Armor and shield player guide

This guide is designed to help new and experienced players understand how armor works and how to create mixed armor setups.

Skillset Placement

Your guild can be armor-primary, armor-secondary, or armor-tertiary. The main consequence of your guild's armor skillset placement is to determine how quickly you learn armor skills. The better your skillset placement, the more field experience you can hold, and the more efficiently that field experience is converted into actual ranks. See Experience for a more detailed discussion.

Additionally, your skillset placement determines your access to skillset-based perks.

	Primary	Secondary	Tertiary
Guilds	Paladin	Barbarian, Ranger, Trader	all others1
arm-worn shields	all sizes2	medium2 or small	small
arm-worn shield protection penalty	lowest	average	worst
ability to work down hindrance	best	average	worst
armor mixing penalty	none3	average	worst
can avoid penalty to aiming/loading bows while wearing	medium or small shields	small shields4	no shield
more nuanced shield appraisal	automatic	requires shield ranks	requires shield ranks

1. Although Commoners are treated as having all secondary skillsets for experience purposes, they lack the other perks of secondary skillset placements.
2. You must be at least 4th circle to take advantage of the ability to wear medium or large shields.
3. Every 10 circles, Paladins gain the ability to negate the mixing penalty for one armor type, so that by 30th circle, they can wear all four armors without a mixing penalty.
4. Barbarians and Rangers can avoid the penalty by arm-wearing a small shield. Traders cannot avoid this penalty.

Stats That Apply to Both

Hindrance

Wearing armor makes it more difficult for you to move in combat. Hindrance comes in two types:

• maneuvering hindrance: penalizes all defenses, with evasion being most affected and shield being least affected
• stealth hindrance: makes it more difficult to engage in stealthy actions such as hiding

Armor has separate maneuvering and stealth hindrance ratings, while shields impose equal maneuvering and stealth hindrance.

As you gain ranks in armor skills, you will experience less hindrance in that type of armor. How much hindrance you can work off depends on your skillset placement and the type of armor.

When you appraise a piece of armor you are wearing, you will see:

• the base maneuvering and stealth hindrance for that piece

You feel certain that a luminous suit of tonlet armor with winged pauldrons appears to impose great maneuvering hindrance and overwhelming stealth hindrance

• how much maneuvering and stealth hindrance you are experiencing from it (usually lower than the base hindrance due to your skill)

If you were only wearing a luminous suit of tonlet armor with winged pauldrons your maneuvering would be minimally hindered and your stealth would be moderately hindered.

• the total amount of maneuvering and stealth hindrance you are experiencing from all of the armor you're wearing.

But considering all the armor and shields you are wearing or carrying, you are currently fairly hindered and your stealth is highly hindered.

Hindrance Levels, From Best to Worst:

Order	Base Hindrance	Current Hindrance
0	no	unhindered
1	insignificant	barely
2	trivial	minimally
3	light	insignificantly
4	minor	lightly
5	fair	fairly
6	mild	somewhat
7	moderate	moderately
8	noticeable	rather
9	high	very
10	significant	highly
11	great	greatly
12	extreme	extremely
13	debilitating	overwhelmingly
14	overwhelming	insanely
15	insane

Construction/Durability and Condition

After the protection and hindrance stats, you will see a line like this:

You are certain that the tonlet armor is unusually resilient to damage¹, and is in pristine condition².

Shields and armor become damaged during use. Though they cannot be permanently destroyed or weakened, you will need to periodically repair your equipment to experience peak performance. The first part of that appraisal tells you how durable the armor is. The more durable it is, the longer it takes for the armor to become damaged and need repairs.

Construction Levels, From Worst to Best:

Order	Construction
1	extremely weak and easily damaged
2	very delicate and easily damaged
3	quite fragile and easily damaged
4	rather flimsy and easily damaged
5	particularly weak against damage
6	somewhat unsound against damage
7	appreciably susceptible to damage
8	marginally vulnerable to damage
9	of average construction
10	a bit safeguarded against damage
11	rather reinforced against damage
12	quite guarded against damage
13	highly protected against damage
14	very strong against damage
15	extremely resistant to damage
16	unusually resilient to damage
17	nearly impervious to damage
18	practically invulnerable to damage

The second part of that line tells you how much damage the armor has taken. When it gets below 80%, you will start to experience diminished performance:
Equipment Damage Levels, From Worst to Best:

Health	Description
98-100%	in pristine condition
90-97%	practically in mint condition
80-89%	in good condition
70-79%	rather scuffed up
60-69%	some minor scratches
50-59%	a few dents and dings
40-49%	several unsightly notches
30-39%	heavily scratched and notched
20-29%	badly damaged
0-19%	battered and practically destroyed

Shields

Shields come in three sizes: small, medium, and large. In general, larger shields offer more protection but at the expense of greater weight and hindrance. (All shields have equal maneuvering and stealth hindrance.)

