What Does Bad Omen Do in Minecraft? [Illustrated Guide]

Featured image credit: Mojang

When the Minecraft developers introduced pillagers in 1.14, Mojang also provided a new feature called Bad Omen.

Not only does it make the game more challenging, but something strange happens when you enter a pillager outpost with it active.

Keep reading, and I’ll tell you the sad story of a small Minecraft village called Tranquility.

Bad Omen Meaning Minecraft - Village Tranquility
Let me tell you the tragic story about a quiet Minecraft village I call Tranquility.
It had been a peaceful day like so many others. The busy townsfolk of Tranquility had attended to their crops, cared for their pets, and enjoyed their quiet life in the lush green hills surrounding them when a stranger walked into town carrying a pick-axe.
(Image credit: Mojang)

Along the way, you’ll learn everything you need about the bad omen status effect and how to avoid having friendly villagers slaughtered by pillagers!

Effects of Bad Omen

Bad Omen village Minecraft. Villager and baby villager.
A dad and a couple of baby villagers greeted the stranger. The villagers were friendly as they had never had any trouble with monsters. They did have a couple of Iron Golems patrolling the outskirts of the village to tend to their sheep at night so the villagers could get a good night’s sleep.
(Image credit: Mojang)

Bad Omen is a negative effect that will cause a raid event to trigger when you enter any village, plunging you and the village into a state of chaos.

Every raid spawn will consist of between five to fifteen raiders. And each raid will consist of a randomized number of vindicators, evokers, pillagers, and witches. 

The first wave will typically only be a small group of pillagers and maybe an indicator. 

After that, every wave will introduce more mobs until the final wave, which will have multiple of every raider type.

Bad Omen - first wave - group of illagers
Not long after the stranger had arrived, the peaceful village of Tranquility was attacked by the first wave of illagers.
(Image credit: Mojang)

When attacking the village, the raiders spawn on different sides every wave, meaning you must constantly be moving around.

While the raiders will target the nearby afflicted player (you or your friend in multiplayer), they prefer to hunt down the villagers and can enter their homes to slaughter them.

If you aren’t careful, your village population can be wiped out in minutes, leaving you with a husk of a village. 

How Do You Get Bad Omen?

The only way a player can get the bad omen effect is by killing a raid captain, also known as an Illager Captain.

You can easily tell which Illager is a raid captain as they will have a banner on their back with an Illager face staring ominously at you.

They sometimes ride a Ravager during village raids.

In the Java Edition of the game, this banner is called the Ominous banner, while in Bedrock Edition, it’s called the Illager banner.

Omnious Banner Minecraft
The first wave wasn’t so bad, and the group of illagers was quickly dispatched off with the help of the stranger and an Iron Golem. The Illager captain dropped his Omnious Banner as a result.
(Image credit: Mojang)

The first Illager captain killed will give you Bad Omen I, with every captain killed after the first increasing the effect’s level.

So let’s say you kill a Pillager Raid Captain, and another Illager picks up the ominous banner to become the new Pillager captain. Killing him increases your Bad Omen level by 1.

Check out this article on how to put letters on banners in Minecraft.

This content was first published on GameDaft.com

Notice, though, that killing any raid captain Illager that spawns during a raid will not increase the level of Bad Omen.

Bad Omen II Minecraft
Little did the villagers expect that the stranger, who had just walked into town, was infected by a negative buff called Bad Omen II.
(Image credit: Mojang)

Bad Omen has a max level of VI, which increases the number of raid waves you have to face, with a maximum of eight.

The Illager Captain

The Illager Captain can be a Pillager, Vindicator, Evoker, or Illusioner.

You’ll usually find between one and three captains in outposts (the outpost captain).

If you meet an Illager patrol, the patrol captain will be either a pillager or vindicator.

In Java Edition, you can also stumble upon a captain in Woodland mansions, either a Vindicator or Evoker.

Finding Pillagers

Pillager Outpost Tower Minecraft
The villagers of Tranquility had no idea that the stranger who had just walked into their town carried the Bad Omen effect because he had just encountered a Pillager Outpost the day before.
(Image credit: Mojang)

If you are trying to give yourself the bad omen effect on purpose, you can find pillagers in their natural habitat for whatever mad purpose you may have in mind (raid farms, anyone? Muahahahahaaa!).

