Dyed fletching

[LadyWYT]

Just as the title says. We really ought to be able to turn feathers into proper fletching before being able to use them to craft arrows, with the ability to dye said fletching in order to made resulting arrows much easier to find. That is all. 

[Bruno Willis]

2 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

made resulting arrows much easier to find.

and more stylish. 

[Heart_Afire]

I'm in a multiplayer world rn, playing a Hunter with some other mods (Combat Overhaul, Additional Arrowheads, etc.) and I said this very thing to my friend. We absolutely should be able to dye our fletching, it's a common real-world practice for exactly the reason above! 

Adding to this (though granted this is from a mod) but if you have a quiver you should be able to select an 'active' arrow. 

[Teh Pizza Lady]

On 11/25/2025 at 4:16 PM, Heart_Afire said:

I'm in a multiplayer world rn, playing a Hunter with some other mods (Combat Overhaul, Additional Arrowheads, etc.) and I said this very thing to my friend. We absolutely should be able to dye our fletching, it's a common real-world practice for exactly the reason above! 

Adding to this (though granted this is from a mod) but if you have a quiver you should be able to select an 'active' arrow. 

so you can say, "YOU HAVE MY ARROW YOU THIEF!" and then shoot him?

[Heart_Afire]

4 hours ago, Teh Pizza Lady said:

so you can say, "YOU HAVE MY ARROW YOU THIEF!" and then shoot him?

Why do I feel like this is a reference I'm not getting?

[Teh Pizza Lady]

25 minutes ago, Heart_Afire said:

Why do I feel like this is a reference I'm not getting?

Eh... a certain blackguard I play with likes to misplace my things into her inventory... >_>

[LadyWYT]

11 minutes ago, Teh Pizza Lady said:

Eh... a certain blackguard I play with likes to misplace my things into her inventory... >_>

Like you misplace your arrows into my face? 

Relevant story link: 

 

[Heart_Afire]

24 minutes ago, Teh Pizza Lady said:

Eh... a certain blackguard I play with likes to misplace my things into her inventory... >_>

As a Hunter myself, I completely concur. Literally had to tell the Tailor I play with that if he was going to keep stealing my arrows then he could go and make me three dozen of them.

Tailor being who he is, next thing I know I'm tending the farm and suddenly 36 iron arrows in my quiver.

14 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

Like you misplace your arrows into my face? 

Relevant story link: 

 

I mean, makes for an easy place to find the arrows when a hunter needs them, I suppose. 

[Heart_Afire]

Sorry for double posting, but I did want to say that I am actually working on something for this idea. It's slow going, but it's coming along.

[LadyWYT]

5 hours ago, Heart_Afire said:

Sorry for double posting, but I did want to say that I am actually working on something for this idea. It's slow going, but it's coming along.

Will definitely be watching for it!

[Evilel]

BOOP! for potential notification when this becomes available 

[Venusgate]

I think the cosmetic appear is the greater purpose here, only because i think arrows are so (rightfully?) hard to find - even hot pink fletchings wouldn't sizeably increase their odds of being found in thick brush.

I'd love if there was some kind of small dog critter you could train, even within the confines of a Pet AI mod, that would sniff out and direct you to missing arrows/arrowheads.

[Heart_Afire]

So, to be a bit more open about what I am doing and the snags I am hitting:

1) I'm adding a few different items to the game: Fletching, Shafts, and Fletched Arrows. These are meant to be a side-grade, like was talked about in a different thread, wherein you spend more time and materials on the item in question, but in exchange it works a bit better and has better durability...or in this case, a lower break chance.

2) Obviously, the main thrust...or, given these are arrows, should I say Point?...of this mod will be to add dyed fletching to your arrows that will then show up on the arrow's entity when fired, to make your arrow more visible for retrieval and provide a handy "Hey, that's mine" for multiplayer.

