Best utility mods for Minecraft in 2014

There are many occasions where I have been in Minecraft and wanted additional usability. For instance, I am one of those people that likes to explore the World of Minecraftia and ends up losing the location of their house. I am also one of those people that doesn't remeber all the crafting recipes for the incredibly large amounts of mods. Being that I frequently have a large amount of mods installed, I also sometimes can't tell what mod a block or item is from. Additionally, I am frequently trying to build really big structures in creative mode but I am not fond of placing each blog individually. I have rounded up a list of some of mods which I use to solve these issues. I don't have these mods listed in much of a particular order.

Not Enough Items

Not Enough Items (NEI) is one of the first mods that I install. It gives you buttons to change the weather, gamemode, toggle a "magnet" mode where dropped blocks and items are pulled towards you, a button which gives you the ability to delete items in your inventory by clicking on them, and a heal button which restores all your health and food health. It also allows you to enchant tools and other items which normally aren't enchantable to any level. Another feature which will come in handy to someone who wants to build advanced maps in Minecraft with spawners is that it allows you to give yourself spawners. It even supports modded spawners. When enchanting it shows each enchantment individually in English (or whatever language you have Minecraft set to) and allows you to select all the enchantments that you want. While enchanting you can also enchant items with enchantments which you normally can't enchant them with. You could enchant a diamond sword with aqua affinity if you really wanted to (although I see no reason to do that as you can't wear a diamond sword as a helmet) or you could enchant a piece of paper with sharpness. This mod isn't just for cheating yourself items and enhancements in survival mode. It also allows you to have a creative+ mode which gives you more inventory storage and allows you to spawn items from NEI as you would in survival mode. Additionally, NEI animates animated blocks and items in its side panel where all the blocks and items are shown. It also has the ability to save and restore the items which are currently in your inventory. Another useful feature in Not Enough Items which can be enabled is the ability to display the name of the block which you are looking at. It also has the ability to change between "cheat mode" and "recipe mode". "Recipe mode" allows you to see only the recipes for blocks and items in Minecraft although recipes can also be seen by hovering over the desired item or block and pressing R while in cheat mode. This is very convenient if you use a lot of mods and want to be able to see their recipes while playing Minecraft.

Screenshot of NEI:

Check out some of the mod spotlights for NEI below:





NEI Plugins
NEI Plugins is a mod for NEI which enhances compatibility and integration with Buildcraft, Forestry, Railcraft, IndustrialCraft 2, Ars Magica 2, Tinkers Construct, Gregtech, and Thermal Expansion.

NEI Addons
NEI Addons is a mod similar to NEI Plugins. It adds better support and integration with Forestry, Extra Bees, Applied Energistics, Misc Peripherals, Ex Nihilo, BuildCraft, Equivalent Exchange 3, Andrew2448's addon for MachineMuse's Modular Powersuits, and Tinkers' Construct.

Too Many Items

Too Many Items (TMI) is a very similar mod to Not Enough Items with a few differences. It has the ability to save and restore items in your inventory, spawn items, change weather, gamemode, time, and give you the ability to delete items in your inventory by clicking on them by pressing a button, and enchant items. Some things that Not Enough Items have while Too Many Items doesn't are the animation of all the animated items and blocks (TMI doesn't animate the spawners) and it doesn't support the ability to view the recipes for creating items and blocks. TMI does, however, allow you to create custom fireworks, doesn't require Forge to run (although there is a version of TMI available which uses Forge), and is updated faster than NEI. Too Many Items even supports prerelease versions of Minecraft.

Screenshot of TMI:

Check out some of the mod spotlights for TMI below:

WorldEditWrapper

WorldEditWrapper allows you to use WorldEdit in single player. WorldEdit allows you to edit the world and create new things in. It is ideal for big Minecraft builds. I find it to be very convenient for saving time on building the huge builds which I frequently have ideas for creating.

If you don't know how to use WorldEdit check out the video below:

VoxelMap

VoxelMap is a mod for Minecraft that creates a small map which appears in Minecraft. It shows nearby terrain and has the ability to show a bigger version of the map and show even more. It also allows you to zoom in and zoom out. It is configurable so you can change which keys do what and the general appearance of the minimap. It also doesn't just show the surface, rather, it shows everything that is on the layers which are near to you. This is convenient when mining and looking for things such as dungeons, caves, or abandoned mines. Another useful feature that is in this mod is the ability for it to shows mobs in the minimap. It even shows the face of the mob so you can identify what type it is and if you should avoid it or not. VoxelMap also gives you the ability to create waypoints to mark areas in the world which you intend to visit later. Such places could include your house or your mine. A convenient feature in VoxelMap is that you can teleport directly to waypoints which you have set. This comes in handy if you explore a lot (like I do) and end up having waypoints which you would want to teleport to which are very far away from you.

Screenshot of VoxelMap:

Check out some of the mod spotlights for VoxelMap below:

Bspkrs' HUD Mods

The mod developer Bspkrs has made numerous HUD (heads up display) mods for Minecraft which show useful stats about numerous aspects of the game. Read about his HUD mods below.

ArmorStatusHUD

ArmorStatusHUD allows you to see the exact strength of the armor which you are wearing. It also shows the exact strength of the tool which you are using. ArmorStatusHUD has its own config so that you can change where it appears on the screen and change other aspects about it too.

Screenshots of ArmorStatusHUD:

DirectionHUD
DirectionHUD shows you which magnetic direction you are facing in Minecraft. DirectionHUD is configurable in the same way that ArmorStatusHUD is configurable.

StatusEffectHUD
StatusEffectHUD displays exactly what potion and other effects the player is being subjected to.


Watch this mods showcase displaying how each of theseHUD  mods work:




OpenEye

OpenEye is an incredibly useful mod for Minecraft which collects information when Minecraft crashes. This information is then submitted to the OpenEye servers where the information can be analyzed and you can be provided with fixes for known crashes and mod developers can improve their mods and implement bug fixes. Rest assured, OpenEye does not collect any identifying information so your privacy won't be invaded.

Damage Indicators

Damage Indicators is a very helpful mod for Minecraft which allows you to see how much health mobs and players have and how much damage mobs and players are attaining. It also shows whether a mob is hostile or friendly. Damage Indicators supports skins so you can change the way it looks.

Check out the mod spotlight on Damage Indicators below:

OptiFine

OptiFine is a mod for Minecraft that increases framerate, enhances support for resource and texture packs, decreases lag, ads graphical enhancements such as random mobs, adds anti aliasing and anisotropic filtering, and adds an assortment of other features. It comes in a number of versions that each have different levels of enhancements making this mod suitable for use on many different computers. More details can be found on their forum page.

Check out the mod review of OptiFine below:




Are there any utility mods that we didn't list that you recommend using? Feel free to comment about it.