Idea: Nerf reinforced armor. Nerf high-level armor

Game Talk The Drawing Board
1

The whole idea of “reinforcing” armor without raising its encumbrance is rather wonky. Realistically it has no good explanation, the gameplay effect is that cotton trenchcoats melt lead bullets.
I see two possible solutions:

[ul][li]Reinforcing becomes “padding” and raises encumbrance. Padding an armor shouldn’t take too much skill - you just add an extra layer of material.[/li]
[li]Reinforcing only protects the armor itself. This only makes sense for clothing, because factory-made armor should be way better than anything player can make.[/li][/ul]

A player shouldn’t be capable of strictly improving a factory-made armor piece. This is both totally unrealistic and harmful to scavenging: why scavenge fresh pieces when ones you make will be better AND you will still need to repair and reinforce anything you scavenge?

Next, there’s the issue of makeshift armor made of kevlar, leather and duct tape. Survivor armor has it all: 100% coverage, amazing armor values, good availability, low encumbrance and great environmental protection. It has no weak points, the only thing that makes it not totally better than regular armor is slots it occupies (kevlar vest is close to skin, for example).

It should lose some of those values.

Probably not a good idea to nerf:

[ul][li]100% coverage makes a lot of sense - you don’t want a nasty scratch from a rotting corpse. Plus, it actually makes sense that the survivor could improve that value over factory armor. That said, lowering it would help a lot with the OPness, though it could rob it of its role.[/li]
[li]Lowering the availability would only delay the problem. And wouldn’t help the slightest bit with realism of duct taped kevlar being better than a military-grade vest.[/li]
[li]Low encumbrance kinda competes with tailor kit reinforced items, so I guess it is acceptable here. Plus, the survivor would want low encumbrance to run around and haul stuff - the suit isn’t just the armor.[/li][/ul]

Good ones to nerf:

[ul][li]Great environmental protection makes it impossible to balance both survivor armors and items like hazmat etc. It’s always better to go for survivor armor. It doesn’t make a lot of sense that the armor can both fully protect from “elements” and kinetic force and have low encumbrance at the same time.[/li]
[li]Good armor values simply aren’t needed for an armor that is used mostly against things that look like angry humans. Exceptions are brutes and hulks, but armor shouldn’t be able to protect from those too much.[/li][/ul]

I’d lower the environmental protection to like 3, except for boots (5-7 for those), mask (not sure - leave it how it is?) and specialized gear (firesuits). This would allow rubber boots and similar gear to actually have a role. Same for firesuits.
Armor values could be knocked down a notch - the fact that the armor is 100% coverage is enough of a reason to grab any survivor gear that drops from survivor zeds and it would keep being a reason to craft the gear.

Any other ideas? Criticism?

2

An idea would be to separate “bullet” damage from “cutting” damage.

3

I like the idea of reinforcing only making the clothing less likely to be damaged. Kind of like you’re investing your resources to save in the long run. And with your clothing getting damaged less often, it sort of is protecting you more in a way, as the protection values go down when it’s damaged. That would be practically a straight nerf of reinforcing clothing though, so you might want to make it protect from damage a little bit more as well.

As for the survivor armor being too good, I know it’s somewhat a point of contention, but I really don’t see it in being in need of a nerf. It’s late game armor, made by well established survivors to excel in every area that they would need.

And giving bullets their own damage type, that could solve a few weird situations, but I think it would take a ton of effort to do it well, and make it all work together.

4

I’m with you in general, top-tier environmental protection should be limited to factory made items that can provide a full seal and well-designed filtering systems, it shouldn’t be possible to get just as good makeshift protection unless it’s at the cost of high encumbrance.
A nerf to reinforcement does not need a corresponding buff, armor was OP before reinforcing was added.
Another thought, designate some armors as un-reinforceable, there comes a point where just stitching more material on is not going to help. I’d prefer an explicit flag, but a cutoff based on armor value or material thickness might be workable too.

5

I’m on the fence about 100% coverage. On the one hand, no weak points. You can’t get sniped out of your own armor by something that you’d otherwise completely safe from, and after running around in mid-grade armor and getting slowly picked down by random lucky shots, I can safely say that at some point you need to have access to something with that kind of coverage. What it currently lacks is drawbacks.

