Sentient Armor

The armor worn by a Vitaemancer is no inert collection of plates. Bound through the Ritual of Binding described on the Hellfire Forge and Sentient Equipment page, Sentient Armor breathes, learns, and grows alongside its wearer. Each piece begins equivalent to iron in its protection but carries 100 Upgrade Points that it spends as you teach it new skills.

The armor is alive, and it watches everything you do. Be deliberate in what you teach it. Hold sneak while examining a piece to see what it has learned so far.

Specialisation

The armor grows in many directions at once, but its capacity is finite. Trying to master everything yields mastery of nothing. Consider forging multiple chestplates, each trained for a specific purpose, such as a miner's set, a warrior's set, or an explorer's set. The Vitaemancer has devised Rituals to assist with focused training, and the Ritual of Sentient Evolution to imbue your armor with a greater capacity for growth. Stand upon the Master Ritual Stone while clad in Sentient Armor, and the circle pours its power into the symbiotic plates. Each evolution adds 100 Upgrade Points of capacity, up to a maximum of 500 after four evolutions; the ritual deactivates after each one, and tells you when the armor can evolve no further.

Upgrade Tomes

Upgrade Tomes are crystallised records of a particular skill, each carrying the experience needed to inscribe one or more levels of its upgrade onto a chestplate. They come from three places:

• Dungeon loot. Tomes are scattered through the loot tables of The Mines (ore chambers, the Smithy) and the Foreman's hoard.
• Sentient Extraction. Throw an already-trained piece of Sentient Armor onto the small zone above this ritual's Master Ritual Stone and it will extract every upgrade currently inscribed on the armor as a separate Tome, preserving the accumulated experience. The armor itself is left stripped but intact. See Rituals.
• Combining duplicates. Two tomes of the same upgrade can be merged at a vanilla crafting table to consolidate their experience.

Press [Use] while holding a tome to inscribe one level of that skill onto your worn chestplate, assuming sufficient Upgrade Points remain. Hold sneak and [Use] to inscribe as much as possible at once. The tome is consumed in the process, transferring its stored experience to the chestplate. If insufficient points remain, the tome applies what it can and retains the rest; unless less than one level's worth remains, in which case the tome crumbles to nothing.

Tomes are the key to deliberate specialisation; focus your training on the abilities that serve you best and discard the rest. Maintain separate chestplates for different purposes, each with its own set of tomes.

Training Bracelet

To impose order on the armor's undirected growth, the Vitaemancer wears the Training Bracelet, a focus inscribed in an Alchemy Array. With a copy of the relevant Tome in hand, you can set a level cap for any upgrade; once the armor reaches that limit it ceases training the skill. Only one bracelet is active at a time (priority: off-hand, Curios, main inventory, then add-ons). To allow all upgrades except one, set the bracelet to 'allow others' mode and cap the unwanted skill at level 0.

Upgrades

Most upgrades are trained by performing the matching activity while wearing the chestplate; every time you do, the armor banks experience toward the next level. How much it banks depends on the upgrade:

• Proportional upgrades bank experience equal to the magnitude of the event: the damage taken or dealt, the health restored, the experience collected, or the distance moved. Bigger events teach the armor faster.
• Per-event upgrades bank a flat point each time: one per block mined, or one per tick spent on fire or poisoned.

A few upgrades (Brilliance, Curios Sockets, Elytra, Gilded, Skilled) are not trained through activity at all; they are inscribed onto an Upgrade Tome and then applied to the armor. Brilliance is crafted in the Tabula Vitae; the others are found as tomes in dungeon loot. Each upgrade levels up at its own experience thresholds. The Trained by column gives the exact trigger.

