COLORED CARPET

This is the one Shepherd trade where you do not pick a color. A Shepherd at apprentice hands over 4 carpet in whatever shade his stock rolled, for 1 emerald, and no amount of asking changes what comes out.

That randomness is exactly what makes it worth buying rather than crafting: two wool and matching dye gets you a known color every time, but this trade gets you carpet for less effort whenever the color does not matter, floor filler for a build where texture beats hue.

Colored Carpet is pure decoration. It has no crafting recipe leading anywhere else and no use beyond changing how a floor looks, unlike wool, which also stuffs beds and crafts into banners.

One profession sells it. Visit a Shepherd once he reaches apprentice, and 1 emerald buys 4 carpet, a fixed rate rather than a rolled one, so a second shepherd at the same tier quotes exactly the same.

Colored Carpet sells for as little as 1 emerald for 4 at a time, from the Shepherd at the Apprentice tier, and nothing else on the list costs less. The price is fixed rather than rolled, so a second Shepherd will quote you exactly the same.

The Shepherd at its apprentice tier asks 1 emerald for 4 colored carpet. 8 of the 72 villagers that pay emeralds, emptied out:

an acacia boat against 26 flint for the same 1 emerald, 26 times the carrying, and the shortest wait is the Butcher at 37.5 real seconds of shelf, gathering not counted.

A loom next to an unemployed villager makes him a shepherd, but this offer does not appear right away. It sits at apprentice, one tier past where he starts, so a freshly employed shepherd needs to trade his way up before carpet shows up at all.

Once it does, the slot sells 16 loads before it locks, and restocking brings the same fixed price back rather than a new roll, colored carpet included every time.

16 loads close the slot, and the loom needs 2 real minutes to refill it. A Minecraft day runs 20 real minutes, long enough for two of those refills to land while you are still standing there.

A full day of buying pulls 128 carpet out of one shepherd across 32 trades, more flooring than most single rooms will use even in an assorted, un-sorted color mix.

Sort after buying, not before. Since the color is random, the efficient way to gather a matched set is to buy in bulk and separate the colors once they are in the chest, rather than trying to steer any single purchase.

Fund the trip with any dye if you have spare dye lying around: the same Shepherd buys it back at 12 per emerald, which covers the carpet purchase without needing outside emeralds.

Also on the Shepherd's list: bed, banner, painting, white wool, brown wool, and black wool, the rest of what one loom can put on offer.

Two wool make three carpets, so covering a floor in carpet costs a third less than covering it in wool and looks the same from above. Carpet is also thin enough to walk over without a step, which is why stairs and doorways use it.

Two tricks keep it in every builder's chest: carpet on a fence stops mobs jumping over while letting you walk through, and llamas wear it, which is the only way to decorate one. Mobs do not spawn on carpet laid over a spawnable block, so it doubles as cheap lighting-free safety.

Mobs will not spawn on carpet, which makes covering a floor with it the cheapest way to keep a room dark and empty at the same time. The block underneath is irrelevant.

A carpet on a fence lets you walk across the fence, which is the standard trick for keeping animals in a pen you can cross without a gate.

Llamas wear carpet rather than armour, and the colour of the carpet is the pattern the llama wears, which is the only cosmetic slot on any mount in the game.