Common 1.9 Misconceptions/Lesser Known Features

[Power Ranger]

This thread will go over some very common 1.9 misconceptions that are shared among a lot of people I have seen across various servers.



Armor

Armor was completely changed in 1.9. Durability is now taken based on how much damageis dealt so a crit with a sword can possibly do 3 armor damage while a punch will only deal 1 armor damage. This may be a reason to go for crits instead of spam clicking in op modes as it can break armor faster (especially with the added protection enchantment which may take the armor take 6 damage per crit) Also armor protection is based off damage taken meaning that a diamond sword will deal an unproportionate amount of damage to a full iron armor person compared to a wood sword (so better weapons are even better than their downgraded versions in 1.9) This is also a reason to go for crits against highly armored opponents.

Axes

"Axes are better than swords"
"Axes have less dps than swords"
"You cant combo with an axe"
"Spam your axe to stop an opponent's shield"

These I hear a lot from pretty much everywhere. Technically all of these are wrong. The first one is just preference based on fighting style (usually defensive players might use an axe rather than a sword). The second one is correct under normal circumstances but as said above against a highly armored opponent and axe will have a greater dps and with perfect crits axes have a greater dps. Obviously you can combo with an axe you just cant wait for cooldown which removes many of the benefits of an axe so I wouldn't recommend it. The last one is completely wrong as you need to sprint into a blocking target to cause a crushing blow (look in the shields section for more information on why its wrong)

Combos
"You can't combo in 1.9"

This is just really annoying for me I pull a combo off very commonly its just a lot harder to keep a combo up in 1.9 past 3 or 4 hits.

Shields
"Axes are good against shields"
"Shields are op"

Ok so shields are the most buggy thing in the game. They do not deflect fire arrows completely, and sometimes dont even remove knockback from punch arrows (usually when jumping and blocking only). Remember how I mentioned the crushing blow? Well this is the most backwards feature in the game! Sprint into a blocking enemy and hit them with an axe to cause a "Shield Glitch" which will cause the opponent to constantly block while still having full movement meaning they can still attack but will block damage/have reduced knockback and completely block arrows. This glitch will usually stay until the player eats/removes the shield from the offhand. Shields are the worst items in the game for melee combat as you will just be taking more damage then you deal in the end against a player with an average skill level because shields have a delay before they will actually block damage which means quickly blocking and swinging won't work at all. Shields should only be used against arrows/explosions and if you want to be that person, axes.

Cooldown
"The cooldown is so long!"
"Spam clicking ends up dealing more damage"

First off the cooldown is not long for swords being a little over half a second. In 1.8 i got around pretty well with 8 cps which is not a huge increase to 2 cps in 1.9 (also much better for my mouse) I will agree if you are using a stone/wood axe though that the cooldown is long (too long imo). About spam clicking... against an unarmored opponent with a stone axe+ spam clicking will deal about 1.5-2 hearts per hit which is pretty good damage wise but there are "invincibility frames" in minecraft. Maybe someone who is a bit more into 1.8 pvp might know the exact time but I believe it is somewhere around 0.3 seconds which is why you don't need to jitter in 1.8 to win and why you will end up dealing less damage spam clicking overall. So a couple secrets about the cooldown :P It affects knockback so the longer you wait for the cooldown the more knockback you will deal (especially apparent with kb items), your fist has a cooldown and will deal less damage if you jitter. Waiting for 50%+ of the cooldown will still deal a decent amount of damage (this is how most pvpers combo in 1.9 not waiting for cooldown) and Criticals may only need 80% of the cooldown to work (dont quote me on that :P )

Offhanding

Not really a misconception but a lot of people dont seem to realize that you can offhand any item you right click and use it well. This includes: food, snowballs, eggs, blocks, leads, carrots on sticks, nametags, spawn eggs, flint and steel, buckets, bows, shears, hoes, written books, shields, breeding/taming items, and potions. The ONLY exception to this is fishing rods which don't currently work in the offhand but will in 1.11. Also try dual wielding bows and see how it looks :P

Bows/Arrows
"Instant Damage arrows are op"
"Bows were unchanged"

Instant Damage/Health arrows do not currently work in 1.9/1.10 (fixed in 1.11). Some people have told me that bows have reduced range in 1.9 but I don't believe it that much. Bows were technically given a damage buff due too the new way armor works (above). There isn't much to say about bows as said above fire arrows go through shields while everything else is blocked completely.

