Armour

Version 0.13: This article may not be up to date for the latest stable release of Crawl.

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Nought can Deform the Human race Like to the Armours iron brace" -William Blake, "Auguries of Innocence", 99-100. 1803.

Armour encompasses all clothing worn to protect against physical melee and ranged attacks (though some provide benefits against certain magic attacks as well). Armour does this by providing increased AC, GDR, SH (shields), resistances (certain body armours), and whatever benefits their egos provide. However, this comes at a cost to your EV and Spellcasting ability when using the heavier armours. Increasing your Armour skill improves the benefits and lowers the penalties of most armour, though shields are governed by the Shields skill.

Some species have restrictions on the kinds of armour they can wear.

Armour Locations

There are six armour locations in Crawl, also known as armour slots when referring to whether a player is wearing (or can wear) a given type of armour.

• Body armour is worn on a character's torso, and provides both AC and GDR. Its AC bonus is penalized by the Deformed mutation. Heavier ones provide larger EV penalties.
• Gloves are worn on the hands, and are unusable with rank 3 of the Claws mutation. Certain Transmutations, such as Blade Hands, will disable them.
• Boots are worn on the feet, and are unusable with rank 3 of either the Talons or Hooves mutations.
  • In place of boots, centaur and naga characters may wear bardings on the rear portions of their bodies, providing more AC and higher enchantment than regular boots at the cost of a bit of EV. Centaurs cannot wear naga barding, and nagas cannot wear centaur barding.
• Headgear is worn on the head. The Beak, Antennae, and Horns mutations all restrict the player's headgear options.
• Cloaks are worn around the shoulders.
• Shields are worn on a character's arm. They provide SH, but impede spellcasting, EV, and the use of certain weapons.

Encumbrance rating

Most body armour has an encumbrance rating proportional to its AC and GDR. Robes, animal skins, and leather armour, being lightweight, have no or a very small EV penalty; at the other end of the spectrum you can find plate armour and crystal plate armour, which are cumbersome but incredibly protective. All shields and bardings also have an EV penalty.

A higher encumbrance rating:

• Lowers your evasion chance
• Makes you less stealthy
• Reduces your accuracy
• Reduces your spellcasting success rate
• Slows unarmed combat attacks

Increasing your Armour skill decreases the effect of the encumbrance rating (though never completely: -2.2% per level, so at level 27 the reduction is -60%) and boosts the total AC granted by those pieces. High strength will also help. See the encumbrance rating page for more details..

AC Calculations

If you're interested in the formulas the game uses to determine the actual AC contributions from a piece of armour, see the AC calculations page. Otherwise, here's the short version:

• A piece of armour's base AC is always the minimum you'll receive (assuming it's not negatively enchanted).
• Improving your Armour skill increases the base AC an armour provides by about 4% per level.
• Enchanting armour directly adds to your total AC. This AC bonus is not affected by the Armour skill.
• The maximum enchantment possible on a piece of armour is its base AC (for body armour and barding); 3 for all types of shields; and 2 for everything else.
• Wearing your species' racial armour may increase your AC even further.

Guaranteed damage reduction

Any piece of armour with a base AC greater than 2 provides you with guaranteed damage reduction. This is a percentage of damage received from all physical melee attacks that you are guaranteed to ignore. The higher the armour's base AC, the higher the percentage ignored (though it is limited by your total AC). See the article on GDR for more details.

Wear and remove times

It takes AC+1 turns to put on or remove any kind of body armour. (This uses the item's base AC; enchantments are ignored.) A robe, having a base AC of 2, takes 3 turns to put on or remove; crystal plate armour, at AC 14, takes 15 turns.

If you are wearing a cloak, it will take an extra 2 turns to remove it before you can change armours and 2 more turns to put it back on. If you're already wearing body armour, add the amount of time it takes to remove the first armour before you can put on the second. Exchanging one crystal plate armour for another while wearing a cloak will take a total of 34 turns.

Bucklers/shields/large shields take 3/6/8 turns to wear or remove. All other armour types -- boots, headgear, gloves, and cloaks -- take 2 turns to wear or remove.

Racial Armour

Some pieces of armour come in flavours such as dwarven, elven and orcish. These racial armours confer additional bonuses, to wearers of the correct race.

Dwarven Armour

Dwarven items ignore corrosion effects 80% of the time. Dwarven body armour has an increased spellcasting penalty (except for dwarves), but improves your effective Armour skill (moreso for dwarves).

