Mob sparsity
| Mob sparsity | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Event | |||
| |||
| Type | Natural | ||
Mob sparsity is the localised reduction of mob populations, occurring most notably for passive mobs in the Spawn Region.
Passive mobs
Mechanic
Passive and neutral mobs count towards the creature mob cap. When new chunks are initially generated, mobs from the creature category (including cows, pigs, chickens, etc.) may be randomly spawned without counting towards the mob cap. The effect of this is that the population for passive and neutral mobs in new chunks are incredibly high. Depending on biome, as many as 200 passive mobs may spawn within render distance of a player in freshly generated chunks.
Though the initial population in an area may sustain players for some time, once it is depleted the creature mob cap limits the number of passive mobs that can respawn in the area. While hostile and aquatic mobs have a chance of spawning once every game tick, passive mobs only have a chance of spawning once every 400 game ticks (20 seconds)[1].
The server has per-player-mob-spawns enabled, meaning that the creature mob cap of eight is calculated for each player individually. This does not mean that the mob cap is duplicated for two players within the same set of loaded chunks.
Food scarcity
The large population of passive mobs that initially spawned when the server was launched in February 2025 were likely hunted to low levels across the Spawn Region by March. Complaints from players unable to find food occur as early as March 2025, with new players frequently commenting on an inability to find mobs by May and June 2025.
The issue of food scarcity is further exacerbated by the fact that roughly half the Spawn Region is covered in snow, with Snowy Plains biomes, Groves and Frozen Oceans spawning goats, snowy foxes and polar bears instead of pigs, sheep, chicken and cows. While rabbits still spawn in Snowy Plains and Groves, their smaller size and irregular movement when fleeing may make them harder for new players to hunt.
Due to mobs appearing less frequently across the entire region, it is harder for new players to find two of the same mob to breed for a reliable food source and new players are more likely to immediately kill an animal for food instead of attempting to find a second.
Aquatic mobs belong to a separate mob category and have a chance of spawning once every game tick when the mob cap is not filled. As such, fish are a very good source of food for new players that can be found wherever there is a body of water. Cod can be found in oceans, and salmon spawn in both rivers and oceans. Once a new player is able to build a rod, fishing is an easy source of food that does not deplete.
Other issues
Many tameable mobs (including wolves and cats) count towards the creature mob cap, regardless of whether the mob's owner is alive or dead. Where the creature mob cap is just eight mobs, it is possible in some areas for lost pets to comprise almost the entire mob cap and prevent new mobs from spawning. Axolotl's belong to a separate mob cap and therefore do not have an effect on other mobs spawning.
Mob spawning is player dependent, and so chunk loaders (including ender pearl stasis chambers) do not have an impact on mob caps.
Hostile mobs
Hostile mobs such as zombies, creepers, skeletons and spiders have a much larger mob cap than passive and neutral mobs at 40 mobs per player-loaded area. Between February and May 2025, the hostile mob cap was 30. While hostile mob sparsity made nights significantly easier for new players, it also limited access to items dropped by hostile mobs such as string and ender pearls.
Though pillagers belong to the monster mob cap, their spawning logic is not per player. By default, pillager patrols have a 20% chance of spawning every 10-11 minute roll[2]. On a vanilla server with 30 players online, the chance that a given player encounters a pillager patrol for each roll becomes 0.7%. Until the move to Folia in December 2025, players may therefore have gone up to tens or hundreds of hours of playtime without a pillager being spawned at their location. Since moving to Folia, pillager patrols are calculated per region- meaning that areas with high player density such as the Spawn Region may still have lower chances of encountering patrols.
Wandering traders' spawning logic means that they have a 2.5% to 7.5% chance of spawning every 20 minutes depending on the time since one was last spawned[3]. Similar to pillager patrols, wandering traders' logic for spawning is calculated per Folia region. Wandering traders will not spawn if one already exists in a loaded chunk within a region, but this does not take in to account wandering traders in unloaded chunks, which do not immediately despawn upon being unloaded. Wandering traders automatically despawn after 20 minutes of being loaded.
Blazes are only able to spawn from Blaze Spawners found in Nether Fortresses. Many of the Nether Fortresses close to X:0, Y:0 have had their Blaze Spawners destroyed, permanently making it impossible for Blazes to spawn in these areas.
References
- ↑ Mob Spawning. Minecraft Wiki. Retrieved 28 February 2025
- ↑ Patrol. Minecraft Wiki. Retrieved 28 Feb 2026
- ↑ Wandering Traders. Minecraft Wiki. Retrieved 28 February 2025