Additionally, not all sizes are equally suited for all attacks.

Size	Melee	Missile
small	100%	80%
medium	98%	90%
large	96%	100%

Shield Protection Ratings

When you appraise a shield, you will see a line like this:

You are certain that the shield offers fair¹ to incredible² protection.

The first value is the "basic defense" (or minimum defense or low-end protection). This is a guaranteed minimum level of protection afforded to all adventurers, regardless of how skilled they are in using shields.

The second value is the "full defense" (or maximum defense or high-end protection). In order to take advantage of the shield's full defense, you need to have skill in shield usage. The higher the full defense rating, the more ranks are required to take full advantage of it.

Shield Protection Levels, From Worst to Best (some values only visible to Paladins and skilled users):

Order	Protection
0	no
1	extremely terrible
2	terrible
3	dismal
4	very poor
5	poor
6	rather low
7	low
8	fair
9	better than fair
10	moderate
11	moderately good
12	good
13	very good
14	high
15	very high
16	great
17	very great
18	exceptional
19	very exceptional
20	impressive
21	very impressive
22	amazing
23	incredible
24	tremendous
25	unbelievable
26	god-like

Wearing Shields

Depending on your guild and the size of the shield (see above), you may not actually need to hold it in the hand in order to use it. You may be able to ADJUST it so that it's worn on the arm.

Advantages of Arm-worn Shields

• frees up the hands to allow use of two-handed weapons, including crossbows and bows
• As long as you're in shield stance, you are ready to block any surprise attack.

Drawbacks of Arm-worn Shields

• 20% decrease in protection (as opposed to holding it)
• offensive and defensive penalty while using two-handed melee weapons with worn shields
• penalty to aiming and loading bows (see above for exceptions)

Choosing a Shield

Regardless of guild, for your first shield, it is best to choose a small shield that has as much basic defense and as little hindrance and weight as possible. Even if you are a Paladin, it does not make sense to choose a massive wall shield as a novice, because you lack the skill in shield usage to take advantage of a large shield's higher full defense rating. (Yet its added hindrance and weight will definitely hamper you.) Moreover, you cannot wear medium or large shields on the arm until 4th circle anyway.

Although store-bought shields are perfectly serviceable, you will eventually want to upgrade to a player-made shield. Shields can be made of metal (via forging) or leather (via outfitting).

For a skilled Paladin (100+ ranks of shield), a large metal shield is the most popular option (although some high-level Paladins say that a small diamond-hide shield outperforms a large vardite pavise shield at melee). Most other guilds prefer small leather shields, even those that are capable of wearing medium shields. Characters that rely heavily on stealth and evasion tend to prefer the smallest, least hindering shields.

Why don't more people use small metal shields?
Although small metal shields often have a good basic defense rating, they tend to be heavier and more hindering than their leather counterparts while often having a lower full defense.

Why don't more people use medium shields?
Medium shields are not a popular choice. This is because most people either want to minimize hindrance, so they go with small shields, or they want to maximize protection, so they go with large shields. (Additionally, most guilds are only capable of wearing small shields.) Medium shields fall between the two, a niche for which there isn't much demand.

Why don't more people use large leather shields?
While large leather shields may be lighter and less hindering than their metal counterparts, they tend to have lower full defense ratings. Most people who use large shields are Paladins who want to maximize protection. Hindrance is less of an issue to them, because they rely on defenses (namely shield) that aren't as sensitive to hindrance. They don't usually want to reduce hindrance at the expense of protection.

Player-Made Shield Templates

When considering which type of player-made shield you want, the larger templates offer more protection but are usually more hindering and heavier. You can get an idea of the relative size of different templates by looking at the volume of material required to make it.

