Okay, basic info on armour for people that care, and for all the people that keep asking me questions about it in game.

In General
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There are two majorly important statistics in armour, visible on weaponprobing - the cutting resistance and the blunt resistance. These grade the armour's ability to protect you against a certain proportion of that particular damage type that you encounter (uncertain of formula, if someone wants to provide it). Armour statistics seem to work off a single cap for the sum of these two numbers - ie, for a bit of armour with the sum of its statistics at maximum, a rise in one statistic is correlated to a drop in the other.

Armour comes in a variety of designs, called patterns (as opposed to types, which are leather/scale/chain etc). If you want to look pretty, or if you have a lot of cash to burn/time to go hunting wakabi or whatever other outlandish thing you need for your set, pick one that is not solely made of metal commodities. If you want a really, really good set of armour, buy all-metal suits (it does cost more to get the comms for all-metal armour), unless, obviously, you're wearing leather armour.

Pattern does not affect statistics in any significant manner from my data. Design does.

Fullplate - knight smiths.
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If you can make this, you know how expensive it is. Total stat cap is 218.

Fieldplate - knights.
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80+/80+ is a good set. Strongly recommended that you go for at least that stat level in your fieldplate, unless you're looking for specialised armour (biased towards cutting, for instance). Stats can reach >100 in one stat, but will be accompanied with a decrease in the other statistic (ie, 66/109, for instance). Maximum total stat appears to be 178. Commodity prices range by design/state of the market - you are, however, looking at between 18,000 and 30,000 gold for an all-metal suit.

Chain
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Grade below fieldplate. Not many people seem to go for this type of armour, though it does pop up every now and then. Only five public designs, none particularly fancy. Not really worth it, better to save for fieldplate. Statistics are a provisional 105-110 total stat cap (this is only a very, very rough guess).

Scale
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Grade below Chain. Again, fairly uncommon, with few public designs. Probably not worth it, unless you find making gold very hard.

Leather
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Leather is the odd one out of the armours. For an unrefined set (as typically given as freebies to new players), stats are 13/13 base. For refined sets, there is a fairly wide range of what you get - the average from my forging records is about 36/36, with a total cap around 80. However, some flukish leather has popped up lately - the stats were 49/60, for a cap of 109. With the addition of batting for some tailors, which allows proofing as if they were greatrobes, leather is gaining in popularity amongst some druids and some bards. The main advantage with leather is that it is cheap to make - a single leather commodity costs in the region of 15-20 gold, allowing bulk crafting (20 full sets cost roughly 4,500 gold in commodities). You do not, however, have the option to recover commodities from this armour type, but lower quality refined sets make good presents for newbies - they're probably better than what they're wearing at any given point anyway.

Head Protection, Greathelms and Armour Coverage
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Armour types up to fieldplate include a design that provides head protection, and typically come in four pieces, protecting the head, torso, legs and arms respectively. Head protection for these types of armour has similar statistics to the other designs within that type. However, at fieldplate, the single piece of armour protects torso, arms and legs. This means that a second piece of armour, the greathelm, is needed for head protection. Greathelms can be forged to a maximum stat of 178 (anything above this, while it does pop up from time to time, is exceedingly rare), and the same guidelines as for fieldplate should be employed when purchasing them.

Comment/correct, and I'll update it!

Changelog:
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30/10/06 - Added Tervic's comment about pattern not affecting statistical outcomes.
31/10/06 - Added Ildaudid's stat maxima, added head protection/greathelms/armour coverage section.
- Added a guesstimate to Chain based on Ceren's armour stats.

<3 for Cae!

However, I would like to add in big bold letters that

pattern does not make a difference in stats. Scale mail A will have the same statistical probablity of being good as Scale mail B.

but mastercrafted is still >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> otherwise.

is chainmail better then Greatrobes? If I recall, gaurdians can wear chain... although none do so I guess I answered my own question...

