The Guard Villagers mod is a new way to enhance the protection and defenses of any villages that naturally spawn within any of your Minecraft worlds. When you install the mod the villagers will automatically update whether you have an existing save file with villages you have already been to, start a new world, or visit a new village from an existing save. These new villagers will spawn in groups of six and will already have updated skins to differentiate them from standard villagers as well as come equipped with either an iron sword or crossbow by default. There are ways to befriend these guards in a similar way to establishing a reputation with villagers as you normally would and you can also recruit new guards with any villager that isn’t already assigned a job.

These guard villagers are on a constant watch regimen and will protect their villages much like the iron golems already do. That means that you should approach each new village with caution and courtesy as you would if there were already an iron golem patrolling the grounds. They will attack you if you are deemed a threat to them. But once you gain their trust and establish a high reputation among the people then you can utilize the guards to further improve their abilities and provide them with even more defense strategies. The guards can talk with other villagers and either help or hinder your reputation with the community so you should plan your interactions accordingly to better suit your needs as well as theirs. Standard villager trading is still needed to gain overall trust but you will need to obtain the hero of the village achievement in order to interact with guard villagers that you haven’t already recruited.

Once you have the hero of the village achievement you can right click on any of the guards to further improve their arsenal and protection as well as gain the ability to have them follow you to fight for you. When you right click on them you will have a familiar menu similar to any other villager you would like to trade with. Here you can replace any of their weapons with better swords or crossbows as well as giving them shields. You can also give them armor to further enhance their capabilities in protecting both you and their village.

The offhand slot is where you would give the guard villagers a shield if you would prefer them to have one but you can alternatively place food or potions in that slot for them to heal if they become low on health. This could be a very lucrative option for letting the guard villagers take care of themselves when you are not able to be there otherwise.

Guard villagers can also be created by simply crouching and right clicking any villager that doesn’t already have a job within their village. You will need to right click them with either a crossbow or a sword and they will instantly change to a guard villager. The benefit of recruiting your own guards is the ability to access their inventory menu immediately and doesn’t require the hero of the village achievement or any sort of positive reputation with that village. As soon as you recruit a guard villager you can give them whatever armor, weapon, shield or sustenance right away.

When you have access to a guard villager’s menu then you have the ability to set them on patrol as well. For any guards you did not recruit you will need the hero of the village achievement for this button to be available but otherwise once it is then you can click it at any time to set a guard on patrol. You can set custom patrol points for them and depending on what type of guard they are will determine their patrol capabilities. Melee guards with swords will patrol around the area you designate and attack any threats within that particular radius.

Ranged guards that have crossbows will stay positioned on their patrol point but will instead snipe any enemies as they draw near the village.

This mod can certainly improve any village you are trying to protect and upgrade by expanding the defenses already available with iron golems. With the ability to recruit new guards at any time as well recruiting as many as you want or need, you can then focus your attention on anything else you want to do to upgrade the villages you come across or want to inhabit long term. One iron golem can go a long way in taking care of its village but when all of them come with a minimum of six guards by default that can then be further trained and equipped with proper defenses then your job of improving any of these villages becomes that much easier.