Better With Hands

The mod adds a functional offhand slot to the inventory, placed next to the armor slots, with an item shown in the hotbar area when one is equipped. The offhand item is rendered mirrored on Steve's left hand in both first and third person, and it is hidden again when the slot is empty. Other players in multiplayer see what a player is holding and using, because animations and item handling are synced.

The intent is to let a torch stay lit in one hand while mining, keeping blocks ready while exploring, or to swap tools without digging through the inventory. When the main hand is empty, enabled actions automatically use the offhand item instead, and an experimental option lets the game pick the better hand depending on the action, so mining a block uses the better tool. Both keys are changed in Options, and settings sit under Options, Better With Hands, where the toggle during gameplay on the X key is also configured.

Better With Hands is built for BTA Babric, is published for b1.7.3 only, and runs on client and server, so both the server and every player need it. It is released under the MIT License and is open source. Snapshot builds are published alongside the release files, and the mod is last updated 2026-07-30 after its first release on 2026-01-25.