Weight & Encumbrance (Split from RAT)

[Delirium]

The weight of armor and weapons needs to be seriously looked at.

A person of average strength should be able to wear full leather armor and weaponry and be at light encumbrance, no problem.

High strength characters have a ridiculously overpowered ability to actually wear armor AND hit more/harder.

Either tie endurance to strength for encumbrance purposes, or lower the weights of armor and weaponry across the board. Or both.

[nauta]

The weight of armor and weapons needs to be seriously looked at.

A person of average strength should be able to wear full leather armor and weaponry and be at light encumbrance, no problem.

High strength characters have a ridiculously overpowered ability to actually wear armor AND hit more/harder.

Either tie endurance to strength for encumbrance purposes, or lower the weights of armor and weaponry across the board. Or both.

Oh! And then maybe people can stash their armour in their packs when they go into the bar!

[Jingo]

Whoah there. Let's not get too hasty. (I've only been saying this for the last ten years.)

[hyzhenhok]

Probably the only way to get people to play with armor realistically would be to implement wear and tear just from wearing it and exposing it to the elements. (This would also make the armor repair skill less useless.)

You'd probably want to code in some quick-dress/undress commands so the change doesn't unduly affect playability. I'd implement a >strip and >dress command. When used on their own, they would dump your worn items into the room, or pick items up from the room and wear them. They would also be able to target containers, so you could >strip shelf and >dress chest for easy organization of and access to your outfits.

[Quell]

Probably the only way to get people to play with armor realistically would be to implement wear and tear just from wearing it and exposing it to the elements. (This would also make the armor repair skill less useless.)

You'd probably want to code in some quick-dress/undress commands so the change doesn't unduly affect playability. I'd implement a >strip and >dress command. When used on their own, they would dump your worn items into the room, or pick items up from the room and wear them. They would also be able to target containers, so you could >strip shelf and >dress chest for easy organization of and access to your outfits.

I think just having a quick undress, quick redress code would work for most people.

9 times out of 10 when my characters are dressed inappropriately it's out of laziness. The other 1 time out of time is because I forgot what I was wearing. Neither of these situations are ideally fixed by armor decay.

[BadSkeelz]

I actually forgo changing out of armor into something more comfortably usually because I don't want to be carrying the extra few stones of comfortableness around in my pack.

[Jingo]

Just make encumbrance (and weldable encumbrance) a race-based integer and soften stat thresholds across the board.

Jesus. Just make all stats race based integers that only have a marginal threshold of two or three.

[CodeMaster]

I love the idea of adding endurance to the encumbrance calc in some way.

[wizturbo]

Pretty sure Armageddon's carrying thresholds are based on D&D which is extremely punishing for low strength characters, and extremely forgiving for high strength characters.  The weight of items isn't the issue, if those are reduced then high strength characters can walk around with a wagon full of shit in their packs instead of the already massive amount of crap they can haul now.  Also, going through all of the armors and weapons in Arm and editing their weight doesn't sound like a very fun task...

Just give lower strength characters more base encumbrance, problem solved.

[BadSkeelz]

Armageddon items do tend to be pretty damn heavy, which doesn't help matters. While it could be argued that an "average" strength Zalanthan has no business wearing 40 pounds of leather armor and swinging a 15 pound longsword, without a means to ensure our PCs have good stats or the ability to raise functionally poor stats it means any combat PC is probably going to be prioritizing strength in the hopes of getting very good or better so they can equip themselves without taking a defense penalty. A market of high-strength PCs encourages the creation of items fit for these high-strength PCs (heavy armor, heavy weapons, heavy draw bows). Since the speed of new item creation is limited, it skews the supply of items towards those fit for high strength PCs.

I suppose this is all off topic to my original point of why my PCs don't dress sexy. I do wish things like clothes and rings had less weight than they do (I think jewelry might already be less than stone a piece, it just can't display that).

[nauta]

I'm not sure I mentioned this idea, but what if:

You could rent your armor or clothes at the bar/stables for free or a nominal fee of one sid.  In fact, what if the command would also just switch you out of the set you have on for the set you have rented, ala hyzenhook's suggestion above.

Either that or make the Morph's Magick Bag Of A Spare Shirt and Pants, which weighs zero and contains a spare shirt and pants.

[Delirium]

"As leading sword expert Ewart Oakeshott unequivocally stated: "Medieval Swords are neither unwieldably heavy nor all alike - the average weight of any one of normal size is between 2.5 lb. and 3.5 lbs. Even the big hand-and-a-half 'war' swords rarely weigh more than 4.5 lbs."

Armor and weapon weights are Too Damn High! Also everything wizturbo said.

I guess I should split this out into a new thread since it's not really a random thought any more.

[BadSkeelz]

I'm not sure I mentioned this idea, but what if:

You could rent your armor or clothes at the bar/stables for free or a nominal fee of one sid.  In fact, what if the command would also just switch you out of the set you have on for the set you have rented, ala hyzenhook's suggestion above.

Make it a separate dressing room to hide the spam/maintain the illusion that we're not stripping down right in the Gaj and that'd be kind of cool.

