Guild Wars 2

Beyond the visual differences, which is easily negated by use of outfits, why do we have the three types of armor?

Isn’t it all about active defenses: dodging, blocking, reflecting, whatever, regardless of profession?

What are the advantages of heavy armor over medium or light? Are there any disadvantages? Can people in heavy armor do anything people in light or medium can’t?

What are the advantages of medium armor over heavy or light? Are there any disadvantages? Can people in medium armor do anything people in light or heavy armor can’t?

What are the advantages of light armor over heavy or medium? Are there any disadvantages? Can people in light armor do anything people in medium or heavy armor can’t?

Heavy armor wearers move at the same base speed as light and medium armor wearers and enjoy the same unrestricted agility. Amazingly, people in heavy armor, even full plate, can still outrun a centaur — and outswim a sockeye! They can jump just as nimbly across floating platforms. Some heavy armor even rivals the lightest of light armor in how much bare skin is displayed, begging the question, how is it armor and not mere decoration?

In short, beyond a few points of pointless defense rating (see: dodge, block, reflect, etc.), what’s the point of it all? What difference does it really all make?

People expect different armor types. The difference has become more cosmetic than real but there is a decent 15% damage resistance difference between light and heavy when you dilute with toughness.

Twice as much static defence rating is not pointless or insignificant.

I wouldn’t call the increased defense from medium over light or heavy over medium pointless. Ascended heavy armor is ~300 points higher than ascended light armor. I won’t do the math, but that should make some difference.

Aside from that, at the start of the game this was probably made so there is a visual difference between the armor classes. You couldn’t identify an enemy’s class by icon and there were no customes.

With time, the visual borders between the classes blurred because they released more customes, and you don’t need to rely on the armor look since you can easily see the enemy class now.

It’s a combination of statistical difference to delineate the classes and allowing for diversity of visual style. This game is HIGHLY about the BLING!, and different armor weights allow for multiple “looks” from a variety of armor sources. It also allows for some aid in visual identification of classes (or at least groups of classes) while in competitive modes of play.

It’s mostly about the BLING factor, however.

even with the armor differences, you can’t simply see the difference between a necro and an ele.
if it was done like GW1 then you could but they decided to make all armor classes global so light armor is all with light armor and not necro armor and ele armor, personally i think they should remove the visual limit and simply make all armor classes stat wise-only.

the big problem here is that Anet (and some other dev teams) care to much about glitches, armor can glitch through other armor parts.
i would say let the player decide, it’s not up to the dev to decide what we like and what we can see as acceptable.

Kilger.5490:

People expect different armor types. The difference has become more cosmetic than real but there is a decent 15% damage resistance difference between light and heavy when you dilute with toughness.

its less than 15%

The differences are basically:
1. Base direct damage mitigation (with no boons or anything)
2. Aesthetic/lore

Conditions aren’t mitigated by armor at all. Attribute bonuses are the same for all armor types, only varying based on the slot, level, and rarity. It wouldn’t look right seeing a warrior fighting in a cloth dress in battle. The skimpy plate outfits actually fit the aesthetic. They’re skimpy, but still look warrior-y compared to the dresses.

This and they colour differently

In a world in which light and medium armors offer no advantage whatsoever over heavy armor, with the only actual difference between armor types being a few points of defense rating —

Exotic Light: 920
Exotic Medium: 1064
Exotic Heavy: 1211

— why would anyone wear anything besides heavy armor? Especially given that heavy armor need not have a particularly ‘heavy’ appearance.

Are those few points of difference worth it, in terms of game mechanics?

What are some ways anet might possibly play up the differences, to give each type of armor some advantage/disadvantage over the others? Extra dodges for light and medium? Enhanced (or otherwise) resistance to different damage types? Would this benefit gameplay?

What if they went the opposite direction and instead of a trinity (ahem) of armor types, we had a single armor type made of a material (invented, perhaps, by blind asuran scientist-monks who drink only frog sweat harvested on nights when the moon is full and the Tyrian equivalent of Jupiter is aligned with the Tyrian equivalent of Mars) that’s as light and as flexible as the lightest light armor (pretending, for a moment, that armor weight mattered) while offering the same protection as heavy armor, and incorporating holographic technology to allow the wearer to dial in whatever appearance he or she should choose, ranging from the Tyrian equivalent of, say, Barsoomian harness and metal to jeans and a t-shirt to, I don’t know, the fullest, plate-iest, heaviest armor available?

We’d still have all the variety now we have now — more, actually, if everyone had access to the appearance of every armor type — with a few less numbers to crunch.

Hmm, what if that had been how Ascended Armor had worked…

idk why. It’s confusing.

I can wear anything I want to IRL with no issues. It’s hard to wear something on fire though.

They should just scrap tiers and give classes autopassives for armor rating like their HP is.

The 300 point difference in defence between heavy and light armor is minor. For reference, shuffling traits can easily add/subtract that many points of toughness (toughness is the same as armor).

I guess reworking whole armoring system right now could be difficult however I’m not a developer for this game so what I’m guessing isnt really important.

What is important why should they put resources for such a minor “issue” when system works and the only reason for you is cosmetics?

This game is lacking more serious features almost 3 years after the release which still are not going to be adressed (looking at you build templates). I wish for this game to be amazing but working on cosmetics only is not going to help. And armoring is of course a coding thing, not designing only and I want coders I pay for this game to deal with problems not cosmetics.

D&D. The original Pen & Paper RPG homaged of Tolken’s Middle Earth. Maybe even earlier.

In a world in which light and medium armors offer no advantage whatsoever over heavy armor, with the only actual difference between armor types being a few points of defense rating

Who said this? In game mechanics, that is true, but lore-wise, heavy armor is very much heavier than light armor and slows you down. Movespeed being the same across all professions is explained with guardians/warriors being physically stronger than the other classes.

Would a mesmer in heavy armor be slower than in light armor? Lore-wise probably yes, that’s why they don’t even try to wear it and stick with lighter armor instead. Also, metal could very much impair their magical abilities, so they try to stay away from it.

TL;DR: You can explain everything with lore.

Also, don’t even try to argument with real life in a fantasy game, that just won’t work.

Believe it or not but I for one like the current system with having some restrictions. I know restrictions are so 20th century, guess I’m getting old. I’m not used to getting everything I want.

Imo, they made a mistake when they decided to make separate armor weights. They could have put the class defining stats on the chars and made all armors available for everyone. They could then find it easier to make new armors and since each armor would be available to everyone, there would be a lot more choices and looks, important to a cosmetic based game.

Usually light armour classes have benefits (usually higher damage) that heavy armoured classes don’t have. In exchange heavy armoured classes get more innate damage resistances.

I’m not sure how well this works in GW 2. It works with Elementalists vs Warriors and Guardians (more raw damage but fragile as glass) but not so well with other classes. Warriors for example seem to do more damage than Necro’s and Mesmers, even though it also outdoes them in damage resistance.

Someone who’s spend more time checking out profession balance might be able to clarify it though. I play with the “this looks fun” idea.

because this game is not dps vs tank; some classes are better with dps, some are better with sustain and some are better with utility/control; think outside trinity

sorudo.9054:

…..
i would say let the player decide, it’s not up to the dev to decide what we like and what we can see as acceptable.

How would you envision this as possible even if it wasn’t the most absurd thing I’ve ever read on these forums?

I’m not sure why someone would want to, but you SHOULD be able to wear armor LIGHTER than the maximum weight you are allowed. That is, if a warrior wants to fight wearing a robe and sandals and a floppy hat, he should be able to do so.