/entity command help, please!!!!

[Solvei]

I'm doing some very tedious mod config work, and what I really need is the ability to spawn in a bunch of animals and freeze them in place. The wiki leads me to believe that I should be able to execute two quick commands to achieve this - /entity cmd stoptask , and /entity cmd stopanim.

Pasting either of these into the text box, after spawning in a few entities, results in an invalid selector error. As do any permutations of /entity cmd stoptask ending with e[*], e [*], e[, e [ . I've tried the asterisk, the exclamation point, a blank space, alive=true. Inputting /entity cmd e[*] stoptask as suggested on reddit gives a different error, saying there's invalid syntax.

Has anyone been able to use these commands successfully? I'm sure I'm making a rookie mistake here, any help would be appreciated.

Edited November 15, 2025 by Eris Glynn

[Az3r1x]

As far as I am aware when I tried it in the past, the entities would need to exist in the world first. Might be dumb of me to ask, but have you spawned them in first before trying these commands? 

[Solvei]

Yes, I have made sure there are entities to command, hah. But it is the internet, so it's not a dumb question. I'll edit the first post to clarify

[Az3r1x]

Can you try a command for me real quick and tell me if it gives the same error? Spawn a gazelle and try this specific command (yes I stole it from the wiki lol):

/entity cmd e[type=gazelle,range=3,alive=true] stopanim

or 

/entity cmd e[type=gazelle, range=3, alive=true] stopanim

 

Be close to them and also you are on the latest version, right? IIRC, some commands are version specific.

[Solvei]

You'll never believe this, but now it says animation name is missing ;-;

also tried to  use stoptask, but the error message said task id missing again.

Yes, everything is current

[Az3r1x]

Oh wow that's a new one for me because usually that commands work with no issues.

Can you try /entity cmd l[] stopanim (or stoptask) while looking at one?

 

[Solvei]

still getting the task id error. I've got a gazelle right in front of me, continuing to walk on his merry way

[Az3r1x]

Can you share a screenshot of both that error and the previous one from the attempt please?

[Solvei]

got a whole string of them for you

[Az3r1x]

Tyty

 

Okay with the gazelle, let's try /entity cmd e[type=gazelle,range=3,alive=true] stopanim "gazelle-idle" (Might need to try it without the quotes) or even a simple /entity cmd e[type=gazelle,range=3,alive=true] stopanim "walk"

Edited November 15, 2025 by Az3r1x

[Solvei]

no matching player/entity found

this is legit maddening, how can a game so modder-friendly have such terrible command language for something like this

[Az3r1x]

Oh interesting, can you try the same commands but with l[] instead while looking at one?

 

But hmmm, sorry if that don't work either. I'll do some testing myself as well and get back to you once I get some results too.

[Solvei]

well now it's prompting me to choose a subcommand, one of which is stopanim

good luck friend

[Az3r1x]

Heyo,

 

So after some testing I was able to get the command working, however it seems the effect of it does not go through for some for some reason. So for the commands, these are what I got:

 

/entity cmd e[!] stopanim walk 

/entity cmd e[!] stoptask all

 

Those will affect everyone, including yourself, and I got the message that says it went through successfully but the only one that would work is walk because it shows it happening, but it seems it's not permanent because if the entity goes into another animation, the one that was stopped is reset and you would have to retype it to stop it again, at least from my testing. 

 

BTW If you want to target other things than Gazelle, spawn the entity, type /entity list and then do the command with e[type=EXACTNAMEOFLISTEDENTITY]

So in the case of the gazelle (male), the command would be /entity cmd e[type=gazelle-thomson-adult-male] stopanim walk and it will work and only affect the male gazelle (My entity code is most likely different from yours since I have the FotSa mod installed)

 

stoptask and stopanim are interesting because you can put the command I listed and it says it executed successfully, but you can replace "all" with any word and it will say the same thing. So I think we would need to put the actual AI task in there exactly how it is in the code for it to function properly (Yeah I know, obviously it would be that but I just found it interesting it accepts any string with no issues).

 

I'll keep playing around with it, but hey, we're making some type of progress, haha. 

[Solvei]

huh. Well that's something, yeah. That solves half the task at least! It IS very funny having a pen full of critters gliding motionlessly across the grass at least