Minecraft wiki entry for Trading, associated text: If you encounter a village or an igloo with basement in early game, one of the most beneficial things you can do is to convert a villager to a fletcher, sell it sticks, and buy bow and arrows from it. this allows you to perform ranged attacks frequently, without the worry of running out of arrows. To achieve the same results, you either have to meticulously set up a chicken farm, get really lucky to find a skeleton spawner, or wait until you can get Infinity on your bow.