Armor

Armor adds extra protection via a separate health bar that reaches 10 armor points. Armor can be made with leather, gold, iron, diamonds and fire (fire is unavailable without the use of hacking or modding) and consists of chestplates, helmets, boots and leggings.

Player armor
Since Indev, helmets, chestplates, leggings, and boots can be crafted by players out of leather, gold, iron, or diamond (listed in order of increasing durability/effectiveness.)

Since 1.0, each unit of armor gives a certain number of defense points separate from durability. Diamond gives the highest defense along with the most durability, and leather gives the least defense and lest durability. Armor durability is reduced when the player wearing it takes damage, but only if the armor provides protection from that type of damage. For example, if a mob is attacking the player, armor will reduce damage done to the player and therefore lose durability. However, armor will not protect the player (and therefore not lose durability) if the player is drowning. See the effects section below for more information.

In Survival Mode, Chainmail armor can only be hacked into the game, or crafted with edited-in fire blocks. It has the same durability as gold armor. It is available without hacking in Creative Mode; however, it cannot be used.

Players can also wear a Pumpkin as their helmet. Although this will block the player's view and not provide protection from attacks, it will prevent Endermen from attacking the player when the player stops looking at them. The player will still be attacked if they physically attack the Endermen.

Effects
The following types of damage are reduced by armor and, consequently, damage the armor itself:


 * Direct attacks from mobs
 * Direct attacks from other players
 * Getting hit with an arrow
 * Getting hit with a fireball from a Ghast or Blaze
 * Touching a block of fire or lava
 * Touching a cactus
 * Explosions

The following types of damage are not reduced by armor and have no effect on the armor itself:


 * Ongoing damage from being on fire
 * Suffocating inside a block
 * Drowning in water
 * Starvation
 * Fall damage
 * Falling into the Void
 * Poisoning; e.g., from a Cave Spider bite or a Potion of Poison
 * Instant damage from a Potion of Harm

Crafting
It takes 24 units of material to make a full set of armor. Although it is not necessary that all of your armor is the same material, each individual piece must consist of only one material. This means that you could wear a leather cap with an iron chestplate, but you cannot craft a chestplate out of both iron and gold.

Note that it is most efficient to craft boots before a helmet, as boots require less material, and also are more durable than helmets.

Data Values
The following are the data values for each armor piece:

History
Before Alpha 1.0.8, wool was used instead of leather as the lowest tier of armor.

Before 1.9 Prerelease 1, all helmets gave (0.30 efficiency), all chest armor gave  (0.50 efficiency), all leg armor gave  (0.43 efficiency), and all boots gave  (0.38 efficiency). Armor's effectiveness was linked to durability, with lower tier materials less durable than higher tier materials. Leather armor was as protective as diamond armor when undamaged, but leather armor quickly lost durability to attacks, thus its defense power would more rapidly diminish. Likewise, if you put on almost fully decreased boots when you had other armor on, it lowered your armor protection.

Also before 1.9 Prerelease 1, specific types of damage were reduced by a certain amount based upon the effective armor points of the player. Each point of armor reduced the damage you took by 8%, up to the maximum reduction of 80%.

Mob armor
In Survival Test, certain Zombies and Skeletons could be found wearing armor; a chestplate or a helmet. Zombies had the potential, although extremely unlikely, to wear both a chestplate and a helmet at the same time. Skeletons could also be found wearing armor, albeit extremely infrequently. Mob armor was purely cosmetic; however, although it is possible that it was a planned feature to increase mob difficulty.

Trivia

 * Helmets, chestplates and leggings have different names when they are made of leather than when they are made of other materials. Helmets are named caps, chestplates are called tunics, and leggings are termed pants. Boots are still called boots.
 * If you look in the armor folder inside Minecraft.jar, leather armor is still called cloth armor.
 * There is a texture file for armor labeled "Power". It appears to be an indiscernible blue energy of some sort; the same blue energy that appears on a creeper when it is struck by lightning (becomes a charged creeper.) It is unknown why pig's saddles are not in the same folder.
 * The chainmail chestplate has slightly longer sleeves than all other chestplates.
 * The Leather Armor design comes from an old game Notch never finished "Legend of the Chambered"
 * If you are sitting in a minecart with armor leggings on, and press (for your Inventory), or pressing  (for 3rd person view), your legs will be in a sitting position, but your armor will be a standing position. However this can be fixed by removing any bottom piece of armor and then replacing them.


 * There was a popular rumor that stated chain mail armor absorbs all damage done (so instead of losing .5 armor and .5 hearts you lose 1.0 armor), but this is not true.