Altar (Witchery)

An **Altar** is a 2x3x1 multi-block structure added by the Witchery mod. It is the only power source for Witchery utilities like brews and Circle Magic Rituals.

## Placement

The Altar multi-block is complete when a red cloth recovers the whole structure.

It continuously scans its environment in a 14 block radius (cube shaped) and searches life to draw power from. The last altar block placed is the center of this range.

The most important factor is variety.

## Upgrading

The **Altar** can be upgraded by placing specific items on its surface.

Upgrades are additive (Infinity egg and pentacle recharge bonuses are multiplicative), Player head (x3) and filled chalice (x2) is: 1 (base altar) + 3 + 2 = x6 power multiplier.

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1  These bonuses multiply other bonuses on an altar. (EG a player head (x3)+base altar (x1)= x4, adding a pentacle will make this x8 instead.
2. ↑  Arthana's range boost is only for distribution, not for gathering power.

## Power Sources

The altar can draw power from a number of block types within a 14 block radius (placing an Arthana on the altar does **NOT** increase the range it will draw power from).
Each instance of the blocks below within the radius add to the altar's maximum power. However, there is a limit to the number of blocks of each type that can contribute to the altar's power. For example, each melon near the altar adds +4 to its maximum power, but an altar cannot benefit from more than 20 melons (for +80 power total); adding more melons after 80 will not increase the altar's maximum power. Therefore, the altar must be surrounded with a large variety of the blocks listed in the table below in order to store enough power to perform more demanding rituals.

Note that some small sets of blocks are considered to be equivalent to the altar, and the limit on their number applies to all combinations of those equivalent blocks. For example, dirt and podzol are considered equivalent, so an altar cannot benefit from more than 80 total blocks of both, whether it's 40 dirt + 40 podzol, 60 dirt + 20 podzol, 80 dirt + 0 podzol, etc.

Hypothetically, if the maximum number of all of the above blocks (except the Infinity Egg) were placed near an altar, that altar would have 4,230 maximum power, before applying any upgrades. There would be 1,511 of these blocks (excluding extra blocks that must be dirt/grass/farmland for plants), which is rather insignificant compared to the total volume available in a 29x29x29 area around the last placed altar block: 24,389 blocks.

Notably, the following blocks *do not* add to an altar's power, but deserve mention because it's reasonable to expect that they should:

* double tallgrass
* large fern
* lilac
* peony
* rosebush
* sunflower
* minedrake
* wolfsbane
* wormwood

### Placement Tips

* The growth stage of crops does not affect how much power they provide the altar; they provide just as much when they are freshly planted as they do when they are ready to harvest.
* If you are using saplings or mushrooms to power your altar, make sure they cannot grow into trees or giant mushrooms, as those are composed of completely different blocks.
* Don't bury grass, mycelium, or farmland under other blocks, or they will revert to dirt.
* Make sure farmland is placed within 4 blocks of water so that it does not dry out and revert to dirt (but you should probably plant something on it anyway for even more power).
* If you are using a mod that disables vanilla crops, these may still be placeable by a Dispenser.
* Make sure leaf blocks are connected (either directly or through other leaves) to wood blocks to keep them from decaying.