Dripstone Caves

Dripstone Caves is an underground cave biome that generates beneath areas of high continentalness, making it almost exclusive to far-inland regions. It is rarely if ever found beneath oceans or coastal zones. Players can sometimes anticipate its presence from the surface by noticing the absence of river fjords and the elevated floor of mountain valleys. Dripstone Caves can appear at virtually any depth underground and may even replace lush caves when those biomes sit far enough from the coast.

The interior of Dripstone Caves is characterized by dense formations of dripstone blocks and pointed dripstone. Stalactites hang from cave ceilings while stalagmites rise from the floor, creating a jagged and cluttered landscape. Scattered across the ground are small, shallow water pools a few blocks wide, each containing waterlogged pointed dripstone. Wider cavern spaces and ravines within the biome can host large dripstone cluster features, and copper ore generates in notably larger blobs here than it does in other cave biomes.

Dripstone Caves also has a distinct mob spawning profile. Drowned can appear in underground aquifers, and zombie nautiluses spawn there on rare occasions — neither of which is typical for standard cave biomes. Familiar cave features like monster rooms and glow lichen continue to appear as well. In Bedrock Edition, woodland mansions can occasionally generate on the surface above Dripstone Caves, and at elevations above roughly Y=120 all exposed water freezes and snow covers the terrain, even when the overlying surface biome is normally warm. No actual precipitation occurs, however, since the biome is classified as arid.