Troubleshooting

Punchy! Moves says very little when a pack goes wrong. A file with a mistake is usually left out, and your character then moves like plain Minecraft, so a pack can look as if it did nothing. This page takes the usual symptoms one at a time: a pack that does not load, a clip or an emote that does not play, a face that does not show, a body that turns wrong and a camera that misbehaves. It also says where Moves does leave a message and which mistakes drop a file in silence.

It is for players whose pack changed nothing and for pack makers whose files misbehave. Each symptom lists its causes from the likeliest down, with the fix.

Before you start

• The labels and behavior here are checked against Punchy! Moves 1.0.0 for Fabric on Minecraft 1.21.11. Another build can differ.
• Know your game folder: the one that holds mods, resourcepacks, config and logs.
• Press F3+T in a world after every change to a pack. Moves reads a pack’s files, and writes its warnings, each time resources reload.
• The Moves clips on this wiki come from the example pack provided by Crafto, Fluid & Foolish. Names that start with my_ in the examples are placeholders for your own clips.

How Moves reports a problem

Moves speaks in three places: on the screen, on the emote wheel and in the game’s log. Most mistakes use none of them, so the last part of this section lists what stays silent.

On the screen

These short texts show above the hotbar, except the last one, which shows on the emote wheel.

In the log

Moves writes its warnings to the game’s log, never to the screen. A pack maker reads it like this:

Video coming soon

Every log line begins with the time and the thread, as in any Minecraft log. This is the message of a dropped compat file:

Could not load animation compat punchy_moves:compat/my_pack.json: Compat defaults.animations.turn_in_place: declare left e right juntos

The text after Compat and the path of the member is written in Portuguese. What the words after the path mean translates the ones you are likely to meet.

What stays silent

Moves writes nothing for these, so do not read a quiet log as a sign that all is well:

• A clip name that no animation file defines. The action plays nothing, and an emote with that clip is left off the wheel.
• An animation file that is not valid JSON, or whose root is not an object. Its clips are missing.
• A clip that cannot be read. It and every clip after it in the same file are lost.
• A misspelled key inside an action. Only the root, defaults, an item or item group, a sequence and its phases, turn_in_place, cameras and better_combat check their keys. Inside any other action, an unknown key is ignored.
• A valid action name that Moves does not read, such as walkin. It is accepted and never played.
• A rule that is skipped and not dropped: a riding rule without entities, a biome rule without pose or event, an emote entry without animation, a walking candidate without a clip, an overlay whose clip is missing.

Where to go for each symptom

The pack does not load

Minecraft does not list the pack

• There is no pack.mcmeta at the top. Minecraft needs it next to assets, at the top of the folder or the zip.
• The zip has an extra folder. Open the zip. pack.mcmeta and assets must be at the top, not inside a folder that holds them. Zip the contents of the pack folder, not the folder.
• pack.mcmeta is not valid JSON, or its numbers do not fit. For Minecraft 1.21.11 the format number is 75. A pack whose numbers do not cover your game is flagged in the list as made for another version. Resource packs explains pack_format, min_format and max_format.

The pack is listed, and nothing changes

Check these in order.

1. The pack is not in the right-hand list. Under Options, then Resource Packs, move it to the right-hand list and press Done.

2. You did not reload. Press F3+T in a world. Changing the pack list reloads too.

3. A file is in the wrong folder. The namespace folder is punchy_moves, spelled exactly, and the folder names below are lower case.

   What	Where it goes
   Clips	assets/punchy_moves/animations/, any file that ends in .json, subfolders too
   Compat files	assets/punchy_moves/compat/, any file that ends in .json, subfolders too
   Looks	assets/punchy_moves/faces/looks/<name>.json, directly in that folder
   Eye shapes	assets/punchy_moves/faces/shapes/<name>.json, directly in that folder
   Reaction changes	assets/punchy_moves/faces/triggers.json

4. A name Minecraft cannot read. A file or folder name with a capital letter, a space or another character that a resource id cannot hold is skipped by Minecraft itself, so Moves never sees it. Use lower case letters, digits, _, - and ..

5. Another pack has the same file. When two active packs have a file at the same path, only the one higher in the list is read. Files with different names all load, and the compat files of every pack are read in the order of their paths. How the game reads the files has the rest.

6. The compat file was dropped. Look in the log for Could not load animation compat. JSON mistakes lists the causes.

7. The pack has nothing to play. Moves ships no clips of its own. Without a pack that names clips, the camera, the faces and the settings work and the body does not animate.

