Spartan Shields

Overview

Spartan Shields adds a full tier progression to Minecraft's shield system. Instead of jumping straight from nothing to a single vanilla Shield, you now craft shields from Wood, Stone, Iron, Gold, Diamond, and Obsidian, each with different durability values and special properties. Every shield also comes in a Tower Shield variant that lets you apply Banners for customization.

Beyond vanilla materials, the mod automatically detects other installed mods and unlocks additional shields made from Copper, Tin, Bronze, Steel, Silver, Platinum, and many more. If you run Thermal Foundation, Botania, Ender IO, RFTools, or Redstone Arsenal, you get access to shields with powerful special effects like inflicting Weakness on attackers or regenerating durability from Mana. The mod also introduces the Spikes enchantment and supports enchanting shields at an Enchanting Table, something vanilla Minecraft does not allow.

You can browse all 56 items this mod adds using the Items tab above, and check the Recipes tab for crafting details.

Vanilla Material Shields

The core shield set uses vanilla Minecraft materials and is always available regardless of what other mods you have installed. These form the backbone of your defensive progression from the moment you punch your first tree.

The Crude Wooden Shield (104 durability) is your starter option, crafted from Planks and a Stick. Upgrade it with Cobblestone to get the Stone Braced Shield (230 durability), then with Iron Ingots for the Iron Plated Shield (538 durability). The Gold Gilded Shield is a sidegrade at only 192 durability, but has higher enchantability, making it useful for getting better enchantments at an Enchanting Table.

The Diamond Reinforced Shield is the top-tier vanilla option at a massive 2,560 durability. The Bulky Obsidian Shield occupies a unique niche with 1,600 durability plus +0.5 Knockback Resistance when equipped, but at the cost of a 30% movement speed reduction. It is ideal for holding a choke point but terrible for mobile combat.

Tower Shield Variants

Every shield material also has a Tower Shield version. Tower Shields function identically to their standard counterparts but can have Banners applied to them, letting you customize their appearance. If you want to fly your faction's colors or just add some flair, the Tower Shield is the way to go.

Modded Material Shields

One of Spartan Shields' best features is its automatic compatibility with other mods. If another mod adds an ingot registered in the OreDictionary, Spartan Shields can use it to create a shield. All modded shields follow the same crafting pattern as vanilla upgrades: 4 ingots around a Crude Wooden Shield.

Common Modded Materials

These shields activate when any mod provides the corresponding OreDictionary ingot. Mods like Thermal Foundation, Immersive Engineering, or Tinkers' Construct commonly provide these materials. The Copper Braced Shield (400 durability) and Tin Braced Shield (320 durability) offer early-to-mid game alternatives. Bronze Plated (680 durability) and Steel Plated (800 durability) shields sit solidly in the mid-game range, both surpassing Iron.

The Silver Gilded Shield (216 durability) has low durability but a unique special effect: it deals 2 damage to undead mobs that hit you while blocking. This makes it situationally powerful against Zombies, Skeletons, and Wither Skeletons despite its fragility.

Nickel Braced (420 durability), Lead Plated (480 durability), Invar Plated (720 durability), and Electrum Plated (320 durability) shields fill out the mid-tier range. Platinum Plated (1,536 durability) is a strong late-game choice if you have access to Platinum from mods like Thermal Foundation.

Thermal Foundation Shields

If you have Thermal Foundation (or Thermal Expansion) installed, three additional shields with powerful on-block debuff effects become available. These are some of the most tactically interesting shields in the mod.

The Signalum Strengthened Shield (2,048 durability) inflicts Weakness II on any mob that hits you while blocking, lasting 5 seconds. This effectively reduces the damage output of melee attackers, making it an outstanding defensive tool for sustained fights.

The Radiant Lumium Shield (1,280 durability) inflicts Glowing on attackers for 10 seconds. While less directly useful in survival, this is excellent for PvP or for tracking mobs that hit you and then run away.

