Minecraft introduces anvils: they hurt when they land on you

Minecraft_Anvil

As well as a host of tweaks and bug fixes, the latest Minecraft snapshot gives us yet another glimpse into the new features Mojang have been working hard on. Minecraft anvils are the big addition this time around, so click through to find out how you make yours what you can do with it.

First of all, you’d better start smelting, as you’ll need a six blocks of iron and a single iron ingot to make an anvil. Arrange them in two rows of iron, with the ingot in the middle, just like this:

If you’re familiar with the enchantment interface, you’ll know how to use the anvil. You can use it to repair enchanted items, rename them or merge two damaged items into a single, better quality item. Yes, this also means you can combine enchantments.

Be aware that the anvil will gradually degrade with use, slowly forming cracks to reflect this, so sooner or later you’ll need a replacement, but old anvils can always be used as part of weapons or traps. You see, an anvil to the head inflicts 1.5 hearts worth of damage for every block of height it falls, though the anvil will also be damaged.

Oh, and if you’ve never tried testing a Minecraft snapshot before, don’t forget that we have our own guide that will show you what you need to do.

Other changes in this snapshot include:

  • A Creeper can now have custom blast radius.
  • Breeding animals gives experience.
  • Tweaks to the debug interface.
  • The level up sound now only plays every five levels.
  • Cape owners can now hide their capes. Your superhero identity is safe.

For a more thorough list of what has changed with this snapshot, click here to visit the Minecraft wiki.