The quickest sign that Moves read a compat file is the emote wheel: if the file lists emotes and their clips exist, they are on the wheel.

Moves itself is missing, or the game crashes

• The key group is missing. Open Options, then Controls, then Key Binds. Without the group Punchy Moves (on Minecraft 1.21.1 and 1.20.1 it shows as key.categories.punchy_moves), the mod did not load. Check that the Moves file in mods is the one for your profile’s Minecraft version and loader. Getting started has the table.
• The game crashes while it starts or loads a world. Minecraft writes a report into the crash-reports folder of your game folder. Keep the newest file for a bug report.

A clip does not play

A clip needs three things: the pack, the clip file and something that names the clip. Go through these in order.

1. The pack is on and reloaded. See the checklist above.
2. The clip file is in assets/punchy_moves/animations/ and ends in .json.
3. Something names the clip. A compat action such as walking, attack or idle, or an emote entry. A clip that nothing names never plays, however good it looks in Punchy! Studio’s Game view.
4. The name matches exactly. Clip names are case-sensitive: Wave is not wave. For an action played by one arm, Moves looks for <name>_right or <name>_left first, then the plain <name>.
5. The compat file was dropped. Look for Could not load animation compat in the log.
6. An earlier clip in the same animation file lost the rest. A bones that is not an object loses its clip and every clip after it. Move the clip up, or fix the one before it.
7. Another file defines the same name. Animation files are read in the order of their paths, and the one read later wins, even when it comes from another pack. Rename one.
8. The action is in the wrong place. Body actions (walking, jump, falling, swimming, crouch, riding rules, biomes and the like) are read from defaults only. In an item group they do nothing. An id under items needs its namespace, as in minecraft:trident, or it never matches. Each item belongs to the first item group it matches.
9. The moment does not happen. Moves poses your character in third person only. An emote starts only while you stand still on the ground. With Better Combat installed and Better Combat pack attacks on Automatic, Better Combat’s attacks use the pack’s clips only when the pack has Better Combat clips, and a warning in the log that names Better Combat may mean Moves could not use that mod.

It plays, but not as you expect

• It plays once and stops. Only the JSON value true loops. The text "true" and the number 1 play the clip once.
• It jumps when it loops. Key the first pose again at the end of the clip.
• It moves too little. Rotation is in degrees and position in pixels, and a position of 1 is a sixteenth of a block.
• The motion is flat where you used a formula. A key part that is text, such as a Molang expression, is replaced by the channel’s default. Bake the expression into keys before you export.
• Only one arm moves, or the wrong one. Clips are not mirrored for you. A _left clip has to be keyed for the left side.

Animation files and Why a clip does not play go further.

An emote is missing from the wheel

The wheel opens with C unless the pack or you changed the key. It lists the emotes of the packs that are on.

Why my emote is not on the wheel or does not play goes through each one.

A face does not show

The face is drawn from each player’s own skin, on your screen. It needs no pack.

• There is no face at all. First person draws none, and a spectator or an invisible player you cannot see gets none either. Otherwise the finder found no eyes on that skin: the log has a line Face rig for <skin> (...): none. Open the face editor, use Marks to paint the eyes, and press Export skin if others should see the face. See Face editor.
• The eyes are in the wrong place. The finder can misread an eye. Mark them by hand: your marks come first. Reset to found removes your marks and goes back to the skin’s marker or the finder.
• Hair or glasses hide the face. Turn on Over the hat layer in the Face tab.
• There is no Face tab. The tab is part of Punchy’s new menu, and Moves adds it only when that menu is installed. The menu comes with Punchy!, from Modrinth or CurseForge. Without it, edit face.json in config/punchy_moves/ by hand, with the game closed.
• My marks do nothing. Hand marks work only for a skin that is 64 pixels wide. Export skin writes only 64 by 64 skins.
• Other players do not see my marks. Hand marks stay on your computer. Press Export skin and upload the new picture as your skin. See Why my marks do not show.
• A reaction never shows. Its switch in the Face tab is off, or a stronger reaction is playing. Open the Test tab and play it: if it shows there, something outranks it in play. See Face reactions.
• My edits to face.json are ignored in part. The file is read once, when the settings are first used. A value the game cannot read, such as a color that is not hex, stops the read at that key: the keys before it are used and the keys after it keep their defaults. A file that does not parse keeps every default. The game reads the keys in this order, whatever the order in your file: over_hat, blinking, glances, blink_seconds, daydream_seconds, sparkle, sparkle_color, line_color, reactions, trigger_looks.

