Before the Ash

Survive in a world where dinosaurs rule.

Before the Ash is a prehistoric survival modpack for Minecraft 1.20.1, built on NeoForge. Step into a dangerous, beautiful world filled with dinosaurs, prehistoric creatures, and ancient ecosystems. Explore lush biomes shaped by custom world generation, tame creatures from a bygone era, build shelters to survive the night, and uncover the mysteries of a land untouched by human civilization.

This isn't just a mod slapped onto vanilla — it's a fully curated experience with custom menus, hand-picked world generation, balanced progression, and over 130 mods working together to create something that feels like a complete game.

Dinosaurs & Prehistoric Creatures

The star of the show. Before the Ash brings dinosaurs and prehistoric life to Minecraft through Fossils and Archaeology Revival, giving you the ability to discover fossils, extract DNA, and bring ancient creatures back to life. Tame and ride dinosaurs, build enclosures, and study the paleontology of a world that never went extinct.

Alongside the dinosaurs, The Dawn Era and Dawn Era Delight expand the prehistoric roster with even more creatures and themed content. Alex's Mobs and Naturalist fill out the world with diverse wildlife — from the depths of the ocean to the canopy of the jungle — so every biome feels alive.

World Generation

The world itself is as much a character as the creatures in it. Before the Ash uses a layered world generation stack to create landscapes that feel epic and ancient:

• Terralith — Over 100 new biomes with dramatic terrain, towering cliffs, and deep valleys
• Tectonic — Massive continental-scale terrain shaping with realistic geology
• WWOO (William Wythers' Overhauled Overworld) — Enhanced vanilla biomes with richer vegetation and detail
• Biome Replacer — Fine-tuned biome placement to match the prehistoric theme
• Ecologics — Richer ecosystems with new plants and environmental details

Every world you generate will feel unique, vast, and worth exploring.

Structures & Exploration

A prehistoric world needs things to discover. Before the Ash includes a curated set of structure mods to reward exploration:

• Yung's Better Dungeons — Completely overhauled dungeon generation
• Yung's Better Mineshafts — Massive, sprawling underground mineshafts
• Yung's Better Strongholds — Redesigned strongholds that feel like real fortresses
• Repurposed Structures — Hundreds of new structures scattered across every biome
• Philip's Ruins — Atmospheric ruins and remnants of ancient civilizations
• Explorer's Compass & Nature's Compass — Find biomes and structures without wandering aimlessly

Building & Decoration

Once you've survived long enough to settle down, you'll have plenty to build with:

• Handcrafted — Beautiful furniture and decorative blocks
• Macaw's Bridges & Fences — Detailed architectural elements
• Chipped — Hundreds of block variants for every building material
• Supplementaries — Signs, flags, jars, and dozens of useful decorative items
• Chalk — Mark your path through caves and the wilderness
• Simply Tents — Portable shelters for the nomadic survivor
• Storage Drawers & Sophisticated Storage — Keep your base organised

Survival & Progression

Before the Ash adds depth to the survival experience without making it tedious:

• First Aid — Localized body damage; a broken leg means you can't sprint
• Scaling Health — Health scales with progression, making the early game dangerous
• Realistic Torches — Torches burn out; you'll need to plan your lighting
• Spoiled — Food rots over time, adding urgency to farming and storage
• Sol: Carrot Edition — Eat a varied diet to gain permanent health bonuses
• Sleep Tight — Sleeping bags and improved rest mechanics
• Comforts — Sleeping bags that don't set your spawn
• Farmer's Delight & Croptopia — A massively expanded food and cooking system
• Traveler's Backpack — Extra inventory space for long expeditions

Combat & Equipment

You'll need every advantage to survive alongside apex predators:

• Spartan Weaponry — Spears, halberds, battleaxes, and more
• Better Combat — Overhauled melee combat with combos and weapon reach
• Tinkers' Construct — Build and customise your own tools and weapons from parts
• Tool Leveling — Your gear improves the more you use it
• Apotheosis — Overhauled enchanting with rare, powerful enchantments
• Cosmetic Armor Reworked — Look however you want without sacrificing stats

Performance & Quality of Life

Before the Ash is optimised to run well and feel smooth:

• Embeddium — Sodium-level rendering performance on Forge
• Immediately Fast — Entity rendering optimisation
• ModernFix — Memory and startup time improvements
• FerriteCore — Reduces RAM usage significantly
• Entity Culling — Skips rendering entities you can't see
• Fast Leaf Decay — Leaves disappear quickly after chopping trees
• Clumps — Merges XP orbs to reduce lag
• Chunk Sending — Optimised chunk delivery for smoother exploration
• Memory Settings — Automatic memory management

Quality of life mods keep the experience smooth without feeling like cheating: Jade (block info HUD), JEI (recipe browser), Xaero's Minimap & World Map, Controlling (searchable keybinds), Mouse Tweaks, Inventory Profiles Next, and Ping Wheel for multiplayer communication.

Immersion & Atmosphere

The little details that tie it all together:

• Ambient Sounds — Biome-specific ambient audio that makes the world feel alive
• Sound Physics Remastered — Reverb in caves, muffled sounds through walls
• Particle Rain — Weather particles that interact with the terrain
• Fog — Atmospheric distance fog for that prehistoric haze
• Dynamic Lights — Holding a torch lights up the world around you
• Drippy Loading Screen — Custom themed loading screens
• FancyMenu — Fully custom main menu, pause screen, and loading backgrounds

Multiplayer Ready

Before the Ash includes a dedicated server pack with everything pre-configured:

• Aikar's JVM Flags — Industry-standard garbage collection tuning
• 6GB RAM default — Optimised for modded server performance
• Simple Voice Chat — Built-in proximity voice chat (no Discord needed)
• FTB Chunks — Chunk claiming and protection
• FTB Teams & Essentials — Team management and server utilities
• Pre-configured server.properties — Tuned view distance, simulation distance, and compression

Included Shaders

Before the Ash ships with a selection of shaders so you can make the world look incredible right out of the box:

• BSL Shaders
• Complementary Reimagined
• Complementary Unbound
• Sildur's Vibrant Shaders
• Solas Shader
• Bliss Shaders

Included Resource Packs

• Fresh Animations — Improved mob animations
• Mandala's GUI (Dark Mode) — Clean, dark-themed UI

Requirements

• Minecraft: 1.20.1
• Mod Loader: NeoForge 47.1.106
• Minimum RAM: 6GB allocated (8GB recommended)
• Java: 17 or newer