Armour effectiveness

[Argentia]

A while back there was a post concerning the effectiveness of armour and how, for a number of reasons, the effectiveness for heavy armour should be reduced. I agree that it should be, however I've noticed that since that time the effectiveness of heavy armour has been just about nothing when defending against weapons. I was just wondering how others felt about this, whether you agree or not if the effectiveness of heavier armours should be raised just a little. Thanks for your thoughts. =)

[Dalvyn]

I don't think it was ever modified since the last discussion. Was it?

[Balek]

As far as I can tell, heavy armor is acting the same as it has for a very long time. Armor in general very rarely actually blocks an attack made by someone using a weapon. People in light armor dodge a lot of those attacks, and that is the reason the majority of fighters concerned with winning PvP matchups wear light armor. The absolute damage negation of dodging is just more useful than the slight damage reduction granted by heavier armor.

[Argentia]

Maybe I'm just wearing crappy armour then? o_O I've only noticed that its effectiveness is lowered against enemies with weapons. When they are unarmed it is very effective. Perhaps then the rate of weapon effectiveness has changed? Or am I still just wearing crappy armour?>< I just thought I remembered my armour deflecting more armed attacks way back when. Thanks again. =)

[Balek]

Yes, just as I said. Heavy armor works just fine against unarmed attacks, especially mob attacks. Attacks made by a weapon are only blocked occasionally. In a PvP fight it's normal for me to get 1 or 2 armor deflections while wearing lots of heavy armor, while in PvE my armor deflects somewhere around 95% of attacks. The only benefits I can really see for heavy armor at this point are the small damage reduction and the RP benefits, which is why Balek wears his.

[Argentia]

I think for the sake of balance heavier armour should be given at least a little better chance of deflecting weapon attacks. To me it just makes sense that heavier armour deflects more weapon attacks than lighter armour, at the cost that you cannot dodge very well in it. Thoughts/comments?

[Dalvyn]

I believe that the main problem of heavy armour is that we are mixing two systems.

Concretely, armour is supposed to deflect and absorb incoming blows. Consider an arrow shot on a warrior clad in full plate; the armour will just deflect the blow and no damage will be done. Consider a weak opponent swinging a sword at a warrior clad in leather armour; the leather will perhaps be scratched but will not be pierced and no damage is done to the warrior.

These are 2 different situations: in the first case, the blow (arrow) is completely ignored; in the second case, the blow (sword) is not good enough to pierce the protection given by the armour.

Those two systems can be found in various roleplaying games (some use the first, others, the second):

1 - Armour deflecting blows. That's how it works in Dungeons & Dragons. The opponent rolls a hit roll, and if the result is higher than the armour score, this is a hit and full damage is done. If it is lower, then it is a miss and no damage is done.

2 - Armour absorbing damage. Some other roleplaying games use this system. The opponent rolls damage. Armour reduces the damage and the remaining (if > 0) is the actual damage done.

Both systems have their advantages and disadvantages. For example, the first system is an "all or nothing" system: either you get full damage, or you get none, and some do not like it (or think that it does not represent well "real life"). The second system, on the other hand, makes it so that heavy armour renders the wearer completely immune to some weapons (if your armour absorbs 5 points of damage, you will never ever be damaged by a dagger dealing 1d4 points of damage and the situation where the dagger is somehow placed between armour parts and thus hits cannot be represented). Note that, on the contrary, with the first system, it is still possible to damage a warrior in full plate with a dagger.

The mud is "mostly" (that's still far from true, but it's becoming more and more) based on D&D, but it also uses what I guess is base smaug code. As far as armour is concerned, it still uses damage absorption.

That's why, as other posters wrote above, heavy armour makes you immune to opponents that do not have any weapon. Now, that's clearly a problem: some opponents do not use weapons, but should still be a threat to metal-clad warriors. So, at some point (but not recently, several months ago), the damage absorbed by heavy armour was reduced. It did not solve the problem: heavy armour still made people immune to low-damage weapons (daggers, unarmed attacks) but did next to nothing against more powerful weapons, unlike dodge (which is a hit-or-miss system).

There have been talks about whether or not to go to a D&D-based armour system (hit or miss) instead of the clumsy damage absorption system, but it's still being discussed ... and there are more urgent things to work on first, but yes, that's one of the problems we know of.

[Argentia]

Thanks for clearing all that up for me. =) Sorry to have bothered you about this, since you're already aware of the issue and discussing it.