Carapace Armor not worth it?

[Julian]

I finally started building my first carapace armor and realised that you can only upgrade it to level 2 making the armor..... 2 armor better than padded armor? And I need a frickton of mats for that?

Am I missing something and you can upgrade it well beyond that or is the new armor Tier that bad?

EDIT: Thank you to Mozzy for taking the time to check out the dmg reduction on the armors and stuff, his original post is on page 2 of this discussion but here's also a quote for visibility:

Originally posted by Mozzy:

Edit - TLDR at top b/c fairly long post - yes wiki is wrong, had dmg taken inverted from reduction. Armor provides hugely more protection than wiki says

**Biome vs biome, plains best armor was and is significantly better protection than mistlands current best OR eventual best when L4 carapace is obtainable legitimately.
Max plains hit with L4 padded armor = 21.2%
Max mist hit with L2 carapace armor = 28.6% today , 24.4% L4 carapace

-------Details
Ok so apparently, not surprising, wiki is wrong. Because as others pointed out, wiki has it wrong by inversing actual result vs what it states. So either game bugged or Wiki formula means naked dmg = X, and armored dmg = portion TAKEN not portion reduced (e.g. 15% dmg taken, not 15% reduced - meaning whopping 85% reduction in dmg.

So - testing 50 hits minimum, per mob, in god mode so could stand there and get whacked over and over, actual results are as ppl above stated - dmg formula is inverted to what wiki says, e.g. we take only 15% of dmg with 85% giant reduction.

Actuial field data using following methods-
-god mode on, minimum 50 repeated hits from each mob type to establish min and max for each scenario below
* did NOT try establish avg range, sat there for 50 hits and whatever was absolute lowest hit was min, absolute highest as max. Then if within 2/10ths of whole number, rounded up bc doubtful devs put mob dmg range as fractional numbers. Fwiw the max was very rarely reached, seemed usual range was far more towards lower half.

-tested butt naked for min max actual dmg mob can output
-tested with best armor for that biome to establish actual dmg taken min and max
-tested with 0-star fuling as avg plains mob
-tested with 0-star seeker as avg mistlands mob

*pre-declaring here where ppl hopefully read - tested BOTH carapace L2 which is current best, and L4 carapace which is best fair comparison to padded L4 in plains. Can not make legit L4 but can console spawn L4 carapace because already exists in armor tables.

Results:

Plains - 0-star Fuling 50 hits
Naked: Min 75 , Max 85
Padded L4: Min 14 , Max 18
Actual dmg taken: min = 18.66% , max = 21.2%

Mistlands - 0-star Seeker 50 hits
Naked: Min 83, Max 119 (this one did over 100 hits b/c got early high then never seen close to it again until nearly 100 hits later)

Carapace L2: Min 14.5 , Max 34
Actual dmg taken L2: min = 17.5% , max = 28.6%

Carapace L4: Min 13 , Max 29
Actual dmg taken L4: min = 15.7 , max = 24.4%

So with numbers above we can compare 3 different scenarios-
A) Best plains biome max armor vs naked
B) Current best mistlands max armor vs naked
C) L4 best plains padded vs eventual max L4 best mistlands carapace

With caveat only comparing 2 mobs - plains fuling vs mist seeker, the ballpark conclusions are fairly simple -

A) Relatively speaking, wearing best L4 padded in plains, most we could take is ~21% dmg vs butt naked

B) This compares to current best mistlands - L2 carapace being relatively much worse, taking max 28.6% vs butt naked

So if all we did was compare biome best from plains to mistlands TODAY - then L4 padded is significantly better from pov of biome vs biome: ~21% dmg taken in plains vs 28.6% mistlands

But to be fair, also compared more apples to apples, L4 padded vs L4 carapace we will eventually get - however, even L4 carapace is underpowered compared to the biome protection the best plains armor gave us, in plains.

L4 carapace reduced the max dmg taken to 24.4% - but the highest plains hit was ~21%

We would have to compare a lot more mobs, 1 and 2 star fulings, shamans, berserkers, etc vs more mistlands mobs, but this 40k foot initial comparison seems to suggest 1 of 2 things -

Mistland mobs are significantly higher tuned for dmg output, biome vs biome, than plains.
or
Plains best armor is significantly better than both current and eventual best L2/L4 carapace.

