Tips for using heavy armor

[Timmy]

planning on only using heavy armor with either 2h sword , 2h axe or 1h weapon + heavy shield

[DacianDraco]

Imo what you want is not really good or better said other compositions would be better, but i guess out of those the 2H Sword with almost all of Armored Combat tree could work well. So try to get AGL to 20 and VIT to at least 15, maybe even 20 if you see you don't recover Energy passively with Counters or actively with Arc Cleave and Flexible defense.

Also i think it's best to get at least Setup and Opportune Moment from Warfare tree since Armored Combat tree has mostly Maneuvers and Parry is a Maneuver too and you have Counters with Parry from 2H sword tree, and all of these can help with Energy cost and Energy regain. And later maybe add both Tactics and Tactical Advantage passive from Warfare tree, because it also works well with Stances and Maneuvers and helps with Energy.

Plus you won't really be using heavy armor until you get at least Amity in Brynn, so it will be around character lvl 10-15 when you can buy some from the Metalworks bailiff, ideally an Aldorian helm, Knightly Brigandine, Knightly gauntlets and some Scaled boots. And here is where you will get to use them and see if you need more than 15 VIT, but know that when you get Respect in Brynn you can replace boots with some Baron Sabatons also from Metalworks bailiff, and your body armor with an Elven Brigandine from the Elf Trader inside the Azure House which are a bit better armor pieces but have slightly more Energy penalty.

[funkmonster7]

Originally posted by DacianDraco:

Imo what you want is not really good or better said other compositions would be better

Just curious, which other compositions would be better?

I currently run an Arna sword/shield heavy armor build. No energy problem, barely takes damage, only problem really is shield gets worn out very quickly even with the repair passive in armored combat, and repair toolkit seems to only repair 5 durability instead of "up to 10". Bleed is solved by Cauterize Wound, and I never get injured. Heavy shield block power recovery is at 1% (because that is the minimum), however once I pop Hold the Line maneuver, I can really high (50% and above) block power recovery, with near-100% block chance.

My current stats are something like this:

17 Str
15 Agi
14 Per
20 Vit
10 Wil

The goal is to get to at least 15 Per, the reason is my sword has low armor penetration, so it does little damage against armored foes. Also to partially negate the -2 Vision debuff from wearing heavy helmet.

After that I either keep going to 20 Per, or get 20 Str and then the remaining 2 SP into Vit, just for extra energy. This wholly depends on my equipment, because I'm trying to reach a consistent 30% energy restoration for 3-turn energy restoration. Because of my sword passive Endurance Training I can get +20% energy resto for 3 turns when I use a sword skill. That will take me to 50% energy resto every once in a while, which is 1-turn energy restoration.

I'm not saying you're wrong, but I'm hoping to see if my strategy can be improved upon. :)

I think heavy armor works for both 1h or 2h, in fact I would recommend it for 2h builds because the lack of a shield makes for a squishier target. I routinely play DW builds and predominantly with a light armor focus. I'm playing one now with heavy armor focus instead, see if it helps a bit. I already have a Jorgrim DW axes which, regardless of what armor he uses he just destroys enemies in 3-4 turns, this is just because of his axes dealing humongous damage so it doesn't matter what he wears. However he dies from time to time if RNG doesn't smile on him, and every so often an enemy can crit his leg and completely breaks it i.e. 0% bodypart hp. Granted, this Jorgrim has no armored combat skill, as Brace for Impact can solve this issue (it is one of my skills for that Jorgrim to learn now).

The reason this Jorgrim's leg (or chest) breaks so easily is those are the only light armor pieces on him (Duelist Doublet and Duelist Boots). He wears medium Riveted Gloves and a medium helmet, and I aim to raise them to heavy armor counterparts... Because currently if anything is going to kill him for real, they are hands injuries and stun/daze.

