Pre-Hardmode Checklist 1.4+

A checklist for pre-hardmode items/topics to have in your Terraria world before entering hardmode

Introduction

Welcome to my 2nd guide for Terraria! This guide features a checklist of different things that can be done before advancing your Terraria world into hardmode. Note that none of the items/topics on the checklist are required in order to advance into hardmode (beating the wall of flesh) , but they are good to take note of and they may vastly help you in your transition from pre-hardmode to hardmode in Terraria.
Essentially this guide is a list of helpful things to have or use when going into hardmode.

NOTE: There is no set or definitive way to play Terraria, apart from the boss progression. So feel free to use this guide/checklist however you want :) But most importantly play the game however you want and in a way that is the most fun and entertaining for you
This guide may seem big and expansive so if you are feeling overwhelmed when viewing this guide, remember that you can use CTRL+F to find specific items and/or topics throughout this guide :)
In addition to this, the guide will continue to be updated with the release of the 1.4.4 update!

Wall of Flesh

This is the boss that puts your world into hardmode immediately after defeating it. The wall of flesh is spawned by dropping a Guide Voodoo Doll into the lava within the Underworld. Note that the guide must be alive for this to work, if there is no guide in your world or the guide is dead, then the Wall of Flesh will not spawn.

The Voodoo Demon is an enemy is found within the Underworld and is seen carrying the Guide Voodoo Doll. These enemies will ALWAYS drop the doll when killed. Be warned though, if you kill the Voodoo Demon and the doll happens to fall into lava the Wall of Flesh may spawn instantly, catching you off guard if you are unprepared for the fight.

While I will not go into depth on how to fight the Wall of Flesh, as there are plenty of guides of there that show you various strategies to beat it, I will recommend you carve out a straight forward path throughout the entire Underworld. As having a straight path you can follow throughout the entire Underworld will definitely help you while you are running and fighting the Wall of Flesh. The Wall of Flesh will move faster as it's health gets lower so be aware!

Here is a simple example of a straight forward platform throughout the Underworld for fighting the Wall of Flesh. Image provided by Screenrant

Boss Arena + Useful buff items

Even the most basic and simplistic arena can be massively helpful when fighting different bosses in pre-hardmode and even some in hardmode, as you can modify your arena and build others as you progress through the game. A boss arena in Terraria mainly consists of an array of platforms scattered across a large area in layers.


This is just 1 example of a boss arena, you can make/develop yours however you like depending on what you need! :)

Some items you may find useful when building your arena include:

Heart Lantern: Applies a health generation buff to the player.
Crafted with 1 life crystal & 4 chains

Star in a bottle: Increased mana generation to the player. Crafted with 1 fallen star and 1 bottle

Campfire: Applies a health generation buff to the player. Crafted with 10 wood and 5 torches

Honey: When the player steps in or submerges themselves into honey they receive a health regeneration buff for 30 seconds. Can be gathered from beehives within the underground jungle

Sunflower: Increases player movement speed and reduces monster spawns within the area. Can be gathered naturally from growing grass on the surface of the overworld, or purchased from the Dryad for 50 silver.

Bast Statue: Increases all players defense by 5 when standing in the area of the statue. These can be found in sandstone chests located in the Underground Desert.

Additionally, there are some other useful furniture items that apply a buff upon right-clicking them. These can include:

Sharpening Station: When right-clicked it increases the player's armor penetration from melee weapons by 12 for 10 minutes. Found in Underground Jungle cabins

Ammo Box: When right-clicked it grants the player a 20% chance not to consume ammo from ranged weapons for 10 minutes. Sold by the Traveling Merchant for 15 Gold


Bewitching Table: When right-clicked it increases the player's minion capacity by 1. Found placed inside the Dungeon


Slice of Cake: +20% player movement speed and +20% mining speed for 2 minutes. Given to the player after talking to the Party Girl during a party

Enemy Farm

Certain enemy drops can be very time consuming and generally difficult to newer players or anyone in general. Even having a simple enemy farm for drops will make these types of tasks much easier for you in your world. These farms can also be used to make money, biome keys later on in hardmode alongside receiving enemy drops. Any world can benefit from having some type of enemy drop farm!

