Also, I wanted to add that since Minecraft exists, building farms and exploiting mechanics has been a core part. A mob dropper was one of the first things I’ve built, basically giving me vast amounts of XP, bone meal and arrows. Automating resource generation is part of Minecraft.

It is definitely super strong and kinda puts you into a semi-creative state. However, personally, I wouldn’t enjoy Minecraft as much as I do if I we’d go back to the old system, with no villager trading, no mending, etc. since that’d turn Minecraft back into an endless grind. I enjoy the current way since it basically just gives you more opportunities and ability to bring your ideas come to life.

I will always oppose removing optional mechanisms from the game. It is overpowered, but I like to play in the endgame and it removes a lot of barriers that would just be grinding at this point.

In general, I try to be very conscious against saying “I wish other people were blocked from utilizing a mechanism I am not forced to use.” That means you draw a line and expect everyone to respect it…the problem is everyone can draw arbitrary lines. “Strip mining is cheating, all tunnels should have bedrock 1 block outside the walls.” “Farming is duping, the only mechanism to get materials should be exploration and collection of items generated with the world.” It never ends. Ultimately, this is a game with a mechanism for end game players, the ability to reset for early game players, and everything in between. That diversity of styles is the magic.

I wish that villagers were never implemented on first place. If all development time poured into villagers was spent in other gameplay systems, the game would be considerably better.

But it seems to me that Mojang has a tendency to implement RPG features in Minecraft, without good reasons to do so. XP and levels were like this, too. And RPGs have NPCs trading with you, so Minecraft “gotta have NPCs”, no further reason.

Why did people think this was a good idea?

Because they were outright useless before trading.

Im a bit late, but there is a neat modpack that is designed to rebalance the game around the early to midgame. It nerfs villagers, changes how mending works, disables iron farms, buffs minecarts, and has several other rebalances. Musketeer Modpack

The changes I want for villagers are

• No healing (or healing gives a temporary status similar to Hero of the village. No permanent price reduction)
• No diamond tools
• Nerf iron deals
• For librarians, remove some enchantments from their loot table and put them in structures (Mending in End cities, Protection IV in Ancient Cities, Unbreaking in Bastions)

Villager trading actually used to be much much worse- it’s been buffed repeatedly. They used to have set random trades that were pretty poor, but they got upgraded heavily with specialized professions and trading tiers in 1.8, and upgraded again with 1.14 and the raid buff system. I almost never touched trading because I started in the before-1.8 era when it was incredibly simplistic and nigh-on useless.

Thing is, without any sort of these “automations”, Minecraft would be an incredibly grindy game. Really, at it’s core, survival Minecraft is built around grinding. Now, I play Minecraft to build cool stuff. Grinding for materials is a natural part of that- I’d rather grind for those than spend an additional 10-20 hours just trying to get usable enchants on my tools to continue said grind.

The neat part is- Nobody is forcing you to take part in that game mechanic. Everything they provide is available through “normal”, albeit annoying, means.