Ghost Crews (Vanilla Tales)

Requirements

• On Fabric you need Fabric API. On Forge or NeoForge you do not.
• Server-side: install it on the server (or in singleplayer). Players do not need it, and vanilla clients can join without it.
• Languages: English and German. German shows for players who have the mod installed (for example in singleplayer); vanilla clients without the mod see English.

What it does

• Every shipwreck gets a deterministic English name, such as “The Pale Gull”, and a crew of 3 to 6 named drowned.
• The crew is already there when you arrive, and a member that has been dead for a while respawns once you come close again.
• The captain carries a trident and, when killed, drops a logbook: a written book with the ship’s name, its route, its cargo and a last log entry. Rarely it also drops the Captain’s Hat, a dyed leather helmet with its own name, lore and a glint.
• The helmsman wears a turtle shell helmet, and the rest of the crew wears dyed leather caps, one color per wreck.
• Emptying every chest on the wreck, including with hoppers or minecarts, pacifies it: the remaining crew vanishes, a sign with the ship’s name appears on the mast, and the crew never returns.
• With Lootr installed, wreck chests are personal loot that never look empty, so instead the wreck is pacified when a player kills the captain, once the whole wreck area is loaded.

Advancements

• Captain’s Log: kill the captain and get the logbook.
• Dressed for the Sea: get the Captain’s Hat.
• Laid to Rest: a wreck is pacified.

Configuration

File: ghost_crews.json.

A config file with a syntax error is left untouched: the mod logs the problem and keeps the last working settings instead of overwriting the file with defaults.

The same file also holds the lists used for ship and crew names, ports, cargo and log entries, and the crew’s cap colors; edit them to change the flavor text.

The tag ghost_crews:wrecks (default minecraft:shipwreck, minecraft:shipwreck_beached) decides which structures count as wrecks and can be extended for modded structures.

Commands

Needs operator permission.

Good to know

• On 1.20.1 the Captain’s Hat is a dyed leather helmet. A real 3D hat model needs an optional resource pack and is only possible on newer Minecraft versions.
• The crew’s helmets are unbreakable so they do not burn away in the sun.

Part of VanillaTales

Ghost Crews is part of VanillaTales, a collection of small, independent mods that add little stories to vanilla content. Each mod works on its own; install only the ones you want.

• Zombie Sieges: turns a vanilla zombie siege into a real event, with a ringing bell, a boss bar and two waves of zombies.
• Sherd Stories: gives every decorated pot a title and the story of where its sherds were found.
• Illager Scouts: a pillager scout watches your village and warns you two days before a patrol arrives.
• Occupied Villages: some new villages spawn already occupied by an illager garrison you can liberate.
• Bonded Pairs: binds two mobs from the same spawn group into a pair that avenges each other.
• Golem Patrol: gives iron golems a daily patrol, a night watch and an escort for villagers.
• Raid Aftermath: villagers repair the damage a raid or an explosion left in the village.
• Wayfarer’s Landmarks: shows a title and helpful icons when you enter a structure.

More mods by LithiumPlus

• DataDrivenVillagers: create and change villager professions from JSON files or an in-game editor.
• VillagersPlus: new villager types, trades and beautiful workstations. Forge version: VillagersPlus (Forge).
• VillagerTradingPlus: add, replace or delete the trades of any villager, change the currency and gate trades behind conditions, all from a datapack.
• Nyctophobia: dark, foggy and unsettling biomes for the Overworld. Forge version: Nyctophobia (Forge).
• The Graveyard (Fabric) and The Graveyard (Forge/NeoForge): structures, mobs, bosses and blocks with a graveyard theme.