[DredSilent]

That's as far as it goes for now. You'll have to likely wait a good while for the next biome to come out. Someone will probably make a mod to allow for them to go beyond 2 upgrades, but more than likely this is in their introduction to future content, the last couple of biomes and you'll have to wait to be able to upgrade the new crafting tables.

[avatar.zero]

Level 2 is the current maximum. As the last two biomes (Deep North and Ashlands) get fleshed out, the crafting station will get new upgrade items which will allow you to improve the Carapace items to higher levels, just like all of the other crafting stations so far.

[Julian]

That's quite underwhelming to be honest.

I don't see the logic behind this decision. I can upgrade every armor with the materials from that very biome I get the armor in to at least level 3 or straight to level 4, but now we need mats from a biome that will probably be released in 2024 to get to level 3 of the armor. I don't like it one bit...

[DredSilent]

Originally posted by Karon:

That's quite underwhelming to be honest.

Well hopefully it won't take 2 more years for the next biome to come out... hopefully.

Originally posted by Karon:

That's quite underwhelming to be honest.

I don't see the logic behind this decision. I can upgrade every armor with the materials from that very biome I get the armor in to at least level 3 or straight to level 4, but now we need mats from a biome that will probably be released in 2024 to get to level 3 of the armor. I don't like it one bit...

Its not that you can't upgrade it, its the table level is only 2, and most often you get the upgrade components for the table expansions/addons in the consecutive biomes.

[Julian]

Originally posted by DredSilent:

Its not that you can't upgrade it, its the table level is only 2, and most often you get the upgrade components for the table expansions/addons in the consecutive biomes.

IIRC you can upgrade the forge to level 6 with the materials you get up to the swamp biome, so you can max out the iron armor in the swamp biome, the silver armor in the mountain biome, and the padded armor with the grinding wheel upgrade in the plains biome.

So there are only very few armors that need upgrades from the next biome I think^^

[Zep Tepi]

I agree, this was a very strange decision. I could sort of understand if it was just for beta testing so see how the biome ran with armor that wasn't fully upgraded, but now that it's out, two points of armor doesn't seem worth it at all. And those two points are proportionately worth less as the numbers get higher. Two points in Mistlands is worth a lot less than two points in the Black Forest.

[avatar.zero]

Originally posted by Karon:

IIRC you can upgrade the forge to level 6 with the materials you get up to the swamp biome

There are six upgrades for the Forge. Only 2 of them are available in the same biome level as the one that the Forge becomes available at (Black Forest). The other 4 all require materials from the next biome up (Swamp).

Likewise, the Workbench has 4 upgrades, only 2 of which can be made from materials in the same biome that that Workbench is first available at (Meadows). 1 of the remaining upgrades requires materials from one biome up (Black Forest) and the other requires materials from three biomes up (Iron from Swamp and Obsidian from Mountain).

There is already plenty of precedence to warrant waiting for more biomes to be developed before the Black Forge gets more upgrades. It only first becomes available at Mistlands, making Mistlands the low level base biome.

Be patient, or use mods - those are your only reasonable options at the moment.

[Mozzy]

At OP - you are missing something, specifically how combat dmg mechanics work in valheim. This is not ding at you, game doesn't spell out lots of things.

Can check wiki explaining this in full https://valheim.fandom.com/wiki/Damage_mechanics

But in short, armor works on diminishing returns curve where the tier you are calculated at can be using just one example, almost 30% less HP dmg actually taken than if you were 1 single armor point below that tier threshold.

1 - if zero armor, butt naked, HP dmg = hit dmg. Mob whacks you for 50, take 50 HP loss. Easy.

2- if armor < or = to 50.0%, you get the full value of that armor, kinda the newbie threshold. HP dmg = hit - armor
50 dmg hit - 20 armor = 30 HP loss. Still easy.

Now comes diminishing returns but why upgrading just 1 tier of armor helps you take reduced total HP dmg.

3- if armor is more than half (>50.0%) of total dmg hit, then you use formula ( Dmg / [Armor x 4] ) x Dmg

This means in a way armor is worth less than the newbie tier because you got full value of armor reducing dmg when it was less than or equal to 50%. But this also means each tier you get higher than the dmg hitting you shaves off good amount more than the prior tier.