A very simple enemy farm can be made in the forest very early on in the game. A small lava pit can be constructed between 2 ramps which are created from hammering blocks. Make sure to not overfill the pit with lava or the item drops will be destroyed in the process and also be sure to include a small box underneath the lava pit for you to afk in with some chests to store your loot and any other items you may receive from the farm.
IMPORTANT: Do not build your enemy farm close to your town or close to any NPCs as this will reduce the amount of enemies that can spawn or even make no enemies spawn at all.

(Example of simple enemy farm using lava)

Empty Bucket: Used to pick up liquids. This will be used to place the lava for the simple enemy farm. An empty bucket is crafted with 3 Iron Bars.
Wooden Hammer: This tool will allow the player to remove background walls and change the shape of blocks to a ramp shape for the enemy farm. The wooden hammer is the easiest/fastest hammer to craft as it only requires 8 Wood.

The following items are not necessary for the farm but will make the farm much more efficient if used while afking or using the farm.

Water Candle: This item increases enemy and critter spawn rates in the area that is placed in. Found on shelves within the Dungeon. (They can be crafted/purchased later on in Hardmode)

Battle Potion: Potion consumable that doubles the spawn rate of enemies and critters. This can be crafted with 1 Bottle Water, 1 Deathweed, and 1 Rotten Chunk.

The enemy farm can even be created in the cavern layer or anywhere underground for enemies that spawn down there. You just need to mine out a very large area and you can replicate the same lava pit farm underground as well!

(Simple enemy farm created underground in the Cavern Layer)

As you progress throughout Terraria and through hardmode you can modify this farm and move it into different biomes (for biome keys later on in Hardmode) as needed. In addition to this you can also add any traps you find and put them on a timer with wires to add more damage to the farm making it more efficient.

(A much more advanced enemy farm)

Dart Trap: This trap fires a poisoned dart that requires no ammo and can be controlled with wires to fire. These are found naturally in the cavern layers of the world.
1 Second Timer: This timer will activate anything connected to it every second through wires. This item can be purchased from the Mechanic for 1 gold.
Wire: This item will be used to connect your timer to your dart trap or any other traps that are being used. These can be purchased from the Mechanic for 5 silver each, or can be found underground with the Dart Trap. A wrench will be necessary to place any wires.
Red Wrench: Can be used to place red wires, other colors are available. Purchased from Mechanic for 2 gold.

Herbs Farm

Setting up an herbs farm early on in the game will help you massively later on in the game when you need to craft a bunch of potions for boss fights and general use. Clay Pots can be used in the beginning, but once you get the Dryad to move into your town you will want to switch over to Planter Boxes. The Dryad will sell more types of Planter Boxes as you defeat more and more bosses in pre-hardmode.

Daybloom Planter Box: After King Slime is defeated

Moonglow Planter Box: After Queen Bee is defeated

Blinkroot Planter Box: After Eye of Cthulhu is defeated

Shiverthorn Planter Box: After Skeletron is defeated

Waterleaf Planter Box: After Skeletron is defeated

Fireblossom Planter Box: After Wall of Flesh is defeated

Deathweed Planter Box: After Eater of Worlds is defeated (Corruption Worlds)

Crimsonweed Planter Box: After Brain of Cthulhu is defeated (Crimson Worlds)

Each of these Planter Boxes can grow their respective herb inside them, having a large amount of each of these planter boxes or even just a few will help you amass the herbs you need to craft any potions that you may desire throughout Terraria.
Next I will show you where to locate each plant naturally in the world so that you can obtain the seeds of each world to grow them yourself in your Planter Boxes.

Daybloom: Found on grass in the overworld

Moonglow: Found on Jungle grass both Jungle and Underground Jungle

Blinkroot: Found anywhere on Dirt or Mud blocks, but most commonly found in the Underground Layer

Shiverthorn: Found on snow and ice blocks, typically in a snow biome

Waterleaf: Found on Sand blocks, typically nearby water and in an Ocean biome

Fireblossom: Found on Ash blocks in the Underworld

Deathweed: Found on Corrupt Grass and Ebonstone in the Corruption Biome

Crimsonweed: Found on Crimson Grass and Crimstone in the Crimson Biome

This was a very short and concise briefing on herbs in Terraria, I will link a more advance section of herbs on the Terraria wiki if you wish to read more into it

Health & Mana

Health and mana are fairly simple topics in Terraria, but can still easily be missed when going into Hardmode. You will want to make sure both are maxed out (400 health, 200 mana) before entering hardmode or before fighting the wall of flesh. Max health is increased through finding life crystals and max mana is increased through crafting and using mana crystals.

