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[wsippel]

How about these ladies from Radiant Historia?

Eruca sorta has some practicality I guess


Raynie, well not so much lol

The second one actually looks just as practical, if not more so, even if the first one looks better. They seems to offer basically the same level of protection (as in: pretty much no protection at all), but the second one is lighter and easier to move in.

I don't even care about sexual armor, I just hate it when female battle armor has heels. What advantage does heels provide in battle?

Better looks. That's good enough in most fantasy settings, as nothing makes much sense to begin with.

 

[jerry1594]

What the fuck at her hips

Dem hips mang

lol

 

[Lesath]

The thing with rpgs especially the jrpg variant, they must be designed to work with the crazy over the top acrobatics and flashy nonsense of the combat animation.

I'd love to see some heavy armor knights do john woo dives though.

And the idea of traversing giant vast rpg worlds in heavy armor doesn't sound like the funnest thing.

Probably why you rarely ever see a 'tank class' lead in jrpgs.

Plate armor only weighs about 40 lbs. distributed relatively evenly throughout the body. It's not heavy enough to prevent cartwheels or anything.

 

[Finaika]

I don't even care about sexual armor, I just hate it when female battle armor has heels. What advantage does heels provide in battle?

Making the ladies look taller, so more intimidating.

 

[GorillaJu]

"most impractical female armor" would make for a much more fun thread.

 

[neohwa]

She's the winner.

 

[not psycho]

Although, come to think of it, since most of these characters take seemingly deadly attacks from giant monsters and barely get damaged, maybe their physical abilities are so far beyond normal humans that it changes what type of armor is "practical".

For example, if they are much stronger than a real world human, heavier armor becomes practical.

If they are much more resistant to damage, skimpy armor becomes more practical.

Or, conversely, if the enemy is so strong that their attack would cut right through any "practical armor", it wouldn't even matter.

 

[The Awesomest]

How about these ladies from Radiant Historia?

Eruca sorta has some practicality I guess


Raynie, well not so much lol

Well Eruca is a princess in her princessing outfit

And Raynie is from the desert, and is carrying a giant halberd

So I'd say those work pretty well.

 

[Error]

the judges are some of the best designs I've seen in a FF game. they were so awesome looking.

 

[Almighty]

Yeah, most "skimpy" armor would probably offer a much better chance of survival than the heavy ass tin cans posted in this thread. Heavy armor was usually only worn by cavalry units, and the moment you got them off their horses (which was very easy), they were dead.

Based on what I have seen over the years that isn't true.

Someone in heavy armor(in this case i am talking about a knight in full plate) was no where near defenseless even on foot. A full suit if I remember right weighed around 45 pounds. Heavy yes, but not heavy enough to leave them immobile and defenseless on foot. There are many videos out there of people fighting on foot in plate. I have even seen people do cartwheels in full armor.

I think some of the confusion might come from people confusing jousting armor that was much heavier and didn't allow free movement with the armor that they would of worn in battle.

 

[JoseOle5990]

The second one actually looks just as practical, if not more so, even if the first one looks better. They seems to offer basically the same level of protection (as in: pretty much no protection at all), but the second one is lighter and easier to move in.

But when you frame it as a princess (Eruca) versus a soldier/merc (Raynie), I think Raynie's "armor" pales in comparison.


I forgot about Viola though, she's probably the best (albeit, most cumbersome looking one)

 

[chickdigger802]

Based on what I have seen over the years that isn't true.

Someone in heavy armor(in this case i am talking about a knight in full plate) was no where near defenseless even on foot. A full suit if I remember right weighed around 45 pounds. Heavy yes, but not heavy enough to leave them immobile and defenseless on foot. There are many videos out there of people fighting on foot in plate. I have even seen people do cartwheels in full armor.

have you seen them do dmc style air juggles

 

[Dresden]

 

[Wallach]

Chris from Suikoden 3 was the first thing that came to mind.

Junon from Dragon Force wasn't really the definition of practical, but it was still awesome without being stupid video game female armor.

 

[The Awesomest]

But when you frame it as a princess (Eruca) versus a soldier/merc (Raynie), I think Raynie's "armor" pales in comparison.


I forgot about Viola though, she's probably the best (albeit, most cumbersome looking one)

Raynie seems to be pretty well layered, with leather and those metal wrist guards even. Her shoulders and legs I think can be forgiven considering she's from the desert and needs to swing that big halberd around. The only problem is her chest area, but who knows what that stuff is made of. Maybe it's chain mail!

 

[RyanDG]

Based on what I have seen over the years that isn't true.

Someone in heavy armor(in this case i am talking about a knight in full plate) was no where near defenseless even on foot. A full suit if I remember right weighed around 45 pounds. Heavy yes, but not heavy enough to leave them immobile and defenseless on foot. There are many videos out there of people fighting on foot in plate. I have even seen people do cartwheels in full armor.

