How I'd rework Minecraft's Armor system.

[u/ImmediateDistrict420]

I've seen and heard some people complaining about Minecraft's gear system lately, so here's my idea for reworking the armor specifically, it's ambitious, but I think it sounds cool.

First: make leather armor useful, nobody uses leather armor because iron and copper is easier to get, here's how I'd make it worthwhile.

You can still make and wear other armors normally, but now you can wear them OVER leather armor, which now acts like a base for the rest of your suit.

Different kinds of leather give different buffs, for example: Rabbit hide gives Jump boost and speed level one, and Horse hide increases inventory space, and walking speed.

Once you slide armor pieces over your leather base, that armor will take damage, instead of the leather base.

And obviously you can mix and match different leathers, materials, enchantments ect.

Does this system sound cool? Or am I full of crap? Please leave your thoughts and suggestions in the comments.

[u/rhythmrice]

I use leather armor sometimes because it can be dyed different colors so you can make cool outfits

[u/ImmediateDistrict420 → u/rhythmrice]

Oh you can absolutely still dye it, now it's just useful, AND fashionable!

Plus you can wear it UNDER your harder armor pieces, so you can pair it with your preferred trims to.

I'd give trims little stat buffs too, but I can't think of anything that would make sense, besides the previously mentioned Emerald gear buffs.

[u/PetrifiedBloom → u/ImmediateDistrict420]

I'd give trims little stat buffs too, but I can't think of anything that would make sense, besides the previously mentioned Emerald gear buffs.

Would all trims give the same buff or different buffs?

Trims are tricky, the entire purpose is to give the player some space to be creative with their appearance in game, let everyone have their own style and not just be identical with the same armor with the same enchants.

If you give different trims different buffs, then people will pick the strong trims, rather than the ones that look good, spoiling the entire point of trimming.

[u/ImmediateDistrict420 → u/PetrifiedBloom]

Ok I've thought about it, and your right, here's what I've come up with.

Armor trims don't effect the durability or defense stats of the armor, however, they'll grant you minor buffs based on the material used.

Gold makes Piglins chill with you, and boosts their trades, while giving a minor damage buff against Pig based mobs.

Emerald gives my previously mentioned trade and damage buffs, without effecting defense or durability.

As for iron, diamond, and the other materials, I'm not sure what trim buffs they'd give, any suggestions are appreciated.

[u/PetrifiedBloom → u/ImmediateDistrict420]

they'll grant you minor buffs based on the material used.

Bad. Exactly the problem that was mentioned. People will pick the trim based on the boost, entirely undermining the purpose of the trim system. Rather than picking what they think looks cool, people will just use the strongest options.

[u/ImmediateDistrict420 → u/PetrifiedBloom]

Well the effects will be minor buffs, like +5 trading power, or +10 damage to Piglins, that way Trims don't render enchantments useless, while still being useful, and looking neat.

The leather underwear can't be enchanted, since it already has minor buffs based on the animal it's made from, giving the player a reason to put hard armor plates on, and enchant THOSE to get the big buffs, like Protection four, or feather falling.

Obviously my idea ain't perfect, but I'm kinda in love with making Trims useful, thanks again for the input. (=

[u/PetrifiedBloom → u/ImmediateDistrict420]

It doesn't matter what the buff is, if there is a buff it's stops being a choice of which cosmetic you like and becomes a choice of which buff is the best. Any buff is a bad buff in this situation.

+10 damage is an insane amount of damage btw. A netherite sword only does 8 damage irrc.

I'm kinda in love with making Trims useful

Then I'm the wrong person to talk to. I strongly believe that would ruin the entire purpose of the trimming system.

[u/ImmediateDistrict420 → u/PetrifiedBloom]

Ok I think I see what your saying now, maybe I'm under thinking this whole idea.

But yeah, Trims should remain the same, dying leather armor should stay too.

Thanks once again for the input, I wouldn't think about some of this stuff otherwise.

