Talk:Armor

"Items in Dwarf Fortress must be equipped in a specific order. For example, a dwarf must equip a layer type of Under before he equips a layer type of Over. The complete order is: Under, Over, Armor, Cover. It is common among civilians to see a dwarf equip pants with no undergarments due to this restriction, even when an undergarment is available. This issue doesn't typically occur with soldiers, however." - doesn't seem to be true? Make a few loincloths (under) on embark, dwarves wearing trousers will equip them just fine.

"† It appears that equipping footwear on one foot can affect what can be equipped on the other. For example, if a uniform calls for socks and high boots, a dwarf will only equip 3 of those 4 items between both of their feet." - This seems to be a uniform bug, not an equipment-on-one-foot-affects-the-other issue. Dwarves can equip two boots fine over two civilian socks.

Heard that Dwarves may have knees now. This could affect armor coverage.

Armor size scaling.

Does the size of armor's user affect protective properties of armor? In other words: is it harder to penetrate armor piece used by Elephant man than armor piece used by Dwarf, if both pieces are identical in all but user's size (same model, material, quality, state of worn, same weapons with same attackers, ETC). Also, does armor used by bigger creatures get heavier than one used by smaller ones? 109.62.205.122 15:14, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

If previous description was too complex: is elephant-sized breastplate thicker than man-sized breastplate? 109.62.205.122 21:42, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

It does scale, in an unintuitive way. It is not any thicker (as far as the game is concerned), but part of the penetration calculation is the attack contact area. Both the weapon and the armor have contact area values based on their size, and the smaller of these is used as the contact area of the attack. For blugeoning and peircing weapons, the size of the armor rarely plays a role, as the contact area for those attacks is quite small. For slashing attacks however, the default contact area of the attack is quite big, and so the armor contact area comes into play. This makes it easier for an axe to cut through a gauntlet than a breastplate, all else being equal. Unless, of course, that gauntlet belongs to an elephant man. More information is available on the wiki here, though I have no idea how any of this was confirmed. -JAB (66.220.251.71 03:33, 11 January 2024 (UTC))

Armor Coverage Graphic is Wrong

There are quite a few mistakes.

• The shirt has the UBSTEP:MAX token. The graphic does not include face coverage
• The toga, leather armor, and mail shirt have UBSTEP:1. The graphic incorrectly depicts these as covering the face.
• Tunic has UBSTEP:0 and LBSTEP:1. The graphic shows the tunic as covering the upper arms but not the upper legs.

This is, of course, assuming that the coverage tags have been described correctly.

I've been referencing this chart for years and never noticed. In particular, I've seen the claim that chainmail covers the face often repeated, but as far as I can tell it's just plain wrong and originates from this graphic.

There is something else that bothers me. I suspect that all headwear covers the face, much like how all footwear covers toes and all gloves cover the fingers. I can find nothing in the raws that suggest otherwise. The only instance I found of someone testing it was in the bay12 forums back in 2012, but it was a very different game back then. Searching the bug reports is not working on my machine. Can anyone confirm, via testing or search?

-JAB (66.220.251.71 03:14, 11 January 2024 (UTC))

Armor zones analysis.

Armor Level = "AL". Something with AL of 0 or what's not made of metal is "Rag". --95.71.113.173 10:36, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

The most heavily armored body part is Lower Body - it is protected by 2 AL3 pieces (Breastplate, Greaves), 3 AL2 pieces (3 Mail Shirts), and 25 rags (6 Cloaks + 16 Capes + 3 Long Skirts). The second most protected is Upper Torso - Breastplate, 3 Mail Shirts, and 22 Rags. --95.71.113.173 10:36, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

The mouths, noses, eyes, and cheeks are unarmored at all. Feet, head, fists (zones protected by Gauntlets) are only protected by 1 metal item, what is pretty small and have AL2. Also, head has 8 Rags (Hoods) - while boots and fists only have 1 Rag (Chausses, Socks). --95.71.113.173 10:36, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

Capes are covering body parts what metal armor can't - like throat. Also, "Rags" are pretty weak and break a lot faster than metal armor - especially the "Overgarment" type (Capes, Cloaks, Hoods, Mittens). Last time i played in Adventure Mode, my Demigod character frequently fought, and cloaks were regularly worn down to zero, basically becoming consumables of sorts. --95.71.113.173 10:36, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

Besides, did someone test efficiency of "Rags" - basically, comparing dwarf in full metal armor to dwarf with full metal armor + full complect of rags? --95.71.113.173 10:36, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

Also, is there any differences of protection value of clothes and leather armor? --95.71.113.173 10:36, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

Also, what Armor Level does, exactly? Is it armor thickness? --95.71.113.173 10:36, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

• Also, Material science has Armor size - for example, Cap is 162, and Helm is 973. That is surface area - but is it simultaneously armor thickness? --95.71.113.173 11:10, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

Also, Mail Shirts are the only metal armor piece what can be stacked. The other two metal armor pieces what are technically shapeless are Flask, High Boots and Low Boots - but Flask doesn't offer any protection (it just hangs out there), and both Boots variants can't be stacked due to their Size being smaller than their Permit. --95.71.113.173 10:51, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

Fallin objects damage and size correlation.

I heard what, in old versions of game, big falling or thrown objects (like anvils or big boulders) dealt practically no damage at all (just like in old cartoons). Meanwhile, small objects (like seeds or coins) dealt devastating damage (that can be compared to bullets and shrapnel in real lief).

There's an explanation for that: Material science states: "Since momentum = velocity * mass, and lighter items can be swung faster, attack momentum is largely independent from weapon weight". However, the contact surface of some objects are bigger than other - and it's logical what big objects have bigger contact area. That means what, in game, both anvil and coin have same momentum (N), but because coin's contact surface is smaller, it's momentum is distributed on smaller area - therefore, there is bigger momentum per contact unit ratio - and therefore, it's more deadly.

Was that fixed? Nowadays, bigger objects are more deadly - coins are so weak what they are used in Coinstar Room for training, while anvil can maim or kill someone. That's because nowadays speed of falling object correlates with actual speed on which it's flying - while on earlier versions, game treated falling objects hitting someone similarly to as if that someone was whacked by improvised melee weapons. --109.62.247.160 20:12, 10 February 2024 (UTC)

• Wait - that means what, in modern version, throwing small items is preferable. Think about it - the force with which the object is thrown is the same, but small object is faster (= less time to move out of it's way, and bigger range), it has smaller contact area (= more penetration), and you can carry more of these. Unless there is a meaningful cap on object speed, throwing coins is better than throwing something big. Am i right? --109.62.247.160 20:19, 10 February 2024 (UTC)

The bit you quoted is only true for dwarves swinging weapons. It doesn't apply to weapon traps or gravity, which have constant velocity and acceleration respectively. It also doesn't apply to very light objects, which do have a significantly lower momentum -- particularly adamantine weapons, which is why candy hammers are so bad (edged weapons compensate by having 10x sharpness). Coins are pretty light too, so they won't be very damaging. Although I heard that the coinstar exploit is no longer safe in recent versions. 89.20.133.78 06:47, 11 February 2024 (UTC)