In Minecraft, shields can be crafted with little outlay of materials. In addition, you can quickly locate the things you actually require. Since a Shield can protect you from harm, there aren’t many valid arguments against creating one.
Components of a Protective Barrier
You will need six wood planks and one iron ingot to make a shield. The Iron Ingot should be positioned in the middle of the top shelf of a workbench. Then, besides the bottom left and right slots, fill up the rest of the board with Wood Planks.
A Shield can be constructed from any variety of wood planks, or even from many distinct kinds used together. The Shield’s aesthetic is unaffected by the variation in Wood Plank hue.
Making a Decorative Shield (Java Edition-only)
You can construct a Shield with more variety of colour by combining it with a Banner of any hue in a crafting grid. Placing a Shield adjacent to a Banner in a crafting grid will yield a Shield with the same front colour as the Banner.
Acquisition of a Shield via Barter with Locals
A Villager Armorer at the Journeyman level will sell you a Shield for 5 Emeralds if you’re lucky enough to find one. These odds hover around 33% in the Bedrock Edition and 40% in the Java Edition.
A Guide to Using a Shield
Put your Shield in the appropriate place in your inventory to use it. This space is located in your inventory right next to your character’s feet, across from where you keep their boots. Putting your Shield in this slot will cause it to materialise in your left hand.
The right hand can still be used to access the hotbar and use things. The Shield will now be in your line of sight, albeit you can remove it from your Shield slot to disequip it. Shields can only be used for defence if they are equipped in the appropriate slot.
If this is the case, you can use it to strengthen your Shield and fend off any attacks. What button or key your left hand needs to press to use the item in your right hand changes based on the system you’re using to play.
When used, your Shield will deflect any frontal assaults, such as explosions. Furthermore, it will deflect arrows slightly, meaning that even projectiles that bounce off of a raised Shield can cause damage to surrounding targets.
Even the damage done by fiery missiles and the knockback from melee assaults are both nullified by a raised Shield. But a Shield isn’t impenetrable, and its strength will dwindle with use.
Concerning the Stability of the Shield
Your Shield’s durability will decrease by a little amount if you’ve blocked an attack that would have dealt more than 1.5 Hearts in damage to you. As a rule of thumb, the amount of durability reduced is equal to the attack’s full damage minus 1.5.
The total durability of a Shield is 336, so a brand new one should last you quite some time. However, there are simple ways to fix a damaged Shield.
To Mend Shields, or How to
To be as effective as possible, you should construct two Shields. Once the first one reaches about half of its life, the other one should be used instead. When the second one reaches the same level of wear, you can merge them into a single, considerably stronger Shield.
Using any form of crafting grid, you can combine Shields in this way by just placing them next to one other. You can also use wood planks or another shield to fix a damaged shield by setting it on an anvil. The consumable used to fix the Shield must be considered.