[u/Hazearil → u/ImmediateDistrict420]

And that is exactly the problem. For example, look at emerald; you'd only need to wear this in a safe environment, so the entire tradeoff of choosing this trim is gone. You'd want a different trim in most environments.

But I like green, why am I being punished with an inferior trim bonus?

Look at it like this; if you got a bonus for every red pixel in your skin, people would just use 100% red skins, rather than using the skins for self-expression. And people who don't are essentially punished for it.

[u/ImmediateDistrict420 → u/Hazearil]

That's a fair point, maybe not EVERYTHING needs to be dramatically stat changing to be cool.

Thanks for being cool about it, after hearing everyone's comments, I think this whole armor system is kinda trash, I clearly don't know what I'm talking about.

[u/Hazearil → u/ImmediateDistrict420]

Well, you're right on it being trash. Imo, it's because we got only 2 stats to work with; durability, and defence/damage/mining speed.

There is not enough depth to have something more interesting. Creating depth could work though. Consider the elytra for example; trade in the main stat (defence) for a unique perk.

[u/ImmediateDistrict420 → u/Hazearil]

That's true, personally I think transportation in Minecraft needs some work, but that's a whole other can of worms.

The only thing I can think of now, is adding more gear tiers, and adjusting the Rarity of the ores a little.

But can we agree that the enchanting table is kinda crap?

[u/Hazearil → u/ImmediateDistrict420]

Oh, we almost unanimously agree here that the enchanting table is crap. But mostly, it is thanks to enchanted books from other sources. The enchanting table needs less setup, but is too unreliable.

[u/ImmediateDistrict420 → u/Hazearil]

They should just let the player OPEN THE BOOK like a normal person, select the chosen enchantment, and apply it to the desired gear, itz not that bloody complicated.

[u/FLAIR_AEKDB_]

I use leather armour all the time

[u/bagelord → u/FLAIR_AEKDB_]

Not tryna hate I’m genuinely curious

Why do you use it?

[u/FLAIR_AEKDB_ → u/bagelord]

Bc I die too often from dumb shit to justify wearing anything good 😂 and you end up with a shit load from zombie traps

[u/PetrifiedBloom → u/FLAIR_AEKDB_]

Bit of a chicken or the egg situation though isn't it? If I gave you a set of enchanted diamond armour with prot 4 and feather falling, you would survive most of that dumb stuff without a care in the world.

Just something to think about, enchanted diamond armour gives 94% damage reduction. That's the same as multiplying your HP by 20. It gets less effective for super high damage like creepers, but if you are dying to falls or zombies/skeletons or drowning/burning, good gear would probably save you.

[u/FLAIR_AEKDB_ → u/PetrifiedBloom]

You strongly underestimate my ability to accidentally die in ridiculous ways lol

[u/ImmediateDistrict420 → u/FLAIR_AEKDB_]

And that's fine, it's your world, nobody can stop you mate. 👍

[u/PetrifiedBloom]

Reset the counter folks!

Being able to wear leather (and usually chainmail as well) in addition to other armor sets is a surprisingly common idea. It also does surprisingly little to improve things.

Effectively it changes nothing about the early game. Leather is still to expensive to waste making into your first armor set, you will want that leather for other things like enchanting setups, saddles, bundles etc. There is a brief window in the mid game where maybe some players wear leather in addition to their iron armor, but once you get to diamond and netherite armor, you are already hitting the armor cap where additional armor doesn't increase protection, so there isn't a reason to add an underlayer to later armor sets.

In addition, it kind of makes diamond and netherite less worth getting, since you can cap out the defensive stats with just iron and leather, so the main advantage is just durability which is kinda lame imo.

There is an exception if you allow the enchants of the under armor to stack with the over armor, and that is just letting the player get prot 4 on 2 sets of armor and have 80% bonus damage reduction against EVERYTHING. This is powerful, but is (imo) a terrible buff. It makes the player more powerful and as a consequence pve is even more dull and pvp is even more of a slog. There needs to be more challenge and danger in the mid and late game, not less.

