It is a better system to punish mistakes indeed, but it comes with a cost. Your armor doesn't protect you from unproperly executed attacks (doesn't make them glance), it only lessens the effects of them. It makes it impossible to use your armor offensively as you can do in native. In Native, you can get up very close to your enemy to make his/her attacks to glance on your armor; thus taking the initiative. In cRPG, this tactic fails as your opponent hits you in a realistically impossible way, he/she swings his whatever weapon he has and it executes a hiltslash. This makes cRPG to have, how to say, "less depth" in combat if you ask me. Your armor only acts as a dress with an + 10 life enchantment. It makes you die in 5-6 hits instead of 2-3. One might think it is more than enough, but in my opinion it lacks an important dimension of combat. It should require another knowledge to fight against an armored opponent. (such as benefitting from their slowness)
I'm not suggesting for perfect hits to bounce off of armor, nor I am suggesting platers to be invincible to 50% of combatants. I would just welcome to not feel like they are made of linen or silk (in order to not be a retard by stating that they are made of paper).