[DacianDraco]

Well imo both Heavy armor and Heavy shields by themselves are generally bad because you are kind of forced into getting some passives and actives either from Armored Combat or Shield tree or both to make them work, plus you still need to get VIT to fix the Energy pool, Energy Restoration and Block Power Recovery problems you create with choosing these item types. And it's even worse to mix them together because what's the point of having 20+ Prot (and high %Phys Res) plus a shield that can Block some 40+ dmg when very few enemies do 30+ dmg. Also VIT doesn't increase (or unlock) most skills in game, the few exceptions getting stuff like Block Power Recovery or Damage Reduction which is unnecessary if you make better choices. And with some high Prot armor and/or a shield to Block reliably you take less dmg anyway so the %Damage Reduction is less good, plus what's the point of some 15-30 Life from +5 or +10 VIT threshold if you already don't loose much Life anyway.

As for 2H Swords an attribute split between AGL and STR is best, up to 20 or 25 if you overlevel to get more Counter and Block mainly for Parry spam with it's 2 passives below it, also with AGL and STR everything else is better like flat dmg for Heroic Charge and the Stagger and Bleed chances of all your skills. Battles looking something like: activate 2H Sword stance and Unyielding Defense, using Heroic charge from farthest away for max dmg and then just raising Parry up as much as possible, it really depends how and when you Block and/or Counters and kills, for ex when you don't kill you mix in Arc Cleave first (preferably on several enemies) to Stagger or Hewing Strike if you already Staggered with Heroic charge, or Flexible Defense (again preferably on more than one enemy), or just save Hewing Strike for after your 3rd strike with Stance up, anyway generally try to keep Parry active as much as possible to Counter, as Counter and Stagger have most synergy here. Also some Light armor chestpieces give Counter and Dodge, and since you already have some from AGL you can double down while making some Armored Combat skills better.

Then with 2H Axes depends on the weapon type for ex the poleaxe types either want AGL to 20 to fix Fumble first and rest in STR mostly for more dmg and a slight increase of Block chance that can occasionally roll since these weapon types innately have it, or for the "wide" axe types that have slightly more flat dmg and more Armor Dmg (instead of STR) you can go full AGL mainly for Fumble fix but a bit of Counter too and the possibility to lean more into Dodge which pairs well with the occasional Stagger chance that these "wide" axes innately have, and really it's repeating what i said about Light armor chest pieces above at the end of 2H swords, just overall less Block and Counter and Stagger synergy but same thing with either Block or Dodge increase in the case of some Armored Combat skills depending on the axe type chosen. Either way the synergy of 2H Axe is high dmg and in turn Bodypart damage needed to create Injuries and then Bleed said injuries, the power laying in debuffing and generally killing fast, also i think it's best to not try to handicap yourself by wearing Heavy armor which needs Energy fixing when Axes are a bit more Energy hungry weapon types in the first place expecially since all the positives of heavy armor exist when that specific bodypart is hit while all the negatives are always active on the player.

And lastly look at your preferred Heavy shield and instead of spending some 5 or 10 points in VIT spend them in STR instead to get some 7.5% or 15% Block Chance and more flat Block Power to pair with a better chosen Medium shield like at least a Skadian or Huscarl Shield or a Long Shield from Neutrality/Benevolence in Brynn, which being Medium shields don't penalize Block Power Recovery at all and don't negative affect cooldowns of Shield skills like all Heavy shields do. Also your %Dodge penalty may be better, ideally not negative since negative Dodge just increases enemy hit chance. And besides the innate stats STR gives it generally betters weaponry skills in some way and even helps unlock some of them. So imo it's always better to get a Medium shield over Heavy.

Also a final point is imo PRC is not needed at all for any melee build as Topaz jewelry is med lvl, so not hard or expensive to buy, even somewhat common drop (if lucky with a favorable Curse too), plus the +Life it gives is like temporary Prot lets say so imo best in slot most of the time. Thou there are Spears, 2H Swords and some few other weapons that have innate ACC on them, so then you don't need 2 Topaz rings and a Topaz Amulet and could mix in for ex 1 or 2 Gold Diamond rings, an Oracle Star, a Runic amulet or whatever.

