Rot and Mold

You may include this mod in modpacks, including monetized ones, as long as the pack is distributed through CurseForge or Modrinth.

Rot & Mold

Wood rots, wool and hay mold, fruit spoils and stone grows moss, as fast as they do in reality.

Wood left in the rain, in the ground or in a damp cellar decays. Sunlit wood turns silver-grey. Wet wool grows mold and falls apart. Beams carry only as much as real timber would, and a tunnel dug through soft ground caves in unless you shore it up. Nothing here is a timer picked for gameplay: every lifetime comes from how long the material lasts in the real world.

>Alpha: This is an early release. It changes your world for good: blocks decay, mineshaft timbers come already rotten and unsupported structures fall. **Back up your world before adding it**, and expect bugs. Please report anything odd in the comments.

Time

One real year is 96 game days, about 32 hours of play. So wood that lasts 15 years in the ground lasts about 480 hours in a damp corner of your world. Chunks outside the simulation distance do not age.

Wood

-Every shape: planks, logs, wood blocks, slabs, stairs, fences, fence gates, doors and trapdoors.

-Nine woods, each as durable as its real counterpart.** Jungle wood lasts longest (like teak), then acacia and oak, mangrove, cherry, spruce, and birch and bamboo rot within a few years in the ground.

• Three stages. Weathered (silver-grey surface, as strong as fresh wood), rotting (soft, half the strength and span), rotten (carries nothing, crumbles to a stick or nothing; silk touch takes it whole).

-It needs to be wet. Rot only happens above fibre saturation: in the rain and for a few days after, in contact with soil, underground, or next to water. Dry wood under a roof lasts for ever. Fully submerged wood barely rots: no oxygen.

-Temperature matters. Decay fungi are fastest at 20-30 °C and almost stop below 5 °C.

-Living trees do not rot. Felled trunks do.

-Rotten boards and trapdoors give wayn under anything heavier than a cat. A rotten fence post gives way under a load.

-Old mineshafts are found with their timber already decayed.

Protecting wood

All of them are real methods and work the way they do in reality.

-Keep it off the ground Wood standing on stone does not draw damp from the soil.

• Pine tar. Burn resinous spruce or pine logs slowly in a sealed **Tar Kiln**: tar runs out and charcoal is left. Brush it onto wood of any shape (brush in the main hand, tar in the other). Tar keeps rain out and wears off in 3-5 years outdoors.

-Charring (shou sugi ban). Sneak and use flint and steel on dry wood. The charred layer slows rot five times and lasts 60-100 years outdoors.

-Beeswax. Rub honeycomb on wood to keep rain out for a few months. Scrape it off with an axe.

-Planing. An axe takes the grey surface off weathered wood.

Wool and carpets

Wool and carpets kept wet mold in 3-6 months, then fall apart. Wash them in a water cauldron: the stains come out, the damage stays.

Farm produce and books

-Hay bales baled wet or left in the rain mold within weeks and rot away within months. Moldy hay is no feed, only compost. Dried kelp blocks do the same.

-Pumpkins and melons rot from their own water, wet or not: a whole pumpkin keeps 2-3 months, a melon 2-4 weeks, a carved pumpkin 1-2 weeks. Cold storage slows it. When they rot away, their seeds are left.

-Bookshelves in a damp place mold. Moldy books give an enchanting table no power.

Moss

Cobblestone and stone bricks (blocks, stairs, slabs and walls) kept damp turn mossy: in 2-5 years against the ground or in a cellar, 5-10 years out in the rain. Moss does the stone no harm. Scrub it off with a brush.

Structural collapse

Every block carries load the way its material does.

-Building materials have a real span (between two supports) and cantilever (out from one support). Timber beams span several blocks, unreinforced masonry needs a lintel, iron spans far. A loaded beam spans less than an empty one.

-Natural ground follows rock mass classes (Bieniawski's RMR). A narrow tunnel in sound stone stands for ever; the same tunnel in deepslate stands for years; dirt caves in within days. Water seeping in weakens the rock. When a roof caves in, it falls up to its natural pressure arch: a thin slab in hard rock, a deep pit in soil.

-Shore it up. Posts and beams shorten the opening. Like real mine timbers, they rot and need replacing.

-Warnings. Before a cave-in the rock cracks and dust falls. Long-standing openings start to warn when their time is nearly up.

Commands

• /climate moisture – moisture and temperature of the block you look at, and why.

• /climate damage – its decay counters.

• /climate support – whether it is carried, and when it would cave in.

• /climate advance <amount> – age the block you look at (for testing).

AI Usage

The code, textures and models of this mod were made with the help of AI. The idea, design and all gameplay decisions are mine, and everything was tested by hand.

If you'd like to support the mod, you can buy me a tea ☕