Heavy Armor and Other Unusal Builds

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Probably Spoilers:

I just finished another playthrough of this game (literally 15 mins. ago), first time through with the RCM (Kudos btw, can't believe I took as long as I did). I also tried a number of other "new" things, like seeing if the skill based characters could stay on par with the other characters if they had enough components (something the RCM finally let me test), turns out they can.

I also tried an armored character for the first time since my disastrous first attempts in KotOR 1, figuring that I now knew enough to make it work. It worked fairly well, I focused on strength (wound up with more than 40, +17 modifier after all items and bonuses were counted), but also wound up with 20+ in constitution and wisdom before the end (again with items). I spent 2 feats to get the heavy armor proficiency (was a sentinel base) and stuck with the Mandalorian Assault armor as soon as I found it. I only chose force powers that were usable in heavy armor, my go-to powers being energy resistance and barrier. Early game this setup made my character a tank, no enemy that managed to even hit me really managed to hurt me, made my rather slower attacks more acceptable. But as time went on and I got deeper into the game I became more and more vulnerable to every enemy I was facing, my ac capped out at 39 (with no buffs to help) and the amount of damage being done was exceeding the defenses offered by energy resistance and barrier, I found myself using heal after every fight (ended with over 400 hp, they were hitting me but not hurting me very quickly). Though one thing that came as a pleasant surprise was that even though I was wearing heavy armor when Kreia used buffs like force speed they still applied to me.

Overall the armored build seems superfluous, especially with the armor that doesn't restrict force powers. I got nothing from that assault armor that I couldn't also have with the special force sensitive armors other than 7 or so ac points (I wound up with a Dex of 14 or so but assault armor has a 0 dex bonus), which would have been more than made up for by access to the various powers. So while it was fun to see how it worked I probably wouldn't bother with it again (it actually worked very well for the Handmaiden and Bao-Dur though). I am curious to hear if anyone else has tried it this way and what they thought.

All my builds prior to this have been heavily reliant on Force Speed, and to a lesser extent every power that goes into Force Enlightenment, while such builds are extremely powerful they're a little boring. I was wondering if anyone else has found a build that doesn't rely on these powers but is still focused on physical attacks.

[Emmental]

It's nice too see someone else exploring the use of heavy armour. The original concept of Jedi knights back in the 70's wore armour. Over the years by a combination of George Lucas screwing up and misinterpreted fan fiction getting ingrained on official lore the Jedi have become wierd monk type characters instead of the knights they originally intended to be.

This is why all Jedi are now dressed like Owen Lars from episode 4. It's just standard Tatooine desert garb, but somewhere along the line between the original trilogy and the new one the fans decided that that's how all jedi dress. George Lucas had no choice, but to incorporate this in to the new trilogy to minimise the damage to all this expanded universe crap. In short it's a right mess, but Jedi knights should be in armour, not Tatooine robes.

Heavy armour has some major advantages with the upgrades in can equip. My favouite setup for a heavy hitter tank is ballistic shielding overlay with armorweave underlay on mug'tha armour (I think it's called) and then wear an immortality belt on top. You're invincible with energy resistance and or barrier on.

[ppaladin123]

My male sentinel with battle meditation with decent dex and high wisdom (from items and robes) has a base/pre-buff AC of about 45 at level 30 so it is rather easy to surpass heavy armor if you play a male/get handmaiden's training.

[dirigibalistic]

Originally posted by Dave:

It's nice too see someone else exploring the use of heavy armour. The original concept of Jedi knights back in the 70's wore armour. Over the years by a combination of George Lucas screwing up and misinterpreted fan fiction getting ingrained on official lore the Jedi have become wierd monk type characters instead of the knights they originally intended to be.

Cheddar monks!

[Redona]

The negatives from armor restricted force buffs are nulled with Kreia in the party. If I do playthroughs with her in my party for the the majority of the game, I'll usually build around heavy armor.

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Originally posted by Dave:

It's nice too see someone else exploring the use of heavy armour. The original concept of Jedi knights back in the 70's wore armour. Over the years by a combination of George Lucas screwing up and misinterpreted fan fiction getting ingrained on official lore the Jedi have become wierd monk type characters instead of the knights they originally intended to be.

