Armor or Horkval?

Mariki

I am considering becoming an Alchemist or Blademaster. Stats aside, as I intend to choose a race based on RP value for myself, I noticed both classes can wear ringmail. Horkval can't wear armor, but have natural cutting and blunt resistance. Is the resistance itself high enough to outweigh not wearing armor? I am sure there are mechanics that I do not understand that others do, so please forgive the ignorance.

Eld

There are some significant differences in mechanics, which I don't understand as well as some people (*cough* @Sena *cough*). My understanding is that armour gives a reduction on some portion of the damage from a physical attack, and what portion depends on the type of attack. A straight resistance, on the other hand, reduces the entirety of the damage by some percentage. If I recall correctly, horkval resistance is 20% for both blunt and cutting.
I think some discussions on the old forums indicated that the portion of adventurer attacks like dsl that scales with max health is the part that doesn't get reduced by armour, so for those, horkval resistance might get better relative to armour the more health you have.
I think a common rule of thumb is that hork resistance is generally better than leather, and roughly as good as ringmail, on average. As a horkval blademaster, I feel pretty squishy, but I don't know if I'm more so than other blademasters, and how much of that is just me being bad at playing defensively.

Xith

Actually I think horkval is higher than most armours, which is why they can't wear it.

This race has the following statistics:
- Very resistant to CUTTING damage.
- Very resistant to BLUNT damage.
- Can not wear armour.

The damage example in HELP ARTEFACTS DEFENSIVE for Ring of the Magus says a portion is reduced and a portion is unaffected. I always imagine the unaffected portion is half, but probably not always.

I recall someone once saying hork resistance is 100% on both, meaning the reduceable portion doesn't go through. Might have been 80%. Either way, you can get decent scalemail for somewhere around 47/46 and such, so hork protection is higher than that. Probably higher than chain and splint as well.
Main point: The reason horkval can't wear armour is because their natural protection is significant. So yes, it makes up for it, considering both classes otherwise wear ringmail, which is lower grade.

Side note about alchemists: Their robes can be equipped with specific symbols for specific resistances, in which cutting/blunt are included, so that's even more protection.

Eld

Xith said:

Actually I think horkval is higher than most armours, which is why they can't wear it.

This race has the following statistics:
- Very resistant to CUTTING damage.
- Very resistant to BLUNT damage.
- Can not wear armour.

The damage example in HELP ARTEFACTS DEFENSIVE for Ring of the Magus says a portion is reduced and a portion is unaffected. I always imagine the unaffected portion is half, but probably not always.

I recall someone once saying hork resistance is 100% on both, meaning the reduceable portion doesn't go through. Might have been 80%. Either way, you can get decent scalemail for somewhere around 47/46 and such, so hork protection is higher than that. Probably higher than chain and splint as well.
Main point: The reason horkval can't wear armour is because their natural protection is significant. So yes, it makes up for it, considering both classes otherwise wear ringmail, which is lower grade.

Side note about alchemists: Their robes can be equipped with specific symbols for specific resistances, in which cutting/blunt are included, so that's even more protection.

Pretty sure that person didn't know what they were talking about. But could be wrong.

Xith

My bet is on 60-80%. Someone who knows will have to verify though. :P

Eld

Message #4534       Sent by Sena
11/16/7:59 I can't post on the forums from my phone, so I figured I'd message
you instead. In response to the horkval topic, your post is right. Since they
work differently, both are better in different situations. With ringmail, it's
close enough most of the time that it doesn't matter much which you choose. Also,
 I think horkval resistance is 5% or 10% now.

Vaehl

All hail Sena.

Xith

I'll believe it when I see a log and/or the math.

Sena

I probably won't be able to test them (armour or horkval resistance) or find a log until next weekend.

Hirst

From what I remember, hork armour is 40/40 when I tested as magi w/o skins.

Sena

Horkval resistance isn't equal to any armour stats, because resistance doesn't work like armour. It might be the same reduction as 40 for some attacks, but it depends on the attack, and your health in some cases.

For example, with weapon attacks, armour reduces the damage by about (damagestat*3)*(armourstat%), and the portion that scales with max health is unreduced by armour. Resistance applies to the full damage though, not just the reducible part, so the higher your health the better resistance is compared to armour in that case. Then some attacks (like backstab) have no reducible part, so armour is ignored, but resistance still applies.

