Minecraft 1.17 Snapshot 31W13A Patch Notes for Java Edition

We've been waiting for Minecraft 1.17, dubbed "Caves and Cliffs" to release this year. In the meantime, there's a new update today via Mojang Studios with a new Java Snapshot release!

What's the big update in the new Minecraft 1.17 Snapshot 31W13A for Java Edition? None other than our lovable friend the goat being added! Here's the full update for the Minecraft patch and everything you need to know. Important to note, this is only for the Java Edition, and not for PS4, Xbox, Switch, Bedrock, and other editions you may be familiar with.

New Updates in Minecraft 21W13A Snapshot

GOAT
- Goats spawn in Mountains
- Goats can scale the sides of mountains with their incredible jumps!
- Goats can be tempted and bred using Wheat
- Goats are another source of milk!

ACCESSIBILITY
Added an alternative solid black background color for the Mojang Studios loading screen, toggleable with the "Monochrome Logo" accessibility option

CHANGES IN 21W13A
- Tweaks to Caves
- Tweaks to Ore Distribution
- Tweaks to Powdered Snow
- Dripstone clusters can now be found rarely in normal caves
- Deepslate blobs can now be found between heights 0 and 16
- Axolotls and glow squids now spawn in underground water sources
- Axolotls will now always chase after and attack squids, glow squids, tropical fish, cod, salmon, pufferfish, drowned, guardians, and elder guardians
- Axolotls now have a two-minute cooldown after hunting non-hostile targets such as fish, squids, etc.
- They will prioritize targeting hostile mobs first before hunting.
- Bees now see Flowering Azalea (and Flowering Azalea Leaves) as flowers
- Additions to Wandering Trader and Mason trades
- Additions to chest loot tables

CAVE TWEAKS
- Mineshaft tweak: increased the max length of pillars and chains.
Carver tweaks: made carvers less likely to be too flat to walk through.
- Noise cave tweaks:
- Increased likelihood of megacaves (large cheese caves)
- Reduced likelihood of toothpick pillars (tall 1-block thin pillars)
- Other tweaks to make the cheese caves more varied and interesting.

ORE DISTRIBUTION TWEAKS
- Slightly more iron
- Larger diamond blobs sometimes form

POWDERED SNOW
- Powder snow's durability/hardness was slightly increased
- Freeze time has decreased to 7 seconds and hurt frequency has decreased to 2 seconds
- Entities on fire now melt Powder Snow when colliding
- Increase vertical movement speed within Powder Snow
- Strays, Polar Bears, and Snow Golems are now immune to freezing
- Mobs now shake when they are fully frozen
- Skeletons converting to strays now only require the 7 seconds it takes for an entity to be fully frozen to begin converting, instead of the 30 seconds it took before
- Leather horse armor now protects horses from freeze damage
- Mobs that enjoy the heat (Blazes, Magma Cubes, and Striders) take increased freeze damage

TRADE & LOOT TABLE ADDITIONS
- Added the following trades to Mason:
- Will sell 4 Dripstone blocks for 1 emerald
- Added the following trades to Wandering Trader:
- Will sell 2 Pointed Dripstones for 1 emerald
- Will sell 2 Rooted Dirt for 1 emerald
- Will sell 2 Moss Blocks for 1 emerald
- Moss blocks can be found in Shipwreck chests
- Glow Berries can be found in Mineshaft chest minecarts

TECHNICAL CHANGES IN 21W13A
- Added metric cube of light!
- Unused parts of code are no longer removed

LIGHT BLOCK
- Op-only (/give) air-like waterloggable block
- Emits light at a level determined by block state
- Visible and targetable only when the item is held (similar to barrier)
- Right-click cycles light level

Minecraft also addressed a variety of bugs in the update, you can find a full list here.

Where to Download Snapshot 31W13A?

You can download the Minecraft 31W13A Snapshot from the Minecraft launcher. Simply open the launcher and enable snapshots under the installations tab.

Minecraft also recommends you backup your worlds as snapshots have the potential to corrupt the file.