Who (or what?) is Steve? Why is he here?

[Sarudak]

What do we know about him?

He's immortal. Even if his body is destroyed in Lava he will manifest another.
He can summon a portal to hell using only some cooled lava and a flint and steel.
His presence allows undead creatures to seep into the world.
He's a genius level intellect able to reconstruct civilization from base materials with his wit and hands.
He was dropped in the world with nothing.

Perhaps he is some kind of dangerous immortal being and someone wanted to be rid of him by sending him here?

Is Steve the devil?

[AddyBaha]

All signs of civilization in a large radius around his first manifestation in this world were destroyed. The Temples were raided of there magic (holy?) blocks - e.g. vessel of the dragon and enchantment table. But the Witch-huts stay intakt.

It seems like he has a dark presence at least. But why do wiches attack him then?

[Sarudak]

That brings us to the counterpoint section.

The creatures that spawn in his presence are hostile to him, including the creatures of hell.
Perhaps hell portal summoning is something anyone can do with those ingredients (sure... right...)

Perhaps this world is a prison where Steve is being tortured. After all what is the worst thing you could do to an immortal?

[jakerman999]

It's worth noting that Steve doesn't need a flint & steel to open the portal; only fire. Flint & steel is just the most convenient form of fire.

[Taleric]

I am placing a bet that Steve is in purgatory awaiting judgement. His brief access to hell is but one level described by Dante.

The wither is a demon and the other mobs lessers. The ender are twisted angels and the dragon is a major demon bound to that spot.

The live action telling of vanilla MC is Disney the BTW imagining could only be done by Guillermo del Toro :D

Edit: demon vs daemon use.

[Sarudak]

Don't use daemon when you mean demon (unless of course you think this is the warhammer universe/unix simulation)

:)

[Taleric]

Damn, I enjoyed the WH content but was not aware on the Greek outline. Oh well I'll stick to demon in that case. Maybe the endermen are deamons ;)

[chaoticneutral]

He's immortal. Even if his body is destroyed in Lava he will manifest another.

Are we dealing with the same Steve?, or is "Steve?" a race of identical clones, and when one dies another is sent in his place?

[Sarudak]

Ok counterpoint time...

The undead monsters and hellspawn that appear around steve are clearly not his friends as they persistently try to kill him.

Perhaps Steve is the victim here. He is being imprisoned and tortured, but not for long. Perhaps he will not be welcomed when he returns home.

[karnak sam]

Steve being the devil? Perhapse this goes toward explaining his tentative relationship with zombie pigmen?

[Niyu]

Ok counterpoint time...

The undead monsters and hellspawn that appear around steve are clearly not his friends as they persistently try to kill him.

Perhaps Steve is the victim here. He is being imprisoned and tortured, but not for long. Perhaps he will not be welcomed when he returns home.

Yeah, I'm pretty sure that he has been imprisoned. But I'm not sure he would really qualify as a victim. It's more likely that this is a well deserved punishment for his crimes. He doesn't seem to have any problem with the enslaving o every single beeing he comes through, from animals, to the creatures attacking him, to villagers, to the very souls of the dead. Probbly he did the same sort of thing in the place he is from.

[Gunnerman21]

If steve is the bad guy then the monsters are the good guys, which means blackness = good because the darkness tries to kill steve as well. And the blackest place is the end albeit not pitch black but a void, but that would explain why the head good guy is there, because the end is the darkest and the dragon is dark.

The safest terrain for steve would then be the nether, because the only mobs that spawn there in plenty are either ghasts or pigmen. Considering the entire land is made of souls in netherrack, the nether is a vault of wealth like what smoug had for a while. The landscape is safe because its very bright with lava counteracting the darkness of night, and even though lava is deadly it seems like lava is a neutral force that can be controlled and easily dealt with.

Maybe the souls have a different purpose to the ender dragon, but to steve they are valuable commodities.

[Sarudak]

What if Steve was a good man where he came from who was imprisoned unjustly and playing through BTW is his 'Breaking Bad' story?

