Fencer Archive

Name: Eva
Server: Shadowfire


I been doing alot of testing with verious types of armors in the last couple days. I been reviewing combat logs, duels an fights with the oppisite faction primarly to figure out what is best. This is mind findings.....

All tests were conducted with a bothan
Stats
900 hp
800 action
800 mind
550 will power
500 focus
350 str
300 con
300 sta
750 quickness

Weapons used in test:
Vibro-blade

Armor items used in tests:
Chest location
Head location
Boot Location

-Side note-
(boots were removed with heavier armor as only chest an head could be used to give you under 65 move costs)

Bone armor:
The lightest of all armors, basicly engery protection only but not really to effective. It still is heavy on the stat use to wear. Although this is only good for fire fights but the problem is most pvp are now using heat weapons which defeats the purpose of this armor.

Tantel armor:
This would be the most veristile armor, I have seen master smiths come up with crazy things with this set of armor that makes it quite useful. An as well as lowering the ham costs down alot. Thier is a big problem with tantel armor though, it seams that the resistances do degrade over time not due to damage but due to some game bug not entirely sure if its on purpose or not. This is the armor I use if I use any, it seams to provide me the best protection for a very low amount of ham costs. Although, with more exenstive testing is required to see if this armor is better then no armor.

Uberse:
Nice melee armor, although from this point on I noticed I take more hits, the armor is a bit heavier then the other two. Resistances are nice, but not to effective even with splicing this armor tends to be a bit to heavy, as it would seam you take 15% more damage by wearing it.

Chitten:
Again as we go higher up the armor scale the armor's costs get more to wear, you get better resistances an other things with out a dout. But as you advance in the better armors, the less your dodge works, an the more hits you take. I see about a 27% incress in hits with this armor when equiped.

Stormtrooper armor:
Sorry cannot comment on this, its classified under imperal law. (chuckle) just kidden I do not own a chest plate of this yet.

Composite armor:
Increidbly nice armor with very high resistances, although very heavy to wear you loose out well over 200+ str an 300+ stanima an a very heavy hit on you quickness. I notice that this armor does take for us alot of the damage off but the problem is that we take 45% hits with out question. I find that wearing this type of armor my move attacks with my mulitihit3 are around 63pts to use. But when using melee weapons my damage output is droped in half, I hit for max far less times then I normaly would with lighter armor.

No armor used:
Still heavily testing this, I am having a very hard time caculating this out but from what I am noticing is. When a master fencer is using no armor, his/her dodge kicks in a bit more, players, pve creatures have a slightly harder time hitting you. But when you get hit, your taking damage sometimes a little an sometimes alot. I notice that commando weapons have a bit harder time hitting you when on the move. As well as lighting cannons tend to do far less to you as well. Although with out armor on your chances of being instant incaped by heavier weapons is greatly inhansed so keep moveing. As a fencer if you stand still for a second your dead. Effectively this type of style does have alot of pros to it an they are noticible but with not wearing armor the Cons are just as bad. You take wounds much easier, some weapons if they hit will do alot more damage to you then normal. Melee damage tends to own you more often, an mind hits happen FAR to often by PVE an PVP. But what I can caculate out is thier is a 25% greater chance of you avoiding damage completely with no armor. This to me seams to be the most effective rout since armor takes to much out of us.

Well I hope you found my testing amusing. I spent a good month working on this still under going a few more tests. What SOE needs to do is make Cloth armor for fencers, combat medics, doctors an Dancers mucsicans. That way we do not suffer ham costs an encubmerance but we gain special protections say agasit heat, acid ect.... Its an idea but it gives us something a bit more special for us fencers to use to keep up in the fight longer agasit special types of weapons. The cloth wouldnt need kentic protection as it only purpose is to be specialized towrds 1-3 types of unsual damage. This would give cloth makers something else to make an would help keep thier businesses going.

I have been holding out and judging on my own and finally decided to put it to the test. My findings for my toon seem to be quite acceptable to me. I were a full suit of Composite with a few of the Smuggler spices I do incredible dmg with minimal side effects or HAM. Last night I took out a pack of cats all yellow cons to me a number of 6 total. With a few heals I took all 6 of them down. So I was sold. I will wear my composite and use my smuggle drugs.

So all you smugglers on Kettlemore send me a tell in game I am looking for about 10 crates. And more in the future.

**edit** sounds like I am looking for a drug dealer. (LOL)

Anyways

Cypo

Kettlemore

Espa, Tatoonie

> sounds like I am looking for a drug dealer. (LOL)

You are. Just say 'No' to smugglers!

I am new to fencing, but what i have found is a very nice tantel chesplate will deduct a LOT of damage, and my ham cost only increased by 3 points to action, I haven't had the chance to test health costs. I think that you get hit mostly in the chest legs and head, so if you go for chest and head armor, and do acton costing moves than that will benefit you the most. If your special deducts from mind than do leg armor and chest armor. You could even make hotbuttons in combat to switch out armor as you do a move. I don't know how well this would work but it might help a lot with ham costs but still give you maximum protection.

best armor for any melee, Marauder Armor from endor.... beats ubsee hands down, not as good as faction armor or composite but it has no encumbance at all.

for the record.... not to wear armor thats the answer

Armor is actually useful in teams. My friend and I do Dath money runs like nothing.

