[SBW] NPC Squads

[SBW] NPC Squads

An NPC squad addon for SuperbWarfare — recruit, deploy, and command your own AI-driven infantry, mortar, tank, and drone squads.

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What is this

[SBW] NPC Squads lets you recruit NPCs with a single tool, form them into squads, and command them like a small AI-controlled army: riflemen, medics, snipers, machine gunners, grenadiers, mortar crews, tank crews, and kamikaze-drone operators. Squads take cover, dig in under fire, avoid shooting their own side, relay spotted enemies to the rest of their faction, ride and crew vehicles, and follow orders — Attack, Defend, Patrol, Move — from a quick-command HUD or by pointing and clicking.

Requirements

• Minecraft 1.21.1 + NeoForge
• Kotlin for Forge (NeoForge build) — this mod is written in Kotlin and loads through it
• SuperbWarfare — this addon builds directly on its weapons, vehicles, and combat systems and won't do anything without it
• SmartBrainLib — the behavior-tree AI framework every NPC's combat/movement logic runs on
• Optional: the SBW Drone Warfare addon, for the drone operator class to use its FPV drone model
• Optional: GeckolibBetterFPS — noticeably better frame rate when a lot of NPCs are on screen.
• Optional: JourneyMap 6.x — your squads, their objectives and the enemies your side has spotted on the map, and orders given from it
• Optional: Physics Mod — not needed by this addon at all, but ragdolls, debris and shattering blocks make a firefight feel a lot more real

Installation

1. Install NeoForge, Kotlin for Forge, SuperbWarfare, and SmartBrainLib first.
2. Grab the latest jar from the Releases page.
3. Drop it into your mods/ folder.

Recommended alongside: GeckolibBetterFPS — noticeably better frame rate when a lot of NPCs are on screen.

Key conflicts

A few mods often installed alongside bind the same keys as SuperbWarfare, and both actions fire on one press. Rebind the other mod's key under Options → Controls → Key Binds: click the binding and press the new combination, Ctrl included.

Key	SuperbWarfare	Clashes with	Suggested
R	Reload	Iris — Reload Shaders	Ctrl + R
N	Fire mode	JourneyMap — Waypoint Manager	Ctrl + N (the list is also a button on the fullscreen map)

How this mod was made

This is a hobby project, built purely for fun. The entire codebase was written by an AI (Claude Code) — architecture, features, bug fixes, all of it — while the meatbags did the actual playtesting, including multiplayer sessions, and sent back bug reports on whatever broke.

Pull requests and issues are welcome and will be looked at whenever there's free time — no guaranteed response time.

Features

• One tool, two modes — Recruit mode opens a GUI to pick class, rank, faction and squad preset and deploy it; Command mode selects squads and issues orders. Ctrl+right-click switches between them.
• Squad presets — Single, 5 (riflemen + medic), 7 (riflemen, sniper, machine gunner, medic), 16 (large mixed squad), 32 (a company: twice the 16), Mortar Crew, Tank Crew, Drone Team, Heli Crew. The infantry presets deploy standing in a square formation, ready to move. 5 and 7 can deploy with a support vehicle; the tank crew preset lets you pick the model (ZTZ-99A / T-90A / M1A2), and the heli crew the airframe (Mi-28 gunship or AH-6 transport).
• 8 factions, each with its own uniform, team, and color — pick freely, including OPFOR test squads.
• Combat AI — a 150° field of view you can flank them out of, cover-seeking, suppression, digging in as a last resort, partial-cover firing positions, friendly-fire avoidance modeled on the actual firing cone (not just a straight line), and faction-wide relayed contact awareness.
• Vehicles — NPC crews drive, escort, and gun for their squad; a squad far from its objective will commandeer nearby vehicles on its own. Players can now ride along in a seat next to an allied NPC driver instead of bumping them out.
• Drone operators — fly a kamikaze FPV drone at a spotted target (uses the SBW Drone Warfare addon's drone if installed, falls back to a stock SBW drone otherwise); other NPCs will shoot down or take cover from a hostile drone and alert the squad.
• Helicopters — NPC pilots fly a Mi-28 gunship or an AH-6 that carries the squad, takes off, picks a landing zone and puts them down. Kill the pilot and the crew has a few seconds to take the controls before the aircraft comes down with it.
• Barracks — a placeable garrison point, configured like the deploy tool, that deploys a squad and restocks its losses over time.
• Quick-command HUD — a lightweight panel (default key Z) to pick a squad and an order without opening a menu.