3. Spoiler below for the actual recipes and mechanics I added and changed.

Spoiler

• Fletching is made by crafting a feather with a knife, with one feather yielding two fletching (I can't remember if you split the feather or slice off one side but leave the spine?)
• Fletching can be dyed in a barrel using most of the standard colors, 8 fletching to a liter
• Shafts are made by crafting a knife with a stick...this is a placeholder step for a much later "Whittling" behavior I'd want to include. If I can figure out how to work it, I want it to require a copper knife or better.
• Fletched arrows are made with: 1 Arrowhead, 2 Flax Fibers, 1 Shaft, 3 Fletching, and a Knife as a tool
• The benefit of a Fletched arrow, in addition to being much more visible when fired, is that they have a reduced break chance (5% reduction as a working number) and are less affected by drag and gravity (To reflect the fact a properly fletched arrow would fly more true)

4. Spoiler below for the Snags I am currently hitting.

Spoiler

• I am having trouble getting the fletching texture to remap based on color, despite having studied how Linen and Leather do it.
• Same goes for getting fletched arrows to work, both as Items and also as Entities when fired. I've got their mechanics shifted, that's the easy part, but cannot get the textures to play nice.
• Plus I barely know how to work with textures...an artiste I am not

 

I do know this isn't the mod chat section, but I did feel you guys who were interested in this deserved to know what's going on. And if any of you have some advice, I'm all ears.

Edit: Clarified some stuff

Edited December 2, 2025 by Heart_Afire

[LadyWYT]

On 11/30/2025 at 11:35 PM, Heart_Afire said:

And if any of you have some advice, I'm all ears.

I'm not so great at the coding aspect, but this is where I tag my friend who does the codework on our mod. @Teh Pizza Lady

@Thorfinn and @xXx_Ape_xXx I've also seen cruise around the forums giving mod advice. If you're on the VS Discord, I think there is a channel specifically for modding as well, that's very active.

Edited December 2, 2025 by LadyWYT
forgot a word

[Teh Pizza Lady]

The only potential issue I see is that the "crafting fletching with a stick and a knife" might conflict with Primitive Survival which also uses that as a shapeless recipe for stakes.

[Arisilde]

21 hours ago, Venusgate said:

I think the cosmetic appear is the greater purpose here, only because i think arrows are so (rightfully?) hard to find - even hot pink fletchings wouldn't sizeably increase their odds of being found in thick brush.

I'd love if there was some kind of small dog critter you could train, even within the confines of a Pet AI mod, that would sniff out and direct you to missing arrows/arrowheads.

There's a very handy little mod that takes care of this, without being too imbalanced. You still have to hunt around to actually find the things, but it puts you in the right spot.
https://mods.vintagestory.at/projectiletracker

[Thorfinn]

I, too, suck at artistry. I even tried just recoloring cabbage rather than add the flowers and seed pods and all, and it came out crap. I'd ask @xXx_Ape_xXx. His mods (all?) involve graphics, and they look good.

I don't know what your middle "stuck" point means.

[Venusgate]

5 hours ago, Arisilde said:

There's a very handy little mod that takes care of this, without being too imbalanced. You still have to hunt around to actually find the things, but it puts you in the right spot.
https://mods.vintagestory.at/projectiletracker

Well sure, there's also "glowing projectiles." 

But if you've ever shot a bow in the wood real life, you know what you might not be going home with all your arrows, even if you look for them all for an hour. The fact that arrows always "stop" in dirt is also a boon to the player.

I think I'd rather tilt the other way of making an ingot produce 30 some odd arrowheads than make arrow retrieval more gamey.

Edited December 1, 2025 by Venusgate

[Heart_Afire]

6 hours ago, Thorfinn said:

I, too, suck at artistry. I even tried just recoloring cabbage rather than add the flowers and seed pods and all, and it came out crap. I'd ask @xXx_Ape_xXx. His mods (all?) involve graphics, and they look good.

I don't know what your middle "stuck" point means.

Ah, I could have phrased it better.

I mean that I am having issues getting Fletched Arrows to work, both as Items in the Inventory and as Entities when fired. Apologies, I'll edit that real quick.

[Arisilde]

On 12/1/2025 at 5:52 PM, Venusgate said:

Well sure, there's also "glowing projectiles." 

But if you've ever shot a bow in the wood real life, you know what you might not be going home with all your arrows, even if you look for them all for an hour. The fact that arrows always "stop" in dirt is also a boon to the player.

I think I'd rather tilt the other way of making an ingot produce 30 some odd arrowheads than make arrow retrieval more gamey.

I don't disagree with you at all, I was just offering a currently available suggestion that in my opinion is better balanced than glowing highlights. Take it for whatever you will. The chance to break covers a lot of the idea of losing arrows in the wild, so for me at least making the existing arrows a little easier to find isn't that gamey.
You can just edit the arrowhead recipe and make it output 30 if that's the solution you feel works for you. It's a simple json edit or addition. Currently there's 6arrowhead.json and 9arrowhead.json. You could add another or edit one of those and change the output stacksize.