Starting with Butchery: Cleavers, Hooks, and Your First Carcass

guide

To begin the basic butchering workflow in the Butchery mod, you need three core tools: a cleaver, a hook, and a skinning knife. Understanding how these tools interact with carcasses is the foundation of the entire mod.

Getting Your First Carcass

The first step is obtaining a carcass. You will need a cleaver made from bone, iron, gold, diamond, or netherite. Use this cleaver as your killing weapon against any standard mob. When the mob dies from the cleaver's blow, its carcass will drop as an item for you to collect. Note that carrying carcasses in your inventory applies a slowness effect, making you move more slowly. This is a normal part of the process, and you can manage it by not carrying too many at once.

The Cleaver and Its Limits

Cleavers serve three purposes: obtaining carcasses, bleeding them, and butchering them. All cleaver materials function identically for standard mobs. The single exception is netherite. Only a netherite cleaver can obtain and process the carcasses of boss mobs. If you plan to work with boss drops, you must upgrade to netherite. For everything else, any material will suffice.

Hanging and Bleeding

Before you can butcher a carcass, it must be hung and drained of blood. This requires a hook. Hooks attach to the side or underside of blocks. They can also be mounted on horizontal chains, giving you flexibility in where you set up your workspace. To hang a carcass, hold it in your hand and right-click on an installed hook. The carcass will suspend from the hook.

Next, equip your cleaver and right-click the hanging carcass. Blood will begin to drip from it. Place a blood grate on the floor directly beneath the hook to catch the dripping blood; without it, you will create a mess. The draining process takes only a few seconds. You will know it is complete when the carcass changes to its drained appearance. Some carcasses also become lighter in color as a visual cue.

Butchering the Drained Carcass

Once drained, you have two choices. You can leave the carcass hanging on the hook and butcher it there, or you can break the hook to remove the carcass and carry it elsewhere. If you choose the second option, you may place the drained carcass on a wood butchers table. This table is purely optional; it is not required for butchering. It simply provides a designated surface if you prefer one.

With the drained carcass in place, right-click it while holding your cleaver. This starts the butchering process. For most carcasses, the cleaver alone is not enough. You will also need a skinning knife. As its name suggests, this tool removes the skin or fur from the carcass. The same skinning process applies when you want to remove armor from other mobs, such as Pillagers.

Skinning Knife Basics

Skinning knives come in the same five materials as cleavers: bone, iron, gold, diamond, and netherite. For standard carcasses, all materials work the same way. The exception is netherite again, which is the only material strong enough to skin boss carcasses. To use the skinning knife, the carcass must be fully drained first. Then, right-click the drained carcass while holding the knife to obtain the skin.

In summary, your basic workflow is: kill with a cleaver, hang on a hook, drain with the cleaver, then butcher with the cleaver and skin with the skinning knife. Netherite tools unlock boss carcass processing, and the butchers table is an optional convenience.

Covers the mod’s in-game guide topics: Butchering Carcasses Obtaining Carcasses Cleavers Hook Skinning Knives Wood Butchers Table