Armor adds extra protection with 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 an inventory editor) and consists of chestplates, helmets, boots and leggings. Each armor point gives 8% damage reduction, with a maximum of 80% damage reduction with 10 armor points.
Player armor
Player armor (not including Chain Armor)
Helmets, chestplates, leggings, and boots can be crafted out of leather, gold, iron, fire, or diamond. Chain armor also exists but is only obtainable in Creative Mode, or can only be obtained through trading with the villagers in survival mode, as of snapshot 12w21a.
While worn, each piece of armor adds to the player's total defense points, which serve to reduce certain kinds of damage to the player. Whenever a piece of armor absorbs damage for the player, the armor itself is damaged. After taking enough damage, the armor piece is destroyed. Each individual combination of armor type and material gives a different amount of defense points and has a different level of durability. Diamond gives the highest defense along with the most durability, and leather gives the least defense and least durability.
When the player takes damage of a sort that is not affected by armor, any armor they are wearing does not take damage. See the effects section below for more information.
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 Enderman.
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 in the knee.
- 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 attack or a Potion of Poison
- Instant damage from a Potion of Harming
- /kill command
Protection enchantments protect from types of damage that armor doesn't protect against without an enchantment, like falling damage. Armor durability still doesn't decrease when protection-enchanted armor takes environmental damage.
Defense points
The following table shows the amount of defense points added by each individual piece of armor, as well as the total points added by a full set of armor for each material.
| Material | Full set | Helmet | Chestplate | Leggings | Boots |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Leather |  
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| Gold |
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| Chain |
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| Iron |
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| Diamond |
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The following table shows the number of defense points () per unit of material. Thus, a pair of Iron Boots () provides 50% efficiency-4 ingots to 2 points of armor, whereas a Diamond Chestplate () provides 100% efficiency-8 diamonds to 8 points of armor.
| Material | Full Set | Helmet | Chestplate | Leggings | Boots |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Leather | 29.2% | 20% | 37.5% | 28.6% | 25% |
| Gold | 45.8% | 40% | 62.5% | 42.9% | 25% |
| Chain | 50% | 40% | 62.5% | 57.1% | 25% |
| Iron | 62.5% | 40% | 75% | 71.4% | 50% |
| Diamond | 83.3% | 60% | 100% | 85.7% | 75% |
Thus, a full set of diamond armor gives .833 defense points per diamond, whereas a full set of leather armor gives .292 (65% less) defense points.
Armor enchantment effect calculation
Armor can get protection enchantments such as "Protection III" or "Fire protection IV". The maximum level of a protection enchantment is IV (4). Protection enchantments stack (up to a cap). The type of protection enchantment determines whether the protection enchantment comes into effect, according to the following table:
| Enchantment | Damage reduced for |
|---|---|
| Protection | All |
| Fire Protection | Fire, lava, and blaze fireballs |
| Blast Protection | Explosions |
| Projectile Protection | Arrows, ghast and blaze fireballs |
| Feather Falling | Fall damage (including ender pearls) |
This means that "Protection" is always at least as good as for example "Fire protection", even against fire damage (with the exception of "Feather falling", see below).
The enchantment damage reduction is applied to the damage left after the armor's basic effect, and the base "enchantment protection factor" (EPF) of an enchanted item is
floor ( (6 + level * level) / 2 )
Which gives the following EPF for enchantments of level I-IV:
| Level | EPF |
|---|---|
| I | 3 |
| II | 5 |
| III | 7 |
| IV | 11 |
For Feather falling, the EPF of the specific piece is doubled.
The total EPF is the sum for all armor pieces, and capped at 25. An EPF of 25 can be reached by two level III pieces and one level IV piece (2*7+11=25). This also means that Feather Falling is unnecessary to reduce fall damage if you can reach an EPF of 25 without Feather falling boots.
The actual EPF applied is randomized to between 50% and 100% of the EPF calculated above, rounded up, and capped at 20. Each level of the actual EPF reduces damage by 4%, for a maximum damage reduction of 80% from enchantments. Since this is applied after the base armor damage reduction (80% for diamond), you get a total 89.6% to 96% damage reduction for a diamond armor set with an EPF of 25, for damage which is mitigated by unenchanted armor (fx fall damage is not mitigated by unenchanted armor).[1]
Durability
The following table shows the amount of damage each piece of armor can absorb before being destroyed.
Any "hit" dealt by a mob (including creeper explosions) will remove 2 durability points to the armor.
Other damage sources usually remove 3 durability points to the armor, except cacti (only one point).
