Crimson Stem

Overview

Crimson Stem is a Nether block in Minecraft Java Edition 1.21.4. It is gathered by mining rather than crafted. At a hardness of 2 it takes a moment to break but never slows a build down.

Broken correctly, it drops itself. It offers almost no protection from explosions (2 blast resistance). A full stack holds 64.

It is an ingredient in 5 recipes, among them Campfire, Crimson Hyphae, Crimson Planks and 2 more.

About the crimson set

Crimson is not wood at all — it is fungus, harvested from the huge crimson fungi that grow on nylium in the crimson forest — and that biology gives the whole set its defining property: crimson blocks are completely fireproof. They will not burn, fire will not spread across them, and lava will not set them alight, which makes crimson and warped the only sensible building materials anywhere near lava or in the Nether generally. The set covers planks, stairs, slabs, fences, gates, doors, trapdoors, signs, hanging signs, buttons and pressure plates, but there is no crimson boat, because a stem is not a log. Crimson stems strip with an axe like a log and the planks are a deep maroon-red found nowhere else. Bone meal on crimson nylium grows a new huge fungus instantly, so the set is fully renewable from one nylium block.

How long it takes to break

Hardness 2 puts Crimson Stem at 3 seconds a block bare-handed, or 0.35 seconds with the right tool at netherite tier.

An iron tool takes 0.5 seconds and a diamond one 0.4, so the jump that actually matters for this block is the one to iron.

There is no tier requirement to worry about. Any tool, or none, returns the drop; the numbers below just say how fast.

Efficiency adds its level squared plus one to the tool speed, so Efficiency V is about 3.5 times faster than the same tool unenchanted.

Tool	No enchantment	Efficiency III	Efficiency V
Hand	3 s	3 s	3 s
Wooden	1.5 s	0.25 s	0.15 s
Stone	0.75 s	0.25 s	0.1 s
Iron	0.5 s	0.2 s	0.1 s
Diamond	0.4 s	0.2 s	0.1 s
Netherite	0.35 s	0.2 s	0.1 s
Golden	0.25 s	0.15 s	0.1 s

Properties

With 2 blast resistance Crimson Stem goes down to any nearby explosion. It is fully opaque and produces no light. 64 fit in a slot — a full stack. The block is tagged for axes, and only that class gets the speed bonus; everything else mines at bare-hand rate.

Transparent: No
Required tool: Any