Terraria: How to Stop Enemies From Spawning

Terraria is a great game to build, explore, and fight against various foes. The combat can be fun and engaging when you feel like taking it on. However, if you’re trying to enjoy crafting, exploring, and enjoying the life-sim aspects of the game, you might find the enemies bothering your peaceful life.

Learn how to stop enemies from spawning in Terraria so that you can get on with your building and exploring.

The Wall of No-Spawn

One of the most reliable ways to keep enemies from attacking is to build a barrier they can’t cross. A wall, a stone wall, or a row of wooden planks will protect you from hostile intruders. So, to make sure no harm comes your way, build a sturdy boundary around you. Here are the easy steps to wall off your enemies:

1. Gather materials like stone or wood.
2. Use the workbench to construct enough wall pieces.
   
3. Wall off the area where you want to prevent enemy spawns.
   

Fences protect from hostile mobs like any other wall but let trees, mushrooms, and plants grow undisturbed. Transparent, glass-like leaf blocks also stop mobs from invading your space. Scaffolding might also be considered a transparent block, but it’s not a good option since hostile mobs can use them to spawn inside.

Some structures you can’t use for housing won’t prevent enemies from spawning and are unsafe walls.

Potions and Candles

Another way to stave off enemies, at least for a particular time, is to use items like Peace Candles and Calming Potions that can reduce the number of enemies you encounter. Both items are craftable.

Peace Candles

Although Peace Candles promote peace, you must engage in a bit of combat. To craft a Peace Candle:

1. Defeat Pinky at least once.
   
2. Collect Pink Gel from Pinky Slimes.
   
3. Craft a Pink Torch with the Pink Gel on the workbench.
   
4. Craft a Peace Candle with the Pink Torch and either a Gold Bar or a Platinum Bar.
   

The Peace Candle reduces the enemy spawn rate and number of on-screen enemies by 23% and 30% for anyone carrying it or standing within a 169×125 (or 100×84 for mobile) area around the candle.

Note that you won’t get any more benefits with multiple candles, even if you hold one while placing the other. To be effective, the candle must be in a fitting spot, such as a platform or flat furniture like tables and workbenches.

The Water Candle is the opposite of the Peace Candle. It causes a boost in hostile monsters. If you have both of these lit up at once, they’ll cancel each other out, and there won’t be any change in enemies that spawn.

Calming Potions

Calming Potions can also stave off enemies. The Calming Potion is a powerful buff that decreases enemy spawn rate by 17% and the maximum number of enemies on screen by 20%. It has a duration of twelve minutes, but its effects can be stopped at any time from the equipment menu (Console version), by double-tapping the buff icon (Mobile version), or by pressing the cancel button in the buffs screen (Nintendo 3DS version).

To craft a Calming Potion:

1. Collect Bottled Water, Damselfish, and Daybloom.
   
2. Use a placed potion bottle or the Alchemy table to combine these ingredients into a potion.
   

Unfortunately, this potion won’t help reduce the number of enemies that appear during the Pumpkin Moon, Frost Moon, or Frost Legion events.

The NPC Neighborhood

Another way to deal with dangerous mobs is one you might not have ever thought of before – build houses and invite non-player characters in Terraria (NPCs) to move in. To rid a biome, artificial or otherwise, of hostile enemies, construct several dwellings and allow friendly NPCs to occupy them. This should do the trick, and the friendly NPC dwellings will act as a protective buffer between you and enemy mobs. To create an NPC neighborhood, follow these steps:

1. Pick an area where your new town should be.
   
2. Build houses that have all the basic amenities.
   
3. Wait for NPCs to move in.
   

Once the NPCs move in, you can enjoy a mob-free zone (except during Blood Moons).

The Platform Trick

This might be an interesting new bit of info – the height of your platform can affect enemy spawn rates. If you set up your platform at exactly 35 blocks beneath the player, you should be able to avoid enemy spawns. But if you go deeper than that, you’ll be surrounded by creatures. So, if you want to keep enemies out of your way, set your platform at least 35 blocks below your character.

The Arena

Here is one practical example of a situation when spawning enemies can be particularly undesirable, but the game may throw a horde of them at you all the same. This example is the constructible boss arena.

If you construct a battle arena to challenge bosses in Terraria, consider the enemies spawning around it. Gastropods, in particular, can become a major nuisance. For this reason, one suggestion from veteran gamers on the Terraria Community Forums is to use the Peace above Candles and build a well-lit-up town near the arena to keep enemy spawn rates low.

In other words, if you want fewer enemies, especially Gastropods appearing at your boss fights uninvited, light up the area with Peace Candles and build a nearby village.

The Blood Moon Exception

While there are a few ways to keep enemies at bay, one must remember that there are times when many of the otherwise tried-and-true methods will not work.

At night, from 7:30 PM to 4:30 AM, it’s not uncommon for a Blood Moon event to happen. The player can also trigger it with a Bloody Tear. During this time, you’ll notice an increase of enemies spawning, even in places you wouldn’t expect them, such as NPC homes and near your base. Zombies can even open doors. Certain animals you would normally find harmless, such as bunnies, penguins, and goldfish, become dangerous enemies.

You’ll know when a Blood Moon starts when you see a message on the screen telling you, “The Blood Moon is rising…” The moon, sky, water, and rain will turn red. And during this event, you can’t speed up time by sleeping in a bed.

You can’t be too careful when a Blood Moon appears in the sky. Enemies will still show up no matter how many measures you take to stay safe. So, during these nights, it’s best to keep your wits about you and get ready to fight or stay inside where you know you’ll be safe.

Stay Safe, Crafters

If an undesired enemy spawns annoys you and gets in the way of fun in your Terraria play sessions, there are a few tricks to make your environment calmer and more peaceful. You can build walls and protective NPC neighborhoods, use creative platforming techniques, or use the crafting system to control crowds, like strategically placing Peace Candles.

FAQs

Does the time of day affect enemy spawns in Terraria?

Yes. Spawn rates in Terraria are affected by weather and time of day. These factors control the rate at which enemies spawn and what type of enemies will spawn.

Do background walls affect enemy spawns in Terraria?

Yes. Background walls are often used to prevent monsters from spawning in certain areas, though there are exceptions.