Lear's hauberk

Version 0.30: This article may not be up to date for the latest stable release of Crawl.

A well-made golden hauberk that covers all of its wearer's body parts. It includes a chainmail coif, chausses and maille gauntlets.

the +18 Lear's hauberk

+18 chain mail

Fills your body, head, gloves, and feet armour slots

Desirability

Lear's hauberk is an unusual piece of equipment, a heavily enchanted chain mail that fills 4 equipment slots. To wear it, you must be able to wear chain mail, hats, boots, and gloves. Therefore, many species (Trolls, Ogres, Spriggans, Armataurs, Djinn, Draconians, Formicids, Nagas, Tengu) are unable to wear it, Merfolk will meld it when in/above water. and certain level 3 mutations will block it.

In practice, Lear's hauberk is less spectacular than it seems. If you already have a +2 helmet, gloves, and boots, Lear's hauberk is equivalent to a +9 chain mail. However, a +9 chain mail is still a good choice for melee brutes, and the hauberk has a few other advantages:

• You'll often find it before getting any sort of headgear/gloves/boots. Getting a +18 chain mail is a massive boost to defense, especially in the early-game.
• Lear's hauberk saves scrolls of enchant armour, which can be used on a shield or other pieces of equipment. A +9 plate armour might give more AC, but having a +9 chain mail and +8 tower shield is much better for defense.

The main downside is that the hauberk takes up 3 extra equipment slots; wearing it means losing any egos or artefact properties from the head, hand, and foot slots. As you find good equipment, you may value resistances or other intrinsics over a plain, +9 chain mail. So, depending on what you find, you may want to switch to a different body armour (sooner or later).

This artefact is more likely to spawn in the early game, where it is more likely to be useful.

History

• Prior to 0.28, Lear's hauberk was +27, and its generation was not favored for the early-game.
• Lear's hauberk was added in 0.13, replacing Lear's chain mail.