Butchering

Butchering is the process of turning a killed mob into raw and cooked meat, organs, skins and trophies. It is added by the Butchery mod (version 5.3.1). Killing most mobs with a cleaver or an enchanted weapon leaves a physical carcass block item at the death position instead of only the vanilla drops. The carcass is then hung on a Hook, bled, drained and cut up on a butcher's table or with a knife. Butchering changes death drops, food and several vanilla tags, so it is a central part of the pack's food and loot economy and not an optional add-on.

Obtaining carcasses

Each supported mob has a Carcass block item. Supported mobs include cows, pigs, sheep, chickens, horses, llamas, cats, wolves, foxes, rabbits, goats, camels, frogs, axolotls, squids, fish, turtles, creepers, slimes, skeleton and zombie families, pillagers, vindicators, evokers, witches, villagers, iron golems, wardens, withers and the Ender Dragon. Most mobs have a carcass toggle in the configuration, and all of them are enabled by default.

By default, a carcass drops only when the killer holds a cleaver in the main hand, or when the killer's main-hand weapon has the Butcher's Touch or Hunter enchantment. Butcher's Touch applies to melee weapons. Hunter applies to bows and crossbows. The Only Cleavers Drop Carcasses option turns this requirement off, so every kill of a supported mob drops a carcass. Baby mobs do not drop carcasses.

When a carcass drops, the mod removes nearby vanilla food and material drops of the same kind, such as beef, porkchop, leather, rotten flesh and bone. The removal happens within a radius of 4 blocks in Fear Nightfall. The unmodified mod uses 20 blocks. The carcass replaces those vanilla drops. Items dropped by other sources within the radius are removed as well.

Killing a player with a cleaver, or with a weapon that has Butcher's Touch, leaves a Player Corpse item named after the player. Player Corpse items carry the player's name and UUID.

The Ender Dragon does not drop a carcass. Its death spawns a Dragon mob. The Dragon discards itself once there is a solid block beneath it, and places an Ender Dragon Carcass in its place. The dragon's bones, scales and meat come from this carcass. See Dragon Scale and Special Bones and Bone Meal.

Hanging and bleeding

A carcass is placed on a Hook and hung. A knife or cleaver used on a hung carcass starts it bleeding. Bleeding lasts 900 ticks (45 seconds). The blood fills a Blood Grate placed below the carcass. If no grate is present and the Blood Puddle option is enabled (the default), a Blood Puddle block forms instead. The Blood Spread option, which is also on by default, lets blood spread across nearby blocks. The Instant Bleeding option, which is off by default, skips the 45-second wait and converts the carcass immediately.

When bleeding finishes, the carcass becomes a Drained carcass. Drained carcasses are the input for cut-up. Blood is a fluid with source and flowing forms. Blood can be collected in bottles and buckets only when the Vampirism mod is installed.

Cutting up

A drained carcass on a Hook is cut up by a main-hand right-click with a cleaver or skinning knife. Cut-up uses a loot table for each mob. The results are raw and cooked cuts of meat, organs, skins and heads. For the cuts that each mob yields, see Butchery Meats and Organs. Looting applies to cut-up drops when the Looting Enchantment option is on, which it is by default. The Organs option, also on by default, adds organ drops to cut-ups.

The Butchery Workstations include the Meat Grinder, Wooden Spit Rotisserie and Freezer. The Taxidermy Table makes head mounts from heads. See Butchery Workstations and Taxidermy.

Tool tiers come in copper, iron, gold, diamond, netherite and bone. The cleaver is the main carcass tool. The skinning knife handles hides. The hammer and hacksaw work as pickaxe and axe equivalents. See Butchery Tools.

Skins and leather

A skin is placed on a Skin Rack to dry. Drying takes 1800 ticks by default. The rack then gives leather, with a default yield of 2 per retrieval. The Skin Rack is covered in Skins, Furs and Pelts.

Salt, sulfur and Blood

The Basin produces salt on a timer. Each cycle yields one salt by default, controlled by the Salt Basin Yield option. The code comment states that the standard yield is 5. Salt blocks and salt formations generate in surface water. Sulfur ore generates underground in every overworld biome, in two vein types. Sulfuric Acid is one of the mod's brewing recipes. See Salt (Butchery) and Sulfur.

Animal Fat is a furnace fuel with a burn time of 650 ticks. See Butchery Meats.

Magic Wishbone and Wishbones

Chicken carcasses sometimes drop a Wishbone, with a default chance of 0.25. Breaking a Magic Wishbone produces one of 23 random outcomes. The outcomes include TNT, zombie swarms, silverfish, a skeleton, a cave spider, and small structure traps. Some outcomes apply Poison, Hunger, Levitation, Fire Resistance, or a short blessing of Strength, Haste, Regeneration, Water Breathing or Luck. The Magic Wishbone option controls whether these outcomes happen. See Wishbones.

Dangers and horror interactions

Zombies, husks, drowned and zombified piglins all gain a goal that makes them attack Brain blocks within 4 blocks. The Withered Heart and Pillager Friend effect gives a 5% chance on each hit taken to apply Regeneration III and Damage Resistance for 120 seconds. See Withered Heart and Pillager Friend. The Vindicator Butcher's House is a surface structure that spawns in birch forests, dark forests, plains, savannas, swamps and wooded badlands.

Fear Nightfall changes

• The vanilla-drop removal radius was reduced from 20 blocks to 4 blocks, so a carcass kill no longer deletes unrelated food drops nearby.
• Butchery structures and loot are part of the pack's chest mapping. The mod's end city and ancient city chest loot is kept, and modded loot is added on top.

Tips

• Carry a cleaver or a weapon with Butcher's Touch before killing animals if you want carcasses. Without one, the mob drops only its vanilla loot.
• Bleed carcasses over a Blood Grate if you want to collect blood for Vampirism.
• Hang carcasses on a Hook before cutting, since cut-up requires a hung drained carcass.
• Keep the Looting enchantment on your cleaver to get more cut-up drops.