"As leading sword expert Ewart Oakeshott unequivocally stated: "Medieval Swords are neither unwieldably heavy nor all alike - the average weight of any one of normal size is between 2.5 lb. and 3.5 lbs. Even the big hand-and-a-half 'war' swords rarely weigh more than 4.5 lbs."

Armor and weapon weights are Too Damn High! Also everything wizturbo said.

Medieval swords weren't also typically carved out of solid rock or giant magickal bones able to hold an edge. I'm not saying the weight of Armageddon gear is wrong for the setting. It's just really heavy. I wish I could see the weight as an encouragement to use less armor (like Dark Sun art seems to depict everyone as doing) ... but krath are you playing with fire there.

[Jihelu]

Last I checked we weren't carving most weapons out of solid rock.
Most tend to be obsidian tipped or handled.
A pound of obsidian isn't that much though so I could see obsidian weapons having a higher weight than things like wood but I'm not so sure about bone being that heavy as my muscles move my bones around just fine.

[Delirium]

Fantasy game is fantasy. I don't care if we'ere working with stone or oliphant flesh. I am kind of sick of broken systems that offer options but only one viable option.

Because I missed this one in the thread split.

[Dalmeth]

Does anyone really want what armor we can or cannot wear to be determined by random stats?

[Case]

I'll still advocate for an armor wearing skill.

There are ways to way wearing armor 24/7 more punitive, but I'm kinda mixed on it. It would be nice to see people in clothing more often. I make an effort on all my martial PCs to.

[Case]

Does anyone really want what armor we can or cannot wear to be determined by random stats?

Strongly influenced by stat preference. Geez.

[Jihelu]

Simple.
Add the samurai class that fights without armor and uses katanas.
Or everyone roll up pcs that do this and make people who dont feel different
ez

[BadSkeelz]

Samurai fought with tons of armor.

/nerd

[evilcabbage]

samurai who don't wear armor huh.

[Armaddict]

I posted about this not long ago.

Leather armor, in particular...is incredibly heavy.  Was not a big deal long ago when the code was created, because 'manageable' encumbrance was not a big deal.  But there has been modification made to what encumbrance affects, and the strength of agility, which makes walking around at manageable not a good idea.  Plz rebalance leather weights.

As far as basing it on stats...I have no problems with it being based on your strength, but leathers, in particular, are just too heavy for it.

[nauta]

There are ways to way wearing armor 24/7 more punitive, but I'm kinda mixed on it. It would be nice to see people in clothing more often. I make an effort on all my martial PCs to.

Yeah, punitive seems like it'd have a load of bad things attached to it, but what I'd like to see is perhaps ways to make not always wearing your armor / switching clothing made less punitive.

Right now, there are even coded reasons to not.

o Clothes are heavy, and so if you are in the field and your choice is between that torch and that dress and moving from easily manageable to manageable (or whatever): out goes the dress.

o It's a PITA (spammy and requires custom triggers) to change clothes.

o You have to lug all that armour around inside the city.

So on, and so on.  If we can make the Great Clothes Change into something that's easier or at least not punitive, then I think we'd see more people doing it.

[Jihelu]

My original comment about samurai not wearing armor stands.
Just because I'm stupid doesn't mean I can't dream!


Maybe making armor weigh a shit to isn't the issue but adding a bigger benefit to wearing items would be better.
IE:
That 15 stone armor only 'weighs' like 6 stones when wearing or some shit idk isnt it already that good.

[Dresan]

I've brought this up before as well right here: http://gdb.armageddon.org/index.php/topic,50620.msg927618.html#msg927618 (take a quick look)

Good and very good strength on a human isn't that great in terms of encumberance, even with leather armors. You don't really need to be loaded with much more for it to suck. After all, just two good weapons can be pretty heavy too.

[BadSkeelz]

Good and very good strength on a human isn't that great in terms of encumberance, even with leather armors. You don't really need to be loaded with much more for it to suck. After all, just two good weapons can be pretty heavy too.

My above average strength human ranger carried only a single spear (and a knife) for good reason. Managing armor and encumbrance was also a challenge, but not an insurmountable one. It just meant he wore less than my Extremely Good human warrior. If I had gone on, I'd of had to change my playstyle as well (less melee, more ranger).

I don't think everyone should be able to carry two field weapons, wear a full set of scrab plate and not even need to pack their water on their mount. But the space between being able to wear "a lot of armor" and "no armor" seems very narrow. I don't know if I would risk melee combat wearing "no armor" and I'm not sure that's a bad thing. One of the reason skills like sneaking and assassinations developed was because not everyone has the means or ability to dress up in armor and go toe-to-toe with someone else dressed like that. Know who can kill things without needing to wear a lot of armor in Armageddon? Assassins.

Weapons and armor is heavy, yes. It causes us to do a lot of juggling to make sure our encumbrance level is right. That's annoying. But is it really a problem? Or is it realistic for weaker characters to have to compensate for their weakness?

It would be nice if we had some means of improving our stats in game (better diet, exercise) over long periods without it being a total dice roll.

[BadSkeelz]

I'll also admit that I never leave my arms or armor laying around my apartment while I go out clubbing in my new dugs because I'm paranoid someone is going to steal it all.

[Refugee]

It's pretty detrimental to a combat PC to have 4k worth of armor stolen because he put on clothing to go out for a night of drinking.  Now he has lost something that has taken him a long time to amass, that's critical to his life, and critical to making money to replace it. 

