Gambeson balance changes

[Termineitor244]

Summary

Bugfixes "Made the gambesons less good"

Purpose of change

Fixes #52884

Describe the solution

Reduced the thickness of the kevlar gambeson to almost the same thickness as the kevlar vest (5 -> 3.2), increased the encumbrance to a little more than the survivor suit, increased the base time necessary to craft it, added proficiencies to its recipes, changed its material to use kevlar sheets too, and made some other small balance changes to the gambeson (both versions), they can now be worn as outer clothing too.

Describe alternatives you've considered

Testing

Checked values in game, they seem to be fine.

Additional context

The old kevlar gambeson:

The new kevlar gambeson:

[Drew4484]

I wrote the kevlar gambeson and was trying to come up with a good way to reduce the protection without getting too far from the thick padded nature of the standard gambeson in order to keep the recipe reasonable. These values are more realistic, I fully endorse the changes.

[Termineitor244]

I wrote the kevlar gambeson and was trying to come up with a good way to reduce the protection without getting too far from the thick padded nature of the standard gambeson in order to keep the recipe reasonable. These values are more realistic, I fully endorse the changes.

Thanks! I made some more small changes, adjusted the XL recipes to use more reasonable numbers of material (I would have liked even lower numbers, but the XL recipes somewhat differ between themselves), reduced the difficulty of crafting the kevlar gambeson (but maintained the autolearn at 8) and adjusted the coverage on the legs to only the hips, like the cataphract armor and more similar to the coverage in this picture.

[Terrorforge]

I don't think Joint Articulation is an appropriate proficiency. That's for fitting together moving plates on hard armor.

[Termineitor244]

I don't think Joint Articulation is an appropriate proficiency. That's for fitting together moving plates on hard armor.

It is stretching it somewhat thin as a concept, but the proficiency description doesn't mention it as it being only for moving plates, the kevlar gambeson could make use of the "making flexible of the inflexible" for the arms, since it would require some work to make them flexible enough for battle... That said, I'm not married to it, so if you want I can remove it from the recipe or just reduce the time/failure multiplier used.

[Terrorforge]

I'd get rid of it, seems like too much of a reach.

I get why you're reaching, though. It really feels like it should require more specialized knowledge, right? I think what's missing is some sort of "layering" or "soft armor" proficiency. That's out of scope for this PR, tho, so in the meantime... Garment Closures? Most variants you find on a swift googling seem to have some sort of straps or lacing.

I also have to mention that from a pure gameplay perspective, the new version seems a bit... why bother? I get that the current one is pretty busted, but at least it has a niche as the only light high-tier ballistic armor. If you bring it down to encumbrance 7, ballistic 15, it's just a worse survivor suit, innit? That's mostly on survivor suits being kind of busted, but still. The original issue cites the suits requiring lots of varied materials and proficiencies, but personally I find those a lot easier to source than 36 layered kevlar panels. AFAIK, you have to find and cut up exactly kevlar vests. If it was on a different layer, maybe..? If it's as thick as a kevlar vest, it could reasonably fit close to skin. On the flip side, if you look at reconstructions of gambesons worn as primary armor (rather than a padded arming doublet with plates over or whatever), they look more like outer-layer coats.

But that's just me spitballing. I don't mean to hold this up, I just like these armors a lot and it would be a shame if they were made obsolete.

[Termineitor244]

I get why you're reaching, though. It really feels like it should require more specialized knowledge, right? I think what's missing is some sort of "layering" or "soft armor" proficiency. That's out of scope for this PR, tho, so in the meantime... Garment Closures? Most variants you find on a swift googling seem to have some sort of straps or lacing.

Garment Closures will be! I will need to change the recipe to include some fasteners, but it is something common for a gambeson.

I also have to mention that from a pure gameplay perspective [...]

Good thoughts about it, I'm also concerned about the balance of the gambeson, so this helps, I will see to change the recipe to use both layered kevlar and kevlar sheets, since it doesn't makes sense that you make the gambeson with only layered panels, which are supposed to be more rigid and difficult to work on.
With the inclusion of fasteners I could add a function to "loose" or "adjust" the gambeson so it transforms into an object that could be used in the normal and outer layer, with the outer layer version having a very slightly reduction to encumbrance.