I know kevlar is pretty light and tough, and duct tape is…well, duct tape. But the heavy stuff uses steel and quite a lot of kevlar. Maybe it needs to weigh more? And steel isn’t flexible, as I’m sure many are aware. Should be some stiff-ass stuff to shuffle around in if it’s going to be really good armor.

Idk, maybe survivor armor only really helps versus bullets/cutting damage. That IS what kevlar is used a lot in, yes? Bullet-retardent stuff? The steel would add some good blunt protection but it’s also like wearing a suit of platemail.

Light: enough environmental to shield from most things you’d run into in the field (perhaps moreso than normal, since it’s trading mass and durability for a contained environment for the wearer; that’s more or less the entire point of the suit). Only really good versus basic zeds and wildlife in terms of padding but hey, you made the lightest stuff available. At least you’re spitter-proof.

Medium: trades some of that environmental for additional mass and padding. Not very heavy but it’s starting to get a little harder to move around in. Does the general job armor should but either suit of lighter or heavier varieties does each of the tasks it manages better; this is the middle-ground. Covers all fields without being anything but average in all of them.

Heavy: Modern bootleg platemail armor. Stiff, thick, and heavy as hell. Also mostly bulletproof (except for military-grade, of course). You can hug a 9mm turret with this suit and MOSTLY be chill getting beat up by a horde of regulars, in exchange for the fact that if a horde shows up you might not necessarily be able to comfortably get away. Furthermore, getting slugged by a hulk should still hurt; so should explosions. There IS something squishy under that suit, and this thing is metal and kevlar literally duct taped together. Methinks less blunt resistance. Won’t make you impervious to damage but it makes you more or less cutting-proof until you find something that you should never, ever be immune to.

Winter: slightly bulkier Medium with fur traits. As one would expect. Just warm armor, basically. Maybe reduce environmental protection (except for the mask)? It has a very specific purpose.

6

I think Wally is on the right track: light armor should be very basic protection, medium needs a strong nerf, and heavy sounds be protective but very bulky, heavy, and encumbering.

Environmental protection needs to be vastly dropped. I’m ok with having a gas mask with full protection, but it needs more encumberance of the basic gas mask is at 3.

I think the idea of brutes/hulks/explosions still being deadly is important. “Kinetic damage” was a good suggestion before, and we still need to make sure getting thrown through a wall isn’t tankable. Light armor would be able to (hopefully) dodge the smashes, making it better against hulks while heavier armor should be better against hordes of regular zombies.

I think the ANBC suit should be used as a balancing point versus survivor armor: currently there’s no reason to use it at all.

7

I think the main perk of light is coverage of just the most basic attacks, like stray fists thrown by basic zed’s and that skeletal dog nipping at your ankles. It’s also got environmental as a priority, which has its own place late game when you start to really appreciate when everything and its mother starts belching acid at the slightest provocation. Also, at some point acid rain is going to be a thing ,and that’s going to have to be considered very seriously at some point.

It’s good scouting gear; it’ll let you run down something soft and weak and lets you push forward when it starts dripping acid from the sky, but as soon as something serious shows up you need to consider whether you can handle it with your skills or if you need to take the long way around.

Everything else is just armor. Higher environmental than average but just armor, basically.

8

Regarding reinforcing we do need some incentive for players to actually reinforce their gear. I think balancing it around specific armour values that make reinforcing either a good idea or a bad one is not very easily possible.
So, I’d rather have the abilit to reinforce my gear (which should be something I (almost) always want to do, but for balance-reasons make some of it have high skill requirements.

Slightly OT: It is still kinda wierd that the player can easily tailor clothes that are on-par with industrially produced stuff, maybe we need some changes here (preferably these won’t involve creating a “makeshift” recipe for every peace of clothing).

9

I don’t know if this is even possible, but how about making repairs on certain items have some sort of diminishing returns. Like, a factory made item like a hazmat suit. If it gets damaged, a survivor shouldn’t be able to completely repair it with just a soldering iron and all. Like a small but permanent reduction if the hazmat suit becomes damaged below its normal state.

10

Making all factory items start at current “reinforced”, but only letting the player repair up to 0 damage would help.
Instead of “reinforced” it would be “brand new”.