As long as thieves can sneak into apartments and carry out a full set of heavy armor without being noticed by apartment guards, and sell it in the bazaar without any chance of recognition or consequence, I think you have to give the warrior a bye for not wanting to leave it behind.

[BadSkeelz]

It's a great incentive to join clans, too, as their lockers are (generally) more secure.

[Refugee]

Yes indeed.

But it's unfair, I think, to cherrypick one thing for realism while disregarding the thoroughly unrealistic corollaries.

[Dresan]

The only incentive a clan needs is to simply be fun to play in....but thats another thread.

[Molten Heart]

IMO, Realism should be the goal when it doesn't detract from allowing players to engage in meaningful role-playing and is also fun.
Otherwise suspension of disbelief is required, it's always required.

[IAmJacksOpinion]

I agree with BadSkeels, that a lot of the leather is questionably heavy. I tried to play out my last "gud" fighter as a speed fighter (I went "agi str" *gasp*) and thusly tried to purchase some decent-quality studded leather armor, only to find out that an obsidian studded leather vest was only a couple stones lighter than my beetle shell cuirass, and the pants... were heavier than both pieces of armor. Combined. It would be nice to have an initiative where players could bug questionable pieces of armor for weight reclassification.

Apart from that, the main problem I have with armor weight in Zalanthas is that your strength score is the only incentive to wearing lighter armor, as the documents suggest many should be doing anyways. I think I started a thread a year or two ago about this, but the only thing that seems to hinder combat or skill performance is the encumbrance score in your stat output.  What I would LIKE to see is something similar to D&Ds "armor check penalty" and "max dex bonus" systems, whereby heavy armor encumbers you and limits your movement, no matter how strong you are. 

In doing this, characters in heavier armors would have a reduced ability to climb, skin, sneak, shoot bows, and other agi-based skills. They'd also be less dodgy in melee combat, but hopefully having slabs of obsidian strapped to your wrists would compensate for that. As it is now, there's no coded incentive for us to play The Red Viper - the code only benefits The Mountain. Offensively, defensively, and otherwise. Which is sad, because there's a reason he chose to fight with a spear and light armor in that scene - because it's effective.

[Desertman]

I've never found this to be a major issue for me.

I had a human ranger with above average strength who wore full armor (leather-reinforced sandcloth, every body part covered), a bow, two swords, eight knives, two sheathes, a belt, a pack full of healing/medical gear, two light sources, a skin of water, a full quiver, and a couple of pouches with this and thats needed from time to time (coins, tickets, two sentimental trinkets). I'm probably even forgetting a couple of things.

My encumbrance stayed at manageable which never seemed to affect me in any noticeable way.

I never once thought to myself, "I sure wish I could get more stuff because this just isn't cutting it.". I had more than I needed on me at all times by a pretty wide margin.

Maybe I'm doing it wrong but this seems like a non-issue for my play experience personally. If all of that gear wasn't enough to be considered "playable" with only above average strength on a standard human...you guys must be doing things I'm not doing.

[Dalmeth]

Best penalty to cover the encumbrance of heavy armor and its unwieldliness to wear : have all heavy armor torsos cover the <worn on back> slot.

From what I've seen and read, armor technology is not a range based on materials.  It always advances in terms of weight.  The less armor material weighs, the more you can put on there.

It is possible to make armor from linen that will make arrows significantly less likely to kill you (not protect you), but it involves gluing about 50-60 layers of linen together.  That's heavy, hot, and hard to move in.  It would be lighter and a lot less labor to use leather. You can also get even lighter and distribute the hard labor between more people if you make it out of iron.

So it might be best to assign an encumbrance level per race.  Stronger races can just wear rawhide and get armor that lasts forever at the expense of enormous weight.

Finer armor should probably be relatively delicate and require constant repair.   They don't need to cost much more, but the repair bill should be pretty hefty.

Just make them start getting nicked almost immediately to trigger people's OCD.

[BadSkeelz]

I agree with BadSkeels, that a lot of the leather is questionably heavy. I tried to play out my last "gud" fighter as a speed fighter (I went "agi str" *gasp*) and thusly tried to purchase some decent-quality studded leather armor, only to find out that an obsidian studded leather vest was only a couple stones lighter than my beetle shell cuirass, and the pants... were heavier than both pieces of armor. Combined. It would be nice to have an initiative where players could bug questionable pieces of armor for weight reclassification.

Well, one thing we should all remember is that studded leather armor is not something like motorcycle leathers, or leather clothing as we'd think of it. True leather armor is armor and quite heavy and bulky in real life. We shouldn't think of leather as light armor just because it's leather. Better to think of it as medium armor, which is probably the heaviest armor most Zalanthans would be able to afford.

True light armor is what Desertman described - leather-reinforced sandcloth. Which is essentially burlap with leather reinforcement, skewing closer to reinforced clothing that I think a lot of people think of when they think about leather armor. Anything less than that is clothing (which might have stealth bonuses) which could give maximum mobility (assuming the clothing isn't restricted - no ninja moves in a toga) but isn't something you could really expect to protect you.


