5 best Minecraft Java mods for mobs and blocks

Mods or “modifications” in Minecraft are some of the best ways to explore new content for the game. The most promising part about them is that they don’t come as an official supplement from Mojang but from the player base itself.

The Minecraft community is full of developers, programmers, and artists. Many of these people work on mods and custom content for the game, like shaders, resource packs, etc.

Mods are an excellent addition because they add several unique elements. While some add new mobs, others tweak biomes, add new dimensions and blocks, etc.

Explore these Minecraft Java mods for fresh content

5) Better Animations Collection (Forge and Fabric)

The Better Animations mod is widely known as one of the best mob-focused mods in Minecraft. It introduces new animations for almost every mob in the game and is regularly updated to include more and more mobs. Each animation feels more natural, like the legs of squids and ghasts wiggling as they move, spiders having bent legs, dogs becoming more playful, pig snouts and villager noses moving as they oink and speak, and much more.

4) Ore Creeper (Forge)

Creepers are some of the most iconic creatures in Minecraft. Every player can identify them, and they have also bled into pop culture due to their green color and trademark hissing sound.

The Ore Creeper mod transforms the creepers of the Minecraft world into variants that correspond to the different ores. Various creepers have distinct ore textures. For example, some can have the texture of gold ore, while others may look like diamond ore.

The best thing about this mod is that when a creeper explodes, it turns a small chunk of its surrounding area into that particular ore or even a few ore blocks. The mod tends to make the game more unsettling, as the new textures can help creepers blend in with stone and other ore-based blocks.

3) Waystones (Forge and Fabric)

The Waystones mod is one of Minecraft's oldest and most popular mods. It revolves around the waystone block, which lets players mark points of interest and teleport within a network of these blocks.

Players will need to link their waystones together, after which they’ll be able to teleport. This helps players cover absurdly large distances in one go and can be used in all three dimensions. The mod even has multiplayer support.

2) Monster Plus (Forge)

Glow Skeletons, one of the many variants of skeletons (Image via Curseforge/Nitespring)

Monster Plus enhances the mobs that already exist in Minecraft. It adds several new variants of mobs, blocks, and items. Each mob variant has entirely new abilities and textures, making players have to deal with each one differently. The mobs included in this mod are:

Glow Skeleton: Glowing skeleton variant. Stronger than a regular skeleton.
Lava Squid: Squid variant found in the Nether. Shoots fireballs.
Mother Lava Squid: Bigger variant of the lava squid.
Crystalian:Zombie variant. Can summon crystal spikes below players.
Hermit Abysswalker: Rare Illager variant. Mainly uses attacks from the arsenals of other mobs, like fireballs, spike, and more. Inflicts Darkness, like the Warden.
Opalescent Eye and Spectral Minion: Summoned by the Hermit Abysswalker.
Swamp Monster: Zombie variant that spawns in the two swamp biomes. Inflicts poison damage.
Overgrown Skeleton: Jungle and Lush Cave skeleton variant, no damage in sunlight, inflicts poison damage.

1) Tinted Campfires (Forge and Fabric)

Tinted Campfire is a simple mod that allows players to dye the fire. The idea seems to be inspired by Terraria, as players can have torches and campfires in multiple colors in Minecraft.

Players must craft campfires using sticks, coal, and wooden logs/stripped logs. Dyes can also be obtained from their respective sources, like flowers, as they are in the vanilla version of Minecraft.

The Tinted Campfires mod (Image via Curseforge/Cozary)

Players must place the block down, equip a dye from the hotbar, and right-click the campfire to make a tinted campfire. Use any dye in Minecraft when using this mod.