Minecraft wiki entry for Defeating_a_Nether_fortress, associated text: You will not survive long in a fortress (indeed, in the Nether) without armor. The most powerful armor is always needed, so if you have spare diamonds, try to make a piece of diamond armor. Also, you will want to have at least one piece of gold armor (the boots preferably to leave the other armor slots for more powerful armor; but as boots can prevent a limited amount of fall damage, which means stronger boots are recommended, helmets are comparably less useful so they can be made of gold too) on, to ward off piglin attacks. While they don't directly spawn in a nether fortress, if the nether fortress is near a nether wastes or crimson forest biome, a pack can come to attack you without provocation while you traverse the exposed bridges. Even if they can't get near you, some are armed with crossbows and will try to shoot at you.