Damage taken that armor doesn't protect (such as falling or drowning) will not damage the armor. The following chart displays how many hits each piece of armor can endure. The numbers on this chart are subject to change by enchantments.
| Material | Helmet | Chestplate | Leggings | Boots |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Leather | 56 | 81 | 76 | 66 |
| Gold | 78 | 113 | 106 | 92 |
| Chain/Iron | 166 | 241 | 226 | 196 |
| Diamond | 364 | 529 | 496 | 430 |
The following tables shows the durability per unit of material of each piece of armor, compared to that of the boots. Note that the durability per unit does not depend on the material.
| Helmet | Chestplate | Leggings | Boots | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| durability/unit | 68% | 61% | 66% | 100% |
This means that for the same number of leather/iron ingots/gold ingots/chain/diamond, boots can take 1.5 more damage than leggings.
Thus, chestplate and leggings offer more defense points per unit, but have a lesser durability per unit.
Enchantability
Armor can be enchanted, and the material it's made of determines how enchantable it is, according to the following factors.
| Leather | 15 |
|---|---|
| Gold | 25 |
| Chain | 12 |
| Iron | 9 |
| Diamond | 10 |
Notice that golden armor is highly enchantable, compensating somewhat for its poor defensive properties. See the enchanting page for the exact details of how this works.
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 leggings out of both iron and gold.
Note that chestplates provide the most protection per unit of material, followed by leggings, followed by boots, followed by helmets. The exact ratio varies between different materials, however, and golden helmets are actually more cost-effective than golden boots.
As with other items with durability, armor can be repaired by placing two pieces of the same type (e.g., iron helmets) in a crafting grid. The resulting item will have slightly more durability left than the original items combined.
Armor is not stackable.
Template:Armor Crafting
Data values
The following are the data values for each armor piece:
| Leather | Chain | Iron | Diamond | Gold | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dec | Hex | Dec | Hex | Dec | Hex | Dec | Hex | Dec | Hex | |
| Cap/Helmets | 298 | 12A | 302 | 12E | 306 | 132 | 310 | 136 | 314 | 13A |
| Tunic/Chestplates | 299 | 12B | 303 | 12F | 307 | 133 | 311 | 137 | 315 | 13B |
| Pants/Leggings | 300 | 12C | 304 | 130 | 308 | 134 | 312 | 138 | 316 | 13C |
| Boots | 301 | 12D | 305 | 131 | 309 | 135 | 313 | 139 | 317 | 13D |
History
Before Alpha 1.0.8, wool armor was the lowest tier of armor, rather than leather 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%.
Minecraft 1.0 had a bug that caused all armor to be twice as effective at reducing damage as intended. This was fixed in Minecraft 1.1, and as of 1.1, iron armor naturally generates in NPC village chests.
A Zombie wearing both a chestplate and a helmet in Survival Test.
As of Minecraft 1.2, Zombies can drop iron helmets on rare occasions, and Zombie Pigmen can drop golden helmets.
On April 5th, 2012, Jeb mentioned that shift-clicking armor into armor slots was "on the list of things to do.",[2] and it was later added in weekly snapshot 12w15a.
As of snapshot 12w21a, chain armor is now obtainable legitimately in survival mode through trading with blacksmith villagers.
As of snapshot 12w32a, a full set of any armor is sometimes worn by Zombies and Skeletons, likelihood increasing with difficulty.
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, it is possible that it was a planned feature to increase hostile mob difficulty.
However in 12w32a, mob armor was reintroduced. Zombies and skeletons will sometimes wear armor in Normal or Hard, increased likelihood in Hard. It is always in a full set, and can be any tier of armor, including chain.
Leather-Chain armor
The leather-chain armor is just a sprite from Indev 0.31's items.png file. Diamond and gold armor are missing.
Gallery
The armor sprite as it appeared in one of Notch's previous projects, Legend of Chambered.
A Zombie wearing a chestplate in Survival Test.
A Zombie wearing a helmet in Survival Test.
Video
Armor/video
Trivia
- Helmets, chestplates, and leggings have different names when they are made of leather. Helmets are called caps, chestplates are called tunics, and leggings are called pants. Boots do not change.
- In the armor folder inside minecraft.jar, leather armor is called cloth armor. This is because leather armor was initially made from cloth (later renamed to Wool).
- There is a texture file for armor labeled "Power", a faint blue energy used by Creepers when struck by lightning (becoming a charged creeper).
- The chain chestplate has slightly longer sleeves than all other chestplates.
- The leather armor design, along with other Minecraft sprites, comes from a 21st Ludum Dare game by Notch called "Legend of the Chambered".
- If you are sitting in a minecart with armor leggings on, and press E (for your Inventory), or press F5 (for third person view), your legs will be in a sitting position, but your armor will be a standing position. This can be fixed by un-equipping any bottom piece of armor and then re-equipping them.
- There was a popular rumor stating that chain armor absorbs all damage done (so instead of losing .5 armor and .5 hearts you lose 1.0 armor), but this is not true.
- In the Xbox 360 Edition, drowning or falling will cause all equipped armor to take damage due to it being built off beta stages of the game.
- A pumpkin can also be worn as a helmet, but provides no defensive protection.