Procedural Horse Genetics

A Minecraft mod where every horse carries a real Mendelian genotype, and its coat is generated from that genotype rather than picked from a list. This wiki is the reference for the genes, the coat engine, and how to add genes of your own.

315genes
49breeds
9.7×10247genotypes
>9×1018visually distinct

Start here

What the mod is, and the model underneath it

Philosophy

Why breeding is a game of skill, why determinism is the load-bearing wall, and which abstractions were chosen on purpose.

read before making a design call

The genetics model

Alleles as objects, the genotype code string, dominance patterns, and the per-allele epigenome.

common/genetics/

Breeding & pedigree

Segregation, epigenetic inheritance, horse records, the ancestry database and the family tree.

source of truth

The horse’s body

Speed, health, jump and size resolved from the genotype; the disorders a horse carries, and the foals that do not make it.

common/trait/

Breeds

Forty-nine real-world breeds as constrained founder rolls, biome-weighted wild herds, and the cross / mixed label algebra.

common/breed/

Gameplay

The layer on top of the genetics — care, items, breeding aids and the world

Horse care

Gated healing, the bond ladder and its four behaviour tiers, and how a herd forms — all on one shared slow tick.

bond · herds · healing

Breeding carrots & the gene database

Carrots that bias the gamete a parent contributes, the research papers that unlock them, and the progressive gene database behind both.

influencing inheritance

Items & recipes

The roster and the house rules, with a page for each item. Start here if you are not sure what a thing is for.

every recipe

Hay portals & the horse dimension

Light a hay-bale frame with a golden carrot and walk a private corridor of 2,000 pens, each one a rolled genotype with its genome on the sign.

the showroom

Horse designer

The custom horse spawn egg, in a browser: every registered gene over a horse walking a grass field. Runs common/ compiled to WebAssembly, so the coat is the game’s own — byte for byte.

tool

Items

One page each — what it is, how you get one, and what it does

Horse hair

Shear a horse for it. Nearly everything else is made from it, or from something made from it.

the base material

Breeding carrots

Four carrots fed to a parent before breeding. They change what it passes on, not what it is.

stabilizer · magnifier · splices

Splice carrots

Add a gene to a foal — one you picked, one at random, or one from a themed slice of the pool.

known · unknown · 5 themed

Research papers

Learn a gene so you can breed for it on purpose. Found in chests, written by hand, or traded.

unlocks a carrot line

Seed jars

Store a stallion’s genetics in a bottle and breed a mare with him later, from anywhere.

breeding at a distance

Whistles

Every tamed horse you own within range comes to you at once. Three tiers, 16 to 64 blocks.

area recall

Transfer papers

How a horse changes hands — and a signed one is drawn as the horse itself, so a shelf of them reads as a stable.

the deed

Spawn eggs

Build a horse gene by gene, roll a foundation horse of any breed, or keep an exact horse in an item.

custom · breed · preset

Stall signs

Bind a sign to a horse and hang it on a wall to claim the room behind as its stall.

nothing uses stalls yet

Horseman’s Table

The only block the mod adds. Put one near an unemployed villager and you get a horseman.

a job site

Tickets

Four tiers that craft correctly and do nothing at all yet.

inert

The coat engine

How a genotype becomes 16,384 pixels

Three-phase pipeline

Natural genes restrict pigment, the gradient resolves it to colour, magical genes add signed RGB on top.

CoatTextureComposer

Body space & regions

The projection engine that lets a coat rule be a smooth function of position and still come out seamless.

HorseSkinGeometry

The paint order

Every gene that paints a coat, stacked in the order it is applied — the last thing painted at the top. What covers what, as one long picture.

priority, top to bottom

Eye colour & heterochromia

Three biological routes to an iris, ranked; where green and hazel come from; and how a horse ends up with one blue eye or a blue wedge in a brown one.

EyeColor · EyeSpread · EyePatch

Texture resolution

What the sheet size actually is, what would break at half it or sixty-four times it, and the plan to paint on whatever white horse the player’s own resource pack ships.

not built — analysis

For modders

Adding a gene of your own

Making a gene

The whole job in one place: from a picture of a marking to a rule that draws it, every key in the file, every mask and op, the effects vocabulary, the Java escape hatch, and what to re-bake afterwards.

start here

Class abstractions

Every type a gene author touches, what it abstracts, and the signatures that matter.

reference

Trait & effect architecture

The wider behaviour system effects is a first slice of: selectors, auras, pools and goals.

mostly unbuilt

Gene creator

Build a gene in the browser, watch it on a 3D horse over any base coat, and export the JSON the game loads — no code.

tool

Breed designer

Pick a base coat, narrow the pool, band the numbers, and export the JSON the game loads out of .minecraft/phc/breeds/. It validates with the mod’s own parser and previews a herd with the mod’s own founder roll.

tool

LUT lab

Drop a colour gradient in and see the horses the real pipeline bakes against it — the three base coats, every dilution locus, and a tobiano to check the whites.

tool

Project

What is unproven, and what is coming

Architecture & the build

The three-module split that keeps a 1.12.2 backport cheap, the package layout, how a genome reaches a pixel, and what it takes to build and run.

start here to edit code

NeoForge 26.1.2 API notes

What the port actually required — renamed classes, the retained-mode GUI, and the events you must not touch block state from.

each entry cost a crash

Coding notes

The working notebook — how to find things out here, how to tell a real check from a decorative one, and the traps that live between two pages that are each correct.

technique, not reference

Releases

What shipped in each tagged version, newest first — the player-facing record, without the reasoning.

newest first

To be verified

The rolling runClient checklist — open issues, and what is built but not yet seen in-game.

built, not confirmed

Known gaps & lessons

What is broken, half-built, or resting on an unchecked assumption — plus the failure modes this project keeps rediscovering.

near-term

Mod compatibility

What this mod touches on the vanilla horse, why it uses attachments rather than a custom entity, and which kinds of mod it can and cannot live beside.

the renderer is the real conflict

Roadmap & backlog

Everything still to do, ordered by priority — the defects, the decisions, the gene wishlist and the gameplay layer that is not built yet.

nothing here is built

Session log

The dated record of what each session built and why — the reasoning behind decisions a later session would otherwise re-litigate.

newest first

Natural coat genes

The pigment every other gene then works on: whether the horse can make black at all, where that black is allowed to go, and the countershading over the top of it.

Extension

Can this horse make black pigment at all? ee gives chestnut.

E / e · dominant · 50/50

Agouti

Bay: black restricted to the points. Seal brown is the top of its distribution, not a separate gene.

A / a · dominant · 50/50

Brindle

Irregular white streaks that do not match from one side of the horse to the other — and the mod’s only X-linked gene. A stallion carries one copy and can never be a carrier, so it runs visibly down one side of a pedigree.

Brn / n · X-linked · 2% of stallions, 0.04% of mares

Sooty

The dark countershading that lies over a horse's topline, crest, shoulder and croup and makes it look darker than its base colour says - a muddy palomino, a smutty buckskin, a bay people keep calling black. It works by declining to remove pigment the rest of the coat was about to lose, so it shows most on the colours with the most to keep and does nothing at all on a plain black. A dosage of two variant alleles; no confirmed real-world inheritance exists.

S2 / S1 / s

Pangare (mealy)

Mealy: the pale muzzle, eye rings, belly, flanks and inner legs of an Exmoor pony or a Fjord. It takes red pigment off the soft parts of the horse, which is why it shows brightest on a chestnut, spares a bay's black points entirely, and is invisible on a black. A dosage of two variant alleles; near-fixed in some pony and draft breeds and no confirmed mutation anywhere.

