Armor issues that are just sad

[Hauteclaire]

I am sick of all these builds abandoning armor for clothing or just never using armor to begin with. Can you (developers) please rethink this somehow? If i wanted to swing a big sword and wear clothing I'd play a broadsword or dual blade scrapper in City of Heroes ! I picked this game because I love armor and the fantasy thing but tired of all the "good" builds requiring you to wear clothing or robes. I love this game but I enjoy other games over this just because of this armor fact.

Again this is a suggestion to developers, not community members. I don't want any flames or anything. I mean seriously, I love armor and fantasy stuff and 75% of the armor is already ugly as is, but it's better than mc hammer pants or robes. Or at least let us pick the appearance of the armor we want!

[AyumiAmakusa]

I think its because some builds work better without armor. I have a cleric about level 13 and I just find that wearing robes gives me better effects than some increase to AC which doesn't really help because I have low AC anyway...

[Eladiun]

I think its because some builds work better without armor. I have a cleric about level 13 and I just find that wearing robes gives me better effects than some increase to AC which doesn't really help because I have low AC anyway...

That's the point isn't it. Armor should have more varied effects and be more effective. Plate armor characters where called tanks for a reason. A guy in a dress dual wielding shouldn't be able to outclass them so heavily in AC.

[Rakian_Knight]

IMO I believe the entire system of AC should be redone so that having an AC that isn't 80 but maybe have of that would block about half the **** in your direction. I mean seriously when fighters and paladins are wearing dresses and doing more then the fighter in the full plate of the defenders and still getting hit as often as the casters in the back, something is wrong.

MAKE AC MEAN SOMETHING!

~Rakian_Knight

[Isolani]

I wouldn't mind wearing armor if you could insta-swap it like you can robes/docents/outfits. That's the main reason I don't wear armor on most of my characters. Since I don't even bother trying for a meaningful AC past L12 or so, the insta-swap is all I really care about, and armor can't do it. Armor looks better though.

[Khanyth]

What's wrong with dragontouched armor?

[Missing_Minds]

Op, I know you are going to hate this, but even in PnP, clothing was the best way to get high AC. It is just that AC is more balanced in PnP than it is in this game due to the ton of stat bonus we gather.

[Autolycus]

I agree with the OP. A character should be able to wear heavy armor and use a shield if desired and have a meaningful AC. He shouldn't be required to multiclass, grind for exotic robes, etc. to get a useful AC.

[AyumiAmakusa]

Well the whole AC system is broken anway~~Would someone suggest a fix to it?

[Autolycus]

Well the whole AC system is broken anway~~Would someone suggest a fix to it?

I agree. I don't have enough experience to suggest a comprehensive fix, but I'll toss in my 2 cents.

I believe that one of the root causes of problems is the inflation of monster stats, hit points, etc. Probably in response to all the magic that characters can obtain.

Unfortunately, this causes some abilities, such as Turn Undead, to be considered useless, and makes mobs to-hits much better and makes their saves versus spells much better. Thus you get into the whole min/max escalation spiral.

I think they need to either tone down a lot of the inflation, or inflate the currently lacking areas to restore balance. This would make a lot of currently "useless" abilities, spells, etc. useful again and re-introduce variety into the game.

[dopamine]

mc hammer pants, haha nice never thought of them like that

[AyumiAmakusa]

I agree. I don't have enough experience to suggest a comprehensive fix, but I'll toss in my 2 cents.

I believe that one of the root causes of problems is the inflation of monster stats, hit points, etc. Probably in response to all the magic that characters can obtain.

Unfortunately, this causes some abilities, such as Turn Undead, to be considered useless, and makes mobs to-hits much better and makes their saves versus spells much better. Thus you get into the whole min/max escalation spiral.

I think they need to either tone down a lot of the inflation, or inflate the currently lacking areas to restore balance. This would make a lot of currently "useless" abilities, spells, etc. useful again and re-introduce variety into the game.

Well, a little sidetrack here, but IMO, Turn Undead is useless no matter how you look at it. There's just not a lot of quests (other than Delera's, Necro, and some others) that require hordes of undead to swarm at you. Not unless they changed Devil's Assault to Undead Assault anyway.

[JPDefault]

I may be wrong, but I think this is an effect of the "big numbers syndrome".
At higher levels you have god-like (for D&D standards) stats, and so do monsters. Their to-hit bonus is so high that you either have 60 AC or you're basically naked.
I almost miss THAC0...

[shadowhop]

The problem with ac is that it is all calculated with a d20, so if they lower the attack bonus of the monsters then there are some players who can only be hit if the monsters roll a 20 and that would also be wrong.

I think one of the solutions can be to give heavy armour a damage reduction. Not just the +3 from ademantine but +7 - +10 for a lvl 20 heavy armour for example.

[JPDefault]

Of course lowering monsters to-hit bonus is not the solution, unless you also lower players max AC.

Giving armour more properties (not just physical DR) instead of simply more AC could work.

I don't remember having nor needing an AC of 60 in D&D, and that too is based on d20 rolls.

[Dendrix]

The underlying problem here is the achievable differences between characters are greater than 20 and the desire of the referee (system) to hit characters on more than 1 in 20 attacks and present a credible threat.

However people also want to mitigate that and then there is the max ac build vs the dps build, whre the AC differences will span more than 20 numbers.

