Armor Made Easy

The armor rules can look intimidating at first glance but it can be boiled down to a few simple rules that allow you to interact with the armor system in combat.

Armor stops hits by losing points in the location it is hit. Once a location is out of points the armor doesn’t stop hits anymore and the player is hit. All hits remove a single point from the armor in the location struck unless the strike is Armor-Breaking or Armor-Destroying. The three most common Armor-Breaking strikes are from an arrow, a great weapon swung two-handed, or a strike from a Barbarian. Armor-Destroying strikes are much rarer.

Armor-Breaking strikes will reduce the armor to zero in the location struck unless the player struck is wearing more than three points of armor in that location. That can only happen if they are playing Warrior, Paladin, or Anti-Paladin. If the player struck has more than three points of armor in the location struck, then all hits to their armor remove a single point until they are at three points or less and then it behaves as stated earlier.

Armor-Destroying strikes will reduce armor to zero in the location struck regardless of how much armor remains.

Keeping track of your own armor is simple. If you are playing any class other than Warrior, Paladin, or Anti-Paladin then each hit removes a single point of armor unless it’s one of the above types of strikes, which reduces your armor to zero. If you are playing a Warrior, Paladin, or Anti-Paladin and wearing more than three points of armor then all Armor Breaking strikes do one point in the location struck until you get to three points, and then it behaves as above. An Armor-Destroying strike gets rid of all of the armor, period.

There are a few more abilities that interact in different ways with armor, but this covers the vast majority of the situations encountered on the field of play. If you want more information read the Abilities section. If you run into a situation you are not sure of you can always ask a reeve or the player who affected you.

Rulebook 8.6.3