Wiki has a table so will just summarize a key example - say you have 20 armor, take 40 dmg hit. You lose 20 HP (40 - 20 = 20)

Now you upgrade to next tier of armor and with couple upgrades, not max level 4 but say level 2 or so, now you have 30 armor. That same 40 dmg hit now only does 13.33 dmg to you.

40 dmg hit taking 20 HP by prior tier armor now only takes 13.33 HP. If you do the math, that is whopping 66.6% less actual HP dmg by being just 1 armor tier higher on this curve than wearing prior tier armor.

This diminishing curve starts going down, 33% less, then 20%, 8.3%, etc. But main point and TLDR is just being a few armor points higher than the threshold for prior dmg tier can mean 30-66% less actual HP dmg taken. Depends how far down diminishing returns curve you are, but it isn't just the few armor difference, it is whether you are 1 point more than bare minimum needed to be in the new tier.

[Julian]

Originally posted by Mozzy:

At OP - you are missing something, specifically how combat dmg mechanics work in valheim. This is not ding at you, game doesn't spell out lots of things.

Can check wiki explaining this in full https://valheim.fandom.com/wiki/Damage_mechanics

But in short, armor works on diminishing returns curve where the tier you are calculated at can be using just one example, almost 30% less HP dmg actually taken than if you were 1 single armor point below that tier threshold.

1 - if zero armor, butt naked, HP dmg = hit dmg. Mob whacks you for 50, take 50 HP loss. Easy.

2- if armor < or = to 50.0%, you get the full value of that armor, kinda the newbie threshold. HP dmg = hit - armor
50 dmg hit - 20 armor = 30 HP loss. Still easy.

Now comes diminishing returns but why upgrading just 1 tier of armor helps you take reduced total HP dmg.

3- if armor is more than half (>50.0%) of total dmg hit, then you use formula ( Dmg / [Armor x 4] ) x Dmg

This means in a way armor is worth less than the newbie tier because you got full value of armor reducing dmg when it was less than or equal to 50%. But this also means each tier you get higher than the dmg hitting you shaves off good amount more than the prior tier.

Wiki has a table so will just summarize a key example - say you have 20 armor, take 40 dmg hit. You lose 20 HP (40 - 20 = 20)

Now you upgrade to next tier of armor and with couple upgrades, not max level 4 but say level 2 or so, now you have 30 armor. That same 40 dmg hit now only does 13.33 dmg to you.

40 dmg hit taking 20 HP by prior tier armor now only takes 13.33 HP. If you do the math, that is whopping 66.6% less actual HP dmg by being just 1 armor tier higher on this curve than wearing prior tier armor.

This diminishing curve starts going down, 33% less, then 20%, 8.3%, etc. But main point and TLDR is just being a few armor points higher than the threshold for prior dmg tier can mean 30-66% less actual HP dmg taken. Depends how far down diminishing returns curve you are, but it isn't just the few armor difference, it is whether you are 1 point more than bare minimum needed to be in the new tier.

Thank you for that insightful post, do you by any chance know the amount of damage the seekers do? Would be interesting to know how big a difference 106 armor vs 100 armor makes^^

Originally posted by avatar.zero:

There are six upgrades for the Forge. Only 2 of them are available in the same biome level as the one that the Forge becomes available at (Black Forest). The other 4 all require materials from the next biome up (Swamp).

Likewise, the Workbench has 4 upgrades, only 2 of which can be made from materials in the same biome that that Workbench is first available at (Meadows). 1 of the remaining upgrades requires materials from one biome up (Black Forest) and the other requires materials from three biomes up (Iron from Swamp and Obsidian from Mountain).

There is already plenty of precedence to warrant waiting for more biomes to be developed before the Black Forge gets more upgrades. It only first becomes available at Mistlands, making Mistlands the low level base biome.

Yeah true, but once you reach the Swamp biome you can upgrade every armor within the tier you get the armor in. You can upgrade the iron armor in the swamp to max level, you can upgrade the silver armor in the mountain biome to max level etc etc.