Pa2 / Pa1 / pa

Natural dilution genes

Genes that lighten what is already there. Each takes red, or black, or both down by some amount - which is why the same dilution reads completely differently on a chestnut and on a black.

Silver dapple

Dilutes black only — chocolate body, near-flaxen mane and tail. A chestnut carrying it looks untouched.

Z / z · 1 in 60

Flaxen

The pale mane and tail of a chestnut horse - from a few gold strands to a near-white fall of hair - as a dosage of two variant alleles rather than the simple recessive folklore models it as, because no flaxen mutation has ever been identified. It touches the long hair and nothing else, and it is invisible on any horse that makes black hair, which carries and transmits it regardless.

Fl2 / Fl1 / f

Mushroom

The mirror of silver: dilutes red only, and only with two copies, walking a chestnut to a flat sepia.

Mu / mu · recessive · 1 in 34

Dun

Body dilution plus primitive markings. The middle allele draws the dorsal stripe with no dilution, so a horse can carry primitive marks and not be a dun.

D / d1 / d2 · 3 outcomes · D 1 in 24, d1 1 in 10

MATP — cream and pearl

One locus, three alleles, six combinations: palomino and buckskin, classic pearl, and the cremello a cream and a pearl together produce.

Cr / prl / N · 4 outcomes · 1 in 30, 1 in 22

Champagne

Gold, classic and amber champagne from a single rule that reads the current pigment.

Ch / c · dominant · 1 in 40

Grey

Dapple grey on adults only, at a per-horse stage from dark steel to nearly white.

G / g · dominant · 1 in 16

Natural white genes

Genes that take the coat away entirely in places. Only alleles at the same locus compete for a slot, which is why a horse can be tobiano and splashed and framed at once but never dominant white and sabino.

Zebra striping

A real zebra’s pattern, made the way a zebra makes it: the dark bands are the horse’s own colour and the gaps have the pigment taken out of them. So a striped black is black and white and a striped chestnut is red and white.

Zeb / n · codominant · 1 in 60

Roan

White hairs mixed evenly through the body coat, fading out by the head; the points and lower legs stay solid.

Rn / rn · 1 in 30

Rabicano

White ticking that starts at the tail dock and the flank and works forward - a frosted, banded coon tail, a scatter of white hairs over the rear barrel and belly, and broken vertical rib bars on the strongest ones. The allele is dominant but how much shows is a per-horse roll that can come out at almost nothing, so a horse recorded as solid can throw a heavily ticked foal. Not classic roan: the tail tells them apart.

Rb / rb

Tobiano

Big smooth-edged white patches that cross the topline and run down the legs; the head stays coloured.

To / to · 1 in 50

Leopard complex (appaloosa)

Three loci — LP plus the modifiers PATN1 and PATN2 — giving leopard, fewspot, spotted blanket and snowcap, with striped hooves and a white-rimmed eye. The one gene that reads other loci to decide what it paints.

LP / lp · 8 outcomes · 1 in 40

EDNRB — frame overo

Flank white that never crosses the topline — and, from two carriers, the all-white lethal foal.

O / N · 3 outcomes · 1 in 55

KIT — white spotting

Eight alleles at one locus: sabino, the W series and dominant white, which is why a horse can be one of them and never two.

W22 / W13 / W10 / W5 / W23 / SB1 / W20 / N · 8 outcomes

Manchado

A rare Argentine pattern: broad clean white over the back, crest and croup with smooth rounded islands of the base colour left inside it, a mostly white tail, and a dark head, belly and lower legs. It takes two copies and no wild horse has them, so the only way to see one is to breed two carriers. Its own locus - it belongs to none of the mapped white-pattern genes, and its real cause is unknown.

ma / Ma

MITF — splash white

Dipped in white from below, with a sharply bounded edge. One of the two splash loci.

SW3 / SW1 / SW5 / N · 4 outcomes

PAX3 — splash white

The other splash locus, and the one most horses carry: nine wild horses in ten have a copy. Carry one at each locus and the horse is markedly whiter than either alone.

SW2 / SW4 / N · 3 outcomes

Natural health genes

The loci you cannot see: speed, size, jump, and the disorders. Almost every one is recessive and absent from its own founder table as a homozygote - a wild horse can carry a disorder but never have one.

MSTN — myostatin

The sprint / stamina trade: each C copy adds speed and costs two hearts of health.

C / T · codominant · p(C) 0.35

PDK4

A plain speed gene — each A copy adds a little movement speed and nothing else.

A / G · p(A) 0.25

CKM

The weakest and rarest of the three speed loci; each T copy adds a little speed.

T / C · p(T) 0.20

RYR2

Each J copy adds jump strength — the first gene in the mod to move a horse’s jump.

J / n · p(J) 0.20

LCORL / NCAPG

A height gene: taller, with a little more speed and jump, per L copy.

L / n · p(L) 0.30

HMGA2 — pony

Smaller, slower and lower-jumping per p copy — but two hearts hardier for it.

p / N · p(p) 0.25

ACAN

Dwarfism with five alleles; affected means no working copy is left. One pairing is lethal at birth, the rest are surviving dwarfs.

D1 / D2 / D3 / D4 / N · 0.4% per variant

B4GALT7

Friesian dwarfism — reduced size and health, but the one disorder a horse lives with.

d / N · 4% carriers

PLOD1

Fragile foal syndrome — a recessive lethal at birth.

ffs / N · 2.6% carriers

RAPGEF5 — EFIH

The rarest and most severe of the foal lethals — recessive, lethal at birth.

efih / N · 1.4% carriers

ST14

Naked foal syndrome — a recessive lethal at birth (the bald coat itself is not drawn).

nfs / N · 1.8% carriers

SHOX

Skeletal atavism — a recessive lethal at birth, inherited like an ordinary autosomal gene.

sa / N · 2.0% carriers

MET

Lethal at conception: when two carriers would make an affected foal, the pairing simply yields none.

met / N · 3.0% carriers

SCN4A (HYPP)

SCN4A (HYPP), periodic paralysis - the first locus that is BOTH a survivable disorder and a lethal. One copy affects the horse (there is no silent carrier), two kill the foal. Wild horses can be born with one copy, because a dominant that never appeared in a founder could never appear at all.

H / N

GYS1 (PSSM1)

GYS1 (PSSM1), tying-up - a dominant disorder, so every copy shows and there is no carrier. Neither combination is lethal, which makes it the mildest and by far the commonest disorder a player will actually meet.

P / N

PPIB (HERDA)

PPIB (HERDA), fragile skin - a recessive disorder the horse lives with rather than dies of: it splits where a saddle sits and never heals cleanly. The commonest survivable recessive here, because the real thing hides inside exactly the working lines a breeder would choose.

herda / N

PRKDC (SCID)

PRKDC (SCID), severe combined immunodeficiency - a recessive lethal. The foal is born with no immune system and does not survive.

scid / N

MYO5A (lavender foal)

MYO5A, lavender foal syndrome - a recessive lethal at birth. The real disorder comes with a diluted silvery coat, which is deliberately not drawn: the foal dies in seconds and phase 1 can only remove pigment.

lfs / N

TOE1 (cerebellar abiotrophy)

TOE1, cerebellar abiotrophy - a recessive disorder of balance. The horse survives but has no idea where its feet are, which makes it the heaviest jump penalty in the mod. Progressive in reality; a flat cost here, because there is no age model.

ca / N

CVM (cervical malformation)

CVM, cervical vertebral malformation - a recessive lethal at birth. Unlike every other natural gene here it has no confirmed causal variant; treating it as one locus is the mod's simplification, not a claim about horse genetics.

cvm / N

GBE1 (GBED)

GBE1 (GBED), glycogen branching enzyme deficiency - a recessive lethal at birth, and the largest heart reduction in the mod. The foal cannot store or release sugar.

gbed / N

Megaesophagus

Megaesophagus, a slack gullet that will not move milk - a recessive lethal at birth. Like CVM it is a breed condition with no confirmed causal variant, simplified to one locus.

meg / N

Other natural genes

The naturals that are neither pigment nor pattern nor disorder - what the horse will eat, and what colour its eyes are.