I think there's a point on the strength scale where it makes more sense to forgo true armor almost entirely. I wonder if it's in the right spot - my Above Average ranger had a helmet, gorget, and chest piece of not terrible quality, and that seems about right to me.

Apart from that, the main problem I have with armor weight in Zalanthas is that your strength score is the only incentive to wearing lighter armor, as the documents suggest many should be doing anyways. I think I started a thread a year or two ago about this, but the only thing that seems to hinder combat or skill performance is the encumbrance score in your stat output.  What I would LIKE to see is something similar to D&Ds "armor check penalty" and "max dex bonus" systems, whereby heavy armor encumbers you and limits your movement, no matter how strong you are.

This is a fair point. I do think there are incentives for limiting your armor and keeping your encumbrance low, especially if your PC is not a super-strong one. I've not yet had the guts to go full naked in combat and see what happens. I'm a little leery of further penalties for wearing heavy armor, but I'll admit I'm biased here.

In doing this, characters in heavier armors would have a reduced ability to climb, skin, sneak, shoot bows, and other agi-based skills. They'd also be less dodgy in melee combat, but hopefully having slabs of obsidian strapped to your wrists would compensate for that. As it is now, there's no coded incentive for us to play The Red Viper - the code only benefits The Mountain. Offensively, defensively, and otherwise. Which is sad, because there's a reason he chose to fight with a spear and light armor in that scene - because it's effective.

I already believe your first 2 sentences here are true. Heavy armor (whether because of equipment-based debuffs or simply from encumbrance) do discourage you from wearing them while performing most agility-based activities. It's also harder to dodge while being encumbered. "Having slabs of obsidian strapped to your wrists" seems like a ridiculous compromise to me, given the weight of stone and how much more tiring that would be on your arms, but I'd definitely wear some sort of bracers.

I'll also disagree about the Red Viper fighting style not being possible. It totally is, I've seen it done, and I've even heard of people fighting giants using it... sometimes to no greater success than the Red Viper found. The fight was a much closer thing in the books; if the Viper had slipped up once he would have been cut in half. His fighting style was explicitly gladiatorial and flashy. He might have been equipped like a Dornish spearmen - medium armor (relative to the setting), shield, long spear - but if real life is anything to go on, actual Dornish spearmen probably do not fight with a bunch of acrobatics.

[Case]

Leather is hard to move in

Properly made plate armor is easy to move in (not that we have metals available)

[Synthesis]

I had a ranger with below-average strength...went around with no armor at all.  It was basically fine in PvE once his base D got some love, but I had prioritized agility, so he was really dodgy.  Never got into a PvP fight with him, but he wrecked Red Desert gith pretty hard.

Died in typical Northlands fashion:  bahamet to the face while AFK.  Nothing armor would've done about that.

[evilcabbage]

properly made plate armor (a full set) also was "maybe" 40-50 pounds?

and these were dudes who would run and jump and skip and hop and spar and play in these armors.

so.

yeah.

they were not 'heavily encumbered", it was probably more like lightly encumbered.

[nauta]

properly made plate armor (a full set) also was "maybe" 40-50 pounds?

and these were dudes who would run and jump and skip and hop and spar and play in these armors.

so.

yeah.

they were not 'heavily encumbered", it was probably more like lightly encumbered.

Well, strictly speaking, on Arm you can jump, skip, hop, and spar all while at unbelievably heavy. 

You just can't move very far.  (Unrelated, but I've always wondered why each round of sparring/fighting didn't take little whacks to your endurance or stamina or whatever that stat is.  Probably the answer is playability.)

[Molten Heart]

In regards to wearing armor, something more simple might be some kind of armor wearing ability. An ability like this might gauge how well someone carried themselves while wearing armor. This ability might improve after someone's been wearing armor for a while. It could just raise someone's strength but to avoid complicating the other things that strength effects, it could just make worn armor have less effect on encumbrance. Warriors would definitely get this ability, and possibly any mundane class to a lesser degree.

Of course this a code change and something staff would have to discuss as a whole and then have a coder create which is kind of a big deal, but as far as an idea I'm just tossing it out there to think about and maybe change or inspire someone else for another way to make game play more fun, realisic, and intuitive.


(edited for serial comma)

[Case]

In regards to wearing armor, something more simple might be some kind of armor wearing ability. An ability like this might gauge how well someone carried themselves while wearing armor. This ability might improve after someone's been wearing armor for a while. It could just raise someone's strength but to avoid complicating the other things that strength effects, it could just make worn armor have less effect on encumbrance. Warriors would definitely get this ability, and possibly any mundane class to a lesser degree.

Yeah I posted it earlier

[Molten Heart]

You're too smart for mine and your own good.

[Delirium]

That could be a cool perk for warriors (and to a limited, maybe mid-level capped extent, rangers and assassins).

That doesn't solve the issue of encumbrance though.

You start receiving pretty hefty penalties as soon as you get above "light" which severely skews benefits toward strong PCs.

That's why I suggested combining carry weight with endurance, since it'd best reflect the whole idea of being able to deal with the weight of your gear.

Por que no los dos?

[Synthesis]

I really don't like the idea of an armor use skill.  Reasons:

1.  It seems like a work-around for the real problem, which is seeming utter lack of quality control standards for item creation over the years.

