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Armor Is Useless: Difference between revisions
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This trope probably stems from the fact that armor -- especially [[Helmets Are Hardly Heroic|helmets]] -- in movies, games, and other media often serves not to protect characters but to render them [[Faceless Goons|faceless and anonymous]]. Thus dehumanized, they make excellent [[Red Shirt]] and [[Mooks]]. The [[Unspoken Plan Guarantee]] may also be connected; the armor represents a plan to be invulnerable, which, once presented to the audience, has to fail or it'd be boringly predictable. (This helps explain why ''hidden'' [[Bulletproof Vest|Bulletproof Vests]] usually work.)
See also [[The Law of Diminishing Defensive Effort]]. The logical extreme of this trope is the [[Full
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** Fighter [[Deflector Shields]] also qualify. Pretty much everywhere except the films, an X-Wing's shields can repel TIE fighter lasers for several seconds. Not so in the movies, where the X-Wing is destroyed if it's hit squarely ''once''.
* Played straight in ''[[Three Hundred|300]]'', which mimics the [[Shirtless Scene|bare-chested]] Spartan battle outfit found in Frank Miller's graphic novel.
* ''[[The Chronicles of Riddick]]'': Necromonger troops wear heavy, bulky suits of what looks suspiciously like [
* All cops in ''[[The Fifth Element]]'' wear bulky armor that does absolutely nothing to stop bullets.
* Most of the troops in ''[[Red Cliff]]'' wear various forms of armor which provide no protection whatsoever. Master Archers who (because this is a [[John Woo]] film) can [[Improbable Aiming Skills|bullseye any target they can see]] shoot enemy troops right through their breast plates, not even bothering to aim a few inches higher to hit exposed necks. The senior generals frequently cut off limbs with a single stroke, not even slowed down by the heavy metal armor their targets are wearing.
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* One of the most notable examples in the ''[[Warhammer 40000]]'' background is the standard issue flak armour of the Imperial Guard - a bulletproof, heat and shrapnel resistant uniform with potentially extra armoured-areas by our standards... that is generally useless against most of the weaponry of the other species within ''[[Warhammer 40000]]''. The [[Power Armor]] worn by the [[Space Marine]] Mascots, on the other hand, is generally an aversion. Most weapons have a better than even chance of bouncing off harmlessly, and the even more powerful Terminator Armor is protection against anything short of Heavy Anti-tank weaponry or plasma weapons, and for dealing with such weapons, [[Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me|Storm Shields]] and [[Energy Shields|The built in energy shield]] of terminator armor still provide reasonable protection.
** Admitedly, the weaponry used by other species includes, but is not limited to, [[BFG|armor-piercing rocket-propelled grenades]], [[Absurdly Sharp Blade|mono-edged high-speed shurikens]], [[Abnormal Ammo|armored flesh-eating acidic worms]] or [[Energy Weapon|droplets of superheated plasma]]. And thats just what the line infantry uses. Especialists and other elites can, and often do, pack much deadlier weaponry. On the other hand, flak armor provides quite decent protection against lasbolts, bullets (even high-caliber ones) and most conventional melee weapons and its one of the best armors available to starting characters in the [[Dark Heresy|RPG]].
** Dark Eldar wyches play this trope to a tee, with a superhuman athleticism that means the less armour they wear, the more they've practised to avoid needing it (and wearing less armour allows you to be more agile). A wych who goes into battle [[Full
* In ''[[Exalted]]'', averted at the low levels, as good armor vastly increases your survival chance in a fight--aside from the fact that the rules specifically state that the only reason to wear a helmet is if you don't think your hairstyle is [[Rule of Cool|cool enough]]. Played straight at high levels, as there are enough [[Martial Arts and Crafts]] abilities that only need to touch you to mess you up in ways ranging from petrification to ''having your soul fall off'' that characters will mostly be depending on magically-powered defenses, rendering armor somewhat redundant.
** Armour is a lot more useful with the 2.5 revisions, which halved the cost in Artifact dots for a decent suit and reduced weapon damage across the board. It's still vulnerable to bad-touch effects, though.
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* In ''[[Black Sigil]]: Blade of the Exiled'', armor isn't entirely useless so much as Defense is. You appear to take the same damage from introductory-area enemies, even after abusing a specific shop's buy/sell mechanics to purchase hundreds of Defense Up potions and using them to max every character's Defense. It's for this very reason that it's best to equip armor based on any offense and status resistances they have, as opposed to Defense. At least ''technically'' the armor itself isn't what's useless...
* Played straight in the ''[[Rainbow Six]]'' games. Even with Level 3 armor (which includes a full-face helmet), enemies can still get off [[One-Hit Kill]] shots with almost any gun.
** It's more like helmets are useless. Heavy armor will completely shrug off shotguns loaded with buckshot at point blank range as well as submachineguns with JHPs at long range, as long as it doesn't hit your head, which doesn't happen very often since enemies almost always [[Boom! Headshot!|aim for your head]] and are often equipped with assault rifles.
** Lampshaded in the original novel, where it is noted that 7.62 rounds will still go through their armour. Of course, it takes about three missions before [[Curb Stomp Battle|anyone they go up against can even get a shot off.]]
* ''[[Operation Body Count]]''. While most attacks will hit armor first, two enemies that start appearing in the first 10 levels will also damage your health directly regardless of armor: Giant rats and [[Demonic Spiders|shock drones]]. The former has health damage reduced by the presence of armor, the latter completely bypasses it.
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== [[Web Original]] ==
* In ''[[Orions Arm|Orion's Arm]]'' early space warfare is described as being like playing hide-and-seek with bazookas.
* [[Tobuscus]] parodies this in his [[With Lyrics|Literal Trailer]] for ''[[Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood (Video Game)|Assassin's Creed Brotherhood]]''. The lyrics accompany Ezio defeating two pairs of guards with his Hidden Blades and throwing knives, respectively.
{{quote| ''Hopefully those guards have good armor / No they don't, maybe they do / They don't.''}}
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* Modern body armor, intended to stop bullets, is fairly defenseless against bladed weapons - the fiber weave is designed to stop (or at least slow) relatively blunt objects travelling at high speed, and can be cut or pierced by a sharp edge much like any other cloth. This has been a problem for some, such as prison guards, who wear [[Bulletproof Vest|Bullet Proof Vests]] as part of their standard equipment, but frequently face lower-tech threats than firearms. Stab vests, designed to protect against knives, have the opposite problem of offering no protection against bullets. Fortunately, most modern vest designs try to combine both protections in one way or another.
* During [[World War I]], armies experimented with chain mail and found that it actually made bullet wounds ''worse'' -- it couldn't stop a bullet ''and'' the rings would shatter, shoving more shrapnel into the wound than if the bullet just hit an unarmoured person. However, when hung like a curtain, it proved surprisingly effective at stopping shrapnel, leading to terrifying items like the British [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3b/Splatter_Mask_%28WWI%29.jpg splatter mask] for tank crews.
* Not the fault of the armor, but human psychology can make armor useless. People tend to react to increased safety by ''taking more risk'', in an unconscious attempt to balance risk versus reward (riskier behavior is offset by safety equipment like armor, resulting in increased reward for the same amount of risk); this is called the [
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[[Category:This Index Is Useless]]
[[Category:Armor Is Useless]]
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