Damage reduction and armor points

[Reena]

Does anyone know how many armor points give you -1 damage reduction? For example, gladiator armor has a +20 bonus, while ascalon has +10 and it reduces damage from attacks (-2, right?). But is +10 extra armor on gladiator better or worse than -2 damage from attacks?

Thanks :)

[Feynt]

That would depend on what you're fighting. A higher armour rating is like a percentage, it will reduce damage quite a bit as you go up, but it seems like there's a limit. The minimum damage you can take seems to always be 1. However the damage reduction armour can drop that damage from maybe as high as 3 down to 0.

I know it doesn't seem like a whole lot, but a dozen 2s and 3s can kill you eventually.

[Infoceptor]

Read the other thread titled, "Ascalon armor reduces damage from attacks". You'll find out that it takes only one piece of damage reduction armor to benefit your entire body. So buy some Ascalon boots and wear Glads for the rest of your body or the like.

[Feynt]

Never! I refuse to wear patchwork armour. It looks asinine.

[Reena]

I don't know how accurate this is... but this is what I did. I have gladiator boots 71 +20 and ascalon boots 71 +10 + reduces damage from attacks...

I went out from ascalon and found a plague devourer... when it hit me with the gladiator boots on it did -5 damage... when I put ascalon boots on it did -2 or so damage...


BUT the interesting thing is this: it cast a hex on me that reduces armor vs. physical by 20 points... and it started doing 6 damage or so...

(The numbers varied, so this isn't dead on accurate)

Does this suggest that 20 armor points do around 3 damage reduction? Or woudl the graph of armor points to damage reduction be non-linear?

Now I'm going to see if wearing ascalon boots and gloves will increase the damage reduced...

It doesn't seem like wearing gloves and boots together did anything, so this confirms what others have said about them not stacking... I guess...

But the other thing I just don't understand is why that "reduces damage from attacks" tag is important at all. So I was dealt -8 damage instead of -10. Can this really make any difference? Plus, gladiator armor has +10 more points than ascalon, who is to say that it doesn't cancel out the "reduces damage" benefit?

[Feynt]

The higher armour is a sort of percentage reduction. 40 extra armour is like a 50% reduction in damage. So while a higher armour value could dramatically reduce damage, it will never completely eliminate it.