Bee Workforce 0.4.0 Release Notes

Bee Workforce 0.4.0 expands the breeding and genetics foundation introduced in 0.3.0 into multiple bee species, combat, honey gathering, logistics, dropped item collection, mining, and landfilling.

This release moves Bee Workforce from a Construction Bee focused mod toward a broader workforce system where bees can be bred, specialized, and assigned to different jobs. Some systems are still beta-level, but the main species and progression routes are now available to try.

Highlights

Bee Species Expansion

The following bee species are now defined as core Bee Workforce species.

• Honey Forager Bee
• Construction Bee
• Mining Bee
• Landfill Bee
• Combat Bee
• Item Finder Bee
• Item Carrier Bee

Existing Construction Bee items without species data continue to load as Construction Bees.

Bee Conversion Items

• Added and organized Forager Honey, Builder Honey, and Combat Honey.
• Using these items on vanilla bees creates the matching Bee Workforce bee item.
• Honey Forager Bees are intentionally easy to obtain. Construction Bees and Combat Bees use heavier recipes.
• Creative Tab entries are available for all bee species.

Selective Breeding Improvements

• Added selectable breeding policies to the Selective Breeding Hive.
  • Balanced
  • Pioneer
  • Steward
• Offspring now inherit a parent species and can then undergo species mutation.
• Balanced selection gives each mutation candidate a low chance. Pioneer and Steward selection strongly favor their matching mutation routes.
• Biome and nearby block conditions around the Selective Breeding Hive now nudge normal trait variation toward matching environmental targets.
• Parent pairs are committed when both parents are set and cannot be taken back until breeding completes.
• Adjacent vanilla hive HONEY_LEVEL is now treated directly as Honey Units. HONEY_LEVEL 1 = Honey Unit 1.
• The Selective Breeding Hive GUI was compacted so selection policy, adjacent hive count, honey progress, offspring count, and status are easier to read.

Genetic Parameters

Bee performance and personality parameters were expanded and connected to saving, display, inheritance, and mutation.

• HP
• Movement Speed
• Remaining Life
• Carry Capacity
• Mining Speed
• Placement Speed
• Honey Collection Speed
• Attack Damage
• Defense
• Evasion
• Critical Hit
• Attack Speed
• Recovery Power
• Breeding Efficiency
• Seriousness
• Bravery
• Smartness
• Kindness
• Friendliness

Some parameters are saved, displayed, and inherited in 0.4.0 but do not yet have direct gameplay effects.

Trait Effects

Several traits now affect real behavior.

• HP is handled as max health, separate from current health.
• Movement Speed maps to a controlled movement multiplier.
• Remaining Life can grow significantly through breeding.
• Carry Capacity affects how many items a bee can carry.
• Placement Speed affects placement wait time.
• Mining Speed affects mining completion time.
• Breeding Efficiency affects the total number of offspring produced by a parent pair.
• Seriousness affects how often a working bee interrupts work with off-duty behavior.
• Bravery affects whether a bee counter-attacks or flees when hurt.

Honey Forager Bee

• Honey Forager Bees can visit flowers while idle and return to their home Bee Nest or Beehive to increase HONEY_LEVEL.
• Honey Collection Speed changes the chance of gaining honey.
• A honey gathering attempt consumes one remaining life whether it succeeds or fails.
• Honey Forager Bees do not start honey gathering visits when the home hive is already full.
• Honey Bottles and Honeycombs are not generated directly.

Off-Duty Behavior

• Bees can now take short random flights, visit flowers, or wait visually inside their hive while idle or between work attempts.
• During inside-hive waiting, the bee becomes smaller and appears to hide in the hive.
• Bees return to normal work when a job becomes available.

Combat and Defense

• When hurt, bees interrupt their current task and either counter-attack or flee.
• The choice uses species base counter-attack chance plus Bravery.
• Bees flee instead of counter-attacking when hurt by their owner.
• Combat Bees can actively scan for hostile mobs while idle and call other idle Combat Bees from the same hive into battle.
• Attack Damage, Defense, Evasion, Critical Hit, Attack Speed, and Recovery Power now affect combat.
• A bee consumes remaining life when it lands an attack or actually takes combat damage.
• Species-specific attack and defense bonuses were added.

Logistics and Item Collection

• Added Bee Shipping Chest and Bee Receiving Chest.
• Item Carrier Bees move item stacks from same-owner Shipping Chests to Receiving Chests.
• If a Receiving Chest becomes full during transport, remaining items are dropped near the Receiving Chest.
• Item Finder Bees periodically search loaded dropped item entities within the home work range.
• Found items are stored in Bee Builder Chests.
• Building material transport, removed item storage, chest-to-chest logistics, and dropped item collection are now separate responsibilities.

Mining Bee and Bee Mining Block

• Added Bee Mining Block.
• Mining Bees mine a fixed 16x16x16 area starting one block below the Bee Mining Block.
• The work target is the Bee Mining Block, not the hive or home position.
• Bedrock, block entities, unbreakable blocks, and blocks requiring extra item data are excluded.
• Mined drops are stored in Bee Builder Chests.
• The Bee Mining Block facing controls the direction of the work area.
• A client-side outline shows the mining area.

Landfill Bee and Bee Landfill Block

• Added Bee Landfill Block.
• Landfill Bees place materials into a fixed 16x16 plane starting one block below the Bee Landfill Block.
• Target cells are air or fluid blocks.
• Materials are limited to sand, gravel, and red sand from Bee Builder Chests.
• The feature is intended for filling holes or water surfaces through falling block behavior.
• The Bee Landfill Block facing controls the direction of the work area.
• A client-side outline shows the landfill area.

Stability and Performance

• Breeding, logistics, item search, and combat scans avoid every-tick wide searches and world-wide scans.
• Saved and restored data paths were extended for Recovery Ledger data, species, traits, and carried items.

Notes

• 0.4.0 is a large feature expansion release. Bee species behavior and balance will continue to change.
• Some personality traits, such as Smartness, Kindness, and Friendliness, are mostly saved, displayed, and inherited in 0.4.0.
• Bee byproduct loot is not included in 0.4.0. It is planned for later design work.
• Bee Workforce removes and places real blocks in your world. Please make a backup before using it in an important world.