I think some of the confusion might come from people confusing jousting armor that was much heavier and didn't allow free movement with the armor that they would of worn in battle.

The other thing to consider is that most of the time, the restrictions that heavier armor had was not in the weight or the mobility of the armor itself, but in the helmets used with the armor. The helmet by itself and the restrictions it caused to both sight and sound were often times the downfall of the armor wearer in tactical confrontations with "lighter" armored foes.

 

[FyreWulff]

Actually practical too since her sword arm doesn't have heavy armor to keep it from being weighed down, and her off hand is armored for blocks.

 

[chickdigger802]

And a silly thought before i crash for the night.

In fantasy worlds where you have to account for ogres and magic and dragons and what not, would the definition of 'practical' be different from stuff in our world?

Should we account for say this armor set is designed for high magic defense to have many wrinkles or indents for magical runes or seals and what not?

Should we account that bladed weapons in rpg rarely have any laceration or dismemberment properties, so in which having exposed skin could not be as big of a deal?

Heck, for most rpgs you don't even have much freedom over where you swing your damn weapon. Can't think of any that has separate defense stats for different parts of a person's body either.

So in conclusion. all armors with good stats are practical in an rpg! Unless it's trash loot ;P

 

[Almighty]

The other thing to consider is that most of the time, the restrictions that heavier armor had was not in the weight or the mobility of the armor itself, but in the helmets used with the armor. The helmet by itself and the restrictions it caused to both sight and sound were often times the downfall of the armor wearer in tactical confrontations with "lighter" armored foes.

There were definitely pros and cons when fighting in full plate and someone even in full plate isn't invincible. That I will agree with. I was mostly just disagreeing with the idea that on foot they were as good as dead.

 

[Evolved1]

"most impractical female armor" would make for a much more fun thread.

That's what this thread is... people apparently don't know what "practical" means. Cause most of these posts are the opposite.

 

[CorvoSol]

Am I the only person in GAF that always thought the Judge Armors in FFXII looks terribly ridiculous?

I'll give you MOST of them, but Gabraanth looks like a boss. Put him in the following lineup and you have the four true badass villains of Final Fantasy:

Would YOU mess with any of these guys? They all come to battle much better dressed than their female counterparts (Though, to be fair, Golbez can come to battle with a towel and cape, making him the second least clothed character in the game.).

Came to post Meliadoul, from FFT

...but unfortunately, I can't find any official full-body art, so here's a neat fan rendition:




Took me a while to realize the light blue stick on the bottom of the pic was a leg, lol

Me either. I don't know if Yoshida ever did one. I think we can all say that Yoshida does great armor, though.

 

[CloakedPuppet]

It's a telltale sign of the annual summer new-game drought when a thread like this gets to four pages.

 

[Kokonoe]

FFXI

Paladin Empyrean

Samurai Empyrean

Dark Knight Empyrean

 

[tiff]

"please don't stab or shoot or slice my legs, it's not straight up dawg time"

At least with characters like Lyn there's something of an excuse, considering she's got to be as agile as possible, but a lot of Fire Emblem's design choices were clearly made because they were sexy.

she's a peasant girl, frankly the fact that she's wearing any sort of plate armor at all is far more ridiculous than any amount of skin she's showing.

Indeed, it's a shame that her best role is as a meat shield. :\

uh no, meat shield is probably her worst role aside from the bench. she's worth far more to your team reaching strategic objectives quickly, clearing out large groups of enemies, and ferrying Ike around. she has incredible base stats relative to earlygame enemies, a fantastic growth spread, great weapon ranks and one of the best classes in the game. it'd be a waste not to make use of all those advantages.

Her only problem is that she's literally TOO BADASS.

If you're not careful, she'll solo the entire enemy army early on and your other dudes won't get any XP.

this is only a problem if you're bad at the game, it's not hard to use Titania to her fullest potential and still maintain a decent team around her. there's plenty of experience to go around and enemies are a joke even on hard.

But the heavier and bulkier the armor, the more impractical it is.


EDIT: This thread is kind of funny. People too preoccupied with covering skin rather actual functionality.

actually in the real world even full plate armor was relatively easy to move around in (it weighed less and had better weight distribution than modern infantry equipment), though video games often go over the deep end with 100 lb pauldrons and other useless shit. of course, that's not the kind of impracticality that this thread is focused on, obviously.

 

[Sneaky Gato]

This seems fairly practical. Unlike most Chest plates this is not exaggerated and seems more like what you would find in a Roman or Greek cuiras. She is wearing maile over her upper body giving her flexibility while wearing plate over most her vulnerable and important areas (joints). Thus giving her more endurance in a fight and meaning she can easily march or ride a horse without needing attendants. I can even forgive the skirt and boots given that Roman Legionaries wore something similar. The only thing I would change is giving her some covering between her boots and thighs. It doesn't have to be armor but some pants would be good. Even then that might not be necessarily considering Legionaries also fought with bare legs.