He wears a full set of composite, never uses any specials, while I wear clothes and stay 6m behind him while he tanks the creatures. He ends up taking 20-80 damage from kamuri's on Dathomir and I can kill them in a few seconds while spamming body hit 2. Much more efficient, reliable, and cheaper than a CH pet.

If you're going solo, I suggest you get a good non-ch pet like a grand wrix or a rock beetle. Send them to attack, then order them to come back. Wear no armor at all (or armor with no encumberances) and spam your specials on them. Heal your pet as nescessary. That's the best way to do the most damage with the best protection.

I think for those who never use armor there is at least an argument to try mabari if you can find a set that has a good set of resistances. Just the reduction of damage resulting from wearing light armor against AP0 weapons is worth the relatively small HAM affect, especially if you have some medic skill. If you can findpiecesof tantel that have resistances to everything that is even better for negligible HAM cost. I have noticed that the tantel chest pieces are very buggy and sometimes lose some of their resistances temporarily if you log while wearing it (who knows why). It does return though. I have two now and switch depending on which one has the best resistances that day. I also switched chitin gloves and boots when I found 50% kinetic resistance pieces. I usually hotkey the armor and take it off while resting to restore HAM.

Speaking as an armorsmith --

The primary effect of wearing armor is that it reduces your secondary stats. The most critical of these is the ones that affect your special moves cost. Thus, your decision on armor type needs to take into account two factors:

1. How often you spam your special attacks


2. What the special move cost modifiers on your weapons are.

My partner, Synne,is a fencer who has done some experimentation with my armor. Her findings - if she uses a small knife (which requires spamming specials since each special does less damage), then a full set of armor is too heavy to use. If she uses a large blade (which is slower but does more damage and requires less spamming), then wearing a full set is far preferable.

Many people dislike the losing the ability to bang on their specials like a gibbering monkey. However, in her experimentation using a suit of 62% (unsliced!) chitin I gave her, she found that she was a slower but much more consistent fighter. She suddenly could wade into packs of 3-4 monsters at a time. Instead of resting after every fight, she needed to rest after every five.

Also, once she got her hand on some Tatooinian Sunburn, she found that the armor penalties were less onerous (find some, you'll like it). Drugs and Doctor Buffs also can make the penalties for armor negligable. Short form, once you go armored properly, you won't go back.

I'm the fencer Chibba's talking about, and I'm at 2/2/2/2. I don't PvP, and I fight kinetic-damage mobs almost exclusively. I also always solo.

"Her findings - if she uses a small knife (which requires spamming specials since each special does less damage), then a full set of armor is too heavy to use. If she uses a large blade (which is slower but does more damage and requires less spamming), then wearing a full set is far preferable."

To clarify, here's my strategy. I have a set of advanced Ubese. When initiating combat, I wear the gloves, bracers, shirt, pants, and boots, and use a vibroblade to get off blind, bleed, and a few 1HHit2s. Then I equip my hotkeyed jacket and helm and pull out my damage-sliced curved sword and sit back until the mob's nearly dead, when I spam a few body hits.

It's true that chitin will keep me alive a lot longer in a group of mobs, but I find that when I'm soloing, the hotkeyed ubese setup is more versatile, since I can choose my specials strategy by hitting a couple of hotkeys.

I've found that mabari is a good secondary choice to clothing. When wearing a full set, you lose a very insignificant amount of HAM (110/70/70). In turn, you get the "light armor" rating. This means you'll automatically take half as much damage from creatures with no armor piercing. A bonus is that it's effective against kinetic, energy, blast, restraint, and heat, and only vulnerable to stun (very rare), acid, and electricity.

Not very great for PvP since acid and electricity is fairly common, but even if you find a creature that uses an attack you are vulnerable to - that's no big deal since it's just a small infringment against your HAM.

Mabari doesn't offer Energy protection.

Another option to consider for those who think armor is too heavy is a simple Ubese shirt. It has no HAM costs at all and no protection %, but it is considered Light Armor, which means you'll take half damage from anyone with a non-armor piercing weapon.

Name: Eva
Server: Shadowfire

Well, good to see your posting on this form chibba, your the top armorsmith I work with on shadowfire. Anyhow, heavier armor has its benifits in PVE but most of my testing an results are field testing in player vs player. Its the only way I can find the most effective armor for the job. Last night chibba made some very specialized tantel chest plates which I am happy to inform does alot better then the standard mill of the run or experminted upon armors. I have been feild testing this in PVE an in PVP. The results are impressive far an beyound what I orginal expected, for it being such a light armor it offers very good protection all around.

The armor that chibba made for me was out of pure creativity that he came across Rancor enhansed tantel armor. I am not sure how he made it or what is used into making the armor. But the armor gives pretty much 14+ resistances to all areas. From kentic down to acid. The high points of this armor is that you gain 29 engery protection an around 20 heat protection. The encumberance cost is 20pts less then your basic tantel. This armor aslo adds +3 to your move costs, so in short its a very light armor giving you near padded protection. I am very pleased with this armor as it seams to be one of the best armors I ever came across. After getting the two identical sets of armors spliced, one set had an 30% reduction to encumberance. The other had an 23% incress to effectiveness or resistances.