Where everything is

Thing	Where to get it	What it does
Squad Command Tool (sbwnpc:squad_tool)	Creative, Superb Warfare Items tab — or /give @s sbwnpc:squad_tool	Deploys NPCs and commands squads. No recipe: in survival you are handed one on joining and on respawning whenever you have none.
Barracks (sbwnpc:barracks)	Same tab — or /give @s sbwnpc:barracks	A placed block that garrisons a squad and keeps it at strength.
Supply Point (sbwnpc:supply)	Same tab — or /give @s sbwnpc:supply	Groundwork for squad logistics. Places, breaks, does nothing else yet.
Quick-command HUD	Key Z, rebindable under controls category SBW NPC Squads	Pick a squad and an order without opening a menu.

On first use the tool asks you to pick a faction once. That is only your own default — you can still deploy any of the eight afterwards, including hostile ones to fight against.

Using the tool

Two modes, switched with Ctrl + right-click on air. The current one is on the item tooltip.

Recruit mode — what gets deployed

• Right-click air opens the deploy config: preset, class (Single only), rank, faction, and the vehicle or airframe where the preset has one.
• Right-click a block deploys it there, lined up abreast and facing you.
• Presets: Single, 5: Riflemen, 7: Standard, 16: Large, 32: Company, Mortar Crew, Tank Crew (ZTZ-99A / T-90A / M1A2), Drone Team, Heli Crew — Mi-28 gunship or AH-6 transport, and the airframe decides which crew comes with it. 5 and 7 can bring a LAV-25 / LAV-150 / BMP-2.
• Ranks go RECRUIT → REGULAR → VETERAN → ELITE: more health, tighter spread, quicker reactions.
• Anything bigger than a single NPC is formed into a squad automatically, holding where it landed.

Command mode — what they do

• Right-click an NPC selects it; one that is already in a squad selects the whole squad. Shift + right-click clears the selection.
• Right-click air opens the squad screen.
• Right-click a block with a squad selected sets that squad's objective.
• Right-click a hostile focuses the selected squad on it — hunted under Attack, guarded against under Defend.

The squad screen

One row per squad, scrollable, with the footer buttons under the list:

• Order cycles through the orders that squad can actually carry out.
• Objective arms a click: the next block you right-click is where the squad works from.
• Focus arms the same thing on an entity instead.
• R renames · X disbands (the NPCs stay, the squad doesn't) · DEL deletes the squad and everything in it, vehicles included.
• Routes opens patrol routes: add one, right-click blocks to drop waypoints, finish, then assign it to a squad. A squad with a route walks it under Patrol.

There is no limit on how many squads you run. The HUD's number keys reach the first nine; disbanding one moves the rest up into the freed numbers.

Orders

Order	What it means	Who can be given it
Defend	Hold near the objective, don't chase far	Everyone except tank crews
Patrol	Wander the area, or walk the assigned route	Infantry
Attack	Advance on the objective, fight through what's in the way	Everyone except transports and tank crews
Move	Walk there calmly, then hold	Everyone
Barrage	Shell a 40-block area around the objective instead of one point	Mortar crews

Tank crews only take Move — they fight from the tank by themselves. A Mi-28 gunship takes Attack / Defend / Move and holds a standoff hover 20 blocks off its target; an AH-6 transport takes Defend (patrols low with its door gunners, and calls contacts in to the whole faction) and Move (flies the squad there and lands).

The Barracks

Right-click a Barracks you placed to configure it the same way the tool is configured, then press Deploy garrison. It deploys that squad and then keeps it at the strength it went out with: replacements walk out every half a minute or so, and drone operators standing near it get their drones back. Re-deploying replaces the garrison standing there, and only whoever placed it can configure it — it asks for your faction pick the same way the tool does.

It is an ordinary block otherwise: mine it or blow it up and it's gone. The squad stays where it is, with nobody left to replace its losses.

Worth knowing

• Squads take cover, dig in when badly hurt, and won't fire through a squadmate — or through a parked vehicle.
• A squad with a distant objective commandeers a vehicle nearby and drives. You can ride along in a free seat without bumping the NPC driver out.
• They only see what is in front of them, so they can be flanked — but a shot at them, or a contact their own side calls in, turns them around.
• Machine gunners carry a launcher on the side for anything riding a vehicle; infantry stays the machine gun's job.
• Grenades are thrown to flush a target that will not come out of cover and to answer fire that has the squad pinned, rationed so an ambush draws an answer rather than a volley.
• Mortar crews only shell what their own side has actually seen. Out of reach of the target, they break the mortar down, carry it closer and set it back up.
• A killed NPC drops the weapon in its hands with a 15% chance (with only its loaded magazine), each piece of armour with a 5% chance, a magazine of ammunition for its gun half the time, and one of the grenades it had left with a 5% chance, whoever killed it.