TaCZ Armed Mobs

TaCZ Armed Mobs

Village guards with swords are fine. Village guards with whatever guns your modpack has are better.

TaCZ Armed Mobs gives guards from Guard Villagers, zombies, pillagers and any other mob you configure a random gun from every TaCZ gunpack that is currently loaded, plus matching ammo, and its own tactical AI to actually use it.

Features

Weapons

• Works with any gunpack. Guns are picked at runtime from TaCZ's own gun index. Install a new gunpack and mobs will use it automatically. No ID lists, no datapacks.
• Matching ammo in the off hand, sensible fire mode (full auto > burst > semi).
• Filters: allowed weapon types, whitelist and blacklist by gun ID, whole gunpack or sub folder.

Tactical AI

• Mobs aim, shoot, reload with real magazines and cycle bolt-action rifles. Bows and other inventory-fed weapons work too.
• Combat profiles per weapon type: snipers hang back, shotguns and pistols push in, heavy weapons move slowly. Single guns can be moved to another profile.
• Distance keeping: too far, they close in. Too close, they back off while shooting, also while reloading.
• Melee weapons and explosive weapons are detected automatically and handled sensibly.
• Configurable spread and headshot chance. No aimbot guards.
• Friendly-fire protection before every shot: guards won't shoot through villagers or players, monsters won't shoot through other monsters.
• Suppressive fire: machine gun hits briefly slow the target.

Diplomacy

• Warnings: guards warn you before opening fire. Put your weapon away and they stand down.
• Strikes: an accidental hit gets a warning. Hit them again and you're an aggressor, no more warnings.
• White flag: hold white wool or a white banner and guards hold their fire. Betray it and they won't trust it for a while.
• Disguise: hold or wear an ominous banner and illagers take you for one of their own. Armed guards, however, will shoot you on sight.
• Guards talk to you in chat.

Guard pouch

• Armed guards carry a hidden pouch with reserve ammo and food.
• Sneak + right-click a guard to open it (same permissions as the guard inventory).
• Guards eat from the pouch when hurt and out of combat. The pouch drops on death.

Resupply

• Armed mobs slowly receive new ammo inside villages, pillager outposts, woodland mansions or near village bells.
• Guards fetch their own ammo: low on ammo outside the village, they walk to the nearest bell, restock and return to their post. Out of ammo mid-fight, they fall back to restock and rejoin.

Dependencies

Mod
[UNOFFICIAL] TaCZ NeoForge Port	Required
Guard Villagers	Required

Guard Villagers TACZ Support is not needed. This mod has its own AI. If you prefer that mod's AI, set [ai] enabled = false. Never run both AIs at the same time.

Tested gunpacks

Works out of the box with every gunpack tested so far, no configuration needed:

• TaCZ Default Gunpack
• Create Armorer
• Cyber Armorer
• Applied Armorer
• Immersive Armorer
• Ars Armorer (needs more testing)
• Helldivers 2 Gunpack
• TTI Gunpack
• MS-Mobius Gunpack
• TRIS-dyna Gunpack
• EOS - Dawn Goddess Lab
• Destiny Gun Pack

Important: Most gunpacks were made for Minecraft 1.20.1. To use them on 1.21.1 you need TaCZ Pack Upgrader (also built into Gunsmith Lib). This is a TaCZ requirement, not one of this mod.

Using a gunpack that isn't listed? It will most likely work anyway. If something behaves oddly, let me know in the comments!

Configuration

config/taczarmedmobs-common.toml. Most changes apply on the next spawn. Works with Configured for in-game editing.

[guards]

Option	Default	Description
enabled	true	Equip guards with guns
gun_chance	0.75	Chance for a gun, otherwise normal loadout

[extra_mobs]

Option	Default	Description
entities	zombie, pillager	Other mobs that can spawn armed
gun_chance	0.05	Gun chance for those mobs
drop_chance	0.25	Chance to drop gun and ammo on death
ai_enabled	true	Give them this mod's gun AI
ai_excluded	[]	Mobs that get a gun but not the AI
spread_degrees	6.0	Aim spread for these mobs

[weapons]

Option	Default	Description
allowed_types	pistol, smg, rifle, shotgun, sniper, mg	Allowed gun types, empty = all
whitelist	[]	Only these guns
blacklist	[]	Never these guns

[ammo]

Option	Default	Description
min_magazines / max_magazines	2 / 4	Ammo in the off hand on spawn

[ai]

Option	Default	Description
enabled	true	Use this mod's AI
spread_degrees	2.5	Aim spread for guards
headshot_chance	0.15	Chance to aim at the head
reload_time_multiplier	1.0	Multiplier for the gun's reload time
friendly_fire_width	1.0	Base width of the checked line of fire
out_of_ammo	KEEP_DISTANCE	KEEP_DISTANCE or MELEE

[profiles]

Profile	Types	Range	Preferred	Retreat below	Speed
sniper	sniper	64	40	20	0.8
rifle	rifle, smg, mg	32	20	8	0.8
pistol	pistol, shotgun	16	10	4	0.9
heavy	rpg	48	24	12	0.6

Each profile has types, max_range, preferred_distance, retreat_distance and move_speed. Move types between profiles freely, or add custom types from other gunpacks.

