EASY BEACON PLACEMENT

!banner Beacons are the most tedious block in the game to place. A tier-4 base is 164 blocks in a stepped 9×9 pyramid, and you usually only discover something was in the way after you have started digging.

This mod shows you the whole structure before you commit, then builds it for you.

Hold a beacon. Hold a key. See it.

The preview is sized automatically to the base blocks you are carrying — it works out the largest tier you can actually complete, and counts blocks you have already placed towards it, so a half-finished pyramid gets finished rather than restarted.

Slots that will be filled are shown as a translucent ghost of the real block. A previewed iron block looks like iron.

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It tells you what is in the way — through the ground

The pyramid goes below the beacon, so aiming at flat terrain means digging. Everything blocking it is drawn red and visible straight through solid blocks, so you can see the exact volume you need to clear without breaking anything first.

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And whether it will actually work

A tier-4 footprint is 9×9 and mostly behind you. You should not have to inspect it block by block, so the mod gives you a verdict instead:

🟢 Green	will reach the tier shown
🟡 Amber	will only manage a lower tier
🔴 Red	will not work at all

The status line spells it out — "Tier 4 blocked — you'll only get Tier 2" — because a beacon's tier is capped by the first incomplete layer counting up from the bottom.

Then one click

Blocks are placed for you, verified against the world, and retried if the server rejects one, so you do not end up with holes in the base.

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Position it exactly

• Mouse wheel — push the preview along your line of sight
• Sneak + wheel — move it straight up and down
• Works aiming at open sky, not just at a block

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Controls

Action	Default
Show the hologram (hold)	Left Alt
Move nearer / further	Mouse wheel
Move up / down	Sneak + wheel
Cycle tier / cancel a build	V
Build it	Right-click while the hologram is shown

All rebindable. Any block in the #minecraft:beacon_base_blocks tag works, so modded base blocks are supported automatically.

Installing

You only need the client file. Installing on a server is optional and does exactly one thing: removes the reach limit.

Your setup	File	Also needs
Fabric / Quilt	easy_beacon_placement-fabric-*.jar → mods/	Fabric API
NeoForge	easy_beacon_placement-neoforge-*.jar → mods/	nothing
Paper / Spigot server	easy_beacon_placement-paper-*.jar → plugins/	nothing

Mismatched setups are fine in both directions — a client with the mod can join a server without it, and vice versa. Nothing is registered as required, so nobody gets kicked.

About reach

With nothing installed server-side, blocks are placed through the same call vanilla makes when you right-click. The server cannot tell the difference, which is why this works on vanilla, Paper, Spigot, Purpur and Folia untouched — but the server's own reach limit (4.5 blocks) then applies, so large pyramids need you to walk around. Out-of-reach blocks stay queued and you are told about them rather than losing them.

Install the mod or the Paper plugin server-side and that limit disappears: the server places the structure directly.

It grants nothing you could not already do by hand. The beacon must still be in your hand, blocks are still consumed from your inventory, and world border, world height and spawn protection are all enforced. On Paper every block is offered as a normal block-place event, so WorldGuard, GriefPrevention and similar can veto individual blocks — anything refused is refunded.

⚠️ This is an auto-build mod, the same category as Litematica's printer or building wands. Some servers forbid client-side automation regardless of how ordinary the packets look. Check your server's rules.

MIT licensed. By Jom3a.