Sending Packets

Once a packet has been added to the network, it can be called to send a message to the side it refers to. Usually there are four different directions a packet can be sent:

Direction	Description
PLAY_TO_CLIENT	A packet is sent from the server to the client during gameplay.
PLAY_TO_SERVER	A packet is sent from the client to the server during gameplay.
LOGIN_TO_CLIENT	A packet is sent to the client on initial login.
LOGIN_TO_SERVER	A packet is sent to the server on initial login.

The two login packets are handled internally by forge itself. However, the other two need to be sent using SimpleChannel#send for SimpleChannel#sendToServer. Each method takes a new instance of the message to send.

Client Packet Locations

• It might not always be necessary to update every single client with a packet if they are not viewing the entity or are not affected by it. To specify which clients to send a packet from the server to, a PacketDistributor$PacketTarget must also be passed in as a parameter. There are many helpful fields that hold simple implementations of where to send which packet within PacketDistributor. However, they must be supplied with the required input either via PacketDistributor#with or PacketDistributor#noArg if it is going to all players.

Here is a list of Forge provided PacketDistributors:

PacketDistributor	Supplied Value	Description
PLAYER	ServerPlayer	Send to the specified player .
DIMENSION	ResourceKey<Level>	Send to all players within the specified dimension.
NEAR	TargetPoint	Send to all players within the range of the target point.
ALL	None	Send to all currently logged in players.
SERVER	None	Send from the player client to the server. This is the only distributor that should be used for client -> server communication.
TRACKING_ENTITY	Entity	Send to all players currently tracking the specified entity.
TRACKING_ENTITY_AND_SELF	Entity	Send to all players currently tracking the specified entity and the entity itself, if it is a player.
TRACKING_CHUNK	LevelChunk	Send to all players tracking the specified chunk.
NMLIST	List<Connection>	Send to the listed connections. Each connection is typically an individual player.