how do you find stronghold libraries in minecraft?

Question

I have searched all the strongholds I can find, but I have never found a stronghold library. Does anyone know of a 100% accurate way to find stronghold libraries?

Answer 1

As others have noted, there is no guarantee that any specific stronghold will contain a library, although from experience it is extremely rare for a stronghold to not have a library (even if the libraries are extensively damaged by other cave systems).

As of the current PC version of Minecraft, there are many strongholds in the world: up to a maximum of 128 per world. Strongholds generate in concentric rings around the center of the map (similar to how Nether Fortresses generate in "Stripes" throughout the nether). You will find strongholds in the green bands in the image below.

This doesn't tell you where they are, but it gives you a good idea of where to look, and once you get 25km away from 0,0, they do stop spawning, so beware of that. (And the ring with the highest concentration of Strongholds is the 13696-14976, with about 0.2 strongholds per square kilometer.)

Now, back to your original question, it is possible that the stronghold you found lacks libraries. If this is the case, your only option is to find another one somewhere else in the world.

Verifying whether a stronghold has a library or not is tricky; there is no solid answer. The only way to tell for certain--without the use of mods--is to check, and to do that you will need to search carefully. I recommend traversing the stronghold as follows:

1. Pick a starting point in the stronghold. Usually, you'll want to start from the point where you entered the stronghold.
2. Choose a direction and start walking until you encounter a fork in the stronghold. Place torches on the wall to your right as you go (I recommend redstone torches, since there are naturally generated "lighting" torches that can confuse things).
3. When you encounter a fork, always go right. Continue putting torches on the wall to your right.
4. If you encounter a dead-end, turn back until you come upon a fork with paths you haven't explored yet. Pick the next path to your right and explore it.
5. Eventually, you will find a library, or you will end up back at your starting point. (If at any point you wish to return to your starting point, simply follow the path where the torches are on your left. Provided you placed your torches correctly, there will only be one such path from any given spot in the explored stronghold.) This will give you a good idea whether there is a Library to be had in the stronghold.
6. Strongholds are often not well-connected, meaning that even if you fully explore a swath of the stronghold as described above, there may be corridors that you haven't seen, obstructed by the game's cave generation. You can dig around and hope to find more sections to the stronghold. If you find any, repeat the steps above.
7. If you still come up empty handed, it's time to go find another stronghold and start from scratch. I suppose that in theory, it is possible that a world can have no library-containing strongholds, but from my experience that would be exceedingly rare.

Answer 2

You could use the /locate command as follows:
/locate stronghold
This will then give you the coordinates of a nearby stronghold. You could then teleport yourself there by using:
/tp @s [x coordinate of stronghold] ~ [z coordinate of stronghold]
And then digging down. You should land in the stronghold, where you can search and see if there’s a library.

Answer 3

First of all, it's not said, that every stronghold has a library.
Some strongholds are not perfectly generated. There are only 3 strongholds in a world, if I remember correctly. If you found all of them and none had a library, you won't find a library at all.

If you only need bookshelves I'd recommend you to find a village. The librarian has a house with a few bookshelves in it.

To your question in the comment: Abandoned mineshafts are not only found at strongholds. They are generated randomly in the underground. You'll find most of the abandoned mineshafts going through or ending at the sides of deep ravines.

You might also look at this question: What's the fastest way to find mineshafts

I hope that helped you a bit.

Answer 4

An easy way to have a look at the underground world: You will need: A mine cart a rail and TNT

dig as far down as you want. Dig into a wall a few blocks. Set down the rail, set the mine cart on top, and then place the tnt directly on top of the mine cart. Use the command to get into the cart. It'll kind of glitch out and let you see what's around you. I do it to find strongholds and libraries. This last world I spawned into is amazing, but there was only one stronghold and no libraries.

Answer 5

The only 100% way I could guarantee that you will spawn in a world that contains a stronghold with a library or a stronghold intertwined with an abandoned mine-shaft is by knowing of previous worlds that have been known to contain them, and then using their seeds when I generate a new world. Otherwise it is completely random, and I could not really think of a way that you can always 100% find a stronghold with either of those circumstances happening.

Your best bet would be to look for seeds posted by other members of the Minecraft community that speak of strongholds containing a library or the stronghold intertwined with the mine-shaft.

If you are going for books then a simple reed farm and cow farm with a good looting sword should do the trick.