Neat in FTB Skies 2

Neat puts a small unit frame above every entity, so you can read a mob's name, health and armor at a glance. The name is a pun on Tidy Plates. It is a simple quality-of-life mod that makes fights easier to judge.^[1]

The pack includes Neat 1.21-47-NEOFORGE, so everything below describes that build's mod page.^[2]

What you get

• Health bars only show up if the mob is not obstructed, so you don't see through walls.^[1]
• The bar color changes with the mob's health percentage, going from green to yellow to red.^[1]
• It shows the mob's attribute (relevant for Smite or Bane of Arthropods) and its armor.^[1]
• Health bars are grouped for mob stacks, like spider or chicken jockeys.^[1]
• It works with Minecraft's Scoreboard Teams. Mobs and players in teams get a colored name.^[1]
• It is very configurable, and there is a keybind to toggle the health bars.^[1]

Who it's for

Neat is for anyone who wants to see what they're fighting. It is fully client-sided, so it only changes what you see on your own screen.^[1]

Unverified The sources show no place for Neat in the pack's progression. It has no recipes or quests to unlock, and nothing confirms any pack-specific config changes.

Good news: there's nothing to craft to get started with Neat. It adds unit frames above entities, showing info like name, health and armor, and it is fully client sided. That means it only changes what you see on your own screen.^[1]

What you'll notice first

• Health bars only show up if the mob is not obstructed, so you won't see them through walls.^[1]
• The bar color changes with the mob's health percentage, going from green to yellow to red.^[1]
• It shows the mob's attribute (relevant for Smite or Bane of Arthropods) and its armor.^[1]
• Health bars are grouped for mob stacks, like spider or chicken jockeys.^[1]
• It works with Minecraft's Scoreboard Teams, so mobs and players in teams get a colored name.^[1]

Toggling and tweaking

The mod has a keybind to toggle the health bars and is described as very configurable. If the bars get in your way in a busy base or a big fight, check your controls menu for the toggle.^[1]

Unverified This pack's default key for the toggle, the specific config options, any changes the pack makes to the mod's settings, and any recipes or quests involving the mod could not be confirmed from the available sources.

Neat works differently from most mods you'll cover. It adds unit frames above every entity, showing info like name, health and armor, and it is fully client sided. It's a display mod, so there's nothing to craft, power or pipe.^[1]

The sources I have don't describe any machines, multiblocks, power, fluid or item handling for Neat, so this section covers how the health bars behave and how the pack configures them.^[1]

When a health bar shows up

• Bars are meant to appear only when the mob isn't obstructed. In this pack, general.max_distance is 24 blocks, and general.max_distance_without_line_of_sight is 8 blocks for mobs you can't see directly.^[1][3]
• The pack shows bars on hostile mobs, passive mobs, players and bosses, since general.show_on_hostile, general.show_on_passive, general.display_on_players and general.display_on_bosses are all true. Hostile excludes bosses, which have their own toggle.^[3]
• Mobs at full health still get a bar because general.show_entity_full_health is true. general.only_health_bar_for_target is false, so you don't need to aim at a mob to see its bar.^[3]
• general.render_without_gui is false, so bars disappear when you hide the HUD with F1.^[3]
• general.name_tag_render_behavior is WHEN_NO_HEALTHBAR in the pack. The vanilla name tag is drawn only when there's no Neat bar. The other allowed values are ALWAYS and NEVER.^[3]

The mob blacklist

general.blacklist hides bars for specific entities. In this pack it lists the shulker, armor stand, cod, salmon, pufferfish and tropical fish. It uses entity IDs, not display names.^[3]

What the bar shows

Each bar can show the mob's name, current HP, max HP and health percentage. The pack has general.show_entity_name, general.show_current_hp, general.show_max_hp and general.show_hp_percentage all set to true.^[3]

Armor and mob attributes (like the ones Smite or Bane of Arthropods care about) are shown too, via general.show_armor and general.show_attributes. With general.group_armor on, 5 iron icons are grouped into 1 diamond icon.^[1][3]

The bar color changes with the mob's health percentage, going from green to yellow to red. The pack leaves general.color_health_bar_by_type false, so it keeps that health-based coloring instead of coloring by mob type.^[1][3]

Neat also groups health bars for mob stacks, such as spider or chicken jockeys. It works with Minecraft's Scoreboard Teams, so mobs and players in a team get a colored name. There's also a keybind to toggle the health bars. The sources don't say which key it uses by default.^[1]

Layout and appearance

The pack sets general.plate_size to 25 and general.plate_size_boss to 50. A mob with a long name makes its bar grow to fit.^[3]