Guardians can actually wear chain.

The thing with greatrobes vs. chain is, even if the statistics are comparable, greatrobes can be proofed, offering further (magic, fire, frost) damage resistance as well as the cutting/blunt damage that they afford. Chain cannot, however.

You can still wear a proofed cloak with armour. I'm not sure about a proofed coat, because I don't know which layer most armours are, if they're considered overwear, then you can't. I'm pretty sure you cannot wear a proofed coat with leather armour, but since you have the batting (if you can find 100 silk), it doesn't matter so much there.

You can wear both a cloak and a coat over armour, last I checked, and each may be proofed differently.

But you won't have access to magical or electric proofings, while someone wearing robes can have all four.

Fullplate is 218------ 109/109 being a "perfectly balanced" set

Fieldplate is 178 ----- 89/89 being a "perfectly balanced " set

Greathelms are 178 ---- 89/89 same as above

Chain --- no one uses it

Scale ---- same as above, these are made normally for nov's just out of the portal

Leather --- Not sure, since I have never refined it but I think people were saying what 45/45 or something?


Oh well thats about all I know...

Really? This is possible?

I better get to work, then...



I think this cap is inaccurately listed. I have a helm right now that is 88/93.

nobody has forged a 109/109 since fullplate got nerfed.

You are lucky, my champ helm is only 90/90 and it is supposed to be a perfect helm. That still leaves me thinkin the cap is 179 max... but hey there are always random things thrown in. I did forge a 100/80 or 100/?? for someone once.

Helms are a bit higher than that Ild.

One person has come rather close to forging a 109/109 recently, so I don't think it's impossible.

Updated to include Ildaudid's stat info, and added a helm/head protection section.

Keep it coming, guys - this has already proven pretty useful as an Armour 101 thing for me for a couple of people.

I used to encourage novices and fresh graduates to get scale, because it's cheap and when you're done wearing it, you can smelt it down to get steel back for a fieldplate. However, I didn't know you can get good leather back then, and scale's stats aren't high enough when compared to crafted leather to make a difference which would be worth the price.

The way its "used" to be, was Full = 100/100 Field = 80/80 Chain = 60/60 Scale = 40/40 and Leather = 20/20... I would not be surprised if all the armours need to tested again to see whats really worth what.

I'd say it's accurage for full - a good set running about 100/100. Field, a good set above 80/80. There aren't the all-metal designs in chain or scale for me to test in a nice, long run (with practically no market for the armour, there's no real point in making it for sale, so it'd need smelting), and leather is excellent above 36/36 (the average from my data).

The Dragonscale cartel has an all metal chain design, which I had forged for me in the hopes that 60/60 chainmail was still possible. From what I saw, it isn't possible, but I only had it reforged a few times. If anyone's curious these are the stats I have.

Shirt: 46/43
Leggings: 44/47
Coif: 58/47

If any Dragonscale member wants to test it further, contact me IG and I'll give you my chainmail to work with.

The question is, is that with a hammer, or without?

I've been getting reports from non-hammer using forgers saying that 19/19 was about the best leather they could manage, so it's possible that the hammer presents a definite advantage in low-end armour (it practically disappears in the high-end)

I got a 26/25 leathearmour with crafting and my hammer. <.< I am just THAT bad.

Btw, how much do speedweapons go for? I mean, comms can be said about ~14-20k for all-metal-designs, how much does the forger add on top? I mean, I could make like 15k in that hour it takes me to forge a 280 speed hammer, and then some profit as well...40-50k gold?


If one of the designs available to me is all-metal, I am going to dedicate an hour or two to see what stats I get, kind of interested if it would be viable to use over robes.

Be cool if you can give me some info on anything not there.

I was going to post my forging cost criteria, but I'll leave that, as it'd get majorly off-topic.

That sounds about right to me. Without a forging hammer, I seem to average a stat total of 40 on leather. The best I've ever managed so far was 47.