Village



NPC Villages are groups of buildings inhabited by non-player characters (NPCs)--Villager mobs that spawn naturally in the world. They only occur in the plains or desert biomes.

Structures
The buildings and structures that make up a village are:


 * Small Huts made of wooden logs, wooden planks, and cobblestone, with glass panes for windows. There seem to be three different types, one has a flat roof and on the roof a fenced off balcony with access provided by ladders; one with a lower pitched roof that does have a door, dirt floor, and a pressure plate and fence table; and finally one with a higher pitched roof that also has a door and dirt floor but lacks the table. The houses may or may not be inhabited upon the village spawning, and if there are villagers present in these huts, there is only one.


 * Houses, which are composed of the same materials listed above. However, they are much larger in size and are L-shaped. Two normal villagers always spawn in these houses.


 * Butcher Shops, which have a small seating area made of two wooden stairs and between them a pressure plate-on-fence table. Nearby is a double stone slab counter, probably for cutting meat. A fenced off backyard is located behind the building and is accessed through a door. The yard is also presumably for raising animals. A butcher villager with a white work apron and a normal villager, perhaps a customer, always spawn in butcher shops.


 * Libraries are longer and narrower than other buildings, and have a row of wooden stairs as a bench in front of two pressure plate-on-fence tables, with a row of bookshelves above. A crafting table is located in the corner. One librarian villager with a white robe always spawns in each library.


 * Wheat Farms, which can come in small and large varieties. The small farms contain four rows of crops of wheat. A row of water separates the four rows into two groups of two. Larger farms are essentially two small farms combined. The farms are bordered by wooden logs, and in large farms, a walkway of logs also runs down the middle. Farms often seem to spawn in clustered areas near many small huts, possibly suggesting the poorer villagers who reside in the huts work on the farms.


 * Wells, which are 2x2 pools filled with water, surrounded by cobblestone and having a small roof of cobblestone supported by fences. The wells are normally 10 blocks deep, but are only 4 blocks deep on Superflat worlds due to the low elevation. There is always one well in every village, and wells usually spawn near the center of the village with roads leading out from all sides. Wells do not provide an infinite water source.


 * Forge, made out primarily of cobblestone, wooden logs, and wooden planks. On the front of the building is a small porch with an awning supported by fences. Stairs lead up to the porch from the road. On the porch is a small pool of lava, surrounded on one side by iron bars. There are also two furnaces and a work table made of one double stone slab. An opening leads to a back room with a small seating area identical to those in butcher shops, and a small chest containing any amount of bread, red apples, iron ingots, gold ingots, iron swords, iron pickaxes, any and all pieces of iron armor, oak saplings, obsidian, and/or diamonds. One blacksmith villager with a black work apron always spawns near each Forge but often wanders off. The lava can rarely set nearby structures on fire, which was a problem Jeb tweeted about during development.

The approximate chance of finding each item is as follows:


 * Churches are pure cobblestone buildings made of cobblestone and cobblestone stairs, with a small 3 floor tower equipped with ladders and glass panes to a balcony on the top. The tower often leads players to believe the building is actually a watch tower. One priest villager with a purple robe always spawns in each church.


 * Lamp Posts can be found throughout villages, made of stacked fences topped with black wool, to which four torches are affixed, with one on each side.


 * Gravel roads connect most of the buildings.

The number of buildings within villages vary, and not all types of buildings will be in every village. There will always be one well, up to two churches, up to two blacksmiths, up to two libraries, up to three butcher shops, and up to three large homes. The number of small huts, farms, and lamp posts seem to have no limits. Gravel roads may often go out of the village quite a ways to nowhere. Villages that generate on Superflat maps tend to be larger and will usually contain all building types.

Finding NPC Villages
One method is to find the possible places that villages can spawn by using a superflat world, where a lack of terrain makes villages spawn more often. This method will not always work: The above does not always work because NPC villages only spawn in flat biomes (plains and desert), so the above produces many false positives where the location in the original map is not suitable. One possibility is to retry the steps above but for step 2 select default world type (as opposed to superflat). This makes it harder to see NPC villages, but each NPC village found is much more likely to exist in the original world.
 * 1) Find your seed number. This can be done by pressing F3.
 * 2) Create a creative, superflat world, using that seed.
 * 3) If the computer being used is sufficiently powerful, set the render distance to "far".
 * 4) Fly around and search for an NPC village.
 * 5) When you find one, press F3 and find the coordinates.
 * 6) Go to these coordinates on your other (first) world.
 * 7) An NPC village (not the same design but still an NPC village) will have spawned there.

