Cursed Blade

Dev Note: version 2.0.0 is in process of being ported to the rest of the versions

Aware of a bug blocking normal minecraft 1-9 keys input

Gameplay

At the start of the event there is a countdown. At the end of it the cursed blade drops from the sky at a random location given in chat. The first player to pick it up (right-click the grounded blade) becomes the cursed player.

The cursed player can press B and enter battle mode, replacing the normal hotbar with one that displays abilities. Outside battle mode the hotbar works like vanilla again — place blocks, use items, swap slots as usual.

Every kill made with the blade feeds it essence. Fill the essence bar and the blade levels up, increasing blade and ability damage, decreasing cooldowns, and enlarging ability reach and effects. From there, anyone else can become the cursed player by killing the current owner of the blade — the curse transfers to the killer, and the blade keeps its level.

Essence & blade levels

• Killing a player feeds the blade 50 essence.
• Killing a mob feeds it 1 essence for every 20 max health the mob has (always at least 1). A zombie gives 1, an iron golem 5, the Wither 15.
• Each level makes the blade 20% stronger than the level before (editable from config).

Whenever the blade is fed, an essence bar appears at the top of the screen showing the current level and essence collected / required. It pulses with every kill and fades away after a few seconds. On a level-up the bar fills and flashes, and the whole server hears it: a broadcast in chat, a dragon roar and thunder for every player, and harmless lightning striking at the cursed player's feet.

Battle mode & abilities

Battle mode is only available to the cursed player. Press B again to leave it. While battle mode is on you fight with abilities instead of a normal hotbar; you can’t use normal items until you toggle out.

Default ability keys (all remappable in Controls or from the Skill Screen):

Key	Ability	How it works
1	Dash	Launch yourself where you look (~5 blocks). Cooldown starts at 3 seconds and shrinks with blade power.
2	Slash (blade in hand)	Cleave nearby foes, then fire a teal slash wave. Range, size, and damage scale with power; the wave fades with distance.
2	Blink (blade planted)	Teleport to your planted blade. The blade stays where it is.
3	Throw (blade in hand)	Hurl the blade so it sticks in the world. Damages along the flight path, then a shockwave on impact (damage + knockback, without breaking blocks from the blast). While planted you are unarmed: slash and other sword abilities lock; Recall and Blink unlock instead. Dash still works.
3	Recall (blade planted)	Call the blade back handle-first. It smashes through blocks and damages foes on the way to your hand.
4	Fissure	Crack the ground into branching teal fissures. Glowing scar blocks burn anything that stands on them, then fade and leave scars in the earth. Reach, damage, and cooldown scale with power.
5	Judgment	Hold to charge (up to 3 stages). A glowing hologram blade grows with each stage and with power. Release to slam it into the ground; shockwave ripples tear left and right from the impact.
6	Impale	Thrust into the ground and hold. You cannot move while channeling. Each charge stage erupts a wider ring of swords from the earth. Impaled foes take damage and are immobilized (teleports still work). Release to end the channel; cooldown applies if at least one stage fired.
Right-click	Parry	Brief dome for half a second. Blocks projectiles and prevents all damage. Fixed 5 second cooldown — does not scale with blade power.

Press C to open the Skill Screen: see the blade's level and essence progress, browse every ability with its scaled damage / cooldown, and rebind keys without leaving the game.

Setup

To start the event as an admin:

/cursedblade start

To start the event as a player, everyone online marks ready. When all players are ready, the meteor countdown begins automatically:

/cursedblade ready

Useful admin commands (permission level 2):

Command	What it does
/cursedblade set <player>	Force who holds the curse
/cursedblade clear	Remove the cursed player (the blade level is kept; a new meteor event can run again)
/cursedblade who	Show who is cursed
/cursedblade power	Show the blade's level, attack damage, and essence
/cursedblade power <level>	Set the blade's level (essence resets to 0)
/cursedblade essence <amount>	Feed the blade essence, as if from kills (can level it up)
/cursedblade logouttimer	Check logout timeout status

Config

Cursed Blade allows multiple configuration options so the playthrough can suit the players.

By default every kill feeds the blade — players and mobs. It can be changed so only player kills count:

progressionMode = "all" / "players_only"

How much essence each kind of kill gives. Mobs give essencePerMob for every 20 max health they have (minimum one portion):

essencePerPlayer = 50
essencePerMob = 1

How much essence the levels cost. The first level costs firstLevelEssence. Each level after that costs the previous one plus a percentage: it starts at levelCostGrowthPercent, drops by levelCostGrowthDecayPercent every level, and never goes below levelCostGrowthMinPercent. With the defaults, one player kill gets the first level and every level after is much harder. Set the decay to 0 for a fixed rate (e.g. 30% gives 50, 65, 85, 110 …), or the growth to 0 for every level to cost the same:

firstLevelEssence = 50
levelCostGrowthPercent = 100.0
levelCostGrowthDecayPercent = 4.0
levelCostGrowthMinPercent = 50.0

Power growth is done by percentage. Every level increases damage by this percentage over the previous level, and shortens cooldowns by the same percentage:

powerGrowthPercent = 20.0

Countdown timer for the cursed meteor (blade drop) can also be adjusted (in seconds):

meteorCountdownSeconds = 30

There is a case where the cursed player can leave and never come back. There is a countdown for this as well. Once the cursed player logs out a timer starts; when it reaches 0 the curse is removed and the event can start again. The default is 24 hours.

NOTE: this counts as long as the server is on. If the server stops, no matter how much time passes in real life, the server will resume counting from where it left off.

cursedLogoutTimeoutHours = 24.0

Cursed Blade abilities will destroy blocks in different ways. If you want an experience without griefing, there is a config for this as well. By default griefing is enabled.

destroyBlocks = true

The config file also contains a configVersion entry. It is managed by the mod — don't edit it. When an update changes the config format, the file is reset to the new defaults and your old one is kept next to it as a .old file, so you can copy your values back.

Keybinds

Action	Default
Skill Screen	C
Battle Mode	B
Dash	1
Slash / Blink	2
Throw / Recall	3
Fissure	4
Judgment	5
Impale	6
Parry	Right-click

All of these can be changed under Options → Controls → Cursed Blade, or from the Skill Screen.

Additional Info

• All data regarding the cursed blade is saved on the world save, not on the player save.
• You cannot throw, clear, or spawn the blade with normal item commands — the curse is world-owned.
• While in battle mode you can’t use normal items; leave battle mode (B) to build, mine, and use the hotbar normally again.
• Only one cursed player exists at a time.
• Killing the cursed player can transfer the curse (and battle mode) to the killer.
• The blade's level and essence belong to the world, not the player: whoever takes the curse inherits the blade as it is.
• Ability size and reach also grow with power, but more slowly than damage, so high levels stay readable.