Daryl Frewing

After leaving the simulation running for a while I came back and the pod with the missing villager now had a villager zombie. I added 12 more small glass pods to see if the same thing happened again and let it run for 2 days. When I came back two of the 12 new pods now had 4 villagers, not the 3 they started with, but no one had disappeared.

After watching the behavior of the zombies for a bit I decided to do a test. Up to this point the pods were slightly elevated off the ground by the bottom block of the pod. I added some dirt around the pod I saw most of the mini-zombies around to bring the villagers to the same level as the zombies and almost instantly the zombies started attacking through the corners of the pod and all three villagers were killed.

I guess this must mean that this occasionally happens when a zombie jumps up at one of these pods - which would explain the seemingly randomness of it and how long it takes to reproduce. Mystery solved...I guess. It's a little deflating, though. I had hoped for an obscure bug that was a challenge to work out. Oh well. At least you also now have another issue to look into....the mysteriously appearing villagers!

(Is the fact that zombies can attack through the corners actually a bug? Probably one you already knew about.)

Affected version updated

I've let the simulation run for 2 days now. After the second day (well, a day and a half) I noticed that one of the small glass pods only had two villagers. I checked the rest of the pods and they all had their 3 villagers except for the two that had increased to 4 (mentioned in previous comment).

I will let the simulation run for at least another day and just see what happens, but I would say that the bug is still there, and now comes with an additional bug that seems to add villagers under certain circumstances.

Okay, I have a test set up now and will let it run (off and on) for a few days before saying that there is any definitive results. That said, I've already noticed a strange behaviour that may or may not be intentional. But first, the parameters of the test....

In creative mode on PC version of game (1.8) I created 16 containers, (pods) to hold 3 villagers each.

The first 4 pods were designed from cobblestone as follows:
level 1 2X2 square on the ground
level 2, 3, and 4 were 4X4 square with the center hollow and no corners
level 5 was another 2X2 square capping off the pod

This created a 2X2X3 (3 being the height) enclosed area in which I could contain the villagers. On the bottom level inside the pod I filled all four squares with water, and on one square on the top of the inside I added a torch (so the torch was at level 4).

The next 4 pods were designed the same as the first 4, but out of glass. I had to leave 1 square as cobblestone (on level 4) so that I could still add the torch.

The next 4 pods were designed from cobblestone as 6X6X7 cubes (7 being the height) with a hallow (2X2X3) center. This gave a minimum 2 block thickness at all points. To this I also added the water and torch (and villagers, of course).

The next 4 pods were the same as the last 4 (the 6X6X7 ones) but made from glass with the exception of the one square I had to leave as cobblestone to hold the torch (this being at level 5 in these larger pods).

So, there's the parameters of the test. I should note that I am doing this on a randomly generated map, not a flat map, though I did not enter a seed (so I'm not sure what it is). I flew around after creating the pods checking for any other nearby villages that might cause funny results but I saw none.

After finishing with creating all the pods I decided to take a quick peak in the cobblestone ones. The smaller pods were doing just fine (all still had 3 villagers), but 2 of the four larger pods now also had a child in them.

NOTE: There are NO DOORS present at all anywhere unless one managed to somehow spawn underground (which I don't think is possible.....is it?) This means that doors are NOT a requirement for spawning villagers. Interesting.

We will see where things stand after letting this simulation run for a bit.

I will set up a fresh test in the new version and let you know how it goes.

I have since duplicated this issue in creative mode as well, though it does take a long time for the villagers to start disappearing.

One odd thing I've noticed, in my creative mode duplication, I did not add enough doors for the villagers to start "replicating," and when they started disappearing I only ever noticed pods with 3, 1 of 0 villagers...never 2. It's probably just a coincidence, but I figured I'd mention it.

Oh, and another thing, the seed I'm using is 060474...there's a nearby desert village with a cobblestone well (I thought those wells were for the other type of village).

For reference, I was building the golem farm detailed at the end of the page located here: http://minecraft.gamepedia.com/Tutorials/Iron_golem_farm

The differences were:

1) I put 4 blocks of water in the villager containers, not 1

2) I added a torch to the containers for light

3) I "capped" the villager containers with a cobblestone roof as well (the instructions don't say to do this, but I figured it was a pretty obvious thing that should be done).

Hmmmm. Never mind. I forgot that the hole to allow the ladder through would have counted as 'outside' which would allow a zombie to spawn because in a village the light level doesn't prevent this (right?). If that's the case then that's what happened and the zombie villagers must have just despawned. (I know villagers don't despawn, but I'm guessing that zombie villagers must.)

Of course, if I'm wrong about zombies spawning regardless of light level when within a village (v1.7.4) then the room WAS zombie proof and there still IS a bug. Otherwise, my bad.

I don't know how to answer that for sure, but if it wasn't, then where did the zombies go?

It was a 3 X 7 room that was completely blocked in (no doors or other exits) except for a ladder that came down but didn't reach the bottom (had to jump to get on it). There was a single torch in the center of the floor, so the light level was fine. As far as I know, that is zombie proof.

I will attempt to reproduce this again.