Leather Shields (Tailoring)

Size	Template	Volume
small	ordinary shield	8
small	small shield	8
small	targe	10
small	target shield	12
medium	buckler	12
medium	medium shield	16
medium	oval shield	20
large	kite shield	24

Metal Shields (Armorsmithing)

Size	Template	Volume
small	target shield/round sipar/triangular sipar	14
small	ordinary shield/targe/ceremonial shield	16
medium	medium shield	20
medium	medium buckler/circular buckler/curved shield	20
medium	oval shield/skirmisher's shield/jousting shield	25
large	kite shield/warrior's shield/aegis	30
large	tower shield/battle shield/heater shield/war shield	40

Body Armor

DragonRealms differs from many other games in that any guild can wear any type of armor. As mentioned above, your guild's skillset placement simply determines how quickly you learn armor skills and how effectively you can reduce hindrance by training armor.

Body armor comes in four types: light, chain, brigandine, and plate. Modern light armor is less hindering than chain, which is less hindering than brigandine, which is less hindering than plate.

Light armor consists of cloth, leather, and bone armor. (Bone is a catch-all for any light armor that is not made of cloth or leather.) This is the lightest, least hindering armor. Light armor offers lower protection than the other types of armor, but it's also lighter and less hindering. This is one of the most popular armor types, especially among characters that rely heavily on stealth and evasion.

Chain armor or mail is made of small metal rings linked together to form a mesh. Most armor-tertiary guilds who don't opt for light armor use chain armor.

Brigandine is made of metal scales, bands, or small plates. It is not commonly used as a primary armor for the same reason that medium shields are not popular: that most people either want to minimize hindrance, so they go with light or chain armor, or they want to maximize protection, so they go with plate armor. Brigandine falls between the two, a niche for which there isn't much demand.

Plate armor is made of articulated metal plates. The heaviest and most hindering armor, plate is the primary armor of choice for Paladins. Plate is not a popular choice for armor-tertiary guilds due to its extreme hindrance.

Armor Protection and Absorption

Armor protects against six different types of damage:

• Physical: puncture, slice, impact
• Elemental: fire, cold, electrical

For each type of damage, there are two defense ratings:

• Protection: An armor's protection reduces incoming damage by a flat amount, making it ideal for dealing with light hits. While it may not reduce damage by as much as absorption (the other stat), protection tends to be the stat that reduces damage to 0.

Protection is heavily modified by a skill contest of your armor factor versus the attacker's offensive factor. (Armor factor is armor skill and a few other modifiers. Offensive factor is weapon skill and a some other modifiers.) With low armor skill (compared to the attacker), your armor loses all of its protection.

• Absorption: An armor's absorption reduces damage by a percentage, making it ideal for mitigating large hits. However, absorption generally won't reduce damage to 0. (That's what protection does.) In player-made armor, absorption generally correlates with the density of the material used.

Unlike protection, absorption is not severely penalized by lack of armor skill. It is only modified slightly by a skill contest of your armor factor versus the attacker's offensive factor.

Defense Levels, From Worst to Best:

Order	Protection	Absorption
1	poor	very poor
2	low	poor
3	fair	low
4	moderate	somewhat fair
5	good	fair
6	very good	moderate
7	high	good
8	very high	very good
9	great	high
10	very great	very high
11	extreme	great
12	exceptional	very great
13	incredible	extreme
14	amazing	exceptional
15	unbelievable	incredible
16		outstanding
17		amazing
18		unbelievable

Choosing Body Armor

Although strictly speaking, you will get the best performance by choosing one type of armor and sticking with it, the majority of players prefer to train multiple armors to earn extra TDPs for raising stats. At first, you will not notice much of a difference, but as you grow in skill, you are really shooting yourself in the foot if you deprive yourself of these TDPs.

TDPs From Armor Ranks

Ranks	1 Armor	2 Armors	3 Armors	4 Armors
50	6	12	18	24
100	25	50	75	100
150	56	112	168	224
200	100	200	300	400
250	156	312	468	624
500	626	1,252	1,878	2,504
750	1,408	2,816	4,224	5,632
1,000	2,502	5,004	7,506	10,008
1,250	3,909	7,818	11,727	15,636
1,500	5,628	11,256	16,884	22,512
1,750	7,660	15,320	22,980	30,640

Drawbacks of Mixing Armor

• Mixed armor penalty to hindrance for every additional armor type worn at the same time. (In other words, your total hindrance will be greater than the sum of the hindrance from each piece of armor.)