[funkmonster7]

Well, my reasoning not to go with Str for 15% block chance is simply that Str doesn't give nearly as much block power as I would've needed. Block power recovery isn't a problem with heavy shield due to Hold the Line. But blocking all the damage when I'm surrounded is a problem.

I can understand if this is related to 2h swords since all the block chance comes from Str. But if we're talking about heavy shields, they're really useful in that they really block everything. Medium shields can't block everything, they don't have enough block power nor block chance. A few more Str won't make the difference. It is true medium shields won't give the +25% cooldown duration debuff. But just proccing Embodiment of Resilience, that is taken care of. And also, heavy shields do more damage etc with active shield abilities. Some of its stats even scale off Vit, and at very alarming efficiency too. Main example is Shield Bash, currently doing 39 damage with 57% daze chance and 94% knockback chance. With a light or medium shield, the ability is barely useful due to the paltry damage and everything else. Str may scale with shield damage, but I found that block power scales better.

The reason why I went with Vit was indeed just for energy and energy restoration. Str might've given me more weapon damage, but my current Str is actually 17. My Vit is 20. Basically, to fix the energy problem of heavy shield and heavy armor, all I need is 20 Vit. I could indeed wear medium armor now that I have a heavy shield and all... But it would mean if I miss a block, I'll get hit for a reasonable amount of damage.

I suppose now I can go with a light or medium shield, and let my armor tank damage for me when I don't block.

I'm already wearing the Carved Topaz Amulet and a Silver Topaz Ring. With my helmet and gauntlets giving -4% accuracy each, this ends up with me having a net +2% accuracy with the amulet and ring on. (I have another ring with -4% fumble, but also with +10% move res and +5% phy res so I don't want to give it up for another Silver Topaz Ring.)

But my real reason for PRC is to boost my sword's armor penetration. And another secondary reason is I want my crossbow to hit something for a change. I can use a Brynn Crossbow which with bodkin bolts will give me +10% accuracy, but with default PRC it'll just be me having 92% accuracy. I prefer to hit with more accuracy so I invest into PRC for that reason.

The reason why I don't care about negative dodge chance is when I wear heavy armor, my dodge is already in the negative. In fact, putting on my heavy shield just changes my dodge chance from -13% to -25%; my shield drops dodge by -25%. This means the lowest negative dodge you can get is -25%. Thus it doesn't matter if I hold a medium shield or not, I'm going to get negative dodge unless I get out of heavy armor and not hold a heavy shield ... which, I've done that before, that was what I was using prior to shifting into heavy everything. It wasn't easy playing like that, that was how the Ancient Troll ate me alive.

I've found (across multiple characters now) that having 15-20 Vit is real lifesaver. That extra 15-30 hp means a big deal. I think hp also boosts bodypart damage, so it makes me harder to get injuries. So I don't really consider the 20 Vit to be a nuisance. In fact, I try to make sure all my melee builds have at least 15 Vit nowadays. Maybe the only exception being builds that need max stats in a certain area, like 2h sword. But I've never played 2h sword before in this patch so...

Edit: This is my heavy shield, with Hold the Line active and Raise Shield used:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3229933884

97% block chance, but it is only temporary for 3 turns. However, block power recovery is 55%. What I normally do is let an enemy hit me once, and then I use another shield ability to raise Hold the Line stack to max, which is 70% block power recovery.

I don't have Unyielding Defense learned, I simply think it is unneeded due to me already having learned Fencing Stance. So, with Fencing Stance active, I actually have achieved max block chance while Raise Shield is active.

The shield skills cool down very quickly because I fully block everything. Even at low energy, I can recover energy quickly enough that I never have energy issues. Probably Endurance Training, Opportune Moment and Embodiment of Resilence is a bit too much... But no energy problem at all. I probably have a cooldown problem, but not with my shield skills, rather it is my sword skills.

