Spells and Spellcrafting 2.12.43 — release notes

Rolls up three versions since the last CF release (2.12.40): 2.12.41, 2.12.42, and 2.12.43.

What's new

• Every Risen minion now has its own name. Names are themed to the type — everyday human names for zombies, bone-and-body-part names for skeletons, spider/web names for spiders, glitchy alien names for endermen, and viking/heavy-metal names for wither skeletons. The name floats over the minion in place of the old owner-and-mode label.
• A zombie will occasionally rise wearing your own name — a roughly 1-in-10 chance to spawn named after its owner instead of a pool name. Tunable (or disable it) with the new minions.zombieSelfNameChance config.
• Raising minions now takes a wand. Killing a mob only raises a Risen minion if you own a wand (any tier, anywhere in your inventory — it doesn't have to be in hand). Necromancy is gated behind the magic system now, so you can't build an army before ever crafting a wand. Controlled by the new minions.requireWandToRaise config (on by default; turn it off to restore the old rotten-flesh-only raising).
• Minion command modes are retired. Minions no longer cycle Defend / Stay / Attack / Patrol — they all follow and guard you (the old "Defend" behavior). Right-clicking a minion with an empty hand no longer changes anything.

Fixed

• Fixed a client crash with health-bar mods (such as Neat). With one of those mods installed, the game could crash the instant a Risen minion or the Devourer appeared on screen. Those mods are now safe alongside Spells and Spellcrafting.

Migration notes

• Existing minions are given a name automatically the first time they load after the update.
• If you had built a minion army purely by killing mobs and never owned a wand, killing mobs won't raise new ones until you have a wand. Set minions.requireWandToRaise=false in the server config to restore the previous behavior.
• Any minion you had parked in "Stay" will start following you again, since command modes are gone.

Requires / compatible with

• Minecraft 1.21.1
• NeoForge 21.1.224+
• Existing worlds upgrade cleanly — no config reset needed. The two new [minions] config options appear with safe defaults on first load.