Explosive arrows
An explosive arrow blows up where it lands. Any arrow can be made explosive: plain, spectral or tipped.
441 TNT and 4 × Arrow make 4 × explosive Arrow.
- Fully drawn bow or crossbow: power 2, stronger than a ghast fireball (1)
- Any other shot: power 1, as strong as a ghast fireball (1)
How to craft
- Put an explosive ingredient in the slot on the left. By default that is gunpowder, TNT or a fire charge.
- Put a stack of arrows in any slot of the centre column. You need at least 4, and nothing else can be in the column.
- Take the result.
Each craft uses 1 explosive ingredient and 4 arrows, and makes 4 explosive arrows of the same kind. Tipped arrows keep their potion.
An explosive arrow shows its ingredient in the corner of its icon and in its tooltip, for example Explosive Material: TNT. Arrows that are already explosive cannot be crafted again.
Explosion strength
Each explosive ingredient has a value in the explosive ingredient config. How hard the arrow is shot decides how much of it you get:
- A critical arrow explodes with the full value. A fully drawn bow shoots critical arrows, and a crossbow always does.
- Any other shot, such as a half-drawn bow or a dispenser, explodes with half the value.
| Ingredient | Value | Power, fully drawn | Power, other shots |
|---|---|---|---|
 Gunpowder | 0.5 | 0.5 | 0.25 |
| TNT | 2 | 2 | 1 |
 Fire Charge | 4 | 4 | 2 |
For comparison, a creeper explodes with power 3 and TNT with power 4.
When it hits
- The arrow explodes at the point it hits, whether that is a block or a mob.
- The explosion breaks blocks and hurts everything nearby, including you if you are close.
- A mob hit directly still gets the arrow's effects, such as a tipped arrow's potion or a spectral arrow's glowing.
- The arrow is used up. It cannot be picked back up.
WARNING
Explosive arrows break blocks the same way TNT does. Be careful near your own builds.
Turning it off
Set allowExplosiveCrafting to false in the common config to remove the explosive slot. Explosive arrows that already exist still explode.
The amount per craft is explosiveArrowCraftingAmount in the same file.