How useful actually is armour?

[Blakpik]

I'm wondering about armour. I've got virtually no PvP experience myself (12,000 ping is not conducive to space battles), but armour doesn't seem like it would be useful. I mean, once your shields are down, it doesn't seem to make much of a difference if your ship has advanced or basic armour, half-way decent weapons will make short work of your hull. It seems to me like the difference in protection between the armour types is negligible at best. Considering that basic hull is both cheaper and lighter, it would seem that basic hull is generally better than the alternatives.

So, I would like to open the floor to those with PvP experience (or those who have some other insight) to answer my query. Is armour as useless as it seems to me? Is there some detail I'm missing that means that advanced armour does provide noticeably better protection to basic hull?

Thank you.

 

[Top 4ce]

PvP Anti-Player Research

There's a lot of debate and ideas about armor in that thread, but short answer is yes its very useful especially with passive effects. Not that you need to make all of the outer hull advance, but the front and important parts is important.

 

[Az14el]

From my experience AHP itself is pretty useful, i tend to use quite a lot of hull blocks to buff that out a bit without adding much weight.
The advanced armor which gets the best benefit of this AHP but really bad AHP contribution by weight (full advanced armored vessels are essentially "brittle" under fire due to this, and quite weak even defensively speaking, from building them exclusively for actual years to fighting them extensively i can promise you this method especially is not worth), i tend to keep either around rail parts, around computers, or sparingly in plates on the front/sides, always behind a good number of other "trash" blocks like hull & shields so penetration mechanics can strip the majority of a shots damage off first.

Not a viable defence to rely on on its own really, speed & shield gen/cap are priority defenses mass wise for sure, but hull is really damn light, if you have even a few % of your intended mass to spare here it can go a long way toward mitigating what direct hits you do take.

 

[Blakpik]

From my experience AHP itself is pretty useful, i tend to use quite a lot of hull blocks to buff that out a bit without adding much weight.
The advanced armor which gets the best benefit of this AHP but really bad AHP contribution by weight, i tend to keep either around rail parts, around computers, or sparingly in plates on the front/sides, always behind a good number of other "trash" blocks like hull & shields so penetration mechanics can strip the majority of a shots damage off first.

Not a viable defence to rely on on its own really, speed & shield gen/cap are priority defenses mass wise for sure, but hull is really damn light, if you have even a few % of your intended mass to spare here it can go a long way toward mitigating what direct hits you do take.

Ah, AHP. That was the bit I had overlooked. I had considered only the actual capacity of advanced armour in protecting system blocks, and not the role the AHP would also play.

 

[Kelpaz]

You might hear others claiming armor to be useless but AHP makes it a good investment as long as it's in the right places.
The best way to find out if the armor is well distributed is to try to blast the ship apart and observe the damage.

Frontal armor is usually the most important while side armor can be less thick and various hull details can also stop missiles somewhat.
It might also be a good idea to make bulk heads that split internal systems from each other, to limit missile blasts.

The worst offenders of not using armor correctly is builders who believe that armor is useless leading to giant titans being destroyed once their shield drops for a moment in combat.

I've tested a few of those on my server because other players upload them and I just love to test ships.

 

[NaStral]

For more mobility oriented builds it's quite effective to limit heavy armoring to select spaces in the ship housing the computers, logic drive, aux and other critical parts. A full shell is quite a bit of a burden to your ships's thrust to mass ratio without providing enough protection, even with full passives. Weapons in their current form can chew up even very heavily armored ships quite quickly if they are grouped correctly.

 

[Cluwne]

I wonder if some sort of armor self-repair chamber or astrotech beams repairing blocks and AHP ship-wide would make some people prefer armor over shields.
In case of chambers you'd have protection with little to no energy cost, even no capacity cost with dedicated "autorepair reactor".
Downsides are: need to replace the destroyed blocks, one way or the other you need repairs and armor reinforcement costs reactor capacity.

What also would be nice is armor block that got hit spreading part of the damage across other armor blocks touching it, prompting people to use armor-negating effects more.

 

[silverfoe]

I wonder if some sort of armor self-repair chamber or astrotech beams repairing blocks and AHP ship-wide would make some people prefer armor over shields.
In case of chambers you'd have protection with little to no energy cost, even no capacity cost with dedicated "autorepair reactor".
Downsides are: need to replace the destroyed blocks, one way or the other you need repairs and armor reinforcement costs reactor capacity.

What also would be nice is armor block that got hit spreading part of the damage across other armor blocks touching it, prompting people to use armor-negating effects more.