Expanding NPC Villages
The player can add buildings to a NPC Village to cause more Villagers to spawn there. The requirements for a building are as follows:
 * Must have a solid roof (something that blocks skylight).
 * Must have a door.
 * Buildings may be constructed out of most kinds of blocks provided that they were placed there by the player.
 * Well lit buildings will attract more villagers than non lit buildings.
 * Must have a 3X3 space inside to be counted as a house. I.e, the building itself must be 5X5 including walls.

Creating NPC Villages
The player is capable of founding a new village by "transplanting" villagers from an existing village, as long as the following conditions are met: As a villager cannot be manually pushed far past the boundary of the village, a common method for transplanting villagers from an older town to a newer one is placing tracks, and pushing the villagers into minecarts - they will simply sit in the minecart and not react to the village border as they pass it, until they are removed from the cart. It is often helpful, but not required, to place the doors of the homes after the arrival of the villagers to speed detection. You can also simply destroy all the doors in the villages which will remove the boundary.
 * Must be at least 40 blocks from the "boundary" of the existing village, or else villagers will simply return to the village.
 * There must be homes at the new village, or else the villagers will simply wander.

Underwater Player Made Villages
The player can make villages under things, such as platforms and water. However, at least two blocks must be able to "see the sky" all the way up to the top of the map. Example:

~#0#~ ~#0#~

If an underwater house is desired, the surface should look like this. The air has to be unobstructed all the way from the roof to the surface. Key ~ Water 0 Air
 * 1) Wood

House Designs
Key: @ Log    ^ Glass Pane     | Shared Wall
 * 1) Wood    + Door           Empty space

Scrooge
Bare-bones, high-density design. Summary: 16 logs (including wood for doors); 6 doors; 2.01 villagers 5 width; 4 length; 3 height 7.619 logs per villager; 0.105000 villagers per sq m; 0.033500 villagers per cu m Layer 1    Layer 2     Layer 3 +  #       +   #       ####

Turbo Scrooge
Based on Scrooge, slightly more efficient. Summary: 21 logs; 8 doors; 2.8 villagers; 5 width; 5 length; 3 height; 7.5 logs per villager; 0.112000 villagers per sq m; 0.037333 villagers per cu m Layer 1    Layer 2     Layer 3 +  +       +   +       ##### +   +       +   +       #####

Tiny House
Like Scrooge, but with more style. Summary: 61.5 logs; 6 doors; 2.01 villagers; 5 width; 4 length; 3 height; 29.286 logs per villager; 0.105000 villagers per sq m; 0.033500 villagers per cu m Layer 1    Layer 2     Layer 3 @+#+@      @+#+@       @@@@@ +   #       +   #       @###@ @+#+@       @+#+@       @@@@@

Apartment
Can be stacked and placed in a row to make an appartment building. Make sure there is at least one air space between parallel buildings. Summary: 18 logs; 4 doors; 1.4 villagers; 5 width; 6 length; 3 height; 12.857 logs per villager; 0.058 villagers per sq m * floor; 0.0194 villagers per cu m Layer 1    Layer 2     Layer 3 @@@@| @+#+|      @+#+|       ####| @+#+|       @+#+|       ####|                        @@@@|



Top view of an apartment complex using this pattern.

NPC Village designs
An incomplete list of the houses and buildings in a NPC village and their respective designs can be found here.

History
Notch originally worked on NPC Villages by himself, but eventually gave the task to Jeb, so that he could work on other things. Jeb has said that, during early tests of villages, the lava in a smithy often set the village on fire.

NPC villages were added in Beta 1.8. In Beta 1.9 Pre-release, Villager mobs were added to spawn in NPC Village.

A picture of NPC villages was released by Notch before 1.8 was released. Even though the picture only showed the exterior of the buildings, videos recorded later during PAX revealed the interior of the structures. NPC Villages are most often spawned in desert or plains biomes. This is probably due to the fact that while villagers wander, they are prone to falling off of cliffs and other tall structures, much as a wolf will. It is implied that villages will have their own biome in order to solve many of the problems that were hindering their development.

As of 12w07a, Villagers will automatically repopulate according to the number of available houses in the Village. This is useful, because Zombie sieges have also been implemented, which hordes of zombies will have a chance to spawn near villages at night and attack Villagers. The player may supplement the amount of available houses by creating structures that consist of an area with a roof and wooden door.

