Please note that new user registrations disabled at this time.

swimming assassins, how does armor work, stacking on shelves, and other mysteries...

This forum is to be used for all discussions pertaining to Bethesda Softworks' The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind and its Tribunal and Bloodmoon expansion packs.
Post Reply
User avatar
UserUnfriendly
Posts: 4109
Joined: Mon Aug 06, 2001 10:00 pm
Location: Sluggy Zone
Contact:

swimming assassins, how does armor work, stacking on shelves, and other mysteries...

Post by UserUnfriendly »

ok, so almost every time i am in balmora, i run from the mages guild to cassiuses house, and i take a dive off into the water to dump loot that sucks, and bad enchantment items i have created....

so why is is oleyn barmisel(???) and a hlau guard swimming right there??bad pathing ai dropped them off the edge, and now they swim for the entire game.... and oleyn is a assassin....

ok, how exactly does armor rating work?? dragon bone is at 300, and bear claw helm is at 260 or so, but my current armor rating is at 266...

did anyone have this happen??? i got a pair of ebony boots off the urlakshi burial cavern in the main quest, and i happen to notice they have armor rating of 200!!!! WTF...i just got a pair of daedric gloves that had armor of 200!!!does the stuff you get via quests and random loot have a much higher rating than the stuff you console up????

oh wait, my heavy armor is maxed out...oopse, will have to call up some bound armor and see if its much improved...
but if not...i guess all the console items i invoked and enchanted and dumped caused game to puke...
grin....

anyway, how exactly does armor rating work anyway??? if you add a item with decent armor, like around 80 or so, how many points do you get in your ac?? and higher the ac, the more likely you will avoid damage, right???

so is it possible to put items on display, in all the nice shelving you have in your stronghold??? if you drop an item, it lands at your feet, but is it possible to put on a shelf, so you can show all all the cool armor pieces you won???


HOUSE LOOT:

hlau stronghold quests give you , a ebony longsword, some arrows, and amulet of dominator, a cheap item, but not too bad and thats it...

trav gives you aryons gloves, both rock, fast eddie amulet and ring, both good, and a good light helm, teh squid helm, a very nice itme indeed...

what does reldy give you???

it sure seems like trev is most fun to play amd gives you the best loot...just stronghold location really sucks....

so which is funnest house to join???( best loot, guys!!!)
They call me Darth...

Darth Gizka!

Muwahahahahhahahha!!!
User avatar
Demis
Posts: 1075
Joined: Sun Jul 08, 2001 11:00 am
Location: Cyprus
Contact:

Post by Demis »

I'm not sure if you totally avoid damage with a good AC but it is certain that ac absorbes damage.

From the manual
Armor absorbs damage. When someone hits you the damage they do is compared against your armor rating and some of the damage is absorbed.

Also different pieces of armor have a different persentage of your total armor rating. A cuirass takes 40% of the total armor rating and all the other parts 10%. So i guess when a cuirass(medium) has an armour rating 100, with a skill of 100 at medium armour you should get an armour rating of 40 from it.

Yes you can put them on display, notice your cursor when you try to drop a item, when the cursor has a line under it dropping an item will land on your feet but if it doesn't the item is placed where you want it. I've filled my house's shelves with enchant-later-weapons. It is easier to close the map and attributes menu when your are in the inventory mode to see where you what to place your items.
"When I am working on a problem I never think about beauty. I only think about how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong."
Buckminster Fuller
User avatar
UserUnfriendly
Posts: 4109
Joined: Mon Aug 06, 2001 10:00 pm
Location: Sluggy Zone
Contact:

Post by UserUnfriendly »

thanks!!! well i have been noticing when my ac is high i almost never need to pay for repairs to my armor, just my sword....

think its due to my very high heavy armor skills...

ever noticed bound armor is approx 1/3 of the rating for a daedric pieces???

ok, at high levels of heavy armor, you should stop using bound armor to really boost up your ac to really nasty and rideculous ac!!!!


oh yeah, that guy swimming???
hes the guy you poison for the mephala daedric quest....

so all the hoopla about going on the roof is not needed if you pushed him into the river...

just go in th front door...now i am tempted to do the quest to see if he ends up in the river poisoned, or in his house poisoned...
They call me Darth...

Darth Gizka!

Muwahahahahhahahha!!!
User avatar
cjdevito
Posts: 716
Joined: Mon May 06, 2002 9:26 pm
Contact:

Post by cjdevito »

ever noticed bound armor is approx 1/3 of the rating for a daedric pieces???

Bound armor doesn't receive any modifiers from your armor skills. It's why bound is only good for a character that isn't bothering to build those skills.... although even that's limited, since if you build unarmored to 100, you have about the same AC as you would with full bound gear anyways.
User avatar
Odonatathrope
Posts: 86
Joined: Mon May 13, 2002 10:11 pm
Contact:

Post by Odonatathrope »

More on displaying your loot:

I spend a lot of time "arranging" items in my stronghold for best effect -- guess my assassin's kind of anal.

