YUNG's Better Nether Fortresses guide for All the Mods 10 2.12

YUNG's Better Nether Fortresses rebuilds Minecraft's Nether fortresses from the ground up. Instead of the vanilla maze of bridges, you get fortresses that are much larger, more complex and more rewarding to explore.^[1]

The mod is purely about world generation. It changes the fortresses you find in the Nether and doesn't add a crafting chain. That makes it a good fit if you enjoy exploring and want your Nether trips to feel like a real adventure.^[1]

What a fortress looks like

Each fortress has three parts. Knowing them helps you get your bearings once you're inside:^[1]

• The bridge networks, which link the fortress together across the Nether.^[1]
• The Keep, the fortress's central structure.^[1]
• The Lava Halls, which extend deep underground.^[1]

Compatibility

The mod is designed to work alongside other worldgen mods, including Nether biome mods. It also has built-in Create compatibility: when Create is installed, some parts of a fortress have a chance to spawn using Create pieces. Create is optional and isn't required for the mod to run.^[1]

This pack ships version 3.1.3 of the mod for NeoForge on Minecraft 1.21.1.^[2]

Unverified The sources don't confirm whether Create is in this pack, so it's unverified whether you'll see Create pieces in your fortresses.

Unverified The sources don't describe where these fortresses fit in this pack's progression. The mod has no quests in this pack and isn't on the ATM Star path.

Same as in the All the Mods 10 8.1 guide

Good news: there's nothing to craft before you start with this mod. YUNG's Better Nether Fortresses is a worldgen mod that redesigns Nether fortresses from the ground up, so your first step is simply finding one in the Nether.^[1]

Compared to vanilla, these fortresses are much larger, more complex and more rewarding. Each one has three parts: the bridge networks, the Keep, and the Lava Halls that extend deep underground.^[1]

What to expect when you go exploring

• Expect a much bigger structure than a vanilla fortress. Look for the bridge networks first, then the Keep, and remember the Lava Halls go deep underground.^[1]
• If Create is installed, certain parts of the fortress have a chance of spawning with Create pieces. This is an optional feature, so you may or may not see it.^[1]
• The mod is intended to work with other worldgen mods. With Apocalyptic Fortress, that mod's fortress spawns alongside the Better Fortress. With Bygone Nether, Better Fortresses spawn instead of its enhanced vanilla fortress.^[1]

Vanilla fortresses

The mod has a config option called disableVanillaFortresses, which controls whether vanilla Nether Fortresses are disabled. I can't confirm its value in this pack, so check your config before you assume which fortress types you'll run into.^[3]

Unverified The sources I have don't show any in-pack recipes, quests or items for this mod, so there is no crafting order to follow here. If you find a recipe or quest tied to it, treat it as unconfirmed until it's verified.

This mod doesn't add machines, power, fluids or automation. It completely redesigns Nether fortresses from the ground up, so its core mechanics are all about how those fortresses generate and what you'll find inside. Compared to vanilla, these fortresses are much larger, more complex and more rewarding to explore.^[1]

How a fortress is put together

Every fortress has three parts: the bridge networks, the Keep, and the Lava Halls that extend deep underground. Plan your trip with that in mind. The bridges are only the start, and a lot of the fortress sits below where you first run into it.^[1]

The mod also has built-in Create compatibility. If Create is installed, certain parts of the fortress have a chance of spawning with Create pieces. This is optional, and Create isn't required to run the mod.^[1]

Unverified The sources don't confirm whether Create is part of this pack, so it's unverified whether you'll see Create pieces in fortresses here.

Vanilla fortresses

The mod has a general option that controls whether vanilla Nether Fortresses are disabled.^[3]

Unverified The sources don't show how this pack sets that option, so it's unverified whether vanilla fortresses can still generate alongside the redesigned ones here.