[FlowerChild]

If steve is the bad guy then the monsters are the good guys

Obviously not going to comment on the backstory of BTW itself, but just wanted to say that I find it interesting that you're not the first person in this thread to express a good vs bad sports-team worldview like this. Above, there was another comment about how if Steve were evil, why would witches attack him? I almost said something there, and restrained myself, but it seems to be a more common impulse than I had assumed.

Again, in no way a reference to the BTW backstory, I just find it super interesting that people would make the assumption that all evil or good people/creatures must be somehow allied, when that is so very counter to how the consensus reality works. Would anyone ever assume that two serial killers must of course be working together, because they're both on team evil?

I assume this must be some kind of Hollywood trope that people just automatically assume applies when dealing with fictional worlds.

[Sarudak]

I assume this must be some kind of Hollywood trope that people just automatically assume applies when dealing with fictional worlds.

Even in hollywood bad guys duking it out seems fairly standard. I don't know where the Team Evil thing comes from really.

[chaoticneutral]

Good... evil... what matters? Power is beautiful, and nothing says "power" better than the sound of agonizing souls. If souls had heads then Steve could crush them with his boot, but since they don't...

My headcanon for BTW is that Steve isn't quite human, but a magitek-engineered being built specifically to be able to survive in Minecraft's universe. His job is to prepare the place so humans proper can colonize. It works, kinda - he's apt, but he causes a lot of distortions on the space-time around him, for example allowing other beings to hop into the universe. (That's why monsters only appear around him.)

The humans in Steve's universe (unintended pun) are mass producing Steves. However they're aware of the distortions, so they only send another Steve after the first one died.

[Stormweaver]

Think about some of the recent villager changes.

Now concider that the vast majority of zombies in the world resemble Steve. As entertaining as the 'Steve is an eldritch monster in somewhat human flesh' theorys are, I'm starting to think that the only thing really special about him is that he was able to avoid whatever happened to the millions of poor bastards that he harvests for iron shovels, and that his immortality and similar oddities are more related to the underlying rules of the reality he's found himself in, and his unique situation of still having a soul.

[chaoticneutral]

Now concider that the vast majority of zombies in the world resemble Steve.

That's a fair point.

Maybe he's just being cloned, and even plain humans would create a space-time aberration around them when sent to MC's universe?

[MisterFister]

I, too, am dissuaded away from the Team Evil concept.

I am, however, perplexed by the backstory implications of the enchanting system. "Infernal" enchanters. Leveled priest villagers. Enchanter libraries as a sort of necromancy-capacitor. Steve is some sort of former-mob. Maybe a cured villager, or a spawn mutation? I don't think it's necessary to get all Matrix Reloaded and equate him to a character like Neo attempting to build Zion, or The Frenchman just establishing conduits of informational tradecraft. But the mob-attacks always hinted (to me, at least) to be a sort of vengeful affair, as if the mobs are expressing outrage and betrayal toward Steve. "How could you?"

And wildlife? A simple naturally occurring food chain, perhaps? Frankly, I'm equally stumped by the attack-mob versus animal-mob backstory as the one between Steve and the attack-mobs, but the former is the one that bothers me, and I don't understand why.

[Niyu]

I, too, am dissuaded away from the Team Evil concept.

I am, however, perplexed by the backstory implications of the enchanting system. "Infernal" enchanters. Leveled priest villagers. Enchanter libraries as a sort of necromancy-capacitor. Steve is some sort of former-mob. Maybe a cured villager, or a spawn mutation? I don't think it's necessary to get all Matrix Reloaded and equate him to a character like Neo attempting to build Zion, or The Frenchman just establishing conduits of informational tradecraft. But the mob-attacks always hinted (to me, at least) to be a sort of vengeful affair, as if the mobs are expressing outrage and betrayal toward Steve. "How could you?"

And wildlife? A simple naturally occurring food chain, perhaps? Frankly, I'm equally stumped by the attack-mob versus animal-mob backstory as the one between Steve and the attack-mobs, but the former is the one that bothers me, and I don't understand why.

As I see it, the hostile mobs are made to kill and eat the animals with the hope of starving Steve.

[kazerima]

As I see it, the hostile mobs are made to kill and eat the animals with the hope of starving Steve.