Overall a fairly practical design I would think.

 

[patapuf]

There were definitely pros and cons when fighting in full plate and someone even in full plate isn't invincible. That I will agree with. I was mostly just disagreeing with the idea that on foot they were as good as dead.

there were different roles in battle for different degrees of protection however full plate was more useful mounted as it allowed for more mobility.

A full plated armor has difficulty keeping up with quick moving formations and is easily flanked. Which is why heavy inf was mostly used as a centerpiece and was protected by other units on the flank.

the most successful infantry in mediaval times were rarely fully armored, the same is true for plate armor, the swiss mercenaries for example were not fully armored.

Plate armor was also invented vey late (around 1550) and new weapons made wearing a full armor suit moot anyway.

 

[The Awesomest]

http://media.giantbomb.com/uploads/13/132322/2197174-ca_merced_1.jpg[img]

This seems fairly practical. Unlike most Chest plates this is not exaggerated and seems more like what you would find in a Roman or Greek cuiras. She is wearing maile over her upper body giving her flexibility while wearing plate over most her vulnerable and important areas (joints). Thus giving her more endurance in a fight and meaning she can easily march or ride a horse without needing attendants. I can even forgive the skirt and boots given that Roman Legionaries wore something similar. The only thing I would change is giving her some covering between her boots and thighs. It doesn't have to be armor but some pants would be good. Even then that might not be necessarily considering Legionaries also fought with bare legs.

Overall a fairly practical design I would think.[/QUOTE]

What game is this?

 

[Heretic Kazuma]

What game is this?

Dragon's Dogma.

 

[Femmeworth]

uh no, meat shield is probably her worst role aside from the bench. she's worth far more to your team reaching strategic objectives quickly, clearing out large groups of enemies, and ferrying Ike around. she has incredible base stats relative to earlygame enemies, a fantastic growth spread, great weapon ranks and one of the best classes in the game. it'd be a waste not to make use of all those advantages.

If you see my other post, I didn't know she was that useful. I always assumed that she was like Marcus in FE7.

 

[Vulcano's assistant]

Overall a fairly practical design I would think.

Looks like a noble version of Caska (from Bersek manga)

 

[Almighty]

there were different roles in battle for different degrees of protection however full plate was more useful mounted as it allowed for more mobility.

A full plated armor has difficulty keeping up with quick moving formations and is easily flanked. Which is why heavy inf was mostly used as a centerpiece and was protected by other units on the flank.

the most successful infantry in mediaval times were rarely fully armored, the same is true for plate armor, the swiss mercenaries for example were not fully armored.

Plate armor was also invented vey late (around 1550) and new weapons made wearing a full armor suit moot anyway.

Fair enough.

Though I wasn't arguing that full plate was the go to armor for infantry or anything like that. Just that even on foot knights in full plate would of still been able to put up a fight.

 

[wsippel]

actually in the real world even full plate armor was relatively easy to move around in (it weighed less and had better weight distribution than modern infantry equipment), though video games often go over the deep end with 100 lb pauldrons and other useless shit. of course, that's not the kind of impracticality that this thread is focused on, obviously.

This is real, 16th century combat plate armor:

No, that thing wasn't easy to move in. It also got real hot real fast inside such a tin can, and you couldn't see shit.

While plate armor offered good protection against many conventional weapons, they offered little protection against longbows (huge problem, obviously), and there was special anti armor weaponry like type XV-XVIII swords, Mordäxte, Lucerne hammers or war hammers. A common and highly efficient technique against enemies wearing plate armor was to wrestle them down and simply stab them with a dagger (in the eye slit or some other unarmored part).

 

[Finaika]

And they still had to include some zettai ryouiki.

 

[bunbun777]

I love magical armor because then it can look sexy, defend the body, and augment any powers.

Impractically, just got a pair of 'battle panties' in persona3 and Elizabeth told me she did not try them on before giving them to me. But they do augment magic +20 so guess it is practical.

 

[Tomat]

And they still had to include some zettai ryouiki.

I don't see the problem here.

I love magical armor because then it can look sexy, defend the body, and augment any powers.

Impractically, just got a pair of 'battle panties' in persona3 and Elizabeth told me she did not try them on before giving them to me. But they do augment magic +20 so guess it is practical.

Ditto, I'm not going to say I don't like impractical armor either.

 

[remnant]

"please don't stab or shoot or slice my legs, it's not straight up dawg time"

At least with characters like Lyn there's something of an excuse, considering she's got to be as agile as possible, but a lot of Fire Emblem's design choices were clearly made because they were sexy.

And this is a problem becuase....?

