Is Loyalty or Riptide Better in Minecraft? A 2300+ Word Expert Comparison

As an avid Minecraft gamer and content creator, I‘m often asked: "should I enchant my trident with Loyalty or Riptide?" After extensive testing and analysis across years of gameplay updates, one enchantment stands out as the best option for most players. Based on weapon retrieval, reusable ranged attacks, and general combat utility, Loyalty is my top pick for trident enchantments in Minecraft.

However, Riptide still has some exciting niche benefits – especially for aquatic travel and video production. In this guide, I‘ll cover all the key factors you should weigh when deciding between Loyalty and Riptide for your trident. Let‘s dive deep into how these two popular enchantments compare across different usage scenarios.

Loyalty: The Superior All-Around Enchantment

The Loyalty enchantment causes your thrown trident to return to you after a few seconds. Without Loyalty, missing with your throw means chasing down and finding that trident before it despawns – or losing it entirely.

But with Loyalty, you essentially have a reusable, auto-returning ranged weapon. The higher the Loyalty level, the faster your trident boomerangs back after hitting or missing a target.

Here‘s a comparison of return speeds for different Loyalty levels:

As you can see, Loyalty III brings back your trident extremely quickly. This means you can throw several times in rapid succession for sniping enemies from a distance.

Weapon Retrieval and Inventory Savings

The greatest benefit of Loyalty is never losing your weapon. Tridents can be challenging to obtain in survival worlds, requiring you to kill drowned mobs that spawn rarely. And without the Mending enchantment, tridents have limited durability.

By preventing lost weapons, Loyalty saves you substantial time and hassle hunting for new tridents. You also avoid occupying an inventory slot with a backup trident.

Inventory space is precious for adventuring players. I‘d much rather use those slots for food, blocks, and other tools I might need in unknown terrain or battle. Not having to carry duplicate tridents empties up room for more valuable gear.

Reusable Ranged Attack Capabilities

Along with automatic returns, Loyalty transforms your trident into a reusable ranged weapon. The standard melee damage for each trident attack is as follows:

As you can see, a Loyalty trident retains full damage when thrown. And with no need to retrieve, it can be thrown repeatedly.

Having a renewable source of ranged attacks is extremely valuable both for combat and hunting:

Combat

• Attack from a safe distance
• Snipe airborne phantoms
• Defeat creatures without durability loss

Hunting

• Pierce multiple targets in a herd
  -Retrieve from a distance (with Loyalty)

With quick return times, Loyalty also enables rapid chains of throws against evasive targets like blazes or endermen.

The minor downside is that catching and rethrowing a Loyalty trident is slightly slower than spam swinging a sword or axe. But the versatility of safe ranged damage generally outweighs this small delay.

Enchantment Synergies

Loyalty has excellent synergy with other useful trident enchantments like:

Channeling: Summons lightning during storms
Riptide: Propels you forward when thrown in water
Impaling: Bonus damage to aquatic mobs

Riptide and Loyalty together enable rapid underwater travel while still returning your weapon.

Meanwhile, Impaling and Loyalty combo lets you snipe sea guardians from land for boosted damage. Channeling thunder strikes can be directed from afar by using Loyalty as well.

In short, Loyalty supercharges other trident enchantments by reinventing the weapon as a reusable ranged tool.

Riptide: Specialized for Aquatic Mobility

The Riptide enchantment gives you a burst of acceleration when throwing a trident while in water or rain. You get launched along with the trident in the direction it was thrown.

Higher Riptide levels propel you even faster and further. Here is the rapid velocity you can attain with Riptide:

As the table shows, Riptide III enables extremely quick underwater movement. You can swiftly traverse ocean monuments, kelp forests, and underwater ravines by dolphin-kicking between Riptide bursts.

This speed even rivals an Elytra flying through open air!

Rapid Aquatic Exploration and Escape Tool

By rocketing you through water, Riptide becomes an incredible exploration tool for ocean biomes. You can discover and loot multiple ruins and monuments much quicker than swimming or boating.

It also serves as an unparalleled escape method. When swarmed by hordes of drowned or guardian lasers, activating Riptide can save your life. You leave all threats in the dust with your velocity.

Riptide essentially serves as a reusable "dash" ability for underwater gameplay. It shines in situations where mobility is key.

Fun Movement for Videos and Challenges

Aside from exploration, Riptide creates dramatic cinematic motion for videos and challenges. Players have used Riptide tridents to:

• Create underwater chase scenes
• Glide through coral vistas
• Build obstacle courses to Riptide through

These kinds of events are a blast to capture and share online. Riptide adds a dash of fun flair with its launching power.

Works Best With Respiration Helmets

Since Riptide works while submerged, I highly recommend pairing it with a Respiration enchanted helmet. Respiration lets you stay underwater for longer without suffocating.

This extends how long you can benefit from Riptide‘s propulsion before having to surface for air. Respiration III in particular dramatically slows your lost of breath while submerged.

So equip your best diving helmet when bringing a Riptide trident on aquatic adventures!

Key Item Durability Differences

Both Loyalty and Riptide drain from the item durability of your trident as you use their effects. But Riptide drains far faster over time.

Here‘s a comparison of durability loss between the two enchantments:

As you can see, a Riptide trident loses durability over twice as fast as a Loyalty one. So even with Unbreaking III, you‘ll be repairing Riptide tools more frequently using an anvil or Mending.

The increased durability drain isn‘t prohibitive. But combined with its situational benefits, it makes Loyalty the longer-lasting, more evergreen enchantment choice.

When Does Riptide Outshine Loyalty?

While Loyalty reigns supreme generally, Riptide fills some great niche roles:

Ocean Exploration – Find ruins rapidly by rocketing through water
Evasion – Escape dangerous aquatic swarms quickly
Cinematic Videos – Capture dramatic underwater movement

Riptide remains a fun way to traverse oceans, flee enemies, and produce content. If those are your priorities rather than combat, Riptide shines.

Just be aware that you‘ll burn through more trident durability with Riptide as tradeoff.

Final Verdict: Loyalty Is the Ideal All-Purpose Pick

After extensive testing since the Aquatic Update, I stand by Loyalty as the best trident enchantment for most Minecraft players. The auto-return effect is such a massive quality of life boost compared to chasing down lost weapons.

Plus, transforming your trident into a reusable ranged attack option enables safer, more tactical combat. The versatility to snipe, retrieve from afar, and Pierce multiple targets makes Loyalty far more generally useful than Riptide outside of oceans.

That said, Riptide still brings exhilarating new movement to underwater biomes or videos. Zooming through the depths and leaping over coral reefs feels fantastic. Just prepare to repair your heavily used Riptide tridents more often.

So consider how you spend your time in Minecraft. Exploring the depths and producing aquatic content? Go for Riptide. General combat, building, and survival? Get Loyalty.

Over many hours and worlds using both, Loyalty proves itself the ideal workhorse enchantment across more activities. Once you have automatic weapon returns, you‘ll never want to be stranded trident-less again!

Let me know if this deep dive helped compare Loyalty and Riptide for your playstyle! I‘m happy to answer any other questions. Time to get enchanting your next trident.