The gray background plate is drawn because general.draw_background is true. It has a general.background_height of 6 and general.background_padding of 2. The bar itself uses a general.health_bar_height of 4 and a general.hp_text_height of 14.^[3]

Bars float general.height_above_mob 0.6 above the mob. Both icon offsets, general.icon_offset_x and general.icon_offset_y, are 0. Text color is white (FFFFFF) via general.text_color, and HP numbers use the format "#.##" from general.decimal_format. The config warns to change that last one only if you know how decimal formats work.^[3]

The quest text available here covers the Enchanted, EnderIO and Ars Nouveau chapters. None of the quests shown in those chapters mention this mod, so they give no tier-by-tier path for it.^[4][5][6]

Unverified Any progression steps or tiers for this mod would be told in the pack's quest book, in the chapters that mention it. The quest text for those chapters is not included in the sources here, so what it says about the mod is unverified. Open the quest book in game to follow it.

The quest book chapter called RFTools Series sits in the Tech Mods group as chapter 41 of 41, and it has 33 quests. It starts with "RFTools and Friends" quest, which asks for a Machine Frame and a Machine Base.^[7]

Seven quests follow directly from that opener: "Dialing Destinations" quest, "Redstone Potpourri" quest, "Advanced Elevators" quest, "Spawner" quest, "Environmental Controller" quest, "XNet Management" quest and "Targeted Teleports" quest. After "XNet Management" quest comes "XNet Channel Interface" quest, a checkmark quest.^[7]

Unverified Neat is mentioned in the RFTools Series chapter and in several other quest book chapters: Malum, Industrial Foregoing, Cooking and Brewing, Actually Additions, Logistics, Iron's Spells 'n Spellbooks, Getting Started and three more. The sources here do not show which quests mention it or what they ask for. The quest text for 24 of the 33 RFTools Series quests and for those other chapters is not included, so check them in the quest book.

Neat is fully client sided, so everything in neat-client.toml only changes what you see on your own screen. The mod also has a keybind to toggle the health bars if you ever want them off quickly. Below is exactly how the pack sets the options you're most likely to touch.^[1][3]

Which mobs get a bar

• general.show_on_hostile, general.show_on_passive, general.display_on_players and general.display_on_bosses are all true, so bars show on hostile mobs, passive mobs, players and bosses.^[3]
• general.show_entity_full_health is true, so mobs at full health still get a bar. general.only_health_bar_for_target is false, so you don't need to aim at a mob to see its bar.^[3]
• general.blacklist is set to these entities: minecraft:shulker, minecraft:armor_stand, minecraft:cod, minecraft:salmon, minecraft:pufferfish and minecraft:tropical_fish.^[3]

Range

general.max_distance is 24 blocks, so bars render out to 24 blocks. Without line of sight that shrinks to 8 blocks, set by general.max_distance_without_line_of_sight. general.render_without_gui is false, so bars disappear when you hide the HUD with F1.^[3]

What the bar shows

• Name, current HP, max HP and HP percentage are all on, through general.show_entity_name, general.show_current_hp, general.show_max_hp and general.show_hp_percentage.^[3]
• general.show_armor and general.show_attributes are true. Attributes are things like arthropod or undead.^[3]
• general.group_armor is true, so 5 iron icons are grouped into 1 diamond icon.^[3]
• general.color_health_bar_by_type is false, so the bar colour follows health percentage rather than mob type.^[1][3]
• general.name_tag_render_behavior is WHEN_NO_HEALTHBAR, so the vanilla name tag only appears when there's no Neat bar. The other choices are ALWAYS and NEVER.^[3]

Size and look

• general.plate_size is 25 and general.plate_size_boss is 50. A long name makes the bar grow to fit.^[3]
• general.health_bar_height is 4, general.hp_text_height is 14 and general.height_above_mob is 0.6.^[3]
• general.draw_background is true, with general.background_height at 6 and general.background_padding at 2.^[3]
• general.text_color is FFFFFF (white). general.decimal_format is #.##, which the config says to change only if you know how decimal formats work. Both icon offsets, general.icon_offset_x and general.icon_offset_y, are 0.^[3]

FTB Skies 2 1.22.0 ships with Neat 1.21-47-NEOFORGE. Neat has been in the pack since FTB Skies 2 1.0.1 or earlier, so it's been there pretty much from the start.^[2]

Unverified The changelog texts for Neat 1.21-40-NEOFORGE and 1.21-47-NEOFORGE were not available to me, only their titles. What changed between those releases is unverified, and the pack changelogs have no entries for this mod either.