ChestToLoot

Copy & refill vanilla chests with a cooldown — while ignoring player-placed chests, respecting claims (GriefPrevention / GriefDefender), and staying gentle on TPS with a time-budgeted scanner.

I built this to stop server-wide “razzia” runs—when one player (intentionally or not) clears every chest—so everyone still gets a chance to loot, even if others got there first. It boosts replayability and makes the server more welcoming to new players.

MC/Server: Spigot/Paper 1.12.x
Version: 1.0.0

What it does

ChestToLoot discovers world-generated chests, snapshots their contents once, and then refills them after a cooldown when players loot them.

Snapshot + refill flow

Snapshots discovered world chests (once), storing their contents as a template.
When a player loots/changes a managed chest, it’s marked dirty and refills after a cooldown.

What it skips

ChestToLoot will not manage:

Player-placed chests (persisted to exclusions.yml)
Chests inside configured colony/town centers
Chests inside GriefPrevention / GriefDefender claims (configurable)

Villager safety guard (optional)

Can block refills near villagers (configurable) to avoid interfering with gameplay or villages.

Lightweight world scanning (TPS-friendly)

Designed to avoid heavy world iteration:

Enumerates generated chunks directly from .mca region headers (no worldgen)
Processes only a few chunks & chests per tick using a hard time budget
Keeps a ledger (scanned-chunks.yml) so each chunk is scanned only once

Admin tools

Commands include:

/ctl status — live progress (queues, managed count, throttle)
/ctl pause / /ctl resume — control scanning
/ctl speed <chunks> <chests> — adjust throttles live
/ctl save — flush all data files

Optional hook:

Per-chest discovery console hook (alsoRunConsoleCommand)

How it decides to refill

A chest is snapshotted once when first seen
(unless it’s empty and onlySnapshotIfNonEmpty=true).
A chest becomes dirty only when players change it via GUI interactions
(click/drag/close events). Automation/NPC-driven changes typically won’t mark it dirty.
After resetMinutes, the chest is restored to the template unless blocked by:
- claims
- configured town/colony centers
- villager guard

Tip: This design focuses on replenishing player-lootable chests without fighting other systems.

Integrations

GriefPrevention (reflection)

Skips snapshot/refill inside claims
Optional: don’t respawn broken chests inside claims

GriefDefender (reflection, best-effort)

Same idea as above when the API bridge is present and enabled

MineColonies / Town centers

Protect zones via a configured colonyCenters list

Container support

Supports vanilla chest blocks: CHEST, TRAPPED_CHEST
Mod storage blocks are not targeted.

Commands & permissions

Commands

/chesttoloot or /ctl:

status — show queues, managed count, % scan discovered, throttle, task state
pause / resume — control the scanner
speed <chunks> <chests> — adjust throttles live
save — flush all data files

Permission

chesttoloot.admin (default: op)

Installation

Drop ChestToLoot-1.0.0.jar into plugins/
Start the server once to generate config files
Edit config.yml to taste, then /reload or restart
Optional plugins: GriefPrevention / GriefDefender (for claim awareness)

Built for Spigot or Paper 1.12.x (built against spigot-api:1.12.2).

FAQ

If a claim is created over an already-managed chest

The snapshot remains in data, but refills are skipped inside claims. If the chest is broken and respectClaimsOnRespawn=true, CTL forgets it instead of respawning.

Does it cover previously placed player chests?

No — player-placed chests are excluded at place time and recorded permanently in exclusions.yml.

Modded inventories?

ChestToLoot targets vanilla chest blocks only. Other containers (drawers, crates, etc.) aren’t scanned/managed.