Armorsmith Archive
Thread: How I would change armor...one Master's perspective
Srednii wrote:
I don't like vulnerabilities. I don't like the thought of fighting some creature or person, and then BAM, you get 1 hit killed by some damage type that leaks through a vulnerabilty.
Ubese is great pve armor cause you can be sure everythings going to be hitting that 76% kinetic resists (as long as you don't go hunting npcs anyways). But it's worthless in pvp because it has too many vulnerabilities.
IMHO vulnerabilities shouldn't be 0%, but maby 10-25% max instead. Then you could nerf composite all you like by adding more vuln damage types and I wouldn't mind. Until then tho, I don't want it nerfed.
Simple change that should be implimented throughout the game, add additional experimentation points for each quarter you are a master. This way someone who had been a master for 6 months has two more experimentation points then someone who just obtained master. Give people a reason to stay in a profession.
Sorea
Kettemoore
I like the idea of giving certain perks to older masters, but I think this should be implemented in all professions. Its annoying, especially with the holo-craze going on to see "flavor-of-the-week" people jumping into a crafting profession only to undercut the market for a few days before surrendering all the skills.
Unofrtunately we wouldn't deal. Most smiths now refuse to do custom orders as it is...not because the other armor types are boring, but because the time vs reward for doing custom order just isn't worth it. People are far too picky and most don't fully understand the crafting process as it is so they'll bicker over every minor detail...yet if you just threw a batch of armor on a vendor these same people would buy up several suits without thinking twice. I personally would not start doing custom orders again if your proposed changes were implemented, and I doubt others would change either.
I also go back to my previous statement when Dewi proposed making all armor "generic"...how does that solve the problem if the type of the armor doesn't determine what it's capable of doing?
Think about it...the problem right now is that all other armor types are just for show and little else. You're suggestion would make them purely cosmetic cause then any armor could be made the same way so it really came down to looks.IMO it would be foolishto make padded armor act like a metal armor, make composite act like padded, and so on. If various types don't have strengths and weaknesses in different areas, then there seems to be little point to having multiple types. You might as well just have compo and make it anyway you wanted.
I think that would actually suck the life out of AS, not put life back in it because you'd be trivializing what work an AS does with any specific type of armor.
Vevy wrote:
If various types don't have strengths and weaknesses in different areas, then there seems to be little point to having multiple types. You might as well just have compo and make it anyway you wanted.
I don't understand at all how making the visual aspectsseperate from the statistic aspects would trivialize the profession....
The constant calls for penalities for people who want the best is getting old, however. In Beta, when armor HAM's first became an issue (I still remember when you could go to an armor vendor and get armor that had no stats and no HAM costs) it was explained to those who complained about the HAM costs that:
A) Armor, even in RL, reduces endurance (its hot and heavy) is cumbersome (field of motion reduced by reinforced joints) and limits field of view (put on a helmet or facemask-paintballers and SCA fighters can attest to this). Health, Action and Mind are explained right there.
B) By requiring Buffs and Spice to effectively use higher protection armors it promotes interdependancy. A number of people were uncomfortable with requiring the use of drugs for armor, but they/we got over it.
GraySeven wrote:
I don't understand at all how making the visual aspectsseperate from the statistic aspects would trivialize the profession....
The constant calls for penalities for people who want the best is getting old, however. In Beta, when armor HAM's first became an issue (I still remember when you could go to an armor vendor and get armor that had no stats and no HAM costs) it was explained to those who complained about the HAM costs that:
A) Armor, even in RL, reduces endurance (its hot and heavy) is cumbersome (field of motion reduced by reinforced joints) and limits field of view (put on a helmet or facemask-paintballers and SCA fighters can attest to this). Health, Action and Mind are explained right there.
B) By requiring Buffs and Spice to effectively use higher protection armors it promotes interdependancy. A number of people were uncomfortable with requiring the use of drugs for armor, but they/we got over it.