Having increased health will allow you to tank more hits against enemies and bosses in pre-hardmode and in hardmode, and having the increased mana pool size will allow for some variety in your attacks whether you are going to become a mage or not, it is still useful to have maximum mana capacity as well.

Life crystals can be found anywhere in the underground layer of the world and below. Each one increases the player's health by 20.

Mana stars are crafted from fallen stars, which can be gathered at night. It takes 5 fallen stars to craft 1 mana crystal which can be used to increase the player's maximum mana by 20. The mana crystal is also used to craft the band of starpower[terraria.fandom.com] for any mages that reading this guide.

NOTE: Even if you are completely maxed out on health and mana, continue to grab life crystals and make mana crystals as you play. They are both still extremely useful and are used to craft heart lanterns and stars in a bottle.

Night's Edge

The Night's Edge has the highest base damage out of all the swords in Pre-Hardmode and is an important weapon to have regardless of what class you are going to become in Terraria. The Night's Edge is crafted at a demon/crimson altar. The following items are needed to craft the Night's Edge, note the recipe for crafting it will vary depending on whether you have crimson or corruption in your world.


Crimson world only, Blood Butcherer: Crafted with 10 Crimtane Bars

Corruption world only, Light's Bane: Crafted with 10 Demonite Bars


Muramasa: Found in locked golden chests inside the Dungeon


Blade of Grass: Crafted with 15 Jungle Spores 12 Stingers and 3 Vines


Volcano: Crafted with 20 Hellstone Bars


..............................................................................................................................................................


Combining The Muramasa, Blade of Grass, Fiery Greatsword, and either the Blood Butcherer or Light's Bane will yield the Night's Edge

NOTE: Even after obtaining better melee weapons than the Night's Edge in Hardmode, it is important to hold onto this sword as it is used to create the True Night's Edge later on in Hardmode.

Molten Armor... etc.

Molten armor has the highest defense of any other armor set in pre-hardmode making this armor set the safest choice for anyone in pre-hardmode that is about to transition into hardmode. To craft a full set of Molten armor, 45 Hellstone Bars and 45 Obsidian is required.

Molten Helmet: Crafted from 10 Hellstone Bars. Provides 8 Defense and a 7% increased melee critical strike chance
Molten Breastplate: Crafted from 20 Hellstone Bars. Provides 9 Defense and a 7% increase to melee damage
Molten Greaves: Crafted from 15 Hellstone Bars. Provides 8 Defense and a 7% increase to melee speed.

Set Bonus: +10% Melee Damage
Fire Imunity

If all of these numbers and state values are confusing here are the total full set benefits from Molten Armor
+25 Defense
+17% Melee Damage
+7% Melee Speed
+7% Melee Critical Strike Chance
Immunity to fire
Cosmetic Fire Trail when you move around

Other useful items that can be crafted with Hellstone Bars include:

Flamarang: Crafted with 10 Hellstone Bars and 1 Enchanted Boomerang


Imp Staff: Crafted with 17 Hellstone Bars


Phoenix Blaster: Crafted with 10 Hellstone Bars and 1 Handgun

Accessories

There are many different accessories available to you in pre-hardmode, I will include some accessories that I think could be useful to you in your playthrough of Terraria. Feel free to choose whichever accessories best fit your play style or class.
NOTE: Due to their long crafting recipes, the Terraspark Boots[terraria.fandom.com] and Blue Horseshoe Balloon[terraria.fandom.com]/Cloud in a balloon[terraria.fandom.com] will be excluded from this list.
These accessories will be sorted by class, Melee/Ranged/Magic/Summoner, and then misc.

