Copper golem workers
Craft a helmet, put it on a copper golem and hand it a tool. It digs, farms or fells trees while you play, and everything it collects goes into a backpack only you can open.
9 lives · 90-day seasons · Java + Bedrock crossplay
Your first worker in five steps
- Get a copper golem: place a copper block and put a carved pumpkin on top, or use one you already have.
- Craft the helmet for the job: a leather helmet, a copper ingot (a copper block for the Quarry) and one job item. Lantern for the Tunneler and Quarry, hay bale for the Farmer, any log for the Lumberjack. The recipes are in your recipe book.
- Right-click the golem with the helmet. It becomes your worker and is waxed, so it never oxidises.
- Right-click it with the tool for the job: a pickaxe for miners, a hoe for the farmer, an axe for the lumberjack. It starts at once.
- Right-click it with an empty hand to open its backpack. Stock torches, spare tools, a copper chest and a stack of cobblestone.
Tunneler
Digs a 3x3 tunnel in the direction it was hired and keeps going until something stops it. With torches in its backpack it lights the tunnel every nine blocks.
Quarry
Clears a 9x9 pit straight down to bedrock, one layer at a time, and leaves a spiral staircase along the wall so you can walk in and out. Torches go on the pit wall every nine layers.
Farmer
Stands in your field and harvests wheat, carrots, potatoes, beetroot, nether wart, melons and pumpkins within ten blocks, replanting as it goes. It waits for crops to regrow, so leave it where it works.
Lumberjack
Finds the nearest natural tree within twelve blocks, fells the whole tree in one go, replants the sapling and clears the leaves. Logs, saplings, sticks and apples land in its backpack. Nether stems count as trees.
The backpack
Every worker carries 27 slots that only its owner can open. Spare tools in the bag are used when one breaks. A copper chest in the bag is placed and filled when the worker runs out of room, and it keeps going. Cobblestone, dirt, stone or planks let miners seal water and lava and bridge gaps instead of stopping.
Terrain only
Workers break natural terrain and ores. They stop at anything a player placed, at chests and other block entities, and at blocks their tool cannot break, and their name tag says why. Break through by hand, then open and close the backpack to send them on. Every block they break is logged under your name.
Real tools, real durability
Workers use real tools with real enchantments. Mending works, but slower than in your own hand: the tax is paid in XP the worker would have collected, and the surplus comes back to you as bottles of enchanting.
Commands and limits
/workers lists every worker you own with its job, coordinates and a bearing. /workers dismiss <number> retires a lost worker from anywhere and frees the slot; its backpack drops where it stood. You can own six workers: up to three tunnelers, two quarries, two farmers and two lumberjacks. A worker that is killed drops everything it carried.
Questions about workers
Does any copper golem work?
Yes. Any vanilla copper golem becomes a worker the moment you put a helmet on it, including golems you already have. Hiring waxes it so it never oxidises.
Can other players open my worker’s backpack?
No. Only the owner can open it; anyone else sees who it belongs to. A worker that is killed drops everything it carried, so keep valuable ones somewhere safe.
Why did my worker stop?
Its name tag shows the reason: a placed block in the way, water or lava with nothing to patch, a broken or missing tool, bedrock, or a full backpack with no chest to unload into. Fix the cause, then open and close the backpack to resume. If it says “waiting for owner”, you are serving a death time-out: it pauses until you are back and then carries on by itself.
Do workers grief builds?
They only break natural terrain and ores and stop at anything a player placed. Every block they break is logged under the owner’s name, so staff can trace it.
How many workers can I have?
Six per player: three tunnelers, two quarries, two farmers and two lumberjacks. Use /workers dismiss to free a slot.
Is this a mod?
No. Workers are a server-side plugin. You need nothing on your client, and Java and Bedrock players can both use them.
In game, /guide and /workers show the short version.