Augments

Augments

Augments slot into a beacon's augment drawer and change what it can do. They are the only way a beacon becomes more than its tier.

One augment of each type per beacon. You cannot fit two Range augments for double the reach — the slot refuses it, and so does the resolver, so a beacon assembled by command cannot cheat it either.

Beacon	Augment slots
Beacon I	0
Beacon II	1
Beacon III	2
Beacon IV	4
Cinder / Void / Tidal	2

There are twelve augments and at most four slots, so the question is never "which do I want" but "which four". Seven of them are pure gains; the other five buy one thing by spending another, and those are the ones worth thinking about.

Each augment exists in one to three tiers of its own, crafted separately — a tier III Range is not built from a tier II one.

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Range

What it does. Adds to the aura radius, in blocks. It only matters for effects set to something other than Self: a self-only effect has no radius to grow.

Augment tier	Bonus
I	+4 blocks
II	+8 blocks
III	+12 blocks

How to use it. Base ranges are 0 / 8 / 12 / 16 blocks for Beacons I–IV, and 10 / 14 / 12 for Cinder / Void / Tidal. Range III on a Beacon IV reaches 28 blocks.

What it costs. Range makes shared effects more expensive: cost is multiplied by 1 + range / 64. That is deliberately mild. A linear cost made the largest Range augment strictly worse than no augment at all, which is not a choice, just a trap. At 28 blocks the multiplier is about 1.44.

Configuring. data/<namespace>/portablebeacons/augment/range.json, operation add_range. The values list is indexed by augment tier, so it must hold at least max_tier entries. Base ranges live on each tier as base_range.

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Focus

What it does. Adds one effect slot, so the beacon can project one more effect at a time.

Augment tier	Bonus
I	+1 effect slot

How to use it. Beacons I and II project one effect; III, IV and the themed beacons project two. Focus takes those to two and three. It is the only augment that changes how many things a beacon does rather than how well it does them.

What it costs. Nothing directly — but every extra effect is charged in full, so a beacon with Focus burns fuel faster simply by doing more.

Configuring. augment/focus.json, operation add_effect_slot. Raise max_tier and add values to allow a second or third extra slot. Base counts live on each tier as effect_slots.

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Amplification

What it does. Raises the ceiling on effect levels. It does not raise your effects — you still choose the level, and you still pay for it.

Augment tier	Bonus
I	+1 to the reachable level

How to use it. Two ceilings apply and the lower one wins: the beacon's, and the effect's own max_amplifier. Amplification only helps when the effect can go higher than the beacon currently allows.

Shipped defaults: Beacon IV and Cinder grant level II unaided; every other beacon grants level I. The six combat and movement effects — Speed, Haste, Jump Boost, Resistance, Strength, Regeneration — allow up to level III. The utility effects — Night Vision, Water Breathing, Slow Falling, Fire Resistance, Conduit Power, Dolphin's Grace — are level I only, because a second level of them means nothing in vanilla.

So Amplification takes Speed from I to II on a Beacon III, from II to III on a Beacon IV, and does nothing at all for Night Vision on any beacon.

What it costs. A great deal. Each level multiplies that effect's cost by the effect's amplifier_cost_multiplier, applied per level — so level III costs the multiplier squared. The sharing mode then multiplies again on top.

Configuring. Three fields, and all three are checked:

• augment/amplification.json, operation add_amplifier — how much ceiling the augment adds.
• portablebeacons/tier/<tier>.json, field max_amplifier — the level a beacon grants unaided.
• portablebeacons/effect/<effect>.json, field max_amplifier — the highest level that effect will ever allow, whatever the beacon.

Raising only one of them is the usual reason a change appears to do nothing.

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Efficiency

What it does. Multiplies the beacon's whole fuel bill.

Augment tier	Fuel cost
I	×0.75 — 25% off
II	×0.60 — 40% off
III	×0.45 — 55% off

How to use it. The multiplier applies to the total, after effect level, sharing mode and range. It is therefore worth most on an expensive beacon — two shared effects at level III — and close to worthless on a single self-only Speed.

