Foxcrows - Mischievous Fox-Crows in Your Minecraft World
In the wild expanses of the Overworld, you can now encounter amazing creatures - foxcrows! These cunning hybrids of foxes and crows adore everything shiny, but their true weakness is cornbread. The most reliable way to gain a foxcrow's trust is to treat it with its favorite delicacy.
Foxcrows possess an amazing talent for finding treasures - whether buried underground or valuables in others' pockets. Both wild and tamed foxcrows (if they're not sitting still) constantly search for loot. Their sharp intellect and sensitive sense of smell often lead to discoveries, but they can equally find something on their own or borrow from someone else!
Treasures and Theft
Foxcrows can dig up various items - from seeds to ores, and sometimes even diamonds! They can also steal various items from villagers, ranging from emeralds to items related to a specific villager's profession. However, be cautious - although the reward for such antics can be valuable, most villagers don't approve of having their pockets picked! If you let tamed foxcrows run rampant in the village, you might draw suspicion from villagers and their golems...
Foxcrows can also steal items from players' hotbars (but only take items specified in the configuration). Wild foxcrows can always decide to steal from a player, and tamed ones can steal from other players, but not from their owner. Foxcrows are smart enough not to linger after theft - they quickly fly away and keep running when the true owner of the stolen item approaches! However, even this instinct can be overpowered by the promise of a favorite treat...
Reward System
Tamed foxcrows can be rewarded for brought items by right-clicking them with favorite food - then they'll drop their loot and grab the treat. Treasures can also be taken from them by right-clicking without favorite food.
The more often a foxcrow is rewarded for brought items, the more frequently it will search for them in the future and the more valuable its finds will be. However, if you take its loot without appropriate reward, it will become upset and search for items less often. Favorite and preferred items can be configured (but they must be food) and provide different amounts of encouragement. Green sparks indicate the foxcrow adores the received item, white ones - that it likes it. Storm clouds mean the foxcrow received nothing satisfactory in return.
This system also influences the foxcrow's tendency to steal. Rewarding it for brought stolen goods increases the likelihood it will search for items both through digging and stealing. Orange sparks along with green or white indicate the foxcrow was rewarded for theft. Taking the item without reward discourages the foxcrow from searching for items, but especially discourages it from stealing them. Pale sparks along with storm clouds indicate the foxcrow was discouraged from stealing.
By carefully choosing which behaviors to encourage and which to suppress, you can teach your foxcrow that crime doesn't pay - or maybe you want to teach it to keep stealing. That's your choice!
Appearance and Breeding
Foxcrows in different regions have different natural colors and patterns. Each area has four possible shades (three common colors and one mutated), and each area also has its unique pattern. Foxcrows spawn with different colors in very cold or very warm biomes (which can be configured), providing three possible color sets and 12 natural shades total. In cold biomes, foxcrows spawn with light fur and magpie pattern. In arid biomes, they spawn with sandy fur and jay pattern. In all other biomes, they spawn with red fur and raven pattern.
However, colors and patterns can be mixed through breeding, obtaining combinations not found in nature. Each shade has a variant in all three pattern types, totaling 36 combinations. Baby foxcrows always inherit pattern and shade from one parent - unless they have a mutated shade, which has high probability of randomly reverting to common. Although foxcrows usually inherit their type from one parent, sometimes they can mutate into the type corresponding to the biome they were born in. These factors can be used to increase chances of obtaining specific combinations.
New Crops and Treats
Corn is a new crop introduced alongside foxcrows, and it's critically important for preparing several of their favorite treats. From cornbread with sweet berries to corn on the cob - you'll use these recipes for taming, breeding, and training your foxcrows - and likely snack on them yourself in the process!
Corn doesn't spawn naturally in the world, but farmer villagers sometimes trade it, and foxcrows can sometimes dig up kernels. Kernels (which can also be crafted from an ear) can be planted to get a corn stalk that grows two blocks tall. Breaking or right-clicking the top block yields ears depending on the maturity of the stalk top.
Like their terrestrial cousins, foxcrows also love sweet berries and glow berries and can collect both berries and corn from respective plants. They also adore the taste of rabbit, which they hunt with great efficiency by diving from the sky. These attacks are so effective they apply the looting effect, making them useful for rabbit farming. They can also pick up food items from the ground.
Management and Behavior
Tamed foxcrows can be managed by making them sit, follow you, or wander independently by right-clicking (note that if the foxcrow has an item, you'll need to click with Shift held to switch command instead of regular click). While following, they'll perform most of their natural behaviors, and while wandering they can perform almost all of them (except stealing from their owner). Besides digging and stealing, foxcrows show particular curiosity towards certain creatures, especially foxes and cats - the latter sometimes frighten them. They usually don't fly too high in the air, but building a safe aviary or leashing them is recommended if you want to leave them wandering. If a tamed wandering foxcrow gets lost (or if you want to attract a flying wild one's attention), the smell of cornbread with sweet berries usually works wonders. Right-clicking with shears removes any unwanted headgear.
The mod includes several advancements, most related to digging and stealing. Most are visible in the advancements menu. There might also be a few surprises...