As of 12w08a, Iron Golems will spawn near villages in order to protect the Villagers against any mobs in its sight, except passive mobs, wolves, and certain hostile mobs, such as the Creeper, due to its potentially destructive nature when aggravated.

Since Minecraft snapshot 12w21a You can buy and sell items with Emeralds.

As of 12w21a, the structures are made of sandstone when any NPC villages are spawned in a desert.

PAX
NPC Villages were shown to the public during the PAX demo. For demo purposes, Notch made them appear near the spawn so people could see them. On a live stream from his Android phone during PAX, Notch stated that NPCs have not been added to the villages but that they are coming eventually. (According to Jeb, NPCs for the village was delayed until Beta 1.9. ) The majority of the NPC structures are made from wood based resources, with frames of cobblestone, and the footpaths are 3 blocks wide and made of gravel. The gravel appears to replace the top layer of dirt upon generation of the village.

Old Interview of Notch
Notch once answered some questions about an idea he had, NPC Villages, where he revealed some thoughts about them:
 * If you treat the Villagers well (giving them items), they'll give you items back. (This has been fulfilled with the addition of Trading.)
 * If you treat the Villagers badly (attacking/killing them), they'll try to do the same to you. (This has been fulfilled with the addition of Iron Golems.)
 * Raiding chests will anger the owners of the town/chest and they will attack.

Eventually these villages will have more player looking NPC's. Also, trading has been Jeb's main focus on villages.

Bugs

 * It is possible for Mushrooms to spawn inside the buildings.
 * NPC villages may occasionally spawn in shallow water (however, it is usually not too far away from shore). As seen Here
 * Occasionally, if a lamp post is generated one block away from a building, one of the torches may be spawned on the wall of that building.
 * It is possible for village buildings as well as farms to be cut off seemingly randomly, as result of chunk errors, making the buildings be only partially spawned.
 * If an NPC village is in the desert, there is a small chance there will be a Cactus on the paths, and that they will have gravel on top of them.
 * It is possible for structures built by NPCs to continue down a ravine, if spawned on/next to one.
 * Zombies may spawn in houses on hardcore mode, even if lit. (Unknown if this a bug or not)
 * In desert villages, stone half slabs spawn on top of blacksmith's. It would make more sense for sandstone half slabs to spawn on top of them to match the rest of the village. (Unknown if a bug or not)

Trivia

 * NPC villages are optional as part of the setting for generated structures.
 * Unlike in the above case, if gravel goes through a tall grass area, tall grass will be removed and it may drop seeds.
 * The paths may also be collapsed because of a cave.
 * Farms in the villages avoid overhanging by filling in the area below them with dirt. When the farm overhangs a ravine, this can cause a very tall rectangular dirt structure that at first glance almost looks like a chunk error.
 * Occasionally, surface ravines will be generated through NPC villages, causing missing pathways or even entire buildings sunken into the ravine. This also applies to cave entrances and other surface oddities.
 * Originally, NPC Villages were intended to be populated with Pigmen.
 * In early screenshots, villages were partly made of Moss Stone.
 * It is possible to spawn directly inside an NPC Village building. Example: gimmeabreak as the seed in 1.0.0 unlike others before 1.0.0 and after Beta 1.7.3 which spawns you near 4 chickens.
 * In 12w21a (and possibly 12w22a), villagers occasionally will all spawn with the original farmer skin. (This does not affect the items they buy/sell, just their appearance, but can be confusing for the player)
 * The wells in NPC villages do not work as infinite water sources, as they are more than one block deep. (They do become infinite water sources once drained to their lowest level, or if the bottom is filled in with sand/gravel.)
 * Sometimes buildings can generate so that their entrances are buried. You have to uncover the entrance, or dig in through the walls. An example of this can be found on the seed, troll, with the church in the NPC village you spawn near, half buried.
 * Alternatively to the above, entire villages can be rarely found 2 or more blocks higher than the gravel path with no stairways going up to the houses.
 * It is possible for 2 or more villages to spawn on one another.
 * There is a rare glitch where a house will spawn upon another, thus creating a doorless 2 story house with a gap where the second "door" should be. [citation needed]
 * Outside the tutorial area in the Xbox 360 Edition, there is a village similar to the ones in the PC edition but without Villagers.
 * Sometimes, a part of a house or the complete house will appear non existent. If you walk where it should be, you will glitch out of it. if you right-click on where the blocks would be, they reappear