2.  The guilds/subguilds that would get it at higher levels, realistically, are already gods of combat...and this would give them yet another advantage in that regard.

3.  "wearing of armor" as a skill seems...kind of stupid.

[Desertman]

I'm not sure what the coded penalties are.

I don't have access to the code.

I know I stealthed around at manageable and don't recall failing often/hardly ever. Master "Scanners" couldn't see me. Whatever the negatives are, they aren't game breaking in the least. I had average human agility, master sneak/hide, and stealth gear.

I'm sure the stealth gear helped a fair bit, my agility was shit, my skill was high. Either way, encumbrance at manageable wasn't something that couldn't be worked around to still be extremely effective.

[valeria]

It's not like you can't prioritize strength if you want to wear decently heavy armor.

I've never had a problem with leather armor encumbrance on any pc except my str-last delf merchant, and I prefer to roll around at easily manageable at the heaviest. It sounds like the one set of leggings described was probably bugged.

Not all PCs should be able to wear whatever armor they want. I think the balance is about right for most purposes.

[Synthesis]

It seems like it's a straight penalty to agility, because when you're encumbered, you also seem to fail more often at other agility-check tasks like crafting, climbing, and skinning.  It's not just a combat penalty.

[Delirium]

You also attack more slowly.

[Molten Heart]

It'd be good if there were more refined weights and measures in the game. Originally objects had a weight calculated in stones/kilograms, with no smaller units. So feathers, keys, rolling papers, scrolls, and other small objects would all weigh one kilo each. For the Americans, like me, a kilo is about 2.2lbs. That's can get messed up and staff fixed it to allow for smaller units of mass for objects. It'd be good if the objects were gone through with a fine tooth comb and adjusted, it's a big and boring job for someone on staff. I wonder if they wouldn't rather go rearrange their sock drawer. Personally I would't blame them.

Something else, there's no measure of volume in the game. Drink containers have volume but that's all. Objects volume is determined by it's weight. The limits of a container is set by the weight of the objects only, A twenty foot pole weighs only one stone it's going to fit into a backpack and it will close.  As far as realism goes, this is a pretty big flaw in the basics of the code. Is it a big deal? I don't think it is, but it also makes weight more than a measure of weight but also size. This complicates things. I don't know a good solution. It'd be nice if some things weighed less. Rather then most objects, especially larger objects like weapons and armor weighting 1 kilo/stone or 2 killos/stones, that they have more in variations in size/weight like  1.2 stones or 3.75 stones. Cutting out little chunks of weight here and there in each individual item could really add up and free up some extra muscle power for those packing around several of these items.

[Case]

I really don't like the idea of an armor use skill.  Reasons:

1.  It seems like a work-around for the real problem, which is seeming utter lack of quality control standards for item creation over the years.

2.  The guilds/subguilds that would get it at higher levels, realistically, are already gods of combat...and this would give them yet another advantage in that regard.

3.  "wearing of armor" as a skill seems...kind of stupid.

Not really any worse than direction sense or something

Just a skill for something a bit less tangible

[BadSkeelz]

I'm still trying to pinpoint what exactly the problem is.

Going back to your Original Post, Delirium,

A person of average strength should be able to wear full leather armor and weaponry and be at light encumbrance, no problem.

I'd dispute this on the grounds of whether that leather armor is light or not. A person of average strength should be able to wear some armor, or a full set of light armor (which probably isn't effective except against smaller beast bites) and presumably relying on their agility for defense. This seems to be the reality of the game now, and I'm largely OK with that.

A problem here is that some items that should be light (sandcloth+leather clothing, explicitly light armor) may not be very light at all. I agree with Synthesis that this probably stems from a lack of QC for item creation, and with Molten Heart that it could use standardization. It's exacerbated by Value (unless you have it) being a pretty unreliable skill, making it difficult to check a gear's weight without wearing it. I doubt this will every get closely looked at, though you should bug items that seem obscenely heavy (like a pair of 150lb pants I can think of).

An unarmored character (whether by choice or or not) should not be looking to get in to straight-up fights with heavily armed, heavily armored opponents anyway. This is why skills like archery, throwing, backstab, sap, and poison exist.

[Delirium]

There's a duster that has to weigh at least 3 stone.. which is ~7 pounds.

Weights are very inconsistent and definitely skewed toward being too heavy.

A human of average strength wearing only light (sandcloth/leather) armor, a cloak, a helmet, a few weapons, a waterskin, and a bow & quiver? You're at manageable, which means you lose all the advantages light armor should give you (lighter weight, more maneuverability, i.e. an "agility" fighter). Or you have to pack everything except your armor and weapons, which might get you to easily manageable.

So the agility fighter concept goes out the window right quick.

Meanwhile a high strength character gets to wear all that or more, plus hit harder, hit faster, and be harder TO hit.

[BadSkeelz]

There's a duster that has to weigh at least 3 stone.. which is ~7 pounds.

Weights are very inconsistent and definitely skewed toward being too heavy.

Agreed.

A human of average strength wearing only light (sandcloth/leather) armor, a cloak, a helmet, a few weapons, a waterskin, and a bow & quiver? You're at manageable, which means you lose all the advantages light armor should give you (lighter weight, more maneuverability, i.e. an "agility" fighter). Or you have to pack everything except your armor and weapons, which might get you to easily manageable.