This is why all Jedi are now dressed like Owen Lars from episode 4. It's just standard Tatooine desert garb, but somewhere along the line between the original trilogy and the new one the fans decided that that's how all jedi dress. George Lucas had no choice, but to incorporate this in to the new trilogy to minimise the damage to all this expanded universe crap. In short it's a right mess, but Jedi knights should be in armour, not Tatooine robes.

Heavy armour has some major advantages with the upgrades in can equip. My favouite setup for a heavy hitter tank is ballistic shielding overlay with armorweave underlay on mug'tha armour (I think it's called) and then wear an immortality belt on top. You're invincible with energy resistance and or barrier on.

The character I was playing really felt like a light sided Darth Vader more than anything else. Luke is never shown to be wearing armor though (though he's definately not wearing a robe).

Sounds like such builds should be less worried about AC and more about the various ways to reduce or ignore the various types of damage that will inevitably overcome ones AC, or being strong\tough enough to withstand any attack. There were a few problems I kept bumping into, not big in this game but present: my saves seemed to fail half the time I was hit with a Force Power, which is part of the reason I switched to an unarmored build in the first place (Force Immunity is too important to ignore in KotOR 1), it didn't come up much but when it did I almost always wound up eating it. Additionally the only offensive power that even did anything against any enemies was Force Wave(? the top tier of push) and that was only because it could affect enough of them that some always failed and things like Lightsaber Throw which don't offer a save anyway, though that's probably a result of my attribute spread which was heavy in Constitution and Strength.

From what I remember there is only one upgrade that is restricted to heavy armor (Flexible Underlays I think) all other upgrades can be applied to armor of any class including the force sensitive ones.

Originally posted by ppaladin123:

My male sentinel with battle meditation with decent dex and high wisdom (from items and robes) has a base/pre-buff AC of about 45 at level 30 so it is rather easy to surpass heavy armor if you play a male/get handmaiden's training.

Atton actually outstriped me in AC this time around. I stacked Dexterity bonuses for him and in the end I was at 39 (with the Handmaiden's training, without it I would have been at 34 I think) and he was at 41 (and he had Master Speed and Master Armor which I think put him at 51 post buffing not even counting buffs from other party members).

Originally posted by Redona:

The negatives from armor restricted force buffs are nulled with Kreia in the party. If I do playthroughs with her in my party for the the majority of the game, I'll usually build around heavy armor.

How do the parts when she can't be in your party go? I learned I could use her the way you specify but I didn't want to rely on her as I knew there were a number of events in the game where I couldn't have her around.

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Another question: Has anyone found a way to reliably increase Mandalore's AC? Or improve his build (heavy armor and rifles) at all? He can't benefit from dex bonuses and you can't change his armor (and from what I remember it isn't the best), every time I play through Mandalore becomes a character that I can only describe as "Good for level 15-18".

[Emmental]

Originally posted by Sesh:

Another question: Has anyone found a way to reliably increase Mandalore's AC? Or improve his build (heavy armor and rifles) at all? He can't benefit from dex bonuses and you can't change his armor (and from what I remember it isn't the best), every time I play through Mandalore becomes a character that I can only describe as "Good for level 15-18".

Dex bonuses only affect AC not attack so there's nothing wrong with him using guns. For his armour I either go bonded plates 4 with flexible underlay to improve his overall defence or go ballistic shielding and armorweave to give him massive immunities. Combined with his 'I am Mandalore you can't hurt me' feat he can become a beast in shooting and melee.

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Originally posted by Dave:

Originally posted by Sesh:

Another question: Has anyone found a way to reliably increase Mandalore's AC? Or improve his build (heavy armor and rifles) at all? He can't benefit from dex bonuses and you can't change his armor (and from what I remember it isn't the best), every time I play through Mandalore becomes a character that I can only describe as "Good for level 15-18".

Dex bonuses only affect AC not attack so there's nothing wrong with him using guns. For his armour I either go bonded plates 4 with flexible underlay to improve his overall defence or go ballistic shielding and armorweave to give him massive immunities. Combined with his 'I am Mandalore you can't hurt me' feat he can become a beast in shooting and melee.

Where do you put his attributes? I've always put them into Constitution as that makes him much better at surviving difficult encounters even if he gets hit but it doesn't seem to be helping all that much, he doesn't go down because he's at range with a rifle but he doesn't seem to do anything besides just being there.