Sex

Mares are X/X, stallions X/Y. First gene in the order, and the only one that paints nothing — so a foal’s sex is inherited, not rolled.

X / Y · 2 outcomes · 50/50

Diet

What the horse will eat. Twelve narrow diets - raw meat, fish, wheat, cake, potions, lava, one metal, one gem and the rest - each of which needs two identical copies to show, against a wild type that eats ordinary horse feed. A narrow diet refuses almost everything, and what it does accept feeds it far better: a single gold bar takes a metal-eater to full health. No breed carries any of it.

13 alleles

Tiger eye

A bright amber iris in a horse whose coat is entirely ordinary — the first gene that changes only the eyes. Essentially confined to the Puerto Rican Paso Fino.

TE1 / TE2 / N · recessive · eyes only

Magical coat genes

Where the magic starts. These are the hand-written genes that put colour on the horse - Java classes rather than gene files, because each does something no colour op can: swap the whole gradient chart, colour the hair on its own axis, draw an emblem over the finished texture, take the front third of the animal away. The data-driven markings are in the seven families below this one, sorted by what shape they are made of.

Bargello

Sharp zigzag ribbons run the length of the ribcage in stacked colours, over a fine screen of straight horizontal lines.

P / C / n

Blackwork

One black ornament lies along the horse's back - thick rounded strokes that curl, hook and taper, all of it connected into a single mass and mirrored exactly either side of the spine.

Bk / Bc / n

Coastline

A rust landmass lies across a sage sea with a pale grey coastline drawn all the way round it, and small rust islands, each with its own shore, scattered off it.

Cl / Cm / n

Contour

The coat reads as a contour map - lobed masses ringed by nested bands that step from cream through pink and mint to near-black, with a drawn line following one level all the way round.

Ct / Cx / n

Crazework

The coat crazes into tiled plates, each one dark with a blue centre and a cyan spark inside that, separated by grey channels that pool pale gold where three of them meet. Toward the forehand the tiling breaks up and the plates drift apart into islands.

Cw / Cq / n

Cutie mark

A recessive emblem of 1–3 item icons stamped on both flanks, over everything. Which items, how many, and the layout are all epigenetic and breed true.

Cutmrk / n · recessive

Dhampir

A magical recessive whose carrier is not silent: one copy gives red eyes with glowing whites and nothing else, which is what makes the locus worth hunting. Two copies give a white, red-eyed animal that burns in daylight and runs for shade or water, with three times the health, half again the speed and twice the jump - and which cannot be fed by any means. It heals only by biting something living.

Dhmp / n

Dorsal Wing

A butterfly lies along the horse's back with its wings spread either side of the spine - dark, edged in teal, with rust squiggles across the wings and hot pink cells inside them. Both halves are identical.

Wb / Wc / n

Dripwork

Heavy ink rings with solid pupils are scattered over a pale ground, each one trailing a drip straight down, with loose dots thrown between them.

Dw / Dx / n

Dustfall

Fine coloured dust settles over the whole horse in three independent scatters - raspberry, yellow and teal - each drifting into its own thicker and thinner patches, over a faint taupe haze where it lies heaviest.

Du / Dc / n

Healer

Mends whoever stands beside it, and carries a red stripe down its mane so you can tell.

Hlr / n · recessive · 9%

Hood

A colour laid solid over the head that thins out along the neck and is gone by the shoulder - how far it reaches, and what colour it is, both run in the family.

Hd / n

Light

Gold hooves, mane or eyes that glow in the dark, and a horse that lights a stable. Three alleles, none dominant to the others.

Lthf / Ltmn / Lteye / n · codominant

LUT

Swaps the whole colour gradient for an unnatural one. Two matching variant copies turn a horse blue and pink; one copy is a silent carrier.

n / Blupnk · homozygous-only

Magic sectoral heterochromia

Two different colour alleles and the horse shows both, a wedge of each in each iris. Two of the same show nothing — the only gene here you cannot breed toward by doubling up.

6 colours / n · 15 expressing pairs

Magic zebra

A zebra’s own stripe map at −200% per channel — black over any coat at all, including one with no pigment left to remove.

Mzeb / n · dominant · 1 in 100

Mane colour

Any colour there is, solid or banded — or both at once, in two colours, because each allele copy carries its own hue.

Mnsld / Mnstrp / n · 4 outcomes

Nacre Saddle

A milky marbled saddle over the back, folded into pale lobes with a thin shifting film picked out along every rim.

W / B / C / n

Nymphaline

The barrel carries the membrane of a butterfly wing - rose cells netted by dark green veins, each vein edged in cream, all of them radiating from a spar along the topline.

Wn / Wf / n

Overcast

Banks of grey cloud drift across the horse - rounded blobs packed shoulder to shoulder, each shaded darker at its middle, with thin bright channels of sky between them. A third allele carries the same four-step cloud in the dark end of the scale - a thunderhead rather than an overcast.

Cu / Ck / Cc / n

Ringwork

A dark network runs over the coat, pooling where its lines meet, and inside every space it encloses sit two or three concentric rings around a small dark core - a contour map of something nobody drew.

Rw / Rc / n

Serpentine

The coat runs in long streaky bands of taupe, sage and blue-grey with dark seams between them, and bright green ore is scattered through it in chips and dust.

Sp / So / n

Shallows

Ripples spread across the coat in rings of short blue flecks over a pale ground, with irregular lime splotches lying over them and a black depth flooding down from the topline in lobed fingers.

Sh / Sc / n

Squiggle

Broad squiggling lanes wander the length of the horse, forking and pinching out, each one white down its middle and running out through yellow to a pink rim, with small holes of bare coat punched through them.

Sq / Sc / n

Starburst

A hard-edged six-pointed star sits on each flank, ringed twice and thrown out over a longer eight-point burst, with shards and flecks scattered clear of it.

W / B / C / n

Suit

A band right round the base of the neck, with everything behind it going pale and the head, crest and lower legs keeping the coat — painted near the bottom of the order, so almost anything else covers it.

Sut / Suc / n

Synort

The whole body under a running colour gradient, with a tobiano-shaped patch of the horse's own coat left in it, outlined in black - and white flecks through an otherwise untouched mane.

Syn / n

Tail colour

The same locus one gene over, so a horse can be one colour at one end and another at the other.

Tlsld / Tlstrp / n · 4 outcomes

Teardrop

A scatter of brilliant blue teardrops hangs point-down across the coat, each one rimmed in navy with a pale cyan spark in its head, and a single pink teardrop sits on the shoulder - one on each side, the same place on every horse that carries it.

Td / Tc / n

Wing Margin

The flank carries a butterfly's wing - a pale field crossed by fine veins running back toward the stifle, edged along the underline with a row of scallops and dark lunules.

W / B / C / n

Magical yield genes

Genes about what you get out of the horse rather than what it looks like - what fills a bucket, how often, how much meat it leaves, what it drops, and what happens to the ground it died on. None of them paints anything, and most of them cannot be seen on a living animal at all, which is what makes them worth a gene database.

Egg layer

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies of the SAME allele and the horse drops an item on the ground every few hours with nothing required from you. One copy shows nothing, and two different alleles show nothing. How often is drawn per allele copy.

