Armor: How much?

[ibanix]

Armor is directly related to recovery speed. What factors are you using to decide what armor to fit to particular classes?  

 

Front line tanks would seem to obviously want heavier armor, and casters less, but where are you drawing that line? What's your minimal recovery speed for any particular class? 

[Braven]

Light armor for ranged and heavy for melee is a good general rule, but it can depend on other factors too.

 

If you have really high defenses, you don’t need as much armor because you won’t get hit as much. If you go all out defense you can just wear light armor (that has a defense boosting enchantment) since armor is useless when everything misses.

 

You can also ignore your defenses and just go all out armor so that everything has the 75% damage reduction from not penetrating. Armor gets better the more you stack because a 3 point difference can mean a 75% reduction with high armor while at the same time it could mean no difference if you have middling armor.

 

Paladins can actually do either of the above strategies since they are capable of both huge defenses and huge armor because of thier abilities.

 

Druids can shapeshift to get heavy armor on demand, so if they are primarily a ranged character, you can skip armor and just shapeshift if targeted by enemy fire.

 

My paladin/druid MC does both. Holds a dagger and large shield with prof. modals activated and defense boosting equipment while “human” wearing no armor to keep casting speed fast. While a bear, she gets around 15 armor to make up for losing the equipment that was boosting defenses while still having no recovey penalty.

 

I think ultimately the unique enchantments out-weight any consideration of armor type and many of them also reduce recovery time too. Just wear the armor with enchants you like later in the game and synergize well, regardless of class.

Edited May 28, 2018 by Braven

[Clerith]

Armor is pretty important. In this game, I gave fast light armors to my wizard and priest. The armors with -recovery are the best imo, the one from Benweth and Devil of Caroc's breastplate. I do like my tanky frontline (Eder, Pallegina) in plate or brigandine, but my dps melee characters always use Caroc's breastplate, since you can cut the recovery penalty to almost nothing, or as a fighter, you actually attack recover faster WITH armor than without.

 

So backline - fast light armor, dps frontline - fast medium armor, tanks - heavy armor.

Edited May 28, 2018 by Clerith

[mazeltov]

My general rule was heavy for tanks, up-armored medium for tanky DPS, and light (typically up-armored Leather) for casters and ranged. It's not worth it to run naked/robes and subject back liners to +30% damage for little gain. I don't use squishy melee as a matter of principle: even Ydwin as a Cipher/Rogue will get Devil of Caroc breastplate or similar.

[Lokithecat]

I ran one Tank: Heavy, Cleric: Light (until I found the Medium that gave entire group +2 Armor, switched to that), Everyone else Light.  Early game, used much heavier on everyone, by mid game the enemies damage wasn't enough that going above 15% recovery just seemed silly.  That said, it felt like there were more 'worthwhile' armors in the Light category, even before you compared Armor, and Recovery.  I probably would have used more Robes, but only found 2, and they were pretty junky. 

 

The really good 15% stuff is only a few points lower Armor than the 50%, and usually has better effects.  As long as its sufficient to prevent Overpenetration its enough.  Enemies seem to (mid and later) do either so much damage, that a few points of armor is meaningless, or low enough damage that you don't care if you get hit for 3 points more, since you have the HP pool to last until you can get healing in place.  When you're exploding everything in a couple hits, armor is almost an after thought.  Also, ignored deflection on everyone but the tank, who was all about using a Tower shield, usually with the Wall modal up.

 

Eder Swashbuckler tank, Berserker Helwalker MC, Xoth Priest, Aloth Wizard, Maia Ranger/Wizard, with a pet that gave all melee attacks interrupt (maybe that helped not taking damage, idk.)

Edited May 28, 2018 by Lokithecat

[KDubya]

I just went with whatever the best armor was based on the abilities. Style counts too, even on PotD I'd go Valian Frock Coat instead of robes for my monk until I got some cool armor.

 

My Shattered Pillar used the light armor Fleshmender as it had a nice regen.

 

Serafen had a high intimidate skill so he got the medium armour that added deflection based on that skill.

 

Basically dual wielding can wear heavier armor as can Fighters with Armored Grace. Anyone with extra armor from abilities would want to go with heavier armor to double down on the armor advantage.

 

Naked is only an extra 30% from over penetration which can be overcome with a mere six points of constitution. A 50% armor malus needs 17 points of dexterity.

[evilcat]

Start low and then add more if you are taking too much dmg.

There are several armour light, but with lowered penalty. Need seek wiki for a list. So this goes for casters, ranged and general second line.

On Veteran my front line was using medium armours dual wielding. And it worked.

 

There could be some class specific impact like:

Monks prefer lower armour to gain wounds

Fighters can handle heavier armour

Barbarians Berzerkers may want heavier armour.

[drchocapic]

I don't use armor on ranged characters, they're not supposed to get hit.

 

Melee damage dealers usually get leather level armor and frontline tanks get breastplate level armor.

 

I only use heavy armor on armored grace Fighters. I find the long recovery unbearable otherwise.

 

I really wish there were high quality/unique cloth armor besides robes. I've had two main characters finish the game in common clothes so far because robes would ruin their look/theme.

[Guest]

Heavy if you’re front line and don’t have a shield. Medium if you’re front line and you do. Light armor for everyone else.

[AndreaColombo]

Light or robes for casters; medium for the front line. I like heavy armor but I value speed too much to take a 55% penalty to recovery.

[ibanix]

I really wish there were high quality/unique cloth armor besides robes. I've had two main characters finish the game in common clothes so far because robes would ruin their look/theme.

 Yeah this is one of my complaints about not being able to enchant common items now.