Elder Guardian

An elder guardian is a stronger, larger variant of the guardian that can inflict Mining Fatigue. Three of them spawn inside an ocean monument; one in the penthouse room and one in each wing.

Spawning
Three elder guardians spawn naturally during the generation of each ocean monument: one in the top room of the monument and the other two in each wing section of the monument. They do not respawn after their initial spawn, thus there are a limited number of them per world.

Drops
Elder guardians drop the following items:
 * 0–2 s – always. Affected by Looting: 1 more drop per level, for a maximum of 5.
 * 1 – when killed by the player. Not affected by Looting.
 * One of the following:
 * $1/2$ chance: a ( if killed by fire). Affected by Looting: 0–1 more drops per level, for a maximum of 4.
 * $1/3$ chance: . Affected by Looting: 0–1 more drops per level, for a maximum of 4.
 * $1/6$ chance: no drop.
 * 2.5% chance: a random fish. Affected by Looting: 1% more chance per level, for a maximum of 5.5% with Looting III. This drop uses the same chances that fishing uses, resulting in a 60% chance for raw cod, a 25% chance for raw salmon, a 13% chance for pufferfish, and a 2% chance for tropical fish.
 * – when killed by a player or tamed wolf.

Behavior
Elder guardians do not swim around as much as normal guardians. Elder guardians do not swim away when approached by a player it is targeting, unlike regular guardians. Like normal guardians, elder guardians attempt to attack both the player and squid.

The elder guardian's eye follows and stares at any nearby players, and always looks directly at its target. The eye still follows a player under the effects of a potion of invisibility or in spectator mode, but doesn't attack.

Elder guardian are considered aquatic mobs, and thus are affected by the Impaling enchantment.

The elder guardian has three methods of attacking, including firing its laser, inflicting mining fatigue, and a defensive thorn-like attack.

The elder guardian pathfinds toward an ocean monument if it is not within one.

Elder guardians do not attack iron golems, even if the iron golem attacks it.

Laser
The laser takes several seconds to charge, doing no damage and allowing the player to move away in the meantime. As it charges it turns from purple to bright yellow (thus acting as a warning indicator). Once charged, the beam flashes green, abruptly ends, and deals damage on normal difficulty. The elder guardian swims around for a few seconds before firing again. 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 disengages from the player and deals no damage.

Inflicting Mining Fatigue
$$, immediately after spawning and once each minute thereafter, the elder guardian searches for any player within 50 blocks to afflict with Mining Fatigue III. $$ the elder guardian inflicts any unafflicted player within range immediately.

When afflicted, the player sees a ghostly image of the elder guardian and hears a ghostly noise. The effect decreases a player's attack speed by 30% and decreases mining speed even more, for 5 minutes. The attack targets players through blocks, even underground, and a potion of Invisibility offers no defense. This is not considered an attack in regards to the Thorns enchantment.

The image of the elder guardian is a particle effect that can be recreated by issuing the command.

$$, the image is partly considered an entity as it can be summoned using the command.

Spike attack
An elder guardian deals ( on hard mode) of damage every time it is hit while its spikes are extended. If cornered, the elder guardian usually extends its spikes and fires at the player, even at point-blank range.

ID




Entity data
Elder guardians have entity data associated with them that contains various properties.

Advancements
to  and the   tag has been removed.
 * The in-game name of elder guardians is now "Elder Guardian" instead of "Guardian".}}

Trivia

 * The elder guardian's eye is the "head" part of the mob's model, giving the illusion of a dynamic eye.
 * The elder guardian texture has the name "jeb" on it.
 * According to Jeb, elder guardians were introduced to encourage players to solve the temple maze rather than dig through it easily. He acknowledges there are ways around it, but players still have to solve the challenge in a different way.
 * Also according to Jeb, the "jump scare" by an elder guardian is unintentional, instead, he added it to provide a visual cue as to why players get slowed down by Mining Fatigue.
 * In Java Edition 3D Shareware v1.34, elder guardians drop blue keys.
 * $$, elder guardians make their underwater death sounds if killed on land. They also, like guardians, don't make flopping sounds on Bedrock Edition.