Deep Dark Speculation!

 Ah yes, the mysterious Deep Dark biome. 

...wait.... is biome the right word? Do we know that the deep dark is going to be a biome? Or is it some sort of new dimension? Is the Deep Dark what has truly lain beneath the bedrock all this time? In this post, I am going to discuss some possibilities of where the Deep Dark could fit into Minecraft, and then at the end give an idea that I think would be really cool.

In Minecraft Live 2020, it was stated that the Deep Dark was the "lowest point of a Minecraft world". But if you look at the clips of the improved cave generation that were shown at Minecon Live 2020, you have to wonder how this could fit into the underground. We see a clip of Agnes sailing on a boat down a waterfall, seemingly starting at the surface. She sails down approximately 10-15 blocks before falling down a waterfall that appears to be around 25-30 blocks. She then lands in a sump that, by my count, is another 15 blocks deep. Even if you take my lower estimates, that is a descent of at least 50 blocks. Even if she started on a hill at y=75, that would put the bottom of that sump at around y=25. Given that there are presumably at least two layers of stone before the deep dark, and bedrock starts at y=4, this leaves less than 20 blocks for the Deep Dark. Looking at the footage we see of the Deep Dark, we see an expansive cave system, including a branch that goes even further down when kingbdogz is running from the Warden. The depth of the Deep Dark is seemingly a lot more than 20 blocks.

There are a few possible explanations to this.

It could be that LadyAgnes' sailing clip started on a higher hill. It is unlikely to be from a tall mountain as we see grass at the surface, not snow. But if she is starting from, say, y=85 and descends 50 blocks to y=35, this could in theory leave room for the Deep Dark. 

Another possibility is that the Deep Dark is simply a biome, but only generates below y=30 or so, and in a "Deep Dark biome", everything above y=30 is just normal caves or solid stone.

The reason I find it odd to have the Deep Dark be simply just another biome is that it features SUCH a powerful enemy. Would you really have an enemy powerful enough to blow any Nether mob off the table... just sitting there in the Overworld for a new unsuspecting player to accidentally stumble upon? This is a mob that can take 6.5 hearts with FULL NETHERITE GEAR and is thought to have 100 health or more! It would be very strange to have this mob accidentally findable so early on in the game. Also, the fact the enemy is called the "Warden" implies that it is guarding something. Like some sort of loot. Would the Deep Dark really just be another biome if it was hiding loot? Or could it be some sort of underground structure like the Mineshaft or Stronghold?

A lot of people have also speculated that the Deep Dark may have something to do with the End or the Stronghold due to the similarity of the sculk blocks with the End colour scheme, but I don't think that's the case. I personally think Strongholds are Strongholds and the Deep Dark is the Deep Dark.

Of course, another possibility is that they are going to increase the world height, and this includes the depth of the underground to accommodate the Deep Dark. Various hints here and there have been dropped that they are looking into increasing the world height, but I personally also think it is unlikely. An increase in world height would cause a MASSIVE hit to performance, and many old machines will be unable to run the game anymore. As much as I'd love to see the world's height increased to 512 or even 1024 blocks, I really don't think they will do this any time soon. Can you imagine what this would do to big servers with hundreds of players?

Then again... in 20w49a they DID add world height options... so maybe server owners could opt to keep the 256 world height if they were to increase it??

Anyway, tangent aside...

I am now going to throw out my suggestion of having the Deep Dark actually be below Bedrock. It would solve the performance hit issues, at it would only generate once the player accessed it. And the player would access it through finding areas where the bedrock is replaced with a special cracked bedrock variant that can actually be broken with only a Netherite pickaxe. It wouldn't drop itself even when mined with Silk Touch. There is no way to convert normal bedrock to cracked bedrock - it can only spawn naturally. It makes sense to require Netherite to enter the Deep Dark given the power of the Warden.

Finally, will there be more to the Deep Dark than they showed at Minecon Live 2020, or is it just sculk and the Warden? Maybe. We will truly just have to wait and see to answer that one.