Mind you, I was already practically invincible from level 20 onwards, I didn't need to be at level 24. My DW Jorgrim still dies at level 20. He's the one with medium gauntlets and helmet, and light chestpiece and boots. Oddly though, he slaughtered the Ancient Troll without using drugs at level 17, while this Arna kept dying. Probably because I couldn't get her a good sword at the time. And 20-prot armor doesn't save you from the Ancient Troll. After all, the Ancient Troll "skewers through plate mail", according to General Webb.

But in hindsight, maybe I will not do heavy armor and shield at the same time the future. I did find heavy armor a bit pointless with the heavy shield at the same time... But I certainly didn't find 20 Vit to be that much of a useless thing.

[funkmonster7]

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3229956054
Holy damn, I'm glad I'm wearing heavy armor for this. My shield broke and on my way back from the distant dungeon, I got ganked by 8 bandits, one of them an Electromancer who did the most damage to me.

I decided to not use V Elixir for the sake of challenge.

The enemies I faced were Electromancer, Brigand Banneret, 2 Crossbow Marksmen, 3 more tier III or IV melee bandits (1 spear - possibly another Brigand Banneret, 2 mace and shield dudes), a T4 duelist bandit, and 1 Goon.

I don't know, maybe my other characters could've dealt with this more easily too. But I guess even heavy armor heavy shield build isn't that invincible after all. This being said, my shield is below 50% durability from the distant dungeon so... I assume this is what would've happened to me if I had a medium shield instead.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3229958591

Oh lookie there, 3 more joined the party late. Although just a tier 2 dog, mancatcher and 2h sword dude.

[DacianDraco]

I said with STR instead of VIT you get more Block Chance and flat Block Power as well, and since now i saw what your favorite Heavy shield is i'll be exact and tell you that if you would have spent those 10 points from VIT in STR instead and used a medium Long shield instead of the heavy Brynn Pavise you would have had 1% more Block Chance and 1 more Block Power, no penalty to Block Power Recovery (so passive Block Power Recovery every turn, not just with Hold the Line or other shield skills/passives), no increased Cooldown on Shield skills plus less penalty to Dodge, Energy and Energy Restoration because of the differences between the Long shield and that Brynn Pavise, and well instead of getting the Pavise at Respect in Brynn you could have gotten at Amity a Knightly Shield for even less Dodge, Energy and Energy Restoration penalties to replace your Long shield you had since Benevolence in Brynn, thou it would have costed you 2% Block chance for lesser penalties.

Also skills like Shield Bash or Breakthrough would be slightly better with STR, not just the Stagger, Daze, Knockback chances but also because you have 1 more Block Power from STR like i explained above. And 10 more STR would have made your Swords skills better too.

Overall i think your character is how i explained above in 1st paragraph, where i say why i think Heavy armor and Heavy shields are bad especially together, and they need fixing for a problem that's created just from choosing them. And i'm not hating on VIT since it's where i always put my 3-4 points that can't reach a threshold, but imo it's just not good when a build has to put some 5-10 in VIT (and needing some skills too) in order to work acceptably, especially when 5-10 attribute somewhere else (and some other skill choices) are better.

If anyone is curious i had made a Sword and Shield Arna work well even with a Light shield and Light chestpiece like Duelist Doublet, she is not really similar to your build as she is a Counter build and i used just the defensive Shield skills, but the idea is defensively i think she works better this way making use of some decent Block and Dodge, essentially 2 rolls for defense on each attack she receives. I'll share some vids where she is just 17 and leveling in some Distant dungeons to eventually get to lvl 20 and those 3 Armored Combat skills i needed to complete the build, also her ACC is not the best because i had 2 good Curses on rings that i found, but i had Setup and Seize the Initiative to help out with ACC.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMi_yyfsC1U
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EqFktEeU3Y
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OosxPAK03fw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKXlZHJbD4o
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwMGQPZTbpg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iXiHz3U31tE

Oh and i remembered you said chest and legs break more often on a character with Light armor in those armor slots and i think it happens because they have least Prot there and probably a Murkstalker, Magistrate Renegades, a Duelist, Crossbowman, 2H sword guy and whichever others have Seize Initiative hit you, so try using stuff like Deflect, Raise shield, Elusiveness, Brace for Impact, etc against it, or you could use Seize Initiative yourself and then they won't use it anymore. Maybe also use some defensive skill vs any Spear guys which Nail Down your feet, and generally 2H axe guys that can do more Bodypart dmg and beasts like Gulons or Harpy which also do a lot of Bodypart dmg, even if these are not targeted attacks on your least protected Bodypart it's still good to avoid them.