I personally hope for armor repair systems that can repair armor blocks if you supply them with blocks and another kind of system that repairs the amor hp pool that uses maybe mesh or something. It may sound like a shield with a different name, but the main thing is damage uses some kind of resource, shields does not.

On topic of the thread, it can be used to soak up damage but shields usually are better in almost every circumstance.

 

[Zoolimar]

The main difference would be that you still could make a breach unlike with the shield that must be first fully depleted to deal any block damage.

 

[AtraUnam]

So rather than presenting an opinion I'll present some data.

Armor:

• Armor provides far more defense per block than shields
• Armor does not require power to function
• The dedicated anti-armor effect (pierce) is rarely encountered
• Armor can weigh a lot.

Shields:

• All shield blocks will always provide defense (only armor blocks in the path of shots will do anything)
• Full shield passive requires only 1 effect (armor needs 2) and is more effective, multiplying defense by 2.5 (as opposed to 2x for armor)
• Shields do not -normally- need to be repaired after every battle
• The dedicated anti-shield effect (ion) is very common

There are 2 basic conclusions that can be drawn from this data without much argument.

1. Assuming even distribution of rescources, shields are far more economical than armor (assuming you win your battles)
2. Assuming you can make use of the majority of your armor (see all or nothign armoring) armor is more effective than shields in a single engagement.

 

[Dr. Whammy]

On the scale at which I usually build (>120m / >10,000 mass), I find that armor is more effective (for my needs) than shields; which can be easily disabled by a powerful enough ion weapon. My ships will sometimes, suffer a speed penalty for this but still have a fast enough turning speed to make them usable in combat.

The last version of my signature fleet ship; the Pathfinder MK6 has full advanced armor coverage so it's an infuriatingly tanky little bastard. It can take a lot of punishment and still keep fighting; including more than a dozen direct missile strikes (200k-300k dmg) with the shields down.



The former generation (basic hull) Pathfinder? ...not so much. Once the shields drop, the armor HP washes off like a cheap paint job and the ship has the durability of wet cardboard. ...hence, discontinued from service.

 

[Panpiper]

For a novice builder or someone not prepared to spend hundreds of hours mastering the game before starting on their ship building, armor should be used sparingly. You should build the walls of your bridge (where you keep all your computers) using advanced armor. That includes covering any light blocks, etc., that are exposed on the outside of that bridge containment with an advanced armor block. You should also use advanced armor to build the nose of your ship, assuming you intend to point your ship at whatever is attacking you. If you intend to run from any fight, do not bother with armoring your nose.

Using more armor than that is best left for when you know better what you are doing. Prior to then, make sure to have 30-40% of your ship mass in shields (and some shield regenerators). (And until they change everything with upcoming updates, make damn sure to have full ion defense.) Learn to get great power out of your ships and how to build great weapons to use that power. Only once you have mastered power and weapons should you try to then master armor tanking. You will get far better bang for your time bucks approaching things this way, in my opinion.

 

[Dire Venom]

Some great advice and infomation here!
Just going to add that Spaced armour can be effective vs missiles. What you can do is create a shield of forcefield blocks (some distance from your ship) on a turret center mass, delete the stick and it will always rotate to face the current target shooting at you.
Your ship weapons will still shoot through it, however Point defense and turrets can't (unless mounted elsewhere).

This will catch most missiles and help preserve weaker armor facings.
You can also develop the turret center to have it's own Shielding system to prevent most ion weaponry oneshotting your ships main shielding.
Best used on small to medium sized combat ships with few turrets.
At the very least it will protect from Alpha shot weapons and missiles to give you enough time to run.
E.g similar to this:

(My laptops fired atm so I can't run starmade to post an actaul picture)

I also quite like docked shielding for key systems (such as computers, docking points etc). This prevents high powered shots from just blowing through the ship and knocking the system out and giving some additional defense in case my armor health poll drops and missiles start raining in.
Not hugely effective, but it can buy you a few more seconds.

(Also, correct me if I'm wrong, but shields/regen do not get size bonuses, thus docked shielding is just re-distributing some of the main shielding to key systems in case of the main shielding failing).

 

[Calhoun]

You should build the walls of your bridge (where you keep all your computers)

Don't keep all your computers in one place.

 

[AtraUnam]

Ok time to voice an actual opinion, armor is vastly superior... on paper. The difference is ease of use, shields just get placed and they work; with armor you have to place it correctly, then you have to keep it pointed at the enemy, then you have to keep damage distributed over as much armor as possible, and thats just against 1 enemy. If your in a battle with more than 1 enemy it opens up a whole new can of worms.