9 alleles

Magic item drop

Dia / Egg / Swd / n

Magic meat

Mty / n

Magic milk volume

Mlk / n

Magic on death

Lav / Wat / Xpl / n

Milk

A bucket gets milk, water or lava. Both magical alleles are invisible in one copy, and lethal together.

Watr / Lava / n · recessive

Potion milk

A magical incomplete dominant that paints nothing: milk a tamed grown mare with an EMPTY BOTTLE rather than a bucket and get a potion. One copy is weak, two matching copies are strong, and two DIFFERENT copies give one bottle carrying both effects at the weak grade.

11 alleles

Magical behaviour genes

Genes that change what the horse <i>does</i> - how mobs feel about it, what it becomes after dark, what it eats and what it turns into. The night loci are the reason this family exists: a horse that stands in the corner watching you is not a coat pattern and never belonged beside one.

Base alarm

A magical DOMINANT that paints nothing: one copy is enough, and the horse whinnies when something hostile comes within about sixteen blocks of IT - not of your base, which is not a thing this mod has. Where you stable it is the configuration.

Alm / n

Bird boned

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies and neither the horse nor its rider takes any falling damage, from any height. It removes fall damage, not falling.

Brd / n

Cleansing light

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies and undead within a radius drawn per allele copy take steady damage. Anything the aura kills was killed by the HORSE, so you get no experience and no player-only drops - it is defence, not farming.

Cln / n

Dryad

A magical recessive that paints nothing: about once a day the horse plants a sapling near where it stands. It plants; it does not fertilise. How often is drawn per allele copy and inherited with it.

Dry / n

Echolocate

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies and the horse cries like a bat now and then, outlining everything alive nearby through walls and darkness. It shows you the skeleton and the lost cow without distinguishing between them.

Ech / n

Ender echo

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies and the horse blinks about eight blocks away when something damages it, carrying its rider. Against skeletons it is close to immunity; against a skeleton across a ravine it is a trip you did not plan.

End / n

Fireproof

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies and neither the horse nor its rider takes fire damage, and the horse swims THROUGH lava rather than over it. Wild horses carry it and never show it, so a fireproof horse is always one somebody bred.

Frp / n

Food preference

A magical DOMINANT that paints nothing: one copy and the horse has one favourite food, which gives a short buff and far more bond than it should. It OVERRIDES the diet locus - a meat-eater that inexplicably loves carrots will eat them, and that is the point.

13 alleles

Gladiator

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies and the horse attacks hostile mobs that come within reach - but only while nobody is riding it, and it holds its ground rather than chasing. It makes the horse willing; magic fighter is what makes it dangerous.

Gld / n

Guardian

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies, tamed, and the horse attacks whatever damaged its OWNER within about sixteen blocks. It never picks the fight and it keeps working while you ride, which is what separates it from a gladiator.

Grd / n

Holy ward

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies and hostile mobs cannot SPAWN within a radius drawn per allele copy, at least eight blocks and never more than sixteen. A camp that walks. Wild horses carry it and never show it.

Hly / n

Hot blooded

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies and snow and ice within a couple of blocks melt away, leaving a thawed circle wherever the horse stands. On a frozen lake it melts the ice it is standing on and is then in the water.

Hot / n

Hydrophobic

A magical recessive that paints nothing, and the odd one out: it RESTORES vanilla behaviour rather than adding to it. Two copies and the horse throws its rider in deep water and heads for shore, losing the swimming assist every other tamed horse here gets.

Hyd / n

Intimidating

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies and everything that is not a horse - your cows as readily as any monster - is pushed out of a radius drawn per allele copy. It cannot be pastured with your animals, which is the cost and is deliberate.

Itm / n

Leader of the pack

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies of the SAME allele and every creature of one kind within sixteen blocks trails the horse around. One allele per non-hostile mob, and wild horses only ever carry - so a matched pair is always something somebody bred.

38 alleles

LYCAN — the werewolf locus

Two copies of the same allele and the horse is a real wolf, cat or chicken from dusk to dawn — and a horse again in the morning, with the same name and the same pedigree.

37 shapes / n · matched pairs only

Magic mob aura

Wrd / Bai / n

Magic night temper

9 alleles

Magic night watch

6 alleles

Meowing

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies and the horse meows occasionally, and creepers keep outside a radius drawn per allele copy. Creepers are the mob that costs you a horse, which is what makes the joke worth breeding.

Mew / n

Music enjoyer

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies and the horse's bond rises while a jukebox plays nearby, with hearts. It answers to the same daily bond ceiling as every other source, so it is a pleasant way to spend a day rather than a shortcut past one.

Msc / n

Ocean-born

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies and neither the horse nor its rider can drown. It says nothing about how fast the horse swims or how long it lasts under - those are other loci, on purpose.

Ocn / n

Spawner

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies of the SAME allele and feeding the horse makes two of one mob, every meal - the food is the only limit. One allele per mob INCLUDING the monsters, and never expressed in the wild.

68 alleles

Spontaneous breeding

A magical recessive that paints nothing and grants no effect at all: two copies, AND another horse nearby with two copies, and the pair breed on their own with no golden carrots. Wild horses carry it and never show it, so the first pair in a world is one somebody bred.

Spb / n

Verdant

Mycelium, moss or grass creeping out from the hooves. Every variant needs two of itself.

mush / moss / grass / n

Magical emission genes

Genes that put something in the air around the horse rather than on it - the particle loci, whose colour, body site and density are all written on the allele copy and inherited with it.

Molten hooves

A magical locus that paints nothing: hoofprints on the ground behind the horse, fading as they cool. WHITE is dominant over everything - one copy glows white. BLACK (unlit), one COLOUR and MULTICOLOUR are recessive and show only as their own homozygotes; the colours are written on the allele copy and inherited with it. Nothing catches fire.

MltW / MltB / MltC / MltM / n

Particle

Flames, souls, snow, hearts — a horse that trails something as it moves. Forty alleles at one locus, so it shows at most two, and one copy of the wild type silences the lot.

40 variants / n · recessive · 87 outcomes

Rainbow dust

Coloured dust off all four hooves, fading from one colour into the next and working its way round the whole rainbow.

Rbw / n · recessive · 0.25%

Singer

A magical recessive that paints nothing: two copies of the SAME allele and the horse plays the OPENING of a music disc now and then - not the whole thing and never the middle, because a Minecraft sound cannot be started partway through. Duration and volume are per allele copy.

16 alleles

Magical body-stat genes

Loci that move what a horse's body can do and paint nothing at all - the magical mirror of the performance genes, with far wider ranges and no real-world claim behind them. Four of them (speed, health, jump and size) resolve into the horse's stats and are the ones a breed pins from its stat bands; the rest reach the game as effects instead, because swimming and fighting mean nothing without a running game around them.

Agatebound

A ribbon of banded colour runs diagonally across the barrel like a slice through agate, every band outlined in near-black, with a bright seam along its middle.

P / C / n

Bracketed

Overlapping shelf lobes crowd the haunch, each one a pale rim around a darker body, stacked the way bracket fungus climbs a trunk.

W / B / C / n

Coronal

A dark, ragged disc sits high on each flank with a ring of long tapering spikes thrown out around it, brightest at the tips.

W / B / C / n

Eyesight locus

A magical recessive that paints nothing: Cav/Cav is faster in the dark and slower in light, Day/Day the reverse, and one of each cancels. It reads the actual LIGHT LEVEL rather than the clock, so a cave at noon counts and your own torches slow a caveborn horse down.

Cav / Day / n

Geode

Straight-sided crystal shards grow up out of the hooves and the lower barrel, faceted, lit along their upward faces and glinting at the tips.