[Emmental]

I usually even split dex and strength and then switch his implant to strength if in melee or alacrity if shooting. As a pure soldier he gets more than enough feats to specialise with both ranged and melee. Another possibility is go full dex and give him finesse melee weapons. More accurate at shooting, but lower melee damage obviously. Both good appoaches from experience.

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I'll have to try that out next time, I've long been of the opinion that Constitution should only recieve points at level up if the character is one of the party member soldier-only blaster-only characters. That's the only way to improve the effectiveness of such characters (Carth and Canderous) in KotOR 1 once they get armor that matches thier dexterity bonuses, but then KotOR 1 wasn't particularly kind to such characters, KotOR 2 probably has given them some tricks I've been missing because I'd already written such characters off as "not particularly effective".

[anarcher]

Scored a Charric from Telos shop early in the game, pimped it out and put flex armor on with durasteel and bonded plates. Shields-ignoring you-can't-touch-this master-rapid-shot-everything pewpewpew build. Worked fairly nicely early on, until the enemies started not getting knocked back anymore. Even then, the damage and high hit rate of it is nice.

[Emmental]

Originally posted by Sesh:

I'll have to try that out next time, I've long been of the opinion that Constitution should only recieve points at level up if the character is one of the party member soldier-only blaster-only characters. That's the only way to improve the effectiveness of such characters (Carth and Canderous) in KotOR 1 once they get armor that matches thier dexterity bonuses, but then KotOR 1 wasn't particularly kind to such characters, KotOR 2 probably has given them some tricks I've been missing because I'd already written such characters off as "not particularly effective".

Mandalore, HK-47 and Mira are the 3 best killers of dark jedi in the game in my opinion if set them up right. Don't train mira if you want her to be good. Let her keep building up the free targeting and precise shots. Ironic that the most epic characters are non jedi, but there it is.

[cerberusiv]

Originally posted by Dave:

Mandalore, HK-47 and Mira are the 3 best killers of dark jedi in the game in my opinion if set them up right. Don't train mira if you want her to be good. Let her keep building up the free targeting and precise shots. Ironic that the most epic characters are non jedi, but there it is.

The crossover point for Mira is when she hits lvl 21 and gets Targeting VI. She will already have all the Precise Shot feats and could have Master Rapid Shot and Two Weapon Fighting and be able to gun down any normal enemy in 1-2 combat rounds.

You can keep her as a scout and go for Targeting VII but by the time you get that she could be a jedi with Master Force Speed and blaster bolt deflection without a lightsaber.

[anarcher]

Originally posted by cerberusiv:

Originally posted by Dave:

Mandalore, HK-47 and Mira are the 3 best killers of dark jedi in the game in my opinion if set them up right. Don't train mira if you want her to be good. Let her keep building up the free targeting and precise shots. Ironic that the most epic characters are non jedi, but there it is.

The crossover point for Mira is when she hits lvl 21 and gets Targeting VI. She will already have all the Precise Shot feats and could have Master Rapid Shot and Two Weapon Fighting and be able to gun down any normal enemy in 1-2 combat rounds.

You can keep her as a scout and go for Targeting VII but by the time you get that she could be a jedi with Master Force Speed and blaster bolt deflection without a lightsaber.

BD without a saber? Why bother? By the time you get to lv21 any enemies can be forced into melee or knocked out in a single round if they stay ranged, because they're then so much easier to hit.

[ppaladin123]

Originally posted by Dave:

Originally posted by Sesh:

Another question: Has anyone found a way to reliably increase Mandalore's AC? Or improve his build (heavy armor and rifles) at all? He can't benefit from dex bonuses and you can't change his armor (and from what I remember it isn't the best), every time I play through Mandalore becomes a character that I can only describe as "Good for level 15-18".

Dex bonuses only affect AC not attack so there's nothing wrong with him using guns. For his armour I either go bonded plates 4 with flexible underlay to improve his overall defence or go ballistic shielding and armorweave to give him massive immunities. Combined with his 'I am Mandalore you can't hurt me' feat he can become a beast in shooting and melee.

Unless it was changed in this game, dex modifier is added to your attack roll with ranged weapons in Star Wars d20 so Mandalore's lack of dex modifier combined with his feat set-up for ranged combat is ridiculous and makes him tough to optimize. I turned him into a melee fighter...has decent survivability if you put the right overlays and underlays on his armor.