25 replies to this topic

[Yeach]

Sounds like Heavy Gear and their penetration system for armor.

[Strum Wealh]

jbone, on 14 February 2012 - 07:59 PM, said:

I'm sure someone can toss up a sarna link for us later.

there are 6 types of Armor battlemechs can field in Level 3 rules.

Standard, (Normal)
Ferro Fibrous (Lighter but it ate up internal space)
Reactive, More effective (less damage) against ballistic, takes more damage than standard from energy weapons
Reflective, Less damage against energy weapons more damage from ballistic
Reinforced, More cumbersome but you can stack more armor than normal.
Stealth, Increased heat while active but it makes you harder to hit at range, eats up internal space.

Personally I'd rather just stay away from all the different types of armor besides Standard and Ferro.

How about several Sarna links?

Strum Wealh, on 13 February 2012 - 11:04 AM, said:

The armor types that were developed at or prior to the game's start point (3049) are:
Ferro-Fibrous Armor - reintroduced to the IS by the Draconis Combine in 3040 (the Clans never lost the FF tech from 2571)
Hardened Armor - developed by the Federated Commonwealth in 3045-3047 (copied by Clan Ghost Bear during the invasion)
Primitive Armor - the original BattleMech armor used on the Mackie in 2439; essentially modern (non-Chobham) armor
Standard Armor - developed by the Terran Hegemony in 2470; maintained by IS and Clans since (essentially a very tough version of modern Chobham armor)

By contrast, a lot of the advanced armors come into being much later in the canon timeline:
Armored Components - developed by the Free Worlds League in 3059-3061
Ferro-Lamellor Armor - developed by Clan Snow Raven in 3070
Heavy FF Armor - developed by the Lyran Alliance in 3069
Laser Reflective/"Glazed"/"Reflec" Armor - developed by the Lyran Alliance in 3058 (copied by Clan Jade Falcon in 3061)
Light FF Armor - developed by the Free Worlds League in 3067
Reactive/"Blazer" Armor - developed by the Draconis Combine in 3063 (copied by Clan Ghost Bear in 3065)
Stealth Armor - developed by the Capellan Confederation in 3063

Then there're the Commercial- and Industrial-grade armors.

Also, there are apparently rules for mixing armor types on a single 'Mech via a "patchwork armor" system (the VTR-9K2 variant of the Victor uses a Standard/FF patchwork, for example), though I, personally, don't know the specifics of how the patchwork armor rules actually work.

Depending on how closely the Devs stick to the canon timeline in that regard, fancy armors are probably not going to be around for quite some time yet...

All armor types are ablative.

• Standard Armor: the basic armor type against which others are judged
  
• Primitive Armor: weaker than Standard Armor, and heavier (need more weight to achieve the same degree of protection) and cheaper (5,000 c-bills - half the price of Standard Armor)
  
• FF Armor: lighter yet bulkier than Standard Armor
  
• Hardened Armor: twice as heavy as Standard Armor (8 armor points pet ton), twice as tough as Standard Armor (each armor point can take two units of damage), half-again as expensive as Standard Armor (15,000 c-bills per ton), and unable to be used on OmniMechs

• FL Armor: 13.6% heavier than Standard Armor, -20% damage from all weapon strikes, negates effects of AP autocannon munitions and tandem-charge missiles and 'Mech tasers
  
• Heavy FF Armor: 10.7% stronger and 50% bulkier than normal FF
  
• Reflective Armor: -50% damage against energy weapons, same as Standard Armor against ballistic and missile weapons, +50% damage against physical and melee attacks, same number of armor points per ton as Standard Armor, and bulkier than Standard Armor
  
• Light FF Armor: Similar to Clan FF, only slightly (6%) more protection than Standard Armor (less than normal FF Armor's 12% increase)
  
• Reactive Armor: -50% damage against missile and artillery weapons, same as Standard Armor against energy and ballistic weapons, occasionally self-destructs and strips that section of the 'Mech, same number of armor points per ton as Standard Armor, and bulkier than Standard Armor
  
• Stealth Armor: same protection as Standard Armor, requires two criticals in every limb and body location, requires Guardian ECM to be active to function, generates heat (average of 1 heat per second) while active, makes one harder to target

I, for one, agree with staying with the canonically-available armors and introducing the rest as their time comes...


Your thoughts?

[Nik Van Rhijn]

I agree with Strum, we should stay with Level 1 tech. It may or not be that we get access to Ferro-Fibrous at start. It is hard enough to balance things without complicating armour as well.

[MaddMaxx]

If there was a choice that had to be made, due to computational limitations, I would ask for the graphical representation of damage be modeled on a Mech over time versus having the required math done behind the scenes based on variable armor type, slope, density, thickness etc. and or damage reduction calculations based on weapon fired.

[jbone]

Just as a side note, the Star league developed a mech with stealth armor before the Capellans came out with it... but the "stealth" system was flavor text because they never gave rules for it. House Liao was the first to manufacture it and deploy it actively since the star league.

[Pht]

Prosperity Park, on 14 February 2012 - 09:08 AM, said:

So, my compromise is this:

Define Ballistic damage as a function of raw Projectile Damage multiplied by a Armor factor (a value between 0 and 1) that represents how much self-reinforcement the Armor posesses, or simply apply less damage to armor for impact events as adjusted by the quantity of residual armor. Say, for a totally arbitrary example with numbers I plucked out of thin air, you gain a 5% ballistic impact resistance buff for every 500kg of armor remaining on that bodypart.

Thoughts?

Overkill and not necessary for a good battlemech simulator or to help people suspend their disbelief; it would make things more complex than they need to be and requires several arbitrary decisions, which leads to unintended consequences in game play.