Synbios

If anything, you also don't have to worry about annoying things like 'forging' or 'buying armour', if money is also a concern.

Eld

Synbios said:

If anything, you also don't have to worry about annoying things like 'forging' or 'buying armour', if money is also a concern.

Though if you can forge, you can wear field/fullplate, which is going to be far better than hork resistance on average.

From very brief testing earlier, it looks like about 10% resistance. I'll try to do something a bit more thorough a bit later.

Synbios

Eld said:

Synbios said:

If anything, you also don't have to worry about annoying things like 'forging' or 'buying armour', if money is also a concern.

Though if you can forge, you can wear field/fullplate, which is going to be far better than hork resistance on average.

From very brief testing earlier, it looks like about 10% resistance. I'll try to do something a bit more thorough a bit later.

Oh, was referring to the context of the OP being an Alchemist or Blademaster. And by 'forging', I mean 'getting a forger to make armour'.

Xith

The endgame is that horkval have a natural armour that is superior to some, but not all, other forged armours. For the classes you were looking into, I'm betting hork skin is better. Plus bm gets weathering and things to beef up more, and alchemist has extra healability and robes armour, plus neat things like Tin.

Eld

Xith said:

The endgame is that horkval have a natural armour that is superior to some, but not all, other forged armours. For the classes you were looking into, I'm betting hork skin is better. Plus bm gets weathering and things to beef up more, and alchemist has extra healability and robes armour, plus neat things like Tin.

Yeah, that's pretty much the bottom line. Horkval resistance is good enough to probably be solidly better than leather and about as good on average as ringmail, with some variation due to the differences in the mechanics of armour and resistance. Blademasters get weathering (+1 con) and toughness (10% cutting resistance), and, if you need it, Mir (significant damage reduction, though I don't know the exact amount, at the cost of slower balance, weaker attacks, and maybe slightly reduced accuracy). Alchemists get robes (any four of a possible seven (?) resistances, not sure about percentages), sip bonuses, and tin (not sure about the mechanics on that).

Xith

Don't have my notes, but robe reduction is like 10%, 12.5% or 15%. Don't remember which. Can cycle based on class of course, so when you fight a mage, use symbols that match their staffcasts. Physical classes, blunt/cutting. Against serps, asphyx and poison resist. Blunt vs tarot users and maybe runelore? (Is thurisaz fire or blunt?) Magic vs occies, necros and anything else with magic-type damage. Yada yada. It has potential, but getting your level up as alch still helpful for tanking.

Mariki

This has been great. I appreciate the assistance very much, especially where you guys are actively testing things to see what happens!

Eld

@Xith Thurisaz/hugalaz are blunt, I think.

Synbios

Mariki said:

This has been great. I appreciate the assistance very much, especially where you guys are actively testing things to see what happens!

You're welcome!

Mizik

In almost all situations, Human is the better tanking choice.

Only reasons to be Horkval are:
1. Class can't wear armour.
2. ***LEAP***
3. Free up a trait slot that would be taken by Reinforced.

Tanris

Human definitely the superior tanking choice. Only reason to be horkval really is leap (like Mizik said magi is probably the one exception, since no armour).

Synbios

Is the sip bonus really noticable for humans?

Achilles

It only happens about 10% of the sips i think. Time for Sena to come in with the hard data.

Eld

Achilles said:

It only happens about 10% of the sips i think. Time for Sena to come in with the hard data.

10% bonus on 10% of sips is what I've heard, but don't know if that's accurate.

Sena

Eld said:

10% bonus on 10% of sips is what I've heard, but don't know if that's accurate.

That's what it was before traits, not sure if it's been changed.

Achilles

So essentially its a 1% bonus on average

Xer

But thinking it in terms of an average isn't that helpful. A 10% burst boost just when you're low on health can be the difference between living and dying. It might be better to think of it as 10% of the time, if you're in this sticky situation that guarantees death, the 10% sip bonus will save your life.

Militis

Monk - Horkval
BM - Human

Thurisaz is fire damage
Leap is amazing

Mizik

Thurisaz/Meteor/Star/Hugalaz/Hailstorm blunt

Militis

Weird, pretty sure thurisaz hurt old Raja and Troll a bunch(weak to fire) but you da man