Illager

Every illager in Java Edition.

Illagers are a type of hostile mob that regularly spawns in woodland mansions, patrols, raids, and pillager outposts.

Illagers are hostile toward players, villagers (excluding baby villagers), wandering traders, snow golems‌ and iron golems. Illagers come in three (or four‌) classes: pillager, vindicator, evoker, and illusioner‌. In Java Edition, all of these mobs are also part of the illager entity tag.

Properties

All illager mobs have the following properties:

• "Johnny" vindicators do not attack the mob.
• The mob is immune to the Raid Omen effect.
• The mob cannot be damaged by evoker fangs.
• The mob cannot be damaged by a ravager's roar.
• The mob does not fight back when hit by a missed arrow shot by a pillager or illusioner.‌
• The mob does attack villagers but ignores baby villagers, unlike zombie variants.
• The mob flees from creakings.

List of mobs

Illagers

Evoker	Illusioner ‌	Pillager	Vindicator

Related mobs

Ravager	Vex	Witch

Ravager jockeys

A ravager jockey is an illager that spawns riding a ravager. The riders can be pillagers, vindicators, or evokers.

They naturally spawn only in certain waves during raids.

Java Edition

A ravager ridden by a pillager spawns in wave 5. Ravagers ridden by vindicators and evokers spawn in wave 7.

Bedrock Edition

A ravager ridden by a pillager spawns in waves 5 and 7. Ravagers ridden by evokers also spawn in wave 7. Ravagers ridden by vindicators do not spawn during raids, and can be spawned only with commands.

Occurrences

Illagers spawn naturally in patrols and raids. They will also spawn in their respective structures:

• Pillagers spawn in pillager outposts.
• Vindicators and evokers spawn in woodland mansions when they are generated.

Vindicators and evokers that spawn naturally in woodland mansions do not despawn. They also do not respawn when killed.

Ravagers spawn exclusively in raids.

Illusioners‌ do not spawn naturally and can be summoned only through commands.

Raid captains

Illagers sometimes have their own captain. Any illager has a small chance to be a raid captain with an ominous banner (even when using a spawn egg‌, or when summoned by commands). Raid captains can spawn in raids‌ and one pillager raid captain always spawns in patrols.

In Java Edition, the ominous banner equips on the illager's helmet slot. In Bedrock Edition, the illager banner equips on the illager's chestplate slot.

Event

Illagers have their own in-game events, led by raid captains‌:

• Patrol — a naturally spawned group of five pillagers roaming the landscape and monitoring the villages.
• Raid — waves of illagers and witches spawn and attack a village with ominous horn blares. In Java Edition, An illager captain spawns in each wave with other illagers, usually with a vindicator as the captain. It is triggered when a player with the Bad Omen status effect enters a village. Raiders and villagers usually have different behavior in a raid. In Bedrock Edition, any killed raiders drops special loot. Both raiders and villagers celebrate after defeating or saving a village respectively.

Effects

Killing a raid captain drops a ominous bottle, which when drank, gives the Bad Omen effect that, when that player enters a village, it becomes Raid Omen. The raid starts where the player got raid omen. The level of the effect increases the enchantment power of pillagers' and vindicators' crossbows and axes, respectively, and omens with a level higher than 1 cause an extra wave of raiders to occur ‌. When all waves have been finished in a raid, the Hero of the Village effect is given, which decreases prices when trading with villagers. The level of the effect scales with the level of the omen that triggered the raid.

Rune

The illageralt alphabet.

Illagers have an alphabet called illageralt, a rune font from Minecraft Dungeons. This font is currently usable only in Java Edition via commands.

Java Edition

All illagers ignore baby villagers, but may still hit them by accident.

Illagers do not retaliate when hit by a missed arrow shot by a pillager or illusioner.

A vindicator can disable the player's shield with its iron axe attack, even when riding a mob. If a player fails to land a melee attack on a vindicator that rides a ravager during a raid in Hard difficulty, the vindicator rider can deal great damage to a player without protection from a shield.

All illagers, ravagers, and witches within 48 blocks of a bell that has been rung gain three seconds of the Glowing effect, effectively highlighting them through walls.

