Does armour really matter?

[BazookaHDZ]

I’ve seen mixed answers on this im guessing it matters a little but not a huge amount

[SLOWHAND LUKE]

yes, they make you look good

[FIRE]

only if it's the heavy ones like veteran's or bullgoat

gives you pretty good defense and some poise to not get staggered by everything

[nfinite.recursion]

Armor is pointless after you git gud. Once you've achieved this it's all about the swag.

[Toad]

Armour decreases incoming damage by a percentage, so it is very useful for survival in the mid to late game. I had around 30% physical defence towards the end, which allowed me to survive quite a few devastating moves from bosses. Combine it with a defensive spell, or one of the crab/prawn consumables and you can get easily 50%+ damage resistance.

[Elymnir]

Armor matters, but not much. It does provide protection, but enemies hit hard in this game and only a good amount of armor will change a three-hit kill to a four-hit kill.
You also gain a little bit of poise, but many enemies still stagger a lot (dogs, for example). And to gain those two meager bonuses, armor and poise that matter, you need the heaviest armors, which means investing a lot in stamina and/or taking arsenal talismans instead of something that could help you make more damage.

On the talisman slot, note that i have ALWAYS used an arsenal talisman in order not to invest too much in stamina and wear havier armor. But only for the sake of fashion, because it's more important to me than efficiency X)

Anyway, my main take on the issue is: if only for the sake of protecting yourself, armor doesn't matter much. You can avoid damage entirely by rolling or by blocking with a shield, if dodging isn't your forte.
However, what does matter is the effects some pieces of armor can have, like improving jump attacks, or improving resistance to this or that status. In my opinion, that's what you should be looking into when you wear armor.

And looking good. That's above all else.

[2001 Space Oddity]

I find armor to be very useful. It's not going to turn you invincible, but it helps survive one or two more hits from a boss. Paired with some damage-reducing talismans/buffs it can make a really big difference, especially against mobs.

The poise also matters, my colossal build does a fair amount of trading and there is a very noticeable difference when I put on light armor vs. heavy armor. I also have a Sword of Night and Flame build, and the casting time on that is so damn long that I was always getting staggered out of attacks until I invested some more points into endurance and got higher poise armor. Unfortunately most of the really high poise armor is ugly as hell.

Some armor has other effects like increasing certain stats, or healing you when low on health, increasing resistances, etc. Always read the description of the items you pick up.

[Aertes]

It matters, but not as much as some people would want. Against common enemies its more evident, against the bosses, not much, you better rely more in ability than tanking.

[medicinezombie]

Armor is useful.

It's more useful the later in the game you are, because it reduces enemy damage by a percentage, and the base numbers keep getting bigger. Early game, it has less of an impact. Which is part of why the answers are mixed - it depends on where you are, and your build

How damage works:
1)Your stats impact how much damage you remove from an incoming hit (1st number in status)
2) Armor is then applied reducing the incoming damage (2nd number, actually a %).
*Additionally, the Poise stat determines if you are staggered by an incoming attack.

Without getting into the details, wearing heavier armor and defensive talismans can make you take roughly 1/2 damage from incoming attacks, without spell buffs/consumables. It turns a lot of "1 hit kills" into not a kill anymore.

Most people choose Vigor over armor, which is fine, but I think that is some of the reason a lot of people struggle with the areas post-capitol - enemies hit so hard having some extra Vigor isn't enough. The difference between 50 and 60 Vigor is 196 HP...and 10 points of Endurance gives you 15lbs more equip load, AND stamina for dodging/blocking.

15lbs is something like 10% extra damage resistance, maybe more. Late game, that's definitely worth more than 196 HP

Also this:

Originally posted by 2001 Space Oddity:

Some armor has other effects like increasing certain stats, or healing you when low on health, increasing resistances, etc. Always read the description of the items you pick up.

This is good advice - a bunch of armors (mostly heads) have extra abilities/stat increases. Sometimes debuffs, for the Scarab heads.

[BazookaHDZ]

Originally posted by 2001 Space Oddity:

I find armor to be very useful. It's not going to turn you invincible, but it helps survive one or two more hits from a boss. Paired with some damage-reducing talismans/buffs it can make a really big difference, especially against mobs.

The poise also matters, my colossal build does a fair amount of trading and there is a very noticeable difference when I put on light armor vs. heavy armor. I also have a Sword of Night and Flame build, and the casting time on that is so damn long that I was always getting staggered out of attacks until I invested some more points into endurance and got higher poise armor. Unfortunately most of the really high poise armor is ugly as hell.

Some armor has other effects like increasing certain stats, or healing you when low on health, increasing resistances, etc. Always read the description of the items you pick up.

That’s my main issue the high poise armour is super ugly I think ima just go with fashion over effectiveness

[GloriousZote]

You just want over 51 poise and some resistances, so veteran's or blaidd's armor are good for their frost resist

[GloriousZote]

Really feels super lame that a lot of armor is useless, IMO for example confessor armor should have a good amount of holy resist and vitality, after all, you're an assassin of the two fingers, spells that are based on, well, the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ greater will, shouldn't be something that you should have a problem with, and naturally you'd want a bit of resistance against heretics.

[Mander]

Yes if it further buffs something you use or is a central part of your gameplay (i.e. Crucible Knights Armour if you use a lot of Crucible Incantations). Otherwise... not a lot.

[Simbolic]

Put it this way, the lighter you are the more useful invisible frames are. Which essentially makes you more invulnerable to damage while rolling through attacks. Why if ever watch youtube videos of pros do speed runs or no hit runs. You will noticed there usually always in the underwear the whole time.

[Room]

F A S H I O N

[vapechimp]

There are two layers of defense in this game. One is called physical defense and improves with each level. And then there is armor which provides for damage absorption.

These two play a different role depending on the enemy. Early game physical defense is king but late game absorption matters more.