This actually seems to be a reasonable situation to face, to me. Water is heavy. A "Few" weapons (depending on size) can quickly add up. Bows and arrows do seem to be slanted towards heavy.  You should be making decisions over what your character actually needs to be wearing at that moment. The pack (with water), quiver, and bow can probably go on the mount until you need it. A Desert Elf doesn't have a mount, but they're something of a special case.

So the agility fighter concept goes out the window right quick.

Anecdotal suggests otherwise... as long as your character is making the above choices about what they actually need to be carrying on them.

Meanwhile a high strength character gets to wear all that or more, plus hit harder, hit faster, and be harder TO hit.

Yes, which is why I always prioritize strength (followed by agility) on my melee-focused PCs. That doesn't seem fundamentally wrong to me. Robes weighing seven pounds or more seems wrong.

[Desertman]

The average person isn't really supposed to be a combatant for a living in reality.

Fighters (people you would expect to have any reason at all to be in armor) are not people who are average when it comes to physical prowess.

Even the fighter who depends on speed is still stronger than an average person.  They are just weaker than other fighters who also train to be fighters.

Even the weakest fighters at my gym who train to be fighters are much stronger than your average person. Why? Because they train to be fighters.

These are the people you would expect to find wearing armor every day if this were the 17th century or Zalanthas.

People with average strength, in reality, shouldn't be wearing armor every day and acting as though they are trained fighters. They should be doing average people things.

Arguing having average strength means you should be able to conduct yourself in full armor like an actual fighter because of "realism", is in fact, not realistic in any way.


With that being said, I don't think having average strength should make you unable to be a fighter in-game for playability reasons.

I'm fine arguing playability, but not realism.

The realism argument works against this.

[BadSkeelz]

It does friggin suck when your PC with a fighter background, a fighter mdesc, a fighter guild and subguild, and fighter prioritization, comes out of the gate with average stats. The realism argument works up to the point where our RNG stats work against us and leave us with no recourse for improvement.

[Desertman]

It does friggin suck when your PC with a fighter background, a fighter mdesc, a fighter guild and subguild, and fighter prioritization, comes out of the gate with average stats. The realism argument works up to the point where our RNG stats work against us and leave us with no recourse for improvement.

Agreed. Though the ability to prioritize helps a lot with this these days.

[IAmJacksOpinion]

This is a fair point. I do think there are incentives for limiting your armor and keeping your encumbrance low, especially if your PC is not a super-strong one.
...
Heavy armor (whether because of equipment-based debuffs or simply from encumbrance) do discourage you from wearing them while performing most agility-based activities. It's also harder to dodge while being encumbered. "

Maybe it's something that we should Ask the Staff about, but I feel like the only real negatives come directly from your encumbrance rating, which is derived from the weight of your eq/inventory, and your strength. What I'm saying is that, if I'm strong enough to wear a full suit of scrab shell armor and only be at light encumbrance, there's absolutely no benefit to me wearing sandcloth and leather armor with the same character. And I don't think that's the best system, because even if I'm physically strong enough to wear heavy armors, they're still going to limit my movements. Yes, I've seen the video on youtube of the guy doing cartwheels in platemail. But lets not pretend he couldn't have cartwheeled more easily and more gracefully if he'd been wearing a sweatsuit.

I'll also disagree about the Red Viper fighting style not being possible. It totally is, I've seen it done, and I've even heard of people fighting giants using it... sometimes to no greater success than the Red Viper found. The fight was a much closer thing in the books; if the Viper had slipped up once he would have been cut in half. His fighting style was explicitly gladiatorial and flashy. He might have been equipped like a Dornish spearmen - medium armor (relative to the setting), shield, long spear - but if real life is anything to go on, actual Dornish spearmen probably do not fight with a bunch of acrobatics.

Right. My last fighter that I spoke of was an exceptional agility, extremely good strength warrior. And I had on a few occasions laid wreck to giants in single combat while wearing leather armor. I could've done the same while wearing a head, neck, body, and wrists of kryl shell if I wanted to - I probably had the strength score for it. And I did read the books, and I remember there being a conversation between him and Tyrion where Tyrion was like "y u no wear armor", and Oberyn was like "Bro, dude EPs a greatsword. They don't make armor that stands up to that, so I gotta go light so I can get my full dex bonus to AC." But I guess maybe he was a lower strength character.

"Having slabs of obsidian strapped to your wrists" seems like a ridiculous compromise to me, given the weight of stone and how much more tiring that would be on your arms, but I'd definitely wear some sort of bracers.

A was referencing a real, fairly popular, piece of Zalanthan armor/idiocy. :p

Reading through these posts, its entirely possible I'm looking at this wrong too. I never fight higher than "easily manageable" unless it can be avoided. I find stepping from there to "manageable" makes me perform noticeably worse. But I also rarely wear any armor heavier than 10 stone, unless I'm a dwarf or giant... So when I see humans running around in the high end Kryl shell head to toe, I naturally assume they're max height/weight warriors with Exceptional strength. Is that true? Or are you guys all sacrificing manageable encumbrance for head to toe chitin?