Some small things

Mining fatigue/haste have very little noticeable effect on the cooldown except with mining fatigue for axes and haste for hoes.
Strength's damage buff is affected by cooldown so the best thing to use with str II may be your fist.
Fishing rods do in fact pull players in vanilla 1.9+ just cubecraft is broken.

That's it for now if I think of some more I'll add them.
Thanks for reading :D

 

[Spyridon Agnew Dragon]

This thread will go over some very common 1.9 misconceptions that are shared among a lot of people I have seen across various servers.



Armor

Armor was completely changed in 1.9. Durability is now taken based on how much damageis dealt so a crit with a sword can possibly do 3 armor damage while a punch will only deal 1 armor damage. This may be a reason to go for crits instead of spam clicking in op modes as it can break armor faster (especially with the added protection enchantment which may take the armor take 6 damage per crit) Also armor protection is based off damage taken meaning that a diamond sword will deal an unproportionate amount of damage to a full iron armor person compared to a wood sword (so better weapons are even better than their downgraded versions in 1.9) This is also a reason to go for crits against highly armored opponents.

Axes

"Axes are better than swords"
"Axes have less dps than swords"
"You cant combo with an axe"
"Spam your axe to stop an opponent's shield"

These I hear a lot from pretty much everywhere. Technically all of these are wrong. The first one is just preference based on fighting style (usually defensive players might use an axe rather than a sword). The second one is correct under normal circumstances but as said above against a highly armored opponent and axe will have a greater dps and with perfect crits axes have a greater dps. Obviously you can combo with an axe you just cant wait for cooldown which removes many of the benefits of an axe so I wouldn't recommend it. The last one is completely wrong as you need to sprint into a blocking target to cause a crushing blow (look in the shields section for more information on why its wrong)

Combos
"You can't combo in 1.9"

This is just really annoying for me I pull a combo off very commonly its just a lot harder to keep a combo up in 1.9 past 3 or 4 hits.

Shields
"Axes are good against shields"
"Shields are op"

Ok so shields are the most buggy thing in the game. They do not deflect fire arrows completely, and sometimes dont even remove knockback from punch arrows (usually when jumping and blocking only). Remember how I mentioned the crushing blow? Well this is the most backwards feature in the game! Sprint into a blocking enemy and hit them with an axe to cause a "Shield Glitch" which will cause the opponent to constantly block while still having full movement meaning they can still attack but will block damage/have reduced knockback and completely block arrows. This glitch will usually stay until the player eats/removes the shield from the offhand. Shields are the worst items in the game for melee combat as you will just be taking more damage then you deal in the end against a player with an average skill level. Shields should only be used against arrows/explosions and if you want to be that person, axes.

Cooldown
"The cooldown is so long!"
"Spam clicking ends up dealing more damage"

First off the cooldown is not long for swords being a little over half a second. In 1.8 i got around pretty well with 8 cps which is not a huge increase to 2 cps in 1.9 (also much better for my mouse) I will agree if you are using a stone/wood axe though that the cooldown is long (too long imo). About spam clicking... against an unarmored opponent with a stone axe+ spam clicking will deal about 1.5-2 hearts per hit which is pretty good damage wise but there are "invincibility frames" in minecraft. Maybe someone who is a bit more into 1.8 pvp might know the exact time but I believe it is somewhere around 0.3 seconds which is why you don't need to jitter in 1.8 to win and why you will end up dealing less damage spam clicking overall. So a couple secrets about the cooldown :p It affects knockback so the longer you wait for the cooldown the more knockback you will deal (especially apparent with kb items), your fist has a cooldown and will deal less damage if you jitter. Waiting for 50%+ of the cooldown will still deal a decent amount of damage (this is how most pvpers combo in 1.9 not waiting for cooldown) and Criticals may only need 80% of the cooldown to work (dont quote me on that :p )

