I wanted to give specific feedback on the Armor changes, but this also works with the timeline shift. My recommendation is to have inside the Mech Lab the options to use "Hardened Armor" with a 5% movement Penalty, but increase in armor hit points, and also a Laser Reflective Armor option (that works well against laser weapons) and true Reactive Armor (that works well against missiles, A/C's and air strikes).
Also, anyway we can get a pure city map, with burnt out buildings to hide in???