Melee
Feral Claws: +12% Attack speed and enables autoswing on nonauto weapons. Found in Jungle Shrines and Living Mahogany Trees inside the Underground Jungle

Black/Yellow Counterweight: A second projectile is thrown alongside the yoyo. Purchased from the Traveling Merchant

String: Increases yoyo range. Crafted with 30 cobwebs (Can be dyed as well)

Magma Stone: Melee attacks inflict fire damage. Rare drop from Lava Bats and Hellbats in the Underworld

Ranged
N/A However, Hellfire Arrows are extremely useful in combination with the Bee's Knees

Hellfire Arrow: 13 Damage and create a small explosion. Crafted with 100 Wooden Arrows and 1 Hellstone Bar (Creates 100)


Bee's Knees: 23 Damage and each shot spawns 3-6 bees that attack nearby enemies. Dropped from the Queen Bee


Magic
Celestial Cuffs: Increases pickup range for mana stars, Restores mana when damaged and Increases max mana by 20. Crafted with Celestial Magnet and Magic Cuffs at the Tinkerer's Workshop

Mana Flower: 8% reduced mana usage and automatically use mana potions when needed. Crafted with Nature's Gift and 1 Mana Potion at the Tinkerer's Workshop.

Magnet Flower: 8% reduced mana usage Automatically use mana potions when needed and Increases pickup range for mana stars. Crafted with Mana Flower and Celestial Magnet at the Tinkerer's Workshop.

Summoner
Pygmy Necklace: Increases the player's max number of minions by 1. Purchased from the Witch Doctor for 20 Gold at night.


Misc
Stinger Necklace: Increases armor penetration by 5 and Released bees and douses the player in honey when damaged. Crafted with a Shark Tooth Necklace and Honey Comb at the Tinkerer's Workshop.

Band of Regeneration: Regenerate 1 extra HP every second. Found in gold chests in the various Underground biomes

Obsidian Shield: +2 Defense with immunity to knockback and fire blocks. Crafted with the Cobalt Shield and Obsidian Skull at the Tinkerer's Workshop.

Magiluminescence: Increases movement speed and acceleration by 20%. Crafted with 5 Topaz and 12 Crimtane/Demonite Bars at a Lead or Iron Anvil

Panic Necklace: Increases movement speed by 50% after taking damage. Found by smashing Crimson Hearts in the Crimson biome.

Wings

As of Terraria update ver. 1.4.1 Fledgling wings can now be obtained in pre-hardmode, making them the only wings obtainable in pre-hardmode Terraria. Wings in Terraria allow you to fly temporarily by pressing and holding spacebar. Flight time varies from wing to wing, Fledgling Wings have the lowest flight but are certainly better than nothing in terms of the accessories available to you in pre-hardmode. In addition to this, you take no fall damage when having wings equipped.
NOTE: If you create a journey mode character you will automatically start the game with these wings as well.

Fledgling Wings: Can be found in Skyware Chests on Floating Islands or from Sky Crates in pre-hardmode ( Azure Crates in hardmode)

If you are lucky these wings can be found super early on in the game if you explore the sky in your world through the usage of platforms or with Gravitation potions.
Being that only a few floating islands exist per world, if you are really determined to get these wings right away in your world you may have to create multiple worlds to help increase your chances in finding them. (Only if you really want these wings that bad)

Before entering into Hardmode it is a good idea to build a suitable house inside of a Jungle biome and moving your Witch Doctor into it. When in Hardmode, when the Witch Doctor is in a Jungle biome at night, they will sell the Leaf Wings to the player for 75 Gold. This is a significant upgrade to the Fledgling Wings or if you have no wings at all going into hardmode.


Leaf Wings: Sold for 75 Gold from the Witch Doctor. Allows for a maximum flight of 53 tiles in 1.67 seconds.

Potion Basics

While potions aren't SUPER important to some in pre-hardmode, they definitely make fights a whole lot easier, and are much much more useful going into hardmode. Down below are a few potions that I chose to include in the checklist (I didn't want this portion of the checklist to become long and redundant so theres only a few for now)

Ironskin Potion: Increases player's defense by 8. Crafted from 1 Bottled Water 1 Daybloom and 1 Iron Ore

Regeneration Potion: Player regenerates 2HP per second for 8 minutes. Crafted with 1 Bottled Water 1 Daybloom and 1 Mushroom

Swiftness Potion: Increases maximum movement speed by 25%. Crafted from 1 Bottled Water 1 Blinkroot and 1 Cactus

In addition to these potions, eating food items will provide some sort of "well fed" buff to the player. This buff will provide a small boost to all stats and can range from 4 to 48 minutes. My preferred method to getting a well fed buff super easily in pre-hardmode is from the teapot.