A look or an eye shape is missing

Unreadable face files are named in the log on Face: lines, once per file or per look. The other looks and shapes still load. Press F3+T after a fix.

A look is also left out when pupils or brows has too few numbers, or a value is not a number. A look or shape file in a subfolder is never read. Faces in packs and clips lists the rest.

The body turns wrong

Without a pack, the body turns the way Minecraft turns it. A pack can add turn in place: while you stand still, the body keeps its heading when you look around, then steps round with a clip. All of the feature is in the turn_in_place action of defaults. Its keys are in Camera and features.

Video coming soon

• The body never steps. The feature is off until enabled is true. It also stays off when either step clip is missing (a name no animation file defines) or lacks a track for left_leg or right_leg. left and right go together: one without the other drops the whole file, and the log says so.
• The body steps only sometimes. The steps play while you stand still on the ground. They do not play while you crouch, ride, climb, crawl, fly, fall, swim or wade, or stand on a fence. As soon as you walk or crouch, the body goes back to Minecraft’s own turning over fade_out_seconds (0.12 by default).
• The body turns later than my head. That is how it works: the head turns first and the body waits. While your view still moves, the body steps only after the head has stayed minimum_turn_degrees away (60 by default) for 0.15 seconds, and that step turns exactly that angle. Once the view has rested for look_idle_seconds (2 by default), one step turns the body the rest of the way to the head. So a quick look 90 degrees round is a step of 60 degrees and then one of 30. Lower look_idle_seconds to make the body follow sooner. The example pack provided by Crafto uses 0.25.
• The steps are too big or too small. minimum_turn_degrees sets the angle of a step while the view still moves. It is kept between 2 and 90.
• The feet step the wrong way. The left clip plays for a turn to the left and the right clip for a turn to the right. If the compat file has them swapped, swap them back. If the names are right, the keys of the clip are what is wrong, because Moves does not mirror clips.
• The turn is too fast, too slow or comes at the wrong moment of the step. The root bone’s rotation around Y paces the turn: the body has turned as far as the root has rotated from its first key to its last. A root rotation that ends where it began counts as none. A step clip without one turns the body evenly over the whole clip, easing in and out, and the turn ends with the clip. The step clips in the example pack provided by Crafto have no root track, so that pack turns this way.
• The body does not turn in the orbit camera, or while you hold a filled map and look down at it. Turn in place is off then. The map case applies only when the Map third-person camera switch is on. In the orbit camera the character keeps its heading until you press B again, and then turns to face where the camera was pointing.
• The body is stuck facing a ladder. The Face the ladder switch on the Features page turns your body to the ladder and keeps it there. Vines are not affected. Switch it off to let the body turn.

The camera misbehaves

• V does nothing. The keys work in a world with no screen open. Check the key under Options, Controls, Key Binds, in the group Punchy Moves: Toggle Custom Camera.
• The custom camera went off when I pressed F5. Minecraft’s perspective key (F5 by default) turns the custom camera off while the view passes through first person and the front view.
• B says “Enable the custom camera first”. The orbit camera needs the custom camera on. Press V first, then B.
• A feature camera does nothing. The fence, ladder, nearby-block, elytra and aiming cameras need all five numbers in their block (horizontal, vertical, depth, fov and response, with response above 0), or that camera stays off. A map camera never needs all five: a number you leave out keeps its default. A riding camera needs four numbers (horizontal, vertical, depth and fov) and has no switch. For the other feature cameras (fence, ladder, nearby block, elytra, map, bow and crossbow, spear and trident), check their switch on the Features page too.
• My camera values went back to the defaults. camera.json could not be read, or a value in it has the wrong type. Moves writes no warning. Close the game before you edit it by hand.
• My character fades or disappears. The character fades as the camera comes close to its body, and disappears when the camera would be inside it. Raise Depth.
• I see no pose in first person. Moves poses nothing there.

How the camera behaves has the rest.

JSON mistakes

Two kinds of mistake exist. Text that is not JSON cannot be read at all. A file that is JSON but breaks the format’s rules is refused by Moves. Both drop the file.

What drops a file

Animation files lists the mistakes that drop one key of a clip.

Moves reads its files with a JSON reader that is more forgiving than most. Comments, single quotes and keys without quotes get through it, so a file can load in Moves and fail in another tool. Write plain JSON. Two things are not forgiven: a comma after the last member of an object, and a missing comma between two members. A comma after the last item of a list does not stop the file, but it adds an empty item, which the format can then refuse.

