Resourceful Bees more modern, codec-driven API, enables pack developers and players to create custom bees varying in degree of complexity easily. Bee creation can feel overwhelming at first, but luckily for creators, a vast majority of available customization options are optional and most options have some kind of default value available, with vanilla-matching values provided where necessary.

Fundamental Overview

At the most basic, high-level view, the creation of a custom bee requires a minimal number of key components to come to life. Below we will highlight the absolute bare minimum required to make a bee as well as additional customizations:

Minimum Requirements

Simply placing a properly structured JSON file in the right location will create a bee. However, the bee may not have the right appearance, create honeycombs, spawn, breed, etc without some additional context.

Additional Customizations

In addition to the bee JSON, a player or pack developer may want to provide custom textures, translations, models, animations, traits, mutations, honeys and honeycombs, various recipes, and more:

• Custom textures, models, and animations will all affect the appearance of the bee.

• Translations make any text associated with the bee display in the proper language.

• Honeys and honeycombs can be created independently from bees so that more than one bee can utilize a honey or honeycomb.

• Traits and mutations can also be created independently so as to be reusable.

File Structure

Traits, bees, honeys, and honeycombs are all customized in the resourcefulbees config folder. They can also be customized via the datapack data folder as well. The datapack location is useful for supporting mods which may want to add their own custom bees when loaded alongside Resourceful Bees, however the config folder is a better location for pack developers and players due to the caveats associated with how bees, honeys, and combs are registered to the game.

Language Files

Language files allow text displayed in game to be displayed in various languages. Not providing an entry in a language file will cause names to appear something like this:

item.resourcefulbees.blaze_honeycomb

Creating a Language File

1. Locate the resourcefulbees config folder inside the main config folder.

2. Before we begin the process of adding a language file we need to verify that specific resource and data pack files have been generated:

3. Inside the resourcefulbees folder there should be another folder labeled resources

Custom Bee Caveats

Custom Bee Data is the main JSON object comprised of several customization objects which are defined using a "key": { value } syntax.

{
  "resourcefulbees:core/v1": {
    ...
  },
  "resourcefulbees:rendering/v1": {
    ...
  },
  "resourcefulbees:mutation/v1": {
    ...
  },
  "resourcefulbees:breeding/v1": {
    ...
  },
  "resourcefulbees:trade/v1": {
    ...
  }
}

The "key" names act as identifiers under which the data is registered and used and follow the namespace:path format. The path generally follows a type/version format.

"resourcefulbees:trade/v1"

This syntax allows for the customizable options to evolve over time with minimal upkeep required since data mappers can be written to upgrade older API versions to newer ones.

Key Components

Below is a list of the key customization components provided by the mod. Additional components can be created by other mods via our API.

Mutations are the repurposing of a vanilla mechanic: pollination effect. When a bee pollinates a flower and is returning to a hive, any flower it flies over has a chance to be fertilized (have a growth tick applied to it). It can do this up to 10 times before it needs to visit a hive to reset the counter.

Mutations reuse the vanilla mechanic by allowing bees to transform one object into another. The bee would simply fly over a target item|block|fluid|entity and the target would be transformed into different item|block|fluid|entity.

The mutation customization component simply contains the recipe ID for the mutations which the bee can perform and the mutation limit.

Identifier

The root JSON of the mutation customization component looks like this:

The identifier of the component is as such:

Customization Options

count

The number of mutations that can be performed before the bee needs to visit a hive to reset the counter.

mutation

The ID for the mutation recipe. The format is that of a .

A unique feature to Resourceful Bees. traits group together:

• Particle Effects

• Damage and Potion Immunities

• Damage Types and Potion Effects

• Special Abilities

• and Auras

Traits enable users to breathe life into infinite variations of bees that can be godly, pesky, helpful, or just downright evil.

Identifier

The root JSON of the trait customization component looks like this:

The identifier of the component is as such:

Customization Options

auraRange

The range within which players would be affected by the aura. This value is the number of blocks.

traits

The list of traits given to the bee.

Customization Options

damageType

Customization Options

source

The combat customization component is responsible for defining a bee's survival ability and hostility:

• Is the bee passive?

• Does it lose its stinger after attacking?