Option	Default	Description
fallback	rifle	Profile for types not listed anywhere
gun_overrides	[]	Move single guns to another profile, e.g. ["eos:eos_riku_t2=rifle"]
melee_bullet_range	8.0	Guns whose bullet flies less than this count as melee weapons

[suppression]

Option	Default	Description
enabled	true	Suppressive fire
types	["mg"]	Gun types that suppress
targets	BOTH	PLAYERS, MOBS or BOTH
duration_seconds / level	1.5 / 1	Slowness per hit

[diplomacy]

Option	Default	Description
messages	true	Guards talk to players
message_display	CHAT	CHAT or ACTION_BAR
warning_seconds	3.0	Warning time before opening fire
lower_weapon_stands_down	true	Putting the weapon away ends the warning
stand_down_seconds	60	How long guards leave an unarmed player alone
aggression_memory_seconds	30	How long attacks are remembered
strikes_before_aggression	2	Hits until a player counts as aggressor
truce.items	white wool, white banner	Items that count as a white flag
truce.break_cooldown_seconds	60	Penalty for attacking under a white flag
disguise.guards_attack_disguised	true	Armed guards shoot disguised players
disguise.break_cooldown_seconds	60	Penalty for attacking illagers while disguised

[pouch]

Option	Default	Description
enabled	true	Pouch for armed guards
rows	1	Size in rows of 9 slots (1–3)
start_magazines	2	Reserve magazines on spawn
food_item / food_count	bread / 4	Food on spawn
eat_below_health	0.6	Eat below this fraction of max health

[resupply]

Option	Default	Description
enabled	true	Periodic ammo resupply
interval_seconds	300	Time between resupplies per mob
magazines_per_resupply / max_magazines	1 / 6	Amount per resupply / total cap
guard_scope	MOD_EQUIPPED	MOD_EQUIPPED or ALL guards
include_extra_mobs	true	Also resupply zombies, pillagers etc.
anywhere	false	Resupply everywhere, ignore location rules
structures	villages, outposts, mansions	Structures with resupply
bell_radius	48	Also near village bells, 0 = off
walk_to_bell	true	Guards low on ammo walk to the nearest bell
walk_below_magazines	2	Walk when carrying fewer magazines than this
bell_search_radius	128	How far guards look for a bell

How weapon filtering works

Every time a mob spawns, each loaded gun goes through three filters in this order:

1. Whitelist: If empty, every gun passes. If not empty, only matching guns pass.
2. Blacklist: Matching guns are removed, even if whitelisted.
3. Allowed types: Only guns with a listed type remain, whitelisted guns included.

Entries can be a single gun ("tacz:ak47"), a whole gunpack ("create_armorer:*") or a sub folder ("destiny:sword/*").

whitelist = ["create_armorer:*"]

whitelist = ["destiny:*"]
blacklist = ["destiny:sword/*"]

Enabling heavy weapons

Launchers, cannons and similar weapons use the type rpg ("Heavy Weapon" in the creative menu). They are disabled by default. To enable them, add rpg to the allowed types:

[weapons]
    allowed_types = ["pistol", "smg", "rifle", "shotgun", "sniper", "mg", "rpg"]

Heavy weapons use the heavy profile: longer range, slower movement, and an automatic safety distance so mobs never fire explosives at targets close enough to hurt themselves. Melee weapons that gunpacks file under the same tab (e.g. swords) are detected automatically and charge in instead.

Before you enable them:

• Explosions may damage your village. Whether explosions destroy blocks is decided by the weapon and TaCZ's own config, not by this mod.
• Zombies and pillagers can get them too, since allowed_types applies to all mobs.
• Only want launchers, no melee weapons? Blacklist them, e.g.:

  blacklist = ["destiny:sword/*", "create_armorer:special_melee_wrench"]

Common pitfalls

• Whitelisted gun never shows up? Check its type. Launchers, cannons and some melee weapons use rpg ("Heavy Weapon" in the creative menu), which is excluded by default.
• All guards suddenly have swords? Usually a typo in the whitelist.
• Guns that fire from the inventory (e.g. bows) or use fuel are not handed out on spawn while this mod's AI is active. Inventory-fed guns still work when you give them to a guard yourself, fuel-based ones don't.

Debugging

Something not working as expected? Stand next to a guard and run /taczarmedmobs debug (ops only). It lists every condition for the AI, ammo, profile, target and resupply with a green YES or red NO. The first red line is usually the reason. Please include its output in bug reports!

Notes

• Only newly spawned mobs are affected. Existing mobs keep their equipment.
• Guard Villagers never attacks players with Hero of the Village or the guard's owner, even if they're disguised.
• Pillagers hold guns in their normal pose. Purely visual, they shoot fine.
• If another mod already arms pillagers or zombies, remove them from entities or add them to ai_excluded.

FAQ

Guns show as a pink/black texture. That's a gunpack loading issue, not this mod. Older 1.20.1 gunpacks have to be converted by TaCZ Pack Upgrader (also built into Gunsmith Lib), and that conversion can fail if Windows locks a file. Close the game, delete the .gunsmithlib folder in your instance (if you use Gunsmith Lib) and restart.

Can I use this in my modpack? Yes.

Credits

Friendly-fire and repositioning logic inspired by Guard Villagers TACZ Support by denialpan (MIT). Built on Guard Villagers by tallestegg.