If you bring it down to encumbrance 7, ballistic 15, it's just a worse survivor suit, innit?

Rather than being a worse survivor suit, its already at the levels of a light survivor suit in encumbrance, and has some more points in ballistic protection, my opinion is that this is already the limit of what a gambeson should be able to do, its main disadvantage being the warmth it gives, the lack of pockets, and that it does not give fire, acid or environment protection. I could make it even more encumbering and increase its thickness, but the gambesons are supposed to be used with plate armor, not replace it...

Speaking of outer armor... The survivor duster and trench coat seem horrible, I will see if I can change them a little in another PR.

[Termineitor244]

I did some changes to the item and recipes, and they now can be used as outer garments too!

[Terrorforge]

Rather than being a worse survivor suit, its already at the levels of a light survivor suit in encumbrance, and has some more points in ballistic protection, my opinion is that this is already the limit of what a gambeson should be able to do, its main disadvantage being the warmth it gives, the lack of pockets, and that it does not give fire, acid or environment protection.

It sounds like you're looking at the raw values. Survivor suits are VARSIZE, so a fitted "medium" Survivor Suit has encumbrance 6 across the board. So it has less encumbrance, more melee armor, full leg coverage, slight environmental resists and plenty of pockets. Only thing the gambeson has on it is 2 points of ballistic defense and 4kgs of weight, which is practically nothing.

I could make it even more encumbering and increase its thickness, but the gambesons are supposed to be used with plate armor, not replace it...

There seem to be two fairly distinct types of item that get referred to as "gambeson", as illustrated by the wikipedia page. One is the arming doublet, a relatively thin garment mainly intended as padding for metal armor. The other is the padded jack, a thicker, coat-like garment intended as primary armor. I think a lot of the headache of these things is that we keep imagining that the "gambeson" in the game looks like the latter, while trying to stat it like the former. A kevlar arming doublet certainly shouldn't be an alternative to plate armor, but a kevlar padded jack probably could be.

Speaking of outer armor... The survivor duster and trench coat seem horrible, I will see if I can change them a little in another PR.

Please do. I've always wanted them to be good, but I've never bothered because they just seem terrible on the face of it.

[Termineitor244]

It sounds like you're looking at the raw values. Survivor suits are VARSIZE, so a fitted "medium" Survivor Suit has encumbrance 6 across the board. So it has less encumbrance, more melee armor, full leg coverage, slight environmental resists and plenty of pockets. Only thing the gambeson has on it is 2 points of ballistic defense and 4kgs of weight, which is practically nothing.

Oh, you are right, I was looking at the raw values... Survivor suits are broken, those things really need the redesign. I will still leave the values for the gambeson as they are since they are more sane values for something you will not need all the planning, prototype versions, planning again, etc, to arrive at the final product (Like the survivor set will be).

There seem to be two fairly distinct types of item that get referred to as "gambeson", as illustrated by the wikipedia page. One is the arming doublet, a relatively thin garment mainly intended as padding for metal armor. The other is the padded jack, a thicker, coat-like garment intended as primary armor. I think a lot of the headache of these things is that we keep imagining that the "gambeson" in the game looks like the latter, while trying to stat it like the former. A kevlar arming doublet certainly shouldn't be an alternative to plate armor, but a kevlar padded jack probably could be.

It would be good to add a padded jack then, the description of the gambeson seems to indicate it as more akin to an arming doublet.

Please do. I've always wanted them to be good, but I've never bothered because they just seem terrible on the face of it.

When I have time I will! I'm working on a new scenario right now, so I'm somewhat busy at the moment.

[Terrorforge]

Death to survivor suits.

It would be good to add a padded jack then, the description of the gambeson seems to indicate it as more akin to an arming doublet.

I might just do that. I'm slow as hell with these things so I won't complain if anyone wants to leapfrog me, but it's on the docket.