Abilities

Bosses fight back with abilities: sixteen shared ones, one of each boss type’s own, and a second phase for strong bosses. This page lists them and explains when they fire.

When a boss casts

1. A player, their pet, or a golem hits the boss.
2. The boss picks a random ability among those its class has reached the level for.
3. It casts once the shared cooldown (5 seconds) and that ability’s own cooldown have passed. A random stretch keeps the timing from showing a pattern.
4. Everyone fighting the boss sees the warning over the hotbar (broadcast.abilities_in).

Abilities hurt players in survival and adventure, and the pets and golems that hit the boss in the last 15 seconds. The boss’s own minions, other pets, and villagers stay out of it. Aimed abilities go for the players the boss fights: the one it chases, the one whose hit set the ability off, then everyone who hit it in the last 30 seconds, nearest first. A bystander who never joined the fight is never their target. Abilities change blocks only where claims and regions allow it, and temporary blocks, like cobwebs, go back when they expire, when the server stops, or, after a crash, on the next start.

Shared abilities

Each class unlocks them at its own boss levels, set in ability_thresholds in classes.yml. The table shows the first level for a Mythic boss and for a Common one.

Ability	What it does	Mythic from	Common from
Lightning	A bolt on every player the boss fights, however far, the rest around them, 15% of them right into a player, up to three each; a lightning rod or copper next to a player draws that player’s bolts. Half the bolts set the ground alight for 8 seconds, never within 6 blocks of a claim (lightning_aimed, lightning_fire)	5	28
Summoning	Calls minions, up to 12 alive at a time	12	34
Regeneration	Regeneration and resistance; clears its bad effects, burns arrows in its aura, slows players near it	18	45
Fire ring	Fire around each player the boss fights, up to four, however far: on the ground, next to grass and trees, and on water as flames that burn whoever wades through (fire_ring_near). Never next to a house; a ring with room for less than a third of its fire doesn’t burn	10	35
Web ring	Cobwebs around the player the boss fights, however far, and slowness inside	14	38
Teleport strike	A teleport behind you	30	70
Meteor shower	Waves of burning blocks over the player the boss fights, however far	25	67
Arrow arc (ring of arrows)	Rings of arrows out of the boss in every direction, some with bad effects; a boss high over the fight aims them down at the ground around it. An archer’s own aimed volley is the fan that flies at you	10	30
Arrow rain	Waves of arrows falling on a square around the player the boss fights, however far	30	75
Shockwave	A slam that hurts and throws back the players around it	15	40
Frost nova	Players around it freeze, as in powder snow; leather armor keeps it off	25	55
Grapple	Yanks the farthest player it fights and can see toward itself, off a pillar or across a ravine	20	50
Obelisk	An end crystal that heals the boss until a player breaks it with a few hits	35	80
Chain	Chains an archer who keeps away and hauls them in like a rope: past 8 blocks, shorter as it goes, it pulls in heaves and hurts once a second; a sprint between heaves gains ground. Three melee blows break it	8	18
Doubles	The boss vanishes in smoke and comes back among copies; a copy falls to one hit	25	65
Blindness	Ink and a warning, then a second later blindness on every player in the fight within 10–16 blocks, for 3–11 seconds by level; run 8 blocks past the radius and it lifts early	15	45
Enrage	Once, below 30% health: strength and speed until it dies	15	60

Each ability’s switch, cooldown, and numbers by level live in abilities.yml.

Each boss type’s own

On top of the shared ones, every boss type has a signature ability. A Mythic boss gets it from level 1, a Common one from level 20 (signature in classes.yml).

Ability	Boss types	What it does
Potion volley	witch	Splash potions at the players it fights near it
Fireball barrage	blaze	Small fireballs that burn players, not blocks
Aimed volley	skeleton, stray, bogged, pillager	A fan of arrows at the player it fights
Pounce	spider, cave spider	A leap and a bite: slowness, or poison from a cave spider
Swap	enderman	Trades places with the player it fights, blinding them
Trident storm	drowned	Tridents nobody can pick up
Fang line	evoker	A line of fangs along the ground
Whirlwind	vindicator, piglin brute	A spin that hits and throws back players close by
Wither aura	wither skeleton	A withering cloud
Sandstorm	husk	Blindness and hunger
Infection	zombie, zombie villager	Hunger, weakness, and nausea
Wind burst	breeze	Wind charges: knockback, no broken blocks
War cry	piglin	Strength and speed for it and the piglins around
Terror	phantom	Darkness and a moment of blindness
Phase	vex	Invisibility and speed for a few seconds
Stampede	ravager, hoglin	A charge that tramples whoever stands at its end
Curse	guardian	The elder guardian’s mining fatigue for players in sight
Fuse	creeper	Speed and resistance for a few seconds

signature in abilities.yml turns each one on or off, sets its cooldown and strength, and lists its boss types.

The second phase

At half health, a boss of level 40 or higher turns:

1. It can’t be hurt for 3 seconds.
2. It throws everyone back.
3. It casts an ability at once.
4. Until it dies, its cooldowns shrink to 65%.

phase_two in abilities.yml holds these numbers. The second phase doesn’t depend on the class.

Next: Minions