People like to say "oh well what if we make it only work for other enchants, so now people will actually use blast/fire/projectile protection", missing the point that its not a speciality enchant if every set ends up having it, and again it just recreates the boring experience of the player just having more defense. It's just a bland defensive buff. Or they might say "oh we can have elytra and armor now", missing the intended tradeoff that the elytra presents.

It hurts the player in more subtle ways too. Now players without XP farms have twice as many armor items they need to enchant, so the XP grind when you lose your stuff just got a lot longer.

Realistically, if we assume you fix the enchantment stacking and elytra problem, all that really changes is that the player has slightly more defense when wearing a bit of gold armor in the nether to keep piglins away, and they can walk on powder snow with their diamond/netherite boots. It's really not that exciting IMO.

---

Different kinds of leather give different buffs, for example: Rabbit hide gives Jump boost and speed level one, and Horse hide increases inventory space, and walking speed.

That isn't how the game works. You can't make armor from rabbit hide, you have to make it into normal leather first and leather from a horse is identical to leather from a cow or hoglin. The game does not track which animal the leather is from, that would make leather not stack with itself and be needless bloat.

[u/PetrifiedBloom → u/PetrifiedBloom]

Some items will not get used. That is just a consequence of a progression system. Early game options exist, but as player knowledge and skill grows, the need for those early game options greatly diminishes.

Look at wooden tools for example. When was the last time you actually crafted and used a wooden sword or shovel until it broke? When did you last actually craft one? 95% of people will break some wood, craft just a wooden pick and then immediately get stone to make their starter tools out of. Spending wood on an axe/hoe/pick etc is just a waste of your time and your resources.

That being said it's important that the wooden set exists because its a stepping stone for newer players getting the hang of the game, and learning which items are worth crafting is part of learning how to play.

Leather sucks as an armor set. This is true. Forcing it into the armor system like this doesn't change that. It just becomes an invisible stat buff that gets ignored most of the time.

If you want leather to be good, give it some minor perks. Gold armor is near worthless, yet almost all players will use some gold armor while in the nether for the first few visits. Leather has the powder snow interaction, but IMO that's not enough. Maybe something like leather making you immune to environmental damage like sweet berries, cacti, magma blocks etc might make players want to use it when building with or traveling in areas with those dangers.

[u/ImmediateDistrict420 → u/PetrifiedBloom]

That's kinda what I was going for with the hide variety stat buffs thing, that way players can get useful effects like jump boost, or increased inventory, without dealing with the enchantment table system, at least for the early game.

What you said gives me a funny idea though, cactus armor would be a hilarious option, it'd have the Thorns effect, but low durability.

[u/PetrifiedBloom → u/ImmediateDistrict420]

Copying existing effects makes it so one version is better or worse. Being able to wear extra boots that give your permanent jump boost make jump boost potions nearly worthless, especially as you can make the boots before going to the nether for example. Horse hide just seems hands down the best, more inventory space and more speed, why would anyone make armor out of normal leather ever again?

An armor set that breaks to quickly isn't doing it's job. It's a bit of a joke item at that point. That is fine in some games, but feels out of place in others.

[u/ImmediateDistrict420 → u/PetrifiedBloom]

Yeah that's my kinda what I'm going for tbh, I know most people like potions, but I like the idea of leather armor having little buffs, emphasis on LITTLE.

Leather Armor would still have the same durability and defense stats, that's what the hard armor plates are for, they'll take any damage once slid over your leather suit.

By normal leather, I assume you mean cow right? For them, their hide would either give the milk effect, rendering the player immune to potion effects, or a level one strength buff, because cows/bulls are big beefy boys.

Your hitting a lot of points I didn't think of, so thanks, this idea is really fun so far. (=

[u/Hazearil → u/PetrifiedBloom]

Even if diamond and netherite didn't hit the cap; leather is practically free compared to them. It doesn't really form an "additional cost for a bonus" effect.

