Terraria Blood Moon guide - How to trigger, skip, and more

Publish date: 2024-05-17

When does a Blood Moon happen in Terraria?

Blood Moons have a decent chance of happening should the proper criteria be met. For an 11% chance that a Blood Moon will rise, at least one player in the server needs to have 120 health, and it needs to be any night where the moon is present (any night except a new moon). Once started, the Blood Moon will last for the entire night cycle.

If you want to force a Blood Moon to happen, you will need to consume a Bloody Tear at nighttime. These are dropped by various enemies that appear during a Blood Moon. Below is a breakdown of what enemies to kill for a chance at a Blood Tear, along with the percentage chance they will drop it.

Normal enemies, Blood Zombies, Clowns – 1%
Wandering Eye Fish, Zombie Merman, Blood Eel, Hemogoblin Shark – 4%
Groom, Bride – 20%
Dreadnautilus (Classic Mode) – 50%
Dreadnautilus (Expert or Master Mode) – 100%

How to skip a Blood Moon in Terraria

The only way to skip a Blood moon in Terraria is to summon either the Pumpkin Moon or Frost Moon. This can only be done in Hardmode after defeating Plantera and using either a Naughty Present or Pumpkin Moon Medallion. Outside of those two circumstances, you need to either fight or avoid enemies for the entire night.

Enemies that appear during a Blood moon in Terraria

During a Blood Moon, enemy spawns increase, even near NPCs, which generally would not have enemies spawning nearby. During this time, zombies can open doors unless you put a block in front of them, and usually peaceful creatures like rabbits, penguins, and goldfish will become corrupted or vicious versions of themselves, depending on the world, and hostile.

The Groom and Bride are both zombie variants with more health than your typical zombie and are dressed the part. As you would guess, a Blood Zombie is another zombie type, but with more health, damage, and speed buffs than you would see in a typical undead. It also gets faster the closer to a player it gets. Dripplers are flying enemies that slowly float towards the player.

All four of the above enemies will spawn via traditional means in the world; however, other enemies will appear during certain circumstances. In Hardmode, the Clown can spawn. This evil clown figure balances himself on a big ball. He will throw Chattering Teeth Bombs at you and can make you confused if you touch him.

Fishing, will now have the chance to reel in multiple new enemies. Using the Chum Caster will bring a better opportunity to bring in one of these monsters. Zombie Merman moves exceptionally fast while underwater, so after fishing it up, be sure to keep it from going back in the water. It also can not be knocked back and will have higher defense and health than a typical zombie. The Wandering Eye Fish is a small flying fish with a big eye. Like the Zombie Merman, it cannot be knocked back and will have high defense and health. However, while it is fast moving in the air, it is slower in the water.

When playing in Hardmode, three more enemies can be fished up during the Blood Moon, and one will summon another kind of enemy. The Blood Eel is a segmented enemy that acts like a faster Wyvern. Its head is its weakest area, so aim your attacks there. The Hemogoblin Shark is an apex predator both in the water and on land. Finally is the Dreadnautilus, the most dangerous of fished up enemies. This flying enemy has a few moves it can pull off, making it invincible, reflecting projectiles, or summoning Blood Squids, which we will get to in a second. Probably the best way to protect yourself while fighting one of these is to build a square structure, but even then, the Dreadnautilus can pass through walls and hit you, so be sure to be kitted with health items when trying to fight one.

When Blood Squids are summoned, they will try to get close to you and fire projectiles. These are more meant to be a distraction from the Dreadnautilus itself, so if you have any summon weapons, let them focus on the Blood Squids while you focus on the big boss himself.

What do Terraria shops sell in a Blood Moon?

While you will likely have your hands full with fighting enemies during a Blood Moon, if you find yourself near an NPC, they could be selling items that can only be found during Blood Moons. Here are all of the items that can be purchased during the Blood Moon.

Throwing Knives – Merchant
Mime Mask, Fallen Tuxedo Shirt, Fallen Tuxedo Pants – Clothier
Tungston or Silver Bullets – Arms Dealer
Vile Powder, Corrupt Seeds or Vicious Powder, Crimson Seeds – Dryad
Bloodbath Dye – Dye Trader
Evil Presence painting – Painter
Purple or Red Solution – Steampunker
Rocket II ammunition – Cyborg
Slap Hand – Skeleton Merchant (Hardmode only)

About the author

John Hansen

John Hansen is a Full-time Staff Writer for Gamepur as well as a host for the YouTube channel Pixel Street Videos where he co-hosts a weekly gaming podcast and more. His favorite games include Super Mario 64, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Breath of the Wild, Left 4 Dead 2, and Overwatch. He covers Overwatch 2 and other FPS titles, Minecraft, Sonic the Hedgehog, Legend of Zelda, and whatever zombie games are placed in front of him.

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