• Does it inflict poison?

• Can it take damage?

• General attributes of the entity such as:

  • Max health

  • Armor

  • Attack damage

Identifier

The root JSON of the combat customization component looks like this:

The identifier of the component is as such:

Customization Options

isPassive

When true, the bee will not attack entities back.

removeStingerOnAttack

When true, the bees stinger will be removed on attack. If a bees stinger is removed, it has a chance of randomly dying a bit after the stinger was removed.

inflictsPoison

When true, the targeted entity will be inflicted with poison when attacked.

isInvulnerable

When true, the bee will not take any damage.

attributes

A map of and their values. The keys are the Attribute ID's and the values are the attribute value.

The color customization component handles the Bee Jar and Spawn Egg colors.

Customization Options

spawnEggPrimaryColor

Sets the primary color used on the spawn egg item.

spawnEggSecondaryColor

Sets the secondary color used on the spawn egg item.

jarColor

The color used on the jar when the bee is in the bee jar.

The villager trade customization component is reused across several JSON files within Resourceful Bees. It is responsible for defining the costs and rewards of certain trade items depending on which file it is used in. Not including a villager trade customization component prevents the associated items from being added to the pool of trades.

Below are the JSON files which can have a villager trade customization component and the trades they create.

Mutations utilize the recipe system to make them more data pack friendly. One benefit of using the recipe system is that a mutation can be created once and shared among many different bees.

The render customization component is responsible for defining how the bee looks. The data is only used on the client. There are several visual aspects of a bee that can be modified:

• Size

• Model

• Animations

• Textures/Layers

• UI Colors

Identifier

The root JSON of the rendering customization component looks like this:

The identifier of the component is as such:

Customization Options

layers

Layers are used to add custom textures on top of the base texture and allow them to have special effects or be enabled by special means.

ColorData

Color data is used to set the colors for things like jars and spawn eggs.

model

The location where the is stored.

texture

The base texture for the bee. Each texture requires two versions to exist: normal and angry. The angry texture should use the same name as the normal texture with the suffix _angry appended to it.

animation

The location where the is stored.

sizeModifier

The scale of the bee when rendered in-game.

The core customization component is responsible for defining four key aspects of nearly every bee imaginable:

• the flower(s) which a bee uses for pollination

• the base amount of time the bee spends in the hive

• associated lore

Customization Options

aura

The Aura Type determines the effect that the aura has on the player. It is a required value for the Aura to load properly.

damageEffect

Used when the aura type is DAMAGING The damage source and strength values are defined in the .

potionEffect

Used when the aura type is POTION The effect and strength values are defined in the .

modifier

The modifier value is used with the HEALING, EXPERIENCE, and EXPERIENCE_DRAIN aura types.

calmingDisabled

The aura can be disabled by the "calming" status effect when this value is set to true.

Customization Options

type

The breeding customization component is responsible for defining relationships between bees. Bees can have many different breeding relationships.

Identifier

The root JSON of the breeding customization component looks like this:

The identifier of the component is as such:

Customization Options

effect

A bee family consists of four key pieces of information necessary for breeding a bee:

• The first parent required

• The second parent required

• The weighting of how likely the child is to be selected among potential candidates

• The chance the child is created if selected

Customization Options

weight

For all possible children these two parents can create how likely is it this one will be picked? Weight affects the result distribution among potential outcomes.

chance

Once this child has been chosen as the result type, what is the chance that it will be created?

parent1

The ID of the first parent.

parent2

The ID of the second parent.

The layer customization component is responsible for defining key aspects of a specific render layer. There are several aspects of a layer that can be modified:

• Effect

• Pulse Frequency

• Color

• Texture

• Visibility when carrying pollen

Customization Options

color

The color that will be applied to the layers texture, this should not be set if your texture is not made to be colored.

texture

The texture for the layer. Each texture requires two versions to exist: normal and angry. The angry texture should use the same name as the normal texture with the suffix _angry appended to it.

layerEffect

The effect the layer will have. There are 3 options available:

isPollen

When true, this layer will only be visible if the bee is carrying pollen.

pulseFrequency

Used with the GLOW layerEffect to create a flashing effect.