What Better Ladders does
Better Ladders has one job: it lets you place the vanilla ladder in open air, with no block behind it. In the base game a ladder needs something solid to attach to, and this mod drops that rule.
The author describes the mod as having a single purpose, and the listing mentions no other features. If you're after a big feature pack, this isn't it. If you want ladders that go where you tell them, it is exactly that.
How placement works
Put a ladder against a block and it attaches to that surface, the same way it does in vanilla. Put one down with nothing to attach to and it faces the direction of the player instead.
There is a second change that matters just as much. Destroying supporting blocks no longer destroys the ladder attached to them. Mine out the wall and the ladder stays where it is.
Who it suits
Builders, mostly. Modrinth files the project under Building & Decoration. The author says barrier blocks are no longer needed for this job, so anyone who has been using them as hidden backing for ladders is the obvious audience.
Taking it out later
Think about this before you add the mod to a world you care about. If you remove it, the floating ladders stay in your world. A ladder only pops off after a block update, and the example given is placing a block where vanilla expects the supporting block. Until then, it just hangs there.
Models and resource packs
If you want a 3D ladder look, the project recommends picking one of the many 3D ladder resource packs. That's a separate choice from this mod, whose stated purpose is the placement change described above.
Compatibility
Fabric is the only mod loader listed. That is all the sources say, so don't assume other loaders work.
Modrinth marks both client side and server side as required. If you run a server, the mod has to be on the server too, and players need it as well. The license is the MIT License.
The listed Minecraft versions are 1.21.5, 1.21.4, 1.21.3, 1.21.2, 1.21.1, 1.21, 1.20.6, 1.20.5, 1.20.4, 1.20.3, 1.20.2, 1.20.1, 1.20, 1.19.4, 1.19.3, 1.19.2, 1.19.1 and 1.19. Look, nothing outside that list is claimed, so check your own version against it before installing.
Quick summary
Better Ladders is a small, focused Fabric mod for builders who are tired of hiding barrier blocks behind ladders. It lets ladders float, keeps them in place when their supports are mined, and asks you to be careful when removing it from an existing world.
