How to Lock New Worlds to a Specific Difficulty

If you are configuring a modpack or want to stop yourself from lowering the challenge mid-playthrough, you can automatically assign and lock the difficulty for every new world you create.

Choosing the Default Difficulty

1. Open your Minecraft instance directory and look inside the config folder for the Difficulty Lock Mod configuration file (launch the game once first if the file has not generated yet).

2. Open the configuration file in any plain text editor.

3. Find the four difficulty options: forcePeaceful, forceEasy, forceNormal, and forceHard.

4. Enable the single difficulty you want new worlds to use. Because these four settings are prioritized against one another, turn the other three off so you always get the exact setting you expect.

5. Make sure forceHardcoreMode is disabled unless you want Hardcore rules to override your choice.

Preventing Later Changes

1. In the same configuration file, locate shouldLockDifficulty and make sure it is enabled.

2. Save the file and restart Minecraft so the updated settings load.

3. Go to Singleplayer and create a new world.

Once the world loads, open the pause menu and check Options. Your chosen difficulty will already be active and locked in place, preventing anyone from switching it afterward. Because the mod applies your chosen difficulty to new worlds, always generate a fresh world when testing your configuration.