Elder Guardian

The Elder Guardian is a mini-boss mob which only spawns underwater in ocean monuments. It is a stronger variant of the Guardian.

Spawning
Three Elder Guardians spawn naturally during the generation of each ocean monument. They will not respawn after their initial spawn, thus there are a limited amount of them per world. Elder Guardians spawned with monuments do not naturally despawn, although they will be removed along with other hostile mobs in peaceful difficulty. They do not have a spawn egg and thus can only be spawned through commands or natural generation.

Drops
The Elder Guardian drops 0 to 1 prismarine crystals, 0 to 2 prismarine shards, and 0 to 1 raw fish. If killed by the player, it also drops a single wet sponge.

The Elder Guardian has a 2.5% chance of dropping a rare drop when killed by the player. The chance of which fish you get is identical to catching fish: 60% chance for raw fish, 25% chance for raw salmon, 2% chance for clownfish, and 13% chance for pufferfish.

Looting increases the maximum prismarine shard drop by one per level. The chance of getting a raw fish drop is 50% with Looting I (2/4), 60% with Looting II (3/5), and 67% with Looting III (4/6). The chance of getting a rare drop is also increased by 0.5% per level.

The prismarine crystals drop will only happen if the common raw fish drop fails, with the same chances as the raw fish drop. This works out to a base chance of 22% (2/9), Looting I giving 25% (4/16), Looting II dropping down to 24% (6/25), and Looting III giving 22% (8/36), or the same as the base chance.

Behavior
Elder Guardians do not swim around as much as normal Guardians, but otherwise act the same as regular Guardians both in water and on land. Elder Guardians will swim away when approached by a player it is targeting. Like normal Guardians, Elder Guardians will attempt to attack both the player and squids.

The Elder Guardians' eye follows and stares at any nearby players, and always looks directly at its target. The eye still follows a completely unarmored player under the effects of a Potion of Invisibility, but the Elder Guardian won't attack them. However, Elder Guardians still attack squids under that same status effect.

Combat
The Elder Guardian has several methods of attack, including firing its laser, inflicting mining fatigue, and a defensive thorn-like attack.

The laser takes several seconds to charge, doing no damage in the meantime, and changing from purple to bright yellow. Once charged, the beam abruptly ends and deals damage in Normal difficulty. The Elder Guardian will swim around for a few seconds before firing again. If the target comes near the Elder Guardian while it is firing its beam, it will stop firing and swim away until it is at a comfortable range, at which point it will continue attacking. The beam cannot be dodged, and has a maximum range of approximately 14 blocks. Once the player is out of range, or if the beam is obstructed by solid blocks, the Guardian's beam will disengage from the player, and deal no damage.

Once each minute, the Elder Guardian will search for players in a 50-block radius who are not afflicted with Mining Fatigue III for a minute or longer. The players found will be inflicted with Mining Fatigue III for 5 minutes, and a ghostly image of the Elder Guardian will appear to the player, accompanied with a ghastly noise. Drinking milk cures players of the status effect.

The Elder Guardian will deal of damage every time it is hit when its spikes are extended. If cornered, the Elder Guardian will usually extend its spikes and fire at the player, even at point blank range.

Trivia

 * The Elder Guardian's eye is actually the "head" part of the mob's model, giving the illusion of a dynamic eye.

Gallery
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