11

I think one of the easiest ways to nerf armor is to nerf their storage at the same time. High armor value items should have almost no storage on them. Also is it possible to have damaged items have worse coverage? Is that something we already have?

12

[quote=“Coolthulhu, post:10, topic:9701”]Making all factory items start at current “reinforced”, but only letting the player repair up to 0 damage would help.
Instead of “reinforced” it would be “brand new”.[/quote]

I like that idea!

13

I am all for balancing armor so long as it doesn’t take away fun factor. Lets be honest, CDDA has HEAVY realism elements integrated into it, and then there are some more game-ish elements in there. If CDDA was 100% realistic it wouldn’t have it’s same gleaming fun. I agree CDDA is built off realism, but the game still has a 2-4% non-realistic game factor in there. If that wiggle room wasn’t there it would lose some of it’s charm.

On the other hand, as much as I hate to, cause I love being invincible, I do agree armor is OP as all frick. It’s silly walking into room with a turret, and it unloads on me and I only get scratched when I only have survivor built gear on, and a Kevlar vest. I am sorry but even a Kevlar vest and armored guards all over my body wont stop a hail of 10-20 9MM rounds or even a few rifle rounds. But balancing the system wont be easy so we need to take care not to nerf the armor so much it becomes useless, I’d like to be able to take a few shots and live, especially if I am covered in Kevlar. But as a result still let it severely hurt me to the point where I don’t want to face that turret again.

If Power Armor is nerfed I hope it is very carefully nerfed, I personally don’t think there is anything wrong with it at the moment. If my guy decides to weld on some extra metal plates to increase it’s protection I don’t see how that is unreasonable, and considering the technology it is made up of, I think being able to stand there and have turret rounds reflect off my armor does work with power armor. HOWEVER, I have one point about power armor. I should not be able to walk up to a anti-material rifle turret without so much as being scratched or having my armor dented. I think my Heavy Power Armor should be able to withstand the impacts of rifle rounds from Milspec turrets, it makes sense, I mean it is military grade heavy power armor. But a .50BMG round? I don’t think so, it would be cool to be knocked on my ass by a 50BMG round hitting my armor, and have to slowly back off knowing the next hit might penetrate my armor and kill me.

I personally think that at the same time we want to nerf something, lets carefully examine it and give credit to where credit is due regarding the armor. If I am laced with Kevlar armor I personally made, it will most likely fit me perfectly, but will be heavy and slow me down considerably. I should also be able to take a few 9MM rounds and live, and maybe a rifle round or two, but not without heavy damage. And Heavy power armor is pretty much okay where it is at, except a few things, like as I mentioned before with the .50BMG rounds. As for environmental protection, it’s my opinion that no armor should give even a medium environmental protection unless it is a designated hazard suit, like power armor, ANBC, AEP, or hazmat. On the flip side though, I think it would be very cool if we could have the option to line our clothing with lead. This of course could be only for level 8 or 10 tailors, but would ultimately add a degree of environmental protection against radiation. And while at the same time extremely increasing weight, lets be real, lining your clothes with lead would be heavy as all frick.

I think that about sums up my thoughts on nerfing armor, I trust you guys will be considerate where you nerf the armor and not just witch hunt it down to uselessness. (While we are here though, anyone else think it’s silly to be able to carry a 53" roller drum around in their hands that weighs a couple tons? xD)

14

[quote=“Obscure, post:12, topic:9701”][quote=“Coolthulhu, post:10, topic:9701”]Making all factory items start at current “reinforced”, but only letting the player repair up to 0 damage would help.
Instead of “reinforced” it would be “brand new”.[/quote]

I like that idea![/quote]

As an alternate suggestions. Factory made stuff, when damaged, instead of repairing them normally with soldering iron and whatnot, you have use the crafting menu for a repaired version of the factory made item. It could provide the usual protection of the factory made item, and can be reinforced, but perhaps they have a few downsides as well, like being more bulky and more encumbering, and heavier as well.

15

There should probably be a separate suit for environment-proofing. Made of lots of plastic bags and some kevlar to back it up with weak protection. Moderately-low encumbrance (10-15 when fitting).
Or just “survivor waders” that cover both legs and feet, have good environmental protection, but no storage and either low damage protection or high encumbrance.

16

Love that survivor waders idea!