SHEARS

Shears is something you buy from villagers rather than sell to them; it does not appear as a raw-material trade, so a Shepherd at novice asking 2 emeralds is one of the few survival-friendly ways to stock up on it.

A crafting grid makes one from 2 iron ingot, the simplest recipe of anything a villager sells at this end of the shelf. That simplicity is what makes shears the cleanest case on this whole site for weighing gathering against buying, since there is only one ingredient to price.

One seller, one price: a Shepherd at novice asks 2 emeralds for a pair of shears. It is fixed rather than rolled, so a second Shepherd asks exactly the same.

Shears sells for as little as 2 emeralds, from the Shepherd at the Novice tier, and 3 of the other 5 cost less. The price is fixed rather than rolled, so a second Shepherd will quote you exactly the same.

The Shepherd at its novice tier asks 2 emeralds for shears. 8 of the 72 villagers that pay emeralds, emptied out:

2 compasses against 64 rotten flesh for the same 2 emeralds, 32 times the carrying, and the shortest wait is the Butcher at 1.3 real minutes of shelf, gathering not counted.

The offer locks after 12 uses, and a villager restocks at most twice a Minecraft day, so 24 shears is the ceiling one Shepherd sells before the day cuts him off.

It sits at the very first tier. A villager who claimed a loom minutes ago is already selling shears, no trade experience needed and no earlier offer to unlock first.

12 shears drain one slot, and the Shepherd needs 2 real minutes back at his loom before he sells another. A Minecraft day, 20 real minutes, holds two of those refills.

A full day camped nets 24 pairs of shears for 48 emeralds, one about every 50 real seconds, 2.4 emeralds a real minute. Shears stacks to only one, so carrying that many home fills that many separate slots.

Clearing the shelf takes 12 trades and 24 emeralds. Where the emeralds come from: the same Shepherd pays an emerald per 18 white wool, so one flock can fund the shears that shear it.

The rest of his sheet, worth a look on the same trip: any dye, colored wool, colored carpet, bed, banner and painting.

Two iron ingots buy a tool that is the only way to collect a whole list of blocks intact: leaves, cobwebs, vines, ferns, tall grass, sea pickles and dead bushes all drop themselves when sheared and drop nothing useful otherwise. For a builder that makes shears a gathering tool rather than a farming one.

On animals they matter twice. Shearing a sheep gives wool without killing it and the wool grows back on grass, and shearing a snow golem or a mooshroom changes what the mob is rather than what it drops. Each use costs one point of durability, so a single pair lasts a long building session.

Shearing a sheep gives several wool and leaves the sheep standing, ready to regrow its coat on grass. Killing one gives a single wool and no sheep, which is the difference between a flock and a one-off.

The same tool takes honeycomb from a hive, and doing that without a campfire underneath makes the bees angry, which is the most common way a peaceful builder ends up being stung.

Shears also cut a big dripleaf back to a stem, carve a pumpkin without wasting it, and are the only sensible way to gather cobwebs. Two iron for all of that is the best value on the crafting grid.