Is heirlooming armour really worth it?

[Canuck]

Sorry if this has been brought up before. I'm just wanting to hear other peoples opinions on this. I've been told to loom armour once I have all my weapons done, but it just doesn't seem worth it to me. I generally use agility builds and low/medium tier armour, lately the heavy aketon mostly.  Fully loomed the heavy aketon only goes up from 30 body and 10 leg to 34 and 14 armour values respectively. Should I actually spend 3 generations worth of time and effort on that?

[Relit]

Honestly if you are going to be retiring anyway, there is not reason to not get your armor loomed (after weapons). Wearing medium armor (mail hauberk) myself I found I survived a lot longer with loomed head/body armor.

[Miwiw]

Unless you want a really rare armor piece, you don't need to retire 3 times but about 2 times plus investing some gold on the marketplace. You get many common armors for 2 LPs and 50-200k gold.

If you plan to retire anyway, may it be for gold or enjoying many different builds or going high generations, it is worth for sure.

[Macropus]

Anything that get's "reinforced" at +3 (meaning it gets only +4 armor) isn't worth looming unless you already have some spare looms because it's a pretty low armor anyway.
+3 "Lordly" items (usually those weighting more than 7) get +5 bonus armor and coupled with loomed gloves make quite a big difference in your survivability.

[Miwiw]

If you wear that armor anyway though and got the time to play for LPs, you can still loom reinforced stuff. ^^

[owens]

Loom gloves first

Same advantage, good market value and if you change build/appearance/rp they don't have to get traded on.

[Grumpy_Nic]

its nice to have, but you will die just as quickly. Armour isnt really helping that much.

[owens]

loomed armour + gloves is really worth it.

+10 armour for no extra weight. Thats about 10K or 7 weight worth of extra armour  (light kuyak vs khergit elite). Or putting it another way about %20 extra armour for no disadvantage when considering most medium tier armours.

[Grumpy_Nic]

I have +3 armor and +3 gloves with my 8IF char, its nice versus weak players but helps only in few situations

[Butan]

Heirlooming isnt really worth it AT ALL.
Even in full +3 you'll be only around 5% more resilient/stronger/faster.

This +5% can save your ass some time, but 95% of your skill is keyboard/mouse + build; heirlooming is for me only a long term goal and a desire to be the best at all cost. Its an efficient way to enhance the replayability of the game 



BUT, the most "interesting items" to heirlooms are definitely those that :

- puts you in a "very high" item value (like heirlooming heaviest armors, or faster/stronger weapon; it then becomes "unbeatable" in its category)
- have multi-layered heirloom item bonus : armors have only 1-2 bonus values (1 armor type, or 2 (for the chest, or even 3 in the case of the gothic plate with bevor)); the horses have 4-5 stats bonus (armor, hit points, speed, manoeuvrability AND CHARGE) and a few weapons have 3 stats bonus (speed, damage and weight)


Those are definitely the first to be heirloomed if you want to be the most efficient;

If you want style, heirloom what you want!

[Phew]

Heirlooming isnt really worth it AT ALL.
Even in full +3 you'll be only around 5% more resilient/stronger/faster.

This +5% can save your ass some time, but 95% of your skill is keyboard/mouse + build; heirlooming is for me only a long term goal and a desire to be the best at all cost. Its an efficient way to enhance the replayability of the game 



BUT, the most "interesting items" to heirlooms are definitely those that :

- puts you in a "very high" item value (like heirlooming heaviest armors, or faster/stronger weapon; it then becomes "unbeatable" in its category)
- have multi-layered heirloom item bonus : armors have only 1-2 bonus values (1 armor type, or 2 (for the chest, or even 3 in the case of the gothic plate with bevor)); the horses have 4-5 stats bonus (armor, hit points, speed, manoeuvrability AND CHARGE) and a few weapons have 3 stats bonus (speed, damage and weight)


Those are definitely the first to be heirloomed if you want to be the most efficient;

If you want style, heirloom what you want!

Generally, going from no looms to full looms is equivalent to gaining:
+1 free level of Power Strike
+2 free levels of Weapon Master (+1 speed)
+2 free levels of Shield Skill (when looming a shield)
+6-8 free levels of Ironflesh (+10 armor)
+1-2 free levels of riding (when looming a horse)
+1 level of power throw/draw (when looming ranged)

So if you are a hybrid like me, you gain like 15 skill points worth of upgrades by looming. Or you could think of it as being 5 levels higher. That's a big deal!

[Butan]

Its a bit less than that, but I had forgot that heirlooming an item that is then multiplied by each skill point you have (especially PS/PT/PD for raw damage, and the horses stats multiplied by riding) makes it more worthwhile than I first though indeed!

The weapon master and iron flesh skill is pretty much under powered though, so your comparison chart is of course very high when you talk of those 2 skills.



Still, a good player with a good build will 9 times out of 10 do wonder even with full +0 !



On topic : heirlooming armour should be done last, after weapons and or horses 

[Templar_Steevee]

As an archer using same set all the time (heavy aketon+3 and mail gauntlets +3) i can tell that difference between nan loomed and loomed ligtharmor is noticable.
My non loomed equip have 34 body armor, loomed 43 so difference is big IMO. You can survive one more hit sometimes an belive me, it helps a lot.

[CrazyCracka420]

Loom gloves first

Same advantage, good market value and if you change build/appearance/rp they don't have to get traded on.

no no no.  Why would you loom gloves first?  Only reason to do that, would be if you switch your builds a lot and wouldn't use the same body armor from one gen to the next.

if you're going to be able to keep using the same body armor, then loom your body armor before your gloves.  It's simple math really...

A +3 body armor (at lordly) is going to give you 5 more body and 5 more leg armor
+3 gloves will give you 5 more body armor.

What's better, 5 more leg and body armor, or just 5 more body armor?

After your horse, then weapon, I'd suggest looming your body armor.

[owens]

^Mate leg armour is for newbs (see light kuyak, archons armour, sarranid guard armour)


But seriously I don't rate leg armour all that much unless you are cav. I can use the same gloves on all my characters even if my body armour is too heavy to use on my archer alt. Weapon, Gloves, Armour.