 

[silverfoe]

On the scale at which I usually build (>120m / >10,000 mass), I find that armor is more effective (for my needs) than shields; which can be easily disabled by a powerful enough ion weapon.

if you havent, try using ion effect passive with oversized shield rechargers. You'll be surprised how much damage you can tank. Only give it enough capacity to survive a missile/high damage volley you'd expect to take. Then you'll see your shields shoot back up

 

[GDPR 302420]

Armor is most certantly useable, but I would not rely on it as a primary defence for reasons AtraUnam has already mentioned.

You should build the walls of your bridge (where you keep all your computers) using advanced armor.

You should have have all your computers in one area in the first place, keep them apart in the ship. Ideally your computer blocks (and basicly everything except the core) should not be accessable from the interior and burried in the hull.

Prior to then, make sure to have 30-40% of your ship mass in shields (and some shield regenerators).

The ratios you have mentioned (shields to everything else) are entirely subjective and dependant on builder preference.

You can have a ship with only 10% shields to everything else work and people like Veilith do amazing things with low shield builds all the time.

I know you were reffering as a "general design" but I wanted to mention that you are not required to have such a ratio.

which can be easily disabled by a powerful enough ion weapon

The scaling between offence and defence heavily favors offence.

I can do the exact same thing to your ship with a powerfull enough missile.

Anyone who has a clue about this games mechanics can testify that offence massivly outscales defence. "The best defence is a good offence" is actually one of the most viable shipbuilds, debatably the best (as shown by people like Az1 and Veilith)

 

[Calhoun]

one of the most viable shipbuilds, debatably the best

Hardly debatable.

 

[silverfoe]

Anyone who has a clue about this games mechanics can testify that offence massivly outscales defence. "The best defence is a good offence" is actually one of the most viable shipbuilds, debatably the best (as shown by people like Az1 and Veilith)

I wonder how it would play out if brick power still existed and self powering turrets didn't work. Tbh I didn't build any PvP ships before aux.

 

[Napther]

Just logged in and page refreshed and finally someone mentions that weapons and offence outstrips defence capabilities severely.

However, Atra mentions that pierce weapons arent common, however, Missile-beam-Pierce IS majorly common and chews up armour blocks like no tomorrow. Without effects, statistically, 1 piece of ADV armour will provide 2000HP total defence at a single point when the AHP is active, due to its 100hp, 1/2 damage to AHP mitigation, and 90% armour rate. Shields provide around 100 global HP per block on average when you start using a bunch, this will decay to 90 on large builds.

Basic hull is 0.05 mass, has 75hp, and diverts 1/2 to the AHP for a total HP of 150. And 300HP point-defence added per mass

But this all changes under the Pierce effect missiles especially.
Pierce at max effect adds 50% Armour ignore, and +5 radius to Missiles (Plus something else I forget because thanks hidden stats).
This means your ADV armour block now has only 45% armour rate against this attack, therefore:

100/0.55 = 181.8 HP as a BASELINE. Now the 1/2 AHP divert makes it 363.6 total HP.
Now we all know ADV is heavy as all fuck at 0.25 mass, so equating HP per 1 mass point = 1454 HP per mass while the AHP pool is still filled

Now basic hull on the other hand? 150/0.05 = 3000.
Basic hull is twice as effective in preventing damage as the most expensive armour in the game

And now the shields baseline: 100/0.1 = 1000hp global defence per mass Now without the AHP protecting it, Hull has 1500 point-HP per mass, and ADV armour?... 775HP per mass

Of course, when one isnt spamming pierce missiles (WHO WOULDNT Its a fucking massive direct upgrade to use Pierce effect missiles - or punch which depletes AHP by an extra amount) Armour will rapidly mitigate Explosive effect missiles up until the point of failure in the AHP.

But this isnt even the half the story: Certain rapid fire weapons like Beam-cannon-Overdrive or heavy cannon-cannon-punch will get through something like a solid 30m of effect-hardened ADV armour in maybe 5 seconds or less. Its just chewed through by AI Tick-spam

Armour is also a massive detriment to using passive effects (Especially Ion effect) if not separated onto a docked hull (Which is a stupid mechanic to keep allowing). Overall making the vessel much heavier than it should be.

Otherwise Armour-main vessels only really see use in trolling noobs who just learned that ion effect weapons exist and havent got adequate Anti-armour weapons... Its just sad since I LIKE the concept of using armour to protect a ship from small arms fire, but the overall mechanics of the game do not condone that as viable.

KDI Wyvern Heavy Cruiser this pile of armour is 1/2 its weight. This is actually a 60k-odd mass ship under its defences, but due to armour, its falsely shown as almost 120k mass which it most certainly is not in terms of actual capability.