Pack Mules

A Minecraft player can only carry 9 stacks of items in his belt and 27 more in his pack, a capacity that is easily filled by even a modestly successful trip into the caves. Vanilla Minecraft provides chests for semi-permanent mass-storage, but when it comes to transporting more than 36 stacks between chests, the player must make multiple trips. The Pack Mule mod (concept) aims to provide a better way.

New mobs

 * Horse: Large, strong, wild beasts mostly good for riding once tamed. The Pack Mule mod will not implement its own horse-riding behaviors; either they will be a simplistic cow re-skin, or we will borrow from another mod like Simply Horses.


 * Donkey: Similar to horses; smaller and more stubborn. Possibly just a different skin until someone who is really interested in donkeys gets offended and submits a patch.


 * Mule: Acquired by breeding a horse and a donkey. Unable to breed itself, and combining the wit of a horse with the endurance of a donkey, the mule is a legendary pack animal. Left alone, these animals wander randomly and graze on grass.


 * Pack Mule: A mule with a mule pack. Right clicking a pack mule reveals its inventory screen, which works just like a double chest. If a pack mule dies, it drops a double chest containing the previous contents of its mule pack. Hostile mobs like zombies and skeletons attack pack mules (but not wild mules).

New items

 * Rope: Borrowed from Simply Horses or Better Than Wolves, this item is crafted from leather. A player can right click a mule (or pack mule) while holding a rope to tie it to the mule. This converts the mule's behavior from random wandering to following the player.
 * If the player then right clicks on a fence while holding the same rope, the mule is considered to be tied to that post, and will not wander beyond its original distance from it.
 * A player may use multiple ropes to lead multiple mules simultaneously.
 * If the player travels to the Nether while leading a mule, the mule is transported into the Nether as well.


 * Mule Pack: Crafted from two chests with leather in between. When the player right clicks a mule while holding a mule pack, the mule pack vanishes and the mule is transformed into a pack mule.

Balance considerations
Hostile mob attacks are intended to offset the convenience of pack mules with some amount of danger and potential inconvenience, and mules' death chests are meant to limit the inconvenience to a manageable level.

Leather and wood are available fairly early, so this would be early- to mid-game material.