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Taming & Interaction

Taming

Horses need to be tamed in order to be interacted with, until that time a player cannot:

  • Brush or interact with desensitization items to gain affinity
  • Access the inventory of a horse (GUI)
  • Equip any accessories or tack
  • Ride the horse

To tame a 'wild' horse you must ride it until it no longer refuses the attempts. A horse will either rear or buck when refusing an attempt to tame them; throwing the player off in the process. Rearing is harmless, whereas bucking can cause significant damage to both player and nearby entities if within their damage radius.

If successfully tamed after one or more riding attempts, the horse will emit hearty particles and the horse inventory will become accessible (E) to equip tack.

A frightened and bucking horse can harm nearby entities and players. Horses may kick back if harmed, which can initiate a fatal 'kick-off'. It is recommended you tame wild horses in a controlled area such as an (unoccupied) arena or round-pen.

Horse Info & Inventory

Once tamed, a horse has a unique inventory, needs and skills that were previously not available when untamed - an overview of these can be seen in the Horse Inventory. Access this GUI by shift + right clicking the horse with an empty hand, or press (E) while mounted to see important information on a horse's status and well-being:

  • [1] Name - Set by using a nametag on a horse. If the horse is not named, it will specify 'SWEM Horse'
  • [2] Owner - The name of the player that tamed or currently owns the horse. Changes if transferred to a new owner.
  • [3] Jump Level (I-V) and experience points towards that level
  • [4] Speed Level (I-V) and experience points towards that level
  • [5] Health Level (I-V) and current / maximum health or hitpoints (HP)
  • [6] Affinity Level (Unwilling to Bonded) and experience points towards that level
  • [7] Tack slots - Hover over each slot to see what it accepts or equip tack in slots
  • [8] Tracker Status - Red indicator (untracked) or green indicator (connected to a tracker)
  • [9] Food Status - An indicator of a horse's feed status from starving (empty) to fully fed (full)
  • [10] Thirst Status - An indicator of a horse's water status from exsiccosis (empty) to quenched (full)
  • [11] Trust Status - An interactive button that changes a horse's trust setting from All > Trust > None 

GUI info.png

Shown: Horse Inventory GUI displaying current stats, skills, status and equipment.

Trust

On Multiplayer servers, it is strongly recommended to set personal horses to Trust or None.

There are three trust levels for Horses that can be toggled by the owner in the Horse Inventory. Trust is a setting that determines what access other players can have to your horse, from full (relatively) unrestricted access, all the way to not being able to interact with the horse at all.

Trust Level Restrictions
All Anyone can ride and interact with this horse.
Trust Only rider(s) who were added as trusted via a command can ride and interact with this horse.
None Only the owner can ride and interact with this horse.

Staff with the Moderator key perm will be able to override Trust or None settings on Multiplayer servers.

Health & Healing

Some healing items listed are now in SWPM. This light-weight Quality of Life mod pairs well with SWEM.

Horses may take damage when faced with hostile mobs attacking a player, negative splash potion or magic effects, harmful plants like cactus and sweet berry, attacks from other horses (kicking), falling from a great height etc. When harmed, they will lose health points and require healing. Health will regenerate slowly over time unless the horse is missing any meals or drinks (1.18.2-1.2.8+) - during that time they are incredibly vulnerable to damage or even death as their current and maximum health values decrease.

  • Bandage image.png
  • Salve image.png image.png
  • Medicated Bandage image.png image.png image.png
  • Glistening Melon image.png image.png image.png image.png image.png
  • Fly Spray: 15 seconds of healing
  • Splash Potion of Healing 

Brushing

Brush a horse each day to increase the affinity (bond) experience. Brushing is not a requirement and has no negative debuffs for neglecting to brush them regularly. It is a small quality of life feature to help players bond with their horses and undertake highly requested realistic care tasks such as grooming. More expansive grooming mechanics will be implemented in later releases.

Sleep (1.18.2-1.2.8+)

Horses sleep every night from 9PM-6AM. Sleep is not currently a requirement and has no negative debuffs if they are unable to do so. Sleeping each night gives a horse an opportunity to lie down for realism and to take a break from eating. This is a good time to check the needs and general wellbeing of your horses with the Vet Bag before turning in for the night. 

  • Horses can sleep with a halter or pasture blanket
  • Horses will not sleep when wearing a bridle, but will lie down and sleep with other tack
  • Horses can be woken up from sleep by equipping a bridle

Other

Horse pee and poo is a configurable value - if it is disabled none of your horses will excrete waste.

Pee & Poo
Horses pee and poop approximately every 25-30 minutes provided they are not starving or critically dehydrated. This waste will need cleaning from stalls, pastures or around the property. Waste products (currently) have no negative effect on horse health. 

Welfare Standards
The use of welfare standards for horses in stall and pasture sizing, doorway and walkway height is encouraged. Currently these standards - or lack of them - do not have any effect on the horse so are optional in singleplayer games or non-SWEM servers. In our official SWE and VIP servers these standards of care and accommodation are considered mandatory for all players.

Known Issues

If you find an issue, please report it to our bugs channel on Discord. We ask that you look to see if your issue was reported first!

  • [-] Sleeping horses do not react to taking harm
  • [-] Sleeping horses will go to sleep where they stand, even if that means lying down semi-floating, in water etc.
  • [~] Foals cannot be led or name-tagged in multiplayer unless the player holds an enhanced key.

Changelog

View Changes

This is not a complete list of version changes / fixes. It is a changelog of relevant wiki-related version information.

MC Version Release Notes
1.18.2
 1.18.2-1.3.0 [Beta]
 Must own the horse to use breeding tokens - cannot breed foals from others' horses without the owner present and consenting if tokens are enabled.
Fly spray added as a healing item for horses.
Horses avoid dangers such as cactus, sweet berries, magma and lava. 
1.18.2-1.2.8
 Must own the horse to add or remove trusted players via commands.
Horses sleep at night between 9PM and 6AM.
[Bug Fix] Horses should pee on servers + decreased default frequency (config).
1.16.5 1.16.5-0.5.3.20

[Deprecated Information]

Horses pee roughly every 15 minutes when their chunk is loaded. 

Horses poo roughly every 16 minutes when their chunk is loaded. 
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