Herobrine Sightings

A harmless, server side Herobrine prank for Paper. Every now and then a player spots Herobrine standing in the distance, just at the edge of their view. Look at him, walk towards him, or wait too long, and he is gone in a puff of smoke.

Only the targeted player sees him. No damage, no resource pack, no client mod, and by default no block changes. Perfect for Halloween, or just to keep your players wondering.

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✨ Features

• 👁️ Sightings: Herobrine appears 30 to 50 blocks away, 45 to 70 degrees off the player's view direction, and vanishes when looked at, approached, or after a timeout.
• 🔒 Per player and harmless: only the targeted player sees him. He is a vanilla Mannequin entity with no AI, collision or gravity, and nothing is saved to the world.
• 🔊 Spooky sounds: footsteps sneaking up behind you, a door opening and closing, cave ambience, a fake "Herobrine joined the game" in one player's chat, breathing right behind you, a chest opening nearby, distant mining, a low far-away moan, breaking glass, someone building behind you, and soul sand valley mood. Each sound has its own toggle.
• 🎃 Halloween mode: all chances are multiplied between two dates (default Oct 25 to Nov 1).
• 🌩️ Event night: /herobrine event runs extra rolls with a higher chance for a set time, with an optional broadcast, night and thunderstorm.
• 🙈 Opt out: any player can use /herobrine optout. This is saved across restarts.
• 🧱 World traces (optional, off by default): 2x2 tunnels, leafless trees, small sand pyramids and torch messages. See World traces below.
• 🎨 Classic skin: the signed _Herobrine texture is built in, or set any Mojang username.

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💬 Commands

All commands need herobrine.admin, except optout.

Command	Description
/herobrine spawn <player>	Make him appear for a player now
/herobrine spawnat <player> <x> <y> <z>	Place him at an exact spot for a player
/herobrine sound <player> [type]	Play a spooky sound for a player now
/herobrine event [start [minutes]|stop|status]	Start, stop or check an event night
/herobrine toggle	Turn random appearances on or off
/herobrine status	Show state and active apparitions
/herobrine clear	Remove all active apparitions
/herobrine reload	Reload config.yml
/herobrine traces list	List world traces with id and coordinates
/herobrine traces undo <id>	Restore the original blocks of one trace
/herobrine traces undoall	Restore all traces
/herobrine traces place <player> [type]	Test: place a trace near a player (safety checks still apply)
/herobrine optout	Opt out of (or back into) Herobrine

🔑 Permissions

Permission	Default	Description
herobrine.admin	op	All admin commands
herobrine.optout	everyone	Use /herobrine optout

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⚙️ How it works

• Every check-interval-seconds (default 600), each eligible player (survival, alive, allowed world, not excluded, not opted out) gets a roll with probability chance (default 0.05).
• night-or-cave-multiplier can boost the chance at night or in dark spots. Set only-night-or-cave: true to limit him to those.
• After a sighting the player gets a cooldown (player-cooldown-seconds, default 900).
• He vanishes when the player looks within look-angle degrees of him (with line of sight), comes closer than vanish-distance, or after timeout-seconds.

🛠️ Configuration

The main options (defaults shown):

enabled: true
check-interval-seconds: 600
chance: 0.05
night-or-cave-multiplier: 1.0
only-night-or-cave: false
player-cooldown-seconds: 900
min-distance: 30
max-distance: 50
vanish-distance: 15
look-angle: 5.0
timeout-seconds: 60
worlds: []            # empty = all worlds
excluded-players: []
skin-name: ''         # empty = built in _Herobrine skin

sounds:
  enabled: true
  chance: 0.05
  footsteps: true
  door: true
  cave: true
  fake-join: true
  breathing: true
  chest: true
  mining: true
  moan: true
  glass: true
  building: true
  mood: true

halloween:
  enabled: true
  start: "10-25"
  end: "11-01"
  chance-multiplier: 2.0

event:
  duration-minutes: 60
  chance-multiplier: 5.0
  set-night: false
  thunder: false

traces:
  enabled: false      # world traces are OFF by default

The full config with every option and comment is generated on first start in plugins/Herobrine/config.yml.

🧱 World traces (off by default)

Traces are the only feature that changes blocks, so they have their own toggle (traces.enabled, default false) and every type can be switched off separately.

• Placed only far from players, far from spawn, in rarely visited chunks, and never near player made blocks (chests, beds, planks, rails and more).
• Every trace is logged to the console and to plugins/Herobrine/traces.log.
• The original blocks are stored, so /herobrine traces undo <id> or undoall restores everything exactly.
• Claim plugins (WorldGuard, GriefPrevention) are not checked. The distance and block checks are the protection.

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✅ Compatibility

Tested	Paper 26.3 (Java 25)
Untested	Purpur and other Paper forks
Not supported	Folia, Spigot/Bukkit
Bedrock	Works with Geyser and Floodgate (Bedrock players get the skin)
Client	Nothing to install, fully server side

📦 Installation

1. Download the jar and put it in your plugins/ folder.
2. Restart the server.
3. Edit plugins/Herobrine/config.yml and run /herobrine reload.

Updating from 1.0: your existing config keeps working. New options use their defaults, and traces stay off.

🐞 Support

Found a bug or have an idea? Open an issue on GitHub.

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_{MIT licensed. Not affiliated with Mojang or Microsoft.}