Minecraft wiki entry for Combat, associated text: Swimming creepers can be easily dealt with using melee attacks while the player is on land. If fighting on land with no ranged options. Alternatively, the player can find sufficiently high ground to strike a creeper from above with a melee weapon without the detonation sequence being activated. By making a 3–4 block pillar of dirt/sand by pillar-jumping, and waiting until the creeper comes next to the pillar, the player can attack it without exploding.