What a monster farm brings in

Two identical farms can bring in very different amounts, up to three times as much for one as for the other. Here is why.

Three rules that decide what you harvest

• Two monsters of the same species less than 64 blocks apart group into a single stack, with the number shown above it. A stack goes up to 4,096. Sixty-four blocks is four big houses end to end, which is to say your whole farm.
• A monster left on its own disappears after five minutes. So does an item dropped on the ground.
• The server comes round every minute, and as soon as a 16 by 16 block square holds more than 20 mobs, it takes some out until only 15 are left. That square counts over the full height, from the void under your island up to the sky: building three floors on top of each other gets around nothing.

Why stacks change everything

That third point sounds terrible, and it would be without the stacks. A stack of 300 monsters counts as a single mob in that count: that is exactly what lets big farms exist here.

The grouping itself is automatic: you have nothing to do, two identical mobs within range merge on their own. What you have to organise is bringing them to the same spot to kill them, and water is the only way since they do not walk.

A farm spread over several 16 block squares will therefore get trimmed on every pass, without you noticing. It is not a punishment, it is automatic housekeeping.

Finally, nothing runs while you are elsewhere: the game only animates what is around a connected player. A farm does not fill your chests overnight.

Back to: Monster spawners