Note:
- See comment blocks.
- More data required for enchantment slot influence.
- More images for gold rooms and Hunt Doors.
- Concept art.
Icon used to depict Ancient Hunts.
An Ancient Hunt is an end-game[1] mission that can be found within the Nether Cave at the Camp of Minecraft Dungeons. Ancient Hunts offer a chance at winning gilded gear and gold for the price of sacrificing equipment to enter.
Starting a hunt[]
The ranged weapon selection interface for configuring an ancient hunt.
Accessible after a single mission at Default V or greater is completed, a portal located in the Nether Cave serves as the physical point of interaction for Ancient Hunts, next to the piglin merchant. Hunts can also be accessed from the Other Dimensions tab of the Mission Select map.
Offerings[]
Before starting a Hunt the hero needs to offer up a valid set of equipment. Runes attached to the items determine what Ancient might respond. The hero cannot offer gilded gear.
Structure[]
In an Ancient Hunt, the heroes explore three large locations connected by Nether portals, primarily searching for Hunt Doors. Most doors lead to Gold Rooms, but some can lead to an arena where the heroes can summon an Ancient. Ancients are powerful mobs that drop gilded gear.
Chests and ordinary mobs do not drop equipment but can instead drop gold. Gold Rooms are packed full of mobs and include at least one piglin ambush, and they offer chests of gold as a reward. On completing the Hunt, the end-of-mission chest provides thirty gold.
During a Hunt, heroes are given three revives and are able to leave and return to the Hunt three times at any point.
Sub-missions[]
The majority of the hunt takes place in a sequence of large sub-missions. They are connected by Nether portals that weave the hero's Hunt between the Mainland and the Nether. Their locations can include:
- Creeper Woods
- Desert Temple
- Spider Cave (Ancient hunt–exclusive)
- Woodland Mansion (Ancient hunt–exclusive)
- Woodland Prison (Ancient hunt–exclusive)
Mainland locations feature hunt-exclusive tiles that do not appear in regular missions. These tiles provide further points for unique procedural generation and the appearance of hunt doors.
Hunt Doors[]
These doorways lead to Ancient Arenas and Gold Rooms.
A Hunt Door is a dark-framed, blue glowing passage that transport the hero to a hunt exclusive area. These areas could be a gold room or an area themed around the ancient that resides there, containing an intractable button or lever that summons the ancient and its enchanted minions.
The number of Hunt Doors generated depends on the dungeon seed. These doors normally lead to gold rooms, but some are replaced by ancient arenas with respect to the ancients on average value.
Ancient arena[]
These arenas are where the heroes battle Ancients for a shot at gilded loot.
An Ancient Arena is a Hunt-exclusive arena that's themed for the Ancient that resides there. They have an interactable button or lever that summons the Ancient and its enchanted minions.
Gold room[]
A Gold Room is an interior, bastion-themed area explored in a counterclockwise direction. They are full of mobs, and they have gold-containing chests, a supplies chest, and an extendable bridge. These rooms can generate with fancy chests, and obsidian chests. Activating a beacon or lever to get into a treasure room summons a multi-part ambush of mostly piglins, blazes, wraiths, and the occasional ghast.
Mobs[]
Ancient mobs[]
Ancients are powerful boss-like variants of enchanted mobs with enchanted minions, their own title name, and a themed arena accessed through hunt doors. These mobs and their minions can possess enchantments that would otherwise be player-exclusive, such as Shockwave, and some ancient exclusive enchantments such as Mob Resurrection Aura and Huge.
Ancients and their minions can obliterate unprepared heroes, forcing considerations of different tactics to prevail against the ancient. Upon the ancient's defeat, a gilded item of any rarity is dropped as a reward.
Ordinary mobs[]
All mobs, including DLC exclusive mobs, can appear during Ancient Hunts even if they do not fit the theme of their environment. The Woodland Mansion has charged creepers as an exclusive mob.
- Due to the nature of Ancient Hunts all mobs and entities spawn along the generated areas, except for bosses, Chicken Jockey Towers, Drowned Necromancers, Elder Guardians, Endersent, Guardians, Pink Slimes, Poison Anemones, Quick Growing Kelps, Raid Captains, Redstone Cubes, Shulkers, Silverfish, Squall Golems, Tower Guards, Tower Wraiths and Wavewhisperers.
