Arthropod Phobia Expansions + Horror Bosses Spider Moth Dweller

Version 3.2.1 fixes

Fixed issues with tamed Termite King where it would be unable to switch following mode, and where it could rarely cause crashes when attacking entities. Also gave it passive regeneration. Fixed potential division by zero error with termite workers. Fixed potential tick crash with Ant Soldiers Decreased millipede rarity. Added climbing animation for termite workers. In addition to the major 3.2 update released the other day:

ArPhEx version 3.2

The colony update!

Tameable ant colonies and antagonistic termite colonies added! Extremely intricate, intuitive, and fun mechanics - ants can mine, build, and defend for you. FOUR new variants: Worker ants, soldier ants, drone ants, and alate ants that turn into queens - all included.
Huge Termite Tunneler mounds now generate naturally in taigas, old growth pine taigas, and savannas. They contain FIVE new termite mob variants: Worker termites, soldier termites, alate termites, king termites, and a queen termite. Killing the queen spawns an egg that will tame to the nearest player and turns into a king termite a minute later. Strongest pet so far, miniboss tier with 250HP. Moreover, it can toggle between following or not, and is rideable.
Upgraded crusher claw to be able to execute strong sweep attacks dealing AoE damage, like swords.
Massively improved anthill generation.
Holding powerful mineral items in either hand will consistently give the strength effect now.
Anthills now generate instantly and avoid creating large blocks of dirt for the tunnels underneath. The tunnels will go through whatever kind of blocks are beneath.
Fixed an issue where picking up pets could remove stacks of spider jars. It will only remove one now.
Improvements to WIP items: Abyss Ascendant now no longer gives swirling particles every time you get the slow falling effect while it is in your inventory. Now only if provided by the tool directly. Eternal Armour (WIP) now has a custom model (subject to change) and additional powers to block all attacks that deal 2.5 hearts or less in damage. New “Eternal Evasion” effect added as a set bonus for eternal armour. While you have eternal evasion, you will be able to dodge attacks, like Ultra Instinct, by crouching briefly before the attack hits (rechargeable).
Fixed an issue that could cause the Voidlasher to rarely destroy items.
Fixed an issue where tamed tarantulas would look repeatedly to the side if they had an attack target while you hold the jump key.
Improved performance for nearly all arphex mobs.
Modified Ethereal Staff to be unable to teleport mobs and players into blocks (unless the hitbox of the teleported entity is bigger than 1x2x1).
Small butterfly bewitchers now fly away if a player gets close.Additionally, the wall-walking is much better now, actually disabling physics for a short period..
Added a one-time warning upon attacking a stronger centipede larvae. Hints that killing it may spawn the miniboss.
Teleport ghosts and Scorpioid bloodlusters should no longer make damage hit sounds when passing through walls.inside walls.lRemoved
Modified infernal armour (boots) to now give slow falling when you crouch, instead of when you sprint.
Found a fix for a long-standing issue where the spider moth would sometimes look the wrong way while flying.
Fixed another long-standing issue with teleporter ghosts getting hurt repeatedly while going through walls.
Improved creative tab ordering.

Full guide to ant and termite colonies!:

Ants should be seen as replaceable, not as accumulating pets. If you have more than 20 ants in your colony, the furthest loaded one will despawn until you have 20. This number is fully configurable, including to zero as a means of disabling tamed colony mechanics if desired.

Naturally generated anthills (generating in non-snowy taiga biomes) can now spawn worker ants (1 in ~2 chance), drone ants (1 in 10), regular tiny ants (1 in ~3), and alate ants (1 in 20). Since the blocks that spawn the ants turn to regular dirt after doing so, there are only finite chances to get an alate from each nest.

Ant alates spawn rarely from anthills (1 in 20 ). They are tameable with golden apples, turning into a queen 5 minutes after being tamed, following you until this change happens. 1 in 5 chance to tame per golden apple, or guaranteed to tame from an enchanted golden apple. Ant queens take continuous damage if they can see the sky. They need to be under cover once they’re queens. You need to make a nest/den for them of any sort. Only requirements are space for them to grow (visual and hitbox sizes increase with tiers!), and a roof. Once they’ve turned into a queen, their wings disappear and they get a gold emblem on their back. Queens grow naturally over time, but you can accelerate the process with golden apples. Otherwise, they take 30 ingame days to reach full size. A regular golden apple gives 1200XP, equivalent to a day of waiting. An enchanted golden apple gives 9600XP, equivalent to 8 days of waiting. Golden apples also heal the queen. To heal regular ants, you can feed them regular apples.

When an ant spawns naturally away from a tamed queen, it will get a tag that prevents it from taming. If a queen is tamed, then it will repeatedly attempt to tame untamed nearby ants that don’t have this tag to its own owner.  The queen will only spawn ants if the owner is nearby within 100-ish blocks.

