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Comment by skrebbel | Hacker News Reader

I tried Minecraft for the first time in my life a few weeks ago. Together with my 5 year old son. He loved it, and I liked it too, but we really didn't get very far - the moment night fell, we got brutally slaughtered by zombies or whatever. Respawning only made things worse, because later nights seemed to bring stronger attackers.

I played some Quake back in the day, it's not like 3d games are totally new to me. Still, I felt completely incompetent. Does anyone know what someone should do to get past these first few days? I keep reading articles like these on the internet about how kids build fantastic structures, but how do you do that if half the game is basically about being hunted down by mindless killers?

I feel like there's some key aspect I don't understand. Any tips?

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You have survival and creative mode. In creative mode you have all the blocks you want to make great buildings, dont need to mine them and you can even fly around.

Start with your son in creative mode and practice building basic stuff. Then learn how to go survival mode watching some youtube tutorials. Small kids really enjoy creating their own houses, towns and megacaves in creative, when they feel comfortable they ask to go to survival on their own. Then they discover roblox (that has hundreds of mods) and there is no back! Hope it helps.

Searching for "how to survive first night minecraft" yields 2.2M results. Have you checked any of the videos out?

E.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0VWnQHS-ffs

Spend night underground, mining. There won't be any enemies as long as you put up enough torches and don't explore natural caves.

Hmm, that's not true. Torches stop mobs from spawning right there, they don't stop them approaching. Also mining enough wood and coal to make lots of torches isn't that simple when you've not played before.

Usually it's easier to mine a couple of blocks of wood, kill 3 same-coloured sheep, make a bed. Then just build a prison of earth around you, including a roof, to stop mobs (ie monsters) getting in. If you can't make the bed, just entomb yourself and wait for morning!

First, remember that there are two modes - creative and survival. Creative is a world where nothing will try to kill you and you have access to all the materials without having to explore/mine for them. In survival, you're dropped off with a few basic items and told to survive. Both are fun, but if you're having trouble in survival, it's good to start in creative to learn mechanics and build some really cool things!

When I've played survival with my stepdaughter, in the beginning, we usually spend our days collecting resources to craft torches, doors and pickaxes, then spend our nights underground, where we build large mines (and often build elaborate underground structures). We keep this up until we have a steady food supply, good quality armour/weapons and lighted defensive structures outside.

This series, by Paul Soares, is the canonical Minecraft how-to.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7326EF82122776A9

Find some sheep as quickly as possible, then you can construct beds and "skip" the night. You won't be bothered by monsters again until you venture into dark caves.

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