As mentioned earlier, every 10 circles, Paladins gain the ability to negate the mixing penalty for one armor type, so that by 30th circle, they can wear all four armors without a mixing penalty.

• Even without the mixing penalty, the more of your body that is covered by heavier armors, the more hindered you will be. This is felt most keenly by armor-tertiary guilds and those who rely heavily on stealth and evasion.
• Paladins who prefer to wear plate are sacrificing protection for parts of the body covered by the lighter armors.

Coverage Areas

When wearing armor, the experience that you get -- and the hindrance that you experience -- is based on the amount of the body covered by that armor. For example, if you were wearing full plate with brigandine accessories, 71.4% of your armor experience would go to plate armor, and the remaining 28.6% of your armor experience would go to brigandine. Moreover, 71.4% of your total hindrance would be attributed to your plate armor, whereas 28.6% of your hindrance would be attributed to your brigandine armor. (You can check your total hindrance by APPRAISING a piece of armor you are wearing.)

The experience/hindrance percentages were calculated by the player of Codiax. You can also see what that piece of armor is called in player-made cloth, leather, bone, chain, brigandine, and plate templates. (Store-bought armor will often follow the same naming conventions, but you should appraise it or check Elanthipedia to be sure.)

Area	Exp/Hind	Cloth	Leather	Bone	Chain	Brigandine	Plate
head/eyes/neck	20.8%		cowl	cowl	balaclava	balaclava	sallet/armet/great helm
head/eyes	14.3%						bascinet/visored helm/closed helm
head/neck	16.9%	hood	helm	helm	helm	helm
head	10.4%	cap	cap	cap	cap	cap	dome helm/morion/barbute
eyes	3.9%	mask	mask	mask	mask	mask	mask
neck/chest/back	29.9%	mantle	mantle	mantle	mantle	mantle
neck	6.5%	aventail	aventail	aventail	aventail	aventail	aventail
torso/arms/legs	71.4%	hauberk	leathers	hauberk	hauberk	hauberk	full plate/fluted plate
torso/arms	55.8%	shirt	coat	coat	shirt	shirt	half plate
torso/legs	49.4%	robe	robe	robe	robe	robe	field plate
torso	33.8%	tabard	jerkin	tabard	lorica	lorica	cuirass
chest/back	23.4%	vest	vest	vest	vest	vest
chest	11.7%						breastplate
abdomen	10.4%	tasset	tasset	tasset	tasset	tasset	fauld
back	11.7%						backplate
arms/hands	29.9%	sleeves	sleeves	sleeves	sleeves	sleeves	sleeves
arms	22.1%	vambraces	vambraces	vambraces	vambraces	vambraces	vambraces
hands	7.8%	gloves	gloves	gloves	gloves	gloves	gauntlets
legs	15.6%	pants	greaves	greaves	greaves	greaves	greaves

You can use this chart to created mixed armor setups that divide experience as evenly as possible. For example, if you wanted to train chain armor and light armor, you might try a chain robe (torso/legs), and a leather cowl (head/eyes/neck) and sleeves (arms/hands). When choosing where to put which types of armor, it is often advisable to put the most protection on your vital areas (head, neck, chest, abdomen, and back).

For those who are considering whether to buy one large piece of armor or several small pieces of the same type (for example, a ring hauberk versus a ring lorica + ring vambraces + ring greaves), it takes the same amount of material. Here are the advantages of each approach:

Advantages of Larger Pieces of Armor

• reduced item count (as few as three for a full suit of armor)
• reduced roundtime for removing all armor (since you are reducing the number of pieces to remove)
• When looking at your worn items, your description will not be as cluttered (assuming you don't have any items that conceal armor).

Advantages of Smaller Pieces of Armor

• reduced weight
• reduced hindrance
• Smaller pieces of armor are easier to craft, requiring less skill to get the most out of rare materials.
• If you later decide to mix armor, it is less expensive to have a few accessories made than to pay for a whole new setup.

