I need to clone an entity when I spawn it so that I can have multiple of the same entity in the world at once. I use this code:

//If we are on the client side
if (!worldIn.isRemote) {
	Entity entity = ((Entity) thingToPlace);
	Entity entity2 = (Entity) EntityList.createEntityFromNBT(entity.getEntityData(), worldIn);
								
	//Set the EntitY's location
	entity2.setPosition(pos.getX(), pos.getY(), pos.getZ());
								
	//Spawn the entity
	worldIn.spawnEntity(entity2);
}

 

I got a null pointer exception on that code, and I figured out it was because the value "id" was not set in the nbt I passed, so Minecraft skipped the entity and returned null. I added this code:

 

entity.getEntityData().setString("id", entity.getName());

 

and that seemed to work, but I am not sure if this is what I am supposed to do and if this will cause problems. What is the proper way to solve this problem?

Thank You!