LW: New armors -->Impact vest

[frdnwsm]

I just finished advanced armor research, and have a question. Most of the new armors are self-explanatory ... aegis for example is a minor ugrade to carapace ... but impact vest is a little obscure. I'm not sure why I would even make one of these. Aside from the fact that only Assault troopers can wear it, it costs more and provides less protection than plain old alloy plating. In fact, it seems the same as ceramic plating, which is free.

And yes, I looked it up on a wiki. It is described as "impact absorbing" but this was not defined at all. What exactly does this property do to make the impact vest better than alloy or ceramic plating?

I've also considered the fact that it might be additive to alloy plating ... that you might be able to wear both at once (I have no idea if you can or not, just speculating here) ... but this would take up the last item slot (I don't have tactical rigging yet) and I'm not sure that would be worth it. I usually give my assaults shredder ammo, since only they and engineers can carry this perk.

[Wantoomany]

Wearing it gives you the shock absorbent armor ability. Giving you 33% reduced damage to anything you take within 4 tiles.

[frdnwsm]

So if my assault is shot at and hit from more than 4 squares away, it does nothing? Sounds pretty feeble to me. OK, I understand the concept, that assaults are more prone than other trooper types to be hit at close range because of the weapons they usually use, but I'd like to see a bit better benefit.

A lot of times my assaults fire from 5-6 squares away, depending on the target and the availability of cover, so a perk that reduced damage from a hit at something like, for example, 8 squares away would be much more worth while. The vest taking up an item slot and having a dinky 4 square limitation to its protection makes the benefit much less appealing, and I am far less inclined now to incur the cost of manufacturing one.

[szmind]

I only have one and use it occasionally when close quarters are expected

[Fadeway]

Originally posted by frdnwsm:

A lot of times my assaults fire from 5-6 squares away, depending on the target and the availability of cover, so a perk that reduced damage from a hit at something like, for example, 8 squares away would be much more worth while. The vest taking up an item slot and having a dinky 4 square limitation to its protection makes the benefit much less appealing, and I am far less inclined now to incur the cost of manufacturing one.

It's for specialized biotank assaults. Their job isn't to shoot, it's to move to positions where they draw maximum amount of fire. So with that perk, if the biggest threat on the field is a disk, you'll move to some cover right next to it, and take 6 instead of 9 damage.

[Doing gens, you?]

CCS and Close Encounters also proc in a 4 tile radius, so its good for an Assault that utilizes one or both.

[red255]

Yeah.

I know on mectoids it works.

so if you stick it on a assault, give him chitlin plating, mind merge him, iron skin Titan armor.

he can probably just eat a bunch of crystallids. except of course they have acid and they'll break his DR with it, but it calculated like that.

like it would say you get dealt 15 damage (melee)

the 35% would take off 5-6 damage, and the rest of the stuff would kick in to subtract the remaining damage.

you'll walk off nearly scott free unless you get acid'd.