Enemy armor 2.0

[lukinu_u]

As you may have heard in last devstreams, there are some plan to tweak armor into some sort of a S curve so avoid the absurd EHP (efficient health) scaling we have right know, but I'm not sure it's the right idea.
Before going deeper in the subject, let's mention what the main issues are right know :

• Armor is just a damage reduction percentage : Right know, armor is a damage reduction that apply to health. It means more armor mean more health, but it also mean even more health could do the job of armor. There are a few way to reduce armor, which still make it a bit different from health, but overall it do what health already do.
   
• Both armor and health scale with level and multiply together : As armor is a damage reduction to health, it means they stack kind of multiplicatively, and since they both scale with enemy level, it means EHP scale exponentially (not exactly but that's the idea) which result is the isane tankiness armored enemies get as their level grow.
   
• It's too strong but can be removed by a few things in the game : As mentionnel earlier, there are a few ways of reducing armor and this is what make it different from health. So it mean we can avoid the insane scaling, only if bringing one of the few sources of armor reduction, which restrict at lot the loadout poissibility. Past level 80, some enemies will already have more than 90% damage reduction, so removing armor will multiply your damage by 10x, it become mandatory.

So, to fix these three issues, my idea is to change enemies into various armor type that interact differently with each damage type, but also scale in a way it hit the maximum armor potential at level 100 and no longer scale, while health still does.
Each armor type will affect different damages types in 3 differents ways (note that level always cap at 100 in these calculation) :

• Resistant : damage reduction is "level / 2 + 50" - So, reduction start at 50% and increase by 0.5% every level up to 100% reduction at level 100.
• Robust : damage is reduction is "level / 2" - So, reduction start at 0% and increase by 0.5% every level up to 50% reduction at level 100.
• Weak : damage reduction is "level / 3 - 40 / 3" - So reduction start at 0%, don't move until level 40% and increase by ~0.33% per level up to 20% reduction at level 100.

Here are a few example of armor that could exist in the game with this new system :

• Elemental Armor : This armor type is resistant to combined elemental damage , robust to non-combined elemental damage and weak to physical damage.
  Overall you're better using physical damage but non-combined elemental damage still work a little bit.
   
• Physical Armor : This armor type is resistant to physical damages, and weak to elemenetal.
  The way to go is any element, regular or combined both work.
   
• Adaptative Armor : This armor type is resistant to your most used damage type, robust to your second most used and weak to everything else.
  This armor type adapt to the damages type presents in your hit and the "most used / second most used" refer to the damage type repartition in your shot. For example, your bullet deal 50 impact, 20 slash and 30 puncture damages, the most and second most used damages type will respectively be impact and puncture.
   
• Elemental Weakness : This armor type is weak to a specific combined elemental damage, robust to elemental damages it's made of and resistant to everything else.
  This armor type has one variation per combined elements (6). For example, if it's weak to corrosive, it will be robust toxin and electricity. 
   

The systeme would slowly introduce the player to the armor mechanic without too much issues if using the wrong damage type, but slowly make armor more meaningful as enemies level grow, up to level 100 at a point resistance totally negate the "wrong" damage and force you to adapt, rather than sticking with one setup that work and spam damage regardless of enemies your facing.
Overall, it prevent the use of corrosive and high damage buff to shred armor and brute force any enemy resistance or slash to bypass armor, like we are currently able to do.

Edited January 26, 2020 by lukinu_u
Corrected a few spelling mistakes.