Do you guys bother upgrading armor?

[WickedRequiem]

Just curious.
I generally don't, but wondering if anyone did.

[Call Sign: Raven]

I only upgrade if I know I’m going to run the character through NG+6 and further, or if I use a vitality build.

[pgo9ro]

I always upgrade it because less damage. That's a no brainer.

[General Tenebrous]

Only the armor for the build I'm using, not all.

[Iban The Dude]

Absolutly yes.

[JellyPuff]

There really isn't any reason not to, provided you have the upgrade materials. Worst case, you receive a handful of points less damage, best case you get ~10% elemental damage reduction out of it.

[J]

Partially, if I have spare souls to stay within my preferred sm level. I don't think upgrading your armour helps that much. If you can't roll through attacks reliably, harder enemies and bosses will still get you when you run out of healing items. And if you got your rolls down, you won't take much damage either way

[King Robert Baratheon]

Originally posted by pgo9ro:

I always upgrade it because less damage. That's a no brainer.

This. You'd be ridiculous not to. Unless you're super obsessed with not raising your soul memory by spending souls on upgrading armor. But EVERY armor set in the game, even the crappiest ones, can benefit a lot of from being fully upgraded. And all of the upgrade materials (even chunks and slabs) are much MUCH less rare in Dark Souls 2. Titanite Slabs are actually kind of common. I get a lot of Titanite Slabs from Smooth & Silky Stones and Petrified Somethings. Also there are more than a few enemies in the game that drop slabs and most are not that hard to fight. There are a ton of enemies that drop large titanite shards and titanite chunks. There's no good excuse imo for not having fully upgraded weapons and gear when each upgrade material can be farmed from various different enemies. Even Petrified Dragon Bones can be farmed from one late game enemy and one dlc enemy. If I need PDB's I actually go the Shulva dlc BEFORE ending up at Aldia's Keep. It's actually faster to get down to the Lair of the Imperfect than it is to get to Aldia's Keep and farm those Dragon Acolytes. At least for me. I have the route memorized.

[Edgarek]

I upgraded my ful late gamel armor with twinking titanite at SM 450k and now i m literally invinsible for usual enemies. I even can tank a several hits from enemies from DLC, despite having less then SL 80. Even poise sometimes very useful.

And yea benefits upgrading some sets from 0 to +5 and +10 give you a huge boost for elemental resistance.
And anyway its costs almost nothing in souls, even if you start to buy some stones. If you dont spend on this souls, how many levels you got...1-2? Maybe 3 if you have really low SL character.

There is not point to not upgrading your armor. Only if you some kind of pro, who literally can play without constant damage and complete any area in the game with couple hits.

[crystalgatedh]

I upgrade armor once I know it won't harm my weapon upgrading. Armor is usually not that great, but it does a notable help, especially against fast hitting enemies. It has a big effect against manikins for example, since they hit for a low damage per hit, but rapidly. On the other hand, against slow, but hard hitting enemies like Rotten, it will do almost nothing. Fortunately, it works out so that enemies against who armor is inefficient, you can usually much easier dodge them. For medium enemies, expect to last one extra hit if you pay attention to your armor.

[patrixilentius]

Sometimes I do, but usually I forget about it and simply try to not get hit by enemies. I've come to the realization that it's the best method for survival.

[Terrorize Exercise]

Never, the extra defense provided by doing so is next to nothing and not worth the soul memory.

[Call Sign: Raven]

Originally posted by A Dirty Fart:

Never, the extra defense provided by doing so is next to nothing and not worth the soul memory.

Depends on what you are upgrading.

If you upgrade a combination of armor to give you over 1000 defense in the physical stuff, that usually makes a pretty good difference in most situations. With magic defense, you can be almost invulnerable if you upgrade armor to the point it gets to 800-900 in whatever particular element.

But if you're wearing prisoner's tatters and various pieces of the thief set, then you're right, you won't see a dif.

[Edgarek]

Originally posted by A Dirty Fart:

Never, the extra defense provided by doing so is next to nothing and not worth the soul memory.

Every upgrade literally costs 500-2k souls, its not so many, especially if you have it plenty of stones.
If you only make a super low build around SM below 100k-200k then maybe its not worth it.
Otherwise i see no difference between 3-5 vigor and upgraded armor.

[Leoscar]

Only if I know for sure that's the one armor set I'll be using for the playthrough. For example my current playthrough is a rampart knight cosplay, I know exactly what I'll be using and won't have any other use for the twinkling titanite, might as well upgrade it even though it won't change anything.

[Avarual]

I only upgrade it when i'm going to NG+++