LE Realistic Armor Overhaul

[jakeoberg]

Ok... As a hardcore immersive/realistic player of Skyrim i have been looking for a mod that changes the way armor works completely. I am a modder and i have tried to do this myself but i am not the best with scripts and such. I know it is possible, anyone willing to help me would be the coolest person ever ;)

 

Heavy Armor

Knowing of many mods that change armor speed and stats, they are good enough to get the feel of being weighed down and being a tank, but heavy armor has a downfall that no one mod thus far has addressed. Chinks in the armor. For example, you are shot by an arrow in the arm, you take regular damage, where this is wrong is when you are shot in the chest-plate you take the same amount of damage... Arm/legs>Chestplate/Leg Curries damage taken. This just makes sense. Archery is so messed up in this game and most other games in this way. This should go for the helmet, gauntlets and shin guards/boots. An arrow hitting heavy armor should not even penetrate it at all. The way a modder could do this is by setting impact data to make it so the arrow bounces off of the armor. These certain parts aligning it with the textures. It IS possible, but i have no knowledge of how. Then changing the weight of it and movement speed is pretty self explanatory.

 

Light armor

Mods also change the data with these. but in my mind the system Bethesda set up for armor was fine with light armor. arrows should also penetrate it, unless the armor has parts that are hard and would not allow for an arrow to pass. Whiterun guard helmet should stop an arrow in the from top face part but not the back (where there is not metallic plate. Elven armor would have to be discussed.

 

Weapons

I think that locational damage was a great mod for some time, but it also didnt make sense at times. They did implement distinction between heavy and light HELMETS so it is possible. Different types of weapons can have levels of penetration like they have for perks in the game. deadly combat has tried to touch base with disarming when hitting arms and such but is really doesn't do it well. Hitting someone with a bow drawn should force them to either drop it or relase the arrow (not crossbows) and many more ideas to discuss.

 

Missiles

Bows and crossbows should be different in impact data because they do have different strengths in joules of force

arrow types should also be taken into consideration when taking down an enemy with certain armor types.

-weight

-broad-head

-bodkin

 

Any reply or support would be appreciated and thanks for reading my big af article bout armor haha

 

jake

[Deleted1308005User]

"an arrow hitting heavy armor should not even penetrate it at all."

*BEEEEP*

Wrong. Longbows were made to penetrate plate armors, there's many battles in history that were lost because knights were defeated by longbows.

 

Anyhow, I thought about how "armors" could be fixed.

 

One way, (though undoable for skyrim) could be done in next TES game. (and hopefully Bethesda does it.)

 

Instead of armor rating which provides % of damage reduction, Bethesda should use the DT/damage treshold system which was used in Fallout.

If armor piece has DT of 20, for example and the said piece is hit with sword that deals 15 damage, the sword doesn't pierce the armor and deals little to no damage. However, if the weapon deals over 20 damage, it deals the whole damage against the target, or the amount it dealt over the treshold of 20.

(I hope I am explaining this in easy to comprehend manner)

 

This armor system would be pretty much flawless in TES game.

Different weapon types could passively have "piercing" on them, and thus pierce the armors. (Mostly bows, crossbows, spears)

Daggers would be useless in direct combat, but critical hits could still hit through all the armors.

 

But as I said, this system couldn't be used in Skyrim, it's impossible to rebuild it.

But hopefully it's used on next TES game.

[jakeoberg]

Your right about the armor. But the arrow killing knights, yes, if those knight were lightly armored example

 

 

It has been suggested that the bodkin came into its own as a means of penetrating armour, but research by the Royal Armouries^[1] has found no hardened bodkin points, though only two bodkin points were actually tested, not a statistically relevant number. Bodkins did, however, have greater ability to pierce mail armour than broadheads, and historical accounts do speak of bodkin arrows shot from close range piercing plate armour. Broadheads were made from steel, sometimes with hardened edges, but were more often used against lightly armoured men or horses than against an armoured adversary.

