We are now releasing Snapshot 23w40a, the first snapshot for 1.20.3! This snapshot contains improvements for shields, changes to chat component serialization and bug fixes.

Changes

When a player is blocking with a shield, the arm with the shield now follows the direction the player is looking at, when viewed from third person perspective

Technical Changes

The Data Pack version is now 19
A few minor changes to chat component serialization

Chat components

Serialization

Plain-text chat components (text, no sibilings, no stylings) are now always serialized as string instead of {"text': "blah"}
Chat components now serialize to NBT when sent over network
Chat components now have an optional type value (allowed values: text, translatable, score, nbt, keybind) to speed up parsing and improve error checking
id field in show_entity hoverEvent style now also accepts UUID as an array of 4 ints
Numeric and boolean arguments for translate component are no longer converted to string
The following JSON component representations are no longer accepted:
- null
- []
Errors in following style fields are no longer silently ignored:
- color
- clickEvent
- hoverEvent
- hoverEvent[action=show_entity].contents.name
- hoverEvent[action=show_item].contents.tag

Data Pack Version 19

Fixed bugs in 23w40a

MC-47607 Barrier particles aren't shown if particles are set to minimal
MC-50647 Slime mob spawners spawn slimes only in slime chunks
MC-78314 (Marker) Armor stands create bubbles in water
MC-109101 Shields do not block damage while the player faces straight up
MC-114761 Area effect cloud applies effect to dying mob
MC-172398 Fire texture renders according to the player's rotation in the player inventory
MC-221558 Light particles aren't shown if particles are set to minimal
MC-227255 Beehives and bee nests do not rotate/mirror correctly in structure blocks
MC-236946 Shield attack vector is normalized incorrectly
MC-253819 Bells don't rotate correctly when loaded by structure/jigsaw blocks
MC-254850 An operator can kick a host of a LAN world
MC-255173 Nether portal teleportation is inaccurate at large coordinate values
MC-261303 Decorated pots have an unused "cracked" block state
MC-263123 Mending incorrectly calculates overflow after full repair
MC-264748 GLX._initGlfw Treats Pointer as a String
MC-265353 Clocks and Compasses in Item Display Entities don't show correct time/direction
MC-265462 Sending resource pack during play phase shows loading terrain screen for a long time
MC-265519 Game minimizes when certain areas of the screen are clicked on Mac in fullscreen mode

Changes

Technical Changes

Chat components

Serialization

Data Pack Version 19

Tags

Fixed bugs in 23w40a

Minecraft Snapshot 23w40a