The Enderium Strengthened Shield (3,120 durability) is the second most durable shield in the entire mod, surpassed only by Diamond. It inflicts Slowness II for 5 seconds on attackers, making it nearly impossible for melee mobs to pursue you after hitting your block. Combined with its massive durability, this is one of the best all-around shields available.

Botania Shields

With Botania installed, three magical shields become available. All Botania shields share a unique property: they regenerate durability over time by consuming Mana from your inventory (at a rate of 60 Mana per damage point). This means they effectively have unlimited durability as long as you keep a Mana supply on hand.

The Manasteel Plated Shield (450 durability) is the entry point, requiring Manasteel Ingots. The Elementium Plated Shield (1,080 durability) is crafted from Elementium and implements the Pixie Spawner interface, giving blocked attacks a chance to summon a retaliatory Pixie. The Terrasteel Strengthened Shield (2,920 durability) is the ultimate Botania shield, requiring Terrasteel, one of Botania's most expensive materials. All three shields have entries in the Lexica Botania.

RF/FE Powered Shields

Three shields run on Redstone Flux (RF) or Forge Energy (FE) instead of traditional durability. Each has a capacity of 1,000,000 RF and accepts up to 2,048 RF/t when charging. Instead of losing durability, these shields consume 50 RF per point of damage absorbed. When their energy runs out, they cannot block at all.

The Dark Steel Riot Shield requires Ender IO. The Infused Riot Shield requires RFTools and is crafted using a Machine Base, Shield Projector, Power Cell, Infused Diamonds, and Shield Templates. The Flux-Infused Shield requires Redstone Arsenal and uses Flux Plates and an Obsidian Stick in its recipe. These shields cannot be enchanted at an Enchanting Table, but they never break as long as you keep them charged.

Enchantments

Unlike the vanilla Shield, Spartan Shields can be enchanted directly on an Enchanting Table. The mod supports Unbreaking (up to level III) and Knockback from vanilla enchantments, plus its own unique enchantment: Spikes.

Spikes Enchantment

Spikes is essentially Thorns for shields, with a maximum level of 3. Each level gives a 20% chance to deal reflected damage when a mob hits your shield while blocking. At Spikes I, reflected hits deal 2 damage. At higher levels, damage is 2 plus a random bonus up to (level - 1), so Spikes III can deal 2 to 4 damage per proc. The enchantment does wear down the shield faster: a successful proc costs 9 durability, while a non-proc still costs 3 durability. Spikes III can only be obtained by combining two Spikes II books on an Anvil, similar to how Thorns III works.

Mending also works on Spartan Shields, letting you repair them with experience orbs. If you have Ender IO installed, the Soulbound enchantment can be applied as well, letting you keep your shield through death.

Crafting Patterns

All shields in the mod follow one of two crafting patterns. The Crude Wooden Shield uses a diagonal cross of Planks with a Stick in the center. Every other shield upgrade uses a plus-shaped pattern: the target material in the top, left, right, and bottom slots with an undamaged Crude Wooden Shield in the center.

Tower Shield variants follow the same pattern but use six of the material instead of four (in version 3.x). Each shield can be repaired on an Anvil using its corresponding material. For modded shields, the OreDictionary determines which items count as valid repair materials, so any mod's Copper Ingot can repair a Copper Braced Shield.

Configuration

Spartan Shields offers extensive configuration through four categories: vanilla, moddedCommon, moddedThermal, and moddedPowered. Every shield's durability can be individually tweaked from 1 to 100,000. If you find the Diamond Reinforced Shield too powerful at 2,560 durability or the Gold Gilded Shield too weak at 192, you can change these values to suit your playstyle.

Each modded shield can also be individually enabled or disabled. If you want only vanilla material shields, set the "vanillaOnly" option to true, which completely removes all mod-based shields from the game (they won't even appear in JEI). The RF/FE multiplier settings control how much energy powered shields consume per damage point, defaulting to 50 each.

Full Durability Rankings

Here is every shield ranked from highest to lowest durability, combining both vanilla and modded options. This gives you a clear picture of progression from early game to endgame defensive options.