Armor: The illusion of choice

[ulfy]

The new/teased Scout armor & light armors look great; however, I don't see anyone beyond mages pursuing them. The way Armor works now, the only penalty is to mana regen... stam/movement doesn't see a hit until you exceed your armor weight, which can be trained away via skill points. Being able to toss 100-200 points to make you a heavy armor juggernaut with no effects on endurance & speed, is a joke.

The result? Anyone not reliant on mana will simply train their armor as high as they can afford to, and then wear just under the upper limit. There's no reason (currently) to leave that mitigation/defense on the table if you don't care about mana regen. Hell, even most hybrids will do this.

In the most recent stream, Henrik mentioned the idea of people wearing above their limit because the defensive gains would offset the stam/movement penalty... but does anyone actually do that? I'm guessing not. We know that the min/max attitude will have people take the highest armor value whilst skirting the penalty.

TL;DR: Lighter armors are only viable for mana users, and that's a shame. If SV won't change the way stam/movement works with heavier armor, then I hope they at least make it a factor for when other movement types come out.. quickstep/crouch/etc.

 

[Rhias]

The way Armor works now, the only penalty is to mana regen... stam/movement doesn't see a hit until you exceed your armor weight

You're wrong.
Hover over your armor weight in the stats menu. There it says "Stamina regeneration is affected past X KG." And it's less than your total armor weight. But with 14+kg it's still pretty high.

However, generally I agree that there is no reason for anyone but a mage/hybrid to wear anything < 14kg.

 

[ulfy]

Sorry, forgot about stam regen. Personally, I don't think that's enough. There should also be a faster stam drain on say, sprinting. And movement speed should be impacted to some degree as well.

I think a curve of sorts would make sense, with armor training mitigating some of the effect.... instead of completely pushing them out.

 

[Nefnate]

Sorry, forgot about stam regen. Personally, I don't think that's enough. There should also be a faster stam drain on say, sprinting. And movement speed should be impacted to some degree as well.

I think a curve of sorts would make sense, with armor training mitigating some of the effect.... instead of completely pushing them out.

I agree. Right now, (trust me I know) anyone who wears lighter armor is not going to have a good time. Even just PvE becomes fairly miserable in melee. There are no reasons to go light unless you are desperate for points, and the trade offs are virtually non-existent right now for going heavy.

 

[Tzone]

I would take off armor if I was above the stam weight penalty. We would make the 15.85 sets just to get that stamina as veela. Also the stam weight stuff affects your jump height despite tool tip saying it doesnt.

It absolutly makes or breaks veelas at least.

 

[Teknique]

There a few problem relative to MO 1,

the 5 piece sets vs 10 piece gives less opportunity for light weight pieces to fit in.

More importantly though the fact that weapon weight barely matters in MO 2 makes light armor a death sentence.

 

[pooternackle]

Seems like adding a dex penalty to armors exceeding a certain weight would be the simplest solution to this. It would also take care of complaints (valid imo) that dex builds aren't fast enough without actually buffing current run speeds.

 

[Tzone]

Seems like adding a dex penalty to armors exceeding a certain weight would be the simplest solution to this. It would also take care of complaints (valid imo) that dex builds aren't fast enough without actually buffing current run speeds.

Why? people already dont wear steel because its too heavy.