Formations: Nether Natural Formations

Formations: Nether Natural Formations is a group of nine natural structure types that the Formations add-on for the Nether places in Nether biomes. They include pillars, pedestals, a tree, spikes, a rib cage, ore shards hanging from cave ceilings and a sphere cage. Each one is built from vanilla blocks only. The mod adds no custom blocks, items or mobs, so these structures are exploration sites that contain chests, barrels and, in some cases, mob spawners rather than sources of unique items.

Three of the structures contain mob spawners, and the sphere cage has two variants with different spawners. The structures have no progression gating, so a player can reach any of them as soon as they enter the Nether.

Generation

Eight of the nine structures use the formationsnether:common structure set, which contains 18 structure types with a weight of 1 each. Each of the eight therefore has a 1/18 share of that set's placements. The set places structures by random spread with a spacing of 9 chunks and a separation of 3 chunks, the in-game values after the pack's Sparse Structures scaling. The ore shards use their own set, formationsnether:ore_shards, which has a spacing of 7 chunks and a separation of 1 chunk.

Each structure is limited to a list of Nether biomes through a biome tag. The overlap is wide: the ore shards can appear in 16 biomes, and the obsidian pillar and rib cage can each appear in 14. The flaming pillar is the most restricted, appearing in four biomes, including Nether Wastes, Crystalline Chasm and Erupting Inferno. The table generated at the bottom of this page lists the biomes for each structure. The pack's 26 km² tuning sample recorded none of these nine structures, so the spacing values above are the main guide to how common they are. For the other Formations Nether structures, such as the arenas and temples, see Formations: Nether Temples and Arenas.

The pack thins non-horror structures with Sparse Structures. Across the tuning sample, non-horror structures were about three times less dense than at the mods' default spacing.

Layout

Each structure uses one of several placement types, and this affects how it sits in the terrain.

• Surface structures make up most of the group, including the common-set structures and the large tree. They use beard_thin terrain adaptation, which fills the ground under the structure so it sits flat on uneven terrain.
• Flaming pillar is placed on lava and uses no terrain adaptation.
• Sphere cage is placed buried, so most of it lies below the surface.
• Ore shards are placed on cave ceilings and hang down from them. There are four template variants.

Template counts differ between structures. The flaming pillar, large tree and obsidian pillar each have one template. The large and small pedestals, the rib cage and the sphere cage each have two. The quartz spikes have three. The ore shards have four, the most of any structure in the group.

Several of the structure templates include processors that change the contents. Wood blocks such as planks, stairs, logs and stems are swapped for the wood type that matches the biome, so a structure in a crimson biome uses crimson wood and one in a warped biome uses warped wood. Nether wart in the rib cage is given a random growth age from 0 to its maximum. Each of the rib cage's three brewing stand bottle slots has a 30% chance of holding a random potion.

Inhabitants

The large tree, obsidian pillar and sphere cage each contain a spawner. The obsidian pillar's spawner produces piglin brutes. The sphere cage has two variants: one with a piglin brute spawner and one with a wither skeleton spawner. The mod profile lists an endermite spawner in the large tree, but the spawn list was not confirmed in the pack's data scan, so treat the endermite as unverified.

The spawn data is stored in the structure templates. The spawn rate and cap follow vanilla spawner behaviour.

Loot

The loot tables for these structures are formationsnether:large_tree, formationsnether:rib_cage, formationsnether:sphere_cage/piglin and formationsnether:sphere_cage/wither. The sphere cage's two variants each have their own table. The ore shards have no loot table of their own; their contents are stored in the template data. The 1.0.2 update of the mod reduced the valuables that ore shards hold and reduced how often they spawn. The generated table below lists each structure's chest and barrel contents.

Flaming Pillar formationsnether:flaming_pillar

Biomes (4): Nether Wastes, Crystalline Chasm, Erupting Inferno, Redstone Abyss (Removed)

Large Pedestal formationsnether:large_pedestal

Biomes (9): Nether Wastes, Basalt Deltas, Soul Sand Valley, Crystalline Chasm, Erupting Inferno, Withered Abyss, Black Ice Glaciers, Blackstone Basin, Redstone Abyss (Removed)

Large Tree formationsnether:large_tree

Biomes (7): Crimson Forest, Warped Forest, Undergrowth, Visceral Heap, Glistering Meadow, Infernal Holt, Mycotoxic Undergrowth

Obsidian Pillar formationsnether:obsidian_pillar

Biomes (14): Nether Wastes, Soul Sand Valley, Crimson Forest, Warped Forest, Crystalline Chasm, Erupting Inferno, Undergrowth, Visceral Heap, Withered Abyss, Black Ice Glaciers, Glistering Meadow, Infernal Holt, Mycotoxic Undergrowth, Redstone Abyss (Removed)

Mobs placed in the structure: Piglin Brute

Ore Shard formationsnether:ore_shard

Biomes (16): Nether Wastes, Soul Sand Valley, Crimson Forest, Warped Forest, Basalt Deltas, Black Ice Glaciers, Crystalline Chasm, Erupting Inferno, Undergrowth, Visceral Heap, Withered Abyss, Mycotoxic Undergrowth, Blackstone Basin, Infernal Holt, Glistering Meadow, Redstone Abyss (Removed)

Quartz Spikes formationsnether:quartz_spikes

Biomes (7): Nether Wastes, Soul Sand Valley, Crystalline Chasm, Erupting Inferno, Withered Abyss, Black Ice Glaciers, Redstone Abyss (Removed)

Rib Cage formationsnether:rib_cage

Biomes (14): Nether Wastes, Soul Sand Valley, Crimson Forest, Warped Forest, Crystalline Chasm, Erupting Inferno, Undergrowth, Visceral Heap, Withered Abyss, Black Ice Glaciers, Glistering Meadow, Infernal Holt, Mycotoxic Undergrowth, Redstone Abyss (Removed)

Small Pedestal formationsnether:small_pedestal

Biomes (7): Crimson Forest, Warped Forest, Undergrowth, Visceral Heap, Glistering Meadow, Infernal Holt, Mycotoxic Undergrowth

Sphere Cage formationsnether:sphere_cage

Biomes (16): Nether Wastes, Soul Sand Valley, Crimson Forest, Warped Forest, Basalt Deltas, Black Ice Glaciers, Crystalline Chasm, Erupting Inferno, Undergrowth, Visceral Heap, Withered Abyss, Mycotoxic Undergrowth, Blackstone Basin, Infernal Holt, Glistering Meadow, Redstone Abyss (Removed)

Mobs placed in the structure: Piglin Brute, Wither Skeleton

Tips

Approach the sphere cage and the obsidian pillar carefully. Both contain spawners, and the piglin brutes that come from them hit hard. Wither skeletons from the sphere cage can apply the wither effect on hit. Milk removes it.

The flaming pillar sits on lava, so bring fire resistance before you approach it. Ore shards hang from cave ceilings, so check the ceilings of caves in the biomes listed in the table below rather than only the open ground.