Elven Armour

Elven armour impedes spellcasting less than other armour (moreso for elves). Elves receive a small bonus to Armour skill from elven armour. Elven cloaks and boots boost stealth. Elven shields, gloves, robes and helmets weigh less.

Orcish Armour

Orcish armour impedes spellcasting less than normal and improves your effective Armour skill, but only for hill orcs. Followers of Beogh get even greater Armour bonuses.

Tables of Armours

Body Armour

Armour	Base AC	Base EVP	GDR	Wearable	Mass
Robe	2	0	0%	All	6.0 aum
Leather armour	3	-4	14%	Small and medium	15.0 aum
Ring mail	5	-7	24%	Small and medium	25.0 aum
Scale mail	6	-11	28%	Small and medium	35.0 aum
Chain mail	8	-15	34%	Small and medium	40.0 aum
Plate armour	10	-19	39%	Small and medium	65.0 aum
Crystal plate armour	14	-24	48%	Small and medium	120.0 aum
Animal skin	2	0	0%	All	10.0 aum
Troll hide	2	-4	0%	All	22.0 aum
Troll leather armour	4	-4	19%	All	22.0 aum
Steam dragon hide	2	0	0%	All	12.0 aum
Steam dragon armour	5	0	24%	All	12.0 aum
Mottled dragon hide	3	-4	14%	All	15.0 aum
Mottled dragon armour	6	-4	28%	All	15.0 aum
Swamp dragon hide	3	-7	14%	All	20.0 aum
Swamp dragon armour	7	-7	31%	All	20.0 aum
Fire dragon hide	3	-11	14%	All	35.0 aum
Fire dragon armour	8	-11	34%	All	35.0 aum
Ice dragon hide	4	-11	19%	All	35.0 aum
Ice dragon armour	9	-11	37%	All	35.0 aum
Pearl dragon hide	3	-11	14%	All	40.0 aum
Pearl dragon armour	10	-11	39%	All	40.0 aum
Storm dragon hide	4	-11	19%	All	60.0 aum
Storm dragon armour	10	-17	39%	All	60.0 aum
Gold dragon hide	4	-17	19%	All	110.0 aum
Gold dragon armour	12	-27	44%	All	110.0 aum

Shields

Shield	SH	EVP	Wearable	Mass
Buckler	5	-1	Tiny to medium	9.0 aum
Shield	8	-3	Small to giant	15.0 aum
Large shield	13	-5	Medium to giant	23.0 aum

Headgear

Headgear	AC	EVP	Wearable	Mass
Helmet	1	0	Small and medium	8.0 aum
Cap	0	0	All	4.0 aum
Wizard hat	0	0	All	4.0 aum

Miscellanous

Armour	AC	EVP	Wearable	Mass
Boots	1	0	Small and medium	3.0 aum
Cloak	1	0	All	4.0 aum
Gloves/Gauntlets	1	0	Small and medium	2.0 aum
Centaur barding	4	-6	Centaur	10.0 aum
Naga barding	4	-6	Naga	10.0 aum

Armour Ego

Enchanted armour may have an ego, which gives it additional properties.

Restrictions and Mutations

• Beaks, horns, and antennae are incompatible with helmets. Caps and wizard hats are allowed.
  • Horns 3 and Antennae 3 disallow all headgear, however.
• Hooves and talons are incompatible with boots.
• Claws and Blade Hands are incompatible with gloves.
  • Blade Hands is in addition incompatible with all types of shields and weapons.
• Porcupine Form and Wisp Form are incompatible with every armour or jewellery.
• Bat Form and Pig Form are incompatible with every armour (you can only wear amulets).
• Spider Form, and Dragon Form are incompatible with every armour (you can only wear jewellery).
• Ice Form is incompatible with every armour, except cloaks.
• Ice Form is incompatible with every armour, except helmets.
• Tree Form is incompatible with every armour, except helmets and shields.
• Statue Form is incompatible with every armour, except helmets, shields and cloaks.

History

In 0.13, the evasion penalty system was changed, and the base evasion penalty was renamed as the encumbrance rating and rescaled for all armours [1]. Splint mails were removed and chain mails were increased to 8AC.

Prior to 0.11, you could only train Armour while wearing equipment with an EV penalty of at least -1.

Prior to 0.6, body armour was divided into Light Armour and Heavy Armour. The former would allow you to train dodging, while the latter trained Armour.