Reinforcements

On all difficulty levels, damaged illager mobs call all other illagers of their respective type within an area centered on the attacked illager to target the attacker, as long as the attacker is a non-illager. For example, pillagers attack a skeleton that injures another pillager, but pillagers do not aid a vindicator hit by a skeleton.​

Raids

During raids, vindicators can open doors like villagers. They can break wooden doors in Normal or Hard difficulty, if they cannot open the door successfully. Evokers and illusioners gain high movement speed without any effect.

A raid captain spawns in each wave with other raiders, usually with a vindicator as the captain.

Illagers pick up ominous banners dropped by raid captains, depends on how many raid captains die in this wave. If the raid captain is still alive, they do not pick up the banner from last wave remains or if thrown by the player.

Patrols

All illagers, ravagers, and witches join nearby patrol actively. If a "Johnny" vindicator joins a patrol, all patrol members assume the "Johnny" vindicator's aggressive behavior.

Bedrock Edition

All illagers and vexes ignore baby villagers, but pillagers may still shoot them by accident.

A dispenser can equip an evoker, vindicator, or pillager with armor. However, no armor is visible on them and no armor drops upon death.

Pillagers and ravagers do not purposefully attack other illagers. However, non-pillagers and non-ravagers do attack pillagers who hit them with missed arrows. Vindicators and evokers retaliate against a pillager if the pillager accidentally hits the vindicator or evoker with an arrow, although the evoker fang deals no damage to pillagers. Vexes summoned by an injured evoker can still attack the pillager.

A "ravager with vindicator rider" is unused in Bedrock Edition. It can be summoned by a spawn event command without raid configuration.

After the Texture Update, illagers still use the Java Edition 1.14 snapshot texture, including some of the Marketplace textures (for example, the pillager's arms). Also, a ravager's leg texture in Bedrock Edition is different from that in Java edition.

History

[hide]Java Edition
1.11			16w39a				Added vindicators and evokers.
1.12			17w16a				Added illusioners.
1.14			18w43a				Added pillagers.
1.18			21w37a				Added illageralt.
							Illagers no longer attack baby villagers.
1.19			22w17a				Changed the illager's models.
1.21.2 Experiment Winter Drop			24w40a				Are now afraid of the creaking.
[hide]Pocket Edition
1.1.0			alpha 1.1.0.0				Added vindicators and evokers.
[hide]Bedrock Edition
1.9.0			beta 1.9.0.0				Added pillagers.
1.11.0			beta 1.11.0.1				Illagers no longer attack baby villagers.
?							Armor is no longer visible on evokers, vindicators and pillagers.
1.19.40			Preview 1.19.40.21				Ravagers are no longer illagers.
[hide]Legacy Console Edition
Xbox 360	Xbox One	PS3	PS4	PS Vita	Wii U	Switch
TU54	CU44	1.52	1.52	1.52	Patch 24	1.0.4	Added vindicators, evokers and illusioners.
			1.90				Added pillagers.
[hide]New Nintendo 3DS Edition
1.9.19							Added vindicators and evokers.

Trivia

• During the development of Minecraft Dungeons, Mojang decided that the game needed a significantly larger number of hostile mobs than existed at the time. This lead to the creation of a generically evil faction in the illagers that could be used in any sort of spin-off media.
  • Jeb stated that illagers could have any agenda or skills necessary to fuel a story's plot. However, these skills should lean more toward being magic-oriented than technical.
• According to Minecraft: Mobestiary, illagers were "expelled" from villages due to their "unspeakable activities."
• Witches ally with the illagers during raids. Cory Scheviak jokingly explained that witches spawned in raids are just along for the ride.
• According to Jeb, illagers were originally called "ill-willed villagers" or "illvillagers", but "evillagers" and "illagers" were also suggested. The lattermost option was chosen as it was the shortest.
  • Following that, "illager" is "fybo" (bad villager) in Swedish, from "bybo" (villager), since it creates the same pun and meaning as the English term.

Gallery

• 

  A poster by Mojang Studios of the Village and Pillage update.

• 

  An illager patrol looking at a villager secretly at night.

• 

  A vindicator from Minecraft Mobestiary.

• 

  Three pillagers and two vindicators attacking a nitwit villager.

• 

  A ravager that is destroying leaves.

• 

  Pillager and Vindicator Height comparison.

• 

  All the illager mobs, including a vex and ravager.

Renders

• 

  A pillager.

• 

  A vindicator.

• 

  An evoker.

• 

  An illusioner.