There are a number of ways of dealing with it, many of which break core D&D rules, and most of which will cause people to scream and shout.

You could have an AC per level caps. Your maximum achievable AC is 20+level (or perhaps 20+ 2*level).

Diminishing returns. have a cap similar to the above, but that's a soft cap and every point of AC above that only provides 1/2 a point of AC. i.e. a cap of 40 ac, a character with 50ac, has an effective 45 ac.

Damage mitigation for AC types - light, med, heavy grant 1/2/3 stacking dr.

[pasterqb]

So you are saying people in pajamas shouldn't be able to survive better in combat? Well that is just pure poppycock! Look back in history, all the great warriors wore pajamas. /endsarcasm

[JPDefault]

Good points there, Dendrix.

You could have an AC per level caps. Your maximum achievable AC is 20+level (or perhaps 20+ 2*level).

This could kind of be done without breaking D&D, via Minimum Level requirements.
Of course, some people would yell doom!

[shadowhop]

So you are saying people in pajamas shouldn't be able to survive better in combat? Well that is just pure poppycock! Look back in history, all the great warriors wore pajamas. /endsarcasm

lol you do remember that samurai for example mostly wore armour(great armour) when the went to battle.

[Hauteclaire]

I meant that, I think we should be able to change the armor graphic so we can at least LOOK how we want. It is hard for me to word this since my first language is Japanese and not English, but I will try -

It's not that I am talking about historical things (but yes I have seem the Samurai heavy armor here in Japan, it is great), actual AC being meaningful (though I think it SHOULD be) or anything like that, it's that I've read a TON of D&D related books (Ravenloft stuff, Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance etc) and then tons of other books that were fantasy of the same setting, watched a lot of ANIME obviously where the characters are well armored and manga, and it's just an iconic image. The really cool armor, carrying swords, killing monsters. There is so many art pieces I have too, modules or guides from this game that on the cover and inside art, warriors etc wearing cool armor, I collect these mostly for the art and the writing. I still have trouble with the rules, but that's something else. Then there is Demon's Souls, Sacred 2, Two Worlds 1/2, Ultima Online, Aion, Lineage 2, countless other games that the people who use swords wear big armor if they want, no penalty because it just makes sense. Like firefighters wear certain gear, martial arts wear certain gear, regular cops from SWAT and all that.

So in a game of this genre, over say City of Heroes, where your character is superpowered so they wear tights (but you can wear armor pieces for looks) and swing swords or maces or whatever, I just want to wear big armor and not suffer from it because it's how I want to look and how it makes sense with the 1000s of pictures (official ones too from guides) i am flipping through right now. In traditional games like this warrior based classes wear armor, not civilian clothing. I just think it would be great if we could pic a graphic, if even for a money fee in the game, or the DDO store too (good way for them to actually make it useful, since all the swords/armor on there are worthless in my opinion.) It would also be nice if the clothing looked cool like say the stuff in Assassin's Creed 2, the Assassin class in Diablo 2, Guild Wars classes, Lineage 2 etc. Even in the LoTR movies Aragon went from leather armor etc kind of look, to heavier armor in the 3rd film at the gates at the end, and it always looked cool. Not MC Hammer pants so he could evade for forks sake! I just don't know why they can't make it cool looking or let us decide how we want our character to look on the outside, regardless of what is "under the hood?" Doesn't LOTRO have this option? I know CoH/V does. I know Two Worlds 2 will (inside info I shouldn't be posting) and I know other games will too. I just think it would be nice, if someone wants to look like the classic armor wearing character, they can do that.

Everyone I see in game looks the same to me. MC Hammer pants or Robes like they are waking up to read their morning paper. It's just silly. I want to SEE (all the time) the full plate armor graphic on my multiclasses that use melee weapons and are more warrior based. I can't afford to get the dragontouched stuff either. I play solo and I play from Japan, I play strange hours, I have to go afk at odd times, so grouping doesn't work for me. I am fine playing solo. Don't want to wear robes or clothing and swing dual swords. I want the armored look.

Sorry if this was hard to follow. I am trying to describe it best I can. I was drawn to this game because of all the novels and other things of this franchise and just fantasy books in general depicting characters, similar to the ones I play in this game, wearing plate armor or chainmail etc. This game isn't Prince of Persia. I'm not Chris Tucker in Rush Hour 2, fighting with melee weapons in clothing, getting stabbed in the chest, but being saved by a thick stack of rolled up money in my jacket pocket. I just want it to be more "warrior-like" in look, based on a lot of the fantasy art. I freaking love the armor in Demon's Souls. You run around and you hear it, it weighs you down in rolls dodges and you feel the "weight" of it and the weapons you swing. I know this game will never have that, but let us visually look how we want. Provide this as a DDO STORE service, or in-game money sink... or just give us the option for free to change the look at a tailor NPC. It shouldn't cost a lot either way. it's bad enough the economy on the server I play is horrible. This would be a great way for the developers to make yet more money off us and put more money back into development. It would also be good for the artists working on the game. I am an artist myself, and you need to push yourself sometimes beyond your limit to reach the next level. Do the artists of this game suck so much as artists, that they can't make attractive looking armor? Are the coders more script kiddies, that they cannot code this feature into the game? I think not, because the game (outside of the armor) is beautiful. So please use your talents, bring us these features. Make more profit for your game too!