Teras Kasi Archive

I need to know if any TKA's wear armor, I have never worn it personally but, has anyone found that it is more helpful than not?

I've talked more than 1 TKA into wearing kinetic ubese armor, and they're all totally amazed afterwards. Now that I'm master I don't wear it for normal killing (say typical stuff on Dathomir/Dantooine/whatever), but I put it on for killing things like red con nightsisters, rancors, faction missions, soloing force crystal hunters, etc). Its EXTREMELY useful to have around. For grinding up the tree? its invaluable! Especially if you have the cash to buy it until you get a full suit of ham sliced stuff. Keep in mind the difference between say 50% kinetic and 75% kinetic actually is rather small, so if you're low on cash don't be afraid to get some lower quality stuff. Just make sure it has high durability (I think I'm on to my third ubese jacket now..)

Buy a helmet,everything likes to hit us in the head.

I'm a big fan of encumbrance-optimized mabari armorweave lately. You can get this stuff super-light, and since it has kinetic resists (if you go full encumbrance, not much) you get the benefits of having light armor. If I have to tank something utterly huge, high resist ubese is going to be better, but for everyday use, low encumbrance mabari gives you that 50% light armor damage reduction against critters without killing you on specials. It's not so good against NPCs or players, though, since it has a lot of vulnerabilities.

As a former TKA with this character, Master Armorsmith, Master Smugglerand soon to be Master TKA on my alt I understand the system pretty well I think so I'll try to share. Armor usage is largely situational. Situational based on what damage type the mob you're fighting is dealing, based on if you're buffed or not, and what is buffed (ie breath of heaven reduces your special move costs, but maybe you just got hit in the leg and your action is low already so applying your knockdown/warcry with your armor on might not be the best idea.

What I'm doing is using advanced ubese with a kinetic layer, with every piece sliced for enc so it has the minimal amount of impact on my specials possible. I use an armor macro to take off all my armor and put my clothes on with just one button, so when I'm not fighting I get maximum regen. If you just knocked your target down and want to warcry, take your armor off, then warcry, save yourself the HAM. If you're starting out combat with maybe some pistol specials or something, have your armor off, then macro it all on when you start to take damage. Ubese with a kinetic layer is great against melee mobs. A 70% suit against a mob doing kinetic damage with armor piercing 0 (most things) Will only do 15% of their total damage to you. Wheras if you had 50% kinetic ubese you'd be seeing 25%. That's 66% more damage that you're taking with a 50% suit versus a 70% suit. It is worth it to get the highest % possible, if you want to really be a tank (we are supposed to be tanks right?) You can't get the kinetic resist sliced higher because it's in the special protection section of the armor, and special protections are not effected by effectiveness (Resist) slices.

If you're going up against nightsister, please do not use ubese. You want encumberence sliced composite for fighting high level mobs who do a variety of damage types (their pistols/rifles/carbines can do any kind of damage, it's randomly selected when the mob is generated for that mob, then it stays the same, so if it randomly selects electricity damage for their gun then that particular nightsister will always do electrical damage) And again, you macro it all on when you start taking damage. If your mind substats are high already (500 or so each) and you get doctor buffs for your other 6, then get a suit of advanced composite effectiveness sliced, should be able to get it 65-low 70% to all except elec (usually low-mid 60s) and stun (vulnerable, but almost nothing does stun damage). Ubese is amazing protection versus kinetic, and it'll cover you in a spot with a few other damage types, but if you want to be serious and fight the really high end stuff you need composite. The difference between absorbing 60% of damage (20% resist, which is what ubese's secondaries usually are, coupled with the 50% damage reduction for armor piercing 0, which is ubese's best case) and 80-85% of damage (60-70% composite) on a hit of 2000 from a nightsister is a difference of taking 800 versus taking 200-400. Two hits and you're dead versus 3-5 hits. Those extra rounds could let you land a kd2, stim yourself and actually win the fight. Now if the nightsister's weapon has an armor piercing > 0, which there's a good chance of, then the difference is even more pronounced, you take 1600 damage with the ubese absorbing 20% (if it's not vulnerable, which there's a good chance it is) versus the composite where you'll take (assuming 60%) 800.

The moral of the story is, if you want to be effective versus a variety of high end mobs, and vastly increase your tanking abilities, you need 2 sets of armor. Ideally encumberence sliced ubese for kinetic mobs, and encumberence sliced composite for high end faction/FS/nightsister/nym kind of hunting. Yes your specials hurt you slightly more while wearing armor, but if you don't think blocking 85% of kinetic damage is worth that trade off in pve, or actually living through more than 2 shots in pvp or npc w/ blaster type encounters, then I don't know what to tell you :-)

You have to understand your armor, understand what it's good for, and when you should use each suit. It's really not rocket science but doing so, coupled with an armor macro to minimize its downsides (slower regen, higher special move costs)will elevate you to a new level of effectiveness.

- Rorrak

A WHOLE set of armor or just a few good peices?(sorry, I suppose I didn't read it well enough)

I'm currently at 1/2/3/2 TKA and I personally wear 73% Full Ubese when I'm doing Melee (PvE) combat. The Armor is absorbing a lot of the damage, however you have to closely watch your mind when wearing the stuff during combat. I'm also a Master Smuggler and 4/0/0/4 Pistoleer so my mods are slightly different than a straight TKA. And for the record, I'm happier than a <insert lame analogy here> about dropping CH, and picking up TKA to go with being a Smuggler.

I wear a Composite Helmet when going up against higher end stuff. Its 63% kinetic, sliced for encumb, so its not too much of a burden.

I then buff out the rest of my stats to around 2-3k, so I dont really need to wear a full suit.

ubese for animals, composite for pvp/npcs.