Everyone knows the gamemode. And everyone has probably attempted it at one moment but failed. Yes, the beast of Minecraft. Hardcore Mode. Probably desgined by Herobrine himself, Hardcore mode locks the difficulty on Hard and, the best part, if you die, your file is deleted!

However, if you approach Hardcore mode carefully and strategically, it will be no problem!

Lets just start with some simple things to always do:

1. Play with sound on! Honestly, the majority of gamers play with the sound off. But in hardcore mode, you need to hear the "ssss" of a creeper, or the cave spiders crawling, and the Zombies... noise... This can be the difference from life and death! (a deleted file) This is certainly true if you venture into the depths of the overworld to gather ores, or if you dare enter the Hells of the land.
   
2. Don't be stupid! How many times have we all been playing survival, and felt the need to jump off the cliff to "reach the water below"  or went into a mine with no sword... In Hardcore mode, you can't risk it. For example, you climbed a mountain, and there is a pool of water below. The simple solution is to not jump. (If it's a giant ocean and impossible to miss, then go for it!) And ALWAYS have a sword!
   
3. Dont let monsters spawn! On my current Hardcore file, for pretty much most of my journey, I have not even seen an evil mob because I sleep as soon as the sun falls. Only recently have I began to live the night.
   
4. Food, food, and more food. And when you think you have enoguh, MORE FOOD! You will be surprised how quickly this gets drained. You will need to keep eating to regenerate. Again, there is no second chance, so don't give creepers the upper hand just because you "forget to eat"
   
5. Don't feel tied up! This is probably the reason I love Hardcore mode. Since you have no respawn, your free to do ANYTHING you want, and go ANYWHERE you want. When I begin my hardcore files, I don't start building a house until much later. Typically, I'll just roam, looting resources as I go until I find a nice suitable spot to build. This reminds me,
   
6. Build smart on a smart location. Don't build where you can easily be taken down by mobs, or can't see some coming. Build on places where you can defend yourself. Also make sure you have quick access to many things, just as water, tree's, mines, food. And some locations where to build: On top of a mountain, on an island, in the open, on a hill. Where not to build: In the forest, in between hills, in the nether, in a mine. Again, location is everything.
   

So now to the "guide" part.

So now you have made a Hardcore file. Great. The first thing to ask yourself is: Where am I? What's around me? Am I lagging? If your lagging, turn down graphics, remove texture packs, etc. lag = death. Where am I? Are you in a forest, a field? Get to a location where you can begin to gather resources. But remember, THE FIRST thing to get is wool. Why? Well, I'll tell you. Bed. Remember how I said "Dont let monsters spawn?" Well, I did. Get a bed so you don't have to build a shelter. Find sheep, even if it means you have to leave a nice building location. (Remember my "Dont get tied up" thing?)

Great, you now have wool. Gather wood, build a bed and a pickaxe. Quickly gather stone, and build a stone pickaxe, sword, and axe. Depending on how fast you did this, you may want to get ready for bed. (Just depends on if sheep spawned near you or not)

So lets just assume you had no time left. So you sleep, now it's a fresh new day. We now need food. So lets go find pigs, chickens and cows, and MURDER THEM! BWA HA HA HA HA *cough* *cough*
Don't be afraid to kill as many as you need, because remember, dont feel tied up! Once your ready to go, go explore the world. Go find a great, beatiful, convenient, safe place to build. Keep gathering resources on your way. Also, don't be afraid to stay in one spot for days on end, just to keep going. Remember, no respawn, amirite?

Probably by now, your getting the hang of it. Once you have found your spot, begin gathering resources for what you want to build, and build your new house. You can build your house slowly, remember. You can do what you have been doing the last few nights. Just sleep under the stars before monsters spawn. Build a nice house!

Go find a great, deep, complicated mine! Go get lots of iron, coal, and diamonds! My suggestion is to have lots of torches before you go in deep. Keep laying torches along your path so you can easily get back. Make sure each torch is in a location so that, once you get to it, you can see the next torch. Another tip whilst mining: go slow and look at your surroundings. If you can remember landmarks in your cave/mine, you can easily navigate it.

Now your days into your file. Your doing pretty well. You have a house, food and ores. What's next in your quest? Well, hardcore is survival but harder. So anthing you might want to do in survival, you can do in hardcore. My suggestion would be to make a large farm, (Maybe make it automatic?) find a horse or two, and create an iron golem. Iron golems are great, like seriously. You won't have to worry about mobs keeping you from sleep. Iron will take care of it! Once your over world farm, house and entire life is in a great state, get ready to venture into Hell itself. Arm your self with more than you might in a survival file. The nether is a dangerous place, and few who enter it will enter it without death. So make sure who have full diamond armor, diamond sword, make sure it's enchanted, have some potions of fire resistance, regeneration, swiftness and invisibility. (remember, once you die no respawn, so why not bring everything you own into the nether?)

Remember, always stay safe. If you are going to die, retreat. If your going to starve, go gather food. Play smart in Hardcore mode. But the biggest tip I can give anyone: play confident. I am confident. I may be playing LAN on my hardcore file, and my friend will be like "why you going to go fight all those mobs?" and I'll just smile and say, "I'll be fine." And guess what, I haven't died yet... there have been close calls, but nothing I can't deal with. Just stay cool and focus. (BTW, that friend died within the first 30 minutes because of a lack of confidence when a creeper came his way...)


I hope you have gleaned some merit from this post! Even if you learned nothing, I hope you enjoyed reading it. Diamond if you like, and feel free to comment. Any other tips you have gathered? Any advice that may be helpful? Any thing that is not true? Please tell me. I would love to make this blog post as helpful and accurate as possible. Thanks for reading!
~Whitedevil