These are what text that is not JSON looks like. They are text blocks because they would not parse:

"enabled": true
"left": "my_step_left"

A comma is missing between two members. The log says Unterminated object, then the line, the column and the path of the member before the gap, for example Unterminated object at line 7 column 10 path $.defaults.animations.turn_in_place.enabled, when the two lines sit inside turn_in_place in a file laid out like the one in the next section.

"minimum_turn_degrees": 60,
}

A comma sits after the last member. The log says Expected name, then the line, the column and the path of that member.

What the words after the path mean

When the text is JSON but the format refuses it, the warning reads Compat <path>: <words>. The path is in English and names the member. The words are in Portuguese. These are the ones you will meet.

Things that drop a whole file lists every cause by topic.

One file, three mistakes

This compat file looks fine and does nothing. Assume the pack’s animation files define the clips my_step_left, my_step_right and my_wave:

{
  "format_version": 2,
  "defaults": {
    "animations": {
      "turn_in_place": {
        "enabled": true,
        "left": "my_step_left",
        "minimum_turn_degrees": 60,
      }
    }
  },
  "emotes": {
    "entries": [
      { "id": "wave", "display_name": "Wave", "animation": "My_Wave", "face": "happy" }
    ]
  }
}

The comma after 60 is not JSON. The log says:

Could not load animation compat punchy_moves:compat/my_pack.json: com.google.gson.stream.MalformedJsonException: Expected name at line 9 column 8 path $.defaults.animations.turn_in_place.minimum_turn_degrees
See https://github.com/google/gson/blob/main/Troubleshooting.md#malformed-json

The See line is the JSON reader’s own pointer to its help page. Delete the comma. The file is JSON now, and Moves refuses it for a different reason:

Could not load animation compat punchy_moves:compat/my_pack.json: Compat defaults.animations.turn_in_place: declare left e right juntos

turn_in_place has left and no right. Add right. The file loads, and the emote is still not on the wheel, with no message at all: the clip is my_wave, and My_Wave is another name. This is the file that works. Its numbers come from the example pack provided by Crafto:

{
  "format_version": 2,
  "defaults": {
    "animations": {
      "turn_in_place": {
        "enabled": true,
        "left": "my_step_left",
        "right": "my_step_right",
        "minimum_turn_degrees": 60,
        "look_idle_seconds": 0.25,
        "fade_out_seconds": 0.12
      }
    }
  },
  "emotes": {
    "menu_key": "C",
    "entries": [
      { "id": "wave", "display_name": "Wave", "animation": "my_wave", "keybind": "H", "face": "happy" }
    ]
  }
}

Both step clips need tracks for left_leg and right_leg, or the turn stays off without a word.

To try the file yourself, make the pack from Make a pack with one emote, rename its clip wave to my_wave in animations/wave.json, and save this file as compat/my_pack.json in place of emotes.json. The step clips my_step_left and my_step_right are clips you key yourself (see Animation files). Until they exist the turn stays off, and the emote still works.

Check a file before the game does

Punchy! Studio reads your files the way the game does, so it finds these mistakes while you type.

The Game view shows its own short messages when it cannot play a clip. When the view shows a message explains each.

Check your setup with a pack that works

When you cannot tell a problem in the game from a problem in your files, set your pack aside and make the pack from Make a pack with one emote. It has three small files and one emote.

Report a bug

If you still cannot find it, ask in the Punchy Discord. A report is easier to answer when it has:

• The Punchy! Moves version, the Minecraft version, your loader (Fabric, Forge or NeoForge) and its version, and whether Better Combat or Punchy’s new menu is installed.
• The packs that are on, in order, and the file that does not work, or the line of it, with what you expected to see.
• Every Could not load animation compat and Face: line from logs/latest.log, after a F3+T reload.
• For a crash, the newest file in crash-reports.
• What the Verdict and Checks in Punchy! Studio say, if you use it.

Related pages

• Getting started installs Moves and adds a pack.
• Compat files is the whole format, with the list of mistakes that drop a file.
• Animation files holds the clips and what drops a key.
• Keys and emotes covers the wheel and every key.
• Camera and features covers the camera, the switches and turn in place.
• Faces and Faces in packs and clips cover the face and the files that change it.
• Punchy! Studio for Moves and the Game view check a pack while you make it.
• The FAQ answers the short questions.
• Punchy! troubleshooting is the page for the first-person mod.