In a modern test, a direct hit from a steel bodkin point penetrated Damascus chain armour, although at point blank range.^[2] However, the test was conducted without a padded jack or gambeson, which was layered cloth armour worn over heavier armour for protection against projectiles, as it was known to stop even heavy arrows. ^[3]

Armour of the medieval era was not completely proof against arrows until the specialised armour of the Italian city-state mercenary companies.^[4] Archery was thought not to be effective against plate armour in theBattle of Neville's Cross (1346), the siege of Bergerac (1345), and the Battle of Poitiers (1356); such armour became available to European knights of fairly modest means by the late 14th century, though never to all soldiers in any army.^[5]

Some recent tests have demonstrated that needle bodkins could penetrate all but heavy steel plate armour; one test used padded "jack" armour, coat of plates, iron and steel mail and steel plate. A needle bodkin penetrated every type, but may not have been able to inflict a lethal injury behind plate.^[6]

[Deleted1308005User]

Meh, can't remember the name of the battle which was "longbow vs. heavy armor" which ended up in victory for the longbows.

 

Anyhow, interesting video.

[bben46]

@Shadowjin - you are probably thinking of Agincourt. Where some historians claim that the archers shot at the horses and many wounded horses ran back through the French lines causing confusion and scattering the French infantry. The field was so muddy the horses couldn't advance. Many of the French Knights dismounted and charged at the head of their infantry through a hail of arrows. The better armored knights mostly survived. the somewhat lesser armor of the foot soldiers didn't hold up as well though. The English finally ran out of arrows and finished off the french army with whatever weapons they had, including the large wooden mallets they used to hammer in the anti cavalry stakes before the battle. The wealthy knights with the best armor survived the hail of arrows much better than the poorer knights with second rate armor or the footmen with mediocre armor. Here is a link - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Agincourt

[Deleted1308005User]

Mmmm.. Can't remember if it was that one.

 

There has been multiple similar fights in history I assume :laugh:

 

Anyhow, I guess I might be wrong then.

 

Just thoughts: If next TES game would utilize DT system, different kind of armors with different "specializations" could be possible.

For example, bodkin could pierce armor but be less effective against armors, and the other way around for broad head.

[jakeoberg]

yes im sure an army of long bows could destroy and army of knights, but the definition of knights can differ. For example, this french knight has a Chain-mail vest on with some cloth over the top. This definitely would not stop an arrow of any kind really. (unless it was made out of foam lol) but the battle scene has armor that would most definitely stop an arrow. Unless hit in the chainmail chinks http://m7.i.pbase.com/v3/77/321777/1/47105227.FrenchKnight2.jpghttp://img807.imageshack.us/img807/1521/italianknightsxvcentury.jpg

[jakeoberg]

Haha i feel special, staff done be on my topics :wink:

Edited July 8, 2014 by jakeoberg

[ClumzySurgeon]

A mod like this would be great, another aspect of armour that should be addressed is visibility and sound. Both should be reduced when wearing certain helmets, sounds should be muffled and FOV should be reduced.

[jaxonz]

Very interesting subsequent conversation on longbow vs plate, Agincourt, etc., however, I'd like to address the original post.

 

I don't disagree with this at all conceptually, but looking at the available mechanisms to implement such a system this seems a daunting task. I've looked at Locational Damage and think that was a great concept that also illustrates how difficult it is to implement such a scheme within Skyrim. What Jake suggests sounds to me like Locational Damage + providing differing armor values for each body part. To do this accurately, one would have to provide location differential armor values for every armor set in the game (and any DLC or 3rd party armor?).

 

Not sure if LD does this, but the easiest assumption would be to apply helmet armor to the entire head, main armor to torso, gauntlets to the whole arm, and boots to the entire leg. But as Jake points out, this is inaccurate at the outset and one is striving for higher accuracy.

 

Great idea, but I really don't see how one would accomplish this without deep changes to the Skyrim engine itself.

 

The DT system from Fallout, cited by Shadowjin, is a better approximation, but still doesn't approach the complexity/realism proposed by Jake.