Now that some great work has been done on
How Armor Works and
Mob Damage Studies - Circa 2008 we can now better figure which armors offer the best protection for the price (decay). (NOTE: Any input you have on specific mob dmg can always improve our results and should be placed
here.)
I went through the entire table of mobs and using this fantastic
Entropedia tool plus other data pages, I've come up with recommendations for the most economical armor to use while hunting. Eco meaning good protection while paying the least decay. I've found some very interesting things.
For example, Shogun+2A, Rascal, & Gremlin all protect 15 impact, but which one decays less? You might be surprised.
Note, these are simply recommendations based on a decent combination of protection & decay. Your equipment/skills, team hunting, etc. may allow for less armor, or require more. These are just starting points to consider in choosing your armor/plate combinations.
Assumptions I used:
- No nekkid hunting
- No team hunting
- korss+A104 type dmg
- avg. evade/fap
- No (L) armor or (L) plates
- No exotic/rare/expensive armors, nothing over ghost
Lists created using "standard" armor+plates (fairly easy to get these)
- Armor Plates 2a
- Armor Plates 3b
- Armor Plates 5a
- Armor Plates 5b
- Armor Plates 6a
- Armor Plates 6b
- Ghost
- Gnome
- Goblin
- Gremlin
- Knight
- Kobold
- Pixie
- Rascal
- Shogun
- Vigilante
Expected avg. damage amount on fully repaired armor/plates
- 1 dmg = too much protection
- below 25 = optimal
- above 30 = danger
- above 50 = run
"Run" simply means in ghost+5B (or similar) it still does over 40-50 max. dmg. You may still be able to hunt them, skills & equipment depending. (For completeness, I list high-end armor on these when I can, aiming for close to 50 avg dmg. However at this level certain other factors come into play for armor selection.)
In some cases other armors/plates produced better results. For example Rascal+5D is more eco then Kobold for Feffs, however 5Ds are not in high circulation and may be difficult for the avg. person to get.
Perfect example is Ghost vs. Nemesis. Most times nemesis offers much better C/S/I economy, but the price/rarity keeps it out of most folk's hands, and Ghost is currently quite easily available. So if you have Nemesis and see "Ghost" just adjust as needed.
I'm not going to list "dead" or non-fighting mobs like Eomon and Gibnib.
And yes some mobs (I.E. Exo) you can hunt nekkid without much problem. However, this is just an exercise for me.