Assessing Armor: Green Armor: The Alpha and the Omega (Patreon)

We have almost finished our journey across the realms of armor, with just one more post to come after this one which will provide a contents entry point and summarisation of various points, philosophy of rankings, assessment and capstone the entire thing.

However, before we get there, we need to talk about Kevin.  

Green Armor is one of the most notorious and controversial aspects of the first wave of Kingdom Death expansions. Memed as being 'impossible to build' by early players, and still doubted as being possible to legitimately construct by many new and low-mid experience players it represents one of the pinnacles of strategy in the game. If you are going to build Green Armor you are going to focus on it from the very beginning, it doesn't stop you doing other things, but it does change the goals and values of a lot of aspects of the game.

In that way, it is very cool, it gives you a focus to a campaign that most other expansions (apart from Spidicules) do not provide. It's fun and exciting, with the only way you can completely fail being killing the L3 Lion Knight without Katar Mastery "innovated", messing up your disorder grinding (or getting very unlucky at it) or running out of time on the Calcification and TOM processes.  It's a lot easier and more forgiving to build than you would think, it's also even more powerful than you'd think as well - capable of almost solo killing most of the monsters in the game right now.  

However, as mentioned it holds a lot of controversy. Fetorsaurus is very easy to make and utterly busted in duplicates, the expansion requires 1 card from the Spidicules expansion to work (pretty unfair for people on a budget), the quality of the expansion is low compared to many of the others, the models are notoriously awkward to assemble, it absolutely requires a whole bunch of other expansions to work (DBK, LK, Manhunter, Spidicules, Gorm, Flower Knight) and once you've built it, the campaign is pretty much a won deal unless your green armor survivor falls down a crack in the ground. 

There's even more I could write about the issues surrounding this expansion, most notable of all is that according to members of the internal design team, they released the expansion without ever actually building it during a testing campaign (which still floors me to learn) - but on the whole I actually really love Green Armor, for all of its hot mess issues it represents a genuine piece of cross expansion content, something that Kingdom Death currently lacks - which is why Campaigns of Death may be the single most exciting item that is coming out from the second kickstarter, it also promises that cross expansion experience and that is a beautiful thing.

So, lets look at the hot mess shall we?

Green Helm

Resource Cost: 1x Scell, 1x Beetle Horn, 1x DBK Errant Badge (1x organ, 1x bone).

Requirements: The Old Master (TOM) on the settlement's Quarry List.

Expansions Involved: Dung Beetle Knight

Number you can craft: Unlimited

Assessment

Efficiency: You're going to see this a lot in the resource cost and efficiency estimations, this gear costs other gear to make and you've built your entire campaign around making it. That said, the Green Helm is so efficient that it's essentially the 6th part of Rolling Armor. It's super cheap and the requirement is not hard to do, it's not like you need to kill TOM, you just need him standing outside your settlement waiting for sweet oblivion.

S++

Defense: In a word. Extraordinary. It's 5 armor on the head, plus a 50% chance of cancelling a hit as long as you choose to take that hit on the head. It's not automatic like the Phoenix Plackart, but it doesn't require insanity and it's got a built in counter attack.

S+++

Abilities: In addition to the defensive side of the helm we also get +1 Luck and if you are adjacent when you cancel the hit you get to 'gore' the monster with an automatic wound.  Did I mention how easy and cheap it is to make this helm? It's basically a part of any mixed set you want it to be.

S++

Affinities: Left red, down green half affinities, both solid options, but they are not going to blow the doors off anything either. Most helmets only have the one affinity though, so the Green Helm scores a bit extra because of that.

A

Score: The easiest to craft part of Green Armor and one of the strongest. As mentioned in the mixed set series, you can use the Green Helm for a lot of different builds because of it's price and low barrier to entry.

S++

Green Plate

Resource Cost: 1x Lion Knight's Left Claw*, 2x Iron, 3x Leather, 1x Scarab Shell

Requirements: Citrinitas, *Claw requires Katar Mastery Innovation when beating L3 Lion Knight

Expansions Involved: Dung Beetle Knight, Lion Knight, Gorm

Number you can craft: One per timeline

Assessment

Efficiency: This one is kind of not efficient to craft, you're forced into mastering Katars by LY16 in order to get this, and if you don't manage that you have to throw your fights vs. the L3 Lion Knight until you do get it (or run out of time). In contrast to that difficulty, it is still very damn powerful once you have crafted it. So swings and roundabouts.