 

[Laughing Banana]

Regarding the Judges Armor in FFXII... how do hell do they even see from such an enclosed helmet and how can they even breathe in that stuff? Not to mention they looked incredibly bulky I am amazed the judges can even walk a step with that stuff.

But I suppose they're coming from a game where the lead female character wore a terribly short skirt--if that can even be called a skirt, it's more like two extremely short pieces of leather tied together with a belt--while going around bashing monsters and stuff.

 

[patapuf]

Fair enough.

Though I wasn't arguing that full plate was the go to armor for infantry or anything like that. Just that even on foot knights in full plate would of still been able to put up a fight.

and you were right. It's just that in this thread only full body armor seemed to be accepted as "pratctical" when it's really not the practical armor for a typical RPG adventurer and armor suits like nephenee's are the commonly used armor for a spear weilding soldier, wheter it shows some skin or not.

not that there aren't ridiculous armors in RPG's

 

[VanillaCakeIsBurning]

Regarding the Judges Armor in FFXII... how do hell do they even see from such an enclosed helmet and how can they even breathe in that stuff? Not to mention they looked incredibly bulky I am amazed the judges can even walk a step with that stuff.

But I suppose they're coming from a game where the lead female character wore a terribly short skirt--if that can even be called a skirt, it's more like two extremely short pieces of leather tied together with a belt--while going around bashing monsters and stuff.

This reminds me of the helmets in FF games where there is literally no holes or anything to see out of.

 

[lastplayed]

Witcher 2's realistic females

Heavy Armor:

Light Armor:

But the two most vital organs are exposed. She wouldn't last long in a fight.

 

[Esura]

So what this thread proves is: almost no practical female armor.

And I'm 100% ok with this.

 

[Almighty]

and you were right. It's just that in this thread only full body armor seemed to be accepted as "pratctical" when it's really not the practical armor for a typical RPG adventurer and armor suits like nephenee's are the commonly used armor for a spear weilding soldier, wheter it shows some skin or not.

not that there aren't ridiculous armors in RPG's

Well I agree with that.

Armor can be practical without having to cover everything from head to toe in a layer of metal. Even some of the full suits posted in this tread I think go over board enough that they would be just as impractical as the ones that barely cover up anything at all. Though I am personally fine with that well fine with the ones that are over armored at least. I still hate armor that is pretty much nothing more then a chain mail bikini. A lot of games would lose there visual flare if they tried to have only realistic practical looking armor.

 

[patapuf]

Well I agree with that.

Armor can be practical without having to cover everything from head to toe in a layer of metal. Even some of the full suits posted in this tread I think go over board enough that they would be just as impractical as the ones that barely cover up anything at all. Though I am personally fine with that well fine with the ones that are over armored at least. I still hate armor that is pretty much nothing more then a chain mail bikini. A lot of games would lose there visual flare if they tried to have only realistic practical looking armor.

exactly. a lot of the full armor suits posted here are not good armors, but they look good

apart from the dekoltees the witcher 2 and demon's souls have some of the most "realistic" armors for their characters, though i wouldn't want to fight dragons in full plate mail.

 

[MrT-Tar]

 

[cw_sasuke]

Wow, im suprised no one posted that Vaan FF XII Artwork....not bad Gaf, not bad.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

The only practical armor for fictional characters in fictional worlds is armor that players can fap to. That's a practical use for the fictional armor in the player's real world!

 

[GorillaJu]

So many RPGs feature a female character who wants the main character's dick than she wants oxygen. Armor just gets in the way of her aspirations.

If they're only there for the player to jerk off over, then I'd say the proverbial plate mail thong is very practical. It serves the purpose of the female characters existence. It's a sad state but it's part of the fantasy.

Edit: beaten while typing -___-

 

[More Fun To Compute]

While plate armor offered good protection against many conventional weapons, they offered little protection against longbows (huge problem, obviously), and there was special anti armor weaponry like type XV-XVIII swords, Mordäxte, Lucerne hammers or war hammers. A common and highly efficient technique against enemies wearing plate armor was to wrestle them down and simply stab them with a dagger (in the eye slit or some other unarmored part).

A myth. Longbows had to be very close to have enough strength to deal with plate armour. At the height of plate mail technology the longbow was pretty much totally ineffective. Even into the Napoleonic era the cuirass was still used by heavy cavalry because musket balls would just bounce off it at range.

 

[Dinosaur Tamer]

"most impractical female armor" would make for a much more fun thread.

Looking through this thread, that would also be a more fitting title for this one. The vast majority of JRPG characters posted here seem like joke posts.

 

[More Fun To Compute]

Looking through this thread, that would also be a more fitting title for this one. The vast majority of JRPG characters posted here seem like joke posts.

But then you get the posts complaining about how armour without lots of frou frou bullshit, metal corsets, tits hanging out and exposed thighs is "boring." In games I personally find armour that looks warlike and dangerous more interesting and unusual.