Upgrade	Effect	Trained by
Body Builder	Anchored stance that resists being thrown; greatly bolsters vitality.	Eating food: experience equal to the food points restored when you eat.
Brilliance	Inscribe knowledge upon tomes and the armor crystallises into diamond-like hardness.	Inscribe a Brilliance Tome in the Tabula Vitae (diamond, written book, netherite ingot, shulker shell; Master orb, 10,000 EV), then apply it. Each tome grants one level, to a maximum of four.
Charging Strike	Your momentum becomes a weapon; the faster you charge, the harder you strike.	Dealing damage while sprinting: experience equal to the damage dealt.
Curios Sockets (Socketed)	The armor grows sockets to hold your vitaemantic trinkets.	Applied from a tome found in the Foreman's hoard; not trained.
Dwarven Might	The deeper you dig, the faster the armor drives your arms.	Breaking blocks: one point per block.
Elytra	Wings of living tissue unfurl from the chestplate; take to the sky.	Applied from a tome found in the Foreman's hoard; not trained.
Experienced	The armor draws deeper knowledge from each fallen foe.	Collecting experience: points equal to the orb value picked up.
Fierce Strike	Each blow teaches the armor to sharpen the next.	Dealing damage: experience equal to the damage dealt.
Gift of Ignis	The armor remembers the flame and learns to refuse it.	One point per tick spent on fire.
Gilded	A golden sheen earns the Piglins' grudging respect.	Applied from a tome found in the Foreman's hoard; not trained.
Healthy	Greatly increases the punishment your body can endure.	Restoring health (regeneration, potions, vitaemantic healing): experience equal to the health restored.
Pin Cushion	Every arrow absorbed teaches the armor to turn the next aside.	Taking projectile damage: experience equal to the damage taken.
Poison Resistance	The armor learns to purge venom from your blood.	One point per tick you are poisoned.
Quick Feet	The armor quickens your step with every mile traveled.	Distance moved on the ground: experience equal to the blocks travelled.
Repair	The armor knits its own wounds shut, slowly restoring worn equipment.	Durability restored to the chestplate: points equal to the durability mended.
Skilled	Increases the Luck attribute by 2 per level (up to +10), improving loot rolls.	Applied from a tome found in the loot of The Mines; not trained.
Soft Fall	The armor absorbs impact; the ground softens beneath you.	Taking fall damage: experience equal to the damage taken.
Strong Legs	The armor coils like a spring; launch yourself skyward.	Rising through the air (jumping/launching): experience equal to the height gained.
Tough	Hardens against melee, explosions, and all close-range violence.	Taking non-projectile damage: experience equal to the damage taken.
Tough Palms	Calloused hands yield more Essentia Vitae with each sacrifice.	Taking self-sacrifice damage (dagger or altar): experience equal to the damage taken.

Downgrades

Every upgrade has a shadow. Downgrades are deliberate curses that hobble you in one respect and carry a negative point cost, freeing Upgrade Points to reinvest elsewhere; a chestplate burdened with the right curses can hold upgrades beyond its normal capacity.

Downgrades are imposed by the Ritual of Sentient Penance (see Rituals): stand on the Master Ritual Stone wearing your Sentient chestplate and throw the matching catalyst item onto the stone. Each catalyst consumed inscribes one level of its curse. To lift a curse, run the chestplate through Sentient Extraction; the downgrade comes back as a tome along with your upgrades.

Downgrade	Effect	Catalyst
Battle Hungry	The armor craves combat; starve it of violence, and it starves you.	Rotten Flesh
Concrete Shoes	The armor drags you down; water becomes a grave.	Water Bucket
Crippled Arm	The armor locks your off-hand; one arm must suffice.	Shield
Diseased	The armor festers, choking your body's ability to heal.	Ghast Tear
Dulled Blade	The armor bleeds your strength; every strike lands softer.	Stone Sword
Hollow Hunger	The armor feeds on you without pause; your hunger drains faster at all times.	Hollow Gut
Leadened Pick	The armor drags at your arms; mining becomes a crawl.	Stone Pickaxe
Limp Leg	The armor hobbles your stride; each step heavier than the last.	Soul Sand
Poisoned Blood	The armor's tissue turns venomous, periodically poisoning you.	Venomgland Sac
Quenched	The armor seals your throat; no potion shall pass your lips.	Glass Bottle
Storm Trooper	The armor ruins your aim; every shot goes astray.	Arrow

Caretaking

Sentient Equipment rivals Diamond in resilience and is repaired in an anvil with additional Binding Reagent (brewed in the Tabula Vitae). The armor is also highly receptive to enchantment. To strip all upgrades and recover their points, use the Tabula Rasa ritual.

See also: Hellfire Forge and Sentient Equipment (how the binding is performed), Sigils (the Training Bracelet that directs growth), Rituals (Sentient Evolution, Sentient Penance, Sentient Extraction, Tabula Rasa), Alchemy Arrays (where binding and bracelet are inscribed).