P / C / n

Maelstrom

A whirlpool of tapering arms winds into a tight spiral on each flank, with a scatter of pale flecks caught in the sweep.

W / B / C / n

Magic body size

Most horses carry a copy, worth about a tenth either way. Two copies add — and no wild horse is born with two.

Big / Small / n · codominant · 80%

Magic fighter

Gld / Wmp / n

Magic health

The same, for hearts. Not a disorder — the config “off” switch leaves it alone.

Hardy / Frail / n · codominant · 80%

Magic jump

The same, for jump strength. One of the four body-stat genes most wild horses carry all of.

Springy / Leaden / n · codominant · 80%

Magic speed

Magic body size for how fast a horse runs. Multiplies the natural speed loci; most horses carry a copy.

Swift / Sluggish / n · codominant · 80%

Magic swim speed

Otr / Stne / n

Magic water breathing

Gil / Shal / n

Sunspiral

A tight spiral sits centred on each flank with three rings of short dashes thrown out around it, gathered into five points like a rock-carved sun.

W / B / C / n

Weather sensitive (jump)

A magical codominant that paints nothing: the same idea as the weather speed locus and a completely separate gene, moving jump instead. Inheriting one tells you nothing about the other, which is the whole reason there are two.

7 alleles

Weather sensitive (speed)

A magical codominant that paints nothing: a positive and a negative allele for rain, storms and snowfall, each moving the horse's speed by a percentage drawn per allele copy while its own weather holds. Unlinked to the jump locus. You cannot check it on demand - you wait for the sky.

7 alleles

Witchfire

Tongues of cold fire climb the underline and the legs, forking and pinching out before they reach the topline, with one slow curl low on the barrel.

P / C / n

Magic: ground and strong white

Genes that replace the base coat rather than mark it - a white horse with the colour breaking through, a coat confined to a handful of regions, a field split down the middle.

Beetle Pearl

A hard black barrel scattered with pearls, a pale cap over the poll and a dark fork down the face - a pearl-spotted beetle rather than a spotted horse.

Bpw / Bpc / n

Black Holes

Solid hard-edged patches with scalloped margins, dropped anywhere at all - face, limbs, belly, over the base of the mane - each with a satellite dot or two beside it.

Bhl / n

Burn

Pure black, and pure black regardless of what the coat is - up the legs and over the muzzle on one allele, through the mane and tail on the other, and both at once when a horse carries one of each.

Bm / Bt / n

Carapace Sheen

The coat gleams like a beetle's shell - glassy and deep where the body turns toward the light, paling underneath, with a bright ridge down the spine and a few pale blazes on each flank.

Csh / n

Cleave

The horse split about half and half, along a boundary made of interlocking spears - long narrow triangles driven into each field from the other, and never a curve anywhere.

Clv / Clc / Wav / Wac / n

Coccinella Marking

A beetle-black coat with red paisley over the barrel and a cream patch at each shoulder - a seven-spot ladybird read onto a horse.

Ccr / Ccv / n

Cracked Porcelain

A glaze laid over the whole horse and then crazed - the coat underneath shows through only as the hairline cracks between the plates.

Cpw / Cpc / n

Dragon Shroud

Soft-edged plumage laid over the whole horse and piped in steel grey, breaking into streamers down the mane and tail - with the coat underneath showing through as scattered windows.

Drsw / Drsc / n

Fracture

Overo read backwards - a white horse with the coat colour breaking through it in hard-edged, unpredictable blocks and streaks.

Fdf / Fdc / n

Galaxy

A black field over most of the horse with the coat left showing in a few lobed patches, and the black full of stars - hard points and long curved streaks in white and a cool accent or two.

Gxy / n

Imperial

A white cape starting at the withers and working forward up the neck - reaching the poll at full coverage - with slivers of coat left showing between its branches.

Sbi / Sbc / n

Iridescent Jewel Beetle Coat

A coat that runs through the spectrum from one flank to the other, pitted with dark punctures in warm haloes - the shell of a jewel beetle.

Ijw / Ijm / n

Koi

A hard-edged patchwork over the whole horse, the way a koi carp is marked - one colour against another with nothing blended between them, and the mane and tail striped to match.

Koi / Kob / Kow / n

Laciano

Tobiano and appaloosa in one marking - white coming down from the back rather than up from the belly, spotting over it, and always the banded raccoon tail that gives it away.

Lac / Lcc / n

Marble Tobiano

Tobiano gone streaky and angular - hair-thin veins on a minimal horse, broad blocky zones on a heavily marked one, and nothing at all unless it is homozygous.

Tmr / Tmc / n

Moth Mantle

A pale mantle over the barrel crossed by a wing net, with a banded tail, a pair of spots at its tip, and a mark on each cheek - a tiger moth at rest.

Mmw / Mmc / n

Opal Wing-Vein Marking

The barrel as an insect wing - a membrane running dark at the belly to bright along the back, fanned with fine veins and lit between them.

Owv / Owm / n

Panda

A strong white that keeps the coat only where a giant panda is dark - the muzzle, the ears, patches round the eyes, the shoulders and the hindquarters - with freckles of it scattered along the topline.

Pan / Pnc / n

Qular

White over eight or nine tenths of the horse, left open in big irregular panels of coat - a giraffe read backwards, with the mane untouched.

Qul / Quc / n

Snow Cloud

A white horse with its colour left only where the snow did not settle - clustered high on the croup, round the ankles, and across the face in front of the ears.

Snw / Snc / n

Suntouched

A data-driven gene shipped as a JSON file: an emissive gold mane and tail, a gold-dust aura, and enough light to walk by.

Sntch / n · gene file

Tribal Ward

A painted ward - a pale ground with coiled swirls at hip and shoulder, chevrons down the back, bands round the neck and rings round the legs, and the coat left bare at the throat and chest.

Twd / Twc / n

Valentine Appaloosa

The whole coat pushed into pinks and reds - black to fuchsia, red to pink - and then blanketed with white spots, mane and tail carried along with it.

Vln / n

Waterborn

The other shipped gene file: neon-blue streaks through the mane and tail, a blue trail at the hooves, and walking on water.

Wtbn / n · gene file

Winged

Curved bands sweeping back from the withers along the ribs with ovoid spots between them, and one diagonal stripe across the shoulder - laid straight on the coat with one copy, and inside a dark saddle with two.

Wng / n

Magic: fields and regions

Genes that divide the horse into areas - a blanket off the topline, a band round the neck, the underside against the back, a wash with no edge anywhere.

Accretion

One long boundary running the length of the horse, dividing it into a pale field and a coloured one - the allele decides whether it is the underside or the topline that goes pale.

Ab / At / Ac / n

Agate

The coat splits into cracked, jewel-toned cells, each one softening to a pale rim and deepening at its heart - agate split open in the light.

Agt / Agc / n

Banded Socks

Stacked bands up all four legs, like a set of rings pulled on - the height of the band and its colour are the horse's own.

Bsk / n

Barred Wing

A butterfly's wings opened across the ribs, the dark ground cut into bars by a paler field running through it.

Bw / Bwb / Bwc / n

Candelabra

A spired chandelier stood upright on the ribs, its scrollwork open enough to show the coat through it.

Cnd / Cnb / Cnc / n

Coral Bloom

The coat ruffles into overlapping coral lobes, each rimmed in bright orange and shading from deep sea-blue to a pale crown, flecked all over with gold.

Crb / n

Cosmic

A blanket anchored on the topline and hanging down the sides, filled with a starfield - and, on a well-marked horse, a planet or two with a ring round it.

Cs / n

Dorsal Shield

A plate laid over the back from withers to croup, studded with haloed marks - armour rather than a blanket.

