Ok, thanks for answering my questions! Since I'm fairly new to forge modding and Java, I'll stick to more basic/less compatability breaking things. But, if I ever decide to look into this some more I'll have a few places to start.
Very informative, thank you! Would you have any idea if this mod:
http://www.minecraftforum.net/forums/mapping-and-modding/minecraft-mods/1280263-animated-enchantments-1-0-0
Implements something similar to what you've done? Or has forge changed? Or is it a more basic modification?
EDIT: Just saw that the mod is most likely using ASM. Why is it frowned upon?
I want to create multiple types of visual enchantment effects (the vanilla purple glow not the enchantments themselves). How would I go about doing this?
So far I've looked at the RenderItem class and it would seem that the game uses the renderItem method to check if an item is enchanted and the renderEffect method to actually create the effect. I thought could override the renderEffect method but it's private. I tried making my own version of the method but it required a lot more private methods and my file started looking like a mangled mess. I thought maybe I could copy over the whole of RenderItem into my own class but I have no idea how to call that instead of the default.
Any help would be appreciated!