For the record, I'm also partial to the "armor wearing" skill idea. It would be a nice little perk to throw warriors, who people seem to think are so gimped. I agree, it sounds odd as a "skill" at first, but I think if you framed it as familiarity with and practice of wearing armor into battle, you could get away with it. Even if platemail isn't as heavy and encumbering as some people seem to think, I have a hard time believing it's not awkward and tiring when you're getting used to it for the early parts of your career.

[BadSkeelz]

So when I see humans running around in the high end Kryl shell head to toe, I naturally assume they're max height/weight warriors with Exceptional strength. Is that true? Or are you guys all sacrificing manageable encumbrance for head to toe chitin?

Without actually seeing them in fight, it's impossible to say. They could be PCs with the stats or skills to pull that off. Or the PC could be bluffing, dressing as a badass to make you think they're a badass without having the actual ability to back it up. Or the player could just have no idea what they're doing beyond making their PC look cool.

[Case]

Last I played a poor strength human, I had no issues with wearing light armor :S

[Ender]

Without actually seeing them in fight, it's impossible to say. They could be PCs with the stats or skills to pull that off. Or the PC could be bluffing, dressing as a badass to make you think they're a badass without having the actual ability to back it up. Or the player could just have no idea what they're doing beyond making their PC look cool.

If they have to take a break to rest on the way to the Gaj, that might be a good indication.

[Dalmeth]

I've played a human with poor strength, and I had a lot of trouble wearing enough armor not to be reel-locked by the first carru I came across.

Yes, you can wear armor with poor strength, but you can't carry the spoils of whatever activity you were wearing armor for.

[Case]

I've played a human with poor strength, and I had a lot of trouble wearing enough armor not to be reel-locked by the first carru I came across.

Yes, you can wear armor with poor strength, but you can't carry the spoils of whatever activity you were wearing armor for.

but reel locking has little to do with armor and more to do with your skill against being reeled?

[Dalmeth]

but reel locking has little to do with armor and more to do with your skill against being reeled?

Nope.  I've both trained many newb characters and led them to their tragic death via some random accident.

A certain basic level of armor is always necessary until their skills are up, and that armor is pretty heavy.  One skin instead of two, or maybe just a gourd for water.

I'm almost inclined to say we have very little data on how effective the range of heavier armor is because so few people use it.

[Case]

but reel locking has little to do with armor and more to do with your skill against being reeled?

Nope.  I've both trained many newb characters and led them to their tragic death via some random accident.

A certain basic level of armor is always necessary until their skills are up, and that armor is pretty heavy.  One skin instead of two, or maybe just a gourd for water.

I'm almost inclined to say we have very little data on how effective the range of heavier armor is because so few people use it.

yeah you're wrong dude

[Synthesis]

I've played a human with poor strength, and I had a lot of trouble wearing enough armor not to be reel-locked by the first carru I came across.

Yes, you can wear armor with poor strength, but you can't carry the spoils of whatever activity you were wearing armor for.

but reel locking has little to do with armor and more to do with your skill against being reeled?

Uh, no.

You get reeled when you take a certain percentage of your maximum health or stun in a single shot.

That being said...if you're capable of being hit by a carru, you probably shouldn't be fighting carru.

#justsayin

Dalmeth, you're completely wrong about armor being necessary.  I've run no-armor with a d-elf warrior, two human rangers, countless rinthers, and it worked just fine.  The trick is to manage your expectations, know your skillset, and don't fight shit that a) can hit you regularly and b) hits hard.  Yes, there's a spot where it's dangerous, because a random scrab will roll exceptional stats across the board and fuck you up...but guess what...that same scrab would fuck you up just as badly if you were wearing armor.

Also:  don't be a hero.  Flee early, flee often.

The only time it might be "necessary" is if you're running hard melee PVP against another 1337 dude...in which case...why are you even doing that?  It's stupid.

[Case]

I've played a human with poor strength, and I had a lot of trouble wearing enough armor not to be reel-locked by the first carru I came across.

Yes, you can wear armor with poor strength, but you can't carry the spoils of whatever activity you were wearing armor for.

but reel locking has little to do with armor and more to do with your skill against being reeled?

Uh, no.

You get reeled when you take a certain percentage of your maximum health or stun in a single shot.

That being said...if you're capable of being hit by a carru, you probably shouldn't be fighting carru.

#justsayin

Dalmeth, you're completely wrong about armor being necessary.  I've run no-armor with a d-elf warrior, two human rangers, countless rinthers, and it worked just fine.  The trick is to manage your expectations, know your skillset, and don't fight shit that a) can hit you regularly and b) hits hard.  Yes, there's a spot where it's dangerous, because a random scrab will roll exceptional stats across the board and fuck you up...but guess what...that same scrab would fuck you up just as badly if you were wearing armor.

Also:  don't be a hero.  Flee early, flee often.

The only time it might be "necessary" is if you're running hard melee PVP against another 1337 dude...in which case...why are you even doing that?  It's stupid.

You get a chance to resist being reeled. It's a resistance and trainable. Hell, Gladiator gets a boost.

[Dalmeth]

That being said...if you're capable of being hit by a carru, you probably shouldn't be fighting carru.