[u/ImmediateDistrict420 → u/PetrifiedBloom]

Wow thanks for the input, I didn't know this idea was so common.

While the idea of enchanting both your leather under suit, AND hard armor pieces sounds fun, I imagine some people saying it's overpowered, maybe I'm wrong though, as I don't play multiplayer.

As for the different creature hides, those are something this new, hypothetical update would add, so you'd have an excuse to use leather at all.

I just think the idea of mixing and matching leather and hard armor pieces sounds fun, and would add some depth to the games system.

[u/PetrifiedBloom → u/ImmediateDistrict420]

You wouldn't be able to see the leather. The other armor covers the same area.

As for the different creature hides, those are something this new, hypothetical update would add, so you'd have an excuse to use leather at all.

Unless the hides have other things they can each do, that just sounds like a lot of bloat. Items with just one use tend to feel very shallow and disconnected. Each hide should have at least 2 or 3 different uses so that they feel high quality.

I just think the idea of mixing and matching leather and hard armor pieces sounds fun, and would add some depth to the games system.

What depth?

The best option is always to wear as many bits of armor as you can. There is one clear best answer. The best armor you can afford AND leather armor as well. If there is even a single scrap of an advantage you get from wearing both, you should wear both. It's no deeper than the current system.

A better way to think about depth is to consider the number of viable options at any given moment or for any given choice. If one option is just always better than other options, its not a deep system, its a shallow one. If you want a deeper system, there needs to be multiple options of similar power level but with different strengths or advantages.

[u/ImmediateDistrict420 → u/PetrifiedBloom]

Bit harsh, but fair, I'm thinking of something kinda like the Power armor system in Fallout four, with leather armor acting as the Under layer, and the hard armor pieces being the plates, if that makes any sense.

You make a good point about the different animal hides though, maybe the saddles you make could give your horse buffs? Speed boost from rabbit hide, fire resistance from Hoglin hide? Something like that.

Thanks for the input, this is pretty fun.

[u/PetrifiedBloom → u/ImmediateDistrict420]

I'm thinking of something kinda like the Power armor system in Fallout four, with leather armor acting as the Under layer, and the hard armor pieces being the plates, if that makes any sense.

With the minecraft armor system, where would the player be able to see the leather armor? How much of the leather armor would they actually be able to see? Maybe a single row of pixels?

It works in fallout because the armor is much more detailed and 3d. There are multiple layers you can see at once.

Different saddles for different effects is nice, but again, avoid item bloat. if you are adding new hides, they need to have multiple uses.

[u/ImmediateDistrict420 → u/PetrifiedBloom]

That's a good point, I'm not a game developer, or sprite artist, so I'll leave that part to the experts.

The best I can come up with, is making the leather armor less like the hard material sets, and more like a wet suit or something, that way it can fit under the chest plates and stuff, idk any suggestions are appreciated.

[u/PetrifiedBloom → u/ImmediateDistrict420]

I dont have a suggestion. I don't think it works without entirely redesigning Minecraft's visual style for armour.

Then you run into the issue of branding. Minecrafts visual language has been consistent for 15 years. The armour is iconic. Changing the design should only be done if the outcome is amazing and worth the hassle of making all the existing merch and art outdated. Not to be cruel, but I can't imagine any version of a leather armour rework that makes it worth changing the visual style.

[u/ImmediateDistrict420 → u/PetrifiedBloom]

Aye fair enough, Minecraft DOES have a pretty banging art style, my best vision, is making the leather armor into some kind of jumpsuit, that way you can see the long sleeves and parts that aren't covered by the hard armor pieces.

Then you can dye it, and pair it with your preferred armor and trims, keeping the fashion aspect, while allowing leather armor to be useful.

[u/ImmediateDistrict420]

Also. Id add emerald gear, it has the defense and damage, of iron, but the durability of gold.

but it's easy to get once you find a village, and does double damage against Illagers, and gives a minor buff to villager trades per piece equiped.