A-

Defense: 5 armor to the body and 3 tactics cards is a lot of defense. I've written about the various tactics cards in the past (here) they are mostly strong and the more you draw the more powerful they become. 

S+

Abilities: In addition to the tactics cards, you're also getting a really unique ability in the chest piece. When the puzzle pieces are active you get the Club keyword for your weapon, that means it's a X/Club dual weapon type gear card. Club specialisation and mastery are super powerful, excellent for tanks. 

That's not all though! This allows you to turn anything into a club, and that opens up a huge range of other neat things by increasing the power level of other weapon classes. Of particular note are Dagger/Club, Whip/Club and Bow/Club combos - you may find more.

Affinities: Very good. We have 2 green and 2 blue half affinities, though the postioning of the blue and green up/down pairing could have been swapped to make it better for mixed sets (other affinities on other items would have needed to be changed).  It's very reminiscent of the Lantern Cuirass in that manner.

Score: Neat, unique, powerful abilities, tonnes of armor. What's not to like? Shame about the crafting cost though.

S+

Green Gloves

Resource Cost: 1x Hunter's Heart*, 1x Iron, 1x Jiggling Lard

Requirements: Scrap Smelting, Albedo, *Beating an L2 Manhunter

Expansions Involved: Gorm, Manhunter

Number you can craft: One per timeline

Assessment

Efficiency: It's certainly easier to craft than the Green Plate despite also needing a unique piece of gear that drops only from a certain level nemesis monster.  The L2 Manhunter will return if somehow you do lose to it (the L2 Manhunter is rather weak overall), so you get multiple chances as getting the Hunter's Heart. 

Also, unlike the replica claw, there's little to no reason to use the Hunter's Heart a lot of the time. Items that trigger after you've died and do not provide 100% chance of avoiding death are not that great. You shouldn't be dying in the first place. I will admit that the Hunter's Heart has created some really odd situations, duplicating survivors who have experienced the Phoenix's defeat reset for example. 

So it's not bad and the other two resources are relatively common.

S-

Defense: Defense isn't really the Green Glove's jam. It provides 5 armor points and a little protection against Parry locations. However, overall this is more of an item about the offense.

A+

Abilities: The Green Gloves have an inbuilt active Monster-Tooth Necklace in addition to a huge luck boost when trying to wound parry locations. We currently have 4 monsters with Parries (all the Knights) and we'll likely see at least two more of those in the Black Knight and Spiral Knight because Parry seems to be a mechanic linked to 'knights'.  +2 Strength is actually a massive amount, it generally moves a weapon up one "threat class".  

I'll write more about this subtle interaction in the future, but one of the things to note is this example.  L1 White Lion = 8 Toughness, L2 White Lion = 10 Toughness.  A lot of the time monsters get tougher by 2 points (especially when moving from L1 to L2, so as small as it seems, when you're dealing with plateau target numbers +2 matters).

S+

Affinities: Red right, Red down. Nothing really special and these two affinities are mostly to activate the anti-parry ability. Still gloves with multiple affinities are not the norm.

A-

Score: Green Gloves are the least exciting part of the armor set, they represent a large boost in power against certain opponents and a criminally underrated +2 strength bonus. A dependable workhorse.

S-

Green Faulds

Resource Cost: 1x Elytra, 1x Gormite, 1x Scell, 1x Lantern Bloom

Requirements: Choreia

Expansions Involved: Gorm, Flower Knight, Dung Beetle Knight

Number you can craft: Unlimited

Assessment

Efficiency: Very good. Once you have your Gorm innovations set up Gormite is a cheap (if unreliable) resource to get.  Costing 2 organs per Gormite (it's also a good source of Iron). And the other resources are not that hard to get your hands on (Scell requires the L2+ DBK, which is fine).  In fact the only really tricky part here is the Lantern Bloom, which is a perishable resource - so normally you will end up crafting this right after you kill a Flower Knight (usually an L3 for efficiency).  However, what you get from this is probably the least impressive part of the Green Armor set.

A-

Defense: 5 armor, +1 evasion and the ability to mill first strike cards away. Remember always that you have so many green affinities in Green Armor that Monster Grease is always active, so it's simple to hit +3 evasion from your gear when you are using Green Armor. 