Dsh / Dsc / n

Dutch

A hard-edged white band right round the body at the shoulder, widest under the chest and narrowing over the withers, with white stockings and a white muzzle to match.

Dut / Dtc / n

Emitola

The whole underside taken in black, its upper edge broken into flames, and bright speckling worked all through the flame work - with the forelock the same colour.

Emi / n

Flametouched

Fire on the horse - stylised flames licking up the legs and face with one copy, or a smooth ember gradient over the topline, face, hair and hooves with two. Never both on one horse.

Ffm / n

Foxglove

A flowering stalk stands on each flank - one curved stem hung with pale nodding bells, each throat ringed and stippled.

W / B / C / n

Gill Bloom

A fungal-touched marking: one or two fan-shaped patches on the barrel, each rimmed in dull gold and hollowed to a deep maroon interior spoked like the underside of a mushroom cap.

Gbl / n

Goth

A soft-edged hood over the forehead, poll, ears and crest - darker than the coat with one copy, greyed out to near-white with two.

Gth / n

Hued Pangare

Pangare in a colour instead of in cream: a soft field up the belly and the underside of the neck with one copy, and half the horse with two.

Hpa / n

Inkcoil

A brushed coil of ink running up the ribs, doubling back on itself twice and closing on a spiral at each end.

Ik / Ikb / Ikc / n

Iris Bloom Diamonds

Dark royal-blue diamonds unfold across the barrel like a fan of iris petals, each rimmed in ink, dappled white, and lit at the middle by radiating amber veins.

Ibd / n

Iuari

Concentrated patches a shade off the coat, each one ringed by a scatter of bright speckles that thins as it moves away.

Iua / n

Kite Bloom

Angular, jewel-toned panels tile the coat like a stained-glass leaf, each one salted with pale flecks and seamed with the coat beneath.

Kbw / Kbc / n

Ladybug Saddle

A pair of wing panels over the barrel split by a black spine, veined in black, with a checkered collar where they meet the withers.

Lbs / Lbc / n

Masked

A hard-edged dark mask over the top of the head and down the crest, broken by pointed light streaks along the neck, with the far half of the tail dark to match.

Msk / n

Moonwing

A pearl-white wing sweeps back across each side of the barrel, dusted with a faint shimmer of blue, violet and pink and bound at the edge by a thick band of gold. Rare foals carry it reversed - the wing itself coloured, the gold unchanged.

Mnw / Mnc / n

Morpho Wing

A patch of iridescent light gathers low on the haunch like a wing folded against the flank, cut through with dark bars that rake toward the tail.

Mow / Moc / n

Nebula Points

Black points - head, muzzle, ears, mane and tail - with a fan of light running up the crest and raking across the barrel. The dominant form glows in the dark; the recessive one is the same pattern in plain pigment.

Nbg / Nbp / n

Nightbloom Shroud

A marking said to fall on horses touched by fungal fae magic in old-growth forest: the crest and skull glow deep abyssal blue, and ribbons of gold-to-violet gill striping fan down the neck and barrel before fading out over the legs.

Nbs / n

Nimbus

A cloud of colour lying over the trunk with no edge anywhere, curdled into stronger and weaker cells so the coat reads through it in places.

Nim / n

Opal Crackle

A coat shot through with fine dark seams, each one catching light in its own colour - the fire you would find cracked out of a boulder opal.

Ocr / Ocp / n

Opal Fire

A dark stone set into the shoulder, with two sprays of fire fanning up out of the underline and green flecks caught in the ground around them.

Opw / Opc / n

Opaline

A network of raised glassy veins divides the coat into a mosaic of small irregular cells - pale-on-pale in the common form, and in the rare one blazing blue and violet, each cell rimmed near-black and starred with tiny bubbles.

Opw / Opd / n

Opossum

Grey confined to the front of the horse - forehead, face, neck and the front of the shoulder - with roaned edges that never cut sharply, and a pink muzzle where it reaches that far.

Opo / Opc / n

Orchid Frost

Cold, soft-edged blotches settle over the coat, bleaching its black and plum toward candy pink wherever they land - and finding nothing to bite into on a coat already that pale.

Frs / n

Oscar

Black laid over the whole horse and then flaked away in big wavy upright stripes, so the coat underneath shows through the gaps like the scales of a fish.

Osc / n

Papillon

A butterfly's wing laid over the neck, drawn from a real species, with the mane and tail carrying the wing's brightest and darkest colours down their length.

Si / Gr / Sp / n

Patina

Copper going green - verdigris marbling worked into exactly the places a seal bay keeps its light patches, with mottling round the eyes and muzzle.

Pat / n

Petaled

The coat breaks into overlapping petals, each rimmed in dark rose and then in black, veined across a pale blush field like a flower caught mid-bloom.

Ptl / n

Quarter

The trunk cut into quadrants by two transverse planes and the midline, with one of them going pale - or two, on the other allele.

Qp / Qd / Qc / n

Quazars

Two to four long pale beams lying nose-to-tail across the shoulder, hip and thigh, brightest along their middle and fading out with no edge at all.

Qzr / Qzc / n

Shark

A single fin-shaped pale field standing on the withers, leaning forward, with a tapering band running on up the crest to the poll.

Shk / Shc / n

Sky Shadow

The whole coat pushed toward mid-grey, with a further wash of light up the belly and flank - and the mane, tail, lower legs and muzzle left at full strength.

Sky / n

Stardust

Colour leaving the hair from two places at once - the base of the forelock and the tip of the tail - and creeping along the spine, with star-shaped dapples crowding the edge of wherever it has reached.

Str / Stt / n

Taper Flame

A candle flame stood on the barrel: a dark outer skin, a brighter body inside it, a pale foot and one small spark near the tip.

Tf / Tfb / Tfc / n

Tidefoam Sash

A sinuous sash of deep tidewater teal sweeps diagonally across the barrel, its surface laced with a fine white net of foam cells and the occasional larger bubble.

Tfs / n

Tidemark

The belly and lower barrel filled to an arched waterline, with the line picked out in a second colour and a row of dots riding along it.

Tdm / Tdc / n

Tidewave

Three long swells running the length of the ribcage, the colour sweeping most of the way round the wheel from nose to tail.

Tw / Twc / n

Trillium

Three broad petals laid flat on the flank around a small ringed eye. The petals take the line's own colour; the eye does not.

Tri / Trb / Trc / n

Uraniid

A swallowtail moth held open on the barrel - a dark body raked with fine bands, two of them brighter than the rest.

Ur / Urb / Urc / n

War Mask

Most of the face taken by a flat armoured mask - near-black on a light coat, and light grey on a dark one, so it reads on every horse.

WrM / n

Xuke

The head and all four legs taken over completely by dense coloured ticking - a roan rather than a spotting - with black hooves and often a little striping over the hindquarter.

Xuk / n

Magic: spots and rings

Genes made of countable marks: spots, rosettes, annuli, crescents, chains of disks, and haloes with something dark inside them.

Agate Eye

A few banded agate eyes sit on the haunch - a pale rim, two bands and a dark core, like a cut geode.

Ag / ag / n

Angler

Strings of faintly glowing lights strung horizontally along the body, each light a pale core inside a deeper rim, like the lures of a deep-water fish.

Ang / n

Aurorae

Luminescent spots scattered over the whole horse, in one hue the line carries, with the mane and tail fading into the same light toward their tips.

Aur / n

Beadscale

The crest of the neck is beaded with small iridescent scales, each taking its own colour, separated by dark channels.

Bs / bs / n

Concentric Eyespots

Butterfly-wing eyespots - nested rings around a pale glinting core - scatter down the neck and all four legs.