Configuring. augment/efficiency.json, operation mul_fuel. Values below 1 reduce the cost; a value above 1 raises it, which is a perfectly good way to write a cursed augment.

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Capacity

What it does. Multiplies the size of the beacon's internal fuel buffer.

Augment tier	Buffer
I	×2
II	×3
III	×4

How to use it. This one matters more than it looks, because of how refuelling works: a beacon refuses any fuel item its buffer cannot hold whole. It will not burn most of a netherite ingot and waste the remainder. A Beacon II holds 3600 units, so a netherite ingot worth more than that simply sits in the slot, full and useless.

Capacity is what lets a small beacon use dense fuel at all, and what lets a large one run unattended for longer.

Base buffers are 1200 / 3600 / 10800 / 36000 for Beacons I–IV, and 10800 for the themed three.

Configuring. augment/capacity.json, operation mul_capacity. Base buffers live on each tier as fuel_capacity.

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Attunement

What it does. Unlocks wider sharing than the beacon offers on its own.

The sharing modes form a ladder, and each has a rank:

Mode	Rank	Reaches	Fuel cost
Self	0	only you	×1.0
Team	1	your scoreboard team	×1.7
Allies	2	every player nearby	×2.0
Allies and Pets	3	nearby players and tamed animals	×2.4

A beacon grants every mode up to its own aura_rank. Attunement raises that rank.

Augment tier	Bonus
I	+1 rank
II	+2 ranks

How to use it. The shipped defaults:

Beacon	aura_rank	Unaided	+ Attunement I	+ Attunement II
I	0	Self	no augment slot	no augment slot
II	0	Self	Team	Allies
III, IV	1	Team	Allies	Allies and Pets
Cinder / Void / Tidal	1	Team	Allies	Allies and Pets

Team sits below Allies deliberately: it reaches fewer people and costs less, so it is the cheaper first step out of keeping everything to yourself.

A Beacon II has exactly one augment slot, so sharing at all costs it the only augment it will ever carry. That is the intended decision, not an oversight.

What it costs. The mode multiplies every shared effect's cost — see the table above. Allies is twice Self; Allies and Pets nearly two and a half times. Range multiplies on top of that.

Configuring. augment/attunement.json, operation unlock_aura, and aura_rank on each tier (0–3, defaulting to 0).

Give a tier "aura_rank": 3 to make all sharing free from the start; set every tier to 0 to make sharing always require the augment. The ranks of the modes themselves are fixed by the ladder and are not datapack-configurable — only which rank a beacon reaches is.

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Discretion

What it does. Hides the visual evidence that you have effects running.

Augment tier	Hides
I	the particle swirl
II	the particle swirl and the status icons

How to use it. Useful on PvP servers, where a swirl of particles announces that you are buffed, and useful for anyone who dislikes the visual noise. It changes nothing about what the effects do, only what others — and you — can see.

Configuring. augment/discretion.json, operation hide_effects. The value is read as a level, not summed: 1 hides particles, 2 or more hides the icons as well. Two augments both granting concealment do not add up — the highest wins, because the value names a behaviour rather than an amount.

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The trade-off augments

The seven above are pure gains — the only cost is the slot. These five each spend one stat to buy another, so they compete with the plain ones instead of queueing behind them.

None of them needed new code. An augment entry may carry several operations, and the resolver clamps every stat it produces, so penalties have always been expressible: a mul_fuel above 1 raises the bill, a negative add_range shortens the reach. Your own datapack can do the same.

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Overdrive

What it does. Raises the level ceiling further than Amplification, and charges for it twice.

Augment tier	Level ceiling	Fuel
I	+1	×1.6
II	+2	×2.4

How to use it. Overdrive II on a Beacon IV reaches level III on any effect that allows it — the same place Amplification reaches — but it gets there in one augment tier rather than needing the beacon to grant level II first. The catch is that the fuel multiplier applies to the whole beacon, not just the effect you raised.

