Combat School - The Ultimate Player's Guide to Minecraft - page 101

Various enchantment effects can also greatly increase a bow's strength and versatility, and
also provide an unlimited supply of arrows.
Armor-All
Armor is crafted from leather, iron ingots, gold ingots, and diamond gems. A fifth type of
armormadefromchainmailcan'tbecraftedbutisavailable asatradableiteminsomevil-
lages, if you are lucky enough to find it. (See Chapter 11 , “ Villages and Other Structures ,”
page 217 .)
A full suit of armor requires 24 units of source material, but they don't all have to be the
sametype.It'sbesttothinkofarmornotasacompletesuitbutasitsindividualparts:ahel-
met, chest plate, leggings, and boots. Each can be made from a different material, depend-
ing on what you have on hand, and each adds to the damage protection value that protects
your entire body, regardless of where you are hit. Your avatar is, to put it plainly, one giant
hit box...like a punching bag that can also strike back.
I mentioned in Chapter 3 , “ Gathering Resources ,” that each armor icon represents an 8%
reduction in the damage you'll take, so a 10/10 suit of armor will reduce the damage you
take by 80%, whereas a 1/10 suit will absorb only 8%. Armor becomes less effective the
more damage it absorbs, although the rate at which it deteriorates also depends on its ma-
terial, leather being the weakest and diamond the strongest.
Note: Which Suit Suits You?
Finding 24 units of any of the materials that can be turned into a suit
of armor isn't easy when you're starting out, but if you happen to have
spawned near a few cattle, consider starting a farm as described in
Chapter 7 , and breed the cattle rather than trying to constantly find more
out in the wild. Horses also sometimes drop two pieces of leather on
death. If you haven't found any willing bovines (or horses, perish the
thought—it just seems wrong), mining is the only reasonable option, but
ensure you can build up enough of a stock of iron ingots for your tools
before turning additional ones into armor.
Your HUD shows the total defense points for your current armor. As with the other bars,
each unit represents two points, decreasing by half an icon as each point depletes.
Table 5.2 lists the maximum damage absorption provided by each armor material. Various
enchantments can also improve the damage absorption of each type, with gold fairing the
best, followed by leather, diamond, and iron.