Item frame decorations

The pack ships an item frame config for this mod with five groups: alchemy, loot, mess hall, study and weapon. Each group has a default item and a list of entries, each paired with a value. In this pack, every group's default item is set to minecraft:air, for example lootItems.defaultItem.^[4]

• Alchemy: Fire Charge is set to 0.2, and Magma Cream and Quartz are each set to 0.3.^[4]
• Loot: Gold Ingot is set to 0.1, Gold Nugget to 0.2 and Nether Wart to 0.1.^[4]
• Mess hall: Cooked Porkchop and Porkchop are each set to 0.3, and Gold Ingot to 0.2.^[4]
• Study: Book is set to 0.4, while Enchanted Book, Paper and Writable Book are each set to 0.1.^[4]
• Weapon: Golden Axe and Golden Sword are each set to 0.05. Iron Axe, Iron Sword, Shield, Stone Axe and Stone Sword are each set to 0.025, and Netherite Sword to 0.005.^[4]

Look at the weapon group: Netherite Sword has the smallest value in the whole file. If you spot one on a fortress wall, you've found something special.^[4]

Unverified The sources don't explain exactly how these values are used, for example whether they are per-frame chances or weights. They also don't say whether the air default means a frame can end up empty, or whether this pack changed any of these values from the mod's defaults.

Playing nicely with other worldgen

The mod is intended to be fully compatible with every worldgen mod, including other Nether biome mods. It also has specific interactions: Apocalyptic Fortress's fortress spawns alongside the Better Fortress, and Better Fortresses spawn instead of Bygone Nether's enhanced vanilla fortress.^[1]

The mod overhauls Nether fortresses into much larger structures built from bridge networks, the Keep, and the Lava Halls deep underground, and the decorated rooms in those structures are full of item frames.^[1]

The config file you are most likely to touch in this pack is the item frame table, which controls which items show up in the frames of each room type. Every category in it has a default item and a list of entries with a number attached to each one.^[4]

How the pack sets the frame tables

In this pack, every category's default item is set to air: alchemyItems.defaultItem, lootItems.defaultItem, messHallItems.defaultItem, studyItems.defaultItem and weaponItems.defaultItem are all minecraft:air, so a frame that doesn't land on one of the listed entries is left empty.^[4]

The weapon frames are where the interesting numbers live. Stone and iron gear sit at 0.025 each, gold at 0.05, and Netherite Sword is the rarest entry in the whole file at 0.005.^[4]

• Weapon rooms: Golden Axe and Golden Sword at 0.05, Iron Axe, Iron Sword, Shield, Stone Axe and Stone Sword at 0.025, and Netherite Sword at 0.005.^[4]
• Study rooms: Book at 0.4, with Enchanted Book, Paper and Writable Book each at 0.1.^[4]
• Mess hall: Porkchop and Cooked Porkchop at 0.3 each, plus Gold Ingot at 0.2.^[4]
• Alchemy rooms: Magma Cream and Quartz at 0.3 each, and Fire Charge at 0.2.^[4]
• Loot rooms: Gold Nugget at 0.2, with Gold Ingot and Nether Wart at 0.1 each.^[4]

Unverified We haven't confirmed whether these values differ from the mod's own defaults, or how the pack sets the mod's other config files (such as structure spacing or the optional Create-style fortress pieces), so treat anything outside the item frame table as unchecked.

All the Mods 10 2.12 ships YUNG's Better Nether Fortresses at version 1.21.1-NeoForge-3.1.3, and the mod has been in the pack since All the Mods 10 1.0 or earlier. I don't have any pack changelog entries for this mod, so what follows comes from the mod's own changelogs.^[2]

Mod changelog highlights

• 3.1.3: Fixed an issue where feature mixins could cause worldgen deadlocks. This is the version your pack currently uses.^[2][5]
• 3.1.2: Lowered the minimum version requirements so the mod works on both 1.21 and 1.21.1.^[6]
• 3.1.0: Port to 1.21.1, with all structure NBT files updated.^[7]

The changelogs I was given only cover these three releases, so I can't say what changed in other versions of the mod.^[5][6][7]