How to Find Buried Treasure (& Maps) in Minecraft

Minecraft has continued to add a substantial number of features over the years and the developers at Mojang show no signs of slowing down, ensuring the iconic game continues to grow for years to come. One update that added a plethora of new content is Update Aquatic, focused on enlivening the ocean biomes with more wildlife, enemies, blocks, and even buried treasure for players to dig up.

The contents in a buried treasure chest vary, but players can expect to find useful resources like gold, iron, and diamonds, or even emeralds. However, they’ll always contain one Heart of the Sea, a rare item that cannot be obtained through any other method. By surrounding this enigmatic blue orb with eight nautilus shells in a crafting table, treasure hunters can craft a conduit, an orb that provides underwater night vision and oxygen restoration for nearby players. It can even attack hostile foes that come too close! Anyone planning to embark on an underwater adventure will want to get their hands on a Heart of the Sea to make a conduit of their own, so here’s how to find the buried treasure chests that contain them.

Treasure Hunting in Minecraft

Gear Up

• First things first, treasure hunters need to prepare for their ocean voyage by bringing along appropriate items. Sailing through the water on a boat is much quicker than swimming, so craft a boat and a backup just in case. Those with access to a brewing stand can concoct water-breathing potions by using a pufferfish, which will grant them more time underwater. Additionally, all other basics, like armor, tools, and food are needed to keep the player safe and healthy on their expedition. There’s a variety of aquatic life roaming Minecraft‘s ocean biomes, including deadly mobs that can threaten the player’s expedition if they’re unprepared.

Find A Treasure Map

• Next, players will need to travel out into an ocean biome and search for any shipwrecks or sunken ships. The abandoned ships don’t spawn very often, so treasure hunters will need to scour the oceans in search of them. Crafting a spyglass will enhance the player’s sight a bit and make them feel like a pirate, but a more reliable method is by feeding raw salmon or raw cod to a dolphin. By doing so, dolphins will reward the player by bringing them to a location of interest out in the ocean, which has a chance to include the shipwrecks. They contain multiple loot chests, with some containing junk like poisonous potatoes, while others harbor metal ingots. It’s never guaranteed, but one of these chests might hold a treasure map, which will lead players to the closest buried treasure in their game world.

Head to the Red X

• After opening up their new treasure map, players will see an X marks the spot on the map. However, the location on the map isn’t guaranteed to be anywhere nearby or anywhere they’ve been before. By looking at where the player’s reticle is on the treasure map, they can deduce what direction the mapped area is. For instance, if the player’s icon is south on the map, they’ll need to travel north. If players don’t know how to check cardinal directions, observe the sun; it only rises in the east and sets in the west. After sailing to the map’s location, head straight for the red X and use a shovel to dig through the sand in the area surrounding that spot. After finding it, open it up and claim the contents inside! More than one map and chest will spawn per world, so players can search for buried treasure to their heart’s content. However, keep in mind that because treasure maps lead to the closest chest, two maps in the same area might lead to the same one. To ensure each treasure map has a new treasure chest, make sure to sail far away from the most recent uncovered chest and mark its location down for future reference.

Minecraft is available now on PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X, Xbox One, PC, Nintendo Switch, and Mobile.

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