Some tricks I've learned: 1) turning clipping off (console tcl) makes it easier to place items exactly where you want them, as you can approach a shelf from any angle; 2) some items can be placed in different orientations. for example, if you have a daedric dai-katana you want to display, putting it on a shelf might have it sticking through the wall on the other side. not very aesthetically pleasing. however, change your field of view, and you can lay it across the length of the shelf, rather than across the width. i've found that looking down towards your feet generally lays items lengthwise, while looking parallel to the ground lays them widthwise (or maybe it was vice versa). 3) placement is sensitive. play around with where you place items and you can get a battery of ebony longswords all lined up on the shelf -- makes for a cool armory.
User avatar
limorkil
Posts: 88
Joined: Mon Feb 11, 2002 11:41 am
Contact:

Post by limorkil »

The following is based on:
1. How Daggerfall worked
2. Looking in TES Editor

It might not be exactly right.

Whether an opponent hits you doesn't depend on armor, it depends on your opponents attack skill versus your:
1. Level
2. Agility
3. Sanctuary (Illusion spell, some races have a sanctuary ability like Dark Elves)

Armor affects how much damage you take. The combat systems rolls a random hit location and you take damage based on the armor protecting that location. I don't know how the hit location is determined, but I assume it is the same as the percentage allocations given in the manual: i.e. 40% chest and 10% every other location (note that double locations, such as two hands or two shoulders, count for 5% each). If you wear different 'weights' of armor you will notice that your skill in each rises relative to how much of your body is covered by that type of armor. That's why unarmored skill rises slowly when you don't carry a shield.

Your armor rating for each body location is what you see when you examine the piece of armor. I don't know exactly how this is calculated but it is some measure of the base armor rating of the piece of armor multiplied by your skill with that type of armor. This is why heavy armor can have a lower armor rating than light armor, if you are better trained with light than heavy.

The composite armor rating given below your character in the inventory screen means nothing, despite what is mentioned in the manual. It is a weighted average of the armor ratings of all the individual body locations. It gives you a rough idea of your overall level of protection, nothing more. For example: I wear medium armor all over except I don't carry a shield or wear a helmet. I have a very low unarmored skill (14). Most hits don't do that much damage, but some send me reeling. I think that is because I get hit on a vulnerable location.

There are two 'big unknowns' in all this:
A. The effect of a shield
B. The effect of the unarmored skill

The shield does not cover one particular body area. It seems as though it protects multiple areas: chest, upper legs and maybe left shoulder/arm (this was true in Daggerfall). I assume the shield protection is added to the base protection of the body area, which means you take a lot less damage on those body areas providing you are hit from the front. Hits to the back don't factor in the shield.

Unarmored is a strange skill. It appears to work like any other armor skill, except without the armor. However, it might be that unarmored effects your opponent's chance to hit you instead, which would make more sense but I don't see any evidence of this. There does appear to be some boost to unarmored protection when you wear no armor at all anywhere on your body (shield might not count, I don't know). I am not sure how this bonus works. It might be a bonus to your ability to avoid damage, like the Santuary spell, or it might just be an increase in overall armor rating. I believe it's the former because there is no noticeable effect on your composite armor rating when you remove all armor, although maybe it becomes noticeable at high levels of Unarmored. Perhaps someone with a high Unarmored skill knows the answer.
User avatar
preiter
Posts: 17
Joined: Mon May 06, 2002 3:14 pm
Contact:

Post by preiter »

Is there any way to place books vertically on a shelf?

I wanted to create a library in my stronghold, but the piles of books all over just aren't very attractive.
User avatar
UserUnfriendly
Posts: 4109
Joined: Mon Aug 06, 2001 10:00 pm
Location: Sluggy Zone
Contact:

Post by UserUnfriendly »

preiter, i wonder if click and drag group might not work...will have to give it a try....

ok, my agility and armor except med, but i only have one piece of med anyway, are all at 100....so is my unarmored skill, so essentially i dodge everything that can be dodged, and my armor points are maxed out, so i have no clue....

but i think its funny that the only way to get trainied in armor style, unless you train is to get hit....

sorta like training in acrobatics by falling down a lot...

well, thanks all... now i have soem answers...

short version....
train, and get best armor you can wear, as per char type....

mine is the heavy metal assassin....sneak with magic assistance, and kill by getting in close and chopping with battle axe or two handed sword....
They call me Darth...

Darth Gizka!

Muwahahahahhahahha!!!
User avatar
limorkil
Posts: 88
Joined: Mon Feb 11, 2002 11:41 am
Contact:

Post by limorkil »

Actually, the best way to train Acrobatics IS to fall down a lot. Falling gives you 10 times as much skill usage as jumping, maybe even more!
User avatar
Odonatathrope
Posts: 86
Joined: Mon May 13, 2002 10:11 pm
Contact:

Post by Odonatathrope »

Sisyphus reversed:

For training acrobatics, I use a little place I call Circus Rock. I think it's a little east of Balmora on the road (cross the bridge). Doesn't matter--there are probably plenty of them. Look for a tall mountain that you can climb up fairly quickly with a couple of "jump-staging-points". Mine had three (i.e., jump from top of mountain, land on rock, jump from rock, land on other rock, jump to ground, climb and repeat). Ideally, each jump should flash red and cost you some hitpoints (I have found this is the maximum threshold for skill gains). A ring of regeneration can help here, otherwise rest every few trips down the mountain. Each run'o'the'mountain netted me about 30 points in acrobatics (i.e., 3-4 runs per skill level). Also, you can maximize the gain from jumping distances by jumping from a standstill. This nets you more height. Other possible acrobatics training grounds are the siltstrider platforms (i.e., Balmora, two staging platforms).
Post Reply