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab ac ad ae af ag ah ai aj ak al am an ao ap aq ar as at au av aw ax ay az ba bb bc bd be bf Spawns in arena battle as ambush
- ↑ a b c chickens spawn as its mount
- ↑ a b c d e f Throws blue nethershrooms
- ↑ a b c Summons geomancer bombs and geomancer walls
- ↑ a b c Summons ice chunks
- ↑ a b c d e f Summoned by whisperers
- ↑ a b c Summoned by evokers
- ↑ a b c Summons entangle vines
- ↑ a b c Summons evoker fangs
- ↑ a b c Skeleton horses spawn as its mount
Achievements[]
| Icon | Achievement | In-game description | Actual requirements (if different) | Gamerscore earned | Trophy type (PS) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| A Piglin's Best Friend | Collect 500 gold over time. | — | 20G | Bronze | |
| Ancient Hunter | Defeat 15 different ancient mobs in Ancient Hunts. | — | 50G | Silver | |
| Back to Back | Complete two Ancient Hunts and two daily trials, in two-player co-op, on the second day of the month. | — | 50G | Silver |
Sounds[]
Music[]
| Sound | Description |
|---|---|
| Gold Room Main | |
| Spider Cave Arena | |
| Spider Cave Arena End | |
| Spider Cave Main | |
| Woodland Mansion Arena | |
| Woodland Mansion Arena End | |
| Woodland Mansion Intro | |
| Woodland Mansion Roof | |
| Woodland Mansion Boss End | |
| Woodland Mansion Ground Floor | |
| Woodland Mansion Main | |
| Woodland Mansion Prison |
Ancient Mobs[]
| Sound | Description |
|---|---|
| Ancient Mob Alarm | |
| Ancient Mob Generic Pre | |
| Ancient Mob Generic Loop | |
| Ancient Mob Generic Post |
Gilded Gear[]
| Sound | Description |
|---|---|
| Gilded Gear Common Drop | |
| Gilded Gear Common Loop | |
| Gilded Gear Unique Drop | |
| Gilded Gear Unique Loop |
History[]
| Minecraft Dungeons | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| February 12, 2021 | Ancient hunts are mentioned and explained of their potential functionality. | ||||
| February 19, 2021 | Footage of an ancient hunt reveals the new ancient mobs and the offering UI, and the tweet revealing that ancient hunts are an end game feature. | ||||
| February 20, 2021 | Footage of another ancient hunt which reveals gilded gear and their appearance in the inventory. | ||||
| 1.8.0.0 | Added ancient hunts. | ||||
| 1.8.6.0 | Added sound effects for ancients on the offering UI | ||||
| Changed gold room generation. Previously consisted of a single long narrow corridor, stretching in a south-eastern direction containing only mobs and gold chests, and the ambient music and sound effects of the gold room. [more information needed] | |||||
| Changed Spider Cave ambush and "Destroy the Spawns" objectives to occur upon entering the tile instead of upon contacting the web gate | |||||
| Changed web gate of the Spider Cave to not show the purple gate glow | |||||
| Changed Unbreakable One rune requirements from: -> . | |||||
| Changed ancient hunt text to clarify spending enchantment points and level. | |||||
| Fixed gilded gear dropping in inaccessible locations during ancient hunts[2] | |||||
| Fixed Multiple ancient mobs spawning during ancient hunts [3] | |||||
| Fixed gold reward displaying full inventory prompt when inventory is full. [4] | |||||
| Fixed gold room bridge opens properly for both host and clients | |||||
| Fixed text overlapping buttons on ancient hunt menus for several languages | |||||
| Fixed incorrect button colors for the prompt that appears when cancelling an ancient hunt | |||||
| Fixed Nintendo Switch crash upon entering ancient hunt. | |||||
| 1.10.1.0 | Added new ancient mobs, the Abyssal Eye, the Vengeful Mariner, the Scuttling Torment, the Watcher of the End and The Swarm. | ||||
| 1.14.1.0 | Changed solemn giant wearing gold helmet (Variant 0 > Variant 1) | ||||
| 1.17.0.0 | Increased the amount of gold received upon completing an Ancient Hunt from 10 to 30. | ||||
Increased the amount of gold received from gold chests
| |||||
Issues[]
Issues relating to "Ancient Hunt" are maintained on the bug tracker. Report issues there.
Trivia[]
- Due to MCD-5279, it was initially thought that the woodland mansion theme in ancient hunts was sourced from a new secret location obtained in Creeper Woods. This, however, is partially true, Woodland Mansion is connected to Creeper Woods internally but with no method to access it. Spider Cave shares a similar relationship with Soggy Cave without the visual bug.
- The Nether portal in Minecraft Dungeons does not necessarily transport the hero from the Overworld to the Nether and vice versa like in Minecraft. The portal can transport within one dimension. It is possible for a hunt to only consist of Nether locations or Overworld locations.
- The "Ancient Hunt Deep Dive" article on minecraft.net displayed an image presenting unused pink squares in addition to the existing purple and grey squares to represent equipment enchantment slots.
- The max possible amount of Ancients to respond is 16. With melee weapon of Cursed Axe or Whirlwind (), ranged weapon of Corrupted Crossbow (), armor of Black Wolf Armor () and artifact of Torment Quiver () or Soul Lantern ().
Gallery[]
The loading screen for an Ancient Hunt.
The offering menu.
An ancient hunt door inside the Spider Cave.
A hunt doorway with the blue glow. Most regular doorways glow yellow.
See also[]
- Ancient Hunt
- Ancient Offering
- Ancient
- Gold Room
- Nether Cave
- Piglin Merchant
- Gilded Gear
- Gold