Cew / Cec / n

Contour Cells

A patch of coat goes dark and fills with tiling polygons, each drawn as two concentric contour rings around a central pip.

Cl / cl / n

Corolla

Broad flowers open across the barrel and neck, each one a pale halo round a bright rim, a deep heart and a small light eye.

W / B / C / n

Crescents

One to four broad open arcs, the largest centred on the barrel, each thinning to nothing at both of its ends and keeping the coat colour inside its curve.

Crs / Crc / n

Duskwing Bands

Two curved bands sweeping round the barrel one inside the other, like the bands on a moth's wing.

Dwb / Dwc / n

Ehretia

Haloed spots over the barrel and neck, a dorsal stripe, dark socks, and a fine speckled bloom laid over the lot.

Ehr / Ehc / n

Fawn

A single flowing line of soft round spots running neck to rump, a darkened topline above it, and a pale underside to the tail.

Fwn / Fwc / n

Fish Scales

The barrel raises into overlapping fish scales, each one rimmed in a warm colour this line of horses carries, with a darker line traced along its outer edge.

Scl / n

Glow

Small glowing speckles crowded along the topline, with the hooves lit to match. Every lit part of the horse shares one colour.

Gl / n

Harlequin Shield

A saw-toothed shield across the flank, filled with lozenges that each have a smaller lozenge inside them - three tones, all hard-edged.

Hqs / Hqc / n

Integration

A spot field spreading outward from wherever the coat is already dark - merging into solid patches close in, thinning to isolated marks a foot or two out, and gone beyond that.

Int / Inc / n

Iridescent Rosette

Dark rosettes speckle the coat, each rimmed in bands of colour that shift like the shell of a jewel beetle.

Irw / Irc / n

Lantern

A soft line of bioluminescence running the length of the topline from poll to croup, broken here and there where the light fails to carry.

La / n

Lasertae

Two to five large ellipses on the scapula, barrel and hip, each a bright diffuse halo closing around a core that stays darker than the coat around it.

Lst / Lsc / n

Moth Eyes

Fine black vein-work threads the coat like an insect's wing membrane, broken by dark, gold-ringed eyespots along the flank - but only where the coat beneath is already black or grey.

Mte / n

Ocular

Eyes down the horse's neck - open ones, with a white, an iris in the line's own colour and a pupil. They are drawn off a single lattice, so every one of them is a real eye and not a smear that happens to be round.

Ocu / n

Painted Lady Wingmark

A butterfly wing laid over the barrel - a soft-edged field crossed by veins and rimmed in dark.

Plw / Plc / n

Pavonem

Peacock eyes - upright ovals filled paler than the coat, each with a bright spot low in it, and always a scatter of ordinary spots around them.

Pv / Pvc / n

Picasso Marking

Flat dots in one colour and wandering squiggles in another, with the squiggles keeping clear of the dots - a horse marked like a painting rather than like a horse.

Pic / n

Polymoon

A chain of pale disks running from the throatlatch back along the shoulder and onto the barrel, largest in the middle of its run and tapering at both ends.

Pmn / Pmc / n

Rex

Open circles in a bright colour, at least three of them, anywhere on the horse - drawn over whatever else it is wearing, with the hooves in the same colour.

Rx / n

Rosette

Leopard rosettes following the curve of the body - a dark ring around a centre that keeps the coat colour - sparse in one copy and blanketing the horse in two.

Rs / n

Scarab Dapple

Iridescent dapples over the topline, neck and face - each one a dark rim round a mid tone round a pale core, like the shell of a beetle. The legs, the croup and a patch at each shoulder stay clear of them.

Scb / Scc / n

Scuted

The underside carries a snake's belly - a column of wide flat scutes down the midline, graded outward into smaller and smaller scales toward the flanks.

W / B / C / n

Shieldback

A scalloped collar across the withers and a fanning column of ringed eyespots down the topline - a shield bug's back, on the horse's own colour.

Shb / Shc / n

Wormholes

Small pale rings whose centres keep the coat underneath, gathered into two or three clusters over the shoulder, barrel and hip.

Wmh / Wmc / n

Magic: speckle and dust

Genes made of stipple - fields of fine points that drift into drifts and thin out rather than ending, and the markings built on top of them.

Duskfall Speckle

Fine speckling that is thickest along the topline - the back, the crest of the neck and the poll - and has thinned to nothing before it reaches the legs or the muzzle.

Dfs / Dfe / n

Dust

Fine stipple with no boundary anywhere - up from the pasterns, along the belly, a cap on the muzzle, and a band beside the mane.

Dst / Dsc / n

Peafowl

Speckling that sweeps across the body in a current rather than scattering, in two or three colours, with a plume standing in the mane and another in the tail.

Pwl / n

Speckling

Fine coloured speckles scattered over the coat and hooves to match - one colour with a single copy, two with a pair. Half a dozen other markings are described in terms of it.

Spk / n

Sporefall

The hindquarter is stained through with violet and dusted in bright flecks that hold their light after dark.

Sp / sp / n

Stars

A scatter of small pale points over the upper half of the horse, dense along the topline and thinning to nothing at the belly and below the knee.

Sta / Stc / n

Wishstar

One four-pointed sparkle sits high on each flank, with a long tail below it and a soft bloom around it. It holds its light after dark.

Ws / ws / n

Magic: lines and strokes

Genes made of strokes: scratches, contour lines, riblines, brindle nets, filigree, and the two that are stripes but insist they are not.

Bracket

Two clusters of near-black stripes with nothing between them - one down the neck, one fanning over the croup - plus a dark muzzle, a dark hoof and a band above it.

Brk / n

Brindlelace

A dark reticulated net rather than solid patching - short dashes and closed loops with the coat showing through between them, densest at the neck and shoulder and closing to solid below the knee.

Bnl / n

Circuit

Black strokes down the caudal neck and shoulder with a closed spiral at the withers, the widest of them carrying a saturated blue core, and a blue band at every fetlock.

Cir / n

Datarain

A curtain of thin bright streaks falls down the shoulder and ribs over a dark ground, with small lit flecks scattered through it.

P / C / n

Diamond Scutes

A lattice of hollow diamonds crossing the back, running up the crest of the neck, down the tail and round the forelegs - a dragon's wing-scutes rather than a horse's coat.

Dsw / Dsc / n

Elytra Veins

A net of veins over the barrel and neck, each one bright down its middle - the cell pattern of a beetle wing-case rather than a marking.

Elw / Elc / n

Emberveins

Fine seams trace the coat like cracked stone about to give way - molten orange in the glowing form, a quiet rust vein-work in the other - with drifting embers and one wandering thread of light caught along the flank.

Emb / Emr / n

Filigree

White metalwork over the muscle masses - a closed spiral on each of them, long arcs following the body's contours, and broken tracks of short dashes filling the space between.

Flg / Flc / n

Foamed

A raft of round bubbles sits on the flank, drawn as the web between them rather than as the bubbles - heavy where three meet, thin along each wall.

W / B / C / n

Gilded Crackle

A patch of cracked glaze over the haunch, each plate a slightly different shade and every seam between them run with gold.

Gcw / Gck / Gcc / n

Gudial

Warning colours off a poison frog - bold bands round the neck and legs, a dark masked head worked over in stripes, and spotting along the topline.

Gud / n

Ink Scroll

Scrollwork inked over the horse - a band of curls round the neck, a ringed medallion at the shoulder and the hip with lines running off them, and a smaller scroll on each cheek.

Isw / Isc / n

Internal Flow

Thin contour lines in nested groups, tracking the muscles underneath - the back of the shoulder, the sweep of the ribcage, the front of the hindquarter.

Ifl / Ifc / n

Kintsugi

The horse repaired like broken pottery - cracks running across it filled with a metallic colour, one on a leg with a single copy and a network of them with two.