When tamed ants are present, the mod checks how many are currently loaded for each given owner. If more than 20 are loaded that are all tamed by one player, then the furthest one from the owner will despawn. This prevents colonies from getting out of control. Soldier ants count as 3 ants!

Any queen will follow you if you hold a golden apple. When tamed and in alate form, it follows without this requirement. Right click the queen with anything other than a golden apple for information about its health and levelling XP. <1200 = Tier 1 1200XP = Tier 2 (queen gets strength) 12000XP = Tier 3 (queen gets strength + resistance) 36000XP = Tier 4 (queen gets strength 2 + resistance 2)

Initial queen can spawn one ant per day. Cannot spawn soldiers at this tier, only workers. Tier 2 queen can spawn an ant every ten minutes. Tier 3 queen can spawn an ant every six minutes, giving resistance to soldiers Tier 4 queen can spawn an ant every two minutes, and gives resistance, regeneration, and strength effects to both workers and soldiers The max ant limit is the same regardless of the queen tier, it just affects replacement speed.

Soldier ants with the resistance effect gain the additional ability to spawn drones (male flying ants that can’t turn into queens) as temporary minions that assist them in combat. Any drone will despawn after a minute. They fly and attack enemies in a similar way to hornets and mosquitos. Drones do not count towards the maximum total ant count, given how temporary they are and that they don’t tame to the player.

Tamed ants generally patrol near to the queen by default (within 50 blocks), but you can right click any soldier ant to ride it into battle, or right click any worker ant to activate a mode where they will follow you and serve like a wolf (that can build quick temporary structures for you). Right click them again to deactivate the mode, and they will return to the patrolling mode if the queen is near enough for them to detect, else they’ll wander around until despawning. Occasionally, ants will travel back to their queen to check on them, if they can do so without it being obstructed. This is a mechanism that keeps them from wandering too far away, as they will travel back to the queen if it is not near enough.

“Ant Commander” staff has one ability that interacts with any nearby worker ants, and three other functions that interact with the queen from a distance, giving it commands to send out to your worker ants. The item is craftable with a golden apple, copper rod, antenna, and two burning glands. Right click with the staff and nearby worker ants will build a temporary defensive structure at your position (can use anywhere). Queen proximity functions: Left click a block type to mark it for breaking (stone or logs+leaves, hitting any other block disables breaking). Crouch+Right click to prioritize your current area (needs to be near the queen) for patrolling, planting, or block breaking (for ants not following you). Crouch+Left click ground to remove area designation and reset proximity tasks.

Ants within a prioritised area will give off golden particles, indicating that they are able to break blocks within that area and patrol it.

Having multiple tamed queens in one area will further increase the rate at which you can accumulate ants, but does not increase the cap on how many you can have tamed at a time. They will despawn faster as well as spawning faster. However, if they are spread far apart, then the despawning will not happen much as it is localised within 200 blocks. You could spread queens apart for a wider area of being able to use special queen functions for worker ants, or as backups in case one queen is eliminated.

Huge Termite Tunneler mounds now generate naturally in taigas, old growth pine taigas, and savannas. The two shared biomes can lead to wars between ant colonies and nearby termite mounds. Approaching these mounds is extremely dangerous. Late-game weapons/armour recommended to deal with them. As you approach, the queen will give you mining fatigue, discouraging players from just digging to the final room at the bottom - entrance is at the top. Termites are aggressive, attacking any players and ants they come across. They pose a threat to your colony anywhere, not just near termite mounds, especially if they can reach the queen (via workers tunnelling!).

Worker termites can tunnel through blocks. This doesn’t break or change the blocks in the process, so it shouldn’t become too annoying. They especially do this to attack nearby ant queens and players. They slowly move through the blocks, similar to the existing scorpioid bloodluster mechanics, but requiring being in the ground and limited in that they avoid passing through blocks with 5+ hardness (iron bars, obsidian, etc - a defensive option for the ant queen). Arthropod antenna item is useful to see them coming.

Soldier termites are stronger and can track over longer ranges.

Alate termites alternate between attacking on the ground and attacking from the air. A fully hybrid ground/air mob.

King termites are particularly strong, posing a final threat when approaching the queen.

Termite queen gives mining fatigue with a pop up animation to nearby players, encouraging exploration through the mound rather than trying to dig straight to the queen. However, the mound is extremely dangerous. If you kill the termite tunneller queen, it will spawn a large egg at its location. The egg should show a nametag letting you know it is tamed to you. After a minute, it will turn into a termite tunneler king, remaining tamed. These large termite kings are the most powerful tameable entities yet, rideable and able to toggle between following and staying put on right click (while crouching). Feed it any kind of logs to restore its health. Their only flaws are their hitbox size and lack of extra jumping/climbing mobility.

King termites are particularly strong, approaching miniboss territory for the first time in a potential pet.