HudForge

Sidebar, TAB, name tags and boss bars from one file

HudForge writes the sidebar, the TAB list, the name above a player's head, the boss bar and the action bar from a single file, on Paper 1.21.x. It ships configured: drop it in and the scoreboard is already there.

Animated gradients from one tag, frame-by-frame animations, conditions that change a colour when a number crosses a line, and a scoreboard that does not flicker because it is never rebuilt.

Why HudForge

No flicker, at any refresh rate. The scoreboard is built once and only the line text is rewritten afterwards. That is why it can repaint five times a second and still look still
A moving gradient is one tag. <shine:#C879FF:#FFFFFF:1600>TEXT</shine> and the light travels across the text. The usual way is writing twenty frames by hand with the gradient nudged along in each one
Everyone sees the same frame. Animation frames come from the clock, not from a per-player counter, so two players standing together see the same thing
One file for five displays. Sidebar, TAB header and footer, name tags, boss bars and the action bar are all written in the same place, in the same syntax
Profiles instead of an inheritance tree. The first profile that matches wins. Match by world, by permission, by a condition, or by nothing at all

What you get

Sidebar — title and lines, any length, repainted without flicker
TAB list — header and footer, plus the order players are listed in, set per profile by a weight
Name tags — a prefix and suffix above the head, per profile
Boss bars — as many as you like per profile, each with its own colour, style and fill. Reusing an id updates that bar instead of stacking another one, and bars from a profile you left are taken down
Action bar — the short line above the hotbar
Animated gradients — <shine:#AAA:#BBB:1600>, the last number being the cycle in milliseconds
Frame animations — <anim:name>, with the frames written out in the config. Two are included: a dot of light running along a separator, and a breathing diamond
Conditions — %if:%hud_ping%>150?<red>high:<green>good%. Numbers compare as numbers, so 9 is not greater than 100, and a decimal comma works
Built-in values, no other plugin needed — %hud_player% %hud_ping% %hud_tps% %hud_online% %hud_max% %hud_world% %hud_x% %hud_y% %hud_z% %hud_health%
PlaceholderAPI — when it is installed, anything any other plugin publishes can go on the board
Gradients and legacy colours — <gradient:#A:#B> and &b&l both work, so an old config can be pasted in as it is
Long lines are handled — a line past the scoreboard's limit is split where it does not break a colour tag
Adjustable refresh — four ticks by default, which is five repaints a second

How it plays

A player joins and the sidebar is already showing their name, world, coordinates, the player count, their ping in green or red, and the server's TPS. Press TAB and the header is the server's name with the light moving across it. Walk into another world and, if you wrote a second profile for it, the whole display changes on the next repaint — no command, no relog.

Writing a profile

This is a complete profile. Everything you leave out is simply not checked.

profiles:
  vip:
    worlds: [survival]          # only in this world
    permission: hudforge.vip    # only for this permission
    condition: ""               # and nothing else to check
    weight: 100                 # higher up the TAB list

    sidebar:
      title: "<shine:#C879FF:#FFFFFF:1600><bold>MY SERVER</bold></shine>"
      lines:
        - "<anim:separator>"
        - "<white>%hud_player%"
        - "<gray>ping %if:%hud_ping%>150?<red>%hud_ping%ms:<green>%hud_ping%ms%"

    tablist:
      header: ["", "<white>MY SERVER", ""]
      footer: ["<gray>tps %hud_tps%"]

    nametag:
      prefix: "<gold>VIP "
      suffix: ""

    bossbars:
      event:
        text: "<white>Double XP weekend"
        color: PURPLE
        style: PROGRESS
        progress: "1.0"

Configuration

config.yml — the refresh rate, the frame animations and every profile, with a comment next to each key
Profiles are read in the order you write them and the first match wins, so put the specific ones first
metrics-id turns anonymous usage statistics off when set to 0

Commands and permissions

/hud reload — re-read the config without restarting
hudforge.admin defaults to operators
Any permission you name in a profile is yours to define in your permissions plugin

Requirements

Paper 1.21.x running Java 21. Purpur works; Spigot and Bukkit are not supported
Optional: PlaceholderAPI, only if you want values from other plugins on the board

Nothing is mandatory. Without PlaceholderAPI the built-in values still work and the plugin starts normally.