Illager Scouts (Vanilla Tales)

A pillager scout watches your village and warns you two days before a patrol arrives.

Kill it for a map and a canceled patrol. Ignore it, and the patrol comes to attack the village.

Versions: 1.20.1, 1.21.1, 1.21.8

Loader: Fabric, Forge (1.20.1); Fabric, NeoForge (1.21.1, 1.21.8)

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Requirements

• On Fabric you need Fabric API. On Forge or NeoForge you do not.
• Server-side: install it on the server (or in singleplayer). Players do not need it, and vanilla clients can join without it.
• Languages: English and German. German shows for players who have the mod installed (for example in singleplayer); vanilla clients without the mod see English.

What it does

• When vanilla would normally schedule a patrol near your village, a scout appears instead: a pillager holding a spyglass, standing on high ground with a view of the village, a couple of days ahead of time.
• Starting a forecast sends every player within 128 blocks of the bell a short message hinting at the scout on the hill.
• The scout is persistent, flees from an approaching player or iron golem (it notices a golem from further away), and never attacks.
• Kill the scout and it drops an explorer map to the nearest pillager outpost, and the patrol it was watching for never comes.
• Ignore it, and when the time comes, the patrol spawns at the village edge as normal, larger than a vanilla patrol and with vindicators added (an evoker too, on Hard), and the scout disappears.

Advancements

• Shoot the Messenger: kill a scout and get its map.

Configuration

File: illager_scouts.json.

A config file with a syntax error is left untouched: the mod logs the problem and keeps the last working settings instead of overwriting the file with defaults.

The tag illager_scouts:scout_map_target (default minecraft:pillager_outpost) picks which structure the dropped map points to and can be changed to another structure.

Commands

Both commands need operator permission.

Good to know

• Only one forecast runs per village at a time.
• Without a village nearby, patrols spawn exactly like in vanilla.

Part of VanillaTales

Illager Scouts is part of VanillaTales, a collection of small, independent mods that add little stories to vanilla content. Each mod works on its own; install only the ones you want.

• Zombie Sieges: turns a vanilla zombie siege into a real event, with a ringing bell, a boss bar and two waves of zombies.
• Sherd Stories: gives every decorated pot a title and the story of where its sherds were found.
• Ghost Crews: gives every shipwreck a name and a crew of drowned that guard it until it is looted clean.
• Occupied Villages: some new villages spawn already occupied by an illager garrison you can liberate.
• Bonded Pairs: binds two mobs from the same spawn group into a pair that avenges each other.
• Golem Patrol: gives iron golems a daily patrol, a night watch and an escort for villagers.
• Raid Aftermath: villagers repair the damage a raid or an explosion left in the village.
• Wayfarer's Landmarks: shows a title and helpful icons when you enter a structure.

More mods by LithiumPlus

• DataDrivenVillagers: create and change villager professions from JSON files or an in-game editor.
• VillagersPlus: new villager types, trades and beautiful workstations. Forge version: VillagersPlus (Forge).
• VillagerTradingPlus: add, replace or delete the trades of any villager, change the currency and gate trades behind conditions, all from a datapack.
• Nyctophobia: dark, foggy and unsettling biomes for the Overworld. Forge version: Nyctophobia (Forge).
• The Graveyard (Fabric) and The Graveyard (Forge/NeoForge): structures, mobs, bosses and blocks with a graveyard theme.