Dimensional Control

Dimensional Control is a lightweight Minecraft NeoForge mod for Minecraft 1.21.1 that allows you to control where resources can spawn based on dimension-based rules. This mod was derived from DimStructRestrict, a mod by Troy Cook (@cookta2012). This mod provides fine-grained control over world generation and spawning behavior — especially useful for modpack developers and world designers.

🌍 Features

• Prevent or allow the following resources from generating in specific dimensions:
  • Structures
  • Structure Pool Elements (structure pieces)
  • Features (biome decorations)
  • Entities (spawning mobs and friendly creatures)
  • Loot (items filled in generated chests and item drops)
• Define whitelist or blacklist rules.
• Describe dimension and resource locations with regex to easily create overarching rules.
• JSON-based configuration.
• Provides registries.json to easily look up all possible resource locations that you can use to write your definitions.
• Provides expanded-definitions.json to verify your full definitions once the regex has been expanded.
• Logs rule enforcement with context for debugging.

🔧 Configuration

The config file is located at:

<minecraft_root>/config/dimensionalcontrol/definitions.json

If the file doesn't exist, it will be generated with example entries.

📐 Structure of dimstructrestrict.json

{
  // Defines rules for allowing or denying structures.
  "structures": [
    {
      // Dimension ResourceLocation (ID).                                           
      "dimension": "minecraft:overworld",

      // Allowed structures, defined by ResourceLocation.
      "whitelist": ["minecraft:village_plains"],

      // Denied structures, cannot be present with whitelist!
    //"blacklist": []

      // Whether this rule is active.
      "active": true
    }
  ],
  // Defines rules for allowing or denying structure pool elments.
  "structurePoolElements": [ 
    {
      "dimension": "minecraft:overworld",
      "blacklist": ["minecraft:village/common/well_bottom"],
      "active": true
    }
  ],
  // Defines rules for allowing or denying features.
  "features": [ 
    {
      "dimension": "minecraft:overworld",
      "whitelist": ["minecraft:tree"],
      "active": true
    }
  ],
  // Defines rules for allowing or denying entity spawns.
  "entities": [ 
    {
      "dimension": "minecraft:the_end",
      "blacklist": ["minecraft:enderman"],
      "active": true
    }
  ],
  // Defines rules for allowing or denying loot.
  "loot": [ 
    {
      "dimension": "minecraft:.+",
      "whitelist": ["minecraft:diamond"],
      "active": true
    }
  ]
}

🧠 Rule Types

✅ whitelist

Only listed resources are allowed. Cannot be present if blacklist is already present!

❌ blacklist

Listed resources will be prevented. Cannot be present if whitelist is already present!

🔄 active (optional, default false)

Controls whether the rule is enforced. Useful for temporarily disabling rules without removing them.

🧪 Example Use Case

{
  "structures": [
    { 
      // This rule will only allow all village types (plains, desert, etc.) to generate in the overworld.
      // Other structures in the overworld will not generate!
      "dimension": "minecraft:overworld",
      "whitelist": ["minecraft:village_.+"],
      "active": true
    },
    { 
      // This rule will prevent the generation of bastion remnants in the nether.
      "dimension": "minecraft:the_nether",
      "blacklist": ["minecraft:bastion_remnant"],
      "active": true
    },
  ],
  "structurePoolElements": [
    {  
      // This rule will prevent wells being added to villages during overworld generation.
      "dimension": "minecraft:overworld",
      "blacklist": ["minecraft:village/common/well_bottom"],
      "active": true
    }
  ],
  "features": [ 
    { 
      // This rule will prevent all features except trees to be placed during overworld biome generation.
      "dimension": "minecraft:overworld",
      "whitelist": ["minecraft:tree"],
      "active": true
    }
  ],
  "entities": [
    { 
      // This rule will prevent enderman from spawning in the end dimension.
      "dimension": "minecraft:the_end",
      "blacklist": ["minecraft:enderman"],
      "active": true
    }
  ],
  "loot": [
    { 
      // This rule will only permit diamonds to be found in all loot pools of all minecraft dimensions.
      // This includes mob and block drops as well as generated chests.
      "dimension": "minecraft:.+",
      "whitelist": ["minecraft:diamond"],
      "active": true
    }
  ]
}

🧑‍💻 Developer Notes

Author: MattMckenzy, GitHub: @MattMckenzy

Original author: Troy Cook, GitHub: @cookta2012

📄 License

MIT License.

📬 Feedback & Contributions

Feel free to open an issue or fork the project if you'd like to expand the system (e.g., game rule based control, datapack integration, or GUI support).