Does anyone have some tips for a Wither head farm?

[007Nick700]

Hello,
I'm kind of new to FTB. I only started playing it a few days ago. I've set my goal to making a portal gun, but as you probably know it needs a wither star. I've got a Vorpal sword, but I'm not having the best of luck killing the occasional wither skeleton in a nether fortress. Does anyone have an effective design on a farm or something? I tried a soul cage with normal skeletons in the nether but it doesn't seem to spawn wither skeletons, only normal ones.
I've been thinking of trying to find an actual spawner and moving it to the nether with my gravity gun but I'm afraid it do the same thing
Thanks in advance.

 

[ncreen_same]

Golems with visors will cause the heads to drop, smart wooden golems can pick them up, and water can be used to flush all the exp into lava to avoid lag after your brain in a jar is full.

edit: forgot to mention, use soul shards to make a wither skelly spawner

 

[ttech]

Golems with visors will cause the heads to drop, smart wooden golems can pick them up, and water can be used to flush all the exp into lava to avoid lag after your brain in a jar is full.

edit: forgot to mention, use soul shards to make a wither skelly spawner

But with the Wither Skeleton Spawner it will not drop the heads. Direwolf20 said that the mobs that are spawned via soul shards do not drop their rare drops.

 

[007Nick700]

So golems with visors will always make the heads drop? I might just make one of those in a fortress then.

 

[Poppycocks]

But with the Wither Skeleton Spawner it will not drop the heads. Direwolf20 said that the mobs that are spawned via soul shards do not drop their rare drops.

This is false . The mobs will drop rare drops if killed either by:
1. You
2. Turtles
3. Iron golems with visors

 

[ttech]

This is false . The mobs will drop rare drops if killed either by:
1. You
2. Turtles
3. Iron golems with visors

Oh ok. I misunderstood what he meant when he said that. Thank you for telling me that. Now I can make my wither farm in the nether!

 

[007Nick700]

How exactly do I make one of those golems though?

 

[CTMiner]

Do lots of thaumcraft research. It comes after the wand of thaumaturge

 

[Exedra]

Vorpal doesn't actually help with wither's.

 

[Bickers]

Vorpal doesn't actually help with wither's.

this only Looting will help if vorpal kills it it just dies and drops its normal drop best way to get them to spawn is to level out a fortress tear down the walls and create a level floor and keep it dark still wont be fast getting them but its better then running around a fortress all day

 

[haisho]

If you need technical information on vanilla spawning of Wither Skeletons, then watch this whole video.

Mod-wise, you have Soul Shards, but you'll need to either manually kill them, or use solutions that trick the game into thinking you killed them in order for them to drop heads. Additionally, you need to make sure that whatever position you place the spawning cage in is the final location, as the shard will change to holding regular skeleton souls upon breaking it.
You can also move vanilla skeleton spawners into the Nether, where they will randomly spawn Wither Skeletons.

Outside of those two, your only hope is that you find a Wither Skeleton in a Nether Fortress and that it drops a head when you kill it.

 

[Larroke]

Did they fix skelly t5 spawners randomly spawning withers in the nether / fortress chunk?

 

[Dravarden]

bring a vanilla spawner to the nether, use iron golems or turtles to kill them. Or kill wither skelles and do a soulshard of them.

 

[007Nick700]

Thanks everyone.
I just stole a skeleton spawner from the twilight forest and put it in a nether fortress. I got enough heads now.

 

[Democretes]

But with the Wither Skeleton Spawner it will not drop the heads. Direwolf20 said that the mobs that are spawned via soul shards do not drop their rare drops.

Not in this version. Soul shards will no longer drop rare drops soon though. The change will take place in the next few updates.

 

[Poppycocks]

Not in this version. Soul shards will no longer drop rare drops soon though. The change will take place in the next few updates.

No way in hell I'm updating to that version.

There's way too many items requiring nether stars to manufacture them manually.

 

[Celestialphoenix]

You could use a portal/gravi gun to bring vanilla skele spawners into the nether.

If not, the spawning area for wither skeletons is somewhat wierd; the exact shape of the main walkways/towers at the same Y level only- and an extra 5 blocks on each side of towers/crossroads.

 

[Jikahn]

Get a soul shard, fill it to tier 5 with wither skeletons by the method of your choosing.
Note that fall damage = 3 + Number of blocks fallen. Test it to understand.
Note that Wither Skeletons have 20 HP or 10 Hearts. 1/2 of a heart = 1 HP.
A soul cage will spawn mobs at it's current height.
Build the soul cage high enough to leave the wither skeletons with 1/2 heart (1 hp). I think that would mean build up 22 blocks and place the cage at 23 from whatever platform you are using. Just empty all your items somewhere safe and find where you can jump and be left with 1 half heart. Put the cage where the lower half of your body is.
Mine is suspended in mid air with redpower cable wired into a block above it, and a switch at the bottom of the grinder.
Get a hand full of food and kill them with it.

Watch this to understand the principle when applied to enderman.

 

[Daved1058]

Thanks everyone.
I just stole a skeleton spawner from the twilight forest and put it in a nether fortress. I got enough heads now.

thats a genious idea

 

[Dravarden]

Thanks everyone.
I just stole a skeleton spawner from the twilight forest and put it in a nether fortress. I got enough heads now.

why a fortress? just do a 9x9 hole in the floor (nether), place the spawner in the center but like 5-6 blocks from the floor and kill them when they spawn.