Dread Hound

Dread Hound
Mod	Born in Chaos
Type	Hostile
Health	17 ♥×8.5
Attack damage	5
Armor	0.5
Speed	0.34
Follow range	18
Knockback resist.	0.1
Size	0.9 × 1 blocks
XP dropped	8
Spawns in	283 biomes
Category	Monster
ID	born_in_chaos_v1:dread_hound

The Dread Hound is a hostile mob added by Born in Chaos. It is a wolf-like hunter that appears in packs of three to five and attacks players on sight, along with several skeleton-type mobs. Dread Hounds spawn in dark overworld areas such as caves and unlit ground at night, so they are a common threat to players who explore underground or travel after dark. They also make up the population of the Mound of Hounds desert structure.

Spawning

Dread Hounds spawn in packs of 3 to 5 from a biome spawn entry that applies to every biome. The entry is an any-biome modifier, so the mob can appear in 283 biomes. The spawn data is shown in the table below.

Each spawn attempt is also checked against a light rule that is stricter than vanilla monster spawning. A position qualifies only when one of the following is true:

• The block above the position can see the sky, and the brightest local light is 4 or lower.
• The block above cannot see the sky, and the brightest local light is 0.

Dread Hounds never spawn in the Deep Dark or Mushroom Fields biomes, and they spawn only in the Overworld. The check accepts overworld-tagged biomes and the Terralith biomes. The gamerule dreadHoundSpawn (default on) controls natural spawning; setting it to false stops Dread Hounds from spawning naturally.

Because the rule depends on light, Dread Hounds are most likely to appear in caves, underground areas, and dark forests and plains at night. They are rare in lit areas during the day.

In Fear Nightfall, Born in Chaos spawn weights were halved to reduce competition with vanilla monsters, so Dread Hounds appear less often than the mod's defaults would produce.

Mound of Hounds

The Mound of Hounds is a desert structure that places Dread Hounds. Its structure set uses random spread placement with a spacing of 50 chunks and a separation of 3 chunks.

Behavior

The Dread Hound is a melee monster with 17 health (8.5 hearts), 5 base attack damage, 0.5 base armour, and a movement speed of 0.34. Its follow range is 18 blocks. It gives 8 experience points when killed.

When it has no target, the hound wanders at 0.8 times its movement speed, looks around, and floats in water. When it has a target in reach and in line of sight, it attacks at full speed.

Its targets, in order of priority, are:

1. Players. The hound targets the nearest player without needing line of sight.
2. Attackers. A hound that is hit by a mob or player targets that attacker.
3. Skeleton-type mobs. The hound also targets the pack's skeleton mobs, including Baby Skeleton, Bone Imp, Bonescaller, Decrepit Skeleton, Skeleton Thrasher, Siamese Skeletons and Spirit Guide. It also targets the vanilla skeleton and wither skeleton. Hounds therefore fight the pack's undead as well as players.

Dog Truce

A player can stop a Dread Hound from targeting players by right-clicking it while holding a Bone or a Shattered Skull. The item is consumed, and the hound receives the Dog Truce effect for 4200 ticks (3 minutes 30 seconds). While the effect is active, the hound does not target players. It still targets the skeleton-type mobs listed above and still fights back when hit. Dog Truce does not tame the hound.

Attack effects

When a Dread Hound damages an undead mob, the victim receives the Block Break effect for 5 seconds. If the victim is a player holding a shield, that shield is put on a 5-second cooldown. The hound itself receives Strength III for the same 5 seconds. The same effects apply to attacks by the not-despawning variant and by Dire Hound Leaders.

Drops

A Dread Hound drops the following items on death:

• Monster Skin: either 0 or 1, with an equal chance of each.
• Monster Flesh or Gnawed Bones: exactly one of the two is dropped. Monster Flesh has an 80% chance and Gnawed Bones have a 20% chance.

The full loot list is shown in the table below.

Dread Hound

Item	Amount	Conditions
Monster Skin	x0.0-1.0
Monster Flesh	x1.0-1.0
Gnawed Bones	x1.0-1.0

Variants

The Dread Hound has a second entity, the not-despawning variant, which has the same stats and behaviour but is persistent.

Dread Hound

This is the variant that spawns naturally in the biomes listed above and in the Mound of Hounds. It can despawn like other hostile mobs when no player is nearby.

Not Despawning Dread Hound

This variant is always persistent. It is never removed because a player is far away. It has no natural biome spawn entry, so it appears when a structure places it or when it is summoned with its spawn egg. Its death drop always includes one Monster Skin, and it uses the same Monster Flesh and Gnawed Bones roll as the normal variant.

Tips

• Light sources prevent spawning in the area they cover. A position is safe from natural spawns when the light there is above the threshold described under Spawning, so lighting caves and forest edges at night keeps hounds away.
• Hounds come in packs of up to five. Fight them in a narrow tunnel or doorway so that only one or two can reach you at a time.
• To walk past a pack, right-click each hound with a Bone or Shattered Skull to start a Dog Truce. The truce lasts 3 minutes 30 seconds and applies to one hound at a time.
• Hounds attack nearby skeleton-type mobs, so a fight with a skeleton pack can draw them away. A hound under Dog Truce will still attack those mobs.
• The not-despawning variant stays where it spawns. Plan to defeat it in a fight, because it will not leave on its own.