We were able to talk to the developers of Minecraft Dungeons at gamescom 2019, and they provided us with information about the game’s loot system.
What is Minecraft Dungeons? The premise of Minecraft Dungeons is simple: You fight alone or in co-op mode for up to 4 players through procedurally generated dungeons and collect a ton of loot to improve your character.
The game is best compared to Diablo and similar loot-oriented dungeon crawlers, all wrapped in the iconic Minecraft look.
Minecraft Dungeons will be released on PC, Xbox One, PS4, and Nintendo Switch. It is being developed by a small team led by Dawid Nisshagen and Mans Olsen at Mojang. The two developers shared some information about the game in an interview.
How does the loot system work? While Minecraft Dungeons has no classes that players must commit to, there are still certain archetypes defined by the equipment.
The combination of armor, melee and ranged weapons, and the three artifacts defines your character. Let’s say I want a character who should be a very good ranged fighter. Then I would choose armor that gives me extra arrows.
Then I would take a big bow because it feels like a good weapon for a strong ranged fighter. And for my artifacts, I would take a fire quiver, which gives me fire arrows.
Mans Olsen
One of the central conditions of the loot system in Minecraft Dungeons was that players must immediately understand what they are facing. An item that looks like heavy armor should also have corresponding stats, according to Nisshagen.
You must be able to understand it instinctively. You shouldn’t have to think long or look closely at the numbers and instructions, but rather understand it on the spot. That’s one of the great things about the Minecraft franchise. It doesn’t have to be explained a lot, much is simply self-explanatory.
Dawid Nisshagen, Executive Producer of Minecraft Dungeons
The locations of the items also follow this logic. It depends on the type of item, in which dungeon it can be found. If you’re looking for a pickaxe, you’ll find it in a mine where such items are used. If there are monsters in the area that carry these items, then the drop chance is correspondingly higher, explained Nisshagen.
Here’s how rarity levels work: The different levels of item rarity in games have now become a standard part of many gameplay systems, and Minecraft Dungeons is no exception. The loot in the game is divided into three rarity levels:
- normal
- rare
- unique
Unique items have special effects that permanently enhance you. For example, a sword could grant the player permanent lightning damage, said Mans Olsen.
If people with a specific playstyle want to create a build, they have to return to the specific dungeons [, where the loot drops] and restart the missions to get better versions of these items. And with higher difficulty comes new loot that they haven’t seen before.
David Nisshagen, Executive Producer of Minecraft Dungeons
What are Enchantments? Every piece of armor in Minecraft Dungeons has slots, and when acquiring items you receive a random selection of several enchantments that customize the item in various ways.
For example, with a bow, you might have the options: “Do I want Rapid Fire? Or would I prefer Multi-Shot? Or something completely different? This means that even if you find two completely identical bows, they will have different enchantment options.
Mans Olsen, Game Director of Minecraft Dungeons
If you’re lucky, you might get a normal weapon, but the enchantment on it is just amazing. And that makes it very, very powerful. However, there are still rare and unique versions of this weapon, and while they are generally better, if you’re unlucky, you might get a rare bow with enchantments that don’t fit your playstyle, explained Nisshagen.
The enchantments have a range of properties:
- Items always have a guaranteed enchantment slot and a maximum of 3
- The higher the rarity of the item, the higher the likelihood of multiple slots
- The enchantments also have three rarity levels: normal, rare, and powerful
- The enchantments can be upgraded up to 3 times. Powerful enchantments consume more points, but are accordingly stronger.
The difference between two and three slots [on an item] is huge. This means that even if you find a stronger weapon with higher base damage, but it has fewer enchantments, it will probably be worse.
David Nisshagen, Executive Producer of Minecraft Dungeons
Olsen explained that the team wanted to make Minecraft Dungeons as accessible as possible: “We are […] big fans of dungeon crawlers like Diablo and wanted to create something that we ourselves enjoy, with enough depth and complexity. Therefore, we try to find a good middle ground.”