Player-Made Armor Templates

As with shields, you will eventually want to upgrade to player-made armor when you can afford it.

Light Armor

Player-made light armor comes in three material types, which each have three different styles. Each style requires the same amount of material to make and (all other things being equal) will be pretty similar in total stats. Light armor styles differ in which kinds of damage they favor (offer better protection against) or disfavor (offer less protection against).

Cloth Armor (Tailoring)

Style	Favors	Disfavors
Quilted	puncture
Padded	slice
Insulated	impact	puncture

Leather Armor (Tailoring)

Style	Favors	Disfavors
Rugged	puncture
Thick	impact
Coarse	slice

Bone Armor (Carving)

Style	Favors	Disfavors
Segmented	N/A	N/A
Notched	slice	impact
Ribbed	impact	puncture/slice

Metal Armor

Player-made metal armor comes in three types, which each have three different styles. Unlike light armor, the three styles of each metal armor are effectively three tiers of protection. For each type of armor, there is a light, a medium, and a heavy style.

Heavier styles:

• offer superior defense
• are more hindering
• weigh more
• require more metal to make

Metal Armor (Armorsmithing)

Type	Light	Medium	Heavy
Chain	ring	chain	mail
Brigandine	scale	brigandine	lamellar
Plate	light plate	plate	heavy plate
Plate (head)	dome helm	morion	barbute
Plate (head/eyes)	bascinet	visored helm	closed helm
Plate (head/eyes/neck)	sallet	armet	great helm

• Armor-tertiary and armor-secondary guilds usually prefer the light styles of metal armor, especially if they rely heavily on evasion.
• Paladins (armor-primary) prefer the heavy styles, although sometimes you see novices with low strength and stamina using the light styles.

Commonly Used Materials

For more details, see forging materials.

• steel: this is the entry-level material for metal armor. It is a significant improvement over storebought armor. Affordable.
• lumium: superior to steel in protection and weight. Moderately expensive.
• damite: superior to lumium in protection, but heavier and more hindering. Expensive.
• audrualm: exceptional in protection for its light weight. Costs a mint and is hard to find in large quantities.
• vardite: like damite on steroids. Costs a mint and is pretty hard to find in large quantities.

Armor Enhancements

Player-made armor (except bone armor) can also be enhanced in the following ways:

• tempering/sealing: improves construction/durability (this should always be done)
• lightening/trimming: decreases weight by 10% (but not protection or hindrance)
• reinforcing: increases protection, hindrance, and weight

You can reinforce or lighten but not both, as they are opposites. These enhancements are permanent, so choose wisely.

When looking at player-made armor, enhancements may show up in the following ways. (You can also RUB the armor with a cleaning cloth to see which enhancements have been done.

Armor Enhancements

Type	Tempering	Lightening	Reinforcing
Cloth Armor	sealed/sealed with protective wax	lightened/with fitted seams	reinforced/with a reinforced design
Leather Armor	sealed/sealed with protective wax	lightened/with fitted seams	reinforced/with a reinforced design
Bone Armor	N/A	N/A	N/A
Chain Armor	tempered/crafted from tempered links	lightened/with trimmed links	reinforced/with a reinforced design
Brigandine	tempered/crafted from tempered bands	lightened/with trimmed bands	reinforced/with a reinforced design
Plate Armor	tempered/crafted from tempered plates	lightened/with trimmed plates	reinforced/with a reinforced design

Shopping Guide

Storebought

You can either browse Elanthipedia's shops, or you can use the query pages to find something more specific. The query pages allow you to specify types, minimum or maximum stats, etc. When using the queries, you may want to exclude festival, quest, and auction merchandise by scrolling down to where it says "Rare?" and choosing "only not."

• Shield Query
• Armor Query

Remember, Crossing's grizzled old war veteran will also trade you for your starter armor if you don't desire leather.

Player-Made

You can either go directly to the crafter and order something to your specifications, or you can browse the player-owned shops in the market plazas.

• Player Armorsmiths: for metal armor
• Player Tailors: for cloth and leather armor
• Player Carvers: for bone armor

• Isharon's Trader Shop Inventory spreadsheet: a sortable list of the inventory and prices of all player-owned shops

• Isharon's Item Stat spreadsheet: stats for weapons, shields, and armor (does not include every item in the game)