I don't know much about the patch history of the game, but if I remember correctly the release version of the game had every biome up to, including, the swamp in it. Maybe the mountain as well, but I'm not sure on that. And since the swamp was in the game from the beginning, you never had to wait for the next patch to upgrade your armor to max level. This is the first time this happened. I think. Please forgive me if I got this wrong.

Originally posted by avatar.zero:

Be patient, or use mods - those are your only reasonable options at the moment.

It's not about having an option, it's more about trying to point out (IMO) perceived flaws of the game in hopes of either understanding what's going on and why it's not a flaw at all (which Mozzy helped out a lot with) or if others agree as well, hoping that the Devs might take note of it and may try to do fix the flaw.

It's a great game and I don't want this thread to be a QQ or rage thread. The Mistlands patch is overall good and I enjoy the added features. I don't want to punch down or make the game look worse than it is. I just found this one decision weird and wanted to talk about it and see what others think. At the end of the day I will keep playing the game as it is, because so far it is a good game.

[Soulstinger]

Mozzy; do your math sorcery and tell me if fully upgraded Padded armor was worth more in the Plains than tier 2 Carapace is in Mistlands.

Plz and Thanx

[Mozzy]

For plains, let's exclude Berserkers b/c their dmg output is so GD overpowered compared to regular Fulings. So taking 0-star everyday Fuling as your most abundant usual danger - they do 85 blunt/pierce/slash dmg if weapon hit, and 45 blunt/fire dmg if torch.

Let's assume weapon Fuling hit - 85 points total dmg to HP if not blocked, wearing zero armor. That is our baseline.

Non-modded, vanilla max padded armor + cape = 100 armor (32 x 3 armor, 4 cape)

Assuming zero block, just let it whack you in the face, max padded armor would translate that 85pt hit = (85 / [100*4] * 85) = 72.25 dmg HP. Effectively a 15% reduction.

In Mistlands, take the common seeker, not solider or 2 star seeker, just avg 0-star seeker. Wiki doesn't have dmg info yet so for science I will go butt naked into mists and see what dmg they hit. Will edit this post when have that info to determine answer to question of:

Was max L4 padded armor worth more in plains vs current max L2 carapace in Mistlands?

TBD! dun dun dun!!!

[Julian]

https://i.imgur.com/htSam4v.jpeg

100 armor vs fuling makes me take ~14 dmg, I think you mean a dmg reduction of 85% and 15% is the overall damage you still take^^


Edit: I just went into the mist naked, and took around 85 damage from a normal seeker. Did you take the same damage Mozzy?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dqui9rdZPao


With armor I took between 15 and 30ish damage, so it seems that depending on the attack (one foreleg attack vs both forelegs) the seeker does either 85 or 2x85 dmg, depending on the attack.

[coolAlias]

Originally posted by Mozzy:

Assuming zero block, just let it whack you in the face, max padded armor would translate that 85pt hit = (85 / [100*4] * 85) = 72.25 dmg HP. Effectively a 15% reduction.

Great post, but the output of your equation does not match the inputs:

85 / (100*4) = 0.2125
0.2125 x 85 = 18.0625

So, assuming the fuling smacks you in the face and rolls maximum damage, according to your (the wiki's?) formula, you should only take 18 points if wearing maxed out padded gear + cape.

If you went in with level 2 carapace armor for a net +6 armor:

85 / (106 * 4) = 0.2005... x 85 = 17.0401 damage

[Waxior]

Originally posted by avatar.zero:

Level 2 is the current maximum. As the last two biomes (Deep North and Ashlands) get fleshed out, the crafting station will get new upgrade items which will allow you to improve the Carapace items to higher levels, just like all of the other crafting stations so far.

why is all said "2 biome left when devs said it will be 9 boss, its 3 and NOT 2 left

[coolAlias]

Originally posted by Waxior:

Originally posted by avatar.zero:

Level 2 is the current maximum. As the last two biomes (Deep North and Ashlands) get fleshed out, the crafting station will get new upgrade items which will allow you to improve the Carapace items to higher levels, just like all of the other crafting stations so far.

why is all said "2 biome left when devs said it will be 9 boss, its 3 and NOT 2 left

The 9th boss probably has to do with the stones where you sacrifice the forsaken trophies - that circular one in the center, is my guess - and not a 9th biome. Could be totally wrong, but that's how I expect it will be done at this time.