Pairs badly with a beacon running several effects, and well with one running a single expensive one.

Configuring. augment/overdrive.json, operations add_amplifier and mul_fuel.

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Projector

What it does. Buys a large aura at the cost of the fuel buffer.

Augment tier	Range	Buffer
I	+10 blocks	×0.5
II	+18 blocks	×0.35

How to use it. Projector II on a Beacon IV reaches 34 blocks — further than any Range augment — but leaves it holding barely a third of its buffer, which means refuelling far more often and being unable to accept the densest fuels at all. See Capacity for why a small buffer refuses whole items.

Worth it for a fixed camp where fuel is at hand. Painful on the move.

Configuring. augment/projector.json, operations add_range and mul_capacity.

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Miser

What it does. Halves the running cost, and halves what the beacon can hold.

Augment tier	Fuel	Buffer
I	×0.55	×0.5
II	×0.4	×0.35

How to use it. Cheaper per second than Efficiency at the same tier, but the buffer penalty means topping up constantly and losing access to dense fuel. It is the augment for someone who has plenty of iron and no netherite.

Configuring. augment/miser.json, operations mul_fuel and mul_capacity.

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Reservoir

What it does. The opposite trade: an enormous buffer for a slightly higher bill.

Augment tier	Buffer	Fuel
I	×5	×1.2
II	×8	×1.35

How to use it. A Beacon IV with Reservoir II holds 288 000 units — days of running — and accepts any fuel however dense. The 35% surcharge is the price of never thinking about it again.

This is the augment that makes a beacon something you set up rather than something you tend.

Configuring. augment/reservoir.json, operations mul_capacity and mul_fuel.

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Herald

What it does. Reaches further up the sharing ladder than Attunement, and charges every second for it.

Augment tier	Aura ranks	Fuel
I	+2	×1.8
II	+3	×2.2

How to use it. Herald I takes a Beacon III or IV straight from Team to Allies and Pets — two ranks in one augment tier, where Attunement needs its own tier II for the same. So Herald is cheaper to craft and far more expensive to run.

The comparison is the point: Attunement is the patient choice, Herald the impatient one. On a Beacon II, which shares nothing on its own, Herald I unlocks Allies immediately.

Configuring. augment/herald.json, operations unlock_aura and mul_fuel. See Attunement for how ranks and aura_rank work.

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Crafting

Every augment is the same item — its identity comes from a component — so they all share a shape, and only the core changes.

Tier I — amethyst shards around the core:

 A
AMA      A = Amethyst Shard
 A       M = the core, see below

Tier II — amethyst blocks at the corners:

BAB
AMA      B = Amethyst Block
BAB

Tier III — eyes of ender replace the shards:

BEB
EME      E = Eye of Ender
BEB

Augment	Core	Highest tier
Range	Ender Pearl	III
Focus	Spyglass	I
Amplification	Glowstone	I
Efficiency	Block of Redstone	III
Capacity	Block of Gold	III
Attunement	Echo Shard	II
Discretion	Phantom Membrane	II
Overdrive	Blaze Powder	II
Projector	End Rod	II
Miser	Emerald	II
Reservoir	Block of Copper	II
Herald	Goat Horn	II

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Adding your own

An augment is one registered item plus a component pointing at a datapack registry entry, precisely so a datapack can introduce a new augment with no code at all.

// data/mypack/portablebeacons/augment/surveyor.json
{
  "max_tier": 2,
  "color": 5636095,
  "operations": [
    { "type": "add_range", "values": [2.0, 5.0] },
    { "type": "mul_fuel", "values": [0.9, 0.8] }
  ]
}

An augment may carry several operations, as above — nothing restricts an entry to one. The values list is indexed by augment tier and must hold at least max_tier entries.

The full list of operation types, and how to give your augment a name, a colour, a glyph and a recipe, is in the Datapack Guide.