S+

Abilities: Ignoring first strike locations by discarding them when you draw them is a strong mechanic. It does reduce the amount of wounds you will deal overall when you attack, but many of the higher level monsters have very deadly First Strikes that can cause a lot of harm or irritation for survivors. Still, it's not anything to write home about, it's solid at best because of how situational it is. Most monsters have one First Strike card, no more, no less.

A-

Affinities: Up Blue, Right Green. Fits into the Green Armor layout without much hassle, is okay for mixed sets. 

A+

Score: Like most armor sets, Green Armor's least impressive piece is it's waist. This gear is in essence an improved Rawhide vest. Greatly improved, and that's great, but it is still mostly just +1 evasion and 5 armor (aka a pile of stats). Good for the price you pay, but not dominant.

S-

Green Boots

Resource Cost: 1x Iron, 1x Flower Knight Badge, 3x Bone, 1x Calcified Greaves (1x Scarab Shell, 1x Beetle Horn, 2x Iron, +1 Preserved Caustic Dung, + 1 Scell(Optional)).

Requirements: Forbidden Dance, Black Harvest L2 + Second Black Harvest for Calcification (remember to get those Ancient Eggpoot promo items on each harvest!) 

Expansions Involved: Flower Knight, Spidicules, Dung Beetle Knight

Number you can craft: Technically Unlimited.

Assessment

Efficiency: Ugh.  Just UGH. More than any other part of the Green Knight set, this is the one that's a pain in the ass to craft. I find the Green Boots to be more awkward than even Griswaldo if I am  honest. It's that dependency on two Black Harvests that does it. You need an L2 (Nightmare Corn) Black Harvest to get the Greaves crafted and then you need a second one to calcify them. That means typically it takes between 6 and 8 years to get the boots sorted, and I find the whole part obnoxious.  They are super powerful once made, getting there though is awful.

B-

Defense: 5 armor to the legs and an amazing version of Tumble built in. Tumble's one of those Fighting arts that's really strong, but not flashy. Having a piece of gear give you access to a 2+ version of it is amazing (it's great on the Dancer full set) - there's a whole host of nasty things that become an inconvenience once you are wearing active boots.

S+

Abilities: Have I mentioned Tumble is good? It's really good.

S

Affinities: Outside of the Green Armor the affinities here are a tad awkward. Optimal green affinities are right and down, this has left and up. Womp womp.  It is still great in the place it's meant to be used though. Green Armor isn't really designed with mixed sets in mind.

A-

Score: Tumble is great!  However, one word of warning, these boots are heavy. That means you can lose them in cracks in the ground and you have to have the Hellfire Secret Fighting Art to be able to use Green Armor in PotSun.

A-

However, we're not done here, Green Armor is a 7 piece suit, it also includes/requires a shield and sword. So here they are:

Fetorsaurus

Resource Cost: 1x Beacon Shield (2x iron, 3x leather, 4x bone), 1x underplate fungus, 1x Sleeping Virus Flower, 1x Elixir of Life

Requirements: Blacksmith settlement location

Expansions Involved: Flower Knight, Dung Beetle Knight, Gorm

Number you can craft: Unlimited.

Assessment

Efficiency: Ridiculous, if you push your settlement hard you can hit the Blacksmith in LY9 with reliable regularity and because the Flower Knight introduction event gives you a Sleeping Virus Flower (which you should be saving in the settlement by not hunting with that survivor) then you just need to hit the Underplate Fungus and the Elixir. It's still a tall order that requires a lot of farming, but having Fetor online is huge for Green Armor runs.

S

Defense: This shield has one of the highest defensive kits in the entire game wrapped up inside itself. It is in essence an enhanced Beacon Shield, with two bonus affinities and one of the most unique and powerful abilities in the entire game. 

S+++

Abilities: Big Oooof for this one. So Fetor reduces all * (Monster Level) related stuff by 1. This means that L1s become 0 and have a bunch of ineffective cards/abilities. However, that's not where this ends, because you can have multiple Fetor's in a hunt party and they all stack. So you can turn the L2 White Lion's Grab into an ineffective tickle pounce, or force Gorm vomit to become a warm bath, or make the DBK's ball become a balloon.  

It's ridiculous, it should never reduce things to zero and it shouldn't be allowed to stack multiple times.

S+++

Affinities: Not the best affinities out there with a left blue and down green half affinities, but it is still two affinities that combine with the Lucky Charm and the Leather Shield (yup, turtle power). 

