What's Different from Vanilla?
If you're used to regular Minecraft, here's what's changed, what to try first, and links to learn more.
The short version
Vanilla Minecraft is still all there. You can mine, build, enchant, fight mobs, go to the Nether, all the same stuff. What the mods add is mostly more things to do on top of that: cooking, seasons, new animals, furniture, painting, fast travel, and a bunch of visual and audio upgrades.
Nothing here requires you to read a guide. But if you want to get the most out of the pack, here's what's worth trying.
Cooking is a whole thing now
Farmer's Delight is the mod you'll interact with most. In vanilla, food is "eat steak, get full". Here there's a proper cooking system.
Try this
Make a Cutting Board
Planks + sticks. Put it down and right-click items onto it with a knife to prep ingredients for recipes.
Build a Cooking Pot
Iron ingots + a shovel. Over a campfire. Toss ingredients in. Makes stews and meals that give proper buffs.
Grow Tomatoes & Onions
Found in village farms or breaking tall grass. Ingredients for loads of the new recipes.
Set up a Bakery
Bakery mod adds ovens, dough, and a breadmaking pipeline. Croissants, baguettes, cakes. Pair with Candlelight's tables for a proper restaurant.
Tip: Press R on any food item to see all recipes that use it. REI is your best friend here.
Learn more: Farmer's Delight · Bakery · Candlelight
The world has actual seasons
Serene Seasons adds spring, summer, autumn, winter. Different crops per season, leaves change colour, winter brings snow to new biomes.
Things to know
Crops are seasonal
Wheat is fine year-round but things like tomatoes prefer summer. Check the tooltip on seeds.
Winter is real
It snows, water can freeze, the world gets colder-looking. Plan your farming or build a greenhouse.
The calendar
Seasons last several in-game days. See the current season in F3 or just look at the foliage.
Learn more: Serene Seasons
Way more animals
Critters and Companions and Naturalist add a ton of new wildlife. None hostile. Just makes the world feel properly inhabited.
Rivers & Oceans
Otters, koi fish, sea bunnies, dumbo octopi. Otters will follow you if you hold a fish.
Forests
Deer, bears, ferrets, robins, butterflies, snails. Forests feel alive now.
Bamboo & Jungles
Red pandas. They sit in bamboo and look incredible. That's it, that's the note.
Learn more: Critters and Companions · Naturalist
Building and decorating is completely different
In vanilla, your house is blocks and item frames. Here you've got actual furniture, string lights, rope, display jars, candelabras, and a stupid amount of decorative stuff.
Try this
Furnish a room
Handcrafted gives you sofas, tables, shelves, chairs. Craft a sofa and suddenly your base feels like a home.
String up Fairy Lights
String + iron nuggets + dye. Hang them between fence posts or buildings. Instant cosy vibes.
Browse Supplementaries
Hanging signs, bird feeders, jars, rope you can climb, display cases, flags. Press R and just browse. You'll be surprised.
Paint something
Joy of Painting: canvas + palette, mix colours, draw pixel art in-game. Hang it on the wall.
Learn more: Handcrafted · Fairy Lights · Supplementaries · Joy of Painting
Getting around is way easier
Waystones
Craft stone obelisks, name them, teleport between any you've visited. Drop one at base, one at the village, sorted. Right-click to see the full network.
Essential Commands
/sethome to save your spot. /home to teleport back. /tpa <name> to teleport to a friend. /spawn for world spawn. No setup needed.
Learn more: Waystones · Essential Commands
Night-skipping works properly
In vanilla everyone has to be in bed simultaneously. Here one person sleeping skips the night for everyone. Sleeping bags from Comforts skip the night without resetting your spawn. Hammocks skip to daytime if you accidentally slept at the wrong time.
Learn more: Comforts
Voice chat is proximity-based
Simple Voice Chat adds in-game voice that works based on distance. Walk near someone and you can hear them. Walk away and it fades out. Great for building together.
Quick setup
Press V
Opens voice chat settings.
Check your mic
Make sure it's selected in the dropdown. You can test it there.
That's it
Push-to-talk by default. Switch to voice activation if you prefer.
Learn more: Simple Voice Chat
It looks and sounds way better
Shaders
Complementary Reimagined pre-installed. Gorgeous lighting, volumetric fog, water reflections. Low setting by default.
Ambient Sounds
Dynamic Surroundings: birdsong, crickets, wind, rain on leaves. The world isn't silent anymore.
Footstep Sounds
Presence Footsteps: grass, stone, wood, snow all sound different. Tiny detail, huge difference.
Performance
Sodium replaces the renderer. Way faster than vanilla. Lithium and FerriteCore help server-side too.
Key binds worth knowing
| Key | What it does |
|---|---|
| R | Show recipe for hovered item (REI) |
| U | Show uses for hovered item (REI) |
| V | Open voice chat settings |
| C (hold) | Zoom in (Zoomify) |
Useful commands
| Command | What it does |
|---|---|
/sethome | Save your current location as "home" |
/home | Teleport back to your saved home |
/tpa <name> | Request to teleport to someone |
/spawn | Go to world spawn |
/warp <name> | Teleport to a named warp point |
/nick <name> | Set a display nickname |
That's the big picture. Best way to discover everything is just to log in and start poking around. Questions? Check the FAQ or ask in Discord.