#armour trimming

[memento-fugaces]

Armour trimming- snapshot 23W04A

Some thoughts on the newest minecraft snapshot after the cut.

I consider myself relatively knowledgable about minecraft and have been uncommonly obsessed with it recently. As a result I am aware of a great many varied responses to most of the changes (did you hear that they've just made crouching actually shrink your hitbox in a bedrock beta!) and the most recent major feature is armour trimming. Generally, the response has been quite positive and I'm inclined to agree with this but reactions certainly haven't been pure awe or anything. Obviously this is good- the point of the snapshots is to develop features. I want to discuss some of the things I've heard said about the feature with a bit of my own perspective. First I will in passing condemn the idea that this is un-minecrafty; that phrase is nebulous nonsense mostly and the sort of sickly nostalgia I will not put up with.

Netherite is different now

To craft netherite armour, you will need a netherite upgrade smithing template, two of which are guaranteed in every bastion, as well as the current netherite ingot and diamond armour. This template can be cloned at the cost of seven diamonds and one netherrack but we will get to that a bit later.

This change is maybe the one that has recieved the most mixed opinions. Personally, I'm not altogether against it though I ought to admit that I'm planning to take advantage of the current system as much as I can.

What I like about this is that it makes the progression system a little bit more work, which I don't especially mind. It sucessfully achieves its objective of prolonging diamond gear as a tier without making netherite unreachable. Admittedly the different armours that we currently have are a flawed system to an extent but this flaw is so inherent to the design of minecraft its hardly changeable. But my opinion is, quite obviously, biased as I won't have nearly as much experience with this system because I like to keep a world as long as I can. So what do other people think?

One thing I've seen about is that netherite isn't really worth it. Outside of durability upgrades, knockback resistance and being unburnable, they are basically just diamond. This is true. However, I would suggest this as a point in favour of the system- it is a small benefit that becomes essentially optional. And those feature are nice, considering the aforementioned flaws of the armour system.

Small boosts to netherite have been suggested to which I readily assent. One propasal is instaming glass, or at least breaking it faster: this seems minor but an excellent feature all the same, ideal for netherite. Deepslate being instaminable with haste two would be nice but its existence was intended to prevent beacon mining. It would be nice but wouldn't happen. One that ought to come is instamining logs with haste two for java- this would simply be a parity fix and netherite would be better for it.

Customisable armour

This is the main draw of the update. There are eleven trims and ten material (essentially colours.) This means a fun experience and more personalised armour. Most of the troubles I have heard with this are trivial, though I would like to talk about one which is combining trims.

This is not a feature and I think it can't really coexist with the current system: it isn't designed for this and the cost (we'll talk probably lots about that later) of trimming armour evidences this. While this is a similarly viable system to the current implementation, I think based on how developed this feature is, it may well be rather a bit late to change this. Perhaps this is an unintended consequence of the new snapshot cycle where basically done features are just tweaked.

In truth, I think the reticence with showing new features is basically an over reactions to what are inarguably past mistakes. The birch forests in particular are an egrigious example of this. But this isn't a topic I have overly extensive thoughts on.

That the chief feature of this snapshot is good and has me already excited for the update is nice. It's possibly the biggest feature in this update's snapshots so far, which is just cool.

Trim colours

The items that can be used for armour trimming are iron, copper, gold, lapis, emerald, diamond, netherite, redstone, amethyst and quartz. They are numerous and therefore there is much to customise.

The colours are fun and purely cosmetic, allowing you to finally personalise your armour to be even more stylish. Already, this aspect of the feature is great.

Not everyone is happy with this, though. There is a tempestuous ripple of mild disagreement about the choice of items having no effects.

On one hand, there being no benefits to one type of trim over another is helpful as it prevents the confusion of aesthetics and functionality.

From the way I've put that it might be clear to you that I find myself disagreeing with this. Already there are reasons to wear armour for practical purposes, notably gold in the nether. Why then would bonuses for trims be any worse? While the current compromise is to prevent just using the best armour, it is in effect the same. I do, however, understand the basis of the idea.

Therefore, I shall with scant unique-ness propose benefits that are minute but not wholly negligible.

iron: you could go slightly faster in mine carts or perhaps the range at which you can pick up items be expanded slightly

copper: maybe make the spyglass slightly better or just make the player immune to lightning

gold: this one I will strip wholesale. Sometimes the obvious is the best and so gold should not anger piglins

lapis: another stolen one, things costing less levels in both the enchanting table and anvil

emerald: villager trades that being a bit cheaper, like a weaker verison of zombie villager curing seems like an easy suggestion

diamond: if it made treasure chests have better loot that would be good but it doesn't seem like it would be easy to implement. I'd quite like if it made obsidian a but faster to mine

netherite: taking less damage from fire would be a pleasant thing

redstone: since it makes potions last longer, a very small increase to all potion durations would be good

amethyst: even just the sound would be so nice as a little silly thing

quartz: slightly more xp feels platry but i swear this is harder than it looks

Such bonuses would be hard to balance as is clear in my incoherent ramblings. Would you need a whole set of armour or just one piece? I'd prefer the latter but then you'd have four effects at a time. Maybe they should stack per item? Or should it stay purely cosmetic?

There have also been a few more minor suggestions. Echo shards would doubltless be a fun extra trim colour and I'd love to see them add that. The enchantment glint being on the trim only or just more than the rest would be a nice style.

Smithing templates

Old structures, new items. All ten different trims (and the netherite upgrade template) can be found in pre-existing structures. Undeniably, this admittedly slight revitalisation of the old structures is good since it gives more incentives to explore structures.