Score: The best shield in the game (sorry Oxidised Beacon Shield) and the best defensive item money (and flowers) can buy).

S+++

Griswaldo

Resource Cost: 1x Gormite, 1x Stomach Lining (L3 Gorm only), 1x Calcified Juggernaut Blade (L3 DBK or break DBK Sword), 1x Iron

 Requirements: Rubedo Innovation, Survivor with True Blade Secret Fighting Art

Expansions Involved: Flower Knight, Spidicules, Dung Beetle Knight

Number you can craft: Unlimited.

Assessment

Efficiency: The crafting costs on this one are no joke, unlike Fetorsaurus which has a freebie and then you just need L3 Flower Knights for the remaining ones. Getting a Calcified Juggernaut Blade requires that you either beat an L3 DBK (Hard route with guaranteed success) or break the blade of a L1, L2 DBK via a critical wound (easier, but no guarantee of success).  On top of that, you also need to have a survivor with True Blade in your settlement; and that's the single hardest part of this entire Green Armor experience because it's the only thing wholly in the hands of chance.

A

Abilities: So Griswaldo is the second strongest weapon in the game (behind the Black Sword), it's got Sharp, Deadly, Savage, it's one handed, it's a Sword, it's a Club (when used with the Green Plate) and it triggers a free Block 2 on Griswaldo on a wound, so it effectively has it's own built in Blood Paint.  There is literally no better weapon in the game right now, and only one stronger weapon (Black Sword).

S+++

Affinities: Outside of how they fit with Green Armor, the affinities on Griswaldo are not that impressive. There is some linking with Monster Grease and Leather armor in general, but it's not anything to write home about.  Still it is an up red and a right green, that's better than many weapons.

A+

Score: The weapon for Green Armor should be impressive, it is. It seriously is.  Griswaldo is the strongest non-broken weapon in the game (Black Sword is currently broken because of its interactions with Vagabond Armor) and it can turn even the weakest newbie into a devastating powerhouse of a monster. It is stronger than the Perfect Slayer, you can craft multiples as long as you can keep breaking DBK blades and it is sheer perfection itself.

S+++

Green Armor Set

Resource Cost: [Cost]

Assessment

Efficiency: We don't really care about efficiency when we're talking about Green Armor, your entire campaign has been bent around making this set. But for the record, considering how powerful a full set is, it's super efficient for the cost.

S++

Defense: Nothing else in the game comes close, as part of it's loadout it's got a staggeringly high level or armor points, tumble, block 2, hit cancelling, cancellation of First Strike hit location - it's ridiculous.

S++

Abilities: In addition to the abilities listed above in the defense section, you also 

Set Bonus: +5 armor and an exceptionally potent 'monster charge' ability - I'm fine with there being so many different versions of the Pounce/Slam/Charge/Knight's Charge/Leap ability because there are subtle variations between each one, although it must be acknowledged that 1. White Lion's version sucks and 2. We have 11 armor sets (plus 3 hybrid armor sets) and 5 of those 11 have variations of the same set bonus built in. Each one is situationally different, but it can feel homogeneous to the un-expert eye.

The Knight's Charge ability looks hard to activate, but I shall once again remind you of the existence of a Spidicules innovation, one that is specifically required to construct Green Armor in the first place:

So your Green Armor survivor should be male and have access to Harvestman already. There, you can Knight's Charge at 6+ spaces now - and it's not like you need to use anyone other than an absolute newbie in Green Armor anyway, so just get dancing.  Devastating 2 is ridiculous.

S++

Affinities: It has a perfect self contained affinity layout that gives 2 red, 2 blue and 4 green affinities (just in case you want to use a Green Charm) - this means that you can easily slot in the Lucky Charm, Monster Tooth Necklace (Yes that +2 strength is relevant on Griswaldo) or Monster Grease without any difficulty.  In fact the only problems you have with the Green Armor affinity layout is that puzzle piece requirement gear doesn't fit into the grid very well. It's not as strong as Cycloid Scale's affinities, but it's as close as it gets without Prismatic.

S+

Score: If you are going to bend your entire campaign around crafting one set of armor that requires 7 pieces of gear, the payoff should be appropriately high, in the case of Green Armor. It is.  Unfortunately there are no final monsters which are a challenge for it, yet.

Final Score: Green Tier aka "G Class" which is a league of its own.