Spawning Enemies

Now that we can build an entire battle arena with just one chat command, we move on to spawning waves of enemies for the player to battle. Before we spawn any animals, however, we need to learn about functions.

Functions - Concept Introduction

A function is a command in code that will perform a certain task.

Typically, a function performs 1 set task.

Why are functions useful? To see that, remember the mod from the Raid Simulator that would build an entire house when the player types house in the chat?

This mod is very long, and it can be difficult to discern what each individual code block does. However, this mod can be split into several functions with names, making it far easier to understand.

To make a function in Minecraft Education, you must go to the Advanced tab on the left and click on the Functions category.

Now give the function a name and click Done.

Let's make a function to apply what you have learned. We will make a function that will spawn 4 pigs, 8 chickens, and 2 cows.

Now click play. You'll notice that nothing will happen. That is because all we did was create the function definition.

A function definition tells the computer what a function will do.

In order to actually run this function, we need to add a function call like below.

Now we will see the animals

Challenge

Make a function that will spawn 3 blocks of primed (ready to blow) TNT above the player. Call this function whenever the player sprints.

Hint: you will need to use the projectile block from the Mobs category to get primed TNT.

Functions - Introduction