Offhanding

Not really a misconception but a lot of people dont seem to realize that you can offhand any item you right click and use it well. This includes: food, snowballs, eggs, blocks, leads, carrots on sticks, nametags, spawn eggs, flint and steel, buckets, bows, shears, hoes, written books, shields, breeding/taming items, and potions. The ONLY exception to this is fishing rods which don't currently work in the offhand but will in 1.11. Also try dual wielding bows and see how it looks :p

Bows/Arrows
"Instant Damage arrows are op"
"Bows were unchanged"

Instant Damage/Health arrows do not currently work in 1.9/1.10 (fixed in 1.11). Some people have told me that bows have reduced range in 1.9 but I don't believe it that much. Bows were technically given a damage buff due too the new way armor works (above). There isn't much to say about bows as said above fire arrows go through shields while everything else is blocked completely.

Some small things

Mining fatigue/haste have very little noticeable effect on the cooldown except with mining fatigue for axes and haste for hoes.
Strength's damage buff is affected by cooldown so the best thing to use with str II may be your fist.
Fishing rods do in fact pull players in vanilla 1.9+ just cubecraft is broken.

That's it for now if I think of some more I'll add them.
Thanks for reading :D

First of all ive won a fight of crits vs spam it works with pickaxes as they virtually have no cooldown ( i spammed he critted) and second shields have a timer they dont work if you put them up at the last second, however in 1.11 they are getting buffed you will take no melee damage or knockback (killing the strat of fisting someone off a bridge with their shield up) from the changes you are invulnerable from the front or the sides you can only be hit from the rear, i also heard mojang might reintroduce the original armor plan for 1.9, which was debuffing armor durability and as well as lowering all armors protection stats, (diamond armor would barely last longer than gold basically) also i would avoid playing in 1.9 or 1.10 around lillypads they are currently broken and you will get stuck in them

 

[Power Ranger]

First of all ive won a fight of crits vs spam it works with pickaxes as they virtually have no cooldown ( i spammed he critted) and second shields have a timer they dont work if you put them up at the last second, however in 1.11 they are getting buffed you will take no melee damage or knockback (killing the strat of fisting someone off a bridge with their shield up) from the changes you are invulnerable from the front or the sides you can only be hit from the rear, i also heard mojang might reintroduce the original armor plan for 1.9, which was debuffing armor durability and as well as lowering all armors protection stats, (diamond armor would barely last longer than gold basically) also i would avoid playing in 1.9 or 1.10 around lillypads they are currently broken and you will get stuck in them

pickaxes have a pretty long cooldown... but im still not sure of how long you have to wait for crits as sometimes spamming and trying to crit just results in fake crits for me where it shows the particles but doesn't play the sound. I should probably include the shield delay in here but I didn't include the 1.11 shield change as I think it is going to be changed. The original plan for armor was not liked at all and didnt make all that much sense (diamond being the same as iron) so I doubt they will change the current system. I didn't know about the lilypads thing though I'll have to test that out hasn't happened to me before :P

 

[betty's oldies]

Few notes:

-A fire sword, lava, or FnS can act as a soft counter to the shield. Why? The extra fire damage will force them to either stop blocking to put themselves out or continue taking additional damage from the fire if they continue to block your melee hits. Blocking reduces your mobility considerably, making you an OPEN, EASY target. Someone can out-strafe you (similar to out-strafing a sentry gun in TF2 as Scout) and you're out. You also do not take reduced damage to lava/fire placed on your feet.
-Damage reduction based on cooldown is NOT linear; rather, it is quadratic. For example, you would expect that at 50% cooldown, you deal 50% damage. Nope! For a sword, attacking at 50% cooldown (approx. 0.3 seconds) deals a bit over 40% of your weapon damage. Same goes for axe.
-Using an item in your offhand (e.g. eating food from your off-hand instead of your hotbar) is slightly faster than using it in your hotbar. Why? It takes a few split-seconds to switch to your hotbar, but this is skipped if it's in the off-hand. This also means you have to wait for your sword to reload when you switch back compared to using the off-hand. Care should be taken if the off-hand item is lava, FnS, or water though.
-In short fights, mining fatigue and haste don't do much at level 1, but over time, the 10% makes a huge difference in DPS. At level 2 and up, it adds up a lot more.
-Bow range was not changed, but accuracy was however. Accuracy is based on the shooter's motion. Is he taking knockback from enemy attacks? Is he moving quickly? Fast movements and knockback greatly affect accuracy, but strafing won't affect it that much.
-Axes have a 25% chance of disabling a shield. Each level of efficiency adds +5% (e.g. efficiency 1 gives the axe a 30% chance). This is guaranteed if sprinting.
-The invincibility frame lasts for 0.5 seconds.
-Damage does not affect cooldown. "Shoving" your opponent by spamclicking will produce the same knockback as a fully charged hit.
-Your attack range in vanilla is actually 4.7 blocks. The reason it's 5 against someone on higher ground is because your range overlaps with the bottom part of his hitbox. Your attack range starts from around your head level to where you're aiming. I may be wrong about the 2nd part.

I'd like to add some misconceptions.

"1.9 is all about trading hits."
-You explained this under the combos section. Sometimes, the enemy may miss the hit, allowing you land another hit when he loses control over his character from the first attack.

"Fully charged regular bows always deal 9 damage per arrow."
-There's actually a form of damage falloff for bows in MC. Arrow damage is based on speed of the arrow at the instance it hits its target. There's drag that affects this speed. A fully charged critical regular bow can actually deal up to 12 damage because of this. At minimum, a fully charged shot can deal 5 damage (if the arrow isn't falling during its trajectory when it hits a target).

Test video was taken in a singleplayer test world showing how it can deal more than 10 damage on a critical hit.

 

[Power Ranger]

I forgot completely about the accuracy change even tho I complain about it so much when shooting on slabs :P
Also @hypertimeBravo I would reccomend looking at my shields section to see what axes really do to shields. :P I'll get around to adding some of the rings you said when I have the time :D

 

[LooksLikeHacks]

Nice to know. Thanks

 

[betty's oldies]

I forgot completely about the accuracy change even tho I complain about it so much when shooting on slabs :p
Also @hypertimeBravo I would reccomend looking at my shields section to see what axes really do to shields. :p I'll get around to adding some of the rings you said when I have the time :D

I actually read it and used shields before.

By the way, bow shots spread the farther they fly. Let's say I aim at one location. If I fire at a certain angle and at full charge without changing anything, then the arrows will not land at that one point - similar to bullet spread from CS:GO/TF2.

 

[TeamaxX3]

1.9 is a shit bitch

 

[betty's oldies]

1.9 is a shit bitch

Don't swear please. Why comment about hating 1.9 on a 1.9 server? There's a 1.8 thread on the "news" section.

My guess is you hate the cooldown. Other than that and a couple things, almost NOTHING changed in 1.9 PvP.

 

[TeamaxX3]

Don't swear please. Why comment about hating 1.9 on a 1.9 server? There's a 1.8 thread on the "news" section.

My guess is you hate the cooldown. Other than that and a couple things, almost NOTHING changed in 1.9 PvP.

por eso

 

[Rinbunri]

Ooo that awesome introduction to 1.9 tho.

 

[betty's oldies]

por eso

So it is because of the cooldown. Why stick to 1.8? Years from now people will eventually get bored of it and move to later versions. It's like saying someone likes playing MC beta right now because "hunger and enchants didn't ruin MC," yet so many play 1.8+ nowadays.

To @POWER_RANGER: The 25% chance comes from the wiki. It's not a reliable way to disable shields though.

Even if you were to have the axes and the swords have the same effects (e.g. both have the same strength, crit or no crit, and sharpness), the sword will still deal more damage over time. While it won't do as much damage per hit against armor, the fast attack speed makes up for this. Pair it with fire aspect and it will bypass more armor over time.

You are right that in some cases axes are better, but as a general rule and with the right setup/tactics, the sword will kill the target faster.