Now, you sound as if you want to penalize people for wanting the best armor they can get, and its wrong. My Rifleman/Ranger alt has two sets of armor. A full composite set and a full ubese set (the ubese uses nightsister segments and krayt tissues and is quite good). I rarely use either one, because without my stats being fully buffed, my specials in rifleman cause my HAM to drop at an extreme rate. Even buffed, its better for me to remain unarmored simply because this allows me to use my specials to kill enemys faster than simply attacking them. If I just attack, it takes me at least twice as long to kill one enemy as using my specials would allow me. When groups come into play, that means that I am taking more hits over a longer time armored than I would unarmored.
Quite simply, this "nerfing" thatpeople are proposing will make armors useless.
But to your initial point. Composite denotes multiple things brought together to make or do one thing. When I think of composite I see high-impact ceramics layered with ablative and kinetic resistant cloths. Plastic or lightness doesn't even come into how I view it. As to Ubese being BH armor just because Leia wore it, once, as a disguise? What about the jacket Anakin wore in Ep2? Looks Ubese to me, so does that change Ubese to BH/Jedi armor? You're opinion would also include Mabari as BH armor due to Sam Wessel having wore it in Ep2 as well.
What does this prove? That we have different opinions about what the various armor types mean. Under the system I proposed, we would be able to make the armor we envision. It would reduce the constant composite overload currently seen throughout the galaxies.
I have had endless customers come to me for Padded, Mabari and even Tantel without regards for the protection simply because they wanted a "look". Their only provision was that HAM be brought down as low as possible. These same people have my best composite hot-keyed for combat. What is wrong with allowing them their "look" that will protect them just like their composite does now?
As long as one armor type is The Best people will stick to buying just that. If you nerf one armor type to the point that it is no longer The Best people will simply move on to the next armor that is. You can't magic bullet the problems with armor through nerfs without it having an effect on the combat system or the buff system.
Make certain, in your effort to improve AS that you don't simply make us obsolete. The only thing that keeps my armor around is the difficulty I sometimes have in finding Doctors who are buffing. I now fight either Spiced and Armored or Doc Buffed and Unarmormed.
I'm rambling, so I'll close.Keeping the protections tied to the armor types will mean that people will continue to buy the armor they need for their play style, which means we, as AS's will continue to pump out sets of composite and ubese,layered and enhanced.Nerfing armor to reduce or eliminate thedirth of"TheBest" will simply chase people tosomething else that does what they need.Making vulnerabilities that can't be removed damages the Layers line of our profession. Making armor so encumbering that even buffed, users would be penalized would simply mean people would fight buffed, not armored.
Yes, AS is a bit stale, but even with a drastic revamp, it would still become stale again as those who seek "The Best" move on to whatever that may be, and if its still armor we will just be trading composite for the next armor that becomes "The Best".
Vaylis Arturin, Master Artisan, Armorsmith, DE
Vahl Arturin Master Rifleman, Ranger
You have some good points there grey, but overall I think you passed over the point of the thread. i'm guessing the length of this thread now is causing people to skip posts and as a result miss key points that are being made.
The proposal is not to simply nerf compo and call it a day, I've said several times now that is not what I want to see even though others do. I said armor needs to be balanced across the board.
Much of what you describe in your post is EXACTLY what I disagree with and why I think armor is trivialized...
You ask why we shouldn't allow players to get the look they want? I never said that, I said armor simply shouldn't be for looks. They SHOULD be able to go get lower armor types, but not just for cosmetic appearances that are moot when it's time for combat and they just hotkey their compo back on. NO ONE ARMOR SHOULD DO IT ALL! ...but that doesn't mean they all can't be equal in different areas. Compo is very strong, but it needs a very strong weakness that simply can't be layered in...stun isn't cutting it. If it had say energy vulnerability on top of stun, then the most protection you could get would be about 30% give or take. I don't see this as a major disappointment for the game. We're talking about 1 vulnerability and it's not like it can't be overcome to a point, IT JUST SHOULDN'T GO UP TO 80%!! That one vulnerability would not all of a sudden make compo worthless, it would just mean another lesser armor type would need to have energy resists capable of reaching 80% to compensate...then instantly you've given new life to that second type of armor that wasn't there before. Conversely if they made stun a normal protection of say padded, then there's a 3rd armor type that serves a more practical useage...but then those two types would also have their own "major" weaknesses...and so on. That's not called nerfing, that's called balance. Nerfing IMO is when you take something away without giving it back somewhere else...just to hotfix a problem.