Kts / n

Lace

A thread-fine net of white veining over the horse - lace, or a crazed glaze, rather than the broad blotches of Marble Tobiano.

Lac / Lah / n

Lacevein

Fine branching lace etches across the coat, rooted in two deep jewel-toned blooms at the withers and the poll.

Lvn / n

Moth Wings

A moth's wing read onto the barrel - chevron bands each with a dark edge, a paired eye-spot on the flank, and a scalloped hem along the belly.

Mwa / Mwc / n

Ooze Drip

Something bright has been poured along the spine and is running down the barrel in fat rounded lobes.

Oz / oz / n

Opaline Zebra

A full set of stripes - round the barrel, across the face, and down the spine - on a ground that is opal rather than white.

Opz / Opc / n

Panark

Thick stripes thrown across the horse at every angle, each outlined in a bright colour and speckled inside it - and the ordinary speckling still going on underneath.

Pnk / n

Qhada

Broad ribbons of colour draped along the topline with speckling filling the gaps between them, and hair-thin stripes of the same colours through the mane and tail.

Qha / n

Ribbon Drip

A field of black poured over the topline, its lower edge sagging into even lobes and rimmed with four ribbons - pale on one form, the whole spectrum on the other.

Rdw / Rdc / n

Riblines

Thin white strokes following the skeleton - down the neck, along the rib arcs, over the scapula and hip - and set as rings around the legs.

Rib / Rbc / n

Rime

A slow pale vortex of frost turns on each flank, its arms broken into feathered streaks with cold sparks caught among them.

W / B / C / n

Scratches

Sets of three to five near-parallel streaks raked across the hip, the back of the barrel and the side of the neck, each one widest in the middle and tapering to a point at both ends.

Scr / Scc / n

Stained Glass

Black leading in straight lines across the horse, and a quarter-strength wash of colour in each pane between them. Which colours is the allele's business rather than the horse's - this is the one locus where the palette is inherited as an allele and not written on the copy.

Sgv / Sgm / n

Stellar

Angular glyphs of two to four crossing strokes, scattered over the shoulder, withers and front of the barrel, each with a satellite dot or two beside it.

Ste / Sec / n

Tribal Claw

Three swept, tapering claw strokes laid across the shoulder, the same on both flanks.

Tc / tc / n

Vortex

A hard-edged lens over the neck and shoulder filled with undulating bands in a fixed four-colour order - cyan, cream, magenta and near-black - carried a little way into the mane.

Vtx / n

Webbed

A polygonal net of veins over the barrel and neck - the venation of a tiger-moth wing, and nothing else.

Web / Wec / n

Wyrmwood Sigils

Curling black scrollwork wrapping the neck, barrel, face and legs, threaded with a luminous ichor that tints the mane, drips down the hip, trails off the tail and caps the hooves.

Wys / Wyd / n

Zebra's Coat

Narrow transverse striping over the neck and shoulder only, standing upright on the neck and leaning back as it crosses the withers - and stopping dead at the back of the scapula.

Zbc / Zbk / n

Magic: mane and tail

Genes that touch only the hair - gradients down its length, bands across it, and the spectrum run root to tip.

Auroraband

One continuous ribbon running the length of the upper body in a shallow S, combed into fine lengthwise striations, and shifting hue from cyan at the front to magenta where it curls at the back.

Abd / n

Corvid

A white wedge up the face with a black muzzle below it, black cannons over a thin white ring at the coronet, and black hair speckled white throughout.

Cvd / n

Element Dusted

Three hues to a horse - one leading and two supporting - climbing the legs from the hoof, running down the far half of the hair, and settling along the topline as dapples.

Ed / n

Fade

The mane and tail leave the coat colour behind on their way down and end in a colour no horse's hair is, the shade running in the family.

Fd / n

Frostfall

Mane, forelock and tail losing their colour from partway down, ending white - and reaching it at different depths strand by strand, so the front is feathered rather than level.

Fro / Frc / n

Guppy

The mane cut into hard vertical bands of two to four saturated colours, and the tail streaked lengthways in the same palette. The body is untouched.

Gup / n

Prismtail

The hair banded through the spectrum in order from the roots down - yellow, green, cyan, blue, violet, magenta - and back to its own colour before the ends.

Prt / n

Striped Mane and Tail

A handful of contrasting bundles running the length of the mane and tail - light strands through dark hair, dark through light - and nothing at all on the body.

Smt / n

Magic: colour modifiers

Genes with no shape of their own. Each reads what the horse already is and changes it - which is why they paint last, and why a plain horse shows some of them not at all. The far end of the band is where the few genes that must have the LAST word live: a neon outline over everything, a head blacked out under whatever else was drawn on it.

Bloodstained

Red gathers along the bottom edge of the horse's markings - inside the white rather than around it, and under every red the coat already had. It reads as something that ran down and settled, because that is exactly how the mask is built.

Bst / n

Extreme white dominant

A magical gene that paints nothing at all and changes a rule instead: while it is present, a white texel is final. Every marking still runs in the ordinary order and every one of them is discarded wherever the coat is already white, so the horse's natural white markings come out on top of the magic instead of under it. Silent on a horse with no white. One copy is the whole of it.

EWD / n

Fielded

Grass-like tendrils drawn out of the edges of the horse's white markings - a streak or two on a quiet horse, a windblown field of them on a loud one.

Fld / Flw / n

Gamma

A chromatic modifier: diffuse fields of one saturated hue on the barrel and flank, each with a glow blooming past its edge - and nothing hard-edged anywhere on it.

Gam / n

Holo Flake

A dusting of small angular flakes along the crest of the neck, each one a different colour from the one beside it, over a dull grey wash.

Hfw / Hfc / n

Invert

The last thing painted: the whole finished coat comes out as its own negative. White goes black, orange goes blue, and everything the horse was carrying goes with it.

Inv / n

Nacre

The coat breaks into hard-edged plates like a cracked shell, each one paler at its gold seams and richer toward its middle.

Nco / Ncg / n

Nebula Light

Overlapping zones of magenta, violet, blue and teal across the back half of the horse, with a fine population of points through them and a few larger ones wearing halos.

Neb / n

Nyxborn

Every white the horse has goes black, and then the whole of the black is scattered with tiny white points - a night sky where the markings used to be.

Nyx / n

Oil Sheen

The coat looks like a soap film caught in light: a cracked, iridescent web of veins running the length of the horse, pooling over the barrel into a dense, bubble-pitted slick whose colour wanders instead of sweeping.

Osn / n

Opalized

The same substrate as Voided taken the other way - every white region comes out as iridescent cells of three to seven hues, pearlescent at the rim and strongest in the middle.

Opl / n

Rising Sun

Heavy black ribbons roll across a white coat in even waves, each shadowed a little below by grey, and a single red disc sits on either flank.

Rs / Rc / n

Shadowcreature

Shc / n

Spectrum Light

One long field over the barrel and hip through which the hue rotates continuously in spectral order - red to violet, no bands, no repeats.

Spc / n

Tron

Neon run along every edge of the horse. It paints later than anything else in the mod, so whatever else the horse is wearing, the lines are drawn on top of it.

Trs / Trg / n

Voided

Every white the horse would have had comes out black instead - the same markings, the same edges, the opposite pigment.

Vd / n

Yalia

Blocky straight-sided zones outlined in a bright colour and filled flat with white - architecture rather than marking - with a band round each leg and the hair going white where a zone reaches it.

Yal / Ylc / n
Developer notes live in CLAUDE.md; player-facing install and gameplay notes are in README.md. Everything else is here. Licensed CC BY-NC 4.0.