[funkmonster7]

Fair enough. Yes I noticed the 1% block chance disparity. Didn't bother calculating the block power disparity though. 1% was too small a thing to fuss over for me, but it is a fair call. :)

Good mention of StI and the fact that some skills target limb with weakest protection, I tend to forget things like this. I hardly use StI myself so this is a good reminder for me.

Interestingly, you have "Examine Surrounding" on hotkey 0 as well. I shared a screenshot of my hotbar some time ago in this forum, and someone asked me why I have it on 0 instead of 1, which requires me to mouse-click it all the time. My answer was I don't want to accidentally hit 1 for my starter attack skill (a habit I've had since my old MMO days) and instead I end up using Examine Surrounding, that habit would kill me lol...

From watching the first video:

Why are you putting all the bones into caskets?

I believe you use some mods, correct? Just QoL mods though, I presume one that shows your remaining block power and backfire chance?

You don't seem to like using Rest, is there a reason? You have broken limbs at some point, 30 turns away from cooling down your First Aid skill, yet you keep on fighting or moving around with a broken leg anyway.

I've actually watched some bits of the 1st and 3rd video, well played. I would make different decisions at certain times, but you seem to have a certain style going (in terms of general decision making).

I think the difference between you and me here is I went for the absolute defense, whereas you went with the most optimal build, with some risks taken along the way. Also, I played my current build already aiming to make heavy armor and heavy shield a thing - or at least just heavy shield, because I wanted to test out its validity, as well as complete the whole shield tree (rather than just half of it, I believe is what you did). Because I wanted to unlock an achievement, haha...

Same with sword. I unlocked the achievement for it as well, in my current playthrough.

I don't think you can change my mind too much about how Str is better than Vit, but I can now see your reasoning. Block comes after dodge, so if you made a hit fumble then you technically block less damage if you trigger a block as well. But if you don't dodge nor block, you'll take more damage than I would've. Whereas my build is block everything, and then if something gets through then my armor takes the damage.

My build technically is a counter build as well, that is why I've been wondering if I should put more SP into Str or Agi, just for the boost in base damage or counter chance (also -fumble chance).

[DacianDraco]

I decide what valuables to take on my way out after i clear the dungeon, so before that i just drop stuff on the ground and all bones are annoying clutter when i highlight dropped items.

As for the Block Power, Backfire and enemy Bleed/Stagger indicators i used the UI+ mod version at that time, now it has expanded https://www.nexusmods.com/stoneshard/mods/2

And Rest mode i just don't like using at all, i'd rather do anything else while Cooldowns pass.

Overall various preferences and habits, some good some not as good but it works. And yeah i'm not trying to change minds, even for OP i gave tips after considering what they wanted, and in general i'm clear at stating it's my opinion and i expanded on it and explained why only because you were curious, but the reality is everyone does what they want in the end and many things can work and it's fine to try things. Plus it's about fun and fun is subjective.

[Elder Borjoyzee]

I like One-Handed Mace + heavy chest piece. Stun charge into knockout is fun.

[funkmonster7]

Originally posted by DacianDraco:

And yeah i'm not trying to change minds, even for OP i gave tips after considering what they wanted, and in general i'm clear at stating it's my opinion and i expanded on it and explained why only because you were curious, but the reality is everyone does what they want in the end and many things can work and it's fine to try things. Plus it's about fun and fun is subjective.

No prob, I appreciated your advice. There were good points in there.