Vanilla Reflavoured – Combat & Shaders
Koh – 2025︱04 • 15 – Tue 15 Apr
So, while walking towards college, I ended up thinking a lot of... Maybe not new ideas... But certainly some interesting ones.
Combat Revamped
For starters, for the Combat Revamped mod, we could actually make use of the Wind Burst enchantment to introduce a mechanic that I was craving a while back: Air Combos.
So, there's actually a mod named "Air Combo", that works similarly to how I would like to introduce this mechanic, except for a couple of things. For starters, it uses Player Animator to animate the player making front and backflips while striking, which wouldn't be a problem... If it weren't that you can stall a lot with this mechanic in the mod.
A single air strike can make you stay in the air for well over at least 2 to 3 seconds per strike. And that's just ridiculous. So instead, what if we make Wind Burst work in other weapons aswell? The only thing is that, the Mace is the weapon that benefits the most from this, not only to make a lot of damage, but in height gained too! So, any melee weapon enchanted with Wind Burst will have a ton less damage than it would in a Mace, making them not let you stall for very much and at the same time, not rendering the Mace irrelevant for this reason.
We could make it so long reach weapons (like the Trident, Longswords or Battleaxes) can't benefit from this enchantment, as they could either also pull you backwards from the strike, or not being able to enchant them with Wind Burst in the first place.
More Rambling!
I can't seem to remember much more for now, maybe because most of the rambling I was going about also included just narrating all the mods I wanted to make and how I see Minecraft could be like, using and applying assets from other official Minecraft Games (Story Mode and Dungeons), and assets from the same game (Minecraft) itself to make it more immersive and a lot more beautiful. Reworking lackluster parts of the game and make it a lot more interesting and fun all at the same time.Making it feel nostalgic in a way, reintroducing old mechanics, but making it feel new and reworked, so it feels like re-exploring the same-old game from 2013 all over again. With a lot of new stuff, dimensions, loot and much, much more!
Shaders
As you could see, I wasn't only planning on making mods or a modpack, but also a Shader! The Vanilla Reflavoured Shaders is a passion project that mixes all the shader elements I love most:
- Visuals: Vibrant Visuals Minecraft Style with Super Duper Vanilla's Sky-Colors combined, Dungeons-style outlines, and Story Mode-inspired clouds.
- Performance: Lightweight, modular, and pixel-locked where possible.
- Customization: Real-time or vanilla-style shadows, multiple fog types, and adjustable lighting/sky parameters.
🌤️ Cloud Styles
- Vanilla Clouds: Default vanilla system with a crisp edge, similar to Vibrant Visuals.
- Reimagined Clouds: Cubic volumetric clouds based on Complementary Reimagined.
- Story Mode Clouds: Stylized, thick, pixel-style clouds from Super Duper Vanilla.
🌗 Illumination & Shadows
- Real-Time Shadows: Pixel-locked (default), configurable sharpness, or optionally smooth.
- Standard Shadows: Non-pixel-locked, more realistic lighting like most traditional shaders.
- Vanilla-Style Shadows: No real-time shadows, but global illumination similar to default Minecraft.
🌫️ Fog, Atmosphere & Color Control
- Biome-aware fog and sky coloring.
- Optional compatibility with fog mods or internal equivalents.
- Settings for skylight, moonlight, color intensity, and scattering.
- Adjustable Aurora Borealis with randomized palettes!
🌊 Fluids & Reflections
- Water foam, lava bloom, and border glow.
- Pixel-locked and procedural water normals.
- Support for emissive ores and resourcepack-based glow.
- Reflective surfaces with optional refractions (pixel-aligned).
🎨 Visual Modes
- Nostalgia: Inspired by 2013–2015 shaders.
- Alpha/Beta Colors: Desaturated, pre-release aesthetic.
- Vanilla Style: Vibrant yet faithful, like modern Minecraft + Vibrant Visuals.
You’ll be able to mix and match sky colors, water tones, lighting behavior — per layer!
🛠️ Optional Features
- Exposure & auto-exposure (BSL-style).
- Godrays, bloom, PBR, SSAO, anti-aliasing (TAA).
- World outline like in Minecraft Dungeons.
- Maybe... rotating sun/moon textures at 45°!
🔍 Inspirations & Sources
This project takes inspiration or features from:
- BSL / Minimal Shaders: Lightweight shadow mapping and pixel-precision rendering.
- Super Duper Vanilla: Clouds and color palettes with godray aesthetic.
- Complementary + Euphoria Patches: All the good stuff — menus, bloom, portal light, fire recolors, etc.
- Shrimple & Rethinking Voxels: Efficient light modeling and blocklight shadows.
Ultimately, the idea is simple: lock visuals to the pixel grid, enhance performance, allow modular control, and celebrate the vibes of Minecraft’s many forms – from a completely reimagination of traditional minecraft — to the nostalgic lens of shaders long past.