Vanishing Ground

Vanishing Ground is a Fabric mod for Minecraft 26.2 that turns ordinary ground into part of the challenge. Blocks stay in place while players stand on them and can disappear when the last player leaves.

It is made for parkour courses, challenge maps, survival challenges, and multiplayer worlds where every step matters. It stays off until you enable it, so installing it does not change an existing world by itself.

Gameplay Sample

This gameplay sample shows the mod in action:

How It Works

The mod checks which block is supporting each player and uses Minecraft collision shapes for that. Slabs, stairs, carpets, fences, snow layers, trapdoors, and other partial blocks are handled the same way vanilla handles landing.

A block is removed only when no tracked player is standing on it. Several players can share one block. It stays until the last player leaves.

Removal can happen immediately or after a delay. If anyone steps back onto the block during the delay, the removal is cancelled. The same position is only queued once.

Jumping in the air keeps the last support block, so a jump in place does not delete the floor. Landing on a different block still vacates the previous one.

Spectators are never tracked. By default, Creative players are also ignored, so building in singleplayer or on a shared server stays safe. Swimming, Elytra flight, flying, and riding a vehicle do not count as standing on a block. Death, respawn, dimension change, and disconnect clear tracking without removing a block.

Protection

Bedrock, Nether portals, End portals, and End gateways cannot vanish.

Fluids and blocks with block entities such as chests and furnaces are protected by default.

The shipped #vanishingground:protected tag also covers command blocks, structure blocks, spawners, barriers, chests, and similar blocks you almost never want deleted.

You can extend or replace the tags with a data pack:

• data/vanishingground/tags/block/protected.json used in blacklist mode
• data/vanishingground/tags/block/vanishing.json used in whitelist mode

Whitelist mode is the safer choice on mixed survival or adventure worlds: nothing vanishes unless you opt that block in.

Configuration

The mod is disabled by default. The config file is created on first launch at config/vanishingground.json.

{
  "enabled": false,
  "delayTicks": 0,
  "warningTicks": 0,
  "destroyFluids": false,
  "destroyBlockEntities": false,
  "blockSelectionMode": "BLACKLIST",
  "removalMode": "VANISH",
  "restoreTicks": 40,
  "allowedDimensions": [],
  "affectCreative": false,
  "sneakProtects": false,
  "vacateWhenFlyingOrMounted": false,
  "immunePlayers": []
}

Set enabled to true, or use /vg enable.

Config files from 1.0.x and 1.1.0 are upgraded on load. Command changes are saved immediately.

Commands

All commands need Gamemaster permissions (level 2).

/vg is a short alias of /vanishingground.

/vg help
/vg enable
/vg disable
/vg status
/vg debug

Timing

/vg delay <ticks>
/vg warning <ticks>
/vg restore <ticks>

delay 0 removes a vacated block immediately. delay 20 waits about one second. warning shows particles and a short sound before a delayed removal. restore only applies when removal mode is restore.

What may vanish

/vg fluids allow
/vg fluids protect
/vg block_entities allow
/vg block_entities protect
/vg mode blacklist
/vg mode whitelist
/vg removalmode vanish
/vg removalmode restore

• blacklist: every solid block can vanish unless it is hard-protected or tagged #vanishingground:protected
• whitelist: only blocks tagged #vanishingground:vanishing can vanish
• vanish: the block is gone for good
• restore: the block comes back after the restore delay if the spot is still air and empty

Where and who

/vg dimensions add minecraft:overworld
/vg dimensions remove minecraft:overworld
/vg dimensions clear
/vg dimensions list
/vg creative ignore
/vg creative affect
/vg sneak protect
/vg sneak normal
/vg flyleave keep
/vg flyleave vanish
/vg immune add <onlinePlayer>
/vg immune remove <onlinePlayer>
/vg immune clear
/vg immune list

An empty dimension list means every dimension. Restrict it if the mechanic should only run in a parkour world.

sneak protect keeps the block you step off while sneaking. flyleave keep (default) does not treat takeoff or mounting as walking away.

Immune players must be online when added or removed.

Presets

/vg preset parkour
/vg preset challenge
/vg preset safe

• parkour: enables the mod in whitelist mode with a short delay, a warning, and restore
• challenge: enables the mod in blacklist mode with instant vanish, including Creative
• safe: whitelist, restore, sneak protect, left disabled until you turn it on

Use /vg status after a preset to review the result.

Installation

You need:

• Minecraft 26.3
• Fabric Loader
• Fabric API 0.159.0+26.2
• Java 25

Put the mod JAR in the mods folder of your Fabric installation.

Project Status

Vanishing Ground is a small project. The code is available if you want to make a challenge map, change the rules, fix bugs, or update it for a newer Minecraft version.

Development

From the project root:

./gradlew build

The compiled JAR files are placed in build/libs/.

Changelog

1.3.0

• Ported to Minecraft 26.3 with Fabric API 0.161.0+26.3.
• Loader remains 0.19.5. Java 25 is still required.

1.2.0

• Added /vg as a short alias and /vg help.
• Added presets: parkour, challenge, safe.
• Creative players are ignored by default.
• Added sneak-protect, fly/mount leave behaviour, and an immune player list.
• Pending removals and restores are deduplicated per position.
• Pending removals are dropped when the mod is disabled.
• Chunk-loaded checks before world edits.
• Support positions now store an immutable block position.
• Default protected and vanishing block tags ship with starter entries.
• Config files from 1.1.0 gain the new fields automatically.

1.1.0

• Added blacklist and whitelist block selection.
• Added #vanishingground:vanishing for whitelist mode.
• Added restore mode so vanished blocks can reappear.
• Added a warning before delayed removal.
• Added dimension filtering.
• Added /vanishingground debug.
• Added unit tests and a GitHub Actions build.

1.0.1

• Added in-game commands for configuring Vanishing Ground.
• Added enable, disable, status, delay, fluids, and block entity commands.
• Command changes are saved automatically.

1.0.0

• Initial release.

License

Vanishing Ground is licensed under the MIT License.

Source code: https://github.com/Zurret/vanishing-ground