ItemSmith
Custom items for Paper 1.21.8: a schema-driven ability engine and an in-game chest-GUI item creator.
A Minecraft Paper server plugin for building custom weapons and items with scripted abilities entirely through an in-game menu, no config files needed.
ItemSmith is a plugin for Paper 1.21.8 Minecraft servers that lets server owners create custom weapons, tools, armor, and consumables with layered abilities, entirely through an in-game menu, without ever hand editing a configuration file. It is currently in pre-release: the plugin is feature complete for creating and obtaining items, but it is not yet downloadable, since the repository is still its development home.
Each custom item is built from a base material plus display text plus a list of abilities, and each ability follows a small pipeline: an activator decides when it triggers, such as right clicking or taking fall damage; conditions decide whether it should fire, such as low health or a random chance; a targeter decides who it affects, such as yourself or a nearby enemy; and actions decide what actually happens, such as dealing damage or applying a potion effect, including nested logic like delays, repeats, and simple if conditions. An optional gate can also require things like a permission, in-game currency, item charges, or a shared cooldown before the ability can be used at all.
The plugin ships with roughly one hundred fifty activators, one hundred sixty actions, seventy conditions, and eighteen targeters that can be combined freely. Every item you build, whether through the in-game menu or by hand, is saved as one plain, readable YAML file, so items can be copied between servers and reloaded without restarting. Items can also be obtained through crafting recipes, mob or block drops, or loot table injection into existing chests and fishing loot.
ItemSmith is a single drop in jar with no required companion plugin, though it optionally integrates with Vault for economy costs, WorldGuard for region restrictions, GriefPrevention for claim protection, and PlaceholderAPI, all gracefully skipped if those plugins are not installed. It requires Java 21 and is built with Gradle. The project is under active development toward its first public release, with resource pack support and custom blocks and mobs planned for later milestones.
Where it fits
- Build a custom weapon or armor piece with layered abilities using the in-game chest GUI creator.
- Add gated abilities that cost in-game currency, permissions, or shared cooldowns to custom items.
- Share a hand-crafted item across servers by copying its single readable YAML file.