Teapot:

The teapot is a crafting station, so when standing near it, it allows you to craft a teacup with 1 bottled water.
The teacup, provides the Well Fed buff that lasts for 5 minutes and can easily be mass-produced as all you need are water bottles to create them.

Teapot: Crafted from 12 Clay Blocks and 12 Bones

Housing & Money

This goes without saying but I still felt like I needed to included this in the checklist, but it's to make sure that you have plenty of housing spaces for the new NPCs you will acquire as you begin to progress through Hardmode. This is as simple as extending your base to add more housing space after acquiring all the pre-hardmode NPCs. As mentioned earlier in the checklist, it's good to have a house in the Jungle for the Witch Doctor. Additionally it's also good to build your own artificial above-ground Glowing Mushroom Biome for the Truffle, which is an unlockable NPC that you will get much later on in Hardmode. However, if you already have the designated biome and house for the Truffle you can essentially set it and forget it. Below is an example of the artifical biome you can build early on in the game.
Image provided by Terraria Wiki
Note: The house can be made of any material, you only need the mushroom blocks to create the biome. This takes about 100 tiles including mushrooms and mushroom grass to create the biome. You will know you created the biome when you see the background change along with the music.

Also another addition to the checklist that goes without saying, is to make sure you have a fair bit of money saved up before going into hardmode. I would recommend at least 5-7 Platinum if you can. As many new NPCs will great items you will want to buy along with your current NPCs getting new hardmode exclusive items to sell.
Simple guide to making money here[terraria.fandom.com]

Biome Spread

Biome Spread is already occurring right when you create the world, this process is greatly enhanced upon defeating the Wall of Flesh and entering Hardmode. With the edition of the Hallow from Hardmode, this and the crimson and corruption will begin to spread at an significantly increased rate. However, much later on in Hardmode you will be given the opportunity to slow down biome corruption spread (50%) by defeating Plantera.
There is no real rush to attempt to slow the biome spread down as it is much slower than one may think, but if forgotten about for a long period of time you may find your world to become slowly eaten up by your corruption biome.
You can check your world's status of each biome by talking to the Dryad, who will give you a percentage of pure/corruption/hollow in your world. The Dryad also sells Purification Powder for 75 Copper each, which can serve as a temporary early game solution to biome corruption spread

Useful links

Below are some links that have been referenced to throughout this checklist and may even prove to be useful in your Terraria journey.

Complete Terraria Progression Guide[ewauq.github.io] this interactive browser guide/checklist coded by ewauq takes you step by step from the beginning to the end of Terraria and is also useful alongside this guide or just for standalone completion purposes.

Wiki page on herbs[terraria.fandom.com] this will show advanced information on herbs for those who are curious on the topic. For example blooming conditions, and growth of each of the herbs and what particular blocks they grow on naturally in the world.

Checklist for the different Class Setups[terraria.fandom.com] in Terraria. This guide on the wiki will show you the optimal equipment to have at different points throughout the game. It includes the 4 main classes: Melee, Ranged, Magic, and Summoning. This will be very helpful as you go into hardmode as class becomes more aparent after that point especially.

Link[terraria.fandom.com] for additional help for building boss arenas. Very expansive and descriptive for the different scenarios you may face in Terraria.

Closing

Thank you for reading my guide! I hope you enjoyed it and it has helped you in your pre-hardmode to hardmode transition in Terraria. If you have any questions or anything I should add to this checklist/guide feel free to let me know in the comments below! :)

[Soupuyorglasison]

Based guide.

[seyras]

not sure if youre still updating the guide, but in regards to the herb farm, any planter box is able to hold any herb, the different planter boxes are actually completely cosmetic and don't make a difference

[Captn Tunabeerd]

Fantastic !

[La-_-Moody]

this is literally the stuff i do every time i play, this is amazing and comprehensive and so cool

[my form empties]

thanks for making a wiki that isint just "how to jump"

[t1m0]

Just a clarification. On the wiki it is said that any plant can grow in any planter box. Except that, great guide!

[NiCO]

Great suggestion, I will work on adding an enemy farm section as that is a very important structure to have in your world! Thank you :)

[Spookypizza]

what about an enemy farm?

[火华少]

thanks

[NiCO]

Yes, I didn't realize it was previously 3 but after 1.4.1 it was changed to 5, I've updated that portion thanks for the feedback and comments!