All the mobs not only have a purpose against Steve, but almost mirror him too.
Zombies: eat the mammals and convert villagers. Steve: breed animals and trade with villagers
Skeletons: attack from a distance, burn in light. Steve: attacks in melee, devoured by darkness
Spiders: eats chickens, makes webs, climbs. Steve: Breeds chickens and builds walls
Creepers: explodes, destroying blocks. Steve: Builds things out of and creates blocks.
Endermen: steals away pieces of the world to turn into Endstone. Steve: Needs those blocks to build.

If anything, I think Steve is an immortal spirit akin to the Wraith from Shadow of Mordor that possesses the zombies.

[MisterFister]

As I see it, the hostile mobs are made to kill and eat the animals with the hope of starving Steve.

All the mobs not only have a purpose against Steve, but almost mirror him too.
Zombies: eat the mammals and convert villagers. Steve: breed animals and trade with villagers
Skeletons: attack from a distance, burn in light. Steve: attacks in melee, devoured by darkness
Spiders: eats chickens, makes webs, climbs. Steve: Breeds chickens and builds walls
Creepers: explodes, destroying blocks. Steve: Builds things out of and creates blocks.
Endermen: steals away pieces of the world to turn into Endstone. Steve: Needs those blocks to build.

If anything, I think Steve is an immortal spirit akin to the Wraith from Shadow of Mordor that possesses the zombies.

Wow. Ok.

Witches: spawns only in swamps, spontaneously uses potions in the wild, no melee attack. Steve: can spawn (or die) in any biome, must work toward potion ability, almost no natural attack except for melee
Slimes: Tend not to despawn, deadliness increases after taking damage. Steve: Very easily killed, deadliness decreases after taking damage
Squid: Offensive knockback, threaten targets in or near water. Steve: Defensive knockback, vulnerable in or near water.
Jungle spiders: Difficult to cause to spawn, DoT. Steve: Difficult to prevent from respawning, heals over time.
Bats: Innocuous, evasive, only in caves. Steve: ???

~~~

I'm somewhat slow to think of possibilities for nether mobs.

[Rianaru]

I actually have always thought about it a different way, I'm of the opinion that good vs evil can get a little samey tbh. Here's the background I drew to connect the dots in btw:

-magic in BTW is for the most part based on souls
-villagers and zombies/steve have distinct models, almost like one evolved from the other
-steve shows high affinity for absorbing souls, but little else in terms of magical or paranormal ability aside from reincarnation, and must rely on 'technology'

and here's the backstory:

villagers are the fallen descendants of an ancient empire of steves with advanced soul magic(the source of strongholds/temples/pyramids). the steve empire long ago performed a ritual that bound their souls to their bodies even after death in order to fight on equal footing with a god(the player), transforming themselves into zombies and skeletons, along with their tamed spiders, now undead, leaving only isolated clans of their relatives to continue as the villagers we know now. the players steve is actually a god that the steve empire cast down, and the hardcore spawn zone is essentially the blast crater where the gods soul landed in the overworld. In retaliation, the god possessed one of the undead bodies and attempts to use it to regain power through technology, conquering the nether and the end in order to obtain the materials necessary to harvest souls for power, which would hopefully return him to godhood(Home?). When his mortal shell is killed he simply finds another vessel and possesses it(hardcore spawn)

I figure the nether mobs are pretty well explained as damned souls/demons that have little to do with the main plot except for the materials they provide.

The ender dragon is likely either some sort of dragon-god competitive with the player, or some sort of demi-god entity that has some other unrelated role in the backstory

the player being a god also helps to account for steves freakishly long arms

[dawnraider]

If you search the term "s o u l _ a n u s" (I put spaces to avoid further diluting the signal to noise ratio of the search by including it, underscore is for legibility) there's a lot of cool discussion on what the end and the nether are from several years ago.

And with that theory, rianaru, I think it makes sense also with how the steel beacon works, using the trapped soul energy to manifest a new body at the beacon's location. And higher tiers have a larger effective radius because pulling the player's soul to the new vessel takes a lot of energy and you need more trapped souls for larger areas (or even cross-plane binding).

[Rianaru]

s o u l _ a n u s.

Yeah, I vaguely recall some of this from way back when. I had never meant my story as be the most canonically accurate explanation, I just like the story lol