User:LauraFi/Enchanting before 1.8

Before 1.8
An item can be enchanted by on an enchantment table and placing the item in the displayed slot. Upon placing the item, three randomized options will appear on the right of the GUI. The names here are meaningless and option must be chosen blindly, although the player is shown how many experience points each option will cost. Only choices with a cost equal to or below the player's current level can be chosen. Each option will imbue the item with a randomized set of enchantments that are dependent on the number of experience levels spent (e.g.: a level 1 enchantment can give a pickaxe the "Efficiency I" enchantment). Removing the item and replacing it in the slot will re-randomize the enchantment and cost.

The level cost influences the quantity, type, and level of enchantments instilled in the item, with a higher experience level generally resulting in more and/or higher-level enchantments. Nevertheless, there is a heavy random factor, and even a level 30 enchantment (the maximum) doesn't guarantee more than one enchantment, nor even that enchantments will be "maximum strength" — a level 30 enchantment can still yield Fortune II or Efficiency III alone, for example.

Enchanting a book will produce an enchanted book, which does nothing on its own, but effectively "saves" the enchantment for later application to another item via an anvil.

Nearby bookshelves raise the available enchantment levels; without any bookshelves the experience level cost will never exceed 8. The more bookshelves, up to a maximum of 15, the more potent an enchantment hence greater experience level cost.

In order to have an effect, a bookshelf must be placed exactly 2 blocks, laterally, off the enchantment table and be on the same level or one block height above the table, and the 2-high space between the bookshelf and table must be Air (even a torch, snow cover or carpet will block the effect).