The main issue is rarity. The templates are limited to structures, which makes some of them much rarer than others. I think this is mostly an issue of balancing, though, and so a negligible problem.

One point I have seen is that strongholds are only able to spawn in a certain radius around (0,0), which should definitely be amended if only to make these templates not technically finite.

The main thing here, however, is the cloning recipie. It utilises seven diamonds, which gives diamonds a good use (jukeboxes aside) that makes them purposeful in a way that they aren't always. This does restrict the feature to relatively late game but I mind that not.

The recipe is flawed in that with it you can theoretically use up all of your templates and then have to find them again. This isn't an extraordinary issue but it exists regardless.

A commonly proposed solution is giving the templates durability and letting them be repaired with diamonds. This simultaneously would lower the diamond cost, which I am not particularly concerned by but would make this more accessible before the late game. Further, this could balance the rarity with different durabilities. Mostly it would be a small nicitey.

A small note on datapacks

Being on bedrock this is of little significance to me unless there is an equivalent but I'm happy that you can make custom patterns.

-- P.S I'm very excited by all the new features, can't wait to see more of the sniffer and its plants.

With all due respect, memento fugaces

[loktauri]

Amouring out! [LOUD INCORRECT BUZZER] Gearing out? [LOUD INCORRECT BUZZER] ...Triming out...? [LO

[cloudfishh]

Creature

[giildedgold]

hey so wemmbu is using zam's shield. interesting to me

[dredgesnails]

genre of men who use netherite ingots for armour trims instead of actual armour. population at least 2

[mrjeremyman]

That moment when your friend reminds you of that one Minecraft roleplay you both watched so you draw one of the characters because nothing is going right in you life

[boatemboys]

CUB WITH THE VEX ARMOUR TRIM CONVEX FANS WAKE UP!!!!!!

[dividedsingularity]

I watched Soul Eater some time ago. I watched it for the sentient weapons. I was disappointed to find they were humans also… but the show was still really cool in some aspects. So here's some Maka and Soul = ] First one drawn during gartic phone.

[kaatrina]

How's your MC coming along?

beautiful!!

[wjbminecraft]

"Oh hey! Armour Trims are in the game now!", or: How I Learned to Stop Waiting and Start Actually Using the Goddamn Snapshots.

Ok so you know how there's a new 1.20 snapshot thing out? Yeah, here's a post showcasing it.

First off, here's how they work;

The slot on the left (which is animated in-game, fading between the outline of a Smithing Template and a Netherite Upgrade) is for inserting... well, Smithing Templates and Netherite Upgrades, the middle-slot (which gains another animated icon when the first slot is filled; the former cycles between different slot-icons, while the latter cycles between various tools and armour-slots) is for tools, weapons and/or armour, and the third slot (cycles through the outlines of various rare materials) is where the nice materials go. The armour-stand on the right displays a preview of your item, but unfortunately doesn't allow you to rotate it.

The materials that can be used as trims are:

Nether Quartz

Amethyst Shards

Netherite Ingots

Copper Ingots

Iron Ingots

Gold Ingots

Diamonds

Redstone Dust

Lapis Lazuli

Emeralds

They can be applied to any armour-type except Leather, for obvious reasons (although I'm guessing you can probably apply trims to Leather using commands).

Anyway, let's look at all those designs!

Sentry

Very generic, but it makes sense since it's the first one listed and it looks kinda like the Trimmed Armour inventory texture.

Dune

Nice design; somehow feels appropriately deserty. The stomach-pattern makes me think of the trap-floor in Desert Temples.

Coast

Ehhh... again, kinda generic, but it probably goes well with other trim designs.

Wild

See above.

Ward

This design made me realise the design on Chiselled Deepslate is meant to be a silhouette of the Warden's head. I like it!

Eye

Haha, eyebrow helmet... the eye-chest is very cool, gotta love character-designs with facial features in the wrong place. Also I'm biased because it has Big Cyclops Energy™.

Vex

Big eyebrows! I also like the more "formal" design down the front.

Tide

If you used Lapis on Diamond for the colours, you could make some pretty-decent Prismarine Armour for a multiplayer server or Adventure map.

Snout

Frogge-eye helmet. Yes.

Rib

Looks bad as a full set, but would make a great accent-pattern for a more distinctive set. Netherite on Iron is basically white-tiger, and the opposite is zebra.

Tower

The trim on the sleeves and boots makes me think of pizza and racing, although it could just be the colours I'm using.

And now, a thing I don't like.

Ok so you know how, when you want to upgrade your Diamond stuff, you put it on a Smithing Table and merge it with a Netherite Ingot? Yeah, not any more. This is how it'll work in 1.20:

See that item in the first slot? That is a Netherite Upgrade. Now, I don't know how how it'll be found, so it could be easy to obtain, but adding another step just kinda overcomplicates it. Not only that, but the process consumes the upgrade, so if it is rare/hard to craft/only findable in chests, it'll be annoying to make a full set of Netherite gear.

But aside from that I'm really excited!

[rooksunday]

i know we are here for the dad batch but consider:

the rad batch

where everything is the same but they’re all wearing denim cut offs underneath their neon-highlighted armour and hunter travels only by skateboard

[clownov]

transmasc experience of wearing an incredibly fcking cute outfit that gets lots of compliments & smiles from women strangers just to lie on the floor & cry as soon as u get home because it feels so fucking Gross™️

[maythray]

yippy!!! yay!!!! yay!!!!!!!

[vryarts]

Put some armour on that soldier

[childishagate84]

armour trims are the best feature ever added to minecraft

[will-it-trim]

Will It Trim? Elytra | Minecraft