They live in villages called pillager outposts in the Overworld, and you can recognize them on them having multiple large towers built from cobblestone and dark oak planks.

What are they waiting for? You, of course! 

They wait for brave adventurers such as yourself to wander into their territory so they can hunt you down with their crossbows.

How to Start a Raid and Survive It

Illager on Ravager Minecraft
As the night progressed and the number of waves of hostile mobs kept rolling through Tranquility, the number of dead mobs kept increasing. The Illagers even brought in the big guns – also known as Ravagers. The hostile mobs quickly slaughtered those villagers who hadn’t managed to escape into the hills.
(Image credit: Mojang)

The first and most straightforward method to trigger a raid is simply by entering one of the nearby villages with the Bad Omen effect active.

If you can’t find a village in survival mode, read this guide.

A raid typically has four to six waves, each with larger and stronger enemies to face down. 

Fully defeating the raid will grant you the status effect Hero of the Village, which lowers the cost of trading with villagers for roughly two in-game days. 

If you fail to defeat the raid, the pillagers will slaughter the villagers, leaving you without any villagers to trade with.

An Iron Golem is Your Friend

No one is better at invoking fear into a group of hostile mobs than having an Iron Golem patrolling the outskirts of a village.

Check this guide on how to make an Iron Golem.

But one golem won’t be enough to defend an entire village (especially not if you’re hiding in a basement somewhere and expecting the golems to do the job for you).

Depending on the terrain and the potency of your Bad Omen effect, you’ll usually need anywhere between 5 and 15 Iron Golems to defend a village!

Iron golem vs raid Illager Minecraft
As night turned to day, it became clear that the only survivor of Tranquility was an Iron Golem. I made sure to team up with him to kill the last Illagers.
(Image credit: Mojang).

Of course, you can also get your tamed wolf to attack the raiding Illagers, but it won’t last long. You’ll need a lot of wolfs if you expect any of them to survive – or install a mod so that you can give them armor.

Removing Bad Omen

So how do you get rid of bad omen after you have acquired the effect? You can be freed from the pillager’s evil grasp in three ways. 

Dying/Letting the Time Limit Run Out

If you choose not to go to a village, another option available to you is to let the effect wear itself out. 

Now, while it does not show you an actual timer, it eventually takes roughly one hour and forty minutes to disappear. 

If you want to speed up that process, you can jump off a cliff or take a long swim in a nearby river to get rid of it immediately. 

You should only do that if you do not have access to milk.

Hero of the village status effect - challenge completed Minecraft
After a whole night and morning of bloody battle, I emerged victorious and received the Hero of the Village status effect. But at what cost? All the villagers were dead or had run away! Had I only carried a bucket of milk instead of a bucket of water with me!
For generations to come, the village of Tranquility was known as such – not because of its peaceful inhabitants – but because it had become a ghost town.
And deep down, I felt that maybe I was to blame.

Mnah! Moving on to the next village.
(Image credit: Mojang)

Drinking Milk

Drinking a bucket of milk will remove the Bad Omen effect like any other negative status effect. 

This is by far the best method of removing the effect since no villagers have to die, and you don’t have to sentence yourself to exile for nearly two hours. 

Conclusion

I hope you enjoyed this cautious tale of the Bad Omen effect. Feel free to share it as a warning to other Minecraft players.

Bad Omen is probably Minecraft’s most dangerous effect, as it spawns large raids of dangerous and powerful foes to murder you and the local villagers.

If you don’t want to battle waves of mobs, having a couple of milk buckets ready at all times is always advised.

However, defeating a raid will grant you a buff that can make you rich beyond belief. And it’s bloody fun!

If you found this article helpful, check out the different enchantments available for crossbows to use after you defeat a raid. Until next time, happy gaming! 


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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Jan has played video games since the early 1980s. He loves getting immersed in video games as a way to take his mind off stuff when the outside world gets too scary. A lifelong gamer, the big interest led to a job as a lecturer on game sound at the University of Copenhagen and several written articles on video games for magazines.

Read more on the About Page.