Spider Jockey

Spider jockeys are the rare appearance of a spider or cave spider being ridden by a skeleton, stray, wither skeleton, or baby zombie variants.

Spiders and skeletons
There is a 1% chance for a spider to spawn with a skeleton riding it, forming a spider jockey. In the Nether, a spider (spawned with a spawn egg, commands or spawners, since these do not naturally spawn there) has a 0.8% chance to spawn a wither skeleton on its back and form a spider jockey. In snowy biomes, a spider has a 0.8% to spawn a stray on its back and form a stray spider jockey instead.

On Hard difficulty, spiders have a chance (depending on regional difficulty) of spawning with a single beneficial status effect. This effect can be Speed (40%), Strength (20%), Regeneration (20%) or Invisibility (20%), and has an essentially infinite duration.

Spider jockeys spawned in narrow enclosures can cause the skeleton rider to die of suffocation, due to the spider scaling the walls. They can also spawn in a 1 high space with a transparent block above, so the skeleton is stuck in the transparent block.



Using the summon command: yields a spider jockey.

Bedrock Edition
A cave spider can spawn as a jockey, just as a spider can. If either type of spider is spawned in the Nether and occurs as a jockey, it has an 80% chance for its skeleton rider to be a wither skeleton. If cave spider is spawned in a snowy biome with a view of the sky, and occurs as a jockey, it has an 80% chance for its skeleton rider to be a stray.

Baby zombie variants can mount spiders and cave spiders. Specifically, baby zombie variants have a 15% chance to want to be a jockey, and if they do, then upon nearing the player and before attacking, they check for one of the following and mount it: adult zombies, chickens, sheep, cows, pigs, llamas, ocelots, foxes, pandas, mooshrooms, untamed cats, untamed wolves, horses and variants, spiders and cave spiders

Drops
The skeleton and the spider each have separate drops when that part of the spider jockey is killed.

Their drops are no different than if the skeleton or spider were standing alone.

Behavior
The spider controls the movement, so a spider jockey wanders aimlessly in the day and pursues the player at night or in dimly lit areas when the spider is hunting. The two creatures attack and take damage individually (i.e. if the spider is killed, the skeleton continues to attack and move, and vice-versa). The skeleton dismounts if the spider pounces into water.

The skeleton turns and fires at any player in its line of sight, no matter the time of day (although the skeleton burns in sunlight, leaving the spider unharmed). A spider jockey can attack two different players in multiplayer - this is caused by one player damaging one half of the spider jockey and not the other. If the skeleton shoots another hostile mob, the mob attacks the skeleton but not the spider being ridden, even after the skeleton is killed. If the skeleton on the spider jockey is shot by another skeleton, it dismounts and leaves the spider to engage the skeleton that shot it.

A spider jockey can kill itself. Sometimes the skeleton's arrow injures the spider and the spider retaliates. Sometimes the spider's pouncing can run the skeleton into its own arrow.

When a spider jockey rides a minecart, the minecart automatically accelerates, along with the spider's legs moving as if it was walking.

Data values
A spider jockey spawns as two separate entities. The spider and skeleton's IDs nor the entity data are any different than if the skeleton or spider were standing alone.