Nerfing rarely ever works.
You ARE correct in saying that if we simply nerfed compo, players would just move onto the next "best" armor...but again I think you skipped a great many posts here or else you would realize I've been saying this since the initial thread. THERE SHOULD BE NO "BEST"ARMOR...and this can be fixed by spreading out the resists and vulnerabilities.The only way ALL the armor types would be used is if they ALL had the same potential to reach 80% in a certain area...but the problem is compo can reach 80% in ALL areas while the oher types can't reach 80% in anything...this is the core issue behind armor.
The only way I can see to balance out armor is to hardcode specific strengths and weaknesses for each type. SOE did this to an extent but they did it under the assumption that mabari was weak and compo was the "best". In turn, virtually everyone wears compo. I think it's time this decision needs to be overturned.
...and yes, making a piece of armor for purely cosmetic appearances is the worst trivilization of the profession that I can think of. Making all armor types generic with no pre-determined strengths and weaknesses would also trivialize them because again, they then only exist for show. A suit of mabari should not be able to be made identical to a suit of padded, and vice versa...each type needs to have inherent strengths and weaknesses based on it's design...strengths and weaknesses that actually cause a player to choose one over the other. I like the idea of a point spread that we could assign however we want...but again not just with all resists available on every type.
We areNOTdressmakers, we do not make pretty shoes or fancy hats or formal suits for players to run around in...ifplayers want to look good they can go find a tailor. Armorsmiths exist to help you survive combat, not so your enemy can admire your taste in clothing.
I don't think electricity is really an issue, nobody cares about it now anyway...to make it an issue you would need to add more electrical weaps as you say...and my first thought to that is if you're gonna go that far to introduce new weaps, why not just go the extra mile and fix the armor that's already in the game.
Your point is however valid with regards to layers...you add layers to compo it moves the layered stat into special resists...but still increases it with base exp'ing. If that were changed then you would have to choose between raising the special resists and raising the base...I would be agreeable to that change as well however I go back to my previous statement of saying a simple nerf wouldn't work...which is what that is. If we're going to remove that ability and effectively nerf compo as a result, then we need to compensate for it in another type of armor by raising the resists to more practical levels...wouldn't you agree? Without it, we're just lowering the standard or gameplay, not balancing it out.
Changing existing content is gonna be easier than adding all new stuff...and you have to remember adding new stuff is going to also add new unbalance issues with those weaps.
I totally agree, that there needs to be a buff in all the other armor along with the re-adjustment of composite. And I agree that electricity isn't going to completely fix/balance out the armors. It is, in my opinion, the first little baby step though, in that it isn't really a nerf, it is fixing an element of gameplay that is for some reason, currently not acting like EVERY OTHER ARMOR acts.
Istrongly believe that experimentation should be the same for all armors (by which I mean that an experiment to base should only raise base or layer parts, and one to special should only raise the special)there was a reason in the early development of the game why composite was changed to allow for electricity to be raised with base experimentation, but nobody seems to remember why. Fix this, so at least all the armor is on an equal footing when it comes to the way it is made.
Sure, people would still be running around in 80%Kinetic/70+%Base composite or 38%Stun/70%Base comp.....except now, there is a nice little 10% Electricityweakness too Or they gan get this up to a higher level, at the espense of base resists. This bumps up the importance of Bounty Hunters and Advanced Commandos (Heavy Weapons III) in PvP cause they have the only electrical damages out there. But i don't see that as a bad thing. They should be the strongest fighters, with the most points put into combat. Add an electrical carbine and polearm, say, and you are alot closer to balance, since carbs and polearms need help in terms of damage types comparitavely.