Every character I've had that died to a carru had no intention of fighting a carru.  I've never been surprised by my results.

I've only considered policy when dealing with new characters and decided between acceptable burdens and acceptable losses.

But let's get to the point, because you're not really arguing against me :

I do think heavier armor should be less of a pain in the butt.  Whether this happens through a racial trait or a regulation of armor weights across the board makes no difference at all.

[RogueGunslinger]

I've played a human with poor strength, and I had a lot of trouble wearing enough armor not to be reel-locked by the first carru I came across.

Yes, you can wear armor with poor strength, but you can't carry the spoils of whatever activity you were wearing armor for.

but reel locking has little to do with armor and more to do with your skill against being reeled?

Uh, no.

You get reeled when you take a certain percentage of your maximum health or stun in a single shot.

That being said...if you're capable of being hit by a carru, you probably shouldn't be fighting carru.

#justsayin

Dalmeth, you're completely wrong about armor being necessary.  I've run no-armor with a d-elf warrior, two human rangers, countless rinthers, and it worked just fine.  The trick is to manage your expectations, know your skillset, and don't fight shit that a) can hit you regularly and b) hits hard.  Yes, there's a spot where it's dangerous, because a random scrab will roll exceptional stats across the board and fuck you up...but guess what...that same scrab would fuck you up just as badly if you were wearing armor.

Also:  don't be a hero.  Flee early, flee often.

The only time it might be "necessary" is if you're running hard melee PVP against another 1337 dude...in which case...why are you even doing that?  It's stupid.

You get a chance to resist being reeled. It's a resistance and trainable. Hell, Gladiator gets a boost.

This is a good assumption becuase I know reel tolerance is a thing. However my first thought was a bonus to natural defense, like a dwarf. Makes me wonder.

[Mordiggian]

I generally tweak items if I see that they have unusual weights. We have a largely standardized process for things like weight now and most items that exist outside these margins are older. If you see something that seems funky, hit it with an idea command.

It's important to keep in mind that Value is not always accurate.

[Synthesis]

I don't know where y'all are getting the idea that there's some sort of hidden reel-resistance skill, but I've never observed it.  Every time I've taken a shot worthy of getting reeled, I got reeled--hands down.

My guess was the gladatior verbiage meant they get a higher endurance or hp roll.

[Jihelu]

I'm 69% sure of hidden reel stat 2016

[Beethoven]

Reel resistance skill:

http://gdb.armageddon.org/index.php/topic,22964.msg242475.html#msg242475

[Case]

Reel resistance skill:

http://gdb.armageddon.org/index.php/topic,22964.msg242475.html#msg242475

That's also where I knew from.

Wtf Synthesis? You're been so off on your code and skill commentary lately, it's like you don't have your head in the game any more. Gotta want it man. Gotta 110% drop pack.

[Synthesis]

Okay, well.  I still haven't personally observed it.  You must have to GET RECKT a massive number of times for it to go up enough to be noticeable.

[Erythil]

What's the encumbrance number at which I can successfully dodge roll with i-frames?

[Jingo]

What's the encumbrance number at which I can successfully dodge roll with i-frames?

Just lag backstab them.

[Kryos]

For simplicity's sake, I'll just say that a 20-40% increase on encumbrance for all strength levels from elf - dwarfish would be nice for the lower two levels of encumbrance(light, easily managable).  A pretty big boost to the max lift too, in the 100% or doubling range, would be great for game play functionality.  What a healthy human can dead lift is usually more than their own weight and often by a large measure, but perhaps give a much more severe mv penalty for VERY heavy and unbelievably heavy too (1/3 to 1/2 % mv).

I suspect it easier to just bump the lift levels and mv costs than try to find every piece of something that is oddly weighted and fix it, and makes it less distracting in general.  But I am in agreement with the notion these need a redefining.

[roughneck]

I don't think it's a bad thing that you have to manage your encumbrance carefully. The issue, for the most part, isn't if you can wear armor or not with a weak character, it's the type of armor you can wear, and the trade-off of survival gear and armor.

When I play hunters/scouts I end up sacrificing armor to carry arrows, extra water and a tent.

When I play a tough warrior, I ditch the extra arrows (although may carry a few) and wear heavier armor and carry less water.

It seems like that makes sense.

Playing a warrior that can't wear a badass greathelm and silt shell plate might not seem cool to you, but it's definitely cooler than tribal delves running around in heavy plate or assassins ganking you while wearing a huge pack + two shoulder satchels on their back.

If anything were to change, I think it should be limiting would strong characters are able to get away with, not increasing what weak characters can carry.

[Dalmeth]

If anything were to change, I think it should be limiting would strong characters are able to get away with, not increasing what weak characters can carry.

Sounds like adding extra encumbrance reduction for worn armor might be a benefit along these lines.

I don't know if the current system can be picky enough to distinguish between worn clothing and things like quivers and packs.

[Armaddict]

I don't know if the current system can be picky enough to distinguish between worn clothing and things like quivers and packs.

Not sure how I stand on the idea as of yet, but I can tell you putting items into a backpack worn on your back reduces its weight modifier over if it's in your inventory or a bag in your inventory.  How extensive this sort of encumbrance code is, I'm unsure of, but it -is- already there in some form.