ingots. (Around 23 stacks)
 * Once you have all of your iron ingots, gold ingots, diamonds, or emeralds, make 164 blocks of gem/metal. Then make a square layer of 81 blocks, then a layer of 49, then 25 and then 9. In the middle of the last layer of the pyramid, place a beacon. Make sure there are no opaque blocks above it, as an opaque block above it will deactivate the beacon. Feed it an iron ingot, gold ingot, diamond, or emerald and choose your primary power and secondary power.

Final Achievement

Blocking Achievements
Some players in PvP games choose to block achievements by limiting the number of crafting tables they make. When the game first begins, harvest wood before opening the inventory screen. This won't count toward Getting Wood. Then open the screen (Taking Inventory) to